Vanessa Bastardo

Emily Casey

Tanner Landini

Kaylee Prisco

Michelle Carter

Professor Charbonneau

Juvenile Delinquency

November 7, 2017
 On July 13th, 2014, Conrad Roy III committed suicide, prompted by girlfriend of the

time, Michelle Carter. Roy was born in 1995 in New Bedford, MA. He was a former student at

Old Rochester High School, located in Mattapoisett, MA. He was an honor roll student and

graduated with a 3.8 GPA, and had been accepted at Fitchburg State University prior to his

death. He was hard working, and was employed briefly by his family’s marine salvage business,

Tucker-Roy Marine Towing and Salvage, Inc. Family and friends described Roy as funny,

goofy, selfless, and strong. Despite these positive attributes, he had a history of mental illness,

suffering from social anxiety and depressive mood disorder. He described his social anxiety as

“the inability to function properly in a manner that you want to in social situations.” According

to his mother, Lynn Roy, he had a hard time dealing with her divorce from his father, Conrad

Roy Jr, which she believes contributed to his depressive state. (Walsh, 2017) At the time, he was

vulnerable and thought of himself as “a miniscule little particle on the face of this Earth,” as he

described himself in a video made one month prior to his death. This video goes on to explain his

deep struggle with depression and spoke much of his life in “Nevers.” He continues expressing a

drive for personal growth and accomplishment, but is hesitant in remaining positive. This video

provides a lot of insight on his mental state before his death. (Michelle Carter Trial: One Month

Before Suicide, Conrad Roy shot video talking about his struggle with depression, 2017)

Similar to Roy’s mental illness, Carter struggled with body image, eating disorders, and

took medication daily for depression and anxiety disorders. Her psychiatrist described her as

“meshed in a delusional system.” Carter also spent time in a psychiatric facility, Mclean

Hospital, located in Belmont, MA. How much time she spent in the facility is unknown. Despite

her claims of loneliness in text messages to friends saying “stop telling me how beautiful I am.

Beautiful girls get invite to parties and their friends call and wanna hang out…. I have like no
friends. I am alone all the time,” (DeCosta-Klipa, 2017) peers described her as a really nice girl.

She was a popular athlete and won “Most likely to brighten your day” and “class clown”

superlatives in the King Philip Regional High School yearbook. (Glaun, 2017)

Roy and Carter were both from Eastern Massachusetts. They met coincidentally on

family trips to Florida during his high school days in 2012. Roy and Carter had an on and off

relationship for years following. Despite the hour commute between each other’s hometowns,

they rarely saw each other but still maintained a virtual relationship. Roy and Carter only saw

each other twice throughout their two year long relationship, never meeting each other's family.

The two “fell in love” through Facebook and text messaging, constantly confessing their love for

one another. Roy’s aunt Kim Bozzi spoke out about their relationship, saying his mother thought

she was “just an acquaintance of of Conrad’s, nothing more.” Although the relationship didn’t

seem strong for his family, Carter impacted Roy’s life greatly, as he believed all the things she

was saying about him and followed through with his suicide, which she convinced him to do.

(Quinn, 2017)

July 13th, 2014, Conrad Roy III took his own life, and was found dead inside his pickup

truck in the back of a KMart parking lot due to carbon monoxide poisoning. Prior to his suicide,

there were many text messages going back and forth for months between Carter and Roy about

Roy killing himself. For an entire month prior starting on July 7th, 2014 Carter had been

influencing Roys death. Prior to this date on June 19th, there were texts messages of the two

talking about sending Roy to a mental hospital to seek medical help for his suicidal thoughts, but

Roy didn't want to do that. On June 23rd , there were a few times where Carter tried convincing

him not to follow through with it saying to Roy, “What is harming yourself going to do?!

