Nelson sentenced to death for kidnapping, murdering KCK girl

With a vulgarity-laced speech, Keith D. Nelson lashed out at the legal system and his victim's family Monday before a federal judge sentenced him to die for kidnapping and killing Pamela Butler.

Nelson denied sexually assaulting Pamela but acknowledged killing her in 1999.

"People say, `How can you kill a 10-year-old girl?"' said Nelson. "It's not that hard."

Pamela's mother, Cherri West, remained composed as she watched from the second row of seats in U.S. District Judge Fernando Gaitan's courtroom in downtown Kansas City.

"A person that rotten doesn't need to live in our society," she said later.

Last October, Nelson, 27, admitted that he kidnapped and killed Pamela, placing his fate -- either life in prison or death -- in the hands of jurors at a penalty trial. After hearing evidence for two weeks, jurors took less than two hours on Nov. 28 to return a verdict in favor of the death penalty. Gaitan under federal law had to abide by the jury's decision.

Monday's 25-minute hearing capped a case that started in October 1999 and led to one of the largest manhunts in Kansas City history. The facts of the crime shocked and outraged Kansas Citians, who held vigils, lighted candles and contributed money to support Pamela's family.

Nelson kidnapped Pamela as she roller-skated near her Kansas City, Kan., home on Oct. 12, 1999. He stuffed her into the cab of a pickup truck, drove east toward Missouri and stopped in the parking lot of a Grain Valley church. Nelson dragged her through a densely wooded area. There he beat and strangled her with a length of brown speaker wire.

Nelson quickly became a suspect in the girl's disappearance, and officers arrested him two days after the kidnapping on the banks of the Kansas River. Pamela's body was recovered the next day.

Prosecutors also contended that Nelson raped Pamela, but that charge was dropped when he pleaded guilty to the kidnapping count.

Though shackled at his wrists and ankles, Nelson bounced into the courtroom just before 9 a.m. Monday, wearing a tight smile and sporting a wispy mustache and a scruff of beard in his chin.

Gaitan opened the hearing with a quick recitation of the case and then offered the floor to West. In an emotional statement just two days before Pamela would have turned 13, West described her experience as "the worst nightmare a parent could have. My daughter was kidnapped and murdered.

"No one will ever know the pain my family has felt," West said. "No one will ever know the pain that Pamela felt. The hardest part is that I can't kiss her pain and make it go away."

Gaitan then gave Nelson the opportunity to speak.

"I guess I will," Nelson said, rising slowly from his chair.

Nelson expressed concern that he hadn't received a fair trial, a point to which he returned throughout his statement.

"They say it's a 50-50 chance (at trial)," Nelson said. "But when you kill somebody, they think you lose the right to a fair trial."

Nelson criticized Gaitan for not moving the trial away from Kansas City, where media attention about the case has been intense.

The ruling on "the change of venue...was bull.... Come on," Nelson said.

He criticized prosecutors for using jailhouse witnesses, who testified at his trial that Nelson had discussed killing Pamela.

"They can let people out of jail and bribe witnesses," Nelson said. "They did that just to inflamatate (inflame) the jury."

Prosecutors were wrong when they initially accused him of raping Pamela, Nelson contended.

"They don't know what happened back in October," Nelson said. "She wasn't raped....I know. I was there."

Nelson also lashed out at his own lawyers, who have pushed him to participate in his defense and even attend court hearings. The outcome of the case, Nelson said, has never mattered to him.

"Whether it's lethal injection or old age, it doesn't matter," Nelson said. "Basically, I don't (care)."

Nelson then turned to lawyers, FBI agents, news reporters and Pamela's family, and uttered vulgarities.

Nelson also accused Pamela's relatives of profiting from Pamela's death.

"Some of the family was bragging about their sister being dead to get the money" from charitable contributions, Nelson said.

Later, West said that the remaining money was in a trust fund that could not be opened for years. She denied that her interest in the case was monetary.

"He doesn't know everything," West said. "That's just something he had to make up."

During his courtroom speech, Nelson twice touched on the ultimate punishment for his crimes. He gestured at first to prosecutors and then to members of Pamela's family.

"You can't send me to hell, and they can't send me to hell," Nelson said. "I can send me to hell. It's my decision."

Later, he added, "Some of you will meet me in hell when I get there."

Gaitan listened patiently and then passed judgment: "The death sentence is the ultimate sentence in our system..."

"That's not true," Nelson interrupted.

"...It's my duty to impose a death sentence upon Keith Dwayne Nelson."

Afterward, defense attorney Susan Hunt estimated that barring a successful appeal, Nelson still faced up to six years in prison before he would be executed. Nelson's courtroom statement reflected his ambivalence to his punishment, Hunt said.

"He always has never cared whether he got the death penalty or life in prison," Hunt said. "The death penalty would be easier for him."

To contact Mark Morris, federal courts reporter, call (816) 234-4310 or send e-mail to mmorris@kcstar.com.

Good! Needle him, hang him, shoot him, cut him up with ginzu knives. Just exterminate him please.

This kind of thing had been happening forever in this country and it will continue to. There is no way to stop it. But it would go a long way to stop those already caught and convicted if we didn't let them out of jail so often or found some way to identify them as they move around. I wish that we could tattoo their faces and arms bright red. At least the kids would stand a chance. See them coming. Or attach some kind of tracking device on them. That shows their every step. And don't allow them to be in a moving vehicle by themselves, or they go right back to jail! Does that seem to harsh? It does not to me. I know some parents that had their child butchered by one of these slime. I don't know how they go on.

There is a little girl that was just abducted in Houston. People are out on the streets looking for her. And some of the people looking for her have done the same thing several times before. They have been out looking for a child that is missing. Sometimes the news is good, sometimes it's bad. And in part of that group are the parents I mention above. Their little girl was found in parts. In parts! What was left was stuffed in a sewer drain. Horrible! And today, they try to help others. Maybe that's how they go on.

If you have kids, WATCH THEM! No matter what the situation. There are more of these devoid slugs out there than people know.

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