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Jordan
Adam CRIADO
Classification: Mass murderer
Characteristics:
After
learning his wife had spent the night with another man
Number of victims: 5
Date of murders:
July 18, 2011
Date of arrest:
Same day (suicide attempt)
Date of birth:
1960
Victims profile:
His
wife, Tabash Paige-Criado, 30, and their
four children, Elijah, 7, Isaac, 6, Andrew, 5, and Aurora, 2
Method of murder:
Stabbing with knife -
Smothering
Location: Medford,
Jackson County, Oregon, USA
Status:
Sentenced to
life in prison without parole on April 14, 2013
Medford man who killed family, torched home gets
life without parole
OregonLive.com
April 15, 2013
MEDFORD — A 53-year-old Oregon man has been
sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing his wife and
four young children.
In a tearful and rambling statement on Monday,
Jordan Adam Criado of Medford maintained that he had only killed his
wife after she killed the children.
But Jackson County Circuit Judge Lorenzo Mejia told
the defendant he was delusional, and the evidence was overwhelming
that he had killed his entire family on July 18, 2011, and set fire to
the house after learning his wife had spent the night with another
man.
"Maybe you can't admit to yourself that you killed
them, but that is clearly what happened," Mejia said. "You dishonor
the memory of how good a father you were and dishonor the memory of
your children by your insistence that she killed them."
Prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty
after Criado entered what are known as Alford guilty pleas to five
counts of aggravated murder and one of arson. That means he did not
admit guilt, but acknowledged there was enough evidence to convict
him. The judge added 90 months for arson to be served concurrently
with the five life sentences.
After sentencing, District Attorney Beth Heckert
released the first detailed account of the evidence against Criado.
It said that firefighters called to the house had
to break in, because the front door was deadbolted, with a burning
couch in front of it, and a back sliding door was blocked by a wooden
dowel. One firefighter told investigators that when they found the
unconscious Criado, he was holding a kitchen knife covered with blood
that later turned out to be his own. The entire family was in the
master bedroom, where one of four fires had been set.
Authorities said the evidence showed Criado gave
the four children - Elijah, 7, Isaac, 6, Andrew, 5, and Aurora, 2 — a
large dose of melatonin to make them sleep, then sneaked up on his
wife, Tabash Paige-Criado, 30, and stabbed her to death. There were no
signs of a struggle. An autopsy showed she had been stabbed twice in
the face, twice in the neck, and 10 times in the abdomen.
He killed each of the children, stabbing and
smothering the boys, and smothering the girl, then carried them to the
master bedroom, where he put two of them on the bed, and the other two
on a mattress on the floor next to their mother.
He left the knife he used on his wife on a bunk bed
in the kids' room, then he went around the house starting fires and
splashing cooking oil on the walls and the bodies his wife and
children to help them burn, authorities said.
Evidence showed Criado cut his wrists in attempt to
kill himself, but firefighters were able to revive him after taking
him from the burning house. He spent months unconscious from smoke
inhalation in a hospital, and was arrested immediately upon discharge.
Criado told authorities that when his wife came
home, she told him she had woken up in a man's bed and believed she
had been drugged. He went into the back yard to fix a car, and later
felt something was not right. When he went into the house he saw
flames, and his wife standing over the dead children with a knife.
Heckert said Criado had worked at a local factory
after moving to Southern Oregon from California, but lost his job and
the family was evicted from a house in Central Point. All the children
had special needs, and Paige-Criado was treated for bipolar disorder.
She had been telling her husband for some time she wanted a divorce.
Dressed in a black suit, Paige-Criado's father,
Willie Johnson, said he was a victim of domestic violence several
times over, including the murders of his two sisters. He added that
Craido was not himself to blame, but the California prison system,
where he did time for molesting his first wife's daughters.
"Jordan wasn't released from prison," Johnson said.
"Jordan was unleashed on society."
While Criado averted his gaze, Johnson said he
hoped his son-in-law would do something good in prison to make up for
his crimes.
Medford man agrees to plea deal in slaying of
wife, children
OregonLive.com
March 19, 2013
MEDFORD, Ore. — Sobbing and beating his chest in
court Tuesday, a Southern Oregon man admitted that he killed his wife
in July 2011 after she came home from being out all night, but blamed
her for killing their four young children.
