Secrets in the Home Trial – WI v. Josie Dikeman: Full Opening Statements

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Good morning ladies and gentlemen. For anyone keeping track of my health, my ears popped this morning, which is a good thing. Home. There should be no safer place for the children in your community than their home. Home. It's where each one of you go from refuge from this world on every night. It's your safe place from all the ills, from all the dangers, from all the events in this world. It's your peace. For Alexandria Pedron, home was a place where this defendant treated him different than any other child in the home. Home was a place where this defendant kicked Alexandria in his chest, in his face, in his body. Home is a place where this defendant took her hands and wrapped them around Alexandria's neck and choked him. Home is a place where this defendant struck six-year-old Alexandria in the face, in the body, with her hands. For the last 14 hours of Alexandria Pedron's life, there was one and one only adult home with him, this defendant. 14 hours. Alexandria is not here. He has passed away. His death has been ruled a homicide. Here, Alexandria can't tell you what happened to him, but his body speaks volumes about those 14 hours. Alexandria had multiple blunt force injuries to his head and to his face. Bruises on different planes, different sides of his face, different areas of his head, each one requiring a different blow to inflict the injury. You're going to hear from the local medical examiner who was present when the autopsy was performed. You're going to hear that they started to shave away Alexandria's hair during the autopsy process. As they started to shave his hair away, it revealed more bruising. And so they had to keep shaving. And yet still more bruising. So they kept shaving. Until his entire set of hair was gone. So that they could document every single bruise, every single injury on Alexandria's head. That boy was put in the ground with no hair. He had a healing laceration to his right eye. This is important. And we'll talk about that laceration in a little bit. Because one night previous, on February 10th of 2023, at around 7 p.m., law enforcement visits the home. They're there for a welfare check on Alexandria. They ask to see Alexandria. This defendant does everything she can to minimize the amount of contact that law enforcement has with Alexandria. How much they can see of his body. They do see his face. And the one injury that they note when they see his face, that single scab above his right eye. Alexandria had a 7-centimeter laceration abrasions to his neck. They were in parallel, linear lines. He had multiple contusions within his hairline that we discussed. His brain suffered hypoxic ischemic injury. That injury can be inflicted in many ways. One of the ways that that injury is inflicted is through choking and lack of oxygen. Another way that that injury can be inflicted is by the administration of a drug that shuts down nervous system. Another way that that injury can be inflicted is when you don't have enough blood flow to your brain to deliver oxygen. He had multiple bruises to his chest, to his back, contusions to his buttocks, abrasions to his penis. A hundred milliliters of blood in his peritoneum cavity. Bleeding that was described by the forensic pathologist as extensive in his mesentery and in his small intestine. A 3-centimeter laceration to his liver. Hemorrhaging to the pancreas. Hit an acute, which means a fresh, posterior rib fracture to his 10th rib. He had a pattern of dehydration to his body. His eyes were sunken in. His rib cage was visible. Contusions and abrasions on all of his extremities. He had a casted leg from a previous fracture. And we're going to talk about that right femur fracture more in a little bit. His post-mortem toxicology results showed Xanax in his bloodstream. Alex Xavier J. Pedrin was a battered child. And the evidence will show that it was this defendant who repeatedly battered him. And it is this defendant who is responsible for Xavier no longer being alive. So how did all of this come to be? At 9.25 a.m. on February 11th of 2023, this defendant calls 911. She says she needs an ambulance right away. Her son is on the ground and not breathing. I want to repeat that. The defendant said her son is on the ground and not breathing. The defendant said she had an old bag of medication on the floor. That he must have got into those drugs. And she doesn't know which drug he got into. He's six years old, you'll hear her say on this 911 call. The call is transferred to someone to walk this defendant through performing CPR. This defendant tells the person that the call is transferred to that she woke up that morning looking for the defendant around, excuse me, Alex Xavier, the victim, around the house. That she found him on the ground again. She's now said twice in this 911 call that Alex Xavier is on the ground. He's not moving and that he got into her medication. She has now said that twice. On the 911 call, she says that she tried to administer CPR, but it didn't work. That Alex Xavier was not breathing. And as the dispatcher is trying to talk the defendant through performing CPR, first responders from the La Crosse Police Department are arriving on scene. Within four minutes, they are knocking on the defendant's front door. You're going to see the defendant come and answer that door. But remember, she said twice he's on the ground. Twice she said she's performed CPR. She would later tell law enforcement when they interviewed her that day that she was performing CPR for over 10 minutes on Alex Xavier's body. Why is this important? Deputy Karsten Jarre is the first on scene. He knocks on the front door repeatedly until the defendant opens the door. And she says, in a very calm tone, we don't usually use the front door. You're going to get to see her demeanor. All captured on body camera. The very next thing she says is, Alex got into my medicine. He gets up at night and he gets into things. Alex Xavier's body is not on the floor. It's on the defendant's bed. She's on the phone the entire time with 911. She cannot move the body. It would be clearly heard, clearly visible on that 911 call. She says twice the body's on the floor next to medication. They get there while she's still on the phone with 911. You'll see the phone in her hand. And Alex Xavier's body is on the bed. You're going to hear testimony from Deputy Karsten Jarre. He was rather new to the job back on February 11th of 2023. He immediately goes in and starts to assess Alex Xavier. Alex Xavier's not only on the bed, but Alex Xavier's hand is tucked inside of his pants. If he was moved from the floor to the bed, his arm, his hand would have moved. His hand is tucked in his pants. And you will see that. Deputy Jarre rolls Alex Xavier on his side. The first thing he's doing is saying, Alex, Alex, trying to get a response from him. And he rolls him onto his side to see if he can startle Alex Xavier awake. Making this small movement of Alex Xavier's body causes this really dark, almost black-like substance to start to leak from Alex Xavier's mouth. He cuts open his shirt. Shortly after that, backup is responding on scene, and they're assisting with CPR, another law enforcement agent with the Cross County Sheriff's Department. And that person instructs Deputy Jarre to administer NARCAP, because it looks like a potential overdose scene. The defendant says that there's a pill bottle on the floor. She's claiming that Alex Xavier got into the drugs, and they're finding a child that is unresponsive, and he has foam, and now a black substance, from the small step of moving his body to the side, leaking out. They administer NARCAP to no avail. Alex Xavier still remains pulseless and not breathing, so they start performing CPR on his chest. Deputy Jarre does two pumps on Xavier while he's still on the bed, and the black substance starts to ooze out more. Remember this defendant said she performed CPR? Remember this defendant said she performed CPR for 10 minutes? He does two pumps and moves the body on its side, and this black substance is oozing out of Alex Xavier's body. The other officer that is on scene has more experience, and he instructs Deputy Jarre to move the body to the floor, because it's a more stable place to perform CPR. Indeed, that would have made sense if that's really what happened with the defendant. They move Alex Xavier to the floor, and they start performing CPR again, and again, and again. They attach a defibrillator-like machine to administer shock, if possible, and to see if they're getting any reading from Alex Xavier's body. They're getting none. And as they continue to pump and pump and perform CPR on Alex Xavier's six-year-old body, the black substance just starts oozing out more and more. It pools behind his head. There is so much. Unfortunately, you're going to have to, because it's one of the things that you have to see in order to assess her credibility and her claims. Deputy Jarre performed CPR on Alex Xavier for almost nine minutes. Remember, the defendant said she claimed ten minutes. He performs for almost nine minutes before it's turned over to first responders, medical first responders that arrive on scene. During that entire time, he gets no response from six-year-old Alex Xavier's body. During that entire time, the substance continues to ooze from Alex Xavier's body. As he's performing CPR, he asks the defendant, when's the first time you observed Alex Xavier this morning? She says, 20 minutes ago. When he's asking this question, he's just getting on scene, which means that that's a long time before she even called 911. When's the last time you saw Alex Xavier alive? Well, the next question that Deputy Jarre asks. Defendant's response, 3 o'clock in the morning. As Deputy Jarre is performing CPR on Alex Xavier's body after he's been moved to the floor, he finds an empty pill bottle on the floor. The pill bottle that the defendant talked about, it has a prednisone label on it. The cap is off it. You're going to hear that DNA testing was performed on that pill bottle. You're going to hear that Alex Xavier's DNA was found on that pill bottle. You're also going to hear about touch DNA, how touch DNA gets transferred from an object to an object. One of the things I want you to have in your mind when you hear that testimony is that Deputy Jarre has performed CPR on Alex Xavier for a number of minutes, bare skin to bare skin, hands to chest. He is touching Alex Xavier's DNA time and time again. And then he grabs that pill bottle and cap and he moves it. When the medical team arrives on scene, they try CPR for an additional five minutes. They don't get a response from Alex Xavier. No pulse, no breathing, no heart rate. And at 9.44 a.m. on February 11th of 2023, six-year-old Alex Xavier J. Pedran was pronounced deceased. Sergeant John Williams arrived on scene shortly thereafter and he interviewed the defendant about the circumstances surrounding Alex Xavier's passing. The defendant said that she was up with Alex Xavier until 3 o'clock in the morning and that he was by her side in her bed. The very location that he is found the next day. The defendant spoke on the phone with a friend named Laura Lee Rains at approximately 10.44 p.m. This phone call lasted for about 16 minutes. Laura Lee Rains confirms that this phone call took place. Laura Lee Rains also confirmed something else. She could hear Alex Xavier's voice through the phone. She could tell it was him. He sounded fine. When the defendant woke up the next morning after going to bed sometime after 3 a.m. in the very same bed as six-year-old Alex Xavier, she says she wakes up and she can't find him. Think about where his body is located where law enforcement arrives on scene and think about that claim. She says she wakes up and she can't find him. She's in the very same bed as him when she wakes up. She said she finally finds him on the floor and she started performing CPR. You know about that now. The first person she calls is not 911. The first person that she calls is her mother. She talks to her mother for 52 seconds. You're going to hear from the defendant's mother. The defendant's mother told law enforcement that she instructed the defendant to call 911. Not only that, but in a later conversation, the defendant's mother admitted that the defendant said she thought about performing CPR but froze. Very different than what she told law enforcement. She said she performed CPR for upwards of 10 minutes when she ultimately located Alex Xavier on the floor. You're going to hear that well over three minutes pass between the phone call that the defendant placed with her mother and when she decides to call 911. A lot of things can be accomplished in three plus minutes. Deputies Anderson and Deputy Jarre, the first two responders, the two that performed CPR on Alex Xavier's body, were informed of the defendant's statement. They were aware of the circumstances that they were presented with. And they said, it doesn't make sense. There is no way a person could perform CPR and not have that substance immediately ooze out. It was inconsistent with their experience that day. Once again, during this interview, the defendant said, he must have gotten into my bag of medication that morning. The prescription capsule that was on the floor was empty. It was for prednisone. You're going to hear that Sergeant Arminson executed a search warrant at the residence later on. They collected all the prescription bottles that were in that bag. You're going to see every single one of those prescriptions that were in that bag. There are 20 prescription bottles in the defendant's bag of medication. Every single prescription matched the pills that were inside of the container. Every single prescription in that bag matched the pills that were in the container. Why is that important? Because when toxicology was performed on Alex Xavier, the results came back with Xanax, not prednisone. A very different substance. Xanax is a central nervous system. He compresses it, shuts it down, slows it down. It's not prednisone. But what Sergeant Arminson also found in that bag, that prescription bottle that was supposed to be for prednisone, the only pills that were loose in the bottom of that bag were prednisone pills. 