Zahra Clare Baker #8 11/15/10 - 11/27/10

[Northern Rose]

Is Elisa Baker guilty of bigamy?
Zahra’s stepmother may have been already married when she married Adam Baker.


SAWMILLS --
As the Zahra Baker murder investigation continues, a new question has surfaced about her stepmother, Elisa Baker.

Is she guilty of bigamy?

It has been reported that Elisa and Adam were married in Australia in July 2008 and Maj. Clyde Deal said Hickory investigators are working to determine if Baker was divorced from Aaron Young when she married Zahra’s father, Adam Baker.

Aaron Young was granted a divorce from Elisa on Aug. 21, 2009 – 13 months after her Australian wedding – and Young used her new last name, Baker, in the filing. Young filed for divorce on June 28, 2009, using her last name as Baker.

Young and Elisa were married on Aug. 8, 1998 in Cherokee, S.C., according to court documents. The cause given for the divorce was that the couple had not lived together as man and wife since May 29, 2008.

Until about five months ago, Elisa and Adam Baker lived in a trailer a few doors down from Young’s trailer. They could see each other’s homes from their respective front porches and their neighbors said the three were on good terms and spent time together.

“She told us Aaron was her brother,” said Bobby Green who lived in the trailer next door to the Bakers. “They (Adam and Elisa) were up there quite a bit – like they were a regular family.”

Green said Elisa had more than the neighborhood convinced that Young was her brother – Adam believed it, too.

Elisa told her neighbors several far-fetched tales like: she knew Chris Daughtry and had written music for his rock band; she’d been a bounty hunter and knew Dog of the A&E TV show, and she’d been a police officer and had a beach house.

“She had a beach house and can’t keep up the rent on a 3-bedroom trailer?” Green said.

About a month before the Bakers moved away from the trailer park, Green discovered the truth about Elisa’s previous relationship to Young, but never got a chance to ask Adam about it in private, because Elisa was always at his side.

“Adam was gullible and went along with everything she said. He was just somebody else to manipulate, that’s how I see it,” Green said.

Green said his family has taken the news of Zahra’s death hard.

He wrote, “We love you Zahra” on his front door’s window Tuesday – the day that would have been the girl’s 11th birthday.

His wife put a photo of Zahra and the stuffed purple rabbit the child had given her as a gift in a shadow box.

“That’s the rabbit she made my wife. That’s just something else to remember her by,” he said.

http://www2.hickoryrecord.com/news/2010/nov/19/elisa-baker-guilty-bigamy-ar-549445/

[Lake Erie Princess]

So Aaron lived across the street in the trailer park and Gothmonster even told the neighbours he was her brother.  WTF

So sad people are vandalizing the house now.

Oh, come on now. Aaron lived across the street, he had to have seen what was going on. That is where she made Zahra run up the hill. And her girls knew who Aaron was. Were they all too scared of Eliza to speak up, or were they all covering for her?

That is a very good point.
I think the only truth he has said was that EB is a bigamist. LOL

I feel that he inserted himself into this situation for his 5 minutes of fame.

IF he did live across the street from the trailer, he had to KNOW what EB was doing to Zahra. Also he and EB were married for a considerable amount of time, I believe, which he would know Elisa's temperment, correct ?

Aaron is a fame seeker, I am certain now. Sorry Aaron this is not about u, it is all about Zahra and the justice she deserves. Too many people saw and knew, and should have, and could have, but stood by, doing zilcho, & it   does not fly with me. Zahra deserved to be safe and happy, even it was in a foster home !

[Lake Erie Princess]

Nite all !
Short visit for me. I read and caught up.
Continue to pray for justice for Z.

What a nasty world we live in...
after the announcement tonight about the family murdered
in Ohio.

[bananas]

you are so welcome hun..it was a honor to be there for everyone here ......might i add i do not agree with the brakeing of the windows and what ever else people are doing to that home....i understand people are mad...but i say go find ab...sorry but that is my opion.

hmmmm.... yes.... the bricks would be better if aimed at AB's head!

[theboyzmom]

Damaging an innocent man's property does not hurt Elisa or Adam. They don't live there anymore and never will again. It hurts everyone who buys insurance, the community and those visiting the memorial at the house. Not to mention the neighbors. It reeks of vigilanteism, which usually ends up hurting innocent victims.

Although I do understand people's frustration and anger aimed at the Bakers, vandalizing the home where they used to live is an immature act and accomplishes no positive result.