However, Jordan Adam Criado, 53, of Medford,
entered what's known as an Alford guilty plea to four counts of
aggravated murder and one of arson. That means that while he does not
admit guilt, he acknowledged there was enough evidence to convict him.
In return, prosecutors will not pursue a death sentence, and will
recommend life in prison without parole.
"For my wife, Tabasha, I know I have killed her,
and I am sorry for that," said Criado, dressed in an orange jail smock
and pants, his shoulder-length dark hair hanging in his face. "My son,
Elijah, I did not kill him."
"I kill my wife, because she kill my babies. My
Elijah, my Isaac, my Andrew, my babies," he sobbed in heavily accented
English, thumping his chest with the points of stiff fingers on the
name of each child. Turning to District Attorney Beth Heckert, he went
on, "My babies. My babies. My babies."
Judge Lorenzo Mejia accepted the pleas, telling
Criado that the evidence against him was overwhelming.
Sentencing was set for April 15. Heckert said the
evidence against Criado will come out then.
Tabasha Paige-Criado, 30, was out all night, and
appeared completely at ease in a security video from a convenience
store, where police picked her up and gave her a ride home after
Criado reported her missing. She had been posting on her Facebook page
that while she loved her children — Elijah, 7; Isaac, 6; Andrew, 5,
and Aurora, 2 — she could not stand "my hubby."
Hours later, firefighters pulled all five members
of the family from their burning house and tried to revive them on the
front lawn as bystanders watched, but Criado was the only one to
survive. He lay unconscious for nearly three weeks from smoke
inhalation and was arrested when hospital staffed discharged him in a
wheelchair. Authorities said Paige-Criado and three of the children
were stabbed. Autopsies list the probable cause of death for all four
children as smoke inhalation. Authorities said they found multiple
knives, and fires had been started throughout the house, which has
since been torn down.
Wally Johnson, Paige-Criado's biological father,
sat silently in court, dressed all in black, but had nothing to say
after the pleas were entered.
The case marked the highest number of murder
victims in a single case in Jackson County history, said Police Chief
Tim George.
"People did a superhuman effort to revive people,"
he said. "Unfortunately, the only survivor was the suspect. You never
get over it. People who worked that case put their heart and soul into
it. It scarred a community."
Friends and family said Paige-Criado met her
husband at a community college in Bakersfield, Calif., after getting
out of the Navy. She married him despite knowing he had been sentenced
to 20 years in prison for molesting three girls under the age of 14 in
Sacramento County. Criado moved his family to Oregon to get away from
his wife's family. She went to another local community college, and he
worked out of his home fixing cars, neighbors said.
Not guilty pleas entered for Jordan Criado of
Medford, accused of killing family and setting fire to house
OregonLive.com
December 13, 2011
MEDFORD -- His gaze on the floor and his handcuffed
hands in his lap, a Southern Oregon man sat silently Tuesday while a
judge entered not guilty pleas to charges the man murdered his wife
and four young children last summer and set fire to their house.
Dressed in orange jail garb, Jordan Criado, 51,
appeared by video from jail in Jackson County Circuit Court in
Medford. His shoulder-length hair was disheveled, and his grey beard
rested on his chest. His only communication was to nod when asked by
the judge if he could hear.
After a conference in chambers, defense attorney
Geoff Gokey told Judge Lorenzo Mejia in court that Criado was "not
able to enter a plea at this time." Asked why after the brief hearing,
Gokey replied, "I can't say."
Criado is accused of stabbing his wife, 30-year-old
Tabasha Paige-Criado, and two of the children, and setting multiple
fires in their small Medford house in July.
Family and friends have said Paige-Criado, a
student at the local community college, wanted a divorce.
A registered sex offender in California, Criado is
being held on 24 counts of aggravated murder, which carry a potential
death penalty, as well as felony murder, manslaughter and arson
charges.
The many counts of aggravated murder are based on
different theories of the crime. Twenty of them refer to multiple
victims. Four are based on victims under the age of 14 -- Elijah, 7;
Isaac, 6, Andrew, 5, and Aurora, 2. The felony murder counts are
related to four counts of arson.
