We Protect America's Children

This tragic but true story was writen by Keona Wright. You can read more of Mrs. Wright's writteng by clicking this link. Death of an Angle.

It was a joyous morning (4:00 am), in a casino arcade. 7-year-old  Sherrice  Iverson was  left in  the  care of  her  14-year-old  brother  Harold, who obviously was NOT  the  most  responsible  person in   the  world. Their father Leroy Iverson   gambled the night away. Sherrice like any   adorable 7-year-old ran through the casino with bliss. She  met  a  male  child  who  was  around  her same age, they began  to  throw  wet  paper towels  at each other  (innocently). One  of  Sherrice Iverson's  paper towels  hit  a  white  male  by  the name of  Jeremy Strohmeyer.

18-year-old Jeremy  Strohmeyer picked the paper towel up and threw it back at Sherrice. Shortly there-after, he became her playmate of”Hide and seek". Sherrice, with her 7-year-old   mind, thought that the restroom would be a good hiding spot. Sadly enough, this was not the case. Strohmeyer  followed Sherrice into  the  restroom (women's restroom), as he  was   walking  towards  her, she  hit him  with  a  "caution wet floor  sign". He  then  picked  her  up  and  took her  into  a  bathroom  stall. His  friend, David  Cash, who is  also  white,  entered the restroom, tilted his  head  over  the  bathroom  stall  and  saw  Strohmeyer  sexually  attacking  Sherrice  while saying  "Shut up  or  I'll  kill  you". He asked  Strohmeyer  to  stop (once)  but  Strohmeyer  ignored  his  request. David  Cash  then  left the restroom  without  alerting  authorities  or  forcefully  stopping  Strohmeyer.

25 minutes later, Strohmeyer left the restroom alone. Cash asked”what happened". Strohmeyer   replied "I killed her". The  only  thing  Cash  wanted  to know  about the attack  is  if Sherrice  was  "wet"  when  Strohmeyer  touched  her  vagina. Strohmeyer replied saying the child had   bled from her vagina as he”fingered her". He  later  told  Cash  that  he  had  strangled  her, but she  was still breathing, he  snapped  her  neck, she was still alive, than  he twisted  her  neck  around  until  he  heard  a  loud  pop.

The two heartless men left the casino and headed to their home towns, Long Beach, California.

After  bragging  about  the murder  to  the students  at his school, Strohmeyer  was  arrested and  charged with  two counts  of  rape, kidnap  and  murder. He avoided the death penalty by pleading guilty. He  was  sentenced to  life  in  prison  without  parole, a perfect  sentence  for  a killer  so  young.

During Sherrice's funeral on May 31, 1997, at Paradise Baptist Church, her father and mother sat apart. They have not spoken to each other since their daughter's death.  "Jesus, no! Jesus, no,” her mother cried as she was led out. Yolanda has moved into her own apartment. She sometimes dreams about Sherrice. In one dream, Sherrice is lying on a closet shelf, wearing pajamas. She kisses her mother and says, "Hi, Mommy, I'm back."

Although  David Cash  did  what  is  legally  considered  an  accessory  to  a  crime, he was never  arrested. This caused nationwide outrage and media frenzy. More than a year later, the ”Sherrice Iverson’s Bill" was passed. This bill requires  adults  who  witnesses  sex  abuse on  minors under  the  age  fourteen  to  report  it  or  spend  six  months  in jail. The weakest bill you've ever heard of huh?

Dannariah Finley was last seen by  her  parents  in her  bedroom. She  was  mysteriously  kidnapped  from her  home. A  few  hours  later  her mother  reported  her  missing.

                             This case is unsolved! $50,000 reward offered for information!

Late  one night in the  year 1999, three  adorable  little  girls  slept  in  their  bed  in ST. Pete, FL.  The girls, Ashley Mance age 6, Aleesha Mance (Ashley's twin) and Jailene Jones age 4, share the same mother but two different fathers. Their mother is white and both fathers are black. The  girls  spent  the  weekend  at  the  home  of  Ashley/Aleesha's  father, Terry  Mance.

Terry  Mance  had  already  been  shouted  at  by  racist  skinheads  in the  neighborhood. However, Mance  had  never  thought  this  would  lead  to  the death  of  his  beautiful  daughter. One of the sick, heartless skinheads shot at Mance's home, killing Ashley and injuring her sisters. Following  a tip, police arrested  Jessy Roten  and charged  him with two counts  of  attempted murder  and  one count of  second degree murder.

Jessy  Roten, who was  only  17  years  old, was  a  venerate  racist  white  boy. How could a country be so full of hate? Who actually dare refer to this as”civilization". This twisted, sick little boy will spend the rest of his hateful life in prison. His hatred for blacks coasted him his freedom.

The night of  the  shooting, Mance  and  his  companion, Tracy Townshend, rushed into  the  room  where  the  young  girls  slept.

All three girls screamed in agony. The bed was covered with blood and their faces covered with tears.

Terry Mance tearfully performed CPR on Ashley. Sadly enough, he was unable to save Ashley- she died in his arms.

Ashley is  remembered  as  a  quiet, well mannered  child  who loved  to play  with  Barbie  dolls  and  ride  her  bicycle. 

On a stormy winter morning, Ashley Pond, 12, a seventh-grader at Gardiner Middle School, left her South Beavercreek Road apartment complex in Oregon City, OR about 8 a.m. on Jan. 9, 2002, for the school bus stop. Ashley did not make it to school.

It had been a rough year for Ashley and she carried around more pain in her short life than any child should.

