FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. - Two teenage girls accused of stabbing one of the girls' grandparents to death pleaded guilty Thursday to murder during a court hearing, ending a case that garnered national headlines.

Holly Harvey, 15, was sentenced to two life sentences in prison after pleading guilty to two counts of malice murder. Because of her age, she was not eligible for the death penalty.

She will not be eligible for parole until after she serves 20 years in prison.

Sandy Ketchum, 16, who has been described as Holly's lover, was sentenced to serve three life sentences to be served consecutively.

At the end of her hearing, which lasted less than 10 minutes, Fayette County Superior Court Judge Johnnie Caldwell sentenced her to three life sentences for murder and armed robbery, to be served concurrently -- meaning she could be eligible for parole in 10 years.

During the court proceeding, the girls spoke about the stabbings, and the blood, which Harvey said felt like a bucket of hot water.

Carl Collier, 74, and his wife, Sarah, 73, were each stabbed multiple times Aug. 2 inside the couple's house in north Fayette County. The girls then allegedly fled in the Colliers' truck and were arrested the next day in Tybee Island.

As part of her plea, Harvey detailed how she killed the couple. For half an hour, she choked back sobs and spoke softly as she recounted the killings to Fayette County Superior Court Judge Pascal English.

Harvey and her friend had stayed out all night and spent the morning of the killings listening to music in the basement bedroom of her grandparents' north Fayette home.

That was when Ketchum suggested stealing the grandparent's truck "to get something to calm us down," Harvey said.

"'We'll have to kill them to do that,"' Harvey said she responded.

"But I didn't mean nothing by that," she told Judge Pascal English.

Ketchum suggested hitting them in the head with a lamp, and then suggested getting a knife, Harvey said.

"I got the biggest knife I could find out of the kitchen," she said, adding that they practiced stabbing a mattress to see if the knife was sharp enough.

When the grandparents came downstairs to get a suitcase, Harvey said she stabbed her grandmother.

"My eyes were closed the whole time," she said.

Her grandfather then pinned her down and Harvey said she stabbed him in the chest. She pursued him as he ran upstairs and tried to call for help, pulling the phone out of the wall, Harvey said.

"He grabbed the knife and I thought he was going to stab me," Harvey said, adding she took the knife from him and started attacking him.

When the judge asked Harvey why she did it, the teen said, "For Sandy," and added, "So that we could be together."

Judge English asked Harvey after sentencing her if 20 years in prison "was a good deal" for killing her grandparents. She answered no.

When he asked what she thought should happen to her, Harvey replied, "I think I should be dead."

The judge muttered, "We both agree on that."

Ketchum's hearing was much shorter. She was not forced to detail the crime because she was immediately cooperative with authorities, showed remorse and was prepared to testify against Harvey at trial -- factors which justified a lighter sentence, Prosecutor Scott Ballard said during her hearing.

Outside the courthouse, Tim Ketchum, her father, said she did the right thing.

"I can't explain it. I'm not that type of person," he said. "I didn't raise her to be that type of person. I want to say to the community I'm very sorry this happened."

The teens had faced two counts of felony murder, two counts of malice murder and one count of armed robbery. The maximum sentence the girls could have received was life in prison without parole.

The girls were to be tried as adults in the killings.

Harvey had been living with her grandparents while her mother served a prison term.

Police said the girls were lesbian lovers and killed the Colliers because they disapproved of the relationship and refused to let the girls go to the beach together.

The girls were arrested 17 hours after the slayings at a beach house on Tybee Island, about four hours away. Police say they found a sort of to-do list scrawled in ink on Harvey's arm: "kill, keys, money, jewelry."

Murder file yields chilling details

By John Munford - TheCitizen.com

April 20, 2005

[Editor’s note: This story is based on numerous investigative documents collected by sheriff’s detectives that were reviewed by The Citizen Tuesday morning following the guilty pleas offered and accepted on behalf of Holly Harvey and Sandra Ketchum Thursday. The documents provide a glimpse into some of the evidence that likely would have been presented to jurors in the cases had they actually gone to trial.]

When she pled guilty last week to killing her grandparents in their north Fayette home Aug. 2, Holly Harvey pointed blame at her girlfriend, Sandy Ketchum, saying it was Sandy who told her to run upstairs after her grandfather, Carl Collier, in the heat of the attack.

