The wife of a neo-Nazi organizer pleaded not guilty Wednesday to charges that she allowed her husband to abuse her children and failed to keep a gun secured in the home. In court documents, police said the boy shot his step-dad after years of abuse.
Krista Faye McCary, 26, could face more than 30 years in prison if convicted of five counts of child endangerment and four counts of failing to secure firearms and other weapons in a household with children present.
McCary appeared before Riverside County Superior Court Judge Becky Dugan, who set a felony settlement conference in the case for July 21. She remains free on bail.
Riverside police investigators say McCary stood by and watched as her husband, 32-year-old Jeff Russell Hall, abused their five children, mainly the eldest boy, who is McCary’s stepson.
There were numerous guns, knives and swords in the house, easily accessible to any of the youngsters, according to Riverside police Detective Greg Rowe.
He wrote in an arrest warrant affidavit that McCary acknowledged seeing Hall beat and verbally abuse the oldest child, identified in court documents only as “J.”
“Krista said that Jeffrey did these things to punish J,” Rowe wrote. “Krista said that J would get punished for being too loud or getting in Jeffrey’s way. Krista said Jeffrey would get out of control when he punished J, including punching and kicking him several times in the back.”
Hall, a plumber, was the Southwest regional director of the Detroit-based National Socialist Movement, which advocates racial segregation. He was a visible presence at neo-Nazi rallies throughout the Inland Empire.
On May 1, the Riverside man was sleeping on a front room sofa in his two- story Louder Court home when police believe his son shot him in the head, using a Rossi .357 revolver that he’d pulled out of the master bedroom closet, according to investigators.
“The oldest child … admitted during the interview that he was tired of his dad hitting him and his (step)mom,” Rowe wrote. “(J) said he thought his dad was cheating on his (step)mom and thought he might have to choose which person he would live with.”
Neither McCary or J’s siblings — a 2-month-old, 3-year-old, 7-year-old and 9-year-old — were injured.
Hall was pronounced dead 15 minutes later by paramedics. The detective described the house as “filthy,” with dirty clothes
scattered everywhere, urine-stained and soiled bed sheets and floors that “didn’t appear to have been vacuumed in a long time.”
All of the youngsters are now in the care of child welfare workers.
The oldest boy is being held at Riverside Juvenile Hall. He’s undergoing psychiatric evaluations, and another hearing in the case is set for July 22. If convicted of murder and a sentence-enhancing gun use allegation, the 10-year-old could be imprisoned until he’s 25.
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