Jeremiah Berry, Man Convicted Of Dismembering His Father And Feeding Parts To Coyotes Found Dead

HuffingtonPost.com

March 8, 2012

A 24-year-old who admitted to killing and dismembering his father in 2008 has been found dead, according to the Cortez Journal.

The Montezuma County Sheriff's Office said Jeremiah Berry's body was found at his residence just south of Cortez. The coroner has ruled it a suicide.

In 2008 Jeremiah Berry was sentenced to three years in a Colorado Department of Corrections facility and 10 years of supervised probation after pleading guilty to the second-degree murder of his father, 42-year-old Jack Berry.

According to court documents, Jeremiah Berry shot his father and confessed to dismembering the body with an axe before feeding parts of it to coyotes and hiding others in buckets of concrete. 7News reports detectives at the time found Jack Berry's skull, hands and feet encased in concrete.

Jeremiah Berry told police that he killed his father after being raped by him. Before the rape, he said his father claimed God told him that his son needed a sex change in order to become his wife.

According to the Durango Herald, the defendant's attorney said during the sentencing hearing that his client had made several attempts at suicide and engaged in self-mutilation.

An obituary published in the Cortez Journal says that funeral and cremation services for Jeremiah Berry will be held on Saturday.

Jeremiah Raymond Berry Pleads Guilty To Feeding Abusive Father To Coyotes

HuffingtonPost.com

November 28, 2009

Jeremiah Raymond Berry pleaded guilty on Friday to killing his sexually abusive father and feeding him to coyotes.

The Cortez Journal has more:

Jeremiah Raymond Berry was sentenced to three years in a Colorado Department of Corrections facility followed by 10 years of "intense supervised" probation. He appeared Friday afternoon before 22nd Judicial District Judge Douglas Walker, who accepted a plea deal reached between the district attorney and Berry's public defender.

The AP details the hearing and the crime:

Berry, who cried throughout his sentencing hearing, had been charged with second-degree murder for the February 2008 death of his father, 42-year-old Jack Berry. Jeremiah Berry had faced 48 years in prison if convicted of that charge in Montezuma County. He had previously pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, but doctors concluded during two mental evaluations that he was competent to stand trial.

Jeremiah Berry shot his father in the head, and then dismembered his corpse to feed parts of it to coyotes, according to court documents. Authorities said they also found some of Jack Berry's body parts encased in a bucket with concrete.

Jeremiah Berry told police he killed his father after his father raped him. He said his father told him that day he had been told by God his son needed a sex change to become his wife.

Berry receives three years

By Steve Grazier – The Cortez Journal

November 28, 2009

A Montezuma County man who pleaded guilty to felony counts of manslaughter and menacing after admitting to killing his father and decapitating and dismembering the body was sentenced Friday.

Jeremiah Raymond Berry was sentenced to three years in a Colorado Department of Corrections facility followed by 10 years of “intense supervised” probation. He appeared Friday afternoon before 22nd Judicial District Judge Douglas Walker, who accepted a plea deal reached between the district attorney and Berry’s public defender.

“You killed your father, you shot him and you destroyed evidence,” Walker said in announcing the sentence. “You were (also) sexually abused by your father … and have suffered from mental abuse.”

In July 2008, Berry pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity after being charged with second-degree murder, a count that was dismissed as part of his plea agreement in August with the district attorney.

Berry, 22, admitted to killing his father, Jack Berry, who was 42. He told Montezuma County sheriff detectives he shot his father in the back of the head after he was raped by the man, then decapitated and dismembered the body and fed flesh to coyotes in February 2008, according to court documents in the case.

According to police reports, sheriff’s office detectives found body parts, including a skull, hands and feet, thought to be those of Jack Berry in buckets hardened with cement in a storage room of a Montezuma County dog kennel.

The judge’s three-year prison sentence includes credit for 443 days served and was the maximum term recommended under a plea deal reached with prosecutors and the defense. Berry’s manslaughter count had a 10-year probation cap following any prison time he might serve.

“Some incarceration is needed. I can’t sentence you without (it),” said Walker, who noted that Berry’s sentence will begin immediately.

A handful of friends and family members spoke on Jeremiah Berry’s behalf during the sentencing proceeding. His mother, Rita Gallegos, said her son was robbed of a normal childhood because of years of physical and sexual abuse from Jack Berry.

“Jeremiah stopped a cycle of abuse. He’s not a cold-blooded killer,” Gallegos said. “His father was a monster, and Jeremiah was a victim.”

One of Berry’s sisters, Rebecca Lopez, agreed.

“Our father took (Jeremiah’s) strength and ambition … and his (right) to know he was a man,” she said. “Since Jeremiah was born, he has been in prison.”

