■ With 2 defendants in prison for lengthy terms, relatives of Benicia High School grad speak out

Donald Paul Waldecker, one of three accused in the slaying of Shelby Barnes, agreed Monday to plead guilty to first-degree murder in exchange for a sentence of 25 years to life.

A second defendant, Randi Len Dees, entered a no-contest plea to a second-degree murder charge in the brutal killing of the popular former cheerleader and was sentenced to 15 years or more. The case against a third defendant, Johnathan Harriel, who testified against the other two, is expected to be heard next month.

None of this will bring back the 2008 Benicia High School graduate. Nor are her mother, Charlene Barnes, or her sister, Sara Royer, content that the primary killer and one of his assistants will be in prison for many years.

Charlene Barnes said there is plenty of blame for others to share.

Among them, she said, is her former husband, Brad Barnes, who allowed his 21-year-old daughter to stay in his house after foreclosure proceedings started.

She said he was convinced that Shelby’s occupation of the house would stall the proceedings, and he told her that she or other family members could buy the house from the bank at cost. “That’s not true,” she said.

The move did, however, give Shelby the opportunity to welcome into an adjacent living space the very people who would end her life, Charlene Barnes said.

Barnes also blamed her daughter’s death on Assembly Bill 109, California’s realignment program that removes some sentenced offenders from state prison and sends them to county jails or releases them on probation or parole.

While the law is intended to help California comply with a Supreme Court judgment against its overcrowded prisons, and supposedly doesn’t release violent criminals back into the state’s communities, Barnes said Shelby’s murder was directly related to AB 109.

She said Waldecker was released after serving part of his sentence for a robbery in which he held a knife to a man’s throat. She said he had been accused but not convicted of beating the mother of one of his children.

He had had a troubled childhood in Turlock and had been under juvenile authorities’ supervision until he was too old for that system, she said. When he was released from jail under AB 109, he was supposed to be living with his mother, Barnes said.

She said 25 days after Waldecker was let out of jail, “my daughter was dead.”

Later, Waldecker would post on social media sites the photographs of him and others engaged in various activities in the house where “my daughter’s body was decomposing,” Barnes said.

She said Shelby was introduced to Waldecker and Dees by Harriel, a mutual acquaintance who later become the third person arrested in the case, and who is due in court March 24 to face his own charge of manslaughter.

Harriel — who was 17 at the time of the Oct. 25, 2011 murder — and the other two were staying in the house’s “mother-in-law” apartment, which Charlene Barnes and Royer described as “huge.”

Shelby welcomed them and others to the extra accommodations because she felt they were down on their luck, Royer said.

“Shelby was sheltered, and very naive and trustworthy,” she said.

But Waldecker, presuming that house ownerships worked like acquiring pink slips for cars, thought he could gain the deed to the house if Shelby were out of the way, Charlene Barnes said.

“He’s illiterate,” she said. “He’s a sixth-generation Waldecker. His brother was released on parole. They don’t know how things work.”

“A 16-year-old girl told him that’s not how it works,” Royer said. “But he had it in his head.”

They said Waldecker’s plot may have been hatched when his then-girlfried, Dees, claimed she was pregnant with his child, though Charlene Barnes and Royer said the claim wasn’t true.

Nor was Shelby involved romantically with any of her murderers, they said.

Waldecker attempted to recruit others to join in the crime, some of them among those who also joined the trio at the Concord house’s spare accommodations, the women said.

Eventually, those involved were Waldecker, Dees and Harriel.

Helped by the latter two, Waldecker attacked Shelby, beating her until she became helpless, according to court testimony. Waldecker and Dees then taped Shelby’s mouth and body before wrapping her in a rug.

Charlene Barnes said accounts that indicated Shelby was carried down some stairs were inaccurate.

Instead, she said, her daughter was thrown down two flights of stairs.

The coroner’s report said Shelby died of blunt force trauma, and Barnes said the killing blows happened when Waldecker beat Shelby with a table leg.

She said by the time he cut her throat, the woman was already dead.

One of those who learned of the plot ahead of time, the 16-year-old, futilely sought adult help, Barnes and Royer said.

