Murder At 13

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Welcome to ten Minute Murder, Brief
and binge Able True Crime. My name

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is Joe. I'm the host.
Thank you for joining today. And last

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night I was in bed about to
fall asleep, which is where I seem

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to do my best, thinking semi
conscious and under the influence of ben and

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drill or melatonin sometimes both. But
anyway, I'm overly critical of words,

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and I get impressed by people that
are colorfully descriptive, like they're just telling

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you something ordinary a meal they made
for breakfast, but it sounds like they're

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reading from a novel. I love
that, and it makes me hyper fixated

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on words and their usage. I'm
weird. We all know this, but

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anyway, I'm in bed. I
don't recall what it was in reference too,

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but I thought, don't you dare? And sometimes you can break up

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a contraction for emphasis, like a
sign that says do not park versus if

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it were to say don't park,
I might park there because it feels less

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important. So don't you dare?
Do not you dare? That doesn't make

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sense to me, and that sent
me spiraling into who gets to decide these

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language idiosyncrasies? And is this why
people write a letter? To their congressman.

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I've never done that before, but
I need action on this. I

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said all that to say I'm sleepy
today because my brain is a menace to

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my well being. If this is
your first time listening to ten Minute Murder,

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please subscribe now so that you can
catch up on all the back episodes

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and never miss any new ones.
Connect with me on social media and see

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the visuals that we're talking about here
on the podcast. And if you like

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this episode, please leave a rating
and review on Apple or any place that's

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possible. Your positive feedback is appreciated. You can go to ten minute Murder

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dot com for all things ten Minute
Murder. Now to today's story. Paris

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Bennett was born October tenth, nineteen
ninety three. His father quickly abandoned him,

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leaving Paris to be raised by his
mother, Charity. Charity led a

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difficult life, becoming a heroin addict
as a teenager, but when she got

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pregnant with Paris while in a halfway
house, she began to turn her life

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around. For the first eight years
of his life, Paris Bennett seemed like

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a perfectly normal child. In fact, he wasn't just ordinary or normal.

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He was exceptional. He had a
genius level IQ. He loved art and

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had a creative intellectual way of viewing
the world. If there were any signs

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of the violence and cruelty he would
grow up to inflict, they were well

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hidden until the day that Charity told
her son that she was going to have

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another baby. Paris was furious that
he would have to share his life with

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a sibling. He was so upset
whenever Charity spoke about her pregnancy or Paris's

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future sibling, he would storm out
of the room hearing this. You might

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think that Paris's hatred of his sibling
would only increase once Charity gave birth,

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but in fact, the opposite happened. As soon as Paris met his baby

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sister, Ella, all of the
anger he'd shown seemed to evaporate immediately.

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From day one, Paris adored his
little sister. But things for Charity and

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her children were about to get more
difficult. For the second time in her

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life, the father of Charity's young
baby left and Charity was once again a

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single mother, this time to two
young children. The stress began to get

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to her. After so long battling
for sobriety, Charity began using cocaine again.

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Ella was too young to notice her
mother's erratic behavior during these drug binges,

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but Paris knew something was wrong.
He was used to his mom being

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reliable, and now she was working
long hours and going out on drug binges.

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Slowly, Paris began to resent Charity. That anger he felt what his

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mom was pregnant with Ella began to
rise to the surface again. Through all

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of this, Paris and Ella were
still close despite their age gap. They

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often played together and Paris took care
of his little sister without complaining. Six

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months later, Charity finally stopped using
cocaine, but the damage her relapse had

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caused to her family was harder to
fix. They were constantly moving houses without

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any kind of stability for the kids, and eventually had to move in with

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Charity's mom. It was a day
like any other when Paris and Ella were

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playing together and Paris broke one of
Ella's toys. Charity punished Paris for breaking

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the toy and making Ella cry,
and something inside Paris seemed to snap.

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He grabbed a large knife from the
kitchen and began walking around the house with

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it, and when his mother and
grandmother chased after him, Paris turned and

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began brandishing the knife at them.
Eventually, the two women managed to de

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escalate the situation and confiscate the knife, but the way they viewed Paris would

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never be the same. Charity arranged
to have paris Is evaluated in a psychiatric

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facility. The facility staff found out
that the young boy had an obsession with

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killing, especially shooting. He was
also experiencing suicidal ideation and would sometimes repeatedly

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smack his head against a wall until
he drew blood. Despite all of this

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evidence that Paris was anything but okay, the hospital discharged him after one week

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and told Charity that there was nothing
wrong with her son. Charity finally was

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able to move the kids out of
her mom's house, and the three of

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them relocated to Texas, where she
got a steady job working at a restaurant.

