Calista's dad testifies; defense rests

KALAMAZOO, Mich. (WOOD) -- The defense rested its case after Anthony Springer, testifying in his own defense, said he noticed his daughter Calista showed "strange behavior" even as a pre-schooler.

He and his wife, Marsha, are on trial in the murder, child abuse and torture of their 16-year-old daughter who died in a house fire as she was chained to her bed.

The prosecution chose not to cross-examine Springer.

Springer said Calista in her early life "seemed not to be able to comprehend basic numbers," had trouble walking and could not grasp how to use basic utensils such as spoons.

He also testifed that Calista had high levels of lead, enough to cause brain damage.

Springer testified he did his own research to learn about lead, how to treat it and testified in detail at what they did to try to prevent her from further household lead contamination.

Contradicting prosecution contentions that they treated Calista differently, Springer testified that Calista ate the same thing that he, Marsha and their other two daughters ate.

He said he served everyone at dinner and made their breakfasts as well. Marsha Springer is legally blind.

They never withheld food from Calista as a punishment, as the prosecution has argued, but would sometimes give her leftovers - instead of what others ate - if she stole or acted up.

Springer told the jury that Calista, even at age 16, still had not learned how to ride a bike and lacked eye-hand coordination to be able to do any sports. She would prefer to sit and do nothing rather than play outdoors.

Springer said Calista liked to read, do puzzles and watch TV and was learning basic sewing. But, he said, she destroyed 10 or 12 Barbie dolls.

In his sometimes tearful testimony Anthony Springer told the jury that when they tried to discipline Calista with time outs she "would slam her head as hard as she could into that corner." He said they then would have her sit on the floor as a time out where Marsha, with limited sight, could also see her.

Springer said he saw Calista do dangerous things. At one time in 1999, he said, he woke up one night and saw her standing at the foot of the bed holding a knife. At other times, he saw her drinking from a bird bath in the yard, heard his other girls screaming and ran to find Calista beating his coon hound with a 4' branch. He also related the time she swung a cat around by the tail. The cat died later that day.

Calista, he said, would eat rotten food from the garbage. Springer testified that at times Calista would pinch the back of her hand, pick her nose until it bled and pull the hair off her arms.

Anthony Springer said that when Calista got angry "she could be very dangerous." He related an incident when she slammed her head into a wall and kicked and clawed him when he tried to pull her away.

Springer testified they decided they had to restrain her first when she was around 5. He says they put guards on the window screen and a hook on the door.

Eventually, he said, they used two door alarms to keep Calista in her room at night. Then they used a bed alarm to try to keep Calista in it, but she defeated a series of attempts to make it work, he said.

He tried to find something she couldn't cut. One day in his garage, he concluded he would switch to a "dog choke collar" because it was smooth and safe.

Springer said Calista slept chained to the bed only two or three nights while he was figuring how to use the alarm succesfully again. But then the house burned and Calista suffocated chained to her bed.

The prosecutor alleges the Springers removed Calista from public schools and from society after the 6th grade because people were questioning their care of her after she told classmates and school workers she was being chained at night.

But Anthony Springer said the reason they took her out of school was "that the school was much more interested in her education than her behavioral issues and I felt that she could not operate in a society without learning how to have the correct behavioral modifications. She was never going to be a rocket scientist."

Springer said he would have been happy if Calista as an adult could be in an assisted living facility and have some kind of job.

He said he was balancing the risk between what would happen if Calista hurt herself during the night and what could happen if she were chained. He said the greater likelihood was Calista would hurt herself or someone else if she wasn't restrained.

The defense is trying to prove that the Springers were only trying to keep her safe when they chained her to her bed at night and that the chaining had been going on only a couple of days before she died.

Prosecution witnesses, however, have testified that Calista had been chained for years to her bed.