349: Sherrice Iverson

Primm, Nevada was alive with neon and noise on 25 May, 1997, but inside the glittering casino, one small detail flickered across the security monitors - a little girl wandering alone. She slipped past rows of slot machines and bright carpet patterns, eventually disappearing into the women’s restroom. She never came back out.

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Speaker 1: How much am I supposed to to sit down and

cry about this?

Speaker 2: I mean, I mean, let's be reasonable.

Speaker 1: Here is my life supposed to halt for like for days,

weeks and months on end.

Speaker 3: On the road to Last Vegas. Just after the lineast

hill in California, that are three casinos. They straddle Interstate

fifteen at prim Nevada, beckoning eager gamblers with bright lights,

cheap buffets and arcades for the kids. It's forty miles

from the strip right there on the state line. The

three casinos, Whisky Peats, Buffalo Bills, and the Prima Donna

Resort were all owned by Prima Donna Resorts, Incorporated in

nineteen ninety seven. Together, they offered almost three thousand rooms.

These weren't just pit stops for travelers heading to Vegas.

They were destinations in themselves, built entirely on business drawn

off the main interstate linking southern California and Las Vegas.

What was once a small bar and gas station had

transformed into a major attraction. Buffalo Bills boasted one of

the tallest roller coasters in America, the Desperado, with the

two hundred and twenty five foot drop that made grown

men's scream. There was a new twenty seven million dollar

golf course, restaurants, entertainment venues, and stairs nestled in the basement,

video arcades for the children. Over three hundred surveillance cameras

monitored these three resorts. There were eyes everywhere, watching the

slot machines, the poker tables, the cash cages, the corridors.

In the early morning hours of May twenty fifth, ninety

ninety seven, these cameras picked up a little girl. Her

father had told her to step poot in the arcade

while he gambled and drank, but she didn't. The cameras

observed her moving throughout the resort. She was seen playing

in the arcade, running around the fire, her small frame

darting between the flashing machines and cigarette smoke. At some point,

she curled up in the driver's seat of a race

card game called Final Lap and fell asleep. Close to

four am. The cameras captured her heading into the women's

restroom near the arcade, but they never captured her leaving.

Charise Iverson was born on the twentieth of October nineteen

eighty nine. Her mother, Ulander ma'am Weell, was just sixteen

years old at the time. Her father, Leroy Iverson, was

forty six. Land and Leroy were never married, but they

lived together in south central Los Angeles. By nineteen ninety seven,

Orlanda and Leroy were estranged. Orlando was working as a

cafeteria worker, trying to make ends made in a city

that didn't make survival easy for a young single mother.

Leroy had custody of Charise. They lived together with Harold,

LeRoy's fourteen year old son from another relationship. Harold and

Cherise were seven years apart in age, but they shared

a very close bond. He saw himself as his sister's protector,

but the family carried ghosts, tragedies that seemed to follow

Leroy like a shadow. On the seventh of June nineteen

eighty eight, more than a year before Series was born,

Ulanda and LeRoy's son John to Leroy Manuel, was still born.

The baby never took a breath. Then, in July of

nineteen ninety two, the mother of another one of his

children died during childbirth from a hemorrhage. The child from

that birth, Jonathan Jordan, died just seventeen months later from

massive brain swelling caused by bacterial meningitis. His death had

come just wakes after the District Attorney's office declined to

file child abuse charges against Leroy. A hospital worker reported

him after Jonathan sustained second and third degree burns on

his hands. The case landed on the desk of Detective

Angela Rivers. She investigated. The burns appeared to be caused

by scalding tap water from a water heater whose temperature

was set too high. Medical evidence was incoclin as to

the cause of the burns. Without proof, the case was dropped.

Some people who knew the family said that these tragedies

made Lee Roy more protective over Charise. People said that

because of the dangers in their working class neighborhood, he

forbade Charise from playing outside. He drove her to school

each morning and picked her up afterwards, always arriving twenty

minutes early so she wouldn't have to wait alone. Cherise

was a second grader at seventy fifth Street Elementary School

in Los Angeles. The principal, Joyce Cooper, would later remember

her fondly. She was a very sweet girl, and she

was a very good student. Her teachers remembered her as affectionate, trusting,

and open. She attended school with neatly braided hair and

in attractive clothes. She was always clean, always cared for.

She adored jumping rope on the playground. She was obsessed

with a Little Mermaid, watching it over and over until

she knew every word to every song. Like many children

her age, she had big dreams for what she might

become when she grew up. She told people she wanted

to be a policewoman, maybe a nurse, or a dancer

who performed on stage. She was scared of the dark.

