Tapes show Candace facing wrath

`Holding therapy' forced girl, 10, to scream and kick for adults

Peggy Lowe, News Staff Writer

Published April 7, 2001 at midnight

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GOLDEN -- Therapists held 10-year-old Candace Newmaker down, screamed at her, shook her, and threatened her with never going home again -- all part of her treatment in the days leading up to her fatal therapy session.

Evergreen therapist Connell Watkins, sometimes using obscenities, called Candace names, and had her long, brown hair cut off, likening it to what men have to do when they join the Army.

In videotapes played Friday for a Jefferson County District Court jury, Watkins practiced what she calls "holding therapy" on Candace, with the girl held across two adults' laps and made to kick and yell.

Watkins, 54, and another therapist, Julie Ponder, 40, are on trial for child abuse resulting in death. Candace, an adopted girl from Durham, N.C., was declared dead April 19, a day after she was unwrapped from a so-called "rebirthing" therapy not breathing and with no pulse.

Some jurors and courtroom spectators wept Thursday as they watched the 70-minute video of the fatal therapy. Jurors reacted grimly to the rough handling of the girl in Friday's tapes.

But there were other moments. In one exchange on April 13, Candace is being held across the laps of Watkins and her assistant, Jack McDaniel, and they are struggling when Watkins asks Candace why she was brought here.

"To get tortured, that's why," Candace says. Some jurors looked at each other and chuckled.

The holding therapy was aimed at enraging Candace so she would face issues about her birth mother, who lost her daughter to North Carolina social services over neglect issues, investigators said.

During an April 11 session, with Candace draped across Watkins and McDaniel, Watkins tells Candace that when she is mean to her adoptive mother, she's really angry with her biological mother.

"You let your birth mom keep running your life, and every time you do it you let her be the boss of you," Watkins says.

Watkins clutches Candace's head and shakes it, making the girl do a preordained routine of shouting back what Watkins has told her while kicking her legs.

"You're just being her! Got it?" Watkins yells into Candace's face.

"Got it!" Candace shouts back.

"Is it fun being your birth mother?" Watkins shouts.

"No, I hate it," Candace says.

Watkins puts her hand over Candace's face and shakes her head.

"I couldn't make her love me!" Candace says.

"Louder!" Watkins says.

"I COULDN'T MAKE HER LOVE ME!"

"She does love you," Watkins says, referring to Candace's adoptive mom, Jeane Newmaker. "You give her back hate. It's time it stopped. Got it, Candace?"

"GOT IT," Candace says.

Newmaker believed that Candace suffered from attachment disorder, an inability to bond with a caretaker because of earlier abuse or trauma. Newmaker testified earlier this week that life at home with Candace was a nightmare of violent rages.

Newmaker brought Candace for therapy with Watkins, a nationally renowned therapist in attachment-disorder circles.

The mother is seen warning Candace that the Evergreen therapy is the final opportunity to prove that she can change and keep living with her. "This is your last chance, the very last," Newmaker tells her child, during an April 13 session. "I told you I was fed up, and I am fed up."

Watkins appears on the April 13 tape like a couch-bound drill sergeant -- that is, if drill sergeants were allowed physical contact -- jerking Candace's head 309 times, grabbing her face 90 times, shouting into her face 65 times and threatening her with not being reunited with Newmaker at home 49 times.

When a woman named "Denise" comes into the April 11 session, Watkins tells Candace that she will have her hair cut, to make it easier for her mother to get her ready in the morning. When Candace asks just how short it will be cut, Watkins warns her that how she handles the trimming will be indicative of just how much she wants to change her behavior.

"I could just shave her head and tattoo it," the hair cutter says.

"If this doesn't work, maybe I'll have you come back next week and do it," Watkins says.

Newmaker, who testified this week under a grant of immunity, has also been charged in her daughter's death. McDaniel, who was an unemployed construction worker interning for Watkins, has been charged along with another Watkins' associate, Brita St. Clair.

Watkins, Ponder, McDaniel and St. Clair were part of the April 18 rebirthing that killed Candace.

Candace was found not breathing and with no pulse when she was unwrapped after the 70-minute procedure. Prosecutors say she asphyxiated on her own vomit. Watkins' and Ponder's attorneys say the girl died from a heart problem brought on by medications she was taking to treat her emotional problems. The trial continues Monday.

Contact Peggy Lowe at (303) 892-5482 or lowep@RockyMountainNews.com.

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