Girl Asked Killer If She Could Go Home

Bound, gagged and with a slit throat, Jorelys Rivera was still alive after being assaulted by Ryan Brunn.

She managed to make it out of a bathtub in an empty apartment and reach a toilet before Brunn, realizing she wasn't dead yet, used one of her roller skates to strike her five times in the head.

She was stilled.

"I've never seen a situation this horrific," said District Attorney Garry Moss. "It's affected us all."

After killing the Canton child, Brunn, 20, put her in a bag and took the body to the trash compactor "two football fields" away from the apartment and turned the compactor on, he told a packed courtroom Tuesday.

Wearing a bullet proof vest over an orange jumpsuit, Brunn pleaded guilty to the murder of Jorelys, 7, in Cherokee Superior Court—only feet from the first grader's mother, Joselin, and other family members.

As part of a plea agreement with the state, and with the approval of Jorelys' mother, Judge Frank Mills sentenced Brunn to life without the possibility of parole. One of his attorneys, Daran Burns, said Brunn pleaded guilty because he wanted to take responsibility for what he did.

But GBI Director Vernon Keenan said it was because "he was going to get the death penalty" if the case had gone to trial. DA Moss had similar sentiments.

"Let's just say if he hadn't pleaded guilty today, we would be going in a different direction," he said.

The hour-long court proceeding began with Judge Mills advising Brunn, who only recently began working at the River Ridge at Canton apartment complex, of his rights. Was he happy with the attorneys that had been provided for him? To which Brunn replied, "Yes sir."

The judge told him that a lot of people plead guilty to go ahead and get it over with because it means they will get out of prison sooner.

"You understand that's not going to happen in your case," Mills told Brunn. He also said that Brunn would never see the outside of a prison again, ever.

Mills then wanted to hear exactly what had happened that day, Friday Dec. 2, 2011, in the apartment complex.

Jorelys' mother, also sitting with a victims' advocate and a Spanish interpreter, was shaking when Brunn began to speak. Dressed in black, she dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief periodically and hung her head.

Brunn, who said he smoked marijuana at lunch the day the child was killed, found one of Jorelys' roller skates, took a picture of it, and waited. Brunn, who had no one from his family in court Tuesday, said he had watched Jorelys skate on the sidewalk by her apartment and knew the skate was hers.

Brunn, who had never talked to Jorelys befor the murder, said he hatched a plan to lure her inside for sexual purposes.

When Jorelys started home from the playground at the complex, Brunn said he approached her and showed her the picture on his phone.

Brunn said Jorelys agreed to come with him. He took her to an empty apartment in Jorelys' building. Brunn said he knew it was empty and unlocked because the former resident had left some items that Brunn, the apartment complex's maintenance man, had had to remove.

Brunn said he told Jorelys to lay down on a mattress, pull her pants down, and touch herself. She asked Brunn if she did what he said, could she go home.

Brunn said yes.

The child then asked to go to the bathroom.

Although he pleaded guilty to a count of child molestation, Brunn told the judge he never touched Jorelys in a sexual way. Keenan scoffed at that and said Brunn was lying.

"He was exposed for the monster that he is," Keenan said.

In the bathroom bathtub, Brunn said he tied Jorelys' hands behind her back, placed a dish cloth in her mouth and duct taped it "so she wouldn't scream."

With a razor, Brunn said he cut Jorelys' throat "from shoulder to shoulder" and then beat her with the skate. Autopsy results said Jorelys was stabbed several times as well.

Brunn said he got scared and he didn't want Jorelys to "go home and tell on me."

"I was just so terrified and scared. I didn't want her to go home and tell her mom or Dad what I had done."

Brunn put the child's body in a bag and went out the back door of the apartment and threw the bag in the back of the golf cart he drove around.

"It looked like I was carrying trash," Brunn said.

He put the child in the trash bin along with gloves he wore "so I wouldn't leave fingerprints" as well as the razor and the roller skate. The next day Brunn said he threw out his shoes that were covered in blood.

Brunn's boss told him that evening that the child was missing. He helped in the massive search for Jorelys, Brunn said. That night Brunn said he went to Walmart with his roommate and another friend.

On Saturday, Brunn said he and some friends played Monopoly "and chilled."

By that Sunday night, Brunn said police were everywhere. With no explanation, Brunn said he wrote a note on a McDonalds receipt "she's in the trash can" and used scotch tape to attach it to the trash bin.

Keenan said killers often like to watch the police scurry around. That may have been the reason for the note, he said.

On Monday, Dec. 5, Brunn said a GBI agent told him that they were about to remove the trash for it to be sifted through.

"I was freaking out pretty bad," Brunn told Judge Mills.

Jorelys' mangled body was found later that day in the Dumpster.

By Wednesday, police had arrested Brunn. He was indicted last Monday on 13 charges including murder, kidnapping, child molestation, making false statements and aggravated assault. The sentences for the other charges will run concurrent with the life without parole.

Judge Mills asked Brunn if he and his attorneys had discussed other possible defenses including insanity, to which Brunn replied, "I know right from wrong."

Moss got a chance to tell the court what the state would have presented at a trial. Brunn's bloody footprints were in the apartment bathroom. Jorelys' blood and Brunn's fingerprints were on gloves left behind in the apartment. There was plenty of DNA tying Brunn to the murder. And the note was found to be in Brunn's handwriting.

Moss also said a computer used by Brunn had child pornography on it.

Asked at sentencing whether he had anything to say, Brunn told the judge he wanted to apologize for everything he had done. He repeated in Spanish that he was sorry as well.

After the proceedings, a shackled and handcuffed Brunn was led away. At a press conference later on, Keenan said that if Brunn had gotten the death penalty, law enforcement officials wouldn't be able to pick his brain and study the ins and outs of the case.

Calling Brunn a cold and calculated killer, Keenan said he had no emotion or remorse in court.

"He doesn't deserve any sympathy," Keenan said. He also said that Brunn had allegedly molested other children including a family member, in Virginia and Lumpkin County.

Calling the guilty plea "an appropriate end to a horrendous situation," Moss said that no one can attempt to understand Brunn's actions.

Using a Bible verse, Moss said, "Our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the powers of this dark world and the spiritual forces of evil."

Moss said he couldn't explain what happened to Jorelys.

"I can only accept it."