She struggled with raiding, finding out words slowly, but she

was giving it her best shot. She was learning. While

Leroy had custody of Charise, Orlando was in the process

of fighting for custody through the courts. She wanted her

daughter back. She was working and saving money, trying to

prove to the family court system that she could provide

a stable home for her daughter. Neither parent could have

known that time was running out. The Memorial Day weekend

of nineteen ninety seven would be Charise's last. It was

just after midnight on the twenty fifth of May nineteen

ninety seven when Lee Roy arrived in Prim, around fifty

miles southwest of Las Vegas. He headed the Buffalo Bill's

Hotel Casino, which was owned by Prima Donna Resorts, Incorporated.

But Leroy wasn't alone. He was with seven year old

Cheries and fourteen year old Harold. The drive from south

central Los Angeles had taken them through the desert, mile

after mile of empty highway. Interstate fifteen runs like a

spine through that landscape, connecting California to Nevada, and at

the state line, rising from the flat expanse of Ivan Path,

Dry Lake sits Prim. In nineteen ninety seven, Prim wasn't

much of a town. It was three casino hotels clustered

at the border. They existed for one reason alone, to

catch the gamblers heading to or from Las Vegas, to

offer them one more chance at the tables before they

crossed back into California. Buffalo Bills was the newest of

the three, opened just three years earlier in nineteen ninety four.

It exterior was styled like something from the Old West,

a frontier fantasy, complete with wooden facades and in the

Young Cowboy the Desperado roller coaster wrapped around the building.

There was an arcade, a movie theater, a buffalo shaped

swimming pool. The casino marketed itself as family friendly, a

place where parents could gamble while their children entertained themselves.

Leroy Iverson was fifty seven years old. By some accounts,

he had what his brother would later describe as gambling fever.

This was in his first trip to Prim. It had

become something of a routine, the late night drive across

the desert. The casinos opened twenty four hours, time measured

not by clocks, but by how long the money lasted.

He didn't book a room. The three of them, Leroy, Harald,

and Cherise arrived at a round twelve thirty in the

morning that Memorial Day weekend. Leroy headed straight to the

slow machines. He expected Harold, at fourteen years old, to

look after his younger sister. Jerise was seven. She had

dark hair and a massive smile. That night, she was

dressed in a blue sailor dress and black cowboy boots.

The casino floor was no place for a child, certainly

not at that or, but the arcade downstairs was designed

precisely for situations like this. It was for kids who

needed somewhere to bey while their parents played the slots.

It was non smoking, filled with video games and flashing lights,

the kind of place meant to keep children occupied and

out of the way. But Cherise didn't stay put. Throughout

the night, casino security found her wandering. She was in

the arcade, then on the casino floor, drifting between the

maze of slot machines. It was around one thirty a m.

When security first found her. They tracked on her father

and Harold went together. Her Security told lee Roy they

needed to leave, so he and the children crossed the

highway over the prim Valley, where Leroy headed back to

the slots. Cherise and Harold made their way to the arcade,

but again Charise didn't stay put. Security there escorted her

back to their father. He sent her back to the

arcade with her brother. Security found Charis alone again. At

one point, she even dozed off on the sede of

an arcade game. Then she wandered off again. Each time

security returned her to Leroy or Harold. One final time,

Charise and Harold headed back down to the arcade. It

was a Memorial Day weekend, the casino was busy. Leroy

stayed at the slot machines on the floor above, and

somewhere in the maze of video games and flashing screens,

seven year old Charise waited for the night to end.

She had no way of knowing it never would. The

arcade was loud in the way that only Casanos know

how to make things loud. It wasn't oppressive, but constant,

a white noise of electronic chirps and digital explosions designed

to keep you from thinking too much about the time.

Cheries moved between the machines. At some point after three am,

Harold lost track of her. He later said she was

playing on one of the arcade games, but when he

looked up, she was gone. The arcade wasn't enormous, but

the rows of machines created a small labyrinth. It was

easy for a child to slip out of sight in seconds.

Harold searched for her. He checked the arcade, calling out

his sister's name, but it was clear she wasn't there.

