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City Voices: Who was “the uninvited guest?”
Margaret Whalen Margo: The uninvited guests were the voices that turned our 35-year-old son into a murderer.
CV: So there were multiple voices and not just one voice?
MWM: Our son never spoke about his voices but we knew that he had schizophrenia and was hearing voices.
CV: Did he isolate a lot and hardly say a word to anyone?
MWM: Yes. He always seemed preoccupied and if you got his attention, it was short. He was alone a great deal.
CV: Did he have any friends?
MWM: Hardly. He was a loner.
CV: For how many years was he alone this way?
MWM: When Steven was a little boy, he seemed to have many friends at school. He was always an active little boy until the age of 14. Then Steven began to “self-medicate” on marijuana. We felt it was a little more the peer pressure so we got him help. He began to work with a therapist in Santa Cruz County. Then he joined the navy and was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.
CV: Was he honorably discharged from the navy?
MWM: It was a psychiatric discharge. He went into a depression that he could not get out of and we felt it was because we had lost a daughter to cancer who was the eldest sibling.
CV: How close was he to her?
MWM: He was very, very close. She was like a second mom to him. And he was away from home and in the service and all but missed the course of her illness. After she died we found him a psychiatrist to treat his schizophrenia.
CV: How involved were you in his life?
MWM: Very involved. His dad and I were very concerned about his mind, the delusions and hallucinations, thinking things that were not true and was always typically very “grandiose” in his thoughts.
CV: Give me an example of a grandiose thought that he had.
MWM: Okay, like if his dad said, “Steve, I found a nice little car for you. What do you think of that; a Volkswagen rabbit?” And Steven would say, “Well, no, because that is not safe. I want a bigger car; something safe; something strong; something that is going to protect me.” He would go off on an attitude that was so superior to us.
CV: In other words, he felt like he was as important as the President of the United States, that he should be as safe as possible on the road because he was that important. Okay, so was your son presidential material.
MWM: No. He was a bright young man and Steven could fix anything. When he put his mind to anything, he could do it. But in school he wasn’t verbal. He didn’t participate in school activities. His grades, though, astounded us because they were always average or above average.
CV: Why were you so excited if his grades were just average or above average?
MWM: Because most mentally challenged kids who were self medicating [on marijuana] you would think their grades would drop.
CV: Are you connected with the National Alliance on Mental Illness?
MWM: Yes, as a matter of fact, I am going to present at the national conference in Oklahoma City next month. During this entire time I have been busy reading and getting my hands on as much information as possible on the subjects of mental illness and schizophrenia.
CV: Tell me about your surviving children. Who are they? What are they?
MWM: Barbara is the oldest and she is married with children. There’s Sherry who has three children. And Steven’s two biological brothers. As a matter of fact one lives in New York State. And another brother is in Santa Cruz.
CV: So there are four surviving children. And were you and your husband together the entire time raising them?
MWM: Yeah. When Sal senior and I married, I had three children and Sal had the three boys: Sal junior, Sam and Steven. And I had the three girls: Peggy, the daughter I lost to cancer at the age of 30, Barbara and Sherry.
CV: So Steve is not your biological son.
MWM: No. He was four and a half, Sal was eight and Sam was ten when their mother decided to give them to their father.
CV: What happened to their mother?
MWM: She had schizoaffective disorder, which is a combination of bipolar and schizophrenia.
CV: Is she doing well today?
MWM: My understanding is that she is and that she is heavily medicated.
CV: Was she told about what your step-son had done?
MWM: Yes. It was kind of a sad situation because she had been in so many “episodes” that her children hardly visited her in the hospital. As adults they visit her periodically and when our tragedy happened, she wanted to have a service for Steven. And so the other two boys took his ashes down to where she lived and she did have a service.
CV: Were you at this service? Do you know what happened at this service?
MWM: No. I understand from the two boys that they had to bring the ashes back because the ashes were to be scattered in the sea. According to the boys, a minister performed a memorial service with the ashes present.
CV: So you first knew Steven when he was four-years-old and became his step-parent.
MWM: Yes. It was like being raised in a family home with brothers and sisters. My husband who was old-school Italian treated every member of the family equally. Steven got along very well within the family, but outside the family he had trouble making friendships.
CV: Was most of your love for your daughters?
MWM: No. As a matter of fact, I felt so bad that the boys didn’t have their biological mom during very important times in their lives. When she wouldn’t show up for visits, I would be heart-broken. I think I felt worse about it than the children did. The boys would say, “Oh, well, can we go swimming or can we ride our bikes?” I just thought that their mother was not in the right frame of mind and she didn’t do what she agreed to do.
CV: Did you dislike her?
MWM: Not dislike her, but I felt that she needed proper care and medication.
CV: Were you angry with her?
MWM: Not angry, just disappointed.
CV: What is the difference between being angry and disappointed with someone?
MWM: Disappointed to me means that it was sort of a letdown for the boys. They were very loving little boys and were very attached to their dad.
CV: How attached was Steven to his biological mother?
MWM: Steven would say things to me like, “Mom, she’s got a bigger lap than you do.” These little things that a little boy would say and I thought, “God, he really misses her.”
CV: Did you ever meet her?
MWM: I did when we signed the agreement.
CV: Did you ever spend quality time with her?
MWM: Not on a one-to-one.
CV: How did you spend quality time with her?
MWM: I did not spend quality time with her. Many times she would send a stranger to pick up the children and my husband would refuse the visit. Then she would call and scream and yell and carry-on. The fighting between his biological parents especially bothered Steven because he was the peacemaker.
CV: Was his father also peaceful?
MWM: Sal was very reserved and a very good listener. During the difficulties with Steven, Sal would be there to talk to him and calm him in a way that made Steven believe that his feeling and thoughts were valued. Steven hated medications and fought them. Sal would say, “Well, give it a try, they might help you, just give it a try. If they don’t, we’ll try something else, just give it a try.” He was very calm with him when he explained medications and how they worked.
CV: Did Sal ever lose his temper in the family?
MWM: He would lose his temper, but never with the children. With the children he wasn’t a loud man or intimidating in any way.
CV: What about with his ex-wife?
MWM: They lived together in a small community near Sal’s immediate family. When the boys were very young and she had custody and control, there was an incident where the school bus came to pick them up one morning and all the other children and all the other cousins got on the bus except for Sal’s. They were busy playing by the creek all day.
CV: So this is a small town with lots of trees, a creek and natural things all around.
MWM: Campbell, California, a nice place with a lot of nature and that is what the boys would do. And Sal would call his wife from the car dealership where he worked when he found out about the boys. She would tell him that the boys deserve to have fun at their young ages. And he would blow his top.
CV: Was he ever violent with her?
MWM: Not that I know of. But she was violent. I remember at one point, she took a knife and slashed the brand new furniture. She was the one who was violent in the house, at family gatherings, it didn’t matter.
CV: Was she ever violent with the children?
MWM: The middle boy remembered a punishment where he was made to jump up and down until he cried and that would be his punishment.
CV: Anything worse than that?
MWM: After she remarried, little Steven had attended school with bruises on his bottom.
CV: How did the school discover his bottom bruised?
MWM: I guess he was playing in the playground and he fell and went to the nurse’s office. In there, she must have asked him to pull his pants down and saw the big black and blue marks below the belt. It was his step-dad who spanked him.
CV: How long were the boys with their mother and step-dad?
MWM: She gave up custody to Sal and me in 1972; we married in 1968.
CV: Let’s jump ahead to the present when Steven murdered his father and himself. Was there any indication that something was going to erupt in Steven?
MWM: That day Sal called Steven at the group home and invited him to breakfast. Steven said no, but that he would like to come for dinner. At the dinner-table, Steven was extremely quiet.