Jeremiah Berry was immediately ordered back into custody of the Montezuma County Sheriff’s Office and will soon be transported to a state corrections facility in Denver. However, following Friday’s hearing, the judge awarded Berry a few minutes to meet with family members in a private court chamber to say goodbye.

Public defender Chris Trimble, counsel for Jeremiah Berry, called his client’s sentence a “just outcome.”

“It’s sad to see him suffer after a generation of abuse that he was forced to end. Jack Berry was a sadistic monster, and Jeremiah Berry has been a hero,” said Trimble, who noted that on numerous occasions, Berry “self mutilated” his body while in jail and made several attempts of suicide.

Two mental evaluations over the course of Berry’s case suggested he was competent enough to stand trial; however, Kathy Vetter, a sheriff’s department nurse, said he was in serious need of mental health care.

During his remarks to the judge, District Attorney Jim Wilson summed up the plea agreement and potential sentence as a “combined effort” between the defense and prosecution. He said the deal balances the community’s needs with those of Jeremiah Berry.

“We need to give him what he needs to be a constructive member of society,” Wilson said. “He is a victim just like he is a defendant. He’s a troubled young man.”

Jeremiah Raymond Berry and Jack Berry

We have to admit, we’re a bit flummoxed about the situation involving 20-year-old Jeremiah Raymond Berry and his 42-year-old father, Jack Berry.

They both did things which, in other circumstances, would allow People You’ll See In Hell to put their name up in lights, detail their crimes and allow our readers to vote on whether or not they’re Hell-bound. But when Jeremiah Berry, who did some admittedly grisly things to Jack Berry, was actually a victim of his father’s lust…

We’ll let you decide.

On the 19th of Febrary, 2008 Jeremiah Berry and his father, Jack Berry, were out transporting sheep. Jeremiah and Jack Berry were taking the sheep to a sheltered canyon for a while. This was something they did on a regular basis.

At one point, Jack Berry turned to his son, Jeremiah, and told him:

I’ve been told by God that you need to get a sex change and become my wife.

Whoa.

That’s a kind of “out of the blue” sort of statement right there when you’re out with your son transporting sheep. After a great deal of thought, People You’ll See In Hell would like to submit to you that there are several other situations where that comment is inappropriate:

While standing next to another man in the restroom and using the urinal.
While checking out at the supermarket.
While discussing with a loan officer the terms of your loan.
During the middle of a class lecture.
While being written a ticket by a friendly police officer.

Yeah, pretty much any of those situations would not call for you to tell someone that they needed to have a sex change operation so that they could become your wife. Frankly, we would have a hard time coming up with a snappy response to that statement, especially if it came from any of our fathers.

While we do not know what Jeremiah Berry told Jack Berry in response to this, Jeremiah Berry has told the authorities that Jack Berry raped him right then and there.

Raping anyone is bad.

Raping your relative is worse.

Raping your son?

Hell!

He’s also told the police that after being raped, Jack Berry told him that he wanted to take Jeremiah into the mountains and make him his girlfriend. Jack also threatened to kill Jeremiah and his family.

And yeah, it’s kind of weird that Jack would say that he wanted to make Jeremiah his girlfriend at that point because Jack Berry had already made Jeremiah his girlfriend, but oh well – that’s Jeremiah Berry’s story and he’s sticking to it.

Jeremiah Raymond Berry is also sticking to the story of how he dealt with Jack Berry raping him.

Jeremiah Berry didn’t seek counseling. Jeremiah Berry didn’t call the police. He didn’t go on Oprah. He didn’t move away and vow to never see his father again.

No, Jeremiah Berry pulled out his pistol and shot his father, Jack Berry, in the back of the head.

That wasn’t enough, of course. Jeremiah Berry also stabbed his father 199 times with a knife (I guess he decided 200 was just too much) and used an ax to chop Jack Berry up into his component parts. The head had to go, along with the hands and feet.

With the knife, Jeremiah Berry skinned Jack Berry’s corpse. The flesh was fed to the coyotes, which is highly illegal. You aren’t supposed to feed coyotes.

After finishing with the mutilation of his father’s corpse, Jeremiah Berry carted the body parts out of the canyon over the next few days. He used five-gallon buckets.

The tools he used to chop up his father, along with the gun he used to kill him, were thrown into a river.

A portion of Jack Berry’s remains – his head, his hands and his feet – were stored in a storage room at a local dog kennel. The other parts were being searched out after Jeremiah Berry confessed to police on the 29th of April, 2008 about what he’d done.

Jeremiah Berry has been charged with second degree murder. Portions of Jack Berry are currently fertilizer. Other parts of him are in custody.

Pysih.com

Jeremiah Berry

Jeremiah Berry wipes a tear from his eye at his sentencing
hearing in September 2009.
(Photo Sam Gree / Cortez Journal)

Jeremiah Berry