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Lam LUONG
Classification: Mass murderer
Characteristics:
Vietnamese refugee - Threw his four children off the Dauphin
Island Bridge
Number of victims: 4
Date of murder: January 7, 2008
Date of arrest:
Next day
Date of birth: 1970
Victims profile: His four children, Ryan Phan, 3;
Hannah Luong, 2; Lindsey Luong, 1; and Danny Luong; 4 months
Method of murder: Drowning
Location: Mobile County, Alabama, USA
Status:
Sentenced to death on April 29, 2009. Conviction and sentence
overturned on February 16, 2013
Lam Luong was sentenced to death in Alabama
on April 29, 2009 for throwing his four children from the Dauphin
Island Bridge on January 7, 2008.
Appeals court overturns Lam Luong's conviction,
death sentence in Dauphin Island bridge deaths
By Brendan Kirby - Al.com
February 17, 2013
A state appeals court Friday overturned the
conviction and death sentence of a man found guilty of throwing his
four young children off of the Dauphin Island bridge in 2008.
The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals on 4-0 vote,
with Judge Mary Windom recusing herself, sent the murder case against
Lam Luong back to Mobile County Circuit Court. The appellate court
ruled that Mobile County Presiding Circuit Judge Charles Graddick
erred in turning down a defense request to move the trial to another
county because of extensive pretrial publicity.
“Based on the record before us, it is clear that
publicity surrounding the murders completely saturated the Mobile
community in 2008. A great deal of that publicity was prejudicial,”
the opinion states. “The coverage consisted of Luong’s prior criminal
history, Luong’s confession, Luong’s desire to plead guilty, Luong’s
decision to withdraw his guilty plea, the community’s outrage over the
death of the four children, and what the community believed should be
Luong’s punishment.”
Mobile County District Attorney Ashley Rich was out
of town Friday and could not be reached; her office had no immediate
comment.
It is unclear whether the Alabama Attorney
General’s Office will challenge the ruling, but it has the right to
appeal to the state Supreme Court.
The deaths of Ryan Phan, 3; Hannah Luon, 2; Lindsey
Luong, 1; and Danny Luong, 4 months; on Jan. 7, 2008, shocked
southwest Alabama like few crimes in recent history. According to
testimony, Lam Luong drove to the bridge and threw the children one by
one into the Mississippi Sound 100 feet below.
Luong was the father of three of the children; the
oldest was his common-law wife’s from a previous relationship.
Luong pleaded guilty but then withdrew it and went
to trial. A jury convicted him in March 2009 of capital murder;
Graddick followed the jury’s recommendation and sentenced him to
death.
The appeals court ruled that Graddick should have
relocated the trial. The 90-page opinion cites a long list of
newspaper stories from 2008 and 2009, and also notes that hundreds of
stories aired on local television broadcasts.
Only 15 of the 156 potential jurors indicated that
they had not heard about the case. A poll commissioned by the defense
showed that 84 percent of Mobile County residents had heard about the
case, including 71 percent who were familiar with the defenant’s
decision to plead guilty. The poll also suggested that 71 percent of
those questioned thought he was guilty.
“At the time of Luong’s trial, the case was still
of great interest to the public,” the opinion states.
The opinion also faulted several other rulings that
Graddick made during the trial, including:
His decision to deny
the defense funds to travel to Luong’s native Vietnam to investigate
his childhood.
His decision to
allow jurors to see a videotape of then-Bayou La Batre Police Capt.
Darryl Wilson throwing four sandbags off of the bridge because an
appropriate expert did not testify about the formula that the
investigator used to calculate the rate of speed.
His failure to
appoint Vietnamese-language interpreter who was registered with the
state Administrative Office of Courts. Luong’s attorneys argued that
the interpreter’s translations were inadequate.
Death for Ala. man who tossed 4 kids from bridge
Examiner.com
April 30, 2009
A judge ordered a death sentence Thursday for a
jobless shrimper convicted of murdering four young children by tossing
them from an 80-foot-high bridge on the Alabama coast.
Circuit Judge Charles Graddick handed down the
death sentence to Lam Luong (lahm loo-AWNG') and said he would order
prison officials to show Luong photographs of the four children each
day he is on death row.
Luong, 38, was convicted in March of killing the
children on Jan. 7, 2008. A Vietnamese refugee, he was accused of
dropping the four from atop the Dauphin Island Bridge after an
argument with their mother, Kieu Phan, 23.
Luong, who was Phan's common-law husband, fathered
three of the victims - Hannah Luong, 2; Lindsey Luong, 1; and Danny
Luong, 4 months. Ryan Phan, 3, was Phan's child with another man.
At his sentencing, Luong looked toward his wife
and, through an interpreter, apologized.
His attorneys urged Judge Graddick to sentence
Luong to life in prison without parole, the only alternative to the
death sentence under his capital murder conviction. They said he was
addicted to drugs and depressed.
