Convicted sex offender to be charged with three counts of murder in Idaho

COEUR D'ALENE, Idaho -- A convicted sex offender, already facing kidnapping charges in the abduction of two Idaho children, will be charged with murder in the slayings of three people found dead at the children's home, a prosecutor said Tuesday.

The kidnapping charges against Joseph Edward Duncan III will be handled in federal court because the youngsters were taken across a state line, Kootenai County Prosecutor Bill Douglas said. Federal prosecution will follow the state's case, he said.

Duncan, 42, is being held in the abduction of Dylan and Shasta Groene, who were declared missing in May after police found the bound and beaten bodies of their mother, her boyfriend and the children's older brother in their home.

The body of Dylan, 9, was found at a remote campsite in western Montana last week after Shasta gave authorities information about where the children had been held.

A closed probable cause hearing to consider evidence against Duncan was scheduled Tuesday, and Duncan likely will appear in court today to hear the charges against him.

Kootenai County Sheriff Rocky Watson has said he believes the victims in the house were killed so the perpetrator could kidnap the two young siblings for the purposes of sex. He has said the victims were apparently chosen at random, although the killings were carefully planned.

Authorities believe Duncan is also the sole person responsible for the deaths of Brenda Kay Groene, 40; Slade Groene, 13; and Mark Edward McKenzie, 37.

Shasta has been released from Kootenai Medical Center to her father, Steve Groene.

Duncan was released on $15,000 bail earlier this year in Becker County, Minn., after being charged with molesting a 6-year-old boy. Police in Fargo, N.D., where Duncan lived, had been looking for him since he failed to check in with a probation agent there in May.

Police said he got the $15,000 from a Fargo businessman, Joe Crary, 51, who said he became acquainted with Duncan on bicycle trails around Fargo.

"In my contact with him, I saw him like many others apparently did -- he was polite, soft spoken, and seemed sincere in turning his life around," Crary said in a statement faxed Monday night to The Forum newspaper of Fargo.

"I was trying to help him get things straightened out, just like I have tried to help many others over the years," he told the newspaper.

Crary said Duncan told him he was working on a college degree and holding down two jobs. "Furthermore, he assured me he was innocent of the charges in Becker County," Crary wrote in his statement.