We need to be patient and trust that LE is working on an air-tight case to convict the murderer(s) of Zahra.

JMO.

I agree Brandi - the homeowner did nothing wrong. he was simply trying to make a living - not only will he lose the income earing ability of the house because of the search, he will likely have to tear the entire home down. To vandalize a home, an inanimate object, is childish. I understand the anger but did the house do anything? The evil is in the animals that treated this child with complete evil.

[cookie]

Justice for Zahra...
still can't wrap my head around what happened to this child and I never will...

[Monkey King]

Anyone know if Dubs is still representing EB?

[seahorse]

Adam and vampire woman should be sentenced to helping the handicapped. A lifetime in jail plus eight hours a day helping the handicapped.  No one wants these creeps helping, but in some fashion they should spent their entire life sentenced to contributing to others with handicaps. They need to give back in some fashion.  I am not confortable with them just sliding into obsurity.

[Mon Quixote]

Annie Lenox was on GMA this morning singing a song from her new Christmas album.  It was called Universal Child.  I was packing for the weekend trip we're taking but the words sunk in I guess and I started to listen.  It reminded me of Zahra because she is now, as they all become, our Universal child.  Here is an excerpt of the lyrics:

I'm gonna try to find a way to keep you safe from harm.
I'm gonna be a special place, a shelter from the storm.
And I can see you, your everywhere, your portrait fills the sky.
I'm gonna wrap my arms around you, my universal child.


If you can, look up the song or the lyrics, it sounds like our girl.  While it's better that she wasn't like everyone because who she was is awesome, it would have been nice if we could have kept her safe from harm and been her shelter.


With tears in my eyes,
C

[Northern Rose]

Adam Baker in Catawba Co. court for worthless check charges

NEWTON, NC (WBTV) - The father of Zahra Baker is schedule to be in front of a judge for four misdemeanor charges.

Adam Baker is scheduled to be in a Catawba County district court, facing four misdemeanor worthless checks charges.

WBTV's Derrick Rose spotted Baker and his mother Karen Baker at the courthouse just before 9 a.m. Monday morning. Neither of them made any comments to the media.


Baker's daughter Zahra went missing more than a month ago. Last week, police in Hickory said they had enough evidence with remains and DNA to say they had found Zahra and that she was dead.

Baker's wife, Elisa, is being held in jail under obstruction of justice charges related to the case after police say she wrote a fake ransom note after Zahra went missing.

http://www.wbtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=13536099

[Northern Rose]

Was Elisa Baker not divorced when she married Zahra's dad?  (with video)

http://www.wbtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=13528956

[Northern Rose]

A smile hid little Zahra Baker's pain

IT took Zahra Baker to die, it seems, before she was ever truly loved. That is not her failure, but ours.
Here was a young girl born to misery. Indeed, when you read the increasing news reports, you wonder if there was a day in her life when she was ever free from pain, ever truly happy. Born to a mum who gave her away, she died under a father who has to declare he did not dismember her body.

All the while in between she lost.

She lost her family and she lost her home town, forced to follow her father overseas. She lost her hearing. Lost her leg. She very nearly lost her life - and then she did.

Her life was an uphill road. Too hard, if there was any fairness in this world, for one too young.

Maybe that is why, on Tuesday, thousands of people in two countries turned out for a little girl they did not know. They all sang. Some wept. They held candles in cups with R.I.P Zahra penned on the side. It would have been her 11th birthday.

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In North Carolina, in the US, the local police chief stood in front of the crowd at just one of those vigils.

"Thirty-nine days ago, most of us did not know Zahra Baker," said Tom Adkins. His Hickory Police Department has led the homicide investigation.

"In more than a month, we've fallen in love with her and become better people because of her."

And that's the thing. Nobody doubted its veracity. The question is why?

For one, if these people can grow to love what is, in effect, her memory, why was it missing from her life?

While the vigils were being held, Zahra's father Adam Baker was also missing. He was at home watching on the internet. He had his mother beside him. And his lawyer.

Who did he expect to come crashing through the door at that time? The modern father, he later felt moved to speak.

"There is no way I would have done that to my baby," he told a news conference.

He was talking, of course, about Zahra's dismembered remains being found scattered around the state.

"There is no way in the world I would have hurt my daughter."

They held other vigils around North Carolina. They held one, too, in Giru, the small town south of Townsville where Zahra lived before moving to America.