On January 5, 2001, just over a year before Ashley disappeared, her biological father, Wesley Roettger, Jr., was indicted on 40 counts of raping and sexually abusing her for over 4 years.

The following March, Ashley told a friend that two men were molesting her. That same spring, Ashley's reading teacher, Linda Virden, at Gaffney Lane Elementary School, reported to the principal, Chris Mills, that Ward Weaver, 39, kissed Ashley on the lips when he dropped her off at school. Then in June and July Ashley joined Ward, his girlfriend, Tammy Place, her 8-year-old daughter, and Mallori, Ward's 10-year-old daughter, on a two-week vacation to California. Then Ashley began living at their home. In early August: Ashley accused Ward of molesting her and moved out.

Meanwhile, on July 12, 2001, Roettger's lawyer moved to allow allegations that other men sexually abused Ashley as evidence to aid in her father's defense. Ashley told her reading teacher that Ward threatened to testify against her in her father's rape trial.

After learning of Ashley's allegations against Ward, Clackamas County deputy district attorney Chris Owen reported the child abuse to a hotline on Aug. 31st. The hotline report was forwarded to child welfare workers on Sept. 5th. Virden also called the child welfare office to report that Ashley told her that Ward abused her, tried to rape her, and threatened to testify against her. Roettger's ex-girlfriend, Mary Campobasso, also reported similar allegations. September 6, deputy district attorney, Owen, dropped all 40 counts against Roettger, who plead “no contest” to attempted unlawful sexual penetration. He was sentenced to 120 months probation.

Things seemed to be improving for Ashley that fall. During October and November, she seemed happier and more outgoing. However, a caseworker told police that child welfare received many calls about her and her family from concerned neighbors.

That Christmas Ashley told her family she was afraid of Ward.

On January 9 2002, Ashley disappeared. Police interviewed Ward and his daughter, Mallori, the following day.

"Ward Weaver said he felt sorry for Ashley and tried to help her as much as he could, but then she accused him of touching her, and that was it," Viola Valenzuela-Garcia, Oregon City Detective reported.

Clackamas County sheriff's deputy Marty Neiman, a dog handler, searched the property around Ward's house; on Jan. 19th with a search dog, but Ward refused to allow them to search inside his home.

Two months after Ashley's disappearance, on March 8, 2002, 13-year-old Miranda Diane Gaddis, an eighth grader, another friend of Mallori's, disappeared after she left her apartment at 8 a.m. on her way to the school bus stop, sparking a nationwide FBI search. Massive searches turned up no clues.

Ashley and Miranda had attended the same school, rode the same bus, and were in the same dance class. Recently, on February 23rd, Miranda spent the night at the Weaver home for Mallori's, birthday.

Investigators were focusing on Ward, who lived in a cheap rental home by the school bus stop where both girls were last seen. He seemed to be basking in the limelight. He invited television crews into his home to declare his innocence, and giving interviews on top of a concrete slab in his back yard.

On March 15th Harry Oakes, a private citizen, and his search dog, with permission from Lori Pond, offered to search the surrounding area. He was told by Ward to “stay away from freshly laid concrete” because he doesn't “want it messed up.” The dog gave a positive “death alert” behind the house.
After a May 5, 2002, surveillance of Ward, police interviewed his relatives and requesting other reports in June and July.

Ward was arrested on Aug. 13, 2002, at 5:30 p.m. near Place's apartment in Clackamas, after a 19-year-old girlfriend of his son, Francis Weaver, ran naked from Ward's Oregon City home screaming that he tried to rape her. Francis told emergency dispatchers that his father had admitted killing Ashley and Miranda  in October. While in custody, for attempted rape, a grand jury indicted
Ward of aggravated murder charges. FBI investigators secured his back yard with a chain-link fence.

Between August 24 and 25 searchers found Ashley under the concrete slab in a barrel, and Miranda in a box in Ward's tool shed. Weaver was charged with aggravated murder in the deaths.

Corvallis lawyers, Michael Barker and Peter Fahy were Ward's court-appointed representation that asked to be removed from the case for unknown reasons, but ended up staying on.

Initially defense claimed Ward was mentally unfit to stand trial but after an evaluation at the Oregon State Hospital they informed Judge Herndon that he had regained the capacity to assist in his defense.

Defense requested a change of venue claiming the media attention in the case tainted the jury pool, and was a detriment to a fair trial. Judge Herndon agreed with prosecutions arguments that Ward intentionally sought out media attention and turned the investigation into a media circus. After Ward gave numerous interviews to the media, Judge Herndon had issued a gag order.

While in jail, Weaver wrote letters to Mallori. In September he wrote, "You and me against the world," 2002. After being denied visits with his daughter in January 2004, Ward wrote a suicide note:

"I have spent this whole week trying to figure out how to make the pain (of my heart + soul not coming to see me) stop. I can only think of one thing. Cut my heart out and cut (off) the parts that hurt. She is my whole heart.”

Jan. 11, 2004, Ward was treated for razor wounds at Willamette Falls Hospital and released back to jail.

To avoid the death penalty, and claiming he wanted to give his daughter a sense of closure, in September 2004, Ward, 41, plead guilty to 17 counts, of rape, sex abuse, abuse of a corpse and killing his daughter's friends, Ashley and Miranda. He was sentenced to two life sentences without parole.

Ward's father, Ward Francis Weaver Jr., is on death row in California for raping, murdering, and burying a woman's body below concrete in his back yard. She was found in 1982.