Mejia set a March 5 deadline for the defense to
decide whether it will pursue a defense of not guilty by reason of
insanity. Attorneys also will agree on a trial date then.
Active in social networking, Paige-Criado made it
clear on Facebook that she loved her children and no longer wanted to
be with her husband.
She met Criado at community college in Bakersfield,
Calif., and married him despite knowing he had been convicted of
molesting three girls in Sacramento County, Calif., family members
have said. They said he moved his family to Oregon to get away from
his wife's family, who disapproved of him.
Criado was pulled from the burning house with his
wife and children. Firefighters worked to revive them on the front
lawn, but only Criado survived. He spent nearly three weeks
unconscious in a hospital after suffering smoke inhalation.
Criado was eventually released to police, who
immediately arrested him. He has remained in jail without bail.
An autopsy listed Paige-Criado' cause of death as
stab wounds to the neck and abdomen. The children all died of smoke
inhalation, with stab wounds to the neck listed as an additional cause
for Isaac and Andrew.
Medford family's 'domestic disaster' begins as
one-alarm fire, unfolds into 'ugly scene'
By Kimberly A.C. Wilson - The Oregonian
July 23, 2011
Here is what disaster sounded like Monday morning,
when what appeared to be an ordinary house fire in west Medford turned
out to be the area's worst mass homicide: The clank of air tanks, the
crack of a wood-paneled door pried open and the whoosh of a
gasoline-powered fan pushing black smoke through a burning house. Fire
sirens, air horns, idling diesel engines, the barks of startled dogs,
and voices calling out, "Bring me another EMS bag!"
But in the moment, none of it registered.
"I don't recall any single sound," said Deputy Fire
Chief Gordon Sletmoe, who was the first firefighter to arrive at what
police would later describe as a domestic disaster: five members of a
family stabbed and left to die in a burning house.
Firefighters pulled Tabasha Paige-Criado, 30, from
the home, along with her three sons, Elijah, 7, Isaac, 6, and Andrew,
5, and her daughter Aurora, 2. All five were pronounced dead at a
hospital.
Rescuers found her 51-year-old husband, Jordan Adam
Criado, injured and unconscious, overcome by smoke. Unresponsive and
in guarded condition on a ventilator at a local trauma center, Criado
is under police guard, the only individual police have named as a
"person of interest" in the killings.
The crime has unnerved Medford, the largest city in
southern Oregon, with nearly 75,000 residents.
But what grew to a four-alarm, five-ambulance,
100-emergency worker response began much like any ordinary house fire
call.
A neighbor first noticed the black smoke curling
under the eaves of the tan bungalow on West 10th Street. It was a
cool, damp morning and smoke gathered around the home's front door and
poured from the chimney.
At 9:23 a.m., after getting no response to his
knocking, a neighbor phoned 9-1-1.
Two community service officers from the Medford
Police Department were a few blocks away when they heard the call.
Forty-five seconds later, they were standing outside the one-story
wood-frame house. No one answered their knocks.
They radioed in light smoke.
That Monday morning, all of the on-duty fire crews
in Medford were at a monthly shift meeting about a mile away. So when
the call sounded, Sletmoe, at his desk four blocks away, grabbed two
radios and his cellphone and quickly drove over.
He arrived at the same moment as a patrol officer,
at 9:27 a.m. Two minutes later, the first fire engine arrived and the
second a minute later.
It was 9:31 a.m. when a neighbor told firefighters
that he thought the family was home, so the routine house fire had the
potential to be a rescue.
"We had some very vague neighbor reports that
somebody might be inside," Sletmoe said. "I walked around the house."
He saw an officer looking through a partly open
sliding glass door, calling out "Hello, hello, is anybody in there?"
No one replied.
Sletmoe called for an ambulance as a precaution.
Next door, an officer waved to Susan Coghill, who
was drawn to her front window by the noise of sirens. Coghill spied
the smoke seeping from eaves barely 10 feet from her house.
Her frightened dogs were barking when she
evacuated.
