Stroudsburg PA: Second Arrest Made In Fatal Stabbing Of Hate Crime Victim Michael Goucher

February 22, 2009

 

Police have charged a second teenager in the stabbing murder of a Stroudsburg man found Feb. 11 in a wooded area off Snow Hill Road.

Ian Seagraves, 17, whose mailing address is given as Cresco, was charged as an adult Wednesday and arraigned before Mountainhome Magisterial District Judge John Whitesell, while Shawn Freemore, 19, faces an amended criminal complaint.

 

Police say both fatally stabbed and then robbed Michael Goucher, 21. Goucher went missing Feb. 3, after saying he was going to meet a friend, and was found dead Feb. 11 in a wooded area near Stoney Run Road, where his car was found, in Price Township, said state police at Swiftwater.

State police said Freemore gave a different version of events from what he initially told them and that this new version implicates Seagraves.

According to the affidavit in the criminal complaint against Seagraves, police said they found a knife with a 6-inch blade and "the bottom wrapped in duct tape," near Goucher's body. Under a bridge near the murder scene was a roll of duct tape, similar to that found on the knife, with Seagraves' fingerprint on it, police said.

Found in Seagraves' home were wooden-handled knives similar to the one at the murder scene, police said. Initial reports said Goucher was stabbed 20 times, but an autopsy revealed he was stabbed "45 to 50 times," according to the affidavit.

Freemore initially gave police the following story:

He had met Goucher online and gotten together with him in person for a sexual encounter prior to the date of the murder, according to police. He said he and Goucher got together for another encounter in Goucher's car on the night of Feb. 3. He said he refused Goucher's advances and stabbed Goucher in the throat when Goucher followed him out of the car.

The initial criminal complaint against Freemore states he told police he acted alone in Goucher's murder.

But Freemore in a followup interview gave police a different version of events implicating Seagraves, a friend of his since childhood, said Assistant District Attorney Michael Mancuso. Because of those new details and other additional evidence pointing to Seagraves' involvement, the initial criminal complaint will be withdrawn and a new complaint against Freemore will be filed today, Mancuso said. The charges against Freemore — criminal homicide, aggravated assault, robbery and tampering with evidence — will stand.

In Freemore's new version of what happened, he and Seagraves planned to rob and kill Goucher. The plan was for Freemore to meet Goucher, under pretense of wanting a sexual encounter, and lure him to a spot where Seagraves would be hiding nearby.

"We have evidence indicating it was actually Seagraves who struck the first blow and stabbed the victim in the neck," Mancuso said.

Freemore and Seagraves have juvenile criminal records and, according to their MySpace pages, are Juggalos, members of what police call a violent criminal gang. Freemore's MySpace nickname is "Skippy" and Seagraves' is "Throat Stabba."

Defense attorney Paul Kramer Jr. said Seagraves wasn't involved in Goucher's murder and was nowhere near the scene at the time.

"The information in Mr. Freemore's arrest affidavit is very different from the information in Ian's arrest affidavit," Kramer said. "Mr. Freemore told police he acted alone, so why the charges against Ian?"

Kramer apparently was unaware of the amended charges to be filed against Freemore based on Freemore's new version of events, Mancuso said.

Seagraves' arrest affidavit gives the following account:

On Feb. 11, after finding Goucher dead, state police interviewed Seagraves, who was accompanied by his mother, at the Swiftwater barracks. Seagraves told police he had never talked to or communicated with Goucher, and that Freemore had met Goucher online.

He said he saw a car parked alongside the road, though the affidavit does not state when he said saw the car. He said he didn't know whose it was and assumed someone had gotten stuck. He said he did not recognize the car as belonging to Goucher, whom he had met only once, and that he walked past the car.

Twenty minutes into the interview, Seagraves said he "has problems remembering things because he is bipolar and has to take time to think about things." Police exited the room and gave him time to speak to his mother privately.

Five minutes later, police came back into the room and continued the interview.

Seagraves said he now recalled Goucher's car door being unlocked and that he actually got into the car, looked around inside and under the seat and saw nothing. He said he was in the car alone during that entire time.

When asked if he ever tried moving the car by pushing or driving it, he said, "No, I only sat in the car. I was not trying to get the car out. I don't want to get linked to this murder thing."

At that point, Seagraves' mother told police she and her son should talk to an attorney before going any further because she felt "this was going to get deeper than she thought."

The next day, police interviewed two people who said Seagraves had made statements to them about helping Freemore kill Goucher.

"If Ian did in fact make those statements, I don't know why he did," Kramer said. "I can only speculate. We're talking about a group of very young people here. Maybe, Ian just wanted some attention. We're talking about someone being led by the nose by someone two years older than he is."

As far as the knives in Seagraves' home and the fingerprint on the duct tape found near the murder scene, Kramer said that alone isn't enough evidence on which to charge Seagraves.

Kathleen Seagraves told reporters at her son's preliminary arraignment Wednesday that he has had psychological problems, but isn't capable of murder.

"He's just a 17-year-old boy," she said. "Up until now, the worst thing we've ever caught him doing is smoking cigarettes."

Between the night of Feb. 3, when police estimate Goucher was murdered, and Freemore's Feb. 11 arrest, Freemore and her son "seemed normal," Kathleen Seagraves said.

"They were just playing video games like always," she said.

Like Freemore, Ian Seagraves face charges of murder, aggravated assault, robbery, tampering with or fabricating physical evidence and conspiracy.

Both are being held without bail in county jails outside of Monroe County, awaiting a future preliminary hearing in district court. Goucher's uncle, William Searfoss, works at Monroe County Correctional Facility.