After 25 years, killer of 4 gets chance for parole

WILMINGTON – In 1990, Donald Lee Torres was sentenced to eight consecutive life terms for the murder of the four members of the Godt family of Middletown.

According to prosecutors, after pouring kerosene around the kitchen and stairs of the wood duplex on West Lake Street and starting a fire, the 14-year-old Torres stood outside while the house burned and watched as 34-year-old Harry Godt escaped, called for help, and then ran back inside in an attempt to save his family.

Godt ended up dying in his rescue attempt along with his wife Jennifer, 26, and Godt's two children: 4-year-old Jon Robert and 1-year-old Samantha.

Superior Court Judge John Babiarz, who imposed the multiple life terms 24 years ago, told Torres, "No person who has received that sentence has ever been released from prison," and prosecutors promised Francis Godt, Harry's mother, that the person who killed her son and grandchildren would die in prison.

Torres was then, and remains today, the youngest multiple murderer in Delaware history, according to prosecutors.

On Friday, however, the now 39-year-old Donald Torres was back in front of a judge to receive a new sentence that one day could lead to his release.

Four of Torres' life sentences were dropped during an earlier appeal, and on Friday, Superior Court Judge Diane Clarke Streett sentenced Torres to serve four consecutive terms of 27 1/2 years each, for a total of 110 years in prison.

However, under the terms of a new juvenile justice law that was passed after the U.S. Supreme Court made it illegal for a minor to be sentenced to an automatic life term, Torres is eligible to have his sentence reviewed and reduced after serving 30 years. This means he will back before a judge in five years, or perhaps less if he gets good time credit, and every five years after that if he has not been released from prison.

At least 17 defendants who were convicted and sentenced to life as juveniles in Delaware are being resentenced because of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling, and some like Charles "Rusty" Blizzard have already been re-sentenced to time served and been released. Blizzard was 17 when he beat and kicked 55-year-old Howard W. Marshall to death as part of a robbery that yielded $10.

Torres is believed to have been the youngest of Delaware's juvenile defendants at the time of conviction – he was 14 when he set the fire in 1989 – but his crimes were also among the most heinous of all the other juvenile defendants.

Francis Godt said Friday that she was stunned by the turnabout.

Godt, now 81, was not able to attend the resentencing due to health reasons but said she believes Torres should have been kept in prison for the rest of his life.

"He has made my life hell," she said, adding that after her son and his family were killed, she had to resign her job as a teacher due to stress and has had to go through years of therapy to cope with her loss.

"I was in my classroom one day and I looked out the window and I thought, 'Why is it so cloudy out there?' and then I heard my grandson's voice calling me. 'Mom-mom, Mom-mom,' and I passed out," she said.

She left her job shortly thereafter.

"I'm getting ready, because this has surfaced again, I'm getting ready to go see another [therapist]," she said.

What particularly upset Godt was the fact that her son had reached out to Torres and tried to help the troubled teen in 1989, taking him fishing and inviting Torres into his home for dinner.

"And this is how he repaid them," she said.

At Torres' 1990 trial, police said that Torres claimed he was angry at Harry Godt because he said Godt had unjustly accused him of teaching young Jon Godt how to strike matches.

No physical evidence tied Torres to the fatal arson. Instead he was convicted on the strength of his confession and other statements to police after his arrest. Torres' current attorney, Beth Savitz, said under current laws, due to Torres age and IQ, she doubts if Torres' confession would have admitted at a trial today.

At the 1990 trial, a 15-year-old Torres claimed he was beaten and directed to admit to the crime by several shady Middletown friends who were being investigated for burglaries. He testified he was still fearful of those associates when he confessed to police. "They had threatened me, saying they was going to kill me," he said.

Pressed by prosecutor Steven Wood in 1990 on why he got so many unreported details about the fire right in his confession, Torres said they were the result of "lucky guesses."

Torres did not speak at his 1990 sentencing and according to a News Journal report, the teen didn't seem to be paying attention when judge sentenced him to a life behind bars. While the judge spoke, Torres "just gazed around at the high ceiling and the dark-paneled walls of the courtroom."

Torres' then attorney, the late Edmund Hillis, said Torres did not react to the sentence or the verdict because "he didn't appreciate what this meant. He's 15 years old. I don't know that any 15-year-old knows what it means to go to jail for the rest of his life."

At the time, Torres' grandfather Joseph Winslow said, "He's lost, he's lost. He just doesn't know what is going on."

Last month, Torres, dressed in a white prison jumpsuit with a shaved head but still looking slight in stature and boyish, did speak at his resentencing hearing. "I'd like to say that I'm deeply sorry that this crime has been committed and I do accept full responsibility for my actions," he said, adding he hopes that someday members of the Godt family "can find it in their heart to forgive me.

"I just hope one day I can have my own children, my own family and they can grow up to be half the man I am now," he said.

At that hearing, Deputy Attorney General Wood – the same person who prosecuted Torres in 1990 – questioned if Torres had actually accepted responsibility, noting that in a pre-sentence interview Torres said he can't remember much of what happened in 1989 and that he is only "60 to 70 percent" certain he is responsible. Wood said Torres also suggested it was possible the fire might have been set by the 4-year-old victim.

While prosecutors have reached agreement with defense attorneys on other re-sentencings in juvenile cases, like the Blizzard case, that did not happen in the Torres case. Wood urged the judge to impose the maximum possible sentence of 30 years for each of the four murder counts.

Torres said on Friday that the pre-sentence interviewer misunderstood him and the "child" he was talking about, who set the fire, was himself. He then repeated that he was sorry for his crimes, "and I take any and all responsibility."

In February, Torres' attorney Savitz stressed Torres' troubled upbringing and the failure of adults around him to help him. Torres' father left the family when Torres was 6 years old, and in an odd twist of fate, Torres was reunited with him at age 21 when the two became cellmates.

Savitz noted that in 1990 even Wood conceded that the state's social service system failed Torres.

"He was immature, he lacked discipline, he lacked self-control and was unable to deal with pressure," Savitz said of Torres when he was 14. "He failed kindergarten. He failed first grade, the schools did not know how to deal with him or his behavior," she said, and by age 11 he was using drugs and alcohol.

But, Savitz said, gesturing to the 39-year-old man sitting next to her, "Donnie is not that guy."

Savitz said Torres has memory issues – noting that even in 1989 his recall of events was "sketchy" – but she said he has accepted responsibility and expressed remorse. When Torres said he was only 60 to 70 percent certain about his responsibility, Savitz said Torres was just trying to be as open and honest as possible about his memory issues. Savitz said the once young and impulsive Torres has not gotten in any serious trouble in his 25 years behind bars and has thrived while incarcerated, working at a variety of prison jobs, where he has earned positions of trust.

The death of the Godts was a horrible crime, Savitz said, "it doesn't get any worse … but that doesn't change the fact that Donnie was 14."

She said Torres has rehabilitation potential and that is why the U.S. Supreme Court changed the law regarding juveniles. Savitz said Torres told her, "When I was out there doing things, I was taking away and now I want to give back."

Streett, in handing down her sentence, said that there were significant mitigating factors in the case and that she believed that Torres "is a different person today."

She said while Torres committed horrible acts, his actions "should not be equated with those of a full-grown adult."

Prosecutor Wood declined to comment on the new sentence handed down Friday but said he remains troubled at the inability of the criminal justice system to sometimes produce final results in serious cases like this.

"That inability to produce a final result, in a case that is actually over, produces a tremendous emotional toll that is borne by the families of the victims in these cases and our hearts really go out to them," he said.

Savitz, meanwhile, expressed disappointment that the judge did not impose the minimum possible sentence of 25 years on each murder count. "We felt that someone who was so young ... should get less than others, who were older though under 18, when they committed their offenses," she said.

However, Savitz said Torres' sentence can be re-visited in 2019 or sooner if he is given good time credits.

Torres' mother Francine Lloyd spoke at the February hearing telling the judge she struggled with her son before his arrest, saying she knew he was headed for trouble. "I tried and tried to get people to listen to me to no avail," she said.

But since her son has been in prison, she said he has matured and made the right choices during his incarceration, staying away from trouble.

"He's not a monster – he deserves a second chance," she said.

Francis Godt disagreed, saying that Torres may have been young, but he knew what he was doing.

"I know they can say a lot of things about him. I know the father left the family ... but he knew right from wrong," she said, adding she is still haunted by the death of her son and his family.

"I don't want him out on the street again. Never, never, never," she said.

Contact Sean O'Sullivan at (302) 324-2777 or sosullivan@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @SeanGOSullivan