So Much Evidence Was Destroyed-The Story of Brendan Creato

So Much Evidence Was Destroyed-The Story of Brendan Creato

“We kind of talked about what else could have happened to him, and he had told me that maybe his spirits told him to walk down to the woods, which is completely odd and unexplainable. It’s not logical.”

The story I have for you today is one in which I’m not totally convinced that they have the right person behind bars for the murder of this three-year-old little boy, though the investigation was so botched that nobody will ever really know. But let me know what you think at the end of this video.

The Story of Brendan Creato

This is the story of Brendan Creato. Brendan Creato was born in New Jersey on June 1st, 2012, to his mother, Samantha Denoto, and his father, David Creato Jr., who was also known as DJ. Little Brendan was described as a genuinely happy little boy who was always smiling, and he loved everyone around him. Brendan’s favorite songs were The Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine” and “Strawberry Fields.” He loved pirates, including watching the show Jake and the Never Land Pirates, and he also loved Legos, superheroes, animals, and monster trucks.

Brendan’s parents, Samantha and DJ, had been high school sweethearts who lived in Haddon Township, New Jersey. Shortly after they had graduated from high school, they found out that Samantha was pregnant with Brendan. The young couple would raise Brendan together. That is until sometime in 2014 when they went their separate ways after Samantha found out that DJ was being unfaithful to her. After their split, Samantha and DJ were still on good terms and co-parenting was going smoothly. Brendan lived with his mother most of the time, but he would go to see his father every other weekend.

The Disappearance

On October 12th, 2015, Brendan was going to spend a few nights with his father at DJ’s apartment. Shortly before 9:00 p.m. that night, his grandmother dropped him off at his dad’s house. But the following morning, October 13th, at 6:07 a.m., a 911 call would be made by DJ saying that his son Brendan was missing:

DJ: “I just woke up, my three-year-old…” Dispatcher: “Okay, what’s your address, sir?” DJ: “Hold on, he’s out. He’s out.” Dispatcher: “Is he in there?” DJ: “No, yeah, he’s missing.” Dispatcher: “All right, and what’s your—and what is it? Haddon Township?” DJ: “Haddon Township.” Dispatcher: “Three-year-old boy or girl?” DJ: “Three-year-old boy. His name is Brendan.” Dispatcher: “Spell his name for me.” DJ: “B-R-E-N-D-A-N.” Dispatcher: “And last name, Creato?” DJ: “C-R-E-A-T-O.” Dispatcher: “Okay, and what did you last see him wearing?” DJ: “Uh, he was wearing red pajamas.” Dispatcher: “Okay, and you didn’t hear anything or see anything or nothing like that?” DJ: “No, uh, I just woke up and he wasn’t in my apartment. I don’t know if he wandered out or what happened. I don’t know where he is. The door was locked, I guess he unlocked it and left.” Dispatcher: “All right, and your address is… yes, yes. Okay, I already have the police on the way, sir. What is your name?” DJ: “My name is DJ. DJ Creato.” Dispatcher: “Spell it for me.” DJ: “C-R-E-A-T-O.” Dispatcher: “All right sir, do me a favor, just hold on. I already have the police on the way. Don’t hang up, I want to see if the police dispatcher wants to speak to you. Okay, all right, all right, all right. Stay on the phone. All right, on the way.” DJ: “The top door was locked and the bottom door was locked. He unlocked the doors and left. I don’t know what happened.”

When police arrived at DJ’s apartment, he genuinely seemed upset. He told them that the last time he had seen Brendan was the night before when he had put him to bed. DJ theorized that maybe the toddler had opened the door to the second-floor apartment on his own and wandered off into the night. The thing was, Brendan was terrified of the dark.

A Botched Investigation

What followed would be an extensive three-hour search for the little boy that would end in the worst way possible. Brendan’s body was discovered by a K-9 unit in a wooded area next to a stream at Cooper River Park. It was about a half-mile away from DJ’s apartment. Brendan was dressed in only his pajamas and socks, despite the temperatures being in the 50s. His pajamas and diaper had also been pulled down to his ankles, and he had been draped over a rock, face down.

The odd thing was, the police noticed that Brendan’s neon green socks were completely clean, which meant he did not walk down to the creek on his own. Someone had to have brought him there.

