Motive unclear in Laytonville slayings

Three days after the horrific slayings of two members of a respected and well-liked family, allegedly at the hands of a troubled young man they had taken in and treated like one of their own, their friends and neighbors in Laytonville continued to struggle to find a motive for the killings.

“He hasn’t clearly indicated why” he attacked the family, Mendocino County Sheriff’s Lt. Shannon Barney said Wednesday of Talen Clark Barton, 19.

Barton has been charged with murder and attempted murder for the killing of his friend, Teo Palmieri, 17, and his friend’s father, Coleman Palmieri, 52, who were stabbed multiple times with a 12-inch kitchen knife just after midnight on Sunday. Palmieri’s wife, Cindy Norvell, 54, a Laytonville physician, and her brother, Theodore Norvell, 52, a professor of computer engineering at Memorial University of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, suffered multiple knife wounds but survived. They remain hospitalized.

Barton also is charged with imprisoning two teenage girls, Cindy Norvell’s daughter, 14, and niece, 15.

Residents of the small town of about 1,100 largely knew Barton had a troubled past. He reportedly was raised until the age of 7 by a drug-addicted mother in an abusive household. At the age of 17, he was arrested on suspicion of trying to hit his foster mother with a weight.

He has been described as an intelligent teen who could be charming but who also had a dark side.

But area residents have a hard time believing he would do something so horrendous without some reason, like hard drug use.

Barton has said only that he smoked marijuana heavily, including on the night of the stabbings, Barney said.

Toxicology reports on blood samples taken from Barton are not completed and may not be made public any time soon because they will be part of the ?evidence at trial, Barney said.

Most people don’t believe marijuana could trigger violent behavior. Barney said the jury is still out. He said there have been insufficient studies conducted on the effects of heavy, prolonged marijuana use on youths’ brains.

Lack of a reasonable explanation for the attack on such good, well-meaning people makes coping with the tragedies more difficult, residents of Laytonville said.

“It doesn’t make sense to anybody,” said Cindy Lassotovitch, a friend and neighbor of the family.

“They were just hardworking, good people who took in a kid who needed a place to be,” she said. The couple were practicing Quakers who believed in nonviolence and the importance of family and community, Lassotovitch said.

“They believed in helping people,” she said.

Coleman Palmieri was always ready to help out a neighbor, whether it be with his electrical skills or loaning his truck, Lassotovitch said. He also taught juggling workshops.

Norvell had always wanted to be a rural physician and to raise her children in the country, Lassotovitch said. Her father, who died in February, was a physician and surgeon in Canada, according to his obituary.

Lassotovitch said Barton was intelligent and always polite to her. But she was aware also of his alleged assault on his former foster mother.

Norvell and Palmieri also knew about Barton’s past, but it didn’t stop them from helping, at the behest of their son.

“They didn’t see that side of him. Talen was very charming, very sweet when he wanted to be,” Lassotovitch said.

You can reach Staff Writer Glenda Anderson at 462-6473 or glenda.anderson@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MendoReporter.