A YouTube channel with nearly 90,000 subscribers apologized to the family of Gannon Stauch, the 11-year-old boy who was murdered by his stepmother, Letecia Stauch, in January 2020, for trying to sell the boy’s autopsy photos online. 

Outrage ensued last week when it was discovered that the channel, appearing to be run in part by an Ohio woman named Tiffany Zavarelli, was selling access to a video that displayed autopsy pictures of Gannon Stauch for $3 through their Patreon account. 

In May, Letecia Stauch was found guilty of first-degree murder and other charges after a trial that lasted more than six weeks for killing her stepson, despite claims of insanity from her and her attorneys.

Evidence in the trial showed that Letecia Stauch killed Gannon Stauch in January 2020 and disposed of his body by storing it in a suitcase and throwing it over a bridge in northern Florida. 

The autopsy pictures that the YouTube channel acquired come from the period after Gannon Stauch’s body was recovered, more than a month after he was killed. 

After defending her actions over the course of the past several days, the YouTuber posted a three-minute apology video where she claims she never intended to hurt anyone by providing access to the photos, and that her Patreon account has been shut down. 

“I want to apologize to everyone I hurt, but especially Gannon’s family,” the woman appearing to be Zavarelli said in her apology video uploaded to YouTube yesterday. 

A Patreon spokesperson told the New York Post that the YouTuber’s Patreon account was taken down “for violations of our Community Guidelines for Violent and Graphic Content. To create a safe environment for users, Patreon does not allow content glorifying or promoting violence of any kind.”

The apology video has not been received kindly by most in the online community. 

“You defended your actions over and over, blamed everyone but yourself; Patreon shut you down because you didn’t take it down. What you did is unforgivable,” one commenter wrote on the YouTuber’s community page. 

“That wasn’t an apology. That was straight up deflecting and hiding. Someone else supposedly doing it doesn’t make it right for you to jump on that bandwagon, also,” another commenter wrote. 

Questions have been asked since the incident regarding how the YouTube account acquired the autopsy photos of Gannon Stauch. In the video, the YouTuber states she acquired the photos through a records request “in El Paso County, Colorado,” for all records in the trial of Letecia Stauch, and that she didn’t request the autopsy photos specifically. 

Fourth Judicial District Attorney spokesperson Howard Black issued a statement to media on Friday afternoon, claiming that the autopsy pictures of Gannon Stauch were not released by the 4th District Attorney’s Office, the El Paso County Sheriff’s Office or the El Paso County Coroner’s Office.

“It appears, and I am not confirming, that the pictures were released through the Colorado Courts,” Black wrote in the statement. 

Spokesperson for the Colorado Judicial Department Robert McCallum confirmed to The Gazette that the photo was released through the Colorado Judicial Department, but that the department was legally required to do so due to no motion for suppression being filed by the attorneys in the case. 

“The exhibits in the case file entered by the parties at trial, or throughout proceedings, are public records open for inspection,” McCallum wrote in a statement to The Gazette. “There was no Crim. P. 55.1 motion (suppression) filed in this case. The charges in this case did not fit the criteria for §24-72-304(4.5). Thus, the records were released by the Judicial Department.”

Colorado Statute §24-72-304(4.5) primarily states that records identifying a child who was the victim or alleged victim of sexual exploitation crimes — such as pimping, human trafficking or child prostitution — won’t be released as part of open records requests. First-degree murder is not one of the offenses listed in the statute.

Black confirmed in his statement that there is no criminal investigation underway regarding the displaying of Gannon Stauch’s autopsy photos online. 

Zavarelli did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Gazette. 

Letecia Stauch was sentenced to life in prison, and is  serving in a women’s correctional facility in Denver. 

Letecia Stauch found guilty of all charges, sentenced to life in prison