Sandy, however, told Lt. Col. Bruce Jordan of the Fayette County Sheriff’s Department that Holly “had been discussing killing her grandparents for days,” according to a written summary of the interview she gave police the day after the killings.

Sandy added that Carl and Sarah Collier wouldn’t let Holly and Sandy see each other.

Sandy, who was 16 at the time, also indicated to Jordan that Holly, then 15, planned the crime, saying Holly wrote a to-do list on her arm with the words “Kill, Keys, Money and Jewelry.”

Police said both girls were armed with knives during the attack, and Holly admitted in court last week that she had picked “the biggest knife” in the kitchen while preparing for the assault.

The knives were later recovered by police, along with Mr. Collier’s truck, which the girls used to flee the area, calling several friends along the way and urging them to watch the 10 o’clock news, according to witness statements filed in the case.

In her statement to Jordan, Sandy said Holly first stabbed Mrs. Collier in the back, but the Colliers managed to pin Holly down on the bed in her basement bedroom, telling her, “You’re on drugs, you don’t know what you’re doing.”

Sandy said she was hiding beside Holly’s bed and took part in the attack after Holly asked, “Why aren’t you helping me?” At one point, police said, Mr. Collier ran upstairs and that’s when Holly insists that she hesitated before Sandy ordered her to follow him.

Sandy told Jordan that after she “finished with” the attack of Sarah Collier, she went upstairs and dodged a coffee mug thrown by Carl Collier as he tried to fight off his granddaughter. Sandy said she then saw Holly “delivering a severe blow to Carl’s neck which sent Mr. Collier to the floor,” Jordan noted in his summary of the interview.

By the time the attack ended, both girls had blood all over themselves, down to their undergarments, sheriff’s detectives noted.

Jordan noted Sandy’s response when he asked “why they were so compelled to kill the Colliers.”

“We just wanted to leave to be together forever,” Sandy replied, adding, “Those people didn’t deserve to die.”

Carl Collier, a former member of the Fayette County Board of Education, was 75 at the time of his death; his wife Sarah was 72.

Reports in the case file indicated that Sandy expressed urges to kill herself after the arrests, and she was placed on suicide watch.

Sandy and Holly were arrested at a house in Tybee Island where they had befriended two boys, spending the night at their house. A Tybee officer reported that after she was booked at the police station, Holly asked him if “they” were really dead, referring to her grandparents, the Colliers.

“I asked her who, and she responded, ‘Did they die all the way?’” said the written statement from Tybee police officer Frederick L. Anderson III.

A friend of Holly’s gave a statement to police, saying that Holly “hated her grandparents, mainly her grandma.”

“She was very disrespectful to them,” the friend wrote. “She hated living there.”

In her statement to police, Sandy admitted that she called friends trying to get a gun before the killings. One of those friends, interviewed by police, said in a statement that Sandy told her she was scared because “I’m gonna go to jail for murder.”

Also in the case file was a letter to Holly from her mother, Carla Jane Harvey, who was serving a prison sentence for possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. In the July 28 letter, Carla tells her daughter she is astonished that she was put on probation in Fayette County for an unspecified juvenile offense.

“It ain’t no joke,” Carla Harvey counseled her daughter. “If you care about your freedom at all you’d better fly right and straighten up.”

Carla Harvey also sympathized with her daughter’s position.

“I can’t stand the thought of you being there and what you have to go through,” she said, likely referring to Holly’s living situation with the Colliers. Carla Harvey also apologized for putting her daughter through the situation.

“I want you to have faith that this will all be over soon,” Carla Harvey wrote. “And believe that we are gonna be together and happy real soon.”

Jordan has publicly said this is one of the most disturbing cases of his law enforcement career. Superior Court judges Paschal A. English and Johnnie L. Caldwell Jr., who have between them over 50 years of experience in the Griffin Judicial Circuit as judges and formerly as prosecutors, said last week they agreed this was one of the most savage crimes they have seen.

Holly was due to enroll as a freshman at Sandy Creek High School, according to school officials. Sandy was last enrolled in the Coweta County school system, according to some of her friends, but she was living at home with her mother in Griffin at the time of the killings, police said. Now the teenage lovers will serve prison sentences, with Holly sentenced to two consecutive life prison terms and Sandy sentenced to one life term last week.