When police told DJ that his son Brendan had been found dead, he jumped up and yelled, “You can’t tell me this! He was my best friend. I loved him so much.” After the distraught father was finally able to compose himself, police asked him to go over the last 24 hours with them. DJ told police that he had read Brendan three bedtime stories like he usually does, then he put the little boy to bed on the loveseat in the living room, which is just outside of DJ’s bedroom. After Brendan was asleep, DJ tried to contact his 17-year-old girlfriend, Julia Stensky, who was currently attending college in New York. DJ says he then went to bed at 10:00 p.m., and when he woke up the next morning, Brendan was gone.

Police were able to find a surveillance camera about 75 yards away from where Brendan’s body had been found. However, these, unfortunately, would prove to be useless to their investigation.

When Brendan’s body had been found, an officer had removed it from the rock that it had been laying on and passed it off to another officer who was on the side of the river. Another detective had then put Brendan’s tiny body into a body bag, tucked it into the police cruiser, and then took the only photos of the crime scene that would be taken.

This was a clear mishandling of the scene, as the medical examiner is supposed to be there before the body is touched or any of the evidence is removed. In fact, in New Jersey, it is state law that a medical examiner supervises a suspicious death with extra attention if it’s a child. So, the fact that police had removed Brendan’s body from the stream would prove to seriously hinder the investigation later down the road.

The medical examiner’s office had not even been notified until 20 minutes after Brendan’s body had been found, and the death scene investigator, Dr. Gerald Feigin, did not get there until nearly 50 minutes after Brendan’s body was discovered. Once Dr. Feigin had gotten there, he filed a hasty report of fewer than 200 words, which showed that a real investigation was not completed. Dr. Feigin had then taken Brendan’s body from the back of the police cruiser and transported it to the morgue, where he then pronounced the toddler dead.

Inconclusive Autopsies

The first autopsy of the little boy’s body would be performed later that day. Yes, I said first autopsy, because the following day the first autopsy would be announced as inconclusive. After that, a second medical examiner performed an autopsy on Brendan’s body, and again, these results were inconclusive. Then, on October 16th, three days after Brendan’s body had been found, a third medical examiner performed an autopsy, and once again, this was unable to provide Brendan’s cause of death.

Three pathologists had done an autopsy, and none could pinpoint where or when the toddler died, or any useful information about who had done it to him.

The third pathologist to do Brendan’s autopsy did, however, find some things that the first two pathologists missed. The first was a bite mark inside the little boy’s cheek, and the second was pinprick hemorrhaging inside his eyes, which could have indicated strangulation. It was also determined that Brendan was not sexually molested, and his toxicology report came back clean.

So, in December of 2015, the medical examiner finally announced that Brendan’s cause of death was homicidal violence, but from an undetermined cause. The possibilities included drowning, manual strangulation, and asphyxiation. But since Brendan’s body had not been handled correctly when it was found, there was no conclusive DNA evidence that could tie somebody to this horrific crime.

Interrogating DJ and Julia

Police, however, started with the person that the little boy was last with: his father, DJ. DJ was called in to speak with police, and they took his cell phone to search it.

While speaking with him, police found out that DJ had been dating his girlfriend Julia for about four months, and the pair had met on Tinder. Even though DJ and Julia had already been professing their love for one another, when DJ was asked what Julia’s last name was, he said it was “Spiny” and spelled it out instead of Stensky. He also said that her first name was Julie instead of Julia. He told investigators that after they had spent the weekend together, on the morning of October 12th, he had dropped Julia off at the train station.

That night, before Brendan got dropped off at his father’s house, DJ had spoken to Julia on the phone around 8:15 p.m. for about four minutes. They then said goodnight, and Julia told him that she was going to bed early because she had a test the next day. But DJ told the investigators that he did not believe that Julia had actually gone to bed that early. While he waited for his mother to drop off his son, he had texted Julia around 8:30 p.m., sending her some sweet text messages telling her how much he loved her and how beautiful she was. But Julia did not reply.

At 8:50 p.m., Brendan had been dropped off with DJ. After reading to Brendan and eating some potato chips, DJ had put him to bed at 9:30 p.m. on the loveseat, which was about nine feet away from DJ’s bed. DJ had tried to call his girlfriend Julia three more times between 9:54 p.m. and 10:07 p.m., but she never answered. After that, DJ claimed that he had gone to bed shortly after 10:00 p.m.