The girl wrote about the plan in her journal, then reported it to a teacher, Barnes said.

“The teacher failed to report it to Contra Costa (authorities),” she said. “The system failed.”

“She told her aunt,” Royer said. “She was reaching out.”

“She was trying to get help,” Barnes agreed.

“I wish everyone had done their jobs,” she said, saying she feels as if her current compilation of documents is “doing their work for them.”

She is particularly unhappy that District Attorney Mark Peterson didn’t press for a trial and the death penalty.

Instead, she said, he settled for a plea deal that prosecutor Jason Peck said came about after concerns that Waldecker’s confession might be challenged, and that testimony by one of three psychiatrists — the only one who didn’t believe Waldecker was sane at the time of the killing — might taint the case.

But Barnes said she believes the deal was made to save money.

She’s also unhappy with Waldecker’s parole officer, who “did not do her job.”

And she also blames her ex-husband for not insisting that Shelby move back home, live under her house rules and return to school.

Before moving to Concord, Shelby had been attending Sonoma State University in Rohnert Park, where she studied early child development.

Barnes said Shelby’s father has been mostly absent since Shelby was a year old, and drifted in and out of the woman’s life only from time to time.

After his marriage to Shelby’s mother ended, Brad Barnes married two more times, Charlene said; Shelby wrote him after his third marriage, saying she believed her wedding invitation had been lost in the mail.

The man had some interaction with his daughter after that, which led to her free use of his house while he was in Oregon, Barnes said.

However, she said, during a memorial of Shelby’s life the man and his current wife were at the top of the swim club where the service was taking place, shouting obscenities.

One of the other worries Barnes and Royer have is that Waldecker could be released on parole after serving only some of his sentence.

“I won’t be alive then,” Barnes said, so she is preparing documentation so it can be presented against his release.

While they also are looking at civil litigation options, they’re frustrated that they can’t sue those who settled with the two defendants.

They’re also sad that no one from the coroner’s office would let them see Shelby’s body, disagreeing with those who said they were shielding them from that sight and some of the evidence.

“I don’t need ‘protection,’” she said. She wanted to hold her daughter’s hand, perhaps have some locks of her hair, or a scrap of her clothing, “so I could have her scent.” Nor has she been given Shelby’s driver’s license.

“I’m still fighting with them,” Barnes said.

She and Royer have sought out the coroner’s report and court transcripts.

“I want to see all the videos of their interrogation,” Barnes said. “I want to create my testimony.” She wants that information available to her successors who will carry on that fight, “to empower them when he comes up for parole.”

She also hopes her work will help other victims, saying that the Contra Costa County victim advocacy is inadequate.

She spoke about Marsy’s Law, named for Marsy Nicholas, who was stalked and murdered by Kerry Conley while she attended the University of California-Santa Barbara.

The, law, also known as the 2008 California Victims’ Bill of Rights, amended the state constitution to add 17 victims’ rights during the judicial process.

Those rights range from protection from a defendant, notification of court proceedings and restitution, which Barnes said Waldecker is opposing.

“Marsy’s Law is being thrown by the wayside,” she said.

“We’re victims,” Royer said, saying through their own efforts, “we’re definitely the voice” not only for themselves, but for others who are victimized by criminals, either directly or indirectly through the loss of loved ones like Shelby.

“Things need to be changed,” Royer said.

“Unfortunately, my sister is the victim. I am not going to let her slide away.”

“Laws have to be changed,” Barnes said in agreement. “There is no fear, no respect,” for either the law or the judicial process.

She observed Waldecker slouching during his plea deal proceedings, and when Shelby’s survivors presented a slide show about the murdered woman’s life, “he treated it like a dance party,” Royer said.

In contrast, Dees wept and said she was sorry Shelby died, “and at least it showed some remorse,” Barnes said.

Barnes and Royer have been told repeatedly they’ve showed strength during the series of court proceedings.

They disagree.

“We’re not being strong,” Barnes said. “We don’t have a choice. Otherwise we’re letting the bad guys win.”

And their apparent strength doesn’t assuage their pain and loss.

“It’s debilitating,” Royer said. “You can physically feel a broken heart.”