Mother says not responsible for daughter’s actions

By Lee Williams - TheCitizenNews.com

April 14, 2005

Dressed in a two-piece suit Thursday, Carla Harvey told a small band of reporters that she did not feel she was responsible for the murderous actions of her now 16-year-old daughter, Holly.

Holly Harvey pleaded guilty after learning that her co-defendant, Sandy Ketchum, 16, planned to testify against her at her trial, which was scheduled for May 16 in Thomasville. Ketchum’s trial was scheduled for May. 23.

In exchange for her plea, Harvey received two consecutive life sentences. Harvey will likely be eligible for parole in 20 years, Griffin Judicial Circuit District Attorney Scott Ballard said.

Harvey’s lover and co-conspirator, Ketchum, received a lighter sentence in exchange for her cooperation with authorities.

Ketchum will receive one life sentence in exchange for her plea. She likely will be eligible for parole in 10 years, Ballard said.

Immediately following their courtroom appearances, members of the Griffin Judicial Circuit District Attorney Fayette County office and Fayette County Sheriff Randall Johnson’s office held a press conference to answer additional questions about the case.

One reporter asked Carla Harvey — who was incarcerated for drugs when Holly Harvey murdered Carl and Sarah Collier in their north Fayette County home Aug. 2, 2004 — how much did she hold herself responsible for what Holly did.

Harvey countered: “Absolutely, not at all.”

Harvey indicated she did her best to raise her child as a single parent, but admitted it was hard. The Colliers often pitched in to help, but she said Holly had been raised without a father since she was 18 months old.

Harvey indicated that being a parent was the hardest job a person will ever have and she gave it her all.

“Her actions were her doing and I can’t hold myself responsible for that,” Harvey said. “You raise your children up, but they get to a point where they make their own decisions.”

She added people should be held accountable for their actions. Nevertheless, she would continue to give Holly the love and emotional support she needed during her incarceration.

Kevin Collier, the late Colliers’ son, stated during the press conference that his adoptive parents loved Holly unconditionally.

“They loved her to death,” Collier said. “They would do anything for her. They would watch her whenever she needed to be watched. They would take her anywhere she needed to go.”

Collier said he, too, loved Holly unconditionally. Although he still grieves for his parents, the conclusion of the cases have brought him closer to finding closure.

“This is one part of the closure that I need and the family needs,” he said. “Time will heal certain things. There’s nothing we can do to bring my parents back, but time will heal the tensions and the feelings that I have for Holly.”

Holly Harvey and Sandra Ketchum: 'Kill, Keys, Money and Jewelry'

By Rachael Bell

Holly Harvey, 15, had lived with her grandparents Carl, 74, and Sarah, 73, Collier at their Fayette County home in Georgia for just four months when she decided that she had had enough. Holly had no intention of going to church as her grandparents had hoped or conforming to the rules imposed on her. Nor did she want to give up her one true love: Sandra (Sandy) Ketchum, 16, whom she was forbidden to see.

Holly decided that she was not going to allow her grandparents to interfere with her decision-making any longer. She was going to live her life the way she deemed fit. So in the summer of 2004, she recruited her lover Sandy to assist her in a gruesome plan, which they believed would allow them "to gain freedom and be able to stay together forever," according to the Associated Press. Their devious plot would eventually lead to the brutal murders of Carl and Sarah Collier.

According to Jon Shirek's 11Alive.com article, the Colliers believed their granddaughter was up to no good, and they began to fear her. Holly had become increasingly abusive towards them; she had even begun to make death threats. It was so bad that Carl even approached his adopted son, Kevin, sometime in late July and told him that Holly wanted him dead, according to the report.

Neither Holly nor Sandy were secretive about their evil intentions; the girls were brazen enough to tell their friends that they were going to kill Holly's grandparents. Moreover, both girls were actively looking for a gun, asking whomever they knew about how to obtain one so that they could carry out their plans. Although they did not succeed in finding one, they didn't let it hamper their plans. On August 2, 2004, the two girls finally decided to act out their threats.

That evening, Sandy Ketchum, who had sneaked into Holly's basement bedroom the previous day, talked about killing Holly's grandparents. The girls reviewed their plan in detail, which had been broken down into four key steps. Just in case, Holly wrote the "to do" list on her arm in ink. The list read, "Kill, keys, money and jewelry," according to Shirek.

