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  She couldn’t help but feel sorry for the man, although she viewed him with some trepidation. His record spoke for itself and admittedly it had been years since he had held a meaningful relationship with his son, at least a relationship that allowed him to participate in Josh’s day-today activities. Yet, he appeared honestly to want to raise his child and expressed willingness to take the necessary steps in order for him to do so.

  She told Gouker that she was impressed with his sincerity and that, while it would require a lot of work on his part, they could develop a case plan to work toward reuniting Gouker with Little Josh.

  “Thank you, thank you,” Gouker gushed, clenching his lips together and allowing a single tear to roll down his cheek. “Whatever it takes.”

  The system is geared toward reunification of children with their biological parents except in the most egregious of circumstances. If a parent adequately works his or her case plan and shows the court that regaining custody is in the best interest of the child, the child is often returned to the custody of that parent. Gouker would have to prove that he was serious and not a danger to his son before he could attain custody of Little Josh.

  When he went to prison, Gouker and Amanda McFarland were still married, although they had been living apart for some time. During his years of incarceration, he sent Amanda a “self-help” divorce packet that he completed in prison. When she received those documents in September 2004, Amanda immediately signed them and sent them back to Gouker at the prison. By that point she had moved on with her life; Gouker was just a distant memory. She believed she was divorced. Amanda even remarried in the years that Gouker was incarcerated, unaware of the fact that she and the convict were still legally married. Gouker, on the other hand, had never filed the paperwork with the court and, unbeknownst to Amanda, he ensured that the two remained legally married.

  It was the perfect reason for him to reach out to her once he was released from custody. He knew Amanda worked at a fast-food restaurant, the same place of employment she had during their marriage, and he placed a call to her at work. He asked to speak with her and within minutes she was on the line. It would be an uphill climb, he was sure, but Gouker usually got what he wanted.1

  He hadn’t been a good husband, but Amanda was a good woman. He knew she owned her own home. If he could get back with her, that steady relationship would definitely go a long way toward convincing Child Protective Services he was reliable and help him regain custody of Joshua. She worked; she had a regular paycheck.

  Amanda hadn’t seen or heard from Gouker in years, one of the last occasions being when he assaulted her at the motel before they finally split up.

  Gouker told her that he had just gotten out of jail and that their divorce had never been finalized, so they should meet to talk about it. Amanda told him that she would be off work the following day if he wanted to meet then. He agreed.

  Early the next day, Gouker and Amanda went to the Jefferson County Judicial Center together. Records confirmed that they were still legally married. The revelation shocked Amanda. They decided to stop at a restaurant to grab lunch and discuss their next steps. At some point during that conversation, a shift in Amanda’s thinking occurred and it appeared that the couple might attempt to make their marriage work.

  As they enjoyed their impromptu lunch, Gouker apologized to Amanda for the pain that he caused her prior to his stint in prison and promised her that things would be different this time. He once again used his acting abilities and as they chatted in their booth, his eyes welled with tears, reminiscent of the performance he gave at the Cabinet for Health and Family Services. It must have worked, because she let Gouker back into her life.

  He started sleeping over at Amanda’s home within weeks of his release and everything seemed to be going well.2 During that time, the dependency, neglect and abuse case was winding its way through the court system. This was the case that initially vested the Cabinet with custody of Joshua after his mother’s death. Gouker and Little Josh never really had the opportunity to develop a true father-and-son bond. The court began to foster contact between the two by allowing supervised visits beginning on October 28, 2010, not long after Gouker’s initial release from prison. Gouker was ordered to cooperate with Child Protective Services and to attend counseling. Amanda watched as he did both. He seemed sincere to her and the Child Protective Services workers and the courts seemed to buy the act as well.

  By Christmas of 2010, Josh Young was allowed an unsupervised visit at Amanda’s home after his social worker visited the house and deemed it appropriate. Little Josh seemed interested in seeing his father. He was curious about the man who was biologically tied to him but was a virtual stranger. Gouker was extremely nice to him at first and Joshua watched as Gouker charmed everyone around him. He wasn’t really aware of his father’s violent tendencies at the time and it felt good to know somebody wanted him to be a part of their family. His father was pulling out all the stops to have a relationship with him. That had to mean that his father loved him, right?3

  Little Josh’s reintegration into his father’s life occurred when the boy was already in a fragile state. Not only had he lost his own mother less than a year prior to his father’s release from prison, but he was the person who found his beloved mom deceased in their home. The vision of that horrible Easter morning continued to haunt the teen. Little Josh was no stranger to change, but his mom had always come back after their time apart. Her death was final. He would never see his mother again and he grieved intensely for her.

  Josh’s traumatic childhood caused him to appear distant sometimes. He didn’t allow himself to get too comfortable anywhere. He knew that in an instant, anything could be taken away without warning. He was a kind and caring child, but his hard-knock past had taught him that getting emotional didn’t solve anything and he was increasingly introverted with his emotions. He was actually sensitive and became emotional about things but, as a defense mechanism, he did so privately.