Nothing! It will just make it worse!” On July 7th, Roy asked Carter what she would do if she
was in this situation and she told him that she would get help for herself because she knows she

couldn’t do it on her own. Later that day when Roy made the decision not to get help and that he

wanted to kill himself, Carter’s attitude changed completely. She went from trying to talk him

out of suicide to supporting and pressuring him to go through with it. July 8th until July 12th,

Roy started showing hesitation and wanted to push his suicide off another day but Carter didn’t

support him. She said, “ You can’t keep pushing it off, tho, thats all you keep doing”. “ You

better not be bullsh*tting me and saying you’re gunna do this and then purposely get caught”.

Carter said if he doesn’t follow through with it because he gets caught or because he taped the

tubes wrong that it was just a sad excuse for not wanting to do it. The night of the suicide, July

12th, Roy felt trapped in his own thoughts. He couldn’t stop thinking about how his family was

going to feel. Carters negative replies didnt help Roy’s decision. She said that she thinks his

family will accept it because there is nothing left anyone can do for him and that they will get

over it and move on. Right before, Carter told him he cannot push it off another day or she will

get him help knowing that would force him to do it. Right before she made him promise he was

going to do it and roy said “ I promise babe”. (LeBlanc, 2017)

After years and years of waiting on August 3, 2017, Conrad Roys family was done

waiting for justice. Michelle Carter has now created one of the most disturbing cases that has

ever been brought to the courtroom. Michelle utilized the new age of technology to assist in the

death of Conrad Roy making this case even more disturbing. The new age of technology has

created more deaths than anyone could have ever managed, whether it be multiple texting and

driving crashes or cases like Michelle Carter supporting suicide. Conrad while being an innocent

depressed young man was purely seen as the weak by Carter and she utilized his mental

weakness against him. Michelle while being a psychological maniac clearly had evil thoughts
running through her head the majority of her life causing the severe mental illness that she had.

Conrad began to show his dark thought with michell writing text messages such as “ I see the

world as a horrible place with a bunch of horrible people there’s a shortage of good genuine

people like you and me who care” (esquire,2017) This message directly shows how the mental

illness in Conrad’s head really started to consume him and how the end was going to be near.

The most disturbing part of this message is how Conrad sees Michelle as a “good genuine

person”. This directly relates to how Michelle got to him psychologically and how she began

influencing his thoughts making him believe she was a “genuine person”. This ultimately shows

that Michelle had completed her goal and had officially taken over Conrad’s mind convincing

him that she was good when she was in fact evil.

When Conrad and Michelle met on the trip to Florida coincidently Conrad had only positive

thoughts and really felt like he found someone who liked him for him. Unfortunately Conrad

found the darkest of evil that lurks disguised as an innocent girl. This trip ultimately proved to be

Conrad Roy’s last and it was the worst way any summer vacation could have ever taken place.

Aryanna Taylor one of the close friends described some of the most gruesome details that could

disturb some people. She stated “ It just says that he was calling out for help, that he didn’t

actually mean what he was doing, but he really needed help and that this was the only way he

kind of thought that he would really get help” (Esquire,2017).

In February 2015, the state of Massachusetts indicted Michelle Carter for involuntary

manslaughter, a homicide charge that carries a maximum twenty-year sentence. The Carters

retained the services of an attorney named Joseph Cataldo, known in the community for having

gotten serious charges against King Philip students dismissed, including a bomb threat and a
rape. The homicide trial began this past June at the Bristol County Juvenile Court in Taunton,

Massachusetts.

Throughout the spring, she was out on $2,500 cash bail, and opinions about her

proliferated up and down New England. "I did security work all over North Africa and the

Middle East," said the president of the Northeast Maritime Institute in Fairhaven, where Conrad

got his captain's license. "I saw what Saddam Hussein was doing to people. Photographs, bodies,

body parts. This is the most...I almost want to say satanic thing. I'm not a religious guy, but if

there's evil, that was evil."

The court had prepared a thirteen-page juror questionnaire. Question forty-three asked,

"Do you believe a person may commit a crime through words alone?"

Prospective jurors had assembled when Cataldo executed a surprising reversal: Michelle

waived her right to a jury. The decision placed all the power with Judge Lawrence Moniz, a

former high school English teacher. (Esquire,2017)

Relying in part on the text messages collected from Michelle's phone, Rayburn and her

cocounsel, Maryclare Flynn, described her as a lonely, calculating girl who killed an ambivalent

boy to win the attention of her peers. Rayburn said her witnesses, Michelle's former classmates,

didn't "have time for her." Her implication was that they had responsibilities and that Michelle

who was privileged but unpopular, lived in fantasies.

Cataldo challenged the legitimacy of the charges. Massachusetts has no law criminalizing

suicide. Being an accomplice to a lawful activity could not be a crime. And while free speech has

certain limits saying one cannot make "true threats" as Michelle did not threaten Conrad. Cataldo
had spent two years on the case, and one of his motions to dismiss had reached the state's highest

court.

On June 16, the day of the verdict, as soon as Moniz took the bench, he announced

immediately that the state had not proved that the text messages caused Conrad's death. But

Moniz changed what he was saying slightly. "Approximately two hundred years ago," he said,

"an inmate at the Hampshire Jail was charged with causing the murder of the man in the next

cell." The man who killed himself in 1815 was a convicted murderer named Jewett. The night

before he was to be hanged publicly, Jewett hanged himself in his cell. Guards later told a jury

that the petty thief in the next cell had persuaded Jewett so relentlessly why let the hangman have

his fee? that he bore responsibility for the suicide. Instructing his jury, the judge in the case told

them not to consider Jewett's impending death as a mitigation of the thief's crime. "The culprit,

though under sentence of death, is cheered by hope to the last moment of his existence," the

judge had said. (Esquire,2017)

This story told by Judge Muniz shocked each person in the courtroom and had everyone

waiting for what came next. Muniz then said "Whether Conrad would have taken his life at

another time does not control or even inform this court's decision. Knowing that Conrad was in

the truck, Michelle took no action. She did not call the police or Mr. Roy's family. She did not

notify his mother or his sister, even though just several days before that she had requested their

phone numbers. And finally, she did not issue a simple additional instruction: 'Get out of the

truck.' " Consequently, he said, Michelle's "failure to act, where she had a self-created duty,

constituted each and all wanton and reckless conduct." Muniz pronounced her guilty. On August

3, he sentenced Michelle to fifteen months. A stay of the sentence allows her to remain free

pending her filed appeal.

 Currently, Michelle Carter remains free as she awaits her appeal. This freedom remains

largely controversial as does her sentence itself. As for now, Carter remains in Massachusetts, is

required to stay off of social media and must have no contact with the Roy family.

Works Cited

Sanchez, Ray. “Woman Sentenced to 15 Months in Texting Suicide Case.” CNN, Cable News

Network, 3 Aug. 2017, www.cnn.com/2017/08/03/us/michelle-carter-texting-suicide-

sentencing/index.html.

dglaun@masslive.com, Dan Glaun |. “Five Facts to Know about Michelle Carter, the Plainville

Teen Accused of Encouraging Her Boyfriend's Suicide.” Masslive.com, Masslive.com, 1 Mar.

2016,
www.masslive.com/news/index.ssf/2016/03/five_facts_to_know_about_michelle_carter_plainfie

ld_teen.html.

“Michelle Carter, Woman in Suicide Texting Case, Sentenced.” Fox News, FOX News Network,

www.foxnews.com/us/2017/08/03/michelle-carter-could-get-20-year-prison-term-at-thursday-

sentencing.html.

“Commonwealth vs. Michelle Carter.” The New York Times, The New York Times, 16 June

2017, www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/06/16/us/document-Commonwealth-vs-Michelle-

Carter.html?mcubz=0.

Barron, Jesse. “Did Words Kill? Behind the Scenes of the Shocking Michelle Carter Verdict.”

Esquire, Esquire, 11 Oct. 2017, www.esquire.com/news-politics/a57125/michelle-carter-trial/.

Section 12, malegislature.gov/Laws/GeneralLaws/PartII/TitleII/Chapter201D/Section12.