The two girls began to smoke marijuana, hoping to lure the Colliers down into the basement with the smell. It didn't take long for Holly's grandparents to react. When Carl and Sarah reached the room, Sandy was already hidden behind the bed armed with a knife. Holly was also clutching a knife, waiting to lunge at whoever came at her first.

When the couple entered the room, an argument quickly ensued, and Holly stabbed her grandmother in the back. Carl and Sarah managed to wrestle her to the bed, trying to prevent her from stabbing her grandmother again, but Holly shouted for assistance. Sandythen leapt from behind the bed and got involved in the struggle.

During the attack, Sarah suffered more than 20 stab wounds to her chest and back before dying. Although Carl had also been stabbed repeatedly, he was able to run upstairs to the kitchen, where he tried to call the police. Holly chased after him and cut the phone lines. Rochelle Carter reported in The Atlanta Journal and Constitution that Carl tried to stop his granddaughter by throwing a coffee cup at her, but it didn't work. Holly caught up to him and dealt the final fatal blows that left Carl lying face down on the kitchen floor in a pool of his own blood. He had sustained around 15 stab wounds to the chest and neck.

Tybee Bound

After the brutal murders, the two girls scoured the house for money and jewelry, and found only the latter, which they placed in a bag along with some clothes and other items. They then grabbed Carls car keys and took off in his dark blue 2002 Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck. The two blood-soaked girls immediately drove to Griffin, Georgia and telephoned a friend named Sara P. (last name undisclosed), 16. They then went to her house. While there, Holly and Sandy explained that they had been mugged to account for the blood on their clothes, Sara later explained in an interview with Diane Sawyer on Good Morning America. After the girls washed up and changed their clothes, Holly told Sara what really happened. Upon hearing the truth, Sara ordered the girls to leave her house and then informed her parents of the alleged murder.

A short while later, Sara called the police and tearfully told them what the girls had done. Following up on the call, the police immediately visited the Colliers home and found the bodies of Sarah and Carl. Shirek quoted Fayette County Sheriff Randall Johnson, who said, Ive never seen a crime this serious in 28 years that Ive been sheriff, of this magnitude, on kinfolks. An arrest warrant was secured for Holly and Sandy, and officers quickly set out to find them and the stolen truck.

In the meantime, Holly and Sandy were at the beach on Tybee Island, located outside of Savannah, Georgia. While there, they met two brothers, Clayton, 22, and Brett, 14, who had just moved into a new house with their parents several hours earlier. The two girls, using the pseudonyms Jessica and Casey, told the brothers they had nowhere to go, and one of the girls mentioned that her grandmother just recently passed away, according to Tracey Christensen in an August 2004 article. Christensen reports that one of the girls claimed to have her grandmothers jewelry in her possession and asked Clayton to pawn it off for her, so she and her friend would have money. However, Clayton wouldnt do it.

Having no money and nowhere to sleep, the girls asked if they could stay at the brothers house. The mother of the two young men gave permission for the girls to spend the night with the family. The next morning, those in the household awoke to more than two dozen police officers at the front door. Holly and Sandy had been traced through their mobile phone transmission signal.

The family stood in complete shock as Holly and Sandy were arrested for the murder of the Colliers. As they patted Sandy down, they discovered she had a knife in her pocket. Christensen quoted Lt. Col. Bruce Jordan of the Fayette County Sheriffs Office as saying that officers were led to believe that there was a possibility the girls planned to kill the boys mother in order to steal her car. Luckily, the family escaped injury.

At the time of the arrest, Holly surprised officers when she laughed as she walked past them. Jordan stated in his report that Holly acted callous and cocky, showing no remorse for the horrible crimes she committed. On the other hand, Sandy Ketchum did show regret for what she had done, and told officers that she would fully cooperate with them in their investigation.

Once the girls were in custody, the stolen truck was searched. Investigators found a bag of the girls belongings, which contained two bloodied knives and bloodstained clothes. Based on the evidence, there was little, if any, doubt that Holly and Sandy were responsible for the murders. However, what investigators and the girls families couldnt fathom was why they would commit such atrocious acts. The question was left for the state and the girls attorneys to answer.

Trouble Deep

Carl and Sarah Collier couldnt have children of their own, so they decided to adopt two children to raise as their own. According to Christensen, more than 30 years later, they looked with pride upon their adopted son, Kevin, who is active in the church and followed his fathers footsteps in working for Delta Air Lines. However, Christensen reported that when it came to their adopted daughter, Carla, the Colliers had reason to seek group prayer at their Baptist church.

Carla took a different path. Christensen said that Carla had two daughters fathered by two different men and that she was also a known troublemaker. In fact, Carla was arrested on a drug conviction and was imprisoned at the Metro State Prison in the spring of 2004. At that time, the Colliers decided to have Holly live with them. Hollys father was unable to properly care for his daughter due to a car accident that left him paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair.

The Colliers had their hands full with Holly, who proved to be even more rebellious than her mother. She repeatedly tried to run away, although she was always brought back. No matter how much love and compassion the Colliers tried to show their granddaughter, they were rejected. It was clear that Holly was a deeply troubled young woman.

Following the murders, investigators found a poem written by Holly at the crime scene, which revealed valuable insight into her mental state leading up to the crimes. According to the Associated Press, the poem described how depressed she had been and that she cried herself to sleep. Even more troubling was a line of the poem that read, All I want to do is kill, the report stated. And kill she did.

Sandy also suffered her own problems growing up. Shirek suggested in an August 2004 11Alive.com article that her mother abandoned her when she was 15 months old. After that, she had three stepmothers, including one who was accused of physically abusing her. Having been abandoned or abused by the women closest to her in her family, Sandy looked for female companionship and acceptance elsewhere. She believed she found it in her relationship with Holly. The love Sandy received from her became so important in her life that she would do anything not to lose it-- even kill.

On August 5, 2004, the girls appeared in bulletproof vests before a Fayette County magistrate court judge to hear the charges filed against them. Holly and Sandy were charged as adults with two felony counts of murder and two counts of malice murder. As the counts were being read aloud, Holly and Sandy sobbed, as if finally realizing the extent of their crimes.

In accordance with Georgia state law, the death penalty does not apply to their case, because Holly and Sandy are under 17 years of age. If the girls are convicted of the murders, they could face up to life in prison. After the charges were read, the girls were escorted to two separate detention centers, where they remained until their bond hearing.

Two weeks later the girls appeared before a Superior Court judge to find out if they could be released on bond. During the proceedings, Lt. Col. Bruce Jordan testified that Sandy was deeply affected by the crimes she committed. Shirek reported that Holly and Sandy were not only denied bond for felony and malice murder charges but also faced new charges of armed robbery. The judge declared the girls a flight risk and said that he would accelerate the time before trial.

In February 2005, Holly and Sandy appeared at the Fayette County Superior Court and waived their rights to formal arraignments. In doing so, the girls thus entered pleas of not guilty. Their trial date was set for March 21, 2005, but it remains unclear where the trial will take place. The girls lawyers could file a motion for a change of venue, due to the enormous amount of media attention the case has drawn.

TruTV.com

Killer Grandkid?

Holly Harvey's Grandparents Tried to Save Her. Instead, Police Say, the Teen and a Friend Murdered Them

By Bob Meadows - People.com

September 20, 2004

Three months after he and his wife took in Holly, their rebellious 15-year-old granddaughter, Carl Collier confided some disturbing news to his son Kevin. "She said she was going to kill us," Carl told him. Kevin knew his niece was troubled, but he thought the trouble was limited to smoking pot and running away. But just to be on the safe side, "I told him, 'Any little thing, you need to call 911,' " Kevin says. "I wish we'd taken that a little more seriously."

Five days later, police found the blood-soaked bodies of Carl, 75, and his wife of 53 years, Sarah, 73, inside their white brick ranch-style home in Fayetteville, Ga. Carl, a retired airline supervisor, was stabbed at least a dozen times; Sarah, a retired bank teller, 22 times. The next day, cops arrested Holly Harvey and her girlfriend, Sandy Ketchum, 16, at a house on Tybee Island, where they had driven in Carl's stolen pickup. On Holly's forearm was a casually inked to-do list: "kill, keys, money, jewelry." To the Colliers' neighbors, the crime was particularly brutal, considering the patience the couple had shown with Holly. "Many times they could have thrown up their hands and said, 'I quit,' " says their pastor, Rev. Glenn Stringham. "They chose, basically, to give their life to their granddaughter because of their love for her."

Some might say the road to the Colliers' tragic death began in 1967, when they adopted their daughter Carla, now 37. Although they were conscientious parents who insisted on regular bedtimes and getting to know all their children's friends, they had difficulties with Carla as a teen. She battled them constantly over her choice of friends and her drug and alcohol use, says her brother Kevin, 38. Through the years, Carla was jailed three times in connection with drug and alcohol violations.

Holly was born in March 1989. Her father and Carla's common-law husband, Gene Harvey, had also been in trouble with the law. (He has played no role in Holly's life since.) Although well behaved as a child, as a teen Holly began to rival her mother's wild ways. "She used to sneak out of the house when her mother was at work. I had to go up and down the street to chase her down," says Carla's ex-boyfriend Scott Moore. He often found her with Sandy, who lived nearby with her father, Tim Ketchum. The girls became friends in middle school, and at some point became romantically involved. Sandy, according to a statement her father gave in court, often ran away from home and was on probation for drug use.

Then, in April 2003, Carla was arrested for marijuana possession with intent to sell. After her mother began serving a three-year prison term, Holly was alone—and her grandparents took her in. "They loved Holly and wanted to provide a wholesome home for her," says longtime family friend John Webster. "But she couldn't live under the rules, and the rules"—come home each night, no drinking, no smoking pot or cigarettes in the house—"weren't that strict."

As the arguing intensified, her grandparents forbade her to see Sandy—less because of their romance than her police record, says Kevin. Nevertheless, on June 10, the pair ran away together, turning up four days later 20 miles away in Griffin, Ga., at the home of Sandy's birth mother, Sandra Maddox. When they did it again a couple of weeks later, the Colliers, at wit's end, reported Holly to authorities and she was placed on probation. "As soon as they walked out of court, she fired a cigarette up," Kevin says his father told him. She stubbed it out on her grandfather's truck. "Dad was ready to carry her right back inside. Mom said, 'No, she's been through enough today.' " At dinner that Sunday, the Colliers told Kevin that Holly had become enraged when they forbade her to take their pickup truck to the beach—even though she had no driver's license.

The next afternoon, police say, Holly's grandparents went to her downstairs bedroom after smelling marijuana. She attacked her grandmother with a kitchen knife while Sandy, who'd been lying in wait, leaped out to help Holly. "I finished with Mrs. Collier," Sandy told police, "then went to join Holly"—who had chased her grandfather up the stairs. When the girls were picked up on Tybee Island, staying with some boys they'd just met, police found jewelry from the Colliers' home. According to one of the arresting officers, Bruce Jordan, Holly laughed as she was arrested. "She was callous and cocky," he said. No trial date has been set, but the girls—who face life in prison if convicted—are described by their lawyers as remorseful. Meanwhile, Holly's mother, Carla, can only watch the destruction unfold from afar. "My family has suffered a great loss," Carla said in a statement from prison. "I've lost three people whom I love."

Judy Chidester, Holly's court-appointed attorney, says, "I think Holly is still in a state of shock." So too is Kevin Collier. "I'm sure they hoped they would get Holly to turn her life around," he says of his parents. "They obviously didn't expect this to be their payment."

Two teenagers will stay in jail

Augusta.com

August 20, 2004

FAYETTEVILLE, Ga. - Two teenage girls accused of killing one of the girls' grandparents were denied bond Thursday.

Prosecutors argued that Sandy Ketchum, 16, and Holly Harvey, 15, should stay in jail because they are flight risks and because of the severity of the crime. Fayette County Superior Court Judge Paschal English did not explain why he denied the bond in his ruling, but he promised a speedy trial.

Ms. Harvey is accused of recruiting Ms. Ketchum, her girlfriend, to help kill Ms. Harvey's grandparents, Carl and Sarah Collier, both in their 70s, in their home Aug. 2.

Police say the elderly couple, with whom Ms. Harvey lived, had ordered her to stop seeing the girl and to stop using drugs.

The teens were arrested a day after the deaths at the home of two boys they had met on Tybee Island, about 230 miles away.

Prosecutors on Thursday added the charge of armed robbery to the murder charges the girls were facing. There was no elaboration on why the charge was added, but prosecutor Daniel Hiatt presented testimony that the girls had stolen Mr. Collier's pickup and some jewelry from the Colliers' home.

When the girls were arrested on Tybee Island, police also found four knives - three from the Colliers' butcher block and one folding buck knife - that authorities believe were used to stab the Colliers at least 15 times each, said Fayette County Sheriff's Office Lt. Col. Bruce Jordan.

A family member began crying and exclaimed, "Oh God!" after Lt. Col. Jordan explained how the Colliers were killed.

Lloyd Walker, Ms. Ketchum's attorney, said the legal system had failed his client. She has been in and out of the juvenile justice system and had even flunked drug tests with little consequence, he said.

"The evidence shows that a lot of people have failed Sandy," Mr. Walker said. "Up until now, everybody, including the state, has failed this child."

He also said she had been failed by her mother, who ignored orders that Ms. Ketchum was not supposed to have contact with Ms. Harvey.

Ms. Ketchum's eyes were puffy as she entered the courtroom. Her shackles clanked together as she occasionally wiped away tears.

Ms. Harvey rested her head on a table during the entire hearing - looking up only to speak with her attorney, Judy Chidester. The attorney later said the girl was upset that no one testified on her behalf.

Ms. Chidester acknowledged even while asking the judge to grant bond that there might be nowhere for Ms. Harvey to stay. Ms. Ketchum's father and stepmother testified that they would monitor her 24 hours a day if the girl was granted bond.

Teenage girls arrested for stabbing deaths of grandparents

USAToday.com

August 4, 2004

RIVERDALE, Ga. (AP) — Two teenage girls wanted in the double stabbing deaths of one of the girl's grandparents were captured along the Georgia coast Tuesday.

Fifteen-year-old Holly Ann Harvey and her friend, 16-year-old Sandra Ketchum, face murder charges for using a kitchen knife to kill Harvey's grandparents, Carl and Sarah Collier, both 77. They were found dead Monday night at their suburban home in Fayette County, about 15 miles south of Atlanta, authorities said.

Police apprehended the teens at a Tybee Island beach house, said Fayette County Sheriff Randall Johnson. They will be returned to the county Wednesday, where they will be charged as adults with two counts each of felony murder and two counts of malicious murder.

The sheriff said the teens' pickup truck was found a couple of blocks from the house where they were arrested, and there was some evidence of the killings in the truck. He would not elaborate.

"They had hooked up with some local boys they had met on the beach last night who had given them shelter," said Lt. Col. Bruce Jordan, chief investigator for Fayette County. "They had no clue they (the girls) were involved in a homicide."

Ketchum surrendered peacefully, but Harvey tried to escape from her handcuffs, Jordan said.

Police haven't said what caused the quarrel between the girls and the grandparents.

"Our investigation indicated they were doing this for freedom and so they could be together," Jordan said.

The Colliers were stabbed repeatedly with a large knife after 6 p.m. Monday, sheriff's Sgt. Belinda McCastle said. Carl Collier was found in the kitchen, and Sarah Collier was in the basement.

Harvey had been living with her grandparents, McCastle said.

The Colliers were "hardworking, everyday churchgoing people" who had a lot of friends, Johnson said.

"I knew they had some problems with the granddaughter," Johnson said. He said he believes the killings were premeditated and that the girls had behavior problems.

"I think they just had conflicts with people in general," Johnson said.

On Tuesday, the Collier's white-brick ranch house and front yard was surrounded by yellow police tape, spanning from the curbside mailbox to a telephone pole and neighbor's trees. Three officers were seen walking around the property and inside the house, which had a small American flag hanging outside the front door.

Neighbor Neoma Gaskins, who lives two doors down, said the Colliers had lived at the house more than 30 years.

Carl Collier was a retired Delta Air Lines maintenance worker who painted houses and Sara Collier was a homemaker, Gaskins said. She said she knew of some family problems with Harvey and her grandmother.

"Sarah had told her Sunday school class they were having trouble with Holly," Gaskins said.

Rudolph Berthoud, a retired New York City police officer who lives near the Colliers' house, said he never expected to see a crime scene like this in his quiet neighborhood.

"I lived with crime all my life, but it's always been on the outside," he said. "If you live enough, it catches up with you."