Stepmother of murdered Gannon Staunh suffered 'psychotic crack' when she 'stabbed him 18 times, shot him in the head and dumped his body in a suitcase' because she was 'unhappy in her marriage'

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A Colorado woman was on trial on Monday accused of murdering her 11-year-old stepson in January 2020, then driving to Florida with his body to dump it over a bridge.

Letecia Stauch has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, and her attorney told the jury in Colorado Springs that she suffered a 'psychotic crack' that caused her to kill the little boy. Her legal team point to a traumatic childhood with years of sexual and mental abuse.

Prosecutors argue that she was unhappy in her marriage and resentful of being treated like an unpaid babysitter. Her husband was away at the time of his son Gannon's murder, on deployment with the National Guard.

Stauch was arrested in March 2020, in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and extradited back to Colorado.

Stauch is seen in court in Colorado in March 2020

Gannon Stauch's stepmother Letecia is on trial for his January 2020 murder

Stauch is pictured with her husband Eugene - the father of Gannon. He was away on deployment with the National Guard at the time of Gannon's murder

The trial is expected to last several weeks. 

Michael Allen, the district attorney, argued in his opening statement that the steps that Stauch took to cover up her actions are proof that she knew what she did was wrong - and was therefore sane. 

She cleaned up blood in Gannon's bedroom, moving his body to various locations to hide it before disposing of it 'like garbage' in a river that flows into the Gulf of Mexico in hopes it would never be found, he said.

Stauch also lied to investigators various times to try to hamper their investigation, Allen said, changing her accounts of what happened to the little boy. 

She claimed two different men had raped her and then abducted Gannon and, later, that one of those men had taken Gannon after he hurt himself in a bike crash.

'All of her actions were purposefully designed by her to distance herself from what she did,' Allen said.

But defense attorney Will Cook said the gruesome details highlighted by Allen, including how Gannon was killed and the lack of a motive, are proof that Stauch was 'insane' because it all does not make sense.

'These are all signs and evidence of a mind, a soul, that is broken in a most fundamental and profound way,' he said.

Cook suggested Stauch developed dissociative identify disorder as a result of being physically, emotionally and sexually abused by her absent mother's string of partners during her childhood, sometimes sleeping in a car in the driveway to escape the abuse. 

Cook said that when Stauch killed Gannon, in her mind she was killing the 'demons' from her childhood and life.

Based on surveys given to potential jurors, many were skeptical of Stauch's mental health defense, Cook said. 

He urged jurors to put aside their impulse to make someone pay for such a brutal killing and keep an open mind because the judicial system requires Stauch to be presumed innocent.

'I'm not telling you to like it. I'm just telling you that's the way it is,' he said.

Letecia Stauch is seen in her March 2020 booking photo in Colorado

Gannon (pictured) disappeared in Colorado Springs in January 2020. His body was found on March 20, 2020 - 1,400 miles away in Florida

The suspected killer (pictured after her arrest in South Carolina in March 2020) was extradited to Colorado

Stauch is accused of hitting Gannon with a blunt object, stabbing and shooting him before dumping his body in a suitcase 

Initially, authorities said they responded after Stauch said Gannon had not returned from playing with a friend. 

But she did not provide the names of any friends he may have been with or their parents. 

Within days, she concocted a variety of stories to mislead them, including that a man she hired to repair a carpet raped her and then abducted Gannon, according to investigators.

Over 200 volunteers conducted searches for the boy in the area around where the family lived near Colorado Springs. 

About two weeks after Gannon disappeared, searchers found a piece of particle board with Gannon's blood on it in a rural area nearby.  

An investigator in Colorado, Kevin Clark, then told the court that phone records and internet search information showed Stauch searching online for cheap car rentals the morning she reported her stepson missing. 

She then collected a rental car, which was used to transport the body.

Investigators found Gannon's blood on Stauch's shoe, found her DNA on a gun linked to his death and learned that she traveled to the Florida Panhandle shortly after he disappeared, prosecutors have said. 

Gannon's remains were found in March 2020 in the small city of Pace, on the Florida Panhandle.

Stauch was charged with first-degree murder, tampering with a deceased human body and tampering with physical evidence.

Stauch was also accused of trying to escape from jail after her arrest. 

According to court documents, she asked a fellow inmate to help her get out, explaining that she planned to use a broom handle to break the window in her cell, and that she had already measured herself to make sure she could fit through.

Stauch was ruled fit to stand trial on January 27, 2021.  

She had wanted to represent herself, before receiving new counsel.