But Graddick said the aggravating circumstances
were too great. He said the children, during their fall from the
bridge, must have felt "sheer terror" and were alive when they hit the
water.
The jury that convicted Luong last month also
recommended the death sentence.
An appeal is automatic under Alabama's death
penalty law.
Luong, who once entered a guilty plea but later
retracted it, did not testify at his trial or during a later
sentencing phase.
During the trial, the children's mother testified
that Luong had a girlfriend, abused drugs and didn't find a job when
the family returned to the Bayou La Batre area. They had temporarily
relocated to Georgia after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf coast in
2005.
Jury convicts man of tossing kids off Ala.
bridge
Mom testifies that husband laughed after four
children disappeared
NBCNews.com
March 19, 2009
A jury on Thursday convicted a
38-year-old man of murdering four children tossed from an Alabama
bridge in 2008.
The jury deliberated for only about 40 minutes in
Mobile on Thursday before convicting Lam Luong of murder. The
defendant, who came to the United States from Vietnam as a teenager,
declined an opportunity to address the court and presented no defense
witnesses at trial.
Prosecutors said Luong, a part-time shrimp boat
worker, drove the family van to the top of Alabama's two-lane Dauphin
Island bridge and tossed the children into the Mississippi Sound, some
80 feet below.
The Vietnamese immigrant mother had testified
earlier that Luong, her common-law husband, just laughed when he told
her that the children — then reported missing — would never be found.
"He kept laughing," Kieu Phan, 23, told jurors on
Monday.
Officials said most of the children suffered
injuries to the head or neck in addition to asphyxia due to drowning.
They said only one child died from drowning alone.
Luong's lawyer, Greg Hughes, had asked the jury to
return a reduced charge of manslaughter against his client.
Hughes said Luong was on drugs when he threw the
children from a Gulf coast bridge in January 2008.
Luong had confessed to investigators in 2008 and
later recanted that he had thrown the children — Ryan Phan, 3, Hannah
Luong, 2, Lindsey Luong, 1, and Danny Luong, 4 months — off the bridge
after an argument with his wife.
Hundreds volunteer to recover kids
The four tiny bodies were recovered from waters off
the Gulf coast during a search involving hundreds of volunteers in
boats, aircraft and scouring the shoreline on foot.
The mother testified that the couple's relationship
soured after they moved from Alabama after Hurricane Katrina
demolished Bayou La Batre on Aug. 31, 2005, and relocated to
Hinesville, Ga.
Phan said Luong had a girlfriend and began using
crack cocaine. She said the family moved back to Mobile County after
Luong was fired from a restaurant job. Luong also returned, but
couldn't find work, according to testimony.
At a hearing on March 5, Luong pleaded guilty, but
he subsequently reversed that decision after learning a trial would be
held despite the plea.
Luong came to the U.S. as a refugee from Vietnam at
14. Immigration records indicate that he gained legal permanent
residence status as a refugee, but never became a U.S. citizen.
Tears flow at trial for bridge deaths suspect
Lam Luong
By Gay McElroy - Al.com
March 17, 2009
As Lam Luong's capital murder trial began Monday
morning in Mobile County Circuit Court, the state's first witnesses
could not hold back their tears for the four children Luong is accused
of tossing to their deaths a year ago.
Those witnesses -- Luong's mother-in-law, his
sister-in-law and his wife -- each wept throughout their testimony,
which was delivered in the plaintive, sing-song cadence of their
native Vietnamese as an interpreter followed up in English.
As the women cried out, Luong sat motionless in a
white shirt and black pants and wore a pair of earphones to aid in his
own interpretation of the trial proceedings before Circuit Judge
Charles Graddick.
Assistant District Attorney Jo Beth Murphree told
the eight women and eight men of the jury that the state was seeking
Luong's conviction and execution.
According to the children's mother, Kieu Phan, and
the other women, Luong shared their Bayou La Batre-area home with them
and eight children.
At the urging of defense attorneys Art Powell and
Greg Hughes, the witnesses acknowledged that prior to that awful
Monday in January 2008, the defendant was an affectionate father but
perhaps not attentive or a good provider.
They described him as chronically unemployed,
addicted to cocaine and with a habit of staying out all night.
He was always asking for money, and they gave it to
him, the women said.
He had a lover, they said, although he claimed she
was only a friend.
Dung Phan, the defendant's mother-in-law, testified
that on the day the children died, Luong got up and placed them in a
van and announced he was going for a drive.
On that cold morning, three of the children --
Hannah Luong, 2; Lindsey Luong, 1, and Danny Luong, 4 months -- wore
neither coats nor shoes, the women told jurors.
They said the oldest boy, Ryan Phan, 3, fathered by
another man, was the only child properly dressed when Lam Luong took
off with them.
