The Seventh Sense

Eating The Evidence

Yup, the guy was a suspected bank robber, and he ate the stick-up note (police say).  The tape shows it all.  Story here.

New Laws Which Take Effect Today In NC

Let's take a quick look at some of the new laws which take effect today in North Carolina.

The big one is, of course, no texting while driving.  Now, don't think you can be cute about this.  But no, it applies to emailing, too.  In fact it applies to any time you "manually enter multiple letters or text in the device as a means of communicating with another person" while driving.  You can do it while parking, though.  Exceptions are carved out for GPS devices.  And you can still use voice activation.

Kids are being protected better, as of today.  There is a criminal law on the books, as of today, for cyberbullying a minor, or using a minor to cyberbully a parent.  School buses have better protection: a new law allows for cameras on school buses to get at drivers who don't stop -- the penalty for failure to stop and killing a kid is increased as well.  Sex offenders cannot drive school buses anymore (this was a problem?).  And solicitation of a minor by computer now extends to mobile devices.

Other stuff:

• New rules regarding preservation of DNA evidence that is used to convict criminals
• It is illegal to "target picket" a single residence in a manner that would cause severe emotional stress to the occupant.
• School board members are now held to the same standard as police, sheriffs, court clerks, etc. when it comes to failure to discharge their duties
• Certain glass tubes which can serve as crack vials are now regulated.
• Stonger penalities against deadbeat dads who defy court orders to pay child support.
• Stronger penalities for removing or altering serial numbers on guns.
• With some exceptions, it is now illegal to own a venomous snake, crocodile, or a boa constrictor (or other "restricting snakes").

And my personal favorite:

AN ACT to create the offense of LARCENY, DