One by one, Sam Kastanis stabbed his three children and beat them over the head with a hammer while they struggled and resisted his blows.
A blood-spatter expert who reconstructed the quadruple homicide also testified Thursday that 6 year-old Christine Kastanis pushed a bloodied hand against her father's jacket to defend herself from the attack.Another mark shows that either Christine or her 11-year-old sister, Melissa, also tightly grasped his jacket.
"The person who wore these clothes, Mr. Sam Kastanis, I'm told, is the person who killed these individuals in this house. And I say that with certainty," Rod Englert testified during a preliminary hearing for Kastanis, charged with four counts of capital homicide.
Englert reached his conclusion after studying hundreds of photographs, reports and blood spatters throughout the West Jordan home and on clothing worn by Sam Kastanis and his wife, Margaret, who was also killed during the bloody spree.
Englert described how he believes each family member died that Sunday morning based on evidence he examined.
- The attacker stabbed both Melissa and her sister, Christine, several times while they were inside Melissa's basement bedroom. Both were stabbed mostly on their left sides and both received several blows on their heads with a hammer.
Each young girl had cuts described as defensive wounds on the palms of their hands from when they apparently tried to ward off the attacker. The wounds - particularly on the 6-year-old - indicate there was "very much a struggle," Englert said.
Each died in that bedroom and was not moved.
- Clinton, 7, was also attacked in that bedroom, Englert testified. Some of his blood was found on the wall near the door in a "cast-off pattern," meaning that the blood had been flung onto the wall.
But Englert said other blood found and identified as Clinton's leads him to believe the boy tried to run upstairs away from the attacker.
From there, the attacker stabbed Clinton several times while he was inside the upstairs bathroom. He was also struck over the head at least three times.
- Margaret Kastanis, 39, apparently tried to interrupt the attack on Clinton in the bathroom, Englert said.
Some of Clinton's blood was located on her shirt and formed a pattern that indicated she was present when Clinton was hit on the head.
Englert said she stepped in Clinton's blood on the bathroom floor and ended up in the kitchen, where footprints from her bloody sock were located. Prosecutors contend that adjoining footprints are from her husband, who was forcing her to walk with him against her will.
Drops of Margaret's blood were located on the floor near the foot of Kastanis' bed. He had set up a makeshift bedroom in the fruit room where he slept. Two bloody knee prints on the floor near the bed led Englert to believe she remained there on her knees for a "considerable amount of time" and bled.
Englert, a sheriff's lieutenant from Portland, Ore., said he believes she was incapacitated in that room because the room showed no signs of a struggle or "cast-off" blood. Somehow, Margaret sat just outside the bedroom where the two girls were killed.
Margaret was later brought into the bedroom, where she was positioned between her two daughters. The hammer and knife - which Kastanis told police was used to kill sheep - were next to her.
Bloodstains on Margaret's shirt indicates that someone had wiped blood from the knife onto her sleeve three different times.
Englert said there was also an unmistakable knife transfer on Kastanis' jacket that indicated the bloody knife was wiped on the left chest. The knife was also wiped on Kastanis' pants, Englert said.
Blood spatters were also located on the cuff of the jacket Kastanis was wearing when police first arrived.
Two "grabbing patterns" were located on the jacket, presumably from bloody human hands. Kastanis' shoes had such blood spatters, and four bloody lines on Margaret's jeans matched up directly with lines from his shoe.
Of the 15 blood patterns Englert located on Kastanis' clothing, he said only two of the patterns could be explained by the theory that Kastanis got blood on him while trying to resuscitate members of his family.