DENVER (Scripps News Denver) – Opening statements in the murder trial of a Colorado Springs woman accused of murdering her stepson in January 2020 will begin Monday.
Jury selection in the case against Letecia Stauch, accused of murdering 11-year-old Gannon, began March 20 – a little more than three years after she was arrested in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, in connection with Gannon’s disappearance earlier that year.
FILE – Letecia Stauch is in the El Paso County jail on a charge of first-degree murder. (El Paso County Sheriff’s Office)
More than 50 witnesses including law enforcement officials from the Colorado Springs Police Department, the District Attorney’s Office, the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office, the FBI, as well as Florida officials and others from various fields of expertise, will take the stand during the trial, according to court documents.
READ MORE: CO v. Letecia Stauch: Stepmother Murder Trial
Stauch has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity after changing her plea from not guilty in February of last year. It’s unclear if the court received a final report from the defense’s sanity expert.
She faces charges including first-degree murder, child abuse resulting in death, tampering with evidence and tampering with a deceased human body for the killing of her stepson.
She was arrested March 2 in connection with her stepson’s disappearance, and Gannon’s body was discovered in a suitcase by a construction worker on March 18 in Pace, Fla., underneath a bridge off the side of a highway.
FILE – Gannon Stauch (NCMEC)
Gannon died of a gunshot wound and skull fracture, an autopsy found, and prosecutors allege Letecia Stauch shot and stabbed the boy, then drove his body to an area off Colorado Highway 105 and South Perry Park Road and dumped it before later driving it to Florida.
Stauch’s arrest affidavit states on the day Gannon Stauch disappeared, Letecia Stauch texted her daughter to buy carpet cleaning supplies, trash bags and baking soda, which prosecutors say were used to clean up the scene of the alleged crime.
Investigators said Letecia Stauch’s internet history showed she wasn’t happy with her marriage to Gannon’s father and “had some degree of resentment towards the family as a stepparent,” the affidavit said. She also had appeared to be researching a move to an apartment in another state, days before Gannon was killed.
This story was originally published March 31 by KMGH in Denver, an E.W. Scripps Company.