10 prednisone pills were in the bottom of that bag in a bottle that was for 12 prescription prednisone pills. Meaning someone emptied that container in that bag before it was left. Either that or Alex Xavier, a six-year-old child, if you want to believe the defendant, emptied that pill bottle. And the only pill bottle that had a mix of pills was the one he chose. And the only pills that he selected were the Xanax pills in that mix. Somebody emptied the pill bottle into that bag. Somebody staged the scene. That's somebody's in the room. Law enforcement did a search warrant of the residence, not once, but twice. And we'll talk about the reasons why. They did search warrants for phone records. Not just the defendant's phone records, but also Derek Pedron's phone records. Not just the Facebook records of the defendant, but also Derek Pedron's records. They did a search warrant for the prescription medications belonging to this defendant. And they did a search warrant for the defendant's surveillance camera system. The defendant had a surveillance camera system inside the residence. Cameras on the outside, cameras on the inside. You're going to hear from Sergeant Amundsen. One of the things that he will admit he wished he did the first day they were on scene, when he looked at the cameras, they have SD cards that record what's happening. He saw them. And in the midst of all the chaos that's happening and the processing of that scene, and I want you to remember, they initially believe when they're on scene that this may be an overdose. They don't have the toxicology results. They don't have all the bruising, though they start to see it, what's on the outside. They have no idea about what happened to Alex Xavier internally. So that autopsy performed days later. They apply for a secondary search warrant to the residence to go back, amongst other things, to get those SD cards. That search warrant is executed each later. By the time that search warrant is executed, those SD cards and the cameras are gone. Law enforcement doesn't end there. They apply for a search warrant to the company that actually runs these cameras. And the company doesn't upload the videos to their own server, but they create a cloud-based account that only the person who has the camera and the videos can access. And so the only way law enforcement can get access to those videos is if they take on the identity of the person who's responsible for that video surveillance system. And so they attempt to do that. They get the name and the password for this defendant in the surveillance system. And they sign in. And they start trying to look for the videos. And as they are looking for the videos, the videos are being deleted. As they are looking for the videos, the surveillance videos, attempting to capture the videos of what took place in the residence, those videos are being deleted. There's only one person who had access to that account. Ladies and gentlemen, she's in the room. As the search warrant returns start coming back, they start revealing more information about what was really happening during the evening of February 10th, 2023. Remember, the defendant said and told law enforcement that she was on the phone with Laura Lee Raines for about 16 minutes, and then she said that she watched TV with Al Xavier until about 3 o'clock in the morning. When law enforcement starts getting the search warrant returns, it reveals that the defendant is having a conversation with another man. Approximately 6 p.m. and just before midnight, she's exchanged over 100 text messages with this other man. Rafael Suarez. They're setting up a date for the next day. You're going to see those messages. You're going to see what they were talking about. You're going to see that they were planning on meeting up. Between midnight and 2 o'clock in the morning, there's 63 additional text messages between the defendant and Mr. Suarez. Again, talking about the date, talking about what they like about each other, flirting, sexting. Law enforcement also discovers the first text message that the defendant sends the next morning. The morning that Al Xavier is found deceased is at 9.07 a.m. Remember, the phone call to 911 is at 9.25 a.m. At 9.07 a.m., she texts Laura Lee telling her, that's cute. At 9.20 a.m., she texts Rafael Suarez telling him, we're not going to be able to get together today. Something's wrong with my son. At 9.21, she calls her mother, talks to her mother for 52 seconds, and then three minutes and 19 seconds pass after that phone call is concluded until she calls 911. None of that information is disclosed by the defendant to law enforcement. Because of the circumstances surrounding Al Xavier's death, Child Protective Services implements a safety plan. The children that were in the home that day and that evening are put into placements not involving the defendant, and they can't involve Derek Pedron because he's in jail. I want to talk a little bit about Derek Pedron. Derek Pedron is a domestic abuser. He's an abuser of women. One of the women that he abused is Ms. Dykeman. He's been prosecuted for it before by the Little Cross County District Attorney's Office. On February 10th of 2023, there was a no-contact order in place. Derek Pedron was to have no contact with Josie Dykeman because of his domestic abuse. Derek Pedron went to work that day. He got off at 5 p.m. You're going to see his time card, which validates that information. He went to a local store. I believe it's a Walgreens or a Walmart. He's on video surveillance shopping at that store for a few minutes, and then he arrives home at approximately 5.30 in the evening. At the same time that he's arriving home or just a little bit after, the La Crosse County Sheriff's Department is getting a phone call from a concerned family member about the safety of Al-Xavier. Not because Derek's in the home. They have no idea that Derek is in the home. The concern is about this defendant being with Al-Xavier. And so law enforcement goes out at 7 o'clock that evening to perform a welfare check on Al-Xavier. You're going to see the body cam from the two law enforcement personnel who went out that evening. You knock on the door multiple times. You can actually see Derek Pedron in the residence walking around with his hat on, with his work sweatshirt on. And when they're knocking on the door, they're saying repeatedly, we're here to do a welfare check. They want to see Al-Xavier and make sure he's okay. They are eventually allowed in by the defendant. When they tell the defendant that they believe that they've seen Derek inside the residence, the defendant lies. She says it's another man. When they confront her with the belief that they have seen Derek inside the residence and they know what Derek looks like, they say that they just want to know where he is. She says he's left the residence, he being the other man, not Derek. And law enforcement informs her that that's impossible because they have people positioned on both sides of the house at both doors. There was no way anyone left that residence. While they saw the person, while they had the conversation with her, she died. Even with all of that, the predominant responsibility of law enforcement was checking on Al-Xavier. So they ask if they can just see Al-Xavier. Defendant allows them to approach Al-Xavier. They shine a flashlight on Al-Xavier and they start asking questions about, remember, that single scratch above his head. That's the only injury they observe on his body when they see him laying on the couch. Defendant says he has COVID and he's trying to sleep. The defendant eventually becomes frustrated with law enforcement being present. She tells them to get out of the house and she tells them you need to get a warrant. Law enforcement leaves the residence because that's her right and they are respecting her right. They're outside. They're calling their superior officers to find out what they should do next. Do they want to apply for a search warrant because they believe they've seen Derek? Do they want to wait? Are they going to leave? You're going to hear that one of the officers even calls Josie, the defendant, talks to her and says, no, it's Derek inside. Please just convince him to come out. Within minutes, Derek comes out and you're going to see all of that. They tell Derek that he's violating the no contact order. They tell Derek that he can have a smoke and he's cooperative that they'll call his boss and let him know everything that happened. Then Derek is taken into custody just after 7 p.m. The law enforcement checks on Alex Xavier one more time. They go back into the residence and originally Alex Xavier's laying down. Now he's positioned differently on the couch. He's able to move. He's able to function. They see him positioned on the back of the couch. They check on him. They ask questions of the defendant and the defendant says he's just sick with COVID. Nothing's amiss. Please leave. You're scaring him. So they leave. Derek Pedron could not be in the residence during the evening because he was in jail that entire evening. that will be confirmed by law enforcement. It will be confirmed because one of the people that the defendant talks to the morning after Alex Xavier has been found is Derek. Talks to him that evening on a jail call. It's recorded. she texts with him that morning after he's been released. And Alex Xavier has been found deceased. The messages that she sends Derek it's my fault. The messages that she sends Rafael Suarez the person that she was talking to that evening I feel like this is my fault. She messages multiple people that the death of Alex Xavier is her fault. Sergeant Amundsen and the medical examiner when they responded on scene looked at Alex Xavier's body and they saw the injuries that were visible on the outside of his body. They said this needs to be looked at and investigated a little bit more. So forensic interviews of the children were set up the very next day. The children that were forensically interviewed were placed in different homes. One of the children that was interviewed was Major Hellrude. He has a different father. His father is not Derek. His father is Mark Hellrude. He was placed with his father. You're going to also see the forensic interview of five-year-old Brantley. This is what five-year-old Brantley had to say about what he has seen with his five-year-old eyes in this defendant's home. Alex Xavier steals food. You're going to find out why a six-year-old child needs to steal food. When this defendant finds out that he steals food in the middle of the night she kicks him in his chest and in his body. She used to strike Alex Xavier with a spoon or a spatula when he was younger but it's moved on to kicks and blows with the hands. She also chokes Alex Xavier. You're going to get to hear in this five-year-old child's own words what seeing his deceased six-year-old brother was like. He said his six-year-old brother looked like a monster on the morning of February 11, 2023. He said probably because adults told him his brother drank poison water. That's what took his life. in the midst of all that he described what his five-year-old eyes saw this defendant do. Major was eight years old when he was forensically interviewed. My mom yells at Alex Xavier a lot. Major was asked during the forensic interview about home life with his dad and home life with his mother, the defendant. When he talks about home life with his dad, he's talking about it openly and freely as I'm talking to you right now. When he's asked about home life with his mother, he crawls up into a ball, his voice gets quieter, starts to shut down. My mom hits Alex Xavier, not us. She kicks Alex Xavier a lot. She kicks him in his chest, she kicks him in his face. The forensic interviewer asks if there's other times that eight-year-old major has witnessed Alex Xavier stop breathing. And he says in this really quiet tone, my mom caused it. The interviewer actually asks him to speak up because she can't hear it. and he discloses that his mother, the defendant, chokes Alex Xavier with