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She often had late shifts, so
she'd hire a babysitter to look after

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Paris and Ella, who were now
thirteen and four years old. On the

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fourth of February two thousand and seven, Charity was working another night shift when

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a police officer arrived at the restaurant
asking to speak with her. The officer

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told Charity that she needed to come
with them because Ella had been hurt.

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Charity immediately panicked, asking to see
Ella, but the officer had to break

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the news to her Ella was dead. After Charity had left for her shift,

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a chain of events quickly unfolded.
Paris had managed to convince the babysitter

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that she didn't need to stay for
the whole shift, and the babysitter had

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agreed, leaving the two kids alone
at approximately ten pm. Immediately afterwards,

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Paris walked to Ella's room with a
kitchen knife in hand. He stabbed the

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four year old a total of seventeen
times, leaving Ella's bloody body in her

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room. Paris made a phone call
to a school friend and the pair talked

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casually for just over five minutes.
During this conversation, Paris didn't seem distressed

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at all. He talked like it
was any other day. After saying goodbye

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to his friend, Paris then made
a call to nine one one. He

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didn't try to hide what he had
done, instead telling the nine one one

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operator that he had accidentally killed his
sister because he had been hallucinating and thought

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she was a demon. He was
urged to perform CPR on Ella. But

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Paris repeatedly insisted that he knew for
sure that she was dead and that c

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p R would not help. Despite
Paris's reluctance, the operator insisted and talked

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him through the process, getting Paris
to count out loud while he performed the

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chess compressions obediently, Paris did,
or at least the operator believed that he

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had. When the police examined Ella's
body, it was immediately clear that Paris

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had not attempted to perform CPR.
He had just been sitting there counting out

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loud, trying to trick the operator
into believing that he was attempting to help.

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There had been no part of Paris
that wanted to try to bring Ella

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back to life. She was dead
and he wanted her to stay that way.

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Regardless, Paris had openly confessed to
killing Ella, and he was taken

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into custody. During his interview at
the police station, Paris stuck to the

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same story that he had hallucinated that
Ella was a demon and ended up accidentally

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killing her. This time, he
fleshed out the story a little more telling

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interviewered that he had fallen asleep next
to Ella and when he woke up.

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His sister was laughing hysterically at him
while covered in flames. None of the

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investigators believed him for a second.
They knew that he had lied about performing

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CPR, and even though he was
pretending to sob while retelling the story,

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there were no actual tears in his
eyes. Paris had killed Ella in cold

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blood? But why through all of
this? Charity desperately wanted to believe that

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Paris hadn't killed Ella on purpose,
but as the investigation went on, it

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became harder and harder to believe.
Ella's autopsy revealed parts of Paris's motive,

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which was even more horrific than investigators
anticipated. The extent of Ella's true injuries

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had been masked by her stab wounds. She had also been beaten and choked

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by Paris. The worst piece of
evidence came in the form of seamen,

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which belonged to Paris, that was
found in Ella's bed sheets, as well

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as in the pants Paris had been
wearing on the night Ella died. Paris

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hadn't just murdered his four year old
sister, He'd also sexually assaulted her.

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When investigators began looking into this side
of Paris, they quickly discovered more evidence

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that he'd been obsessed with violent pornography, searching up terms like sadism and bondage.

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Hours before Ella died, Paris had
been looking at snuff films, which

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are highly illegal videos where a person
is killed on camera, usually for sexual

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gratification. With all of this evidence, Charity had to accept the facts.

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She confronted Paris about Ella's murder,
and as soon as she flatly told her

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son that she didn't believe his story, his behavior changed immediately. He responded

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to his mother's statement with one sentence
quote, will it took you effing long

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enough? During an interview, Paris
said that his initial plan had been to

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kill his mother, but he decided
that leaving her alive and murdering his sister

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would be more effective in causing his
mother's pain. Paris was given a forty

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year prison sentence, but never showed
any remorse for his crime. Paris said

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quote, I knew by doing that
I could hurt my mother in the worst

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possible way. Because I had always
known as a child that the most devastating

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thing to my mother would be the
loss of one of her children. I

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found a way to take both of
her children in one fell swoop. Paris's

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motive was simple. He wanted to
hurt his mother, and he succeeded.

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On one of Charity's visits to jail, Paris attempted to choke her to death,

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but eventually let her live. To
this day, he does not regret

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the killing, and in two thousand
twenty seven he will be eligible for parole