Entering the house
Sletmoe coordinated the fire response as crews
arrived. Geared up in an air pack and tan fireproof suit, one
firefighter pried the door open. Nearly a dozen firefighters marched
into the wall of smoke. Another put a fan inside the front door to
push the black smoke out the back.
Within seconds, a firefighter inside radioed that
they had found victims.
Sletmoe called for a second alarm, for additional
fire units, and he ordered two more ambulances.
At roughly 9:39 a.m., firefighters began to emerge,
arms filled with victims.
Most of them were bloody, Sletmoe said.
After the first victim, the others were discovered
in rapid succession. They had visible stab wounds. Paige-Criado was
stabbed in the neck, as were the two youngest boys.
"There was some hope for at least two of them
because it looked like they got some pulse or life signs," said
Medford Police Chief Tim George.
But hope was thin.
Sletmoe raised the response to a third and then a
fourth alarm, needing more emergency medical technicians.
By 9:44, all six victims were on the lawn.
The house fire was no longer the focus.
Five victims lay sprawled across one side of the postage stamp front
yard, each being tended by medics and rescuers administering CPR,
putting in IVs, trying to manage the bleeding even as they worked to
get oxygen into smoke-filled lungs. The sixth victim lay on the other
side of the yard, also being treated.
This wasn't artistry, or poetry in motion, or
chaos, said Sletmoe. "It was an ugly scene," he said. "Some of the
kids are really small."
Fire engines blocked traffic for several blocks,
but crowds gathered on the sidewalks to watch medics working
feverishly over tiny bodies, dressed in pajamas stained with blood.
As the first supervisor at the scene, Sletmoe
remained in charge of the fire operations. Tim Doney, deputy chief of
police, handled the police side of what had evolved into a crime
scene.
"Really, their training took over," said George.
After the last ambulance pulled away, it seemed a
strange stillness descended.
"It looked like a van crash," Sletmoe said.
Pediatric kits and plastic caps and packs of gauze
littered the grass. The door hung inward while the fan blew smoke
through the interior and out into the deep, cluttered yard. The crowds
of weeping neighbors swelled. The house fire still smoldered.
It felt as if the air had been let out of a
balloon.
"When it all was over there was this lull," Sletmoe
said.
Debriefing
Sletmoe and George called all the emergency workers
onto the lawn for a real-time debriefing. A police chaplain lowered
his head. They all did.
"We made a circle right there on the grass," said
Sletmoe.
The supervisors each said a few words, thanking the
crews for their efforts. "We told them to go take a shower, go get
cleaned up, we were taking them out of service."
The fire commander and the police chief were
following a protocol for taking care of first responders who must deal
with the emotion and stress of caring for those injured and killed in
a catastrophic event.
Sletmoe said emergency service managers recognized
the need for such care beginning 30 years ago when baggage handlers
who had to collect body parts after a midair plane crash over San
Diego developed post-traumatic stress syndrome. Workers quit,
committed suicide and teetered emotionally afterward.
"That was the turning point in American emergency
services," Sletmoe said. George said 9/11 offered further lessons,
saying it "made everyone stop and think, gosh, we've got to be ready."
An hour after wrapping up the scene Monday,
emergency workers met for a "defusing" at Fire Station 6, a large
group therapy session to share their experiences.
"No matter how it ended," Sletmoe said, "I wanted
these guys to know that what they did was exactly the right thing to
do."
Medford woman, two of her children were stabbed
in neck, says autopsy report
OregonLive.com
July 21, 2011
MEDFORD -- A Medford mother and two
of her four children were stabbed in the neck before firefighters
found them in their burning house on Monday morning, autopsy reports
show.
The woman, Tabasha Paige-Criado, died from stab
wounds to her neck and abdomen, Medford police Lt. Bob Hansen
announced Thursday.
Autopsies list the probable
cause of death for all four of the young children -- Elijah, 7; Isaac,
6; Andrew, 5; and Aurora, 2 -- as smoke inhalation, he said. Stab
wounds to the neck are listed as an additional cause of death for two
of the boys, Isaac and Andrew.
A final determination on the autopsy depends on
toxicology tests, which may take several weeks.
Police said they believe Paige-Criado's husband and
the children's father, Jordan Adam Criado, killed his family and went
around the house setting fires in several locations.