By nightfall, when Luong showed up without the
children and told the women that he had left them with someone that
none of them knew, panic turned to fear and fear turned to dread, the
witnesses said.
"Why did you give the kids to people you don't
know?" Tracy Phan, his sister-in-law, said she asked him in near
hysterics.
When she said she expressed the opinion to Luong
that "crack people will do anything," he looked down and cried.
Luong stuck with his story and even participated in
what his wife and her family said they believed was a genuine,
door-to-door search for the mysterious woman who had the children.
But once his story broke down, and after his
arrest, his wife, Kieu Phan, testified, Luong told her from jail that
no one would ever find the children because they were all dead.
"He was laughing," she said.
The bodies of the children were found one by one
over a two-week period, after they were tossed off the Dauphin Island
bridge.
The last body was found 144 miles south of the
Louisiana coast in the Gulf of Mexico, Murphree told jurors Monday.
Lam Luong pleads guilty to murder of children by
throwing them off Dauphin Island bridge
By K.A. Turner - Al.com
March 6, 2009
Lam Luong pleaded guilty Thursday afternoon in
Mobile to capital murder and asked to be put to death, acknowledging
in a letter the horrific killings of his four young children thrown
from the Dauphin Island bridge last year.
"I am no longer want to live. But I don't know how
to die," the Vietnamese-born Luong scrawled.
The unexpected guilty plea came as prosecutors and
defense lawyers gathered in Presiding Mobile County Circuit Judge
Charles Graddick's courtroom to make final preparations for Luong's
trial, set to open next week.
One of Luong's lawyers, Greg Hughes, said he and
co-counsel Art Powell had no inkling what their client was about to
do. District Attorney John Tyson Jr. said his team was as blind-sided
as the defense.
Graddick questioned Luong, 38, at length to make
sure that Luong understood his request and its consequences. Luong and
the judge exchanged remarks through an interpreter.
Graddick cautioned Luong that his lawyers did not
believe a guilty plea was in his best interest.
"All the medical indications are that you
understand what you're doing and that you have no mental defects,"
Graddick told Luong.
In the end, Graddick accepted Luong's guilty plea,
though Alabama law requires that capital cases still be played out in
court, and jury selection should begin next week. Luong's guilty plea
will be part of the evidence.
Thursday's hearing at Mobile Government Plaza
originally was called to discuss a defense request to move the trial
out of the area and Graddick's decision to sequester the jury. Those
issues were rendered moot by Luong's guilty plea, Graddick said.
If jurors acknowledge Luong's guilt, they still
have the option of recommending life in prison without parole, despite
his death request.
Luong is accused of throwing his children from the
bridge on the morning of Jan. 7, 2008.
Bayou La Batre police reported that he confessed to
the killings as an act of revenge against the children's mother, Kieu
Phan.
The bodies of Ryan Phan, 3; Hannah Luong, 2;
Lindsey Luong, 1; and Danny Luong, 4 months, were found one by one
during a two-week search along the coasts of Alabama, Mississippi and
Louisiana.
Luong moved to the United States when he was 13 or
14, but during his early years in Southeast Asia he was shunned and
ridiculed for being the son of a black American GI father and a
Vietnamese mother, his defense attorneys have said.
Family members have described Luong as a
hardworking father who descended into crack cocaine abuse in the
months leading up to the slayings, often disappearing for days.
The children's deaths drew nationwide media
attention as rescue crews spent days combing miles of coastal lands.
About 600 people attended a memorial service for
the children in Bayou La Batre, where they were later buried at
Oddfellows Cemetery. Cards, gifts and handmade memorials sent from
across the nation filled the Bayou La Batre Community Center.
The Rev. Phi Vo, who has counseled the children's
mother, said Thursday that the family didn't want to comment
immediately on the case.
"They would like to stay out of the media to let
the law enforcement and the judicial system do their work," Vo said.
Tragedy in the Bayou Timeline
By April Douglas - Fox10tv.com
March 5, 2009
MOBILE COUNTY, Ala. - January 7, 2008 - Police
believe on that morning Lam Luong threw his four children off the
Dauphin Island Bridge.
January 8, 2008 - Lam Luong filed a missing persons
report for his four children. In that report, Luong said he last saw
the children on Shell Belt Road in Bayou La Batre on January 7th.
Bayou la Batre police said Luong later confessed to
throwing the children off the Dauphin Island Bridge. A massive search
was launched to look for the children.
January 10, 2008 - Lam Luong makes his first court
appearance to face four counts of capital murder. Mobile County
Circuit Court Judge Charles McKnight denied bond. Joseph Kulahowski,
Luong's defense attorney at the time, released an audio tape recording
to FOX10 News, in which Luong claims the children are still alive. On
the tape, Luong said someone named Kim had the babies.
