Reporter’s Notebook: Statement of Allen Nicklasson
Allen Nicklasson, the other half of the Good Samaritan Killers, was troubled from an early age. Dennis Skillicorn‘s lawyer, Jenny Merrigan, describes him as “fascinating,” and “truly mentally ill.”
Merrigan told me that at age four, he stabbed a man he saw raping his mother, who worked as a prostitute and kept Nicklasson in a closet while meeting johns. At age nine, he attacked his stepfather, who pressed charges. Nicklasson moved from juvenile incarceration to regular prison, and at his last parole hearing, he begged the board not to let him out. The prison shrink seconded this, but he was granted parole anyway, and it was soon after that he met Skillicorn at the Salvation Army in Kansas City.
Nicklasson can’t function in society, he told Merrigan when he met with her at Potosi. She asked him to write a statement to be included in Skillicorn’s clemency petition. Nicklasson’s statement follows:
