Opinion ID: 1060063
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Beck's Statements to Police

Text: Beck told police that several days before the murders he formulated a plan to kill Miller, Beck's former employer. On Monday, June 5, 1995, Beck traveled by bus from his home in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to Washington, D.C., arriving there at 6 p.m. The following morning Beck went to Arlington to the house shared by Marks, Miller, and Kaplan. He arrived at the house at 11 a.m., walked around the perimeter, and then broke in through a basement window under the porch. Wrapping a sledge hammer he found in the basement with a cloth to muffle the sound, he used the sledge hammer to batter a hole in a door to the first floor of the house. Beck then went to Miller's apartment and chose a .22 caliber semi-automatic pistol from several loaded guns Miller kept in the house; he rejected another larger caliber weapon because its report would be too loud. After loading a spare magazine for the pistol, Beck went to the basement and waited for Miller to return home. As Beck waited he became nervous, but finally concluded, I guess I'll go through [with] it. Later that afternoon, Beck heard the sound of someone entering the basement. Beck raised the pistol to arm level, and, as the door opened, he closed his eyes and fired two shots. When Beck opened his eyes, he saw Marks on the basement floor. Beck said, you stupid bitch, why did you have to come home? In an attempt to make it appear that Marks had been raped and robbed, Beck cut off most of her clothes and stabbed her in the right buttock. He threw a condom he had found in the washer onto the floor and, in a further effort to make it appear that Marks had been sexually assaulted, he kicked her and penetrated her vagina with a hammer. Beck reasoned that sexual assault evidence would lead the police to believe that the crime had been committed by a stranger and not by a family member. Beck then went back upstairs to the first floor. About one hour later, Miller returned home. Beck was on the stairs leading to the second floor and hid behind the bannister. Miller remained downstairs for a while and then started up the stairs. Beck shot Miller in the face as he mounted the stairs. Miller fell down the stairs as Beck continued to shoot him, firing a total of five rounds at him. Beck put Miller's body in Kaplan's apartment and threw a blanket over the body, because I got sick and tired looking at it. Later that evening, but while it was still light outside, Kaplan returned home to find Miller's body lying in his room, Beck with a gun in his hand, and blood all over. As Kaplan stared at the scene, Beck shot Kaplan in the back of the head. Beck fired several times and [Kaplan] just wouldn't die. As Kaplan lay on the floor, he talked to Beck, saying, hello, I'm awake, hello. Beck fired what he believed was a full magazine at Kaplan and then stabbed him in the head. Beck stated that he just wanted [Kaplan] to stop having the pain. After he was stabbed, Kaplan appeared to have a seizure and then died. Beck went back through the house taking several guns and two bicycles. He also took cash from each of the victims. He took the keys to Miller's car, changed his clothes, loaded the car with the guns and bicycles, and drove to Washington, D.C., to see a girl. As he left the house, Beck waved to the next door neighbor. After a parking mishap in the District of Columbia in which Beck parked the car but neglected to engage the parking brake, and the car rolled into another vehicle, Beck drove home to Pennsylvania. Once there he hid the guns and stashed the bicycles with a friend. He cleaned the car of all prints[,] wiped it all down, and abandoned it after covering the license plates. Beck was initially interviewed by Arlington County Police officers at his mother's home in Philadelphia. Beck at first claimed to have been transporting bicycles from Tennessee at the time of the murders. When a friend failed to corroborate Beck's alibi, Beck admitted to police that he had killed Marks, Miller and Kaplan. After his arrest, Beck was returned to Arlington, where he gave a full statement concerning the murders to police. During his statement to the police, Beck was given a chance to say something for himself; he said: That ah I know what is like to kill somebody, its one of the worst feelings you can live with that I don't know that it is pretty painful that is one of those things that you can't go to sleep and I'm so sorry that I did, I'm so sorry that I had all that anger built up, I should had went to a counselor or something could have prevented it. I don't know, I'm sorry but I know this is going to be pretty hard for people to believe what happened. In addition to giving that statement, Beck assisted the police in the recovery of the stolen car, guns, and bicycles.