A 51-year-old Georgia man will spend the rest of his life in prison after being convicted of felony murder, rape, child molestation, and incest in connection with the 2022 death of his 10-year-old daughter.
The conviction of William McCue stems from a house fire on April 17, 2022. According to prosecutors’ opening statements, McCue’s 15-year-old son intentionally set the fire to escape his parents. The teenager walked six miles to a church to ask for help, later telling investigators that his parents beat the children, forced them to wear shock collars, and made them stand on milk crates for hours.
While the boy was initially charged with murder, authorities realized something was wrong when they discovered he could not spell his own name and did not know how to use a toilet.
William McCue was working a shift at Waffle House when the fire occurred. His wife, 42-year-old Carina McCue, fled the home with two other sons, ages 8 and 12. Inside, emergency responders found the body of 10-year-old Zowey McCue in a locked bathroom. Her bed was a piece of plywood fitted over a bathtub. She died of smoke inhalation.
Investigators later detailed the living conditions inside the home, noting there was no working plumbing. The children had to use buckets that were emptied only once or twice a week. The children were also not enrolled in school and were not being homeschooled by their parents. Medical examinations at a hospital after the fire revealed physical signs of abuse on all the surviving children, including a human bite mark on one child’s inner thigh and belt lacerations on another’s back.
According to a press release from the district attorney’s office, “Evidence showed that the children flourished once they were away from their parents, although they were developmentally and educationally years behind their respective ages.”
Following the fire and Zowey’s death, William and Carina McCue vanished after a warrant was issued for their arrest. Law enforcement searched for the couple for several months before locating them on June 29, 2022, living along the Appalachian Trail, where they were taken into custody.
Carina McCue ultimately testified against her husband as part of a deal with the prosecution. She told the court that William McCue admitted he had raped their oldest daughter and had sexually assaulted both the older and younger daughters since they were small children. She pleaded guilty to three counts of cruelty to children, aggravated assault, and false imprisonment, receiving a 90-year prison sentence.
On June 11, a jury found William McCue guilty on all charges. He was sentenced to three consecutive life terms without the possibility of parole, an additional life sentence, and an extra 120 years.
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