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Judge denies supervised release, bail for Wahiawa woman in child death case

COURTESY HONOLULU POLICE DEPARTMENT
                                Debra Geron

COURTESY HONOLULU POLICE DEPARTMENT

Debra Geron

A Circuit Court judge today denied Debra Geron, one of three family members indicted in the murder of a 10-year-old girl at their Wahiawa home, to be allowed supervised release or to have bail set at $100,000.

Geron proposed that she be released to the supervision of her husband, William Geron, who continues to live at the 33 Karsten Drive house, where Geanna Bradley was found dead Jan. 18 after allegedly being bound with duct tape, starved, beaten and kept in a small room with a bucket for a toilet and a box to sleep in.

Judge Paul Wong, after considering the written motion and opposition documents filed with the court and testimony of William Geron, found that Geron’s husband is not a viable sponsor, court minutes show.

Geron, her daughter Brandy Blas and son-in-law Thomas Blas, are being held without bail on numerous charges, in the death and abuse of Bradley, for whom the Blases had legal guardianship.

The Medical Examiner’s Office found Bradley died of prolonged child abuse and neglect, starvation, blunt force injury due to assault, prolonged immobilization, physical restraint, medical neglect and pneumonia.

Geron was charged Feb. 14 by indictment with second-degree murder, two counts of kidnapping, two counts of unlawful imprisonment and first-degree hindering prosecution, to which she has pleaded not guilty to Feb. 22.

Her court-appointed attorney, Walter Rodby, said in his motion for supervised release that she has no criminal record, is not a flight risk, not a danger to the public and is a lifelong resident of Oahu.

But she faces the possible imprisonment of life without the possibility of parole because the murder was “especially heinous, atrocious, or cruel, manifesting exceptional depravity,” the state argued, citing state law.

William Geron has not been charged with any crimes, but the deputy prosecutor argued he will be called as a witness at Debra Geron’s trial for either the defense or for the state, according to the prosecution’s memorandum opposing his wife’s supervised release.

The other minor children and William Geron, who lived in the house at the time of the alleged abuse that led to the death of Bradley, denied that any such abuse or maltreatment took place, the document alleges.

“However, through the investigation, including the evidence recovered, these denials are clearly untrue,” the state alleges.

Judge Wong also denied on May 1 Brandy Blas’s request for supervised release, citing she is a flight risk due to the life sentence without parole if convicted, and given the charges of hindering prosecution and obstruction, she poses a risk of obstruction of justice.

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