There, they knew her misery. She was diagnosed with bone cancer when she was five and what happy days there were before this are redundant. Who can ever remember more than a handful?

Her life after that was fighting her cancer which eventually took her leg and part of her hearing. The cancer came back, in the form of secondary lung cancer. She fought it off again.

It is here we get the first inkling of this remarkable young girl.

She fought the cancer, they say, with a bravery that went beyond her fight. Others felt it, and so were drawn to her.

Kim Wright lives in Giru and they considered themselves best friends.

Zahra was five, Kim was 40. She struggles to now talk about her.

"I have to recover from this too," she says.

The first the rest of us heard about Zahra was after she disappeared in the US.

Zahra and her father had moved there after Baker had fallen in love, supposedly, over the internet. He flew to America and married Elisa Baker, a self-described "Gothic fairy princess". Good luck with that.

Early in her disappearance it already looked bad, the fulfilment of such ill-potential.

Zahra was missing and a ransom note appeared. Suspicion fell on what might have happened at home.

Kayla Rotenberry, an American woman who knew the family when they lived in Sawmills, peeled back the first scab on this supposedly modern love story.

SHE recalled noticing Elisa's hand was swollen. "She told me that she was trying to spank Zahra, but hit her on her prosthetic leg," she said.

"When Adam asked her about the injury, she said she fell and hurt her hand. She didn't want him to know.

"She knew he would be mad."

Another former neighbour Brandy Stapleton confirmed the version.

"She wasn't the person everyone thought she was," she said.

There were allegations Elisa kept Zahra locked in a cupboard. Allowed out for only five minutes a day. That she punished her when she fell after walking too long on her prosthetic leg.

As the search continued, police had trouble finding anyone outside her parents who had seen her in the weeks before she disappeared. Soon after, Elisa Baker was arrested and is still being held, charged with writing the fake ransom note. Her new husband claimed to be shocked.

Elisa has since claimed that Adam "knows" what happened to his daughter. She made the claim to bargain for her freedom, which she then strengthened by leading investigators to the various locations where her body parts were found.

And then, as this was happening, an odd thing happened. The stories began to trickle out.

Not the cancer or the prosthetic leg or the hearing aids, but the spirit.

Ribbons were tied outside her home. A shrine of toys and stuffed teddy bears grew.

The story's momentum gathered, and we began to learn about this unusual little girl.

There were the soldiers from B Squadron, 3rd/4th Cavalry Regiment, on a run from Townsville to Innisfail when they pulled in to Camp Quality to give the kids a ride in their Bushmasters.

You can guess which kid stood out.

"They don't make them much tougher than little Zahra Baker," begins the testimony on the Army website, right below a photo of Zahra (above) sitting atop the vehicle.

"The picture tells the whole story," Zahra's gran said. "She handles everything with a smile."

Others saw the smile, heard the stories and began to smile themselves. Why is it that the ones with so little to give end up being the ones who give so much?

Zahra looked inside herself and such was her lot others began looking inside themselves for answers, too.

"She was a very special little girl, I'll never meet another one like her," Kim Wright said.

Ms Wright knew Zahra like none of the rest of us do, yet, somehow, we all still feel her. Police chief Adkins has felt it, too. As have the people of North Carolina.

It makes you wonder how so many people have grown to love this little girl they did not know, and now will never know. This little girl with so much to overcome, born to misery.

It was not her memory people have fallen in love with.

It was her example.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/ipad-application/a-smile-hid-little-zahra-bakers-pain/story-fn6bfmgc-1225956907157

[Northern Rose]

Zahra's end may be case of oath v oath



A town wants justice, but police are taking their time to ensure Zahra Baker's killers do not walk, writes Simon Mann in North Carolina.

In Hickory everyone reckons they know who killed Zahra Baker as the mood in the deeply recessed North Carolina town swings between commemoration of the Australian girl's brief life and condemnation of those responsible for her death.

At a makeshift memorial of stuffed toys, teddies and balloons outside her family's rented bungalow on 21st Avenue NW, a parade of well-wishers volunteer their horror at the little girl's plight and are quick to accuse Zahra's father, 33-year-old Adam Baker, and stepmother, Elisa Baker, 42.

"I just wish the police would get on with it and charge those two," says Rebecca Wright. Her friend, who declines to be identified, says: "This was a child, precious to this community. That girl needs justice; justice for Zahra."