He then headed back upstairs to the casino floor. He

thought that maybe she had wandered back to their father,

but Leroy was alone, still drinking and still playing the

swap machines. Harold then went back downstairs to say if

his sister had re emerged. Maybe she'd been at the restroom,

but Cherise wasn't in the arcade. It was now after

three point thirty in the morning. The arcade was much

quieter than it had been earlier. There were few families

and fewer children. The people who remained with a kind

that stayed until it was dawn. Harold kept looking for

his sister. He then approached staff and asked if they

had seen her, but nobody had. Around thirty minutes later,

Harold went back upstairs to his father to say he

couldn't find Cherise. The response wasn't immediate panic. It wasn't

uncommon for children to wander at the casino, and security

had already returned Charise to her brother multiple times that night.

There was a swimming pool, a movie theater. Cherise could

have wandered off there, but it soon became clear that

Cherise wasn't in any of those places. It was now

five a m. After all of the regular spots were searched,

Leroy asked a female employee to check the women's restroom.

It was the only other place that Cherise could be.

Either she was in there or she had left the premises.

The employee entered and called out Jerise's name that she

was met with silence. The employee glanced at the stalls.

They were all open except for one, the disabled one.

Underneath the stall, she could see fate as if somebody

was sitting on the toilet. She knocked on the door

several times that nobody made a noise. The feet didn't move.

She slowly pushed open the stall door. Inside with Cherise.

She was sitting on the toilet with her head slumped

against the stall beside her. She was dressed in that

same sailor dress, but her underwear was off. Race was dead.

She had been sexually assaulted, beaten, and then strangled to death.

Under Nevada law, cameras were prohibited in the restrooms, so

detectives began to review other surveillance footage and speak with

guests at the casino. That night. There were a handful

of people who reported seeing two young men with charies

near the arcade in the early morning. Ours white males

in their late teens or early twenties. One was clean

shaven with short, light brown to blonde hair. He was

dressed in a basketball cap that he wore backwards. The

other had dark short hair with sideburns. He was dressed

in a dark colored polo shirt and dark knee length shorts.

The men had chatted with several guests in the casino

that night. The one with the baseball cap had even

shown off his nipple and tongue piercings. Casual, comfortable, drawing,

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wasn't long before detectives found the two men on the

surveillance footage. They could be seen several times throughout the night,

playing the slots, hanging out in the arcade. At some

point they seemed to strike up a conversation with Charise.

They were playful with her. At one point, the man

in the baseball cap handed her something, perhaps a token

for the games. Then he started to play hide and

seek with her. One detective remarked, if you look at

the entire tape, it doesn't look like she's afraid of him.

He spends some time with her, gaining her trust. At

three pin forty eight am, Charise was spotted on the surveillance.

She headed to the women's rest just beyond the video games.

She was followed in there by the young man dressed

in a baseball cap. About a minute later, the second

man approached the restroom. He went inside, but quickly came

back out. Twenty five minutes later, the first man re

emerged from the women's restroom. Inside. Charis lay dead. About

ten minutes later, the two men left Prim Valley through

the swimming pool entrance. Sergeant Bill Keaton said of the footage,

from my viewing of the videotapes, this is purely a

predator situation. We have her running into the bathroom, playing

hide and seek in that type of thing, and the

suspects are using several ploys to get her in there.

The footage was grainy, but detectives hope that by releasing

it somebody could identify the two men. Further surveillance was

then analyzed and it showed the men's movements before the murder.

They were seen in the arcades of all three hotels

Prim Valley, whiskey pets and buffalo bills. Detective scent the

flower with the suspects photographs to place throughout the West.

Someone somewhere had to recognize these faces. While the search

for the two men was ongoing, many people turned their

anger towards Leroy Iverson. At the time, the issue of

children's safety was rising as more families were vacationing in

Las Vegas. The Convention in Visitors Authority said that in

the past year, about three million people, or eleven percent

of the total number of visitors, brought their children to

Las Vegas. Two years earlier, only six percent did. Nevada

child seekers and other child advocates said that casinos did

an adequate job of providing supervision. County Authority said that

they were asked just three to five times a month

to pick up lost children at casinos, but Nevada law

forbade children from loitering near gambling areas. Yet the statutes

remained silent on the level of Cassano supervision over these

young guests. Most were just sent to arcades in the

basement and told the step put Kimlin's for the guest

at the casino remarked normally I would have left them

here alone. Now I'm really nervous. Alan Feldman, the vice

president and smokesman for Mirage Resorts, commented, the first and

most significant line of protection is the action of parents.

I think that this case clearly relates to the problems

in society in general. There is no longer a place

where children can be left unsupervised. Lieutenant Wayne Peterson said

he wasn't going to remark on LeRoy's possible culpability, but

he did say parents have a moral and legal obligation

to supervise their children. Leroy obtained an attorney, Eddie Harris,

and he denied that Cherise was left unsupervised. He claimed

that she was only out of his sight when she

went to the restroom. That wasn't all that shocked people

about Leroy. An anonymous source revealed that shortly after Cherise

was found, Leroy had tried to negotiate for gifts from

Prima Donna officials in exchange for not filing a civil lawsuit.

