|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Burlington City Hall Park fatal beating victim hit 21 times after killers got bad information
Vemont News First
A Burlington man, who died from injuries from a mob assault near Burlington City Hall Park last month, was punched, kicked and stomped at least 21 times in less than two minutes, according to the city police investigation.
And the mob incorrectly targeted the wrong person after getting bad information about an earlier assault, a source told Vermont News First (VNF).
The group had been told Scott Kastner, 42, was involved in an earlier attack on a woman, but in reality it was his girlfriend that reportedly assaulted the woman, VNF learned from a source familiar with the police investigation.
On Tuesday, Isaiah “Zay” Argro, 26, of Queens, N.Y. and Karson Taylor, 16, of South Burlington are due in Vermont Superior Court charged in the fatal Aug. 11 daytime beating of Kastner, a Pittsfield, Mass. native.
The incident was reported about 1:35 p.m. in an alley between Church Street and Burlington City Hall Park.
Vermont News First reported over the weekend that they were facing adult charges of second-degree murder in connection with the fatal assault on Aug. 11.
Burlington Police said they arrested Argro at a residence in the Hillside section of Shelburne on Friday night and caught Taylor at a nightclub on Williston Road in South Burlington early Saturday.
Kastner died five days after the vicious attack from complications due to blunt force trauma to the head, according to the Office of the Chief Medical Examiner on Wednesday, police said.
Burlington Police also caught three juveniles, believed to be about 14 to 16 years-old, fleeing from the scene in an alley between Church Street and Burlington City Hall Park.
Vermont News First has learned over the Labor Day weekend several new pieces of information about the homicide case. They include:
— At least one of the juveniles took out his cellphone and captured the brutal attack on Kastner on video. Security cameras near City Hall also captured the assault.
— The beating stemmed from a report – that proved false — that Kastner earlier had struck Taylor’s mother, Katie Bollman, over a $400 dispute and the Aug. 11th incident was retaliation.
— Taylor’s mother, Bollman, reportedly had actually been hit by Kastner’s girlfriend, Alisha Crosby, 41, instead, according to a source that is aware of the investigation, but not authorized to speak about it.
— Argro and Karson Taylor both displayed firearms during the confrontation, but no known shots were fired.
— Argro, also known as Isaiah Argo, is from New York where he has a criminal record, including an intended murder charge, police said.
Kastner became encircled by five people, including Argro, Taylor and three juveniles, roughly ages 14 to 16, and had his chances of escape further cut off in part by two buildings hosting City Hall and Burlington City Arts, a police spokesperson said.
Kastner and Crosby eventually left the park area, but about 2 ½ hours later Burlington Rescue responded to College and St. Paul Streets for a man having medical issues, including an inability to see, police said.
He was taken to UVM Medical Center, where he was treated for a brain bleed and other injuries as his condition worsened, officials said. Kastner died at 8:59 a.m. Aug. 16, according to the public death certificate issued by the state.
Interim Burlington Police Chief Shawn Burke has said officers — both the uniform and detective divisions — worked hard over the past three weeks to bring the case to resolution. Detective Cpl. Zachary Beal is the lead investigator.
Kastner’s funeral is set for 11:30 a.m. Saturday Sept. 6 at Dwyer-Wellington Funeral Home, 220 East Street, Pittsfield MA.
Two of the victim’s children, ages 5 and 6, were living with Kastner in Burlington. Two others, ages 17 and 18, are living in Massachusetts, the victim’s brother Shaun Kastner said.
Discover more from Vermont Daily Chronicle
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Categories: Burlington, Public Safety
They shouldn’t have been attacking anyone!
This is street justice. This is out of control behavior. This is NOT VERMONT!!!!!
When are the leaders going to speak up about this kind of crap happening on a daily basis across our state!!!!!!
See it’s not the gun magazine causing the problems, it’s the hate that is imbedded in our hearts. It’s our pride controlling us, don’t disrespect me! It’s our quest for vengeance, which is not ours to take.
Yeah, some groups of people talk about this stuff every Sunday, they read about it in the…….BIBLE….they read about the deadly consequences, of bringing hell on earth with this type of mindset in proverbs.
