11-Year-Old Alleged Killer Made Threats: Grandma

PITTSBURGH (AP) -- An 11-year-old boy accused of killing his father's pregnant fiance had been threatening the woman for at least two months, the woman's mother said Tuesday.

Debbie Houk said Jordan Brown often gave 26-year-old Kenzie Marie Houk a hard time, especially when his father wasn't around. Brown and his dad Christopher lived with Houk and her two small daughters in a farmhouse in the rural western Pennsylvania town of Wampum.

"It's been at least two months that he's made the threats," Debbie Houk said, adding that Jordan "just bucked her (Kenzie) a lot when his Dad wasn't around."

"Chris was good about it. He tried. He told him, 'Don't you ever disrespect her,"' Debbie Houk added.
Jordan Brown was charged as an adult Saturday with killing Houk and her unborn baby boy the day before as she lay in her bed.

Authorities believe the killing was premeditated. They say Brown came downstairs with two guns, but returned upstairs after Houk's 7-year-old daughter saw him; they believe he then hid the gun in a blanket and came back downstairs to Houk's bedroom and shot her in the back of the head.

Later, the 7-year-old girl told police she saw the boy drop something on the ground from his pocket before they got on the bus. Police said they found a spent shotgun shell in the same spot.
On Monday, Jason Kraner, Kenzie's brother-in-law, told several reporters the boy also told his son he wanted to kill Kenzie and her daughters.

"Jordan had told (my son around Christmas) he was going to pop Kenzie in the head and pop both kids. We didn't believe it. ... We told Chris and Kenzie and they didn't believe it," Kraner said.

A funeral for Houk and her baby boy, who was named Christopher after his father, was planned for Tuesday evening.
The boy's attorney, Dennis Elisco, did not immediately return a telephone call seeking comment Tuesday. Elisco has said he had no indication the boy had a problem with Houk.

Brown is being held at the Lawrence County Jail, in a cell isolated from the adult inmates. Elisco filed an emergency motion asking a judge to set bail so that the boy might be released to his father.

A court hearing has been scheduled Monday for 9 a.m. on that request. Elisco contends the boy can qualify for bail because he is not a flight risk and cannot face the death penalty because of his age.

Debbie Houk said Jordan, a hunter, knew a lot about guns and was a good shot. On Valentine's Day, he beat out many older and more experienced hunters at a turkey shoot.

"I'll never cook that turkey. It's the same gun that killed my daughter," she said. "So he knew what a gun did. He knew the dangers of a gun."

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