  He didn’t know exactly what to think about his father and the time he spent at Amanda’s home, but he felt wanted. For a child, it felt good that someone was willing to fight for him. Josh decided to give the visitations with his father a chance and, for a time, everything appeared to be going well.

  Amanda was nice to him too during the transition and he enjoyed spending time with Trey. Trey and Josh both loved video games and basketball and they hung around with the same circle of friends. They’d known each other since childhood and it was fun getting to reconnect. As he settled in that Christmas Eve for a short unsupervised visit, perhaps Josh thought things were going to work out well for him. Maybe he thought he’d finally found a family in Amanda’s cozy little house.4

  Amanda had worked really hard for her home and had purchased it herself. It wasn’t huge or impressive, but it was hers. It must have felt wonderful to have her own little piece of property in the neighborhood that she had frequented since childhood.

  The little beige house sat back a bit from the road. The home was a fixer-upper when she purchased it and there were a few things she had never gotten around to fixing. The front door could not be opened from the outside, only from the inside, so they tried not to use it. Most of the traffic came in and out through the back door.

  The largest bedroom was on the first floor near the front door and Amanda used that bedroom for herself. There was one bathroom downstairs that everyone used. She had a small kitchen and a living area in addition to a guest bedroom on the first floor. She used that room to store her workout equipment, although Gouker told Child Protective Services that the room would belong to Little Josh once he regained custody. Both her children had bedrooms upstairs, but it wasn’t uncommon for Trey to sleep in his sister’s room on the floor if she was scared of the dark.

  It was a tight squeeze but they all fit. Even with Gouker’s entry into the home, the walls hadn’t yet begun to close in that Christmas Eve. Little Josh and Trey laughed and joked as they spent hours in fron
t of the TV playing video games after opening their presents. The visit was a success. It was the first of many unsupervised visits that Josh and his father would have over the next few months. When a visit was scheduled, Gouker would find a ride to the Walsh household to pick up Little Josh and he would then bring him back to Amanda’s house. He encouraged Little Josh to reintegrate himself into the neighborhood. Gouker’s main focus, however, seemed to be spending his time with Amanda and convincing her that he had changed for the better since the early days of their marriage.

  Gouker’s favorite female cousin from his childhood, Cassi, with whom it’s rumored he may have had a sexual relationship, moved to the neighborhood. Amanda suspected that Gouker was cheating on her, possibly with his cousin, and she confronted Gouker. He threatened Amanda and she locked herself away in her room.5 Amanda was worried, because she had recently learned she was pregnant. How could she bring another child into this mess? Thank goodness her children weren’t home to witness her confrontation with Gouker. She knew that she couldn’t have this baby. She had to break free from Gouker and if they had a child together, that would never happen. He would never willingly relinquish that control. She saw the way he was with his own son. As far as Gouker was concerned, Little Josh was an extension of him, his property. There was no way he would ever leave her alone if they were tied together by a baby.

  An abortion seemed to be the only way out of the situation.

  Only a few weeks later, in mid-January, Amanda underwent the abortion.6 As she had anticipated, Gouker was not happy when he heard the news several weeks later. In the aftermath of the abortion, Amanda attempted to move on with her life without Joshua Gouker. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t get him out of her life. He still attempted to contact her and he still dropped by from time to time. He wouldn’t let her go.

  As 2011 crept into spring, Amanda was in a tug of war with Gouker. The relationship continued to be “off and on.” He found ways to weasel his way back into her life and her home. Then another incident of violence would occur and Amanda desperately tried to get away and leave him once and for all. But he could be exceedingly charming when he wanted and she felt herself repeatedly slipping back into his grasp. It was hard to break the cycle that had begun almost twenty years prior when they were just children.7

  It was easier to avoid Gouker when the kids were home. Both kids had the same visitation schedule, so every other week they would be with her. During these times, it was easier for her to put Gouker out of her mind and stay busy. But on the weeks when the kids were with their dads, she felt more vulnerable and was probably an easier target for Gouker. Eventually, her daughter’s father was sent to prison and, as a result, her daughter began staying with Amanda most days. Even then, Gouker found reasons to call or stop by when the kids were at school or with friends or relatives and by the time the kids came home, he was back in the household.8

  He usually seemed to be on good behavior when the children were there. Gouker appeared to be aware that neither of their fathers had any patience for Gouker’s antics and both kids were close to their dads. Gouker seemed to understand that if he ever mistreated the kids or went too far with Amanda in their presence, the kids would report back to their fathers or their fathers’ families, neither of which would hesitate to involve Child Protective Services.

  Trey did not confide in his father about the state of affairs at his mother’s home. There was still a “no contact” order in effect from Terry and Amanda’s previous custody battle that precluded contact between Trey and Gouker. Terry Zwicker had always felt that Gouker was a danger to everyone around him and did not want his son anywhere near him. He knew Amanda and Gouker were seeing each other again, but he was not aware Gouker was residing in the home. Trey didn’t tell Terry, probably because he did not want to get his mom into trouble.

