Cynthia Achenbach

Cynthia Achenbach

Man Killed Wife In Driveway

Kids In House At Time; Suspect Surrenders After 2-Hour Standoff

POSTED: 2:32 pm EDT April 23, 2008

ANDERSON, Ind. -- A man fatally shot his wife in his driveway while their children were nearby Wednesday, then engaged in a two-hour standoff with police at his Anderson home before surrendering, authorities said.

Investigators believe Michael Achenbach shot Cynthia Achenbach, 24, at about 12:30 p.m. outside his house in the 2000 block of Charles Street on Anderson's southeast side, authorities said.Someone called police, and officers found the woman's body in the driveway. She was taken to a hospital, where she was pronounced dead, police said.

Michael Achenbach's mother and brother and the couple's two children -- one of whom is 1 year old -- were at the home when the shooting happened, police said. His relatives took the children from the house after the shooting, police said.Officers surrounded the house, in which Michael Achenbach, 34, stayed alone for two hours, armed with a shotgun, authorities said.

Police were able to talk to Michael Achenbach by phone, and at about 2:55 p.m., he exited the house and lay down on the front lawn. Video from 6News' helicopter shows officers marching to the lawn and handcuffing him before leading him to a police car."He was on the line with our hostage negotiator right up until the point where he handcuffed him and put him under arrest," Anderson police Detective Joel Sandefur told 6News' Jennifer Carmack.

Michael Achenbach

Information on the other child's age wasn't immediately available.The shooting came more than two months after Michael Achenbach was arrested on suspicion of cutting his wife at Mounds Mall during an argument over a cell phone.

She had received a protective order against him last month and was not living at the Charles Street house when she was shot, police said.Michael Achenbach was charged with criminal confinement and battery in connection with the Feb. 8 incident and was awaiting a resolution to that case.

Achenbach was being held Wednesday evening in the Madison County jail on a murder charge, authorities said.

Fredericka J. Smith

Man Receives 55 years in Shooting Death of Ex-wife

March 12, 2009

ANDERSON — A 77-year-old Anderson man who pleaded guilty last month to killing his ex-wife has received what amounts to a life sentence, 55 years in prison.

Donald P. Johnson was sentenced in Madison Circuit Court Thursday morning before Judge Fredrick Spencer. On Feb. 18, Johnson pleaded guilty to murder in the shooting death of Fredericka J. Smith on May 21, 2008.  The charge carries 45 to 65 years in prison.

Madison County Deputy Prosecutor Pat Ragains argued aggravating circumstances, including Smith’s age (67) and the presence of two young children in the house at the time of the crime, and asked for the maximum. Defense attorney Angela Warner Sims, meanwhile, said Johnson’s lack of criminal history, his age and his guilty plea should be considered mitigating circumstances and asked for the minimum.

“Everyone knows the reality is that it doesn’t matter what the court decides,” Sims said. “Given Mr. Johnson’s age and health, any sentence is a life sentence.”

Sims said her client has not expressed a desire to appeal the sentence.

Johnson entered the courtroom at 10 a.m. in a green-and-white jumpsuit, the same type he wore for his plea hearing, although he looked less disheveled, his white hair and beard neatly trimmed. He clutched a brown paper bag containing personal effects and was seated in the jury box until the hearing began at 10:15 a.m.

After she and Johnson divorced, Smith had a long-term domestic relationship with James Walton, who asked to address the court.

“We were together two weeks past 21 years,” Walton said. “During those 21 years, not a day went by that she didn’t help someone.”

He said Smith offered Johnson a place to live, the house at 808 Nichol Ave. where the shooting took place, when he was near homelessness.

“When he committed this crime, when he shot and killed her, he did it for no reason,” Walton said. “I can’t understand why he did it. He was in no danger from her. She was the kindest, most considerate person I ever met. I ask that the court show him no lenience.”

Johnson, who is hard of hearing and admitted he could not understand Walton, offered an apology in which talked of an incident involving a bed more than 20 years ago and compared his situation to that of Gerald O’Hara in “Gone With The Wind.” People close to Smith referred to her by her middle name, Johanna, or just Hanna.

“As far as Hanna’s concerned, I’m real sorry,” Johnson said. “It’s like ‘Gone With the Wind’ when Mr. O’Hara lost his mind and went chasing a carpetbagger and he said he had to ask Mrs. O’Hara, who was a corpse at that time.”

Spencer previously denied a request by Johnson’s original defense attorney, Robert Cowles, for a psychological evaluation. Ragains said Johnson appeared “lucid” and mentally sound when questioned by investigators.

Ragains said Smith’s age and the violence of the crime were both aggravating circumstances under state statute. The presence of the children, ages 12 and 7 and already “mentally disturbed,” and the “heinous” nature of the crime were not statutory.

“This act is particularly heinous,” Ragains said. “There was no reason whatsoever for this woman to be shot. Despite the fact that this is an old man, the aggravating factors far outweigh the mitigating factors and the state would ask for the maximum sentence.”

Judge Spencer dealt the recommended sentence of 55 years. He said Johnson’s apology to the family was his first such gesture in the 10 months of court proceedings.

“I think the maximum is reserved for particularly ugly crimes permitted by particularly ugly people,” Spencer said. “You don’t have a bad record and I don’t believe you deserve the maximum sentence.

“I want you to go to a facility where you can get ongoing medical attention. You’ll still be inside a prison, you’ll still be inside the walls, but you don’t need to be in Michigan City or Westville or Wabash Valley.”

That decision will be at the discretion of the Indiana Department of Correction.

Amanda Brinker

Amanda Brinker

Brinker, 14, Died of Blows to Back of Head

Police still don’t know motive for attack

September 22, 2007

The Madison County Coroner’s Office has officially ruled the death of 14-year-old Amanda Brinker a homicide, and the lead detective in the case said the girl was struck multiple times in the back of the head with a vehicle’s jack handle.

The Madison Count Prosecutor’s Office has asked for an extra three days to file a formal murder charge against Jesse Lee Pitts, 20, of Anderson.

Pitts, who is being held in the Madison County Jail without bond, made an initial court appearance on Friday, where Madison County Magistrate Stephen Clase read the allegations police laid out in a probable cause affidavit against him.

“Do you understand how serious this is?” Clase asked Pitts, who was dressed in a black-and-white jail jumpsuit.

“Yes,” he replied.

Pitts was soft-spoken during the brief court hearing, answering Clase in single-syllable words with his hands resting on his lap. Clase gave the prosecutor’s office until Wednesday to file the formal murder count.

According to court documents and investigators, officers received a 911 call, purportedly from Pitts, saying he had found a body floating face down in the White River at Edgewater Park off 10th Street. Along the riverbank, police found Brinker’s body, which bore severe injuries to the back of the head. Detectives found her purse and Anderson High School identification card inside a trash barrel nearby. There was blood splatter on the nearby grass and leaves along the walkway next to the river.

Detectives became suspicious of the 911 call because the body had been covered and wouldn’t have easily been seen by passers-by, police said Thursday. Investigators got a search warrant for Pitts’ home in the 1600 block of Southwood Road and found a bloody shirt inside a plastic trash bag. In a car Pitts borrowed from a roommate, they found the jack handle with hair and hair follicles on it, according to court documents.

One of Pitts’ roommates, Jennifer Lawler, told investigators that Brinker, of the 2900 block of Helms Road, called Pitts before school Thursday. Pitts borrowed Lawler’s 1993 Chevrolet Cavalier and picked Brinker up at her bus stop, several AHS students told detectives.

Pitts told detectives during questioning that he and Brinker drove to Edgewater Park. The two were walking down one of the park’s paved trails smoking marijuana when Pitts hit Brinker in the back of the head with the jack handle that he carries in his car “for protection,” according to the affidavit. Pitts said he threw Amanda down from the top of a White River riverbank, and she must have then rolled partially into the river.

Detective Terry Sollars, the lead investigator in the case, said Friday that police interviewed Pitts several times Thursday over a 7-9-hour period. He said Pitts struck Brinker multiple times in the back of the head.

Sollars said that after killing Brinker, Pitts drove back to his Southwood home and told his live-in girlfriend, 20-year-old Barbara Howard, that Brinker was hurt. The couple then went back to the park for a short period of time and returned home, where Pitts called 911.

Pitts gave investigators several different accounts of what happened, Sollars said. At one point, Pitts claimed a stranger came up behind him and Brinker as they were walking and attacked them. Pitts fled, but he saw the stranger knock Brinker to the ground.

Ultimately, however, he admitted what happened, Sollars said, but still hasn’t been completely forthcoming.

“He cooperated to his degree, but not to ours,” the detective said.

Sollars said Howard could also face charges for not being fully cooperative with investigators, but that is still under investigation. When police questioned Pitts and Howard, it “brought more questions than answers (as) to how they actually located the body,” according to Sollars’ affidavit.

“I don’t think she understood the impact until she saw the body by the river herself,” Sollars said Friday.

He said Pitts still has not told investigators why he killed Brinker.

“Robbery certainly wouldn’t have been a motive, because she only would have had a few dollars for lunch or something,” he said.

Sollars said Pitts and Brinker met through mutual friends and had known each other “a few months.” He said the exact nature of the relationship wasn’t immediately known, but it was apparently strong enough that Brinker could call Pitts up early in the morning, and he would get out of bed to meet her.

“I don’t know what that means,” Sollars said.

Attempts to reach Brinker’s family were unsuccessful on Friday.

A man who identified himself as “James” during a phone call to Pitts’ residence said Howard didn’t want to talk and told a Herald Bulletin reporter to “lose this (phone) number.”