An enraged Colorado father killed his 13-year-old son after the boy found “compromising” photos of him eating feces from a diaper while wearing women’s underwear, prosecutors allege.
The murder trial of Mark Redwine, 59, began Monday with opening statements by prosecutors who claim he flew into a rage when his teenage son, Dylan, may have mentioned or shown him the sordid photos the night he was killed in November 2012,
the Denver Post reported.
“A damaged relationship, exposed with compromising photographs, photographs in the hands of a 13-year-old who is disgusted by it, which triggered a violent rage in the defendant,” prosecutor Fred Johnson said.
Redwine,
who was arrested in 2017, is charged with second-degree murder and child abuse resulting in death.
Dylan disappeared from Redwine’s Vallecito home during a court-ordered visit at the residence over Thanksgiving 2012. The boy’s remains were not discovered until 2013 and 2014, the Denver Post reported.
Johnson said Monday prosecutors intend to show Redwine killed Dylan in his living room and then dumped the body off a trail near his home before misleading investigators for months to cover up the killing.
Traces of blood belonging to the boy were found in Redwine’s living room and his son’s body was found without his wallet or backpack.
Redwine’s public defender, meanwhile, insisted that Dylan had no interest in visiting his father and suggested he may have been attacked by a bear or mountain lion after running away, claiming a tooth mark was found on his skull, the Denver Post reported.
Defense attorney John Moran said Redwine’s son had previously confronted him about the fetish photos during a cross-country trip — and that prosecutors will not be able to prove a connection between his death and the revealing snapshots.
The images “come from deep within Mark’s private life,” Moran said. “If the prosecution could find an expert to say people who do that are more likely to kill their child, that information would be given to you … Mr. Redwine did not kill his child.”
“Mr. Redwine … in addition to being innocent, lost everything,” Moran said Monday. “He lost it all, and now he sits here with this demand for wrongful conviction.”
The trial, which was
postponed after multiple delays in the case, is expected to last until mid-July, with testimony to start Tuesday, the Denver Post reported.