They said he wanted a hundred bucks a room at

the hotel his daughter's funeral, paid for dinner first fourteen

year old, and some beer. He also wanted someone flown

in from Los Angeles. Everyone was stunned and shocked at

the requests. His request was denied. Prima Donna Resort's chief

operating officer, Chris Cobays remarked his cavalier attitude was so

shocking everyone was stunned. Leroy denied that this ever happened.

At the time, Leroy was in very bad health. He

walked with a cane and suffered from asthma and high

blood pressure. He was diabetic and required injections of insulin

on a regular basis. Meanwhile, Charisse's brother Harold spoke with

the media. He said he felt respond for what happened.

It was his responsibility to stay with his sister. He said,

everywhere I went, she went, everywhere my father went I went.

We stayed together, but that night they hadn't stayed together.

Leroy himself spoke with the media. He blamed the casino

for what had happened and said they're responsible for my

daughter's killing. They advertise for children. You go down there

thinking your children will be safe. You can't watch your

children twenty four hours a day. On the twenty seventh

of June nineteen ninety seven, District Attorney Stirt Bell announced

that Leroy wouldn't be facing any charges. There is no

basis at this time for criminal prosecution, he said. According

to Leroy, he thought that his children were safe in

the place where children are supposed to be safe, where

they're supposed to be monitored. Surveillance actually showed that he

was checking in on his children every twenty minutes. Leroy

Iverson would spend the rest of his life knowing that

the last time he saw his daughter alive, he had

sent her back to the arcade and she never came home.

After the stills of the two suspects were released, call

started flooding into police in Long Beach, California. They all

identified the man in the baseball cap, the man who

followed Cherase into the bathroom, as eighteen year old Jeremy

Joseph Stromyer. He was a student at Woodrow Wilson High School,

a math whiz, a volleyball player with a pilot's license,

someone who had traveled the world. People who knew him

described him as smart, but troubled. They said he seemed

to be on the right track until recently. In the

months leading up to the murderer, Stromyer had apparently taken

a downward turn one friend, he said he tried to

down a whole bottle of tequila and then fight another student.

He liked to mix speed with alcohol. He'd recently quit

the volleyball team two thirds of the way through the season.

Friend said he had recently been kicked out of the

family home. He was living alone for a couple of months,

bouncing from couch to couch before he was allowed back.

His former girlfriend, Jennifer Ainley, said he was pretty nice

until he didn't get his way. He'd get violent. He

hit me hard. She said that he was partying too

much and it turned him violent. She said his assaults

often left bruises, but she never told anybody. Another former girlfriend,

Agnes Lee, said Stromyer once told her he liked to

date women who looked very young. At one point, he

asked her to dress up like a schoolgirl in a

uniform and with pigtails. Both former girlfriends were unaware that

Stromyer was in fact a pedophile. On his computer, he

downloaded child sexual abuse images. The most recent downloads came

just days before Cherise was killed. Other people said that

he was charming one minute and then violent the next.

Someone else referred to him as a bad seat. Stromyer

had been adopted when he was eighteen months old. His

biological mother had severe mental problems, including chronic schizophrenia, and

had been hospitalized more than sixty times prior to Stromyer's birth.

His biological father was in prison, but none of this

information was disclosed to his adoptive parents, John and Winnifred Stromyer,

who raised him in a stable, well to do home

in Long Beach. In nineteen ninety six, his mother, Winnifred,

filed a lawsuit against Western Digital Court after she had

been led off as director. She accused them of age

and gender discrimination. In the lawsuit, Winnifred said that her

son began having problems as a result of having to

adjust to different skills, cultures, and systems when she she

was transferred to Singapore in January of nineteen ninety five.

It was supposed to be a six month stint, but

the company extended the stay. After her son and husband

returned home in April nineteen ninety six, She said he

was without a mother for four months. When Stromyer came

home from Singapore, he bragged about sexually abusing young girls,

but he portrayed it as consensual in an online chat room.

He said he fantasized about girls as young as five

or six. In addition to the phone calls from people

identifying Stromyer as the man in the footage, there was

another call that stood out. It was from the parents

of a teenage girl. They didn't just identify stro Meyer

as the person in the footage. They said that Stromyer

had confessed to their daughter that he killed a little

girl in Las Vegas. After Jeremy Stromyer was identified as

the man in the footage, detectives put him under surveillance

on the twenty ninth of May, just three days after

the murder. As he left his house, they moved in.