Criado has not regained consciousness since
firefighters carried all six family members out of the small
single-story house in this southern Oregon city of about 75,000 and
rescuers tried to revive them on the front lawn. He remained in
guarded condition in a Medford hospital.
Police said they are waiting for Criado to recover
before they arrest him.
Police to search Medford home where mom, kids
were stabbed
OregonLive.com
July 19, 2011
MEDFORD -- Investigators were trying
to determine what happened in the hours before a mother and her four
children were pulled from a burning home and rescuers discovered they
each had been stabbed.
Police believe the
51-year-old father, Jordan Adam Criado, stabbed them and set fire to
the house, staying inside as it filled with smoke, said Medford police
Chief Tim George. Criado, who was not charged Monday, was sedated in
stable condition and under police watch after surviving the fire.
His 30-year-old wife and children -- ages 2, 5, 6 and 7 -- also were
rushed to the hospital, but died.
"The front yard
looked like it was a plane crash or something, the people working on
those folks," George said. "There were some heroic efforts on the part
of police and fire personnel. My understanding is they were actually
able to get a pulse on two of those children at the scene, but they
eventually succumbed."
George said the number of
victims was the highest of any slaying in the history of Medford, a
city of about 75,000 in Oregon timber country. Police planned to
search the house for more evidence Tuesday.
They
said that hours before the fire, Tabasha Paige-Criado was reported
missing by her husband. It was just before dawn Monday when he called
authorities, and officers found her a couple hours later in the
parking lot of a convenience store a few blocks away. They gave her a
ride home.
A few hours after, she was dead, along
with her children.
"They both met and conversed,"
George said of Criado and his wife after police brought her home.
"What happened between 7:30 and 9:30 in roughly a two-hour time span
is what we are trying to figure out right now."
At
around 9 a.m., Calvin Kennedy said he and other neighbors saw smoke
coming out of the house and contacted police. He pounded on the door
as smoke came out of the eaves and windows and around the chimney.
Police who were first on the scene could not get in the front door
with all the smoke. Firefighters, equipped with breathing devices,
were able to get in and pull all six out and lay them on the front
lawn, where teams of medics worked desperately to revive them. The
fire was extinguished in minutes.
Jennifer Backes
told the Medford Mail Tribune that all she could do was cry as she
watched the rescue efforts.
The family was not well
known on the street, located in a working class neighborhood of older
homes, some undergoing renovation, a few blocks from downtown.
Neighbors said they had moved in about a year ago.
A
public records database shows that Criado has had addresses in Medford
and the nearby cities of White City and Central Point since 2007. The
records also show addresses in California -- Sacramento, Bakersfield
and Salinas -- before 2000, but nothing in the intervening years.
One neighbor thought Criado, who spoke with an accent, was a single
father. Others saw the mother walking with the children -- three boys
aged 7, 6 and 5, and a little girl aged 2. The children's names were
not released pending positive identification.
Oregon
National Guard infantryman Chris Bennett said he met Criado about a
year ago. Bennett was driving his Firebird down the street and it
broke down in front of Criado's house. Criado suggested Bennett check
the fuses. One was burned out. Criado gave Bennett a replacement fuse
and refused payment.
Bennett said he was walking by
the house late at night a couple weeks ago and he heard the couple
arguing loudly.
"He just bluntly told her, 'Hey, you
need to calm down, the kids are asleep,'" Bennett said.
"It was always her yelling," said Bennett's fiance,
Shilo Croswell, 22. "Anytime we saw him it was just him and the kids.
Then we saw this woman. She kept asking him who we were, and he was
not responding because he was talking to us."
Kennedy said he never saw any trouble at the family's house.
"It's just sad," he said.
10th Street tragedy
A
Medford mother and her four children are found with stab wounds in a
burning house Monday; police hold father in connection with the deaths
By Damian Mann - MailTribune.com
July 19, 2011
Police suspect a 51-year-old Medford father stabbed his wife and four
children and set their house on fire Monday morning in the largest
homicide case in Jackson County history.
