Kristen Courtney Salem was two years old when she was murdered in 1999 by her father, Shawn Ryan Grell, who doused her with gasoline and set her on fire in a remote area in Apache Junction, Arizona.

On December 2, 1999, after purchasing beer at the store, Grell picked up his daughter from preschool. For unknown reasons, he signed his girlfriend’s name, Amber Salem, who is also the mother of Kristen Salem. He then made a quick stop to get burgers before taking Kristen to see Christmas lights in Mesa, Arizona, but when she got cranky, he became irate and struck her in the mouth, causing her lip to bleed, according to Justia US Law.

Afterward, Shawn Grell drove to a department store and bought a gas can. He filled it with gasoline at a nearby gas station before driving to a deserted area in Apache Junction, where he drove around for 45 minutes while Kristen was asleep.

When he encountered a drainage ditch, about 15 feet from the roadway, Grell stopped and exited his vehicle before removing his daughter from the car and putting her in the ditch. He then poured gasoline on her, which caused Kristen to wake up from her sleep. She pleaded with her father to stop by saying, “No, daddy, no,” but Grell ignored her pleas. He lit a match and hurled it in her direction, setting Kristen Salem ablaze.

While engulfed in flames, Kristen took a few steps before falling face down in the dirt. That’s when Grell fled the scene, but he later returned to see if she was dead — and she was.

Grell then drove back to the convenience store where he purchased the beer and bought more. He told the clerk that he saw a group of kids setting a dog on fire at a nearby desert. He said, “I can’t believe that kids would set a dog on fire; this is what the world is coming to when kids set dogs on fire.”

The following day, Shawn Grell walked into the police station and confessed to murdering Kristen. He said, “I really did this, I killed my daughter, but no one believes me.” Officers who were dispatched to the area found Kristen Salem’s body in the ditch, along with her footprints in the dirt.

Kristen suffered excruciating pain as she sustained third- and fourth-degree burns over 98 percent of her body — the bottoms of Kristen’s feet were not burned. An autopsy confirmed that Kristen Salem died as a result of the burns and smoke inhalation.

Following a short bench trial in July 2001, Shawn Grell was found guilty of murdering Kristen Salem, and he was later sentenced to death. Grell told the court that he accepts the death penalty. He went on to apologize to Kristen’s family for intentionally killing his daughter. He said, “I’m extremely sorry for what I did to my daughter. There is not a day that’s gone by where I haven’t thought about it. I wish I could take back what I did.”

However, Grell’s defense attorneys claimed that he shouldn’t be executed because he suffers from “severe brain dysfunction.” According to ABC 15, when he was a child, and because of his disabilities, he was “placed in a group home for mentally changed children for five years.”

A judge overturned Shawn Grell’s death sentence in 2013, reducing it to life in prison after determining he is mentally disabled and cannot be put to death. The East Valley Tribune reported that “the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that it would be constitutionally prohibited cruel and unusual punishment to execute someone with mental retardation.”

In May 2013, Kristen’s mother passed away in her sleep. She is now buried next to her daughter at the Greenwood Memory Lawn Cemetery in Phoenix, Arizona.