Judge: Statements From Murder Suspect, 12, Will Stand

NEW CASTLE, Pa. -- A judge has denied a motion to suppress key evidence in a case against a 12-year-old boy accused of killing his father's pregnant fiance while she lay in bed in their Lawrence County farmhouse.

Common Pleas Judge Dominick Motto will allow evidence obtained in a search warrant to be presented in the trial of Jordan Brown, who was 11 at the time of the slaying.

Brown is accused in the February killings of Kenzie Marie Houk, 26, and her unborn son with a 20-gauge shotgun at her home in Wampum.

Motto also denied a request to suppress statements Brown made to police after Houk's body was found. However, the judge agreed to suppress evidence police obtained when searching the boy's school records.

Brown is charged with homicide as an adult. If convicted, he faces life in prison without parole.

Brown's defense attorney argued for dismissal of the case because of lack of evidence. The attorney asked for dismissal on the grounds that Brown was not yet a suspect when he was interviewed at his school by state police.

Houk was eight months pregnant with Brown's father's child, and also had two daughters, 7 and 4, who lived with the Browns in the rural home where, authorities said, Houk was slain as she lay in bed.

Police said the fifth-grader shot Houk and then got onto a school bus with Houk's oldest daughter. He was picked up from school several hours later after some tree trimmers called 911 when Houk's youngest daughter told them she thought her mother was dead.