However, police discovered that he had actually been on Julia’s Snapchat until around 1:30 in the morning. DJ told police that the reason he had been on her Snapchat was because he was worried his girlfriend was actually spending time with another guy, so he had gotten jealous and paranoid and started looking through her social media accounts.

DJ had already lied to police about what time he had gone to bed the night before Brendan had been found dead. But police also believed that DJ was lying to them about other things as well. They said his reaction to some things seemed rehearsed, and when DJ was asked certain questions, he would volunteer information that didn’t even seem relevant. Also, even though DJ had previously denied that he had been to the spot where Brendan’s body had been found, police discovered photos in his phone of that exact spot, and they had been taken just a few days before Brendan’s murder. It was said to actually be DJ’s favorite spot, which he had considered to be spiritual, and Julia would admit that she had gone to this spot with DJ several times as well.

A Toxic Relationship

When Julia was brought in for questioning by police, they took a sample of her DNA as well as searched her cell phone. Julia told police that she had been with DJ at his apartment for a few days; however, she had left the morning of October 12th around 5:45 a.m. to get back to school in New York. She said that that morning, DJ had dropped her off at the Trenton, New Jersey train station.

Surveillance footage from the train station backs up Julia’s alibi. At 6:48 a.m., you can see DJ dropping her off, and Julia walks to the train which then takes off. Police were also able to obtain Julia’s swipe log from her college dorm room at Pace University, which had a record of her swiping back into her dorm room that day. Julia told police that the reason she had not answered all of DJ’s phone calls was because she had gone to bed early for her test and silenced her phone. When she did wake up, though, she saw that she had multiple missed calls from DJ, as well as from a detective who had told her that Brendan was missing.

After searching both DJ and Julia’s phones, police found over 9,000 text messages between the two. Most of them had already been deleted. In these texts, it was apparent that Julia thought of Brendan as a roadblock in her new relationship. Brendan was getting in the way of them spending time together, and time and time again, Julia blamed DJ for this. Julia had warned DJ on their second date that she did not like kids and didn’t want any, but regardless, they continued to carry on their relationship.

Their relationship cooled off a little when Julia left in September to go back to college. That only left the weekends for her to spend with DJ, and DJ spent every other weekend with Brendan. The pair wanted totally different things, but for one reason or another, they were both desperately clinging on to the relationship. Recently, DJ and Julia had been having a lot of fights, and many of these fights had been about Brendan.

As I said, Julia had repeatedly told DJ that she didn’t like children, so she was upset that DJ constantly chose his son over her. Julia wanted DJ to either give up custody of Brendan or break up with her. But DJ would constantly tell Julia that Brendan was always going to be in his life.

The thing was, DJ was obsessed with Julia, and he did not want to lose her. He was also very jealous, particularly of guys that she was spending time with at college. That’s why he had actually gotten the passwords to her social media accounts and would regularly check them—though Julia was aware of this, she had given him the passwords. There was one classmate in particular that DJ was worried about. One that Julia would say was just an acquaintance, though she had previously sent this classmate some flirty text messages. But when the detective later questioned the male classmate about Julia, he had confused her with another Julia and didn’t know who the detective was even talking about.

Julia had even written at one point on social media that Brendan was a mistake. But DJ stood firm and told Julia that if she didn’t accept Brendan, then she didn’t accept him. Julia would admit to detectives that she had also contemplated ending her relationship with DJ the weekend prior to Brendan’s body being found. She said she was particularly annoyed by the transportation down to DJ’s apartment. She typically took a train from Manhattan to Trenton and then was picked up by DJ. On that weekend, however, he was unable to pick her up at the train station, so she had to take public transit all the way to DJ’s house. The reason why DJ was unable to pick her up from the train station was because he had Brendan that weekend, which would make Julia even more spiteful toward the little boy. During that trip, she had actually told DJ at one point to bring her back to Trenton, though that had never happened.

In a text conversation dated October 6th, DJ told Julia that he wanted to be with her, but Julia said, “Well, we don’t always get what we want.” DJ told her they could have what they wanted, and Julia told him that she didn’t want him to have a kid.

The Arrest and Trial

Based on DJ’s claims being inconsistent and the little bit of evidence that had been obtained, investigators concluded that DJ most likely killed his son in a fit of rage over insecurities and fear of losing his relationship.

On January 11th, 2016, DJ Creato was arrested while he was at work. He was charged with first-degree murder as well as second-degree child endangerment, and he was held on a bond of $750,000. However, the lack of a definitive cause of death, along with the absence of physical evidence, made the case against DJ a circumstantial one.

