12-09-2011, 05:47 PM
i remember this awful and senseless case very well.
![[Image: 111209092416-kevin-sweat-oklahoma-suspect-story-top.jpg]](http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/111209092416-kevin-sweat-oklahoma-suspect-story-top.jpg)
![[Image: Taylor%20and%20Skyla.jpg]](http://www.taylorandskyla.net/Images/Taylor%20and%20Skyla.jpg)
![[Image: zzzNEWS+WELEETKA+GIRLS+KILLED+3.jpg]](https://1.bp.blogspot.com/_WzJvFF4O8k8/SFNGFVpyz6I/AAAAAAAACAg/U3m8_Llu8ew/s400/zzzNEWS+WELEETKA+GIRLS+KILLED+3.jpg)
![[Image: story.paschal.placker.whittaker.courtesy.jpg]](http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2009/CRIME/10/24/justice.grace.coldcase.oklahoma/story.paschal.placker.whittaker.courtesy.jpg)
(CNN) -- A 25-year-old Oklahoma man was charged Friday with the murder of two girls who were found about three and a half years ago, shot to death in a ditch alongside a remote country road.
"We don't believe that he knew (the slain girls) directly," Oklahoma State Bureau Of Investigation Director Stan Florence said Friday of Kevin Sweat. "We just believe that he happened to be in the area that day."
Best friends Taylor Paschal-Placker, 13, of Weleetka, and Skyla Jade Whittaker, 11, of nearby Henryetta, were discovered on June 8, 2008, by Taylor's grandfather. They had been shot 13 times in the head and chest -- eight times for Skyla and five for Taylor -- the state medical examiner reported after an autopsy.
Their killings rattled Weleetka, a town of just over 1,000 residents, with police calling the shootings the community's first murders in more than 20 years.
It also set off an extensive investigation involving multiple local, state and federal law enforcement agencies and including about 650 interviews, 900 leads and 19,000 forensic tests on 800 pieces of evidence, according to Florence.
Sweat was among those interviewed relatively early about the girls' murder, because he owned a Glock .40 Model 22 handgun like one of those thought to be used in the shootings. But he was not considered a suspect until this summer, after he was arrested and charged with the murder of his girlfriend, Ashley Taylor, said Florence.
The suspect was already behind bars in Seminole County (Oklahoma) Jail in his girlfriend's death when the new charges were filed, according to the state investigative bureau director.
District Attorney Max Cook, whose jurisdiction includes Creek and Okfuskee counties, told reporters on Friday that he has filed court documents requesting that Sweat be eligible for the death penalty if found guilty of murder in any of these killings.
"We feel that we are in an appropriate position to go forward in this case," Cook said Friday, referring to the case of the two girls.
(CNN) -- A 25-year-old Oklahoma man was charged Friday with the murder of two girls who were found about three and a half years ago, shot to death in a ditch alongside a remote country road.
"We don't believe that he knew (the slain girls) directly," Oklahoma State Bureau Of Investigation Director Stan Florence said Friday of Kevin Sweat. "We just believe that he happened to be in the area that day."
Best friends Taylor Paschal-Placker, 13, of Weleetka, and Skyla Jade Whittaker, 11, of nearby Henryetta, were discovered on June 8, 2008, by Taylor's grandfather. They had been shot 13 times in the head and chest -- eight times for Skyla and five for Taylor -- the state medical examiner reported after an autopsy.
Their killings rattled Weleetka, a town of just over 1,000 residents, with police calling the shootings the community's first murders in more than 20 years.
It also set off an extensive investigation involving multiple local, state and federal law enforcement agencies and including about 650 interviews, 900 leads and 19,000 forensic tests on 800 pieces of evidence, according to Florence.
Sweat was among those interviewed relatively early about the girls' murder, because he owned a Glock .40 Model 22 handgun like one of those thought to be used in the shootings. But he was not considered a suspect until this summer, after he was arrested and charged with the murder of his girlfriend, Ashley Taylor, said Florence.
The suspect was already behind bars in Seminole County (Oklahoma) Jail in his girlfriend's death when the new charges were filed, according to the state investigative bureau director.
District Attorney Max Cook, whose jurisdiction includes Creek and Okfuskee counties, told reporters on Friday that he has filed court documents requesting that Sweat be eligible for the death penalty if found guilty of murder in any of these killings.
"We feel that we are in an appropriate position to go forward in this case," Cook said Friday, referring to the case of the two girls.