Whoever thinks the bible isn’t relevant, isn’t a solution of most every societal problem has not read the book, nor have the studied history.
They talk about entire religions being of hate. They talk about dictatorships. They talk about cesspool of a country. There is a constant amongst all of these, the absence of Jesus Christ, an unrepentant heart, filled with sin, bringing a bit of hell on earth instead of heaven.
Proverbs is perhaps the best schooling a young person could ever obtain, it clearly defines everything about this case and how it could have been avoided.
lol….the “only” problem was the attacked the wrong person??????
They killed someone in broad daylight! AND THEY TOOK A VIDEO OF IT!!!!!!!
May God have mercy on their souls.
TGBTG
Thy Kingdom come, Lord, Thy will be done in our hearts as it is in heaven.
Here is the very beginning of Proverbs, which was wisdom from King Solomon to his son, to all aspiring people….
Proverbs 1:10-19
New International Version
10 My son, if sinful men entice you,
do not give in to them.
11 If they say, “Come along with us;
let’s lie in wait for innocent blood,
let’s ambush some harmless soul;
12 let’s swallow them alive, like the grave,
and whole, like those who go down to the pit;
13 we will get all sorts of valuable things
and fill our houses with plunder;
14 cast lots with us;
we will all share the loot”—
15 my son, do not go along with them,
do not set foot on their paths;
16 for their feet rush into evil,
they are swift to shed blood.
17 How useless to spread a net
where every bird can see it!
18 These men lie in wait for their own blood;
they ambush only themselves!
19 Such are the paths of all who go after ill-gotten gain;
it takes away the life of those who get it.
They must have skipped a very important Sunday school class, too bad. The bible is entirely relevant in today’s world; one only need open it.
Neil: Right on the mark as usual. The almighty will be the judge, & Jury at the approriate time. Lord of Mercy, among us, we should be following Him.
So this gives an excuse to the thugs that attacked him? I think not.
We must consider all the “root causes”…and keep voting for people like Sarah George and Charity Clark who have the best interests of a fair and just society at heart…
Part of “celebrating diversity” is in accepting that there are some ethnicities and other affinity groups who use methods of settling disputes that involve indiscriminate and extreme violence. Whether this is from growing up fatherless or from accepting the irrational and dangerous concept of the “microaggression”, we have invited this into Vermont, and now we are stuck with it UNLESS our “progressive” criminal justice system goes back to holding individuals responsible for their own actions and we stop our sick obsession about “past injustices”. “Being dissed” is not an excuse to commit mayhem or murder. Every person involved in this attack, including the juveniles and the one who simply recorded the event should be locked up permanently, since there is no reasonable hope for their rehabilitation.
So, we’re just now finding out they weren’t ALL juveniles, hmmmm. I’m sure the 16 year is a good boy from a stable family, (sarcasm) except his name is not same as is mother’s (there’s the stable part, NOT!) and they picked him up at a night club!?!? (good boy, NOT!). Friggin’ sad, that’s all I can say.
Here is the bottom line; an innocent man was beaten to death in broad daylight by and 26-year-old man from New York with previous “criminal record, including an intended murder charge” and using an alias. Smart money says he has GANG affiliations in New York and probably so does his teenaged “posse”. The attack was organized, planned, carried out, and filmed resulting in an innocent man’s murder.
This is the result of a progressive system that WELCOMES these thugs in Vermont and a progressive justice system that turns a blind eye to the facts and sets these very thugs free to wreak mayhem and kill again.
God help us . . .
On a Tuesday, at 1:35 PM, in an alley that runs between City Hall and Burlington City Arts …. if it was the mayor who got mugged, do you think it would have taken 2 ½ hours for her bleeding body to be discovered? Imagine the rainbow flag rioters ….
Wait, will a George Floyd esque statue be erected in Burlington’s City Hall Park, reflecting the unusually long response time?
This city’s sickness began with Bernie placing a knee on the city
There’s additional city sickness that allowed high potency cannabis to easily target the brains of our youth.
In the mind of Vermont moonbats, they will have to be released right away. After all, it was a case of mistaken identity, so they actually aren’t guilty.
In the leftist brain, that makes perfect sense.