  Instead, Trey began asking his father if he could go to his mom’s after school, even on the days that fell on his father’s week of visitation. He framed the request as an excuse that he needed to get his sister off of the school bus and babysit her until his mother arrived home from work. In reality, he likely wanted to ensure that his sister was okay and wanted to act as a buffer between her and Gouker. Trey was a protective big brother and he could likely sense the tension in the home that spring. He did not want the dysfunction in the home to affect his sister.

  Another reason Trey likely spent more time at his mother’s home in the spring of 2011 is that he used some of his wages from his fast-food job to buy a black mixed-breed puppy and the puppy stayed at his mother’s house. From the start, the cute little dog wreaked havoc on Amanda’s home and Gouker was not a fan. A condition of Trey acquiring the puppy was that he was supposed to train the dog and clean up after it.

  From the start, the puppy had trouble with training and it was not uncommon for Amanda to come home and find urine and feces in her’s or the kids’ beds. Trey loved the puppy, but Trey was not there all the time to take care of it, so after he had the puppy for a month, Amanda made the decision that the dog could no longer stay at her home.

  She informed Trey that the puppy was ruining her carpet and tearing apart the house, but that if he wanted to keep it, his grandma was okay with the puppy staying there. She made Trey responsible for delivering the puppy to its new home, but as the days stretched on, he did not make time to do so. That’s why Amanda was so relieved when she came home from a long day of work and realized the dog was no longer there.

  Breathing a sigh of relief, she searched the house just to make sure. She was happy that Trey had finally done what he said he would.

  Amanda changed out of her work clothes into more comfortable attire and had headed into the kitchen to start planning dinner when Trey entered the house. Amanda knew her son and she could tell from his demeanor that something was troubling him. She asked him what was wrong and commended him for taking the puppy to his grandmother’s.

  Trey told her that he hadn’t taken the dog to his grandmother’s house; Gouker had killed it instead.

  Amanda asked what Trey meant.

  Trey told her how Gouker had described taking the dog into the backyard and killing it with a baseball bat. It was a sickening feeling. Amanda loved animals and was shocked that Gouker could do such a thing. She didn’t want to believe it. She reached out to Trey, enveloping him in a hug and became determined to get to the bottom of the situation. Could Trey be mistaken?

  Amanda told Trey to go upstairs and then stalked out the back of the house, her eyes immediately falling on Gouker. She asked him if he’d killed the dog.

  Gouker shrugged very nonchalantly and looked in her eyes, saying that the dog was a menace that went to the bathroom on everything. He said he’d done them a favor. He also offered a bag of marijuana he had in the house as reparation.

  He turned around and walked away. Amanda’s heart ached for Trey. She didn’t understand how Gouker could be so cruel. Not only did he cause suffering to the puppy but he rubbed the incident in Trey’s face.9

  Gouker also killed a cat that had belonged to Amanda’s daughter. Months earlier, Amanda’s mother had taken a trip to Tennessee with her sister. While they were there, they discovered a box of abandoned kittens that someone had discarded. She brought the kittens back to Kentucky to find them good homes and she gave one to Amanda’s daughter. Amanda allowed her to adopt the little yellow stray cat that she called DJ. It often lurked around her backyard and the kids would leave food out for it. After that, DJ the cat stopped by the house on a regular basis for milk and snacks. He was an outdoor cat, so he came and went from the yard as he pleased, but he was a constant fixture at their home.

  Sometime in the Spring, Amanda realized that she had not seen the cat in quite a while. She later learned that Gouker bragged that the cat annoyed him, so he took it to the second story of the garage and dropped it to the concrete, killing it. He excised one of the cat’s eyeballs and placed it on a stick, chasing around a neighborhood boy, hissing, “I’ve g
ot my eye on you,” as he laughed.10

  Once again, Gouker demonstrated sociopathic tendencies in his enjoyment of bringing pain to animals and his inability to empathize with the emotional toll his behavior took on those around him. During this time, he and Amanda once again put an end to their relationship, but later in the Spring of 2011, Gouker and Amanda were “on” again. The drama and abuse resumed. Amanda continued to allow Gouker to stay in her home.

  During that spring, Amanda was involved in a car accident that totaled her vehicle and left her without transportation to work. Her mother allowed her to use her car to travel to and from work. Eventually, the battery in the car went dead and it wouldn’t start.

  Gouker’s cousin Cassi allowed Amanda to take the battery from her car and place it in Amanda’s mother’s vehicle so that she could get to work. When she arrived home one evening, Gouker was waiting. Amanda and her daughter were in the car and she rolled down the window as he swiftly approached. Josh asked to use the car, but Amanda refused, reminding him that it was her mother’s car.

  Her mother carried the insurance on the vehicle and she was not comfortable with allowing Gouker to take the car anywhere, especially on his own. Her mom was not a fan of Gouker and Amanda knew her mom might withhold the car if she found out Amanda had allowed Gouker to drive it. It was stress that Amanda did not need. The last thing she wanted to deal with that day was an inebriated Gouker. When he drank liquor, which was almost an everyday occurrence, he got meaner. It had been a long day and she did not feel like fooling with him that evening. As she and her daughter sat in the parked vehicle, Gouker grabbed a long iron rod and began tapping on the car, lightly at first and then with more and more force as he looked through the window and directly into Amanda’s eyes.11