Now, the third medical examiner who had conducted an autopsy on Brendan’s body had concluded that there were signs of asphyxiation. But in his letter to the prosecution’s office after the autopsy, he said he did not have enough evidence to determine that it was a homicide. However, the prosecutor’s office asked him to review the case file and make a determination. That’s the point when the medical examiner determined that Brendan’s cause of death was homicidal violence. The official determination was made only one day before jury selection started, which seems like odd timing.

On April 20th, 2017, the murder trial of DJ Creato began. The prosecution would argue that Julia’s dislike of children was what had resulted in Brendan’s death. They described DJ as a jealous and obsessive boyfriend who had killed his son in an effort to save his relationship with Julia. The prosecution also claimed that Julia no longer wanted DJ and she was moving on with another classmate—yeah, the one that had no idea who she was. The theory was that DJ had suffocated Brendan with a pillow and then he had brought him down to the creek.

Witness Testimonies

One person who was called to testify at trial was Brendan’s mother, Samantha. She testified that DJ had repeatedly told her the same story about putting Brendan to bed and then waking up to find that he was not there. But then she also spoke about how DJ had said that possibly spirits were what led Brendan to that area of the woods. She also said that DJ had talked about seeing and feeling spirits for years, and recently he had told her that there was a weird energy in his apartment. Samantha would also say that her ex-boyfriend DJ was a soft-spoken and fairly gentle man. She said he would never raise a hand against his son and had always been a gentle and loving father in her eyes.

Lisa Creato, DJ’s mother, testified that she and her daughter Sarah had dropped Brendan off at DJ’s apartment on the night of October 12th. She told the jury that she had actually let herself into DJ’s apartment that night by using a screwdriver to pry open the downstairs door—something she had done multiple times in the past. So, even though investigators had made the determination that nobody had forced entry into DJ’s apartment the night that Brendan had disappeared, clearly at least one person had. During the trial, jurors also saw pictures of damage to the door. DJ said it was ridiculously easy to break into his apartment, and he would regularly pop the lock in the same fashion on his own so he didn’t have to carry his keys with him.

There was also the fact that Brendan had known how to open the door on his own. So, if someone had knocked and come to the door, DJ possibly could have slept through it because he was further away from the main door in his bedroom. The door between the living room and the bedroom could have been closed, we don’t know, and Brendan could have opened the door for a stranger, or a stranger could have broken in and taken him easily.

There was also a police officer who had been there the day that Brendan had been discovered dead. He told the court that DJ had complied with every police request that day. He had calmly answered questions and never asked for a lawyer. DJ also readily consented to a search of his cell phone, vehicle, and apartment, as well as provided a DNA sample. The detective also testified that DJ had told them about Julia’s resentment towards his son, and DJ had told them that Brendan going to the park on his own was very unlikely due to how scared of the dark he was.

DJ’s attorney believed that the police investigation was flawed and had targeted DJ from the very beginning. His attorney even said that there had been a fresh cigarette butt found at the scene where Brendan’s body had been found, and the DNA on it did not match DJ’s or anybody in the National DNA database.

Julia, who was subpoenaed to testify at DJ’s trial, tried to get out of it by repeatedly stating that she wanted to invoke her right against self-incrimination. However, a judge eventually ruled that she must testify in front of the jury. Julia went on to testify that at the time of Brendan’s murder, DJ was jealous, paranoid, and kind of broke. Julia admitted that Brendan was one part of DJ’s life that she was not happy with, particularly because he limited their social activities.

A friend of DJ’s named Kevin would also testify on his behalf. Kevin told the jury that DJ was his closest friend, and he was a good dad who was always there for his son. He could never picture DJ doing what he was accused of doing. Kevin also described several instances of Julia’s angry behavior on the weekend before Brendan’s death, as well as an outburst of anger on a trip shortly after Brendan’s funeral. But he described DJ as a peaceful, quiet, and easy-going guy.

During the trial, the jury would also go out to visit the spot where Brendan’s body had been found at Cooper River Park to get a better idea of the scene.

Cross-Examining the Medical Examiner

The medical examiner’s office was, of course, under a ton of scrutiny due to all the mistakes they had made since Brendan’s body had been found. The medical examiner who had been called to the scene that day, Dr. Feigin, was even called out in front of the entire courtroom under cross-examination when it was discovered that the doctor—who claimed he was detail-oriented—had accidentally attached somebody else’s report to the back of Brendan’s.