Pinned to the verandah of the deserted brick home are messages scrawled on cardboard: "Elisa, Adam Baker . . . the nation wants to know why you throw [sic] her out like trash" and "The Bakers need to pay for what happen [sic]".

But Hickory's deputy police chief, Major Clyde Deal, cautions against a rush to judgment, adding that police may not be ready to present the findings of their homicide investigation for some weeks.

"People assume they know what's happened," he says. "[But] there is absolutely no good reason for rushing this thing and then putting together a product that's going to allow a guilty person to walk."

The community's conviction, however, is driven by the Bakers' mutual betrayal as much by their curious behaviour on October 9 when the couple first reported Zahra missing, matter-of-factly suggesting that it may have been a kidnapping gone wrong.

Elisa Baker, now in Catawba County jail on a charge of obstructing justice, admits to having written a fake $US1 million ransom note, and recently led police to several bush sites a few kilometres north of the town where they found the 10-year-old's dismembered body – in close proximity, a limb and the prosthesis that she had worn since losing a leg to bone cancer at age five, and other remains in a ditch alongside a creek.

In a series of letters written from prison that appear to show little remorse or concern for her stepdaughter, Elisa Baker has also pointed the finger at her husband. "We really didn't kill her, but what he did after the fact is kinda horrifying."

Another says: "My family will never believe Adam has done what he has . . . The cops promised if I would help them with what I know, they would keep him locked up for my safety . . . I was trying to save us both, but why should I? He is letting everyone destroy me."

Adam Baker denies he is responsible for Zahra's death ("There's no way in the world I would ever hurt my daughter") and denies dismembering her body. But quizzed about his wife's likely complicity, he says: "I'm not sure. I'd like to say 'No' . . . I can't really say."

Critical to the case will be the length of time investigators determine that Zahra's body was interred. Neighbours say they were not aware of a young girl living at the 21st Avenue address, to where the Bakers had moved in July, and the last confirmed sighting of Zahra outside of her wider family was in a shoe store on September 25.

Should police conclude that Zahra died soon after that sighting, it would expose the Bakers as having lied about her disappearance. "We're not going to get into timelines," says Deal, when discussing the investigation. He also declines to canvas the nature of any possible charges, adding: "Obviously we need to get the results back from the lab, and then the DA's office – which is going to have to prosecute this thing – needs to get first look at this evidence."

Police appear likely to face a case of oath against oath as father and stepmother – united only last year after an internet romance – offer conflicting accounts.

The couple, who appear to have inhabited the fringe of a community suffering double-digit unemployment, moving regularly in and out of rental accommodation, shared an interest in Gothic subculture, with Elisa Baker titling herself "Miss Gothfairy" on her MySpace page that included a mix of violent imagery and dark music.

Some of Elisa Baker's own family have disowned her, describing the mother of three older children as a fantasist who had treated Zahra unkindly. She is alleged to have locked the girl in her bedroom for long periods, and neighbours from a previous address claim that Elisa punished Zahra by making her walk up and down a steep road where they lived. Some people recall seeing Zahra with a blackened eye. "The family does not support her," Elisa Baker's sister, April Fairchild, told US network ABC at this week's memorial service for the dead girl.

Yesterday both were represented in court on minor charges – passing dud cheques and traffic offences – unrelated to Zahra's disappearance.

A sprawling town that is divided by Interstate Highway 40, Hickory is home to 40,000 people.

The recession has hit hard, exacerbating the effect of the area's diminishing manufacturing base. Once a hallmark for locally made furniture, Hickory's big shopping malls are filled mostly with imported product and devoid of customers.

An ice-cream factory has closed, and there have been cutbacks by other big employers.

The original civic centre mimics small-town America: the imposing concrete edifice of the Bank of Granite occupies prime real estate alongside the First Baptist Church, the First Presbyterian Church and the First Citizens Bank.

A mural in Union Square honours civic pioneers and 20th century industrialists.

Hickory is also home to the small private liberal arts university Lenoir-Rhyne, lies beneath the stunning Blue Ridge mountains and was named by Readers' Digest as the 10th best place in America in which to live and raise a family.

But the blissful self-image belies the town's sadness. Zahra Baker's tragic story has cast a pall.

"It's about a child," says the Children's Protection Council vice-chairwoman, Adrienne Opdyke, explaining Hickory's outpouring of grief.

"We love our children. Everybody who has children of their own or who, maybe, teaches them in Sunday school or just sees them in the neighbourhood, desires everything good for them."