January 12, 20087 - The body of four-month-old
Danny is found in Port Aux Pines, about one mile from the bridge. His
body was found by a duck hunter. Investigators said he died of blunt
force trauma and drowning.
January 13, 2008 - The body of 3-year-old Ryan is
found in Bayou La Fourche. That's about three miles west of the body
of four-month-old Danny. Volunteers searching on land found Ryan's
body near a shoreline.
January 15, 2008 - The body of one-year-old Lindsey
is found near Jose Bay just west of the Alabama/Mississippi state
line. That same day Luong is granted in court a Vietnamese translator
to help him understand legal terms.
January 20, 2008 - The body of two-year-old Hannah
is found in Venice, Louisiana. That's about 100 miles from the Dauphin
Island Bridge.
January 26, 2008 - A public funeral is held for all
four children at the Bayou la Batre Civic Center, followed by a
private burial at Odd Fellows Cemetery.
April 1, 2008 - Lam Luong pleads not guilty to five
counts of capital murder. One count of capital murder for each of his
children and one for them as a whole.
August 8, 2008 - Luong's defense lawyers, Greg
Hughes and Art Powell, ask Judge Graddick for a change in venue
because of pre-trial publicity. The judge allows the defense team to
conduct opinion polls, to survey the public's knowledge of the case.
October 15, 2008 - Lam Luong's defense team ask
Judge Graddick for permission to go to Vietnam to interview Luong's
family, since he is facing the death penalty.
November 13, 2008 - Judge Graddick denies the
defense teams request to go to Vietnam.
March 5, 2009 - Lam Luong's defense team is
expected to ask for a change of venue based on information it has
gathered conducting opinion polls.
Father denies throwing 4 kids off Alabama
bridge; bond denied
Whdh.com
January 10, 2008
BAYOU LA BATRE, Ala. -- A man accused of tossing
his four young children off a coastal bridge to their deaths denies
killing them and says police harassed him into making a false
confession, his attorney said Thursday.
Authorities say Lam Luong confessed to killing the
children, ranging in age from a few months to 3 years, a day after
reporting them missing and claiming a woman had taken them.
But Luong's appointed attorney, Joe Kulakowski,
said his client told him he falsely confessed under pressure after
being questioned Monday night and the entire day Tuesday.
"When police yelled, `We know you killed them,' he
at some point realized they weren't going to believe him," Kulakowski
said.
"We don't have any bodies. There's a lot of emotion
and nobody knows the facts right now," he added.
Based in part on a witness's account, investigators
said the four children were thrown from the highest part of the
two-lane Dauphin Island bridge Monday morning, a point about 80 feet
above the Intracoastal Waterway. Luong had had an argument with his
wife earlier, authorities said.
Crews searching near the bridge and into the Gulf
of Mexico have found no sign of the children. State and local teams
were to continue searching Friday, but the Coast Guard announced
Thursday that it was pulling out.
"Many factors go into a decision like this and
believing that the children are not alive at this time, we must ensure
our crews are ready to respond to other search and rescue cases,"
Coast Guard Capt. Ed Stanton said.
Prosecutors have charged Luong with four counts of
capital murder, and he was ordered held without bond Thursday in
Mobile.
Kulakowski said Luong told him the children were
taken Monday morning by a woman named Kim who claimed to know their
mother and would get them food and clothes. He said they were not
returned later Monday as promised.
He said officers should be searching for Kim and a
second woman who left with the children in a van.
Prosecutors said Luong, 37, gave that account after
the children were reported missing Monday but confessed after
investigators pressed him on holes in his story.
"We believe he killed the kids by tossing them off
the bridge," said District Attorney John Tyson Jr.
Presumed dead were Luong's children Hannah, 2,
Lindsey, 1, and Danny, 4 months; and 3-year-old Ryan Phan, who was
raised from infancy by Luong but is not his biological child.
Tyson said Luong's wife, 23-year-old Kieu Ngoc
Phan, discovered her four children missing Monday and went to police
with Luong.
In Bayou La Batre, a fishing village where Luong
had worked briefly as a shrimper, many held out hope the children
would be found alive but also despaired over the details of their
disappearance.
Nguyen Bon, a nun at a Buddhist temple, said she's
been in constant prayer for the children since they disappeared. A
temple prayer service was planned Thursday night for the family.
"We're hoping the four kids will be found alive,"
said temple member Devan Phan, who is not related to the children's
family. "There's really nothing we can do but sit tight and pray. Hope
for a miracle."
In his first court appearance Thursday, Luong was
shackled hand and foot and wore a bulletproof vest amid heavy security
at the brief bond hearing in Mobile.
In denying bond, District Judge Charles McKnight
described the allegations as "heinous."
"I've never seen anything like this before," he
said.
Luong, who came to the U.S. from Vietnam in 1984
and until recently had been living in Hinesville, Ga., had a crack
cocaine possession charge pending in Hinesville.
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