As he saw them approaching, he swallowed a handful of pills.

Detectives referred to it as a half hearted suicide attempt.

He was transported to hospital where he had his stomach pumped.

After that, he was brought to the city jail while

arrangements were made for extradition. Jeremy Stromyer was charged with murder, rape,

and kidnapping. Meanwhile, the man who was with Stromyer at

the casino handed himself in. Eighteen year old David Cash

Junior was a Wilson High senior and one of Stromyer's

closest friends. His parents had recognized him on the surveillance

and went with him to the police station. He told

detectives that he and Stromyer were heading to Las Vegas

when they stopped at the Prima Donicus at the state

line just after midnight. They both carried fake id's. He

said that after Stromyer and Seres went into the bathroom,

he followed. All of the stall doors were open and empty,

except for the handicap one. Cash said he went over

and banked on the door, but got no response.

Speaker 4: Doing the bathroom stalls, I went into the adjacent stall,

looked over and Jeremy was restraining her with his left

hand over her stomach and his right hand over her mouth,

and she was trying to screw He was muffling her skins.

Speaker 3: Cash eddy tried to get his friend's attention, but he

ignored him. Stro Meyer looked up with a blank stare.

He said, he realized he wasn't getting through to him,

so we left the bathroom.

Speaker 4: Well, when an eighteen year old mail grabs a seven

year old child, you know, that's not a position I

want to be in. Based on what I saw, I mean,

it wasn't something I wanted to stick around and you'll

see what we materialized.

Speaker 1: Did you say to her, Jeremy, come on, stop, let's go.

Speaker 4: As giving him a look as if he know that

he shouldn't be doing that.

Speaker 1: But you never said stop, get out of here.

Speaker 4: This is wrong. Verbally, I did not say that, but

my body language certainly suggested it.

Speaker 3: When he met up with Stromyer twenty minutes later, he

confessted killing Charise. Cash Leader said he said at one

point he had fingered her, she bled out of the vagina,

then he strangled her. That's how she initially died, and

that he had snapped her neck I think twice, and

that he eventually propped her up on the toilet, with

her hands on the toilet seat, between her bot on

the toilet seat. According to Kash, he didn't react because

he was more concerned about being lit meeting his father.

He was with them in prim as they headed to

Las Vegas for the weekend. After his confession, detectives annoyance

that they weren't charging him with any crime. In an

interview with the Orange County Register, Cash said, I was

completely ignorant of what was happening in there. I feel terrible.

I saw her playing. She seemed like a normal enough

little kid, but Cash didn't appear all that upset about

what had happened. The next night, he was filmed waving

from a limousine driving around the hotel where his high

school problem was held. He had wanted to attend, but

he was barred by school officials. He then spoke with

several radio stations and newspapers.

Speaker 1: How much am I supposed to to sit down and

cry about this?

Speaker 2: I mean, I mean, let's be reasonable.

Speaker 1: Here is my life supposed to halt for like, for days,

weeks and months on end.

Speaker 5: And if that weren't bad enough, he added this.

Speaker 1: The simple fact remains, I do not know this little girl.

I do not know starving children in Panama, I do

not know you know people had dived disease in Egypt.

Speaker 3: Detectives explained that Cash wasn't charged because he hadn't committed

a crime. Lieutenant Wayne Peterson explained, if you look out

of your window and see a robbery occurring and you

don't report it to police, or you don't do anything

to stop it, that's not a crime under Nevada law.

At the time, there was no legal duty to intervene

or report a crime in progress, even the rape and

murder of a child. So David Cash Junior walked free

and the public was outraged. On the first of June,

Teresa's funeral was held at Paradise Baptist Church. She lay

in her casket at the front of the church, her

face framed by three braids, tipped by rose colored beats.

She looked like she was sleeping. It was presided over

by Pastor A. D Iverson, who defended Leroy. He said,

cousin Leroy, I have nothing but love for you. I

think I know you reasonably well. I never saw you,

never without your children. But that's only what I know.

