Kristi Koslow

Courtroom footage is available for this story for license and/or purchase from the IN SESSION archives – click here.

Yours or Mine First?

Salter had admitted to Kristi thoughts of killing his parents, to solve his own teenage woes. She suggested they get rid of hers too, leaving the future free to live as they liked. No parents telling them to stay in school or be home by ten is any teenager's dream come true. These spiteful youths wanted more than a curfew extension. They wanted no parents — period, and were willing to go to extreme and appalling lengths to fulfill their naïve ambitions.

When the couple became engaged over Christmas holiday in 1991, Salter said during Kristi's trial that at that time her desire to live a life of luxury at a young age became more substantial and obsessive. She felt her parents "owed" her a bright future, brighter than what she was already being given, which by most standards, was already far beyond privileged.

Friends of the pair say Kristi was fortunate in many aspects. Attending the finest schools available, with money and popularity, Kristi had not a care in the world. What she did have, however, these same friends said, was a temper. Not an angry, furious temper, but more of a temper-tantrum-like attitude. She expected things to go her way. Nothing else was acceptable.

As Salter's parents worshipped at church on the night of the attacks, the pair of teen lovebirds took pistols from their house. The final plan, after speculating and strategizing, was to break into the house, disarm the alarm, knock the couple out and cut their throats.