CV: So it was just you, Sal and Steven having a quiet dinner together and no one else. Is it true that you actually witnessed the murders?
MWM: Yes.
CV: Did you feel helpless and paralyzed?
MWM: I did because I didn’t expect it to happen. We were sharing a home-cooked dinner, which we did every Monday, Wednesday and Friday night with him because he didn’t trust the person at the home who cooked the meals. I asked him, “do you trust mom’s cooking?” He said yes, so we did dinner nights with mom. That Friday night, June 29th, Sal brought him home to the house for dinner. And from the very moment that they walked through the door, Steven just seemed very quiet. I kind of motioned to Sal who said to him, “Hey, you’re kind of quiet tonight, what’s going on?”
MWM: I saw Steven walking into the kitchen while Sal made his way to the living room. Steven walked out of the kitchen with a seven-inch knife and I looked at him and I said, “Steve, what are you doing with the knife?” And he just glared at me and I thought, “Oh my God, what is he gonna do?” I didn’t know if he was going to come toward me. And I left him alone. I said to Sal, “Steven’s got a knife.” But before I could approach, Steven came from behind his dad, and reached around him. He didn’t stab him in the back. And when Sal saw him coming, he said, “How dare you pull a knife on your dad.” And the commotion started and I ran into another room and called 911. The 911 lady told me to leave, but I could see Sal on the floor. I said, “Oh my God! Maybe I can help him. Maybe I can put something to stop whatever was going on. Then Steven went across the room just stabbing himself in the chest—three stab wounds to the chest, one to the heart. Each time he stabbed himself, he’d yell and scream and say, “Oh no Dad! Oh No!” Like he realized that was his father he had stabbed. They looked so much alike that the paramedics got the bodies confused. They came downstairs and told me that my son expired and that they were rushing my husband to the hospital. They got them mixed up. It was Steven who was still alive in the hospital and my husband who died instantly.
CV: What was the worst part of it all for you?
MWM: I think the fact that Sal died at the hands of his younger son. I really thought that Sal who was such a survivor in life and had done so well for his family, was the one at the hospital. A young person who worked at the trauma unit and went to high school with Steven told me that it was actually Steven in the hospital and not Sal. The doctor told me that Steven had also expired.
CV: Were there any significant moments for you during the funeral?
MWM: No. Steven was going to be cremated and Sal was going to have the church burial. Steven’s brothers wanted him cremated because Steven had loved the ocean, so they wanted to scatter his ashes in the sea. He loved to fish with his dad from the time he was 10 or 11-years-old and all through the years.
CV: You mentioned that when Steven was about to murder his father, the significant words that Sal said to him were what?
MWM: “I dare you pull a knife on your dad.” Steven was only 140 pounds and his dad was 180. The one thing I will never forget is that Steven reached around to his dad’s chest instead of stabbing him in the back. I never quite understood that.
CV: How long were you married to your husband before he died?
MWM: 33 years. We had plans to travel in August with the whole family to Hawaii. My husband wanted to play with the dolphins with his grandchildren.
CV: Would Steven go with you on this trip?
MWM: As long as Sal was there, Steven would go. And everyone was comfortable with Steven if Sal was there even though he would be all to himself. Even at the graduation of two granddaughters, Steven stood off to the side of where the people were gathered. And at the pool party too, he stood off to the side. I went up to him and asked him if anything was wrong and he told me that he worried that if he said something, the wrong thing would come out. And I said, “As long as you are comfortable like this.”
CV: Would Steven be enthusiastic about going to Hawaii?
MWM: He would probably ask where Sal and I were going to be. “Who am I going to bunk with: Sal or Sam…how is that all going to work?” He would want to know every detail. He always wanted to know all the little things that would not even cross your mind.
CV: Do you believe that this was due to his paranoia around his personal safety?
MWM: Yes I do. Steven was always suspicious of everyone’s behaviors, anyone’s movement.
