He Picked Them from the Sex Offender Registry
By: Jean Campbell
Tags: Pedophilia, Murder, Sex Offender Registry, True Crime, Guns

He Picked Them from the Sex Offender Registry

Photo courtesy of Murderpedia.com

The case of Stephen A. Marshall remains a mystery. While his abhorrence of sex offenders is relatable, his actions were extreme. What pushed this young man to avenge crimes that had nothing to do with him?

Sex offender websites list names and addresses. In some states, the registry publishes personal information for every type of sex crime: from Level One (sometimes only public nudity) to Level Four (a violent offense with high likelihood of recidivism).

All states publish photographs, when available, of convicted sex offenders and list the crime(s) for which they were convicted.

On April 16, 2006, Stephen Marshall drove from his home in Texas to his father’s home in Maine. He took with him a printed list of 29 sex offenders who lived in the state.

The shootings

Ostensibly, Stephen took the solo road trip to visit his dad, who was living in Houlton, ME, just a stone’s throw south of Canada.

Once he reached his destination, he stole three of his father’s guns — a Ruger handgun, a Colt .45 semi-automatic handgun, and a .223 Colt semi-automatic rifle — and threw them in his dad’s Toyota pickup, which he commandeered for his mission.

After midnight, Stephen drove south from Houlton for 2 and ½ hours, arriving at the home of Joseph Gray in Milo, ME. At 3 am, he shot and killed Gray in his home. Five hours later, he showed up 25 miles away in the town of Corinth, located William Elliot at home, and shot him dead.

Elliot’s girlfriend witnessed the murder and called the police, reporting the license plate of the Toyota.

It was determined later that Marshall had driven by the homes of four other men on his copied list of Maine sex offenders.

After the murders, Marshall drove to Bangor and ditched the truck near and ice rink, then caught a bus to Boston.

Gray, 57, was convicted of raping a 14-year-old girl. Elliot, 24, was convicted and sentenced for having sex with a girl who under the age of consent (16) in Maine. Both men served prison sentences.

Who Was Stephen Marshall?

Marshall was a child of divorce, growing up in two homes in Canada and Texas. His baby-face photograph hid an intense personality that would not reveal itself fully until the night of the murders.

Stephen was born in Texas. As a small boy, his family relocated to a remote Canadian island in Nova Scotia called Cape Breton. The family moved twice more, staying in Canada before his parents divorced when he was eight. His dad moved back to Texas and also lived in Idaho, where he was at one point the town’s mayor.

Teachers described Stephen as an occasional discipline problem, and “emotional” — but he was not highly disruptive and had no history of violence as a boy. His mother removed him from middle school in 1996–97 after he was a victim of bullying. He was an intelligent student, interested in computers and video games.

At 13, after a visit from his dad, Stephen decided to move to Texas to live with him.

Stephen’s father was a gun enthusiast, so he grew up around guns. In his teen years, on his first-ever website, he expressed his fondness for weapons, promising to showcase the “sweetest pics” of weapons there.

He also wrote about his “dislikes,” including “minorities getting special treatment, men who don’t keep their women in line, women in general, the beautiful people, my job, cleaning, school, society, the disgusting commercialization of our daily lives, the economic system, capitalism (But it’ll do for now), rich people, the United Nations, a world government, the feds, the man and his rules….”

Stephen Marshall was full of anger and had access to a plentiful supply of weapons.

At 15, one of his high school friends was charged with molesting a child, for which the teen received probation.

This quiet teenager, who friends described as passive, had a brush with the law four months before his 16th birthday, when he broke up a fight on his front lawn.

Stephen saw two boys fighting, went inside his father’s house, and brandished an AR-15 .223 caliber semi-automatic rifle as he stood in the doorway. He told one of the boys to let his friend go. He was charged with felony aggravated assault.

About a year after his friend was charged with molestation, the friend’s father, Kris Dee Peterson, Sr., was arrested and convicted of child molestation and sentenced to two 15-year (consecutive) prison terms.

Just after his 18th birthday, Stephen moved back to live with his mom in Nova Scotia. Shortly thereafter, he attempts to enlist in the Canadian military but is rejected due to his asthma

Apprehension

Stephen must have known the Toyota pickup was too recognizable. He hopped on a bus in Bangor, ME in an attempt to escape the authorities.

It didn’t take long for the cops and transit authorities to find him, however.

When they identified the bus he was riding, the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority arrived at the terminal and surrounded it. Stephen, who sitting 13 rows behind the driver on a crowded bus, shot himself in the head.

He was taken to Boston Medical Center where he died three hours later, at 11:24 pm on April 16, 2006 from his injuries.

Possible motives

After the murders, media speculated on why this young man plotted to kill sex offenders, and why in Maine.

He might have been a victim of sexual abuse that occurred in that state, some wrote. Given that he had at least two friends who were convicted sex offenders, it is also possible he held a grudge and wanted to even a score.

Friends were quoted as saying they didn’t believe he’d been personally preyed upon. Other friends noted they’d discussed how sex offenders were were worse than murderers, and all agreed they should be punished harshly.

Whatever the case, Stephen Marshall’s lifelong love of guns and problems with “women generally,” “society,” and minority groups, is consistent with rage killers.

The tragedy of April 16, 2006, is that three men died and we will never what kind of lives they could have lived.