Deal says Zahra's life story – fighting two bouts of cancer, losing partially her hearing and being left with an artificial leg – has played on investigators' emotions.

"To know what else ended up happening here, it's tough . . .," he says.

"If it doesn't rattle you a little bit, then there's probably something wrong with you."

http://www.smh.com.au/world/zahras-end-may-be-case-of-oath-v-oath-20101119-180yz.html?from=smh_sb

[Northern Rose]

Bad Checks and Bigamy--Bakers Face Scrutiny

Attorneys for Adam and Elisa Baker appeared in Caldwell District Court yesterday, but neither of the parents of Zahra Baker, and the judge granted continuances of the cases against the couple—charges unrelated to the disappearance and death of their daughter. Those hoping to see the pair held up signs that only by-standers saw, calling for punishment in the death of the 10-year old. Adam and Elisa Baker face misdemeanor charges for bad checks and other matters. Their cases were continued until January 27th. Adam Baker is set to face other charges unrelated to Zahra’s disappearance in Catawba County today. Adam Baker is free on bail, but Elisa is still under $97,000 bond in counts including one connected to a faked ransom note meant to throw investigators off in the initial search for Zahra.

Then there’s the question as to whether Elisa Baker is a bigamist. The Hickory Record reports that Elisa and Adam were married in Australia in July 2008 and Hickory investigators are trying to determine if she was divorced from Aaron Young when she married Zahra’s father, Adam Baker. Aaron Young was granted a divorce from Elisa on Aug. 21, 2009 – 13 months after her Australian wedding – and she used her new last name, Baker, in the filing. She filed for divorce on June 28, 2009, using her last name as Baker. Aaron Young and Elisa were married on Aug. 8, 1998 in S.C.

http://www.goblueridge.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=10773

[Northern Rose]

Adam Baker in court on check charges




NEWTON, N.C. (AP) -- The father of a disabled girl found dead in North Carolina is in court on charges unrelated to her disappearance.

Adam Baker appeared Friday at a Catawba County courthouse to face worthless check charges. He wouldn't comment when he arrived for the hearing shortly before 9 a.m.

Police say they have found Zahra Baker's remains but haven't said how she died. She would have turned 11 years old last Tuesday.

Adam Baker is free on bail. His wife, Elisa Baker, remains in jail, accused of trying to mislead investigators with a fake ransom note. Her attorneys have said she guided investigators to remote locations where the girl's remains were dumped.

 http://www.wcnc.com/news/local/Adam-Baker-in-court-on-check-charges-109208229.html

[Monkey King]

Here is a link to Mon Quixote's video suggestion:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHMPipyMsjQ&feature=related

Annie Lennox's "Universal Child".

[SuzieQ]

Here is a link to Mon Quixote's video suggestion:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHMPipyMsjQ&feature=related

Annie Lennox's "Universal Child".

Thanks Monkey King

[Northern Rose]

Adam Baker appears in court, appointed attorney on check charges



NEWTON, NC (WBTV) - The father of Zahra Baker was in Catawba County court Friday morning on four misdemeanor charges.

After he left the court, several people said things to him about the death of his daughter, Zahra, whose body may have been dismembered after she died.

Friday morning, Baker was appointed an attorney in the case, in which he is facing four misdemeanor worthless checks charges. He is not charged in the death or disappearance of Zahra, who was reported missing on Oct. 9.

WBTV's Derrick Rose spotted Baker and his mother Karen Baker at the courthouse just before 9 a.m. Monday morning. Neither of them made any comments to the media. Adam Baker also avoided commenting when asked if his wife, Elisa Baker might have been still married when she married him in Australia in 2008.

In Zahra's case, police in Hickory said last week they had enough evidence with remains and DNA to say they had found Zahra and that she was dead.

Baker's wife, Elisa, is being held in jail under obstruction of justice charges related to the case after police say she wrote a fake ransom note after Zahra went missing.

Adam Baker was appointed attorney Mark Killian in the worthless check case. The case was continued until Jan. 21, 2011.

http://www.wbtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=13536099

[Northern Rose]

No shirt with skulls
Clean shaven
He has his lawyer who's office they watched the memorial from
The lawyer that was assigned to him yesterday
A new lawyer assigned to him today

3 lawyers, Mummy at his side, extreme make over , but none of that can hide he is still a POS IMO

[Tolerance]

AB's lawyers need to arrange for a haircut for him.
ugh
He looks so menacing...................though I think that comes from within and has no relation to grooming.................