Dozens of firefighters and
police desperately tried to resuscitate 30-year-old Tabasha
Paige-Criado and her four children, three boys ages 7, 6 and 5, and a
2-year-old girl before they were pronounced dead at local hospitals
from stab wounds and smoke inhalation.
"When I first saw it, all I
could do was cry," said Jennifer Backes, a 37-year-old neighbor, as
she watched firefighters wearing respirator masks carry one victim
after another out of the smoky house. Three or four firefighters and
police performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation and gave oxygen to each
victim on the front lawn of the home at 1027 W. 10th St.
Police are holding the father,
Jordan Criado, in connection with the deaths. He was listed in
critical condition from smoke inhalation Monday night at Rogue Valley
Medical Center.
"It's a very sad case," said
Medford police Chief Tim George. "At least in my 34 years of memory
here, I can't remember five homicides at one time."
George said police don't
believe there are additional suspects involved.
Fire officials are continuing
to investigate the cause of the fire, which they believe was
deliberately set. Autopsies will be performed on the mother and
children, District Attorney Mark Huddleston said.
"It's an extremely tragic
situation," he said, adding three attorneys would be placed on the
case from his office.
The four children were
transported to Rogue Valley Medical Center, the mother to Providence
Medford Medical Center. They were pronounced dead within an hour and a
half.
Police had responded to the
house earlier that day, when the husband reported his wife missing at
5:30 a.m. Paige-Criado was located at the corner of 10th Street and
Oakdale Avenue at about 7:45 a.m. George said she didn't indicate any
concern for her safety and wanted to return to her home. George said
the couple spoke briefly outside the house, and there didn't appear to
be any indication that something was wrong.
"She didn't express any fear,"
George said. "They both talked. He seemed calm."
At 9:28 a.m., a neighbor called
to report smoke seen inside the Criados' residence. Police arrived
within a few minutes, but couldn't enter the house because of heavy
smoke.
Medford firefighters used fans
to clear the smoke and when they entered the home, they found the
victims unconscious inside and called for backup as they realized the
magnitude of the crisis. Up to 40 firefighters and additional
responders from throughout Jackson County arrived on the scene.
Medford fire Deputy Chief
Gordon Sletmoe said three to four responders worked on each victim.
None appeared to regain consciousness as they were loaded into waiting
ambulances.
But responders held out hope
that some of the younger members of the family could be revived.
Police cordoned off the crime
scene with yellow tape, but onlookers gathered just across the street
on the sidewalk.
Calvin Kennedy, a 64-year-old
neighbor, said he approached the house before the firefighters
arrived, seeing smoke coming up under the chimney area. But he didn't
notice any flames.
"I knocked on the door three or
four times, then I called the fire department," he said, adding he
didn't hear any sounds from a smoke detector.
Kennedy watched from across the
street as responders worked on the family. "I just hope they're all
right," Kennedy said.
Like most neighbors, Kennedy
didn't notice any problems with the family, who had moved into the
house less than a year ago.
"They're a very tight-knit
family," Kennedy said.
Debra Gates, a 58-year-old
neighbor, said she'd never seen any problems at the house.
"The dad was playing with the
kids a lot in the front yard," she said. "I never saw the police come
by."
But Nancy Hanon, who rents out
a house next door to the victims, said she called Medford code
enforcement recently to report trailers and other debris in the
backyard.
"We just wanted them to clean
up the mess," said the 68-year-old Eagle Point resident.
Hanon said a code enforcement
officer called her to say the family was cooperative and appeared to
want to comply with the cleanup.
Gloria Oliva said she knew the
family only casually, saying she spoke to the mother and saw the
children playing.
"I would never expect to see
this," said the 40-year-old neighbor. "They're really in bad shape."
Looking on at one young boy
being loaded into an ambulance, she said tearfully, "He's still not
moving."
George said many of his
officers who tried to resuscitate the family were sent home early
today. They will be offered the chance to speak to a chaplain or talk
to a counselor.
Medford police Lt. Bob Hansen
said investigators likely won't know the full extent of stab wounds on
the victims until today.
Other details will come out as
the investigation continues, he said.
"We haven't been able to
positively I.D. the children yet," Hansen said Monday evening. "The
difficulty is we don't have parents to talk to."