But I don't know everything. No, it's not the time

to fix the blame, because if you fix the blame,

the problem will still be there. There was some controversy

during the service. Several times ministers pulled away speakers from

the podium when they started to talk about blame. One

of them mentioned how the murder occurred while Leroy rolled

the dice. Pastor Iverson remarked, I want to make one

thing clear. This is not a courtroom, this is not

a TV station. During the service, many mourners expressed anger

for how Leroy was interpreted by the media. They said

that he was a caring father, that the newspapers didn't

know him, that he loved his children, he thought they

were safe. But Yulando was in his understanding. She blamed

him for her daughter's murder. The mourners also lashed out

at David Cash. Reverendly James remarked, this young man had

a chance to do something and he did nothing. And

then he waited three days and he still did nothing

before he turned himself in. He should be held just

as responsible as Stromier. After the service, Leroy stumbled out

of the church. He was overcome with emotion, his body

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using promo code more biology. While the dust settled, more

information about Jeremy Stromyer was publicly released. After he was arrested.

He had made a full and detailed confession to the

murder of Cheries. He said that they playing hide and

seek with her, and they were throwing spitballs at one another,

but he said she threw a caution wet floor a

sign at him and it angered him. He said he

followed her into the restroom, grabbed her, and shoved her

into the disabled stoll. He put his hand over her mouth,

he said, because she was struggling. He then put Charase

on top of the toilet and began to remove her underwear.

He said he threw them and her boots into the

toilet and then sexually assaulted her. He said that three

times during the assault he heard women into the restroom.

He said he sat on top of Charise and put

her dangling feet in the toilet water to hide them.

When the women left, he said he noticed that Charies's

breathing was labored.

Speaker 6: After that, I wanted, I just want to leave, and

I noticed that the girl I was still breathing barely.

Speaker 4: I didn't want to leave her that way, so I.

Speaker 5: Tried to break her neck.

Speaker 6: Can I ask you one question, sure, did you when

she was having his labor breathing SD you consider trying

to give her a little.

Speaker 5: Bit of CPR yourself than they.

Speaker 6: That's another calls from Mina.

Speaker 3: Stro Meyer said he thought that she was brand dead,

and he said he didn't want her to suffer, so

he tried to break her neck. He said he did

what he had seen on television, but Cherise was still breathing,

so he did it again. In his words, he didn't

want Cherise to be a vegetable for the rest of

her life. During the confession, stro Meyer had said he

killed Cheres because he wanted to experience death. He commented,

I never have I've never been that close. It seemed

like a dream. I only remember bits and parts of

what happened. What I say is death. He said he

hoped what he'd done would serve as a reminder to

parents to better supervise their children. Despite the confession, on

the fourth of June, Stromyer pleaded not guilty to all

of the charges against him. He obtained Leslie Abramsome as

his defense attorney. The lawyer who reached national prominence defending

Eric and Lylemanendez, David Cash obtained his own defense attorney,

Mark Worksman, after receiving criticism for not helping to Race.

He said in the media, Kash did not believe that

Jeremy was capable of or would commit a violent events

against this girl. He was in a state of shock

and disbelief. He did not anticipate that he would kill her.

According to Cash, he thought that his friend was just

goofing around, that he was simply trying to scarce Race.

But again, Cash didn't seem phazed by what was happening.

Newspapers reported that he planned on selling his story. He

anticipated a Hollywood bid war and reportedly said, I'm no idiot.

I'll fucking get my money out of this. But Cash

wasn't finished making comments. He said to the Los Angeles Times,

I'm not going to get upset over somebody else's life.

I just worry about myself first. I'm not going to

lose sleep over somebody else's problems. He also told the

newspaper that the publicity surrounding the case had made it

easier for him to score with women, and then perhaps

most disturbingly, Cash told Norah Samachau of the Los Angeles

Times that just before he and stro Meyer joined Cash's

father for a car ride back to their home in

Long Beach, Cash asked his friend if Cheries had been

sexually aroused. When asked why he would ask such a thing,

Cash responded, that's just the way I think. Two of

Cash's skillmates later came forward, saying Cash told them that

he saw stro Meyer molest Charise, contradicting his early statements

that he left before the assault. One friend, Jeremy Phillips,

told police he feared that Cash would lie during Stromyer's trial.

Philip said that Cash told him that he had a

brave conversation with Stromyer as the attack occurred, and that

Stromyer explained he was using his fingers because he couldn't

get an erection. But even with this new information, Clark

County District Attorney Stuart Bell said it wouldn't lead to

criminal charges. He said, it doesn't really change things. It's

not against the law to say a crime occur and

not report it. The public was outraged. David Cash Junior

became known as the Bad Samaradan, a young man who

watched a child being raped and murdered and did nothing,

Who asked if she was aroused? Who bragged about meeting

women because of his new found notoriety. Cash later said

in a radio interviews.

Speaker 1: Radio program, how much am I supposed to sit down

and cry about this?

Speaker 2: I mean, I mean, let's be reasonable.

Speaker 1: Here is my life supposed to halt for like, for days,

weeks and months on end. And if that weren't bad enough,

he added this, the simple fact remains, I do not

know this little girl. I do not know starving children

in Panama.

Speaker 2: I do not know you know people that dived disease

in Egypt.

Speaker 3: He means he had always that he did nothing wrong,

and legally he hadn't. In the week of the murder,

Charies's mother, Yulanda, announced that she was filing a lawsuit

against the Prima Donna Resort and Jeremy Stromyer. The lawsuit

accused the hotel of having a lack of supervision of children,

despite having an all night ar catered to them. Her attorney,

Barry Dunn, said it knew children would be accompanying adults,

and they made the police attractive the kid. Nevertheless, the

arcade section in other areas where children played were not

adequately monitored by Prima Donna personnel. He said that the

hotel should have known that an arcade would attract child predators.

He remarked, because gambling is a disease, and the parents

who are taking their children to this resort are doing

so to gamble, it's natural for the resort to have

foreseen that their parents would be preoccupied with their disease,

their gambling and not supervise their kids. Jeremy Stromyer was

extradited in July, and the next month prosecutors announced they

were seeking the death penalty. Then in November, Leroy and

Harold filed their own lawsuit against the casino. They also

filed one against the casino's chief operating officer, Chris Jiabayz,

the man who made the comments about Leroy saying he

wouldn't sue in exchange for money, a hotel room, beer,

an airline ticket, and funeral expenses. According to the lawsuit,

the comments were false and Leroy was defamed as a result.

Chris fought back and his attorney said he had been

speaking the truth and that he would be vindicated at trial.

While those lawsuits were making their way through court, stro

Meyer's defense team tried to get his confession suppressed. They

claimed he wasn't read his miranda rights. The judgice agreed

and said the confession could be used in evidence. Then

in May, as the trial was approaching, prosecutors said they

believed that the murder was racially motivated. Under Nevada law,

prosecutors can seek the death penalty only if certain aggravating

circumstances are present in a crime. In stro Meyer's case,

prosecutors called for the death penalty because the murder was

committed during the perpetration of other felonies, including sexual assault,

and because the victim was under the age of fourteen.

Prosecutors added another potential aggravating circumstance for the juride upon

their when considering a possible penalty. They claimed in court

documents that Stromyer could be executed because the murder of

Scherise was a hate crime. After Stromayer had been arrested,

people who knew him remarked that he often made racist comments.

One friend, James Trigillo, said he would make off call

of remarks about African Americans and black people. The trial

was scheduled to begin in September of nineteen ninety eight,

and prosecutors announced that David Cash was going to be

testifying against Stromyer. Jury's election began on the thirty first

of August, and after three days, a jury of seven

men and five women were selected. Stromyer's defense attorney, Leslie Abramson,

indicated she was going to launch a diminished responsibility defense.

She mentioned how her client had been adopted at eighteen

months old and said he had been taking prescription drugs

and was a regular user of methamphetamines at the time

of the murder. The defense had learned that Stromyer's birth

mother had a history of drug abuse and mental illness,

and this was going to be the focus of their defense.

She was currently in a psychiatric hospital while his biological

father was in prison. She was also going to argue

that Stromer had blacked out on the night of the murder.

This meant that he didn't have the required state of

mind to be convicted of first degree murder. The prosecution,

on the other hand, we're seeking a death sentence. During

emotion hearing, prosecutor Peggy Lean told Judge Myron Leaveth that

Stromayer was confiding in a chat room that he fantasized

about little girls. The conversation came just three days before

he killed Cherise. She stated, you don't need an expert

to tell you what that means. On the seventh of

September nineteen ninety eight, Jeremy Stromyer was escorted into court

for what was supposed to be the first day of

his trial. Instead, his defense attorney announced that she had

ex accepted a plea bargain. He pleaded guilty to all

of the charges against him in exchange for a sentence

of life in prison without the possibility of parole. During

the sentencing phase, Stromyer read a twenty two page typed

statement that detailed the night of the murder. He said

he was in a drunken and drugged haze when he's

actually assaulted and strangled to race. He said, can you

imagine the fear, the panic, the sickness that rushes over

you as you realize that somehow you've done something to

this little girl to cause her to be dying, yet

you don't remember anything. That's what happened to me.

Speaker 5: I'm not seeking sympathy or forgiveness or lessening of my

own guilt. I'm not a monster, a pedophile, a delinquent,

a sociopath. I was not a predator waiting to snatch

this child from her family. I was a high performing,

likablelek kid with the bright future, a sense of duty,

and a sense of honor.

Speaker 3: Stromyer also lashed out at his former best friend, David Cash.

He said, my best friend at the time, David Cash,

was repeatedly sharing me and himself with accolades for what

we had supposedly gotten away with. He may be proud

of what he did that morning, but he makes me sick.

Ulanda then shouted at Stromyer and referred to him as

a devil in a demon Leroy was in a wheelchair.

He described his daughter as very bright and alert and

said she was loved by everyone. He then asked Stromyer,

suppose a black American killed your sister, he wouldn't get

out of Vegas. Stromyer was sentenced to life in prison

without the possibility of parole. For some, it was a

fitting end, but others felt that Stromyer deserved to die

for what he had done. Jeres's mother, Yulanda, was one

of them. She mentioned how he said he wanted to

experience death and that he should experience it his own death.

At the hands of the state, but instead Stromayer is

placed in a segregated cell at the Elea State at

Prison in Nevada. Child molesters and killers are the lowest

of the low in prison hierarchy. He was there for

his own protection. Just days after the play, the Charise

Iverson Act was introduced. It would require states to levy

criminal penalties for witnesses who fail to report sexual crimes

against children. Democratic Representative Nick Lampson said, with crimes against

children on the rise, this type of legislation is more

important than ever before. The fact that David Cash apparently

stood by and alloyed this heinous crime to happen, and

then boasted of his lack of concern on a live

radio call in show make Sarise's terrible death even more tragic.

The Charise Iverson Act was enacted in Nevada in two thousand.

It requires people to report to authorities when they have

reasonable suspicion that a child younger than eighteen is being

sexually abused or violently traded. Jerise needed a good Samaradin

that morning, but instead she got David Cash, a man

who turned his back and allowed his friend to rape

and kill her. There were calls for him to be arrested,

but since Nevada had no good samarad in law at

the time, no charges could ever be filed. After the

guilty play, Cash spoke with sixty Minutes and told them,

I don't feel there's much I could have done differently.

He also said, when Stromyer confessed, he had no desire

to call the police. In his words, I didn't want

to be the one, you know, if he only has

three more days as a free man, I didn't want

to be the one who turned him in. Cash became

a student at UC Berkeley, and students had a campaign

to get him kicked out, but the school said they

had no basis to remove him since he wasn't convicted

of a crime. In December of two thousand and one,

he graduated with a bachelor's degree in nuclear engineering. He

walked away, he got his degree, he moved on with

his life. In October of nineteen ninety nine, Stromyer's adoptive

parents filed a lawsuit against Los Angeles County, alleging social

workers deliberately withheld crucial information about his birth mother's mental illness.

They said, if they knew the truth, they never would

have adopted him. The lawsuit was dismissed. In July of

two thousand, just three years after Cherise was killed, her father, Leroy,

died of cancer. He was fifty seven years old. Some

said grief accelerated his decline, the weight of that night,

the blame, the guilt, the endless questions. Others believed he'd

been dying all along, slowly in the way that people

do when loss becomes routine. Yuland outlived them all, the

father of her child, the daughter she had been fighting

to get back. She was left with only memory and

dreams where Cherise says, Hi, Mommy, I'm back. But Cherise

never came back. The next year, Stromyer said he wanted

a new trial because he was bullied by his defense

attorney and depleting guilty. His appeal was rejected. He spoke

with several reporters over the years.

Speaker 4: Jeremy, you know that there are people who think that

you are a monster.

Speaker 6: Yes. People want to believe that I'm a monster because

that's easy. They don't want to believe that I'm the

same as their own son or their own brother.

Speaker 3: In twenty eighteen, twenty years after his conviction, Stromyer petitioned

for re sentencing, arguing that his age and developmental immaturity

at the time warranted reconsideration. District Judge Douglas Smith denied

the motion. He cited Stromyer's subsequent use of racist language

to describe his victim and child pornography found on his

computer as evidence that the crime was not the result

of immaturity but one of premeditation. The judge told him,

don't ever come in front of me again. I'll make

sure you spend the rest of your rotten life in prison.

As of twenty twenty six, Jeremy Stromer is incarcerated at

High Desert State Prison in Nevada, serving four consecutive life

sentences without the possibility of parole. He will die behind bars.

Well that is it for this episode of Morbidology. As always,

thank you so much for the thing, and i'd like

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have an amazing week.