A Colorado father sentenced to 48 years in prison for killing his 13-year-old son after the teen discovered his fetish photos.
Mark Redwine, 60, was found guilty in July of second-degree mu*rder and child abuse after prosecutors argued he mu*rdered his son Dylan in 2012 after Dylan confronted him about photographs of him dressed in lingerie and eating feces from a diaper.
Redwine did not speak during the hearing, but his attorneys told the Durango Herald that he intends to appeal.
“I can’t recall a convicted defendant who has shown such little remorse for what they’ve done,” Judge Jeffrey Wilson said in court to Redwine. “You must be protected from the community.” You must be removed from society for an extended period of time.”
Elaine Hall, Dylan’s mother, told the outlet, “It’s justice as far as justice can go.” There will never be enough time to take Dylan’s life, but at least he won’t be able to escape. “I hope he dies in prison.”
The long-awaited mu*rder trial of Mark Redwine has begun.
The 59-year-old is accused of m*urdering his adolescent son Dylan, who went missing after a court-ordered visit on Thanksgiving in 2012.
On Monday, a district court in Duango, Colorado heard opening arguments from prosecution and defense attorneys, who painted two very different pictures of what happened to the 13-year-old the weekend he was mur*der
Public defender John Moran argued that the teen, who did not want to see his father, ran away from home and may have been killed by a bear or mountain lion, pointing to a tooth mark on his skull.
However, according to Special Deputy District Attorney Fred Johnson, Redwine mur*dered his son after being confronted about compromising photographs of him wearing women’s underwear and eating feces from a diaper, earning him the moniker “s–t eater.”
Dylan was reported missing for the first time on November 19, 2012. The first of his remains were discovered in the woods about eight miles from his father’s home the following year. His skull was discovered two years later, a mile away, with blunt force trauma.
His father told investigators that he had left his son alone at home to run errands, but when he returned, he discovered that he had gone missing.
He wasn’t arrested until July of 2017. He pled not guilty to charges of second-degree mur*der and child abuse resulting in de*ath.
“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,” Johnson explained to the court, according to the Denver Post.
He claimed Redwine m*urdered his son in his living room before dumping his body off a trail, citing a trace amount of the boy’s blood discovered in the house as well as the scent of human remains picked up by cadaver dogs on the father’s clothing and truck.
He rejected the defense theory that he fled and was killed by an animal, pointing out that the boy was discovered without any identifying items, such as his wallet or backpack; “An animal would have no interest in taking that,” he said.
He also claimed that the lights went out at the Redwine house at 11 p.m. on the night Dylan went missing, while rescue crews were combing the woods.
“At a time when most people would have been out in the woods with a flashlight, and most people would have known to leave the light on in case a child became lost in the woods… “The defendant’s house went dark at 11 p.m.,” Johnson said. “Dylan was gone.”
Meanwhile, Moran claimed that the photographs, which came “from deep within Mark’s private life,” had no bearing on the case and that there was no way to prove any link between them and the boy’s de*ath; he pointed out that text messages show Dylan had previously confronted his father about them, and nothing happened.
He claimed the amount of blood discovered was “infinitesimally small,” and that it could have been found in anyone’s living room, and he dismissed the cadaver dog evidence as “junk science.”
The case gained national attention after the boy’s divorced parents made accusations against each other during a “Dr. Phil” episode about his disappearance.
After being postponed several times, testimony will finally begin on Tuesday; if convicted, Redwine faces up to 48 years in prison.