Attorney: “And after looking at this in your grand jury testimony, is there anything about it that was incorrect?” Dr. Feigin: “Correct. I think there’s a comma missing from my opinion.” Attorney: “Okay, how about the last page of this, sir? This reads ‘my investigator notes’?” Dr. Feigin: “Yes, investigator notes.” Attorney: “Would you read that to us?” Dr. Feigin: “It says… that’s the wrong one. It’s a wrong page, that doesn’t belong here. It’s a wrong person. I was given the wrong one by myself, so this is named… it’s a different person, it’s a different address, it’s a different date, different time. That’s wrong. I put it… ‘was found unresponsive.'” Attorney: “At this point, the doctor indicated the report. It’s not really detail-oriented, right doctor?” Dr. Feigin: “Yes, detail-oriented.” Attorney: “You read those six pages before you came in today, before you told this jury about how Brendan Creato died, right?” Dr. Feigin: “Yes.” Attorney: “Detail-oriented… you got the wrong report from your investigator.”

There were also tests and examinations that should have been performed on Brendan’s body by the medical examiner after it had been found. One of these things that had not been performed was a rape kit, because the medical examiner had performed an external examination and said it was not necessary as there were no signs of injury. But that was wrong, because another medical examiner had found a bite mark inside his cheek.

Dr. Feigin actually had a long past of big mistakes in his career. He had gone to New Jersey in 1998 following problems with two cases that he had overseen while with the Massachusetts medical examiner system, including the notorious Boston Nanny case. His mistake in that case had led to the judge immediately releasing the defendant on time served, which was just 279 days, not the minimum 15 years he had initially imposed. Dr. Feigin and his office had also been sued for mishandling an investigation involving a car crash in late 2015. A woman had died during this car crash, and parts of her hand had been left at the scene. The family, who had been on the site a couple of days later to place a roadside memorial, had discovered the body parts, and they had charged the doctor and his office with carelessness, recklessness, and negligence.

A Mistrial and Plea Deal

David Creato Sr., DJ’s father, said that all the unanswered questions in the case have left him feeling hollow. He was quoted as saying, “I’m never going to be okay. I don’t know if my child is a killer or not. I can say 90% he didn’t do it, but not 100% he didn’t do it because of the way they investigated.”

The trial finally ended in deadlock on May 31st, 2017. Based on circumstantial evidence, no DNA, no physical evidence, no eyewitnesses, coupled with the inconclusive findings from three autopsies, it resulted in a mistrial, and a new trial was set for September 11th. Brendan’s family was told if the second trial ended the same way, then all of the charges would be dropped.

And then, just weeks before the start of the second trial, DJ Creato accepted a plea deal. He pled guilty to the charge of manslaughter, but the father only admitted to depriving his son of oxygen. No further details as to how or why were given. So rather than the 30 years to life that could have been his fate if he had been convicted of murder, DJ was to serve only 10 years for aggravated manslaughter and may be eligible for parole after serving just eight, in July of 2024. Meanwhile, DJ’s family says that he is innocent and only accepted the plea deal to avoid a second trial.

Remembering Brendan

The community came together for a candlelit vigil following the death of Brendan as well. On October 13th, 2015, in Haddon Township, New Jersey, around 100 people gathered holding candles, praying, and singing in memory of Brendan. Blue ribbons had also been tied and placed on homes and businesses to show Brendan’s family that Haddon Township cared.

On October 23rd, 2015, family and friends said a final farewell to Brendan, and a funeral mass was held at Holy Savior Church in Westmont. Then, in December of 2016, the still-grieving community dedicated a bench in Brendan Creato’s name, not far from where the boy’s body had been found in Cooper River Park. The plaque beneath the bench reads: “Captain Hook, you are my perfect storybook. Neverland, I love you so. You are now my home sweet home.”

Well, thank you for listening to all of Brendan’s story today. I don’t know myself if DJ did or didn’t do this to his son, though there’s not enough evidence to tell one way or another. The investigation was just so haphazardly done, and something seems off. Brendan deserved justice, and I don’t know if he actually got that because even if it was his father who did kill him, he only got sentenced to 10 years and is eligible for parole after only eight. Brendan’s family deserves closure that will likely never come.