CV: Do you believe that Steven knew on that fateful day that he was going to murder his father?
MWM: No.
CV: What kept Sal who was much larger from defending himself?
MWM: Steven’s strength in that episode was beyond his father and his father was caught so off-guard. When Sal was trying to get the knife from Steve, the knife went down and hit the main artery of his heart. But I don’t think that Steve came to dinner that night with that intention. There were no hidden weapons on his person.
CV: Something that night transformed the entire space into a part of Steven’s living nightmare and your husband was a figure in that nightmare. Before this incident, you had dinner repeatedly with Steven. What was the difference between those dinners and the last one?
MWM: He told us about his day and what he liked and didn’t like about the group home and that he didn’t trust the cook. He said that he could smell viruses in the kitchen. He would talk and then be quiet.
CV: Did you and your husband make it a practice of discussing Steven after past dinners with him, about his behavior, the things he said and so forth?
MWM: No, because we were so used to his behavior pattern.
CV: You are a woman. Women are more emotionally sensitive than men. Did you ever sense the torment that Steven was going through? Did you ever feel a little bit of his fear or confusion?
MWM: I would feel for Steve that he wasn’t in control of his own thoughts and I did not know how I could help him.
CV: It sounds to me like Sal almost expected to die that night and that you were shocked beyond your mind.
MWM: I don’t think so. He reached around his dad….
CV: Explain the significance of what “reaching around his dad” is.
MWM: Sal walked into the living room from the kitchen and Steve was behind him with a knife.
CV: Was the knife in the left or the right hand?
MWM: In the right hand.
CV: And with the left hand, what did Steven do?
MWM: He grabbed Sal’s left shoulder with his left hand and with his right arm, he came around with the knife to stab Sal.
CV: Was Steve looking at his father in the eye when he stabbed him? Did they make eye contact?
MWM: I don’t know. He brought the knife around and the two of them wrestled for the knife. The knife went in as Sal went down.
CV: Has Steven ever killed anyone before; ever harm animals; get into fights; self-mutilate?
MWM: No.
CV: Are you a church-going lady, mam?
MWM: Yes.
CV: Isn’t it true that the church might say that this was an example of a demonic possession?
MWM: My church believes that Steven is in the arms of the Lord and that the Lord judges him not as a killer, but as a person who was not in the right frame of mind. What has helped me through my recovery and grief is that Steven is in the arms of the Lord and not judged as a killer.
CV: What does the science say about what caused the killing?
MWM: That Steven heard a voice that commanded him to kill his father.
CV: So the science says that it was a hallucination that instructed him to kill his father and he followed through. If you heard a voice that said to set yourself on fire, would you do it?
MWM: I would not do it in my frame of mind, but Steve might.
CV: What is the difference between your frame of mind and Steven’s?
MWM: I am not on heavy medication; psych meds. I take no medication at all. Steven was heavily medicated and he was on medication at the time of this tragedy.
CV: I am going to repeat that: was Steve on his medication at the time of the murder—yes or no?
MWM: Yes.
CV: Are we talking about antipsychotic psychiatric medication?
MWM: Yes.
CV: What is your personal position on antipsychotic medication for people who have schizophrenia?
MWM: I believe that if they need medication to help them cope and the doctor feels that medication is needed, then they should be medicated.
CV: How could Steve commit this murder if he was on medication?
MWM: I have no idea.
CV: How did you know that Steve was on medication?
MWM: Because it was monitored by the group home.
CV: Isn’t it possible that Steve could have tongued the pills or spit them out without the group home knowing about it? How do you know that he did not spit them in the toilette?
MWM: Because the staff watches them take the meds.
CV: Was the medication administered orally with pills or by injection?
MWM: Orally.
CV: Do you believe that it might still be possible for him to fake taking them?
MWM: No, because the pills and the food he ate on my table was what the autopsy found in his system.