her hands. She's done it before and she did it just a few days ago. The choking, the kicking, the striking with the hands, it all happens when Derek is gone, when Dad is gone. Both Brantley and Major independently talk about this defendant kicking, this defendant choking, this defendant hitting, and they both talk about it happening when Derek is not home. Major confirms that Alex Xavier gets up in the middle of the night searching for food. This is something the defendant even talks about. and almost blames six-year-old Alex Xavier for the fact that she has to stay up all night and watch him. Major talks about when this defendant feeds Alex Xavier, she takes hot sauce and puts it on his food. He doesn't want to eat it with hot sauce. He doesn't like hot sauce. It's not done to anybody else, only Alex Xavier. Alex Xavier gets up at night and tries to find something to eat or drink because he doesn't want the food that has hot sauce all over it that this defendant makes special just for him. The defendant's response is to choke him. Remember again that hypoxic ischemic injury to the brain and one of the ways that that is caused is through choking. She also steps on him and in the past when he was younger he used a spoon or a spatula to strike Alex Xavier. Again, just like what Brantley said, they're in two different homes with two different caretakers being brought for these forensic interviews by completely different adults having no idea what the other child is saying and they're both reporting the same things. A forensic interview was conducted of four-year-old Araya. You're going to hear from the interviewer who conducted all of these forensic interviews and she's going to inform you that three to four years old are about the earliest you can actually conduct a forensic interview of a child. You're not going to get a whole lot of information from a child at that age and cognitive developmental levels. They just don't have the words, the vocabulary that children who are older have. But even this four-year-old child can talk about the difference in how Al-Xavier is treated in the home. Remember Al-Xavier had that broken femur? I want to talk about that for a little bit. Al-Xavier suffered a femur fracture in January of 2023. The story given to the medical professionals by the defendant at the hospital is that four-year-old Araya pushed Al-Xavier down the stairs. As she didn't see it, she saw the aftermath of the fall and heard it. Araya, in her forensic interview, says that she pushed her brother down the stairs. A lot of the other children who were not present when the fall happened heard that Araya pushed Al-Xavier down the stairs, and so they, too, talk about Araya pushing Al-Xavier down the stairs. Al-Xavier is not taken in for that femur fracture until two days after. You're going to hear about his pain level when he's admitted to the hospital with that femur fracture. You're going to hear that this is an unusual femur fracture that requires a great amount of force to that particular bone in the body. The femur bone is the largest bone in our bodies. And his is broken and his is broken in a way that requires great force. A femur fracture from a fall downstairs is extraordinarily rare. But we have Araya reporting that that's what happened. And we have Al-Xavier when he's at the hospital looking at his mother and then saying that that's what happened. After she has said that's what happened. After Al-Xavier's death, Major stays in his dad's home. And he starts talking to his dad about the circumstances surrounding Al-Xavier's femur fracture. and Major remembers and tells his dad that he witnessed this defendant take Al-Xavier's leg and bend it and keep bending it forcefully while Al-Xavier was screaming in pain around the same time that the femur fracture supposedly happened from a stairway ball. Out of concern about this disclosure, the father calls law enforcement a second forensic interview to set up of Major. You're going to see that second forensic interview. You're going to see Major reaffirm all the abuse he talked about witnessing at the hands of this defendant to Al-Xavier and you're going to hear him talk about the bending of that leg and what he saw. You're going to hear people who saw Al-Xavier that weekend at a party and how he had to be carried from room to room to room because he could not walk. Bernie Zakar said something in his opening his board diary yesterday and I completely agree with it. You are going to hear situations where this defendant isn't the only person to blame. There is plenty of blame. In this case that belongs to Derek Pedron too for neglecting Al-Xavier. But we're not here for that in the next couple weeks. We're here to decide her culpability. Days go by he's taken to the hospital with his leg fracture. You're going to hear the pain medication that he had to be treated with, how it was casted, and how he was completely immobilized and kept from walking on that leg. Kept under 24-hour supervision. You're also going to hear that when he was hospitalized, the person that he found most comforting was his father. person [00:49:18] Speaker ?: person [00:49:18] Speaker 1: that brought him the most comfort in the room would get in bed next to [00:49:22] Speaker ?: him. in [00:49:39] Speaker 1: during the course of the investigation the decision was made by law enforcement that they had enough evidence to arrest the defendant. In that process, law enforcement was interviewing Derek Pedron. Derek Pedron was cooperative with law enforcement. When they informed Derek Pedron of the drugs that were found in Alexandria's system, he admitted to purchasing those drugs. He admitted to purchasing those drugs for this defendant and delivering those drugs to this defendant. Knowing all the injuries on his six-year-old son's body, Derek Pedron also recorded conversations with this defendant. He asked her, he wanted to know what happened to his son. He gave those to law enforcement. [00:50:47] Speaker ?: him. [00:50:48] Speaker 1: In those conversations, he not once ever says he did something wrong, that he's responsible. This is well over a month later. Instead, she tells him, move on. His death is in the past. We have to get over it. the father searching for answers surrounding the death, the beating death of his six-year-old son. He's saying, move on and get over it. The other thing that law enforcement found when they did the search warrants was text messages between this defendant and her own mother surrounding getting access to pills. This defendant's own mother confirming that she will give pills to the defendant. and then setting up arrangements for Derek to get the pills for this defendant. That's her mother. When law enforcement goes and questions her mother with a search warrant in hand to search her residence, at first, she denies ever engaging in that behavior. Then law enforcement tells her that they have the messages. she reluctantly confirms that this defendant sought pills from her. Law enforcement also tells her, we have a search warrant for your phone. This defendant's response to the search warrant for her own phone is to inform law enforcement that the defendant asked for her phone some time ago and cleared it because the defendant was concerned. And that's not all the evidence you're going to hear. For the end of this case, you're going to hear evidence concerning this defendant and another child from 2011 and 2013. Judge is going to give you a special instruction on that evidence after you receive that evidence. And it is imperative that you follow and listen to that instruction. ladies and gentlemen, the evidence will be clear at the end of this trial. This defendant is responsible for the death of Alex Xavier J. Pedra. This defendant did everything she could to create a scene to try and cover her actions surrounding the death of Alex Xavier J. Pedra. This defendant destroyed evidence to protect herself during the investigation into her culpability into the death of Alex Xavier J. Pedra. At the end of this trial, I will come before you and I will ask you based on all of the evidence you will hear over the next two to three weeks to find this defendant guilty. Thank you. [00:54:42] Speaker 2: It's awfully easy to assume the worst about somebody when you only hear one side of the story. That's the side of the story that everybody's heard for the last three years. For the first time in three years, Josie gets a chance to tell you her side of the story. And I want to start with Alex's last evening. What do we know about that day? We know that Alex called Josie Mom, that she asked him to hold his hand, that he told her that he was scared when the police were shining a flashlight in his eye. He turned to her for comfort. He turned to her for safety. He never once asked about his father because that was the man who was hurting him. That was the man who killed him. The astronomer Carl Sagan once said that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. And indeed, we have an extraordinary claim in this case. A claim that Ms. Dykeman killed a child that she had raised as her own with no motive to do so. A claim that she killed a child when everybody who interacted with her on February 10th of 2023 said that she was happy, said that she was planning to leave Derek, said that she was not angry or upset with Alex at all. A claim that she did so when there's enormous physical and video evidence that Derek Pedron was physically abusing Alex Xavier. A claim that she did so despite the fact that the state's own forensic pathologist will testify he can't rule Mr. Pedron out as his abuser. A claim that she did this in front of two small children in the same bedroom, in the same bed, neither of whom said they saw, heard, or noticed anything about their mother murdering their brother right next to them. All for no apparent purpose. The claim is extraordinary. The evidence is not. One thing that the state and I do agree is that Alex was a battered child. There is no dispute. He was abused. The question that you're going to have to answer is who was doing it. Was it the woman that he called mom? The woman that read to him every single day and loved telling stories? The woman who colored with him, took him to school, made sure that all of his needs were met? Or was it the man who was repeatedly witnessed and video recorded beating and strangling Alex Xavier? That's the question that you're going to have to answer. early on in this investigation law enforcement zeroed in on Ms. Dykeman because she was the only person who was home when Alex Xavier was found dead. You're going to hear that they assume that because Josie was the only one there that Derek couldn't have done it. He was in jail. They didn't consider what had happened the day before with Alex. They didn't consider Derek's extensive history of abusing these children. And even after their own pathologist said these injuries are consistent with having been inflected when Mr. Pedran was home, they ignored it. Even when they were told by multiple witnesses that Derek was hitting the children, they ignored him. Even when they came across multiple videos describing egregious child abuse at the hands of Mr. Pedran, they ignored it because they said he's not our suspect. Josie is. They ignored it when Derek told them outrageous and egregious lies because they never wanted to question the person that they were treating as their victim. They targeted Josie instead. And they had the luxury suspicion. We don't. We have to decide this case on facts and evidence at the highest possible burden of proof. And what will the facts tell you about that household? They'll tell you that Derek made the lies of Josie, Alex, and the rest of those kids is a living hell. This is one of the most aggravated cases of domestic violence that this courtroom has probably seen. And the unusual part of this is that the perpetrator is not the one on trial. But make no mistake, Derek regularly beat Josie. He strangled her. He threatened to kill her. And he raped her. And we know this because Derek wasn't afraid of doing many of these things in front of witnesses. You're going to hear from several said that Derek didn't care if people were watching. He'd hit her anyways. Derek didn't care if Josie was wandering around town black and blue from the latest beating. He was never held accountable for this. It was something that happened time and time and time again. And in that capacity, you're going to hear from Josie's mother. She admitted she gave Josie a couple of hydrocodone pills every now and then. Why did she do that? Because she was worried about Josie being unable to get up even out of bed after certain beatings that Derek had administered. There's no dispute that she gave her hydrocodone. But you need to know the reason why. And you don't have to take our word for it. Because there's video evidence. Like a lot of survivors of abuse, Josie thought that her cell phone would act as a shield. That she had the camera on and it was rolling and Derek Neal was there that he wouldn't act. He wouldn't become violent with her. He would know that there'd be some evidence. He didn't care. He hit her anyways. He'd beat her on camera. He'd choke her on camera. He'd scream on camera that he wants her to die. And he immediately afterwards would gaslight her. Even on video that you're going to see. He'll scream at her that if you don't have a mark right now you can't prove this. Nobody will ever believe you. If you turn me in then I'm going to tell CPS that you're an unfit mother because I'm the one with the job and they'll take your kids away from you. He gaslit her so persistently that she was brainwashed by the end of this relationship. This, ladies and gentlemen, get the Elmo. [01:00:51] Speaker 3: Not the Elmo, [01:00:52] Speaker 2: the video, excuse me. What I'll say is that wherever Josie and Derek went together, the police followed in her wake. I'll ask a police department, La Crosse police department, La Crosse sheriff's department, Joplin, Missouri police department, the Houston county Minnesota police department because the abuse in that home at the hands of Mr. Pedron was never ending. And this is the Derek Pedron that Josie and those kids knew. Keep the lights please. [01:01:22] Speaker ?: he's [01:01:23] Speaker 3: not going to ask [01:01:25] Speaker ?: me [01:01:25] Speaker 3: anything if I tell you I'm done. He's going to ask you [01:01:28] Speaker ?: about what [01:01:29] Speaker 3: at midnight when I'm asking you to get out why I'm trying to [01:01:34] Speaker ?: call. [01:01:34] Speaker 3: here. [01:01:37] Speaker 4: During the day it's [01:01:38] Speaker ?: because [01:01:38] Speaker 4: now it's because one has a reason I want you to get out. [01:01:54] Speaker 5: I'm glad you have that. I'm glad you have that. That is not what I meant. That is what you said. [01:02:04] Speaker ?: I have [01:02:07] Speaker 6: no worries. I have. You don't have to be. [01:02:16] Speaker 3: That is what you just said. Get the out. Right? You're being psycho. Your kids are squeaking. Do you not fucking yourself, Derek? This is the bad is for your being. I told you were done. I'm not going to [01:02:32] Speaker ?: anymore. [01:02:34] Speaker 3: out. [01:02:37] Speaker ?: I don't have to stay with you. [01:02:41] Speaker 3: What a judge is going to tell me I have to stay with you? Then what? You don't have to. What is a judge going to tell me, Daryl? [01:02:49] Speaker ?: You need to be a [01:02:50] Speaker 3: call. And tell me what. What is a judge going to tell me what they do? Over a video. [01:03:02] Speaker 4: where did i get in the face [01:03:32] Speaker 3: i don't want to talk to you [01:04:02] Speaker 7: i don't care i'm helping martin yeah me too by getting rid of you yeah and i'm helping major by getting rid of you and i'm helping major by getting rid of you he loves me because you are the crazy one [01:04:30] Speaker 6: crazy one he doesn't ever since you got hit with that goddamn bat you are a nutcase ever since i got with you ever since no not ever since you got hit with that bat you think you are like entitled to [01:04:50] Speaker 7: who i don't know what you think you're entitled i hope you know these are your last words to me [01:04:58] Speaker 6: i'll be sending them back to yourself and what that's it i'll be sending everything i have to your lawyer i don't to save major from you good i'll send these to your whatever to my what what what what what what what what to fight for you have no contact with her so that's that's that's kind of against the law isn't it just get out that's against the law get out please [01:05:28] Speaker 7: you can't i've asked you to get out multiple times times i feel like you're out you can't even speak because you're scaring you're scaring me derrick you beat me before it's called entrapment get out you just tried to slap me get out i didn't touch you get out i feel like i'm being trapped go get out derrick you're trapping me in a room i came in here to get away from you i came in here and i said no when a woman says no it means no go it is midnight go away from me i don't care you don't own me [01:06:12] Speaker 3: you don't own me go away derrick go away you don't own me i said go i don't care you do not own me go away [01:06:26] Speaker 7: get away from me get away from me right there get away from me please liar please get away you're a liar you're entrapping me and i don't feel comfortable now please go i want to get out of this room i out of this room i don't feel comfortable oh you're a liar you want to get off i don't feel comfortable [01:06:44] Speaker 3: you're now you're pushing me away now you're pushing my phone go over ow you just tricked me dude [01:06:52] Speaker 6: everything i'm asking the judge is not gonna ask [01:06:56] Speaker 2: get the lights please i wish i could tell you that that was a one-time thing that this was a once-in-a-lifetime event that happened to be recorded that would be a lie there are dozens of videos just like this what you saw right there was a near nightly occurrence for josie and her kids you're gonna hear that the children quite frequently slept with josie in her bed in her bedroom because they were terrified of their father when he was behaving just like that and you're gonna hear that josie went through a lot of cell phones during her relationship with mr pedron when he woke up in the morning and sobered up he'd go through a phone and force her to delete the videos he would take out the sd cards and hide them or destroy them and sometimes he just wrecked the phone altogether but quite a few of these videos did survive and you're gonna see a number of them in the course of this trial not the type of thing that anybody wants to watch we're empathic beings we can feel when somebody's scared we can feel when somebody's hurt nobody wants to watch videos like this but if i ask you one thing at the beginning of this case please don't check out don't go numb in order to understand josie in order to understand alex in order to understand that environment that they lived in you're gonna have to see it from their perspective you're gonna have to feel it the way that they felt it you're gonna have to understand why it was so difficult for josie and those children to escape an abusive man and the videos also answer another important question in this case because the videos tell us why the kids weren't going to school Josie narrates it herself out loud on several of these it's the middle of the night and derrick is in there screaming at josie and the children midnight 2 a.m. 3 a.m. screaming at the children as they're huddled up against josie that their mother's just a whore because she doesn't want to take him back screaming at her that he wants to fix their relationship and thinking that the best way to do it is get drunk and high and berate everybody else in the family Josie says it out loud herself several times this is a bad environment maybe once we're finally broken up the kids can start going to school because every night this is my life you standing over me drunk you not letting us sleep you abusing me and the kids every single night that's how Josie felt and one of the saddest parts about these videos ladies and gentlemen is just how used to this abuse those kids were you're going to see footage of josie's son brantley five years old when his dad starts screaming at his mother because she wasn't providing him with enough tax or help doing his taxes and screaming at brantley that his mom is just a nutcase brantley knows to put his fingers in his ears the kids are conditioned with that earmuff reflex knowing that that's just what they do when their father acts like that you're going to see video of alex when he was still alive looking sullen submissive scared with his head down trying not to pay attention to the fact that his dad was beating his mom up right in front of him you're going to see video of Josie's son major sobbing and crying and shaking huddled inside of a closet because Derek had backed him into that position where he didn't even feel safe coming out of it perhaps the saddest moment that you're going to see in these videos as to how conditioned these kids were is Josie's son Brantley again five years old the kids are huddled up with her on the bed because Derek's acting just like this and in the middle of some tirade about how Josie's a whore and he needs to get back with her Brantley stops his father and says dad stop it you're drunk and you're scaring us just go to sleep five years old those kids knew exactly what was going on and make no mistake about it Derek was physically abusing the children too he hit them he'd throw them around the room he liked slamming kids up against the wall Alex in particular he would take a hold against the wall by the throat he'd hit them he'd choke them and he didn't care if there were witnesses you're going to hear from a man who witnessed this that it's a man older man he has some physical disabilities his name is Ted he'll probably testify from a wheelchair that during a month long stay where he had to stay with Josie and her mother because he had had a knee replacement I believe and couldn't get along couldn't get around and Josie and her mom had always helped take care of him he saw Derek hit the kids more than a dozen times he didn't care if there were witnesses Derek would grab the kids and drag them so hard by their arm that the bruises from that grasp would be visible for weeks you're going to see the bruises on Alex's arms caused by Derek grasping him so hard that he left his mark on him even after death and ladies and gentlemen you don't have to just take our word for it because once more there are videos videos of Mr. Pedran strangling Alex videos of Mr. Pedran hurting Alex and one in particular that Mr. Pedran admitted to was one that occurred inside of a vehicle he told investigators that he flew off the handle and engaged in what they were describing as abuse we're going to show you that video Derek's hitting Alex Derek's choking Alex you can hear him coughing and choking you can hear Derek's yelling at him to quit crying and in the middle of all of this Derek screams at his six year old son months before his death you just like getting your beat more than apparent that Alex knew exactly what that felt like coming from his father what was going on in this video Alex was fussy like a six year old he didn't want to get in the car without his favorite toy a toy monster truck and that prompted the reaction from Derek to lead to that attack the video is disturbing ladies and gentlemen not just because of the aggravated child abuse that it depicts but once more because of how used to it the rest of the kids in the car were Josie's taking this video covertly she's got her phone down she's not pointing it directly at Derek because she knew that if Derek looked up saw the phone the next thing that was going to happen is she would get the same treatment and Derek would destroy or delete the video so she's trying to produce some evidence as to how the life was like with Derek and the kids on a daily basis but she does manage to pan the camera out towards briefly and you capture the faces of the children behind her you can see it right in their eyes they're looking but trying not to look at what's going on you can see that they're scared and you can see that they're glad at that moment it just wasn't them but it was easy for the police to assume the best about Derek because of the fact that he happened to be in jail at the time that Alex died and they assume the worst about Josie because of how she presented you hear Mr. Torbenson's opening about how she described 10 minutes, 5 minutes, a certain sequence of events what nobody knew is that Josie's operating with a brain that has approximately 1% of the capacity of the average adult you're going to hear from Dr. Courtney Andrews, a forensic psychologist Dr. Andrews is going to tell you that she's reviewed Ms. Dykeman's medical records that she's reviewed prior neurological testing that she reviewed the records upon which the Social Security Administration found Ms. Dykeman to be 100% disabled and she's going to tell you that due to a series of traumatic brain injuries Ms. Dykeman's working memory and her long term memory are extremely impaired you're going to hear that her processing speed the ability to think and respond to questions is extremely impaired and when it takes time for her when she freezes when she takes time to answer when she isn't quite sure about her responses these are all symptomatic of the brain injuries that she suffered the same goes true for the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder you're going to hear that Josie has some dissociative symptoms where she appears to space out where she appears to be unemotional even in times when others would say that that call for emotion and the police not knowing this looked at her and said this is suspicious we don't think that you're reacting the way that a person should they assumed the worst about her and assumed the best about Mr. Pedrin and what you're going to hear about this is that early on in this investigation well before any of the evidence came back in its final form the police and prosecutors met with Mr. Pedrin and said we think you're the victim and we're going to go after Josie we want you to help us build the case against Josie and Mr. Pedrin was more than happy to oblige he told people on recorded phone calls that he's only going to give the police the bare minimum so that they couldn't target him but they could go after Josie he met with them and tried to explain that Josie was the person who is responsible for everything wrong in his life the police excused his egregious violence at one point asking him why were you treating her like this and his response was oh she's just a who maintains a attitude no follow abast they assumed the best about this man and they assumed the best about him when he told egregious lies about the issue of Xanax Xanax is a huge issue in this case ladies and gentlemen because it answers two important questions how did Alex die and who's responsible for it what you're going to hear is that the state's own forensic pathologist Dr. Reed Quinton cannot rule out overdoses the cause of death in fact he's going to tell you he can't rule out accidental overdose as the cause of death in this case you're going to hear more from Dr. Eric Christiansen Dr. Christiansen is one of the leading pediatric forensic pathologists in the United States he's going to tell you that in his opinion it's extremely unlikely that Alex's internal injuries caused his death because in these cases they look for a minimum blood quantity for death by exsanguination or bleeding to death internally and that's approximately one-third of the child's blood the total blood volume taken from Alex's internal cavities was less than or approximately one-seventeenth of his total blood volume Dr. Christiansen will tell you that even if that number was quadrupled you wouldn't meet the minimum threshold for what a pathologist would consider to cause death by internal bleeding rather Alex's blood Xanax levels were at a toxic level they were at a level that would be lethal for many adults and he says that Alex's signs and symptoms were incredibly consistent with an overdose causing this injury in fact Dr. Quinton we expect to testify that Alex did not die over a short period of time he's going to say that the histological and the slides that they reviewed from the autopsy suggest that it took a period of hours for Alex to die inconsistent with strangling, inconsistent with some instant attack that caused his death Dr. Quinton himself I expect will testify that Alex's injuries are prototypical and something that they look for in cases of overdose causing death So why is that important? It's important because if Alex died by overdose if the state can't rule that out then we know that Alex wasn't intentionally murdered Same thing with he wasn't intentionally abused to the point of his death The state has to rule that out that Xanax the thing both pathologists say is a likely possibility killed him did not in order to reach a verdict on counts one and three But we don't stop our analysis there because we have Josie charged with negligent homicide as well And that's going to ask you to consider how did he get into this? There's a big difference between an accidental overdose which is tragic but not a crime and negligence which means that somebody took an act that left something they knew that would be harmful to a child and knew that it was likely that they would get into it and be killed And in that respect you're going to have to ask yourself Who was responsible for bringing that Xanax into the home? The answer without a doubt is Derek Pedron Mr. Pedron was very squirrely about the issue of Xanax when he was first interviewed He said well, I think that Josie's getting pills from her mom She's skimming the Xanax off the top of her prescriptions and she picks them up at the Onalaska Walmart pharmacy and she gets some Xanax as a reward Investigators did their job They subpoenaed her mother's medical and prescription records from both her provider and the pharmacy Never been prescribed Xanax Then Mr. Pedron said that Ted, the gentleman I talked about earlier, must have been giving her some pills because they're involved in all sorts of shady stuff Shady stuff like Josie doing his grocery shopping for him Or cooking him meals at the beginning of the week Ted's going to testify He's going to tell you that he's never been prescribed Xanax He's never taken Xanax Eventually in April, Mr. Pedron comes to another meeting at the district attorney's office Meets with the investigators and he comes clean And his explanation there is Well, by the way, I was actually buying Xanax from my buddy off the street But only for Josie I only gave it to her and I don't know what she did with it They accepted that explanation at face value No questions about why did you lie to us so egregiously Why would you buy this valuable illegal drug and give it to a woman who's trying to leave you Who makes you sleep in the living room Who you refer to as a They accepted his word at face value What the evidence is actually going to show is that Mr. Pedron was buying that Xanax for himself He was regularly abusing the Xanax at home He was taking them like we would normally take a pill He was chewing them up for a quicker high And for the fastest high yet Including something that he did on the evening of Alex's death He'd grind it up and snort a line off of their kitchen or living room tables He gave the excuse that he was using Xanax just to try to cut down on his drinking And that you know maybe I could use this drug that's less harmful if it's prescribed But in reality it was just an excuse to abuse both substances at once Because when he combined the two he got extra violent and things got extra worse And we know that Derek was the source of this Xanax Because we've got him on video admitting that ladies and gentlemen If Mr. Pedron denies that we'll play the video for you You're going to see that Josie repeatedly confronted him about his drug use in the home before Alex died Telling him that Alex needs to be home healing Not out getting drunk and high with you Telling him that she's so sick of the parties that he's throwing So that strangers can come over to the house and use drugs Ladies and gentlemen when you're considering the source of the Xanax I expect the evidence to show that Mr. Pedron was 100% that source And that leads us to the issue of his cell phone Mr. Pedron initially was asked to produce his cell phone to corroborate some of what he was saying about Josie Corroborate some of what he was saying about the Xanax And initially when asked he said no I don't want you to look at it And I know you have a cell bright examiner here who can dump your phone data I'm not going to consent to that because I'm the victim They said okay That's fair we don't need to see anything relevant to you Mr. Pedron We just want you to go through and screenshot anything that you could help You think would help go after Josie Do that for us He claimed constantly to have all sorts of videos that would implicate Josie But never produced them And what the evidence will show is that he didn't produce them because those videos didn't exist It was another bit of the same bluster that you saw there Mr. Pedron threatening to use his videos against Josie when he's clearly the aggressor in those circumstances Later on in September investigator Fritz Leinfelder and DCI Special Agent Adam Frederick met with Mr. Pedron after the preliminary hearing in this case And they told him Derek were you listening to what how you're being portrayed and the questions that were asked at the preliminary hearing It sure sounds like the defense is accusing you of causing Alex Xavier's death So we need to think like defense attorneys and get ahead of this and try to rule you out Would it be okay if we saw your phone now? Despite telling the investigators just minutes earlier That he was still using and had the same phone from February when Alex died He switched course again and said oh that phone The one I just said that I still had Yeah, I broke it and all the day is gone Taken at face value once more And they took him at face value on any number of things Including how Alex broke his leg That brings us to January 2023 Here are the facts that I know about that Fact number one Alex himself told multiple people Family and medical providers That he broke his leg when his sister Araya pushed him down the stairs Fact number two Alex's sister Araya admitted to people Including a forensic interview That she pushed her brother Alex down the stairs Fact number three Alex and Araya's brother Brantley Told interviewers that he witnessed Araya push Alex down the stairs Fact number four Fact number four Mr. Pedron himself told others that it was his impression That Araya had pushed Alex down the stairs Fact number five Josie's son Major in his first interview Said that he wasn't even there for the leg injury But it was his understanding that Araya had pushed Alex down the stairs Fact number six Can you get the screen please Screen please Screen on the lights Screen This is the staircase that Alex fell down As you can see it's not exactly what I would call safe It has 15 to 17 hardwood laminated planks along the staircase The type of planks that are easy to slip on if you're wearing a sock There's no safety railing at any point on the stairway In fact the second half of the stairway doesn't have walls on the other side at all And at the bottom was a hard concrete floor That's the stairway that Alex fell down Thank you Fact number seven The investigators turned to Alex's own medical providers To ask them Is this something that's consistent with a stairfall? You're going to hear the words of orthopedic surgeon Dr. Jonathan Peterson I say the words because tragically he passed away last year in October But we still have his recorded interview This is the surgeon who treated and diagnosed Alex when he came into the hospital He's going to tell you that His words are going to tell you that he's 100% certain That that femur fracture was not the result of direct abuse And for anybody to even get that impression They must have been relying on some designation of neglect Or some other finding in Josie's medical file He told the investigators that it's consistent Possibly with a fall down the stairs Although a number of things could cause that injury He didn't rule that out You're going to hear from Colton Wagner Who was Dr. Peterson's physician assistant Mr. Wagner is going to testify that he concurs absolutely with Dr. Peterson's assessment And as the person who spent the most time with treating Alex Xavier Mr. Peterson is going to say that This did not strike him as evidence of abuse This did not strike him as something otherwise inconsistent with a fall down the stairs The investigators even went out of system To interview medical providers to see could this have been the result of abuse They talked to a man named Dr. William Shaughnessy Extremely experienced orthopedic surgeon Who told them that this is not something he can rule out a stair fall for And this is not something that would immediately be indicative of abuse Those are the facts about this stair fall And they are by and large undisputed So what are you going to hear on the flip side? You heard from Mr. Torbenson that you are going to hear a forensic interview of Josie's son Major In order to understand Major, you need to understand a little bit about his circumstances His father Mark Hellrude and Josie have never gotten along They never lived together or had a relationship after Major was born And it has been one never ending custody battle in family court ever since They had a very nasty covert battle for a period of over three years Where Mark was recording Josie, Josie was recording Mark And all sorts of nasty things were said back and forth to Major about his parents You are going to hear that shortly before Alex's death Because of some decisions that Mark had made Judge Bierke here in La Crosse Granted Josie full physical custody of Major And Mark only had supervised visitations That was something that the family was very very obviously upset about And as luck would have it The exact moment that people were finding out that Alex had died Was the moment that Josie's mother was transferring custody of Major Over to his side of the family And we know that his family began talking to Major immediately About Josie and what must have been going on at home We know that because his grandmother Sharon Called Sergeant Williams so many times That Sergeant Williams said stop Stop talking to the kid We don't want to pollute his memory When Major came in for his first forensic interview He gave a statement that Attorney Torbenson summarized in port But left some other details out And if there's one thing I want you to ask yourselves If you're listening to these statements It's that why isn't this consistent? Why doesn't this make sense? What you're going to see is that Major told details To the investigators that contradicted himself Even within the same interview Saying at one point that Josie was breaking his leg on the floor Another point he was breaking his leg on the bed He made claims that Josie was coming into school And abusing Alex in response to him using ranch dressing Things that are easily debunked He made claims that Josie was able to He made the claim that he was able to observe Josie breaking Alex's leg And under circumstances that are physically impossible In the house in order what he described there And he described findings that are not consistent with what actually appeared on the autopsy Major's story changed significantly between interview number one and interview number two Interview number one he's telling the investigators that he only was aware that Alex had fallen down the stairs and broken his leg Interview number two after talking some more with his family He comes back in and says no I saw mom break his leg by bending it backwards Listen to his testimony It's an important piece of this case But ask yourself those questions Why isn't this consistent? Why doesn't that make sense? Major of course has been in the sole custody of Mark for the last three years Josie hasn't seen him, spoken with him, or interacted with him at all So I don't know what he's going to present But I do know for a fact that the family has been talking negatively about Josie to Major The same thing can be said about Josie's son Brantley Now Brantley's interview is a little bit easier Brantley was described by the law enforcement officers who viewed his forensic interview as appearing to make things up And that's one of the things that Josie loved about him She loved that he had a big imagination that they could tell each other silly stories Here's what he said about Alex's death That his bully from school put poisonous red sprite inside of the drain of their shower That poisonous red sprite came out of the shower drain and into a minecraft cup That Alex then drank and Brantley watched as Alex turned into a green monster And then watched as the green monster died He also claimed that Josie would punish Alex by making him walk outside on his broken leg picking up dog poop There was no dog There was no dog There was no dog poop And finally he claimed that Josie had a cache of a paddle or spoon to beat the children with Along with a cache of diamonds and firearms inside of a secret door in his brother Zaden's room Needless to say that house was searched and there was no cache of diamonds, firearms, and a paddle to beat the children with Listen to Brantley's testimony but ask yourselves why doesn't this make sense? Why isn't this consistent? Why isn't this consistent with the things that we know about this case for sure? And also remember that Brantley and Uriah have been in the sole custody of Derek Pedron for the last three years Neither Josie nor her family has been permitted to see, speak with them, not even send them a Christmas card That's the person that they've been living with I don't know exactly what's been said to them, but I do know the environment that they're in So after Alex fell down the stairs, Josie ran over to see what the commotion was And she saw Alex lying at the bottom of that concrete staircase She picked him up, she brought him upstairs, and she thought, I'm not sure what to do Maybe this isn't as bad as it seems The boys got hurt regularly, wrestling around, you know, riding their bikes down the hill Things like that, and she thought, maybe it's just a sprain Maybe it's a bruise, so what we'll do is we'll lay him down, we'll elevate it We'll put some ice on it, give him some Tylenol, and see if it gets any better It's a plan that Mr. Pedron agreed with when he came back home from work Now, at some point shortly after this leg break, Josie and her family were invited to a birthday party For one of Laura Lee Raines' children in the city of Sparta Josie at that point said, Alex isn't getting better, I want to take him in to the doctor We know that because that's exactly what Laura Lee told the investigators That Josie's wishes were That she wanted to skip the birthday party And bring Alex in for medical care Derek did not He told Laura Lee that Alex's leg was fine And he wanted to stay and get drunk And get drunk he did He was described by witnesses at that party as, quote, beyond wasted And in that state, he physically abused another child Josie's nine-year-old daughter, Jalen He threw off a toy rocking horse so hard that she began crying And as she cried, Derek laughed The other men at the party didn't think that was very funny They took him outside and they beat him up in the street Derek, of course, blamed Josie for being attacked when he came back in from the party Screaming at her that he must have set her up Despite the fact that Josie was in the child's bedroom with Alex and some of the other kids this entire party And his behavior reached the point where Laura Lee, who by the way is now married to Mr. Pedran Told him that they have to get the fuck out of there They got in their car and Laura Lee was certainly concerned about Josie because she sends her a text message shortly afterwards that, "Are you okay?" He wasn't Derek started hitting her Put his hand around her throat Doing this in front of the kids while she's driving the children home We know from Josie's phone records that she had to stop a couple of times Try to get them out Because her phone stops and she's using Google Googling the Sparta Police Department And then later the Onalaska Police Department The jurisdictions that she happened to be in Josie will tell you that Derek eventually convinced her to let him back in the car Saying that if I get arrested, I'll lose my job and then we'll all be homeless It's an excuse that he used frequently She got them all back home and there Derek did to her exactly what he wanted to do in the vehicle He beat her to a pulp He beat her to the point that she couldn't get herself off of the floor Now, after a while it was ultimately Josie who made the decision to bring Alex into urgent care Derek had the opportunity and he chose not to do it He didn't make it very easy on her He controlled access to the family's vehicle Josie is somebody who had to go out and borrow a vehicle from her friend Ted He had to get all the kids in there, pick Alex up and bring him over to urgent care And she didn't do this without some apprehension Because Josie, as you'll hear, has a history of neglecting another child I am not going to sugar coat this at all Between 2011 and 2013, Josie and her partner at the time, Dustin Barnes Had three young kids, she was between 19 and 20 years old during this time frame And during that time, they were both addicted to drugs All that they cared about was getting their next fix Josie will be the first one to tell you that she wasn't a mother at all to any of her kids in that position And as a result, Dustin's young daughter, Haley, ended up getting seriously injured And needed to be hospitalized on a couple of occasions Now, what you need to know about this case Is that Josie and Dustin were both prosecuted for neglect as part of a crime Meaning that they failed to take good care of her Josie and Dustin pleaded guilty to neglect because they are in fact guilty Josie herself would tell you that in 2013 she would never call herself a mother But later on, as she got her sobriety under control As she got into a better life and a better mindset She grew into the mother that she wanted to be Now, you're going to hear that every single person Who was in and out of that split-level home with Josie and Dustin was interviewed And every single one of them told the police that they never saw Josie physically abusing Haley This was not a case involving physical, intentional abuse It was a case involving failure to appropriately supervise and care for that child Judge Levine will give you some careful instructions on this And he's going to tell you that the one thing that you can't use this evidence for Is what we're perhaps most inclined to do You cannot assume that because Josie and Dustin didn't take good care of Dustin's daughter in 2013 That it makes it more likely that she physically abused or murdered Alex in 2023 You're going to have a very limited set of circumstances that you can use this to consider Including identity or modus operandi Which Judge Levine will explain to you And the legislature says that this is relevant So you should listen to it But what you should also consider is asking yourselves What does this tell us about the big questions here? How did Alex die and who's responsible for it? I submit to you that it tells us nothing at all I'm going to be open and honest about it Because there's nothing to hide in this situation And I'm going to tell you that the witnesses will testify As to Josie's parenting abilities in 2013 And compared to 2023 We'll say that they're light years of difference In 2023 she was a good mom Who loved her kids Who always put them first And she was that way because she completed an intensive drug treatment program She got herself sober She completed probation successfully She learned to parent and live on her own without drugs Dustin unfortunately didn't make it He overdosed and died But the Josie that was in 2023 Was nowhere near the Josie that did these things to Haley in 2013 Now, after Alex broke his leg He went into urgent care And Josie was nervous about that because of her history of neglect It's something that's in her medical file It's something that's come up before And what you're going to see is that she was right to be nervous about that For whatever reason Mayo records their provider phone calls And you're going to get a chance to hear what they were saying about Josie Based on that designation in her file That her sentence was too light That she's a bad mom That she shouldn't have had any more kids being such a bad mom And they immediately called CPS and the police to come in and investigate Alex As a suspicious case Josie cooperated with CPS She talked to them She gave them some information about Alex's injuries They cooperated throughout the course of the CPS investigation And at one point as you're going to hear The worker Sarah Wagner Barton talked to Alex about discipline in the home Who's the only person that Alex said was hitting him in that home? Eric Pedran He didn't say a word about Josie spanking or hurting him Nevertheless they were given a choice to transfer to a higher level of care They were given a choice between Gundersen here in La Crosse and Mayo in Rochester It was Derek who insisted on switching hospital systems and bringing Alex to Gundersen And once they got there he blamed everything on Josie He berated her Said that this is your fault that he got injured A real mother would have been watching their children every second of the day And they should never get hurt He's screaming at her that this is her fault that CPS is involved And if the kids get taken away she's going to be the one that's to blame He berated her to the point that she locked herself sobbing in the bathroom in Alex's hospital room And we know what she's telling Or know what she's feeling during this time frame Because she's sending Facebook messages to Derek Saying stop blaming me I am only here for Alex I'm only concerned about him getting better But I don't want to be abused I am so sick of your abuse I am so sick of the fact That you lied to the woman from Child Protective Services And said that you weren't abusive to any of us This is what she's saying in her private moments to Mr. Pedron Under circumstances that she never believed Would one day be projected in a first degree intentional homicide case Alex was released the following day And it didn't take Derek long to go back to his normal ways Just one day after Alex was released He got into an argument with Josie About her not wanting to be with him And he started grabbing Alex and saying My son is not going anywhere with you It's something that he commonly did That he would punish Josie by saying He's not your son He's my son And I can do whatever I want with him And in the process of this argument Derek tried dragging Alex outside On his broken leg In the January snow To the point that Josie texted him and said You take Alex out like that in your condition Everything is on the table to CPS He needs to be at home healing Not out getting drunk and high with you The following day Derek threw a party Where he invited his strangers over To come over and get drunk and use drugs Josie again texts him saying I'm so sick of the way that you treat Alex He needs to be healing And I'm so uncomfortable in my own home And indeed Josie was at a particularly dangerous time Of her relationship with Derek Because she had planned to leave him She was serious about leaving him She was finally getting up the nerve To walk away from that horribly abusive relationship And she told Derek that repeatedly She told him that they're broken up That she's not taking him back That she doesn't want anything to do with him That once gentle love Alex's mother got out of prison That she and her family Would be able to help take care of Alex Knowing that he'd be safe Derek didn't like that And the violence escalated in kind November 19th of 2022 Less than three months before Alex died Derek beat up and strangled Josie And was arrested for strangulation Domestic battery And domestic disorderly conduct He had again gotten into an argument with Josie Saying that she can't take Alex with her To a rummage sale Because he's his son Josie took the other kids to the rummage sale Came back And when she returned Derek and Alex were still there Alex was on the floor eating a bag of chips And Derek was passed out completely Next to him on the living room floor She got the kids upstairs quietly Because she knew what happened next Eventually Derek woke up When Josie was trying to cook them A real dinner Other than just chips And in Derek's mind Josie was at fault Because she used hamburger meat That he had purchased with his own money He beat her up He strangled her He hit her He did the same thing to Alex As Josie said in that 911 call And then he was eventually arrested Derek was released the next day And that's the next time that she saw him There was never any no contact condition Criminal bond Or restraining order That would keep him away He would violate them all And as Josie became more and more apparent That she's not taking him back That when things are sorted with Alex When things are sorted with their lease That she's out of there with the kids He became more and more flustered He became more and more desperate You're going to see the text Documenting this violence escalating Leading up to Alex's death February 1st, 2023 10 days before Alex died Josie texts Derek that she's so frightened of him She doesn't know what she can say or do Or where she can go in her own home That won't provoke violence from him She's too scared to even go to sleep in her own home Because of his behavior The text continues saying that she's scared of how He treats Alex throughout this period of time He tells Derek is arrested again On February 7th of 2023 This one we have video of You're going to see it You're going to see how Derek looked And how he acted And you're going to see that Derek is visibly drunk And high out of his mind The kids are huddled around Josie in that bedroom They look scared And Derek's in there saying You need to fix this relationship with me You need to be an adult And work things out with me And when Josie says no He turns to the children His own young children And screams Your mom's a whore He tells Josie that he hopes that she dies He pulls down this curtain That she has put up As kind of a makeshift door of her bedroom And he screams at Josie's daughter Jalen Your dad is dead And Josie murdered him Jalen didn't know that her biological father Had passed away at that point That was the first that she found out He screams at Josie's son Major That Josie is the reason He doesn't get to see his father anymore Because she f***ed him over in family court And the behavior kept up Until Josie was able to call 911 Mr. Pedran ran He usually did And the police were able to coax him out of the woods Where he had run into And take him into jail The next day he was released by Judge Scott Horne Here in La Crosse With a condition on his bond Not to return home Not to have contact with Josie The next time that Josie saw him was immediately after he was released There was never a condition that would keep him away And Josie even texted Derek saying When she learned that he was home saying You really need to be following the no contact He didn't care It was his home It was his family He was going to do whatever he wants Which brings us to February 10th of 2023 Josie wasn't feeling particularly well that day She had a UTI that was causing her to pee blood She was recovering from COVID She didn't have her thyroid medications And she was feeling out of sorts Rather than loading up all the kids Who had a day off from school that day And bringing them into urgent care She struck a compromise She spoke with her mother Asked her to take two of the kids overnight Because having three kids at home Would be easier than having five kids at home She told Or she asked her friend Laura Lee To bring her some spare antibiotics Hoping that that would knock the UTI out She was able to make a McDonald's run And get some McDonald's lunch But despite feeling under the weather She was actually pretty optimistic Because she had been introduced to a man Rafael Porfiero By way of his daughter At that birthday party in Sparta Where Derek had gotten beaten up She had the impression that this would be a good man Somebody who would treat her well Somebody who would treat the children well And she just wanted to get to know him He hadn't even met the man yet But the two of them were planning a first date the next day She's Googling good places to get coffee near me She's Googling some phrases to flirt with him She's taking some flirty pictures And sending them to him And she's talking to Laura Lee You know, excited that she's meeting somebody That might be somebody better than Derek Pedron Nobody who interacted with Josie on February 10th of 2023 Described her as angry They certainly didn't describe her as angry or upset with Alex Josie will tell you that when she saw Alex She didn't see Jenna, his mother She didn't see Derek, his father She saw Alex The sweet little boy that she had grown to love And that's how she appeared to everybody who interacted with her on that day Derek, on the other hand, wasn't having such a good day He was arguing with Josie over Facebook Messenger most of the afternoon And when he got home, some point shortly after 5:00, he was primed for a fight Only the first person that he encountered wasn't Josie It was Alex And Alex had done something that in Derek's mind was unforgivable Derek came over and saw that Alex had had an accident in his pants He hadn't been feeling well He'd been throwing up for a couple of days The family was getting over COVID And he had about a diarrhea Josie's going to tell you that that's no big deal for her She has 5 other kids She's cleaned up lots and lots of accidents And with Alex, she would try to get him to the bathroom in time But if he couldn't, that would be okay She would just clean him up And she would talk to him about giving her a little bit of notice Before she needed to use the restroom Derek didn't react that way He grabbed Alex hard by the arm Dragged him out of the bed that he was sitting on And screamed at him You know where the bathroom is He dragged Alex, kicking and screaming, into the bathroom And slammed the door shut behind him And inside of that bathroom, Josie could hear the sounds of three distinct things One, the sound of Derek screaming You're too old to be in your pants You know where the bathroom is You trying to piss me off Two, the sound of something being slammed or slapped around inside of that bathroom She couldn't see it exactly But it sure sounded consistent with her experiences of Derek beating her And sound number three, the sound of Alex screaming and crying When Derek and Alex emerged from the bathroom Alex was red all over his body He had tears and snot coming down his face And it was more than apparent that Derek had beat him inside of that bathroom Derek got him cleaned up Put him into a pair of pull-up diapers And we know that the accident happened at that time Because Alex's soiled underwear is still visible in the only bathtub in the home the next day They put him into a pair of pajamas Had him sit up and watch TV in Josie's room where he regularly relaxed and hung out That was the condition that Josie saw him in You might ask, why didn't she stop him? The answer is what it always was Anytime she intervened, she got it from Derek Only usually worse She knew that she was going to get the crap beaten out of her And she was scared of this man When she saw Alex, she had no reason to believe That this was anything that was potentially life-threatening Because that was their reality He'd beat them up, they'd recover, and he'd do it again She had no clue that Alex may have been suffering from internal injuries at that point in time At some point shortly after that, there was a knock at the door What Josie and Derek didn't know was that at about 6:30 that day One of Jenna's cousins had called in a welfare check One of the things that she said in the welfare check Was that Derek wasn't supposed to be at the house And we know that he's here So we want Alex on our side of the family You're going to hear that Derek had expressly prohibited Jenna, the child's mother's side of the family From seeing or having contact with Alex Because he didn't like the way that they interacted with Alex And since Jenna was in prison As a result of attacking Josie with a baseball bat in Missouri They wanted to try and secure Alex's custody They wanted to make sure that he was okay When the police arrived, Derek knew that they were there for them He told Josie that she had to go to the front door and lie They don't tell him I'm here I don't want to go to jail I don't want to get arrested I don't want to lose my job Josie's not going to lie to you She's going to say that she lied to the police She went out there and she did it The reason is why Because if she hadn't done what Derek did She knew he was getting out the next day And she knew that he was going to give her the beating That he wanted to give her in that moment She lied for him regularly under those circumstances She lied about a 911 hang-up call in Houston County Where the police arrived after Derek had beaten her in front of the children And said one of the kids accidentally did this Because he was sitting there threatening to kill them all So Josie lied to the police She sat and talked to Sergeant Kernine for approximately 15 minutes Outside of the door to the home before he came back in And in this timeframe, the 15 minutes that she was talking to Sergeant Kernine We know that Alex went from upright and watching television To nearly comatose by the time that Sergeant Kernine came in Now there are a couple of different possibilities that you're going to hear about In the course of this trial Number one is that the medical evidence suggests the possibility that Alex had a concussion From whatever had happened inside of that bathroom Number two, the medical evidence suggests that somebody had administered him a Xanax Causing him to be in that state in such a short period of time I don't know exactly what happened in those 15 minutes But what I do know is in the 15 minutes between that change in status The only adult near Alex was Derek, not Josie He was up front talking to the police During the welfare check, Sergeant Kernine shines a flashlight in Alex's face He says, "Mom, I'm scared" Josie holds his hand She covers him She's there for him like any other mom would be Derek doesn't ask about Alex at all When he's eventually arrested, his only concerns were smoking a cigarette And how quickly he could get out of jail the next day With Derek in jail, Josie's night was going to be a little bit easier They got the kids ready for bed The three kids that were still there And they all laid down on Josie's bed as they commonly did To go to sleep together and watch some movies Brantley and Alex in particular like movies by the Olsen twins Because people thought that they were twins With how similar the two of them looked We know what Josie was doing during this time frame And we know what her mood was like Because there's nothing in there to suggest that she was angry or upset Or thinking of murdering Alex In fact, she had arranged with her mother to take Alex and the other two kids For a couple hours the next day to show if she could go on this first date She's excited about her date She's texting back and forth with this man She's trying to get to know him She's Googling good date ideas She's talking to her friend Laura Lee About how excited she is to meet this man And at a certain point in time We know that she's taking these adorable selfie pictures With her son Brantley laying next to her in bed Can I get the screen up again please? This ladies and gentlemen Is what Josie Dyckman looked like In the same bed In the same bedroom At the same time that the state alleges That she murdered her other child Thank you We know that there was nothing unusual on Josie's phone Suggesting some anger or disturbance We know that she ended on a high note With speaking with Laura Lee And we know that Laura Lee herself Heard Alex say that he was waiting for Alex to Or he was waiting for Josie to go to sleep So he could get up and get into things It's a bit of a joke between him and Josie But with every good joke There's always more than a kernel of truth This is something that Alex was well known to do He liked the adventure of sneaking around And getting into the stuff That the adults wouldn't let him have Usually it was just harmless Candy, Red Bull, ice cream sandwiches Josie had even texted Derek After he broke his leg saying One of us really needs to be awake with him Or by him at all times Because he was sneaking around last night And I'm worried that he's going to fall and re-injure his leg Like please do something about this Derek When I'm not around And make sure that he's not getting hurt Josie had no idea that that would be the last thing that Alex ever said She had no idea that Alex knew where Derek had stored his Xanax Now we know that Josie slept for about six hours from her cell phone Had a motion detector on it And you can tell if it's being held or moved around And there was no activity She slept from about three until about nine a.m. And when she woke up There's nothing in her cell phone activity that remotely suggested That she had just beaten a child to death the night before She's going about the ordinary course of business Responding to some innocuous text message About a swing that her friend Laura Lee had sent her Saying that it would be a good sensory tool for her autistic child The only time that we can figure out that something wrong was happening Was after the fact that Josie looks over and sees only two kids in the bed They had staged themselves as Josie with her right to the side Brantley, Alex, and then Brantley, Araya, and then Alex at the very end The reason that Alex was on the end was because With his broken leg they wanted to have a walker available for him So that if he needed to get up at night She could get to him without hopefully waking the other two kids up And when she looked over she saw that Alex was missing Thought, where did he go? What happened to him? Did he fall down trying to go to the bathroom? Did he try to get someplace else in the house? Did he fall off the bed? And when she got up and walked around the bed She saw Alex And it was immediately apparent to her that Alex was gone He was cold, pallid The blood was pooling in his face already He was already in the beginning of rigor mortis Where the body stiffens up She very quickly got the other two kids out of the room And she frantically tried to remember some CPR lesson she had taken when she was young Pushing on his chest but having no result Foam came out of Alex's mouth as she did so And Josie formed the initial impression He must have gotten into her medications She panicked, she sobbed, she held him, she told him how sorry she was For not being awake when he had gotten into whatever he had gotten into She picked him up and put him on the bed Cried with him some more Because she knew that would be the last time that she ever got a chance to hold Alex And yes, she panicked and called her mother first But it was more than apparent at that point That there was nothing to be done with Alex When Josie called 9-1-1 she told the first responders That exactly what her impression was The only thing she could think of from that night Was that Alex had gotten into her pills Josie's bedroom was kind of a pigsty She had a lot of empty pill containers around And what you're going to hear is it wasn't unusual for the kids to use these pill containers To build towers and crash their car toys into them That sort of thing So it wasn't unusual to have these bottles around But she did fear that Alex had gotten into either her current medications for traumatic brain injury Brain injury that Mr. Pedran gave her in an act of domestic abuse That was aggravated by being hit in the head with a baseball bat by Alex's mother Jenna She had medications for pain, for seizures, for cognitive abilities that she kept by her nightstand And then she had a huge duffel bag full of either half full or empty pill containers inside of that She didn't really check with that, she didn't really look in that The kids knew to stay away from that But in her mind that was the only connection that she could make Josie can't tell you how long that the pills have been on the bottom of that bag But she can tell you that that was not an uncommon occurrence if she's looking for something else And the pills come out and they're just on the bottom of the duffel bag But she certainly didn't stage that scene to make it look like an overdose death With a bottle of prednisone Now she cooperated with law enforcement at the scene She gave a statement to Sergeant Williams She told her that she believed it was her fault Because she believed that Alex had gotten into her prescription medications She didn't think about what Derek had done the night before It wasn't even on her radar Because this was such a normal thing in that house That it didn't register as a potentially lethal injury She allowed Sergeant Williams to access her phone She unlocked the form She gave it to him Because she felt that she had nothing to hide And Sergeant Williams was able to look at her cell phone content He was able to look and see that she's not Googling how to remove DNA evidence How to make a homicide look like a drug overdose Josie felt that she had nothing to hide And she believed that overdose was the most likely explanation Which is why she said that But the banner in which she presented it Was why the police initially targeted Josie They said she's not emotional enough She's given us details that we think are a little bit fishy Not knowing about this brain condition or how it was caused So they formed this theory that Josie had killed him and staged the scene You're going to hear that four days After the state crime laboratory gets back DNA evidence That excludes Ms. Dykeman entirely From that pill bottle that was supposedly staged And includes Alex Xavier As well as one if not more [02:03:02] Speaker 1: That's a mischaracterization of the DNA evidence Her DNA was not tested against that container That's a mischaracterization [02:03:09] Speaker 2: That absolutely was tested against that container [02:03:14] Speaker 8: Tell you what, go on over We'll see what the evidence proves This is not evidence ladies and gentlemen This is just the opening statement They ignored the fact that Josie was in bed [02:03:27] Speaker 2: With two children Both of whom said they didn't notice their mother Or their brother being beaten Or drugged to death the night before They ignored the fact that Josie's phone data Suggested nothing of her planning to plot Or stage the scene And they ignored an important piece of evidence Pill fragments that were collected on Alex's pillow They were photographed, they were measured, they were seized And then the investigators took those pillow fragments Which are incredibly important to determining whether or not This was staged with some inert substance Or if it was Xanax Consistent with Alex getting into the Xanax They put it in an evidence locker and they never tested it They simply assumed the worst about Josie And they assumed the worst about Josie Despite the fact that the DNA evidence shows that her DNA was not on that pill bottle Ignoring the facts inconsistent with your theory Doesn't make them disappear ladies and gentlemen But what we had after this is this myth of the wicked stepmother This myth that Josie treated Alex like somebody Some somewhat more poorly than her own Everyone who knew her in the situation said that wasn't the case Mr. Pedron's own comments on how Josie treated Alex Were that his impression was that she might have been treated He might have been treated slightly different Because Alex got less screen time on TV than the other kids That was his impression That was the extent that she was described as treating any of the children differently It's easy to take any of these comments about Alex that you're going to hear And take them out of context with a single remark And everybody who knew Josie knew that she loved that little boy like her own Everybody who described Alex said that he was attached to her by the hip Josie was the one who was reaching out to the schools when Alex was being bullied Trying to make sure that that problem was solved Josie was the one reaching out to the schools so that they had a special birthday party Because he had been born in July and she wanted to make sure he could bring in treats and feel special Josie is the one who's taking him to the dentist when he needed the dental work done She's the one who's cooking and cleaning for him She is the one who contacted the school and makes sure that he had enough water bottles and chapsticks So they didn't get dehydrated during the day And I think the moments in which you have the most You demonstrate the most how you feel about a child Are the moments where you think that nobody's listening Where nobody's watching And in Josie's case you're going to see footage from a Walmart She takes Alex and she gingerly places him to a shopping cart She's pushing him around carefully with her younger daughter Araya She opens up a bag of crackers for Alex to eat when they go into the grocery store And then at the checkout counter when her daughter Araya comes back with a sucker for herself She sends Araya back to make sure that Alex had one too These are the moments where no one was watching These are the moments that demonstrate how Josie felt about this kid Derek Hollerber was panicked When he got out of jail he met Josie at the Analaska McDonald's And he immediately ordered to do three things Number one, don't talk about his abuse Number two, don't talk about his substance abuse And number three, delete all of your phone content and make sure that the police can't get it He was particularly angry when Josie told him that she had already given her phone to Sergeant Williams Derek throughout the course of this manipulated, destroyed, and intimidated witnesses and evidence You're going to hear one in particular a very big attempt at manipulating the witnesses against him in this particular case You're going to hear that Derek continued to threaten Josie He threatened to kill her We know this because she's texting him in response to that You're going to hear that Derek broke into Josie and Becky's home where Josie was staying after Alex died And beat her and strangled her in the middle of the night in front of her brother Gabe Gabe's a big guy He was able to break it up He was able to get Derek out of there But at the end of that he stayed with Josie that night because he knew how scared she was of Derek You're going to hear that Derek immediately tried to take possession of SD cards With evidence on there of him harming Alex And you're going to hear that Derek himself is the one who repeatedly told law enforcement that the cameras were his If Derek denies that we have him recorded a dozen different ways over saying that it was his cameras that he was using to record people in the home In fact Josie will tell you that Derek was using those cameras to monitor her at home while he was at work Talking to her over the loudspeaker asking her where she was going or what she was doing Derek took the step eventually to record some calls trying to trip Josie up He worked with the script with the police and you're going to hear that Mr. Pedron tried to get Josie to admit that she had done something to Alex The state doesn't play these calls for you I will Because they demonstrate exactly what her mindset is at that time They demonstrate that Ms. Daigman had no idea what had happened to Alex That she had no clue that somebody might have beaten him to death Her mindset at that point was still that Alex had gotten into her prescriptions And when Derek tells her lies to her and says there's no pills in her stomach and he didn't die of an overdose You can hear the audible sob in her voice saying I'm so relieved I'm so relieved this wasn't me I'm so relieved that he didn't get into my medication Listen to those calls ladies and gentlemen and ask yourselves Is this the mindset of somebody who believes that they had murdered or drugged a child to death the night before? As this case goes on you're going to have to ask yourself four more primary questions Number one can Derek be ruled out beyond a reasonable doubt as Alex's abuser? This is the only man who's been witnessed abusing Alex The only one who's been video recorded doing so The only one who's admitted to doing so to investigators And the only one who Alex himself told investigators was spanking or hitting him That's the man the state has to rule out Question number two can anyone rule out accidental Xanax overdose as the cause of death? You're going to hear from two pathologists including the states who are both going to say they cannot Question number three can Derek Pedron be ruled out as the source of the Xanax that killed Alex Xavier? I expect the evidence to more than establish that Derek cannot be ruled out Question number four Does the state's theory make sense in light of the motives attributed to Ms. Dykeman? There's this myth of the wicked stepmother There's this myth of the monster But three years after the fact Josie's finally going to be able to tell somebody the rest of this story These are emotional cases ladies and gentlemen You don't check your humanity at the door when you put on those juror badges It's okay to feel sympathy It's okay to feel empathy It's okay to grieve for Alex's loved ones and for Alex himself But at the same time as you're doing that Please, please, keep the logical sides of your brain turned on And use that as the thought process for evaluating this evidence Because I promise you when you're looking at the facts rather than the feelings You're going to have some questions You're going to have some concerns Every single person is in this room for just one reason Myself and my team The state and their team Judge Levine, the court staff and the 14 EU That's because the woman sitting next to us She says that she's innocent She says that she didn't do this And at the close of this trial I'll ask you to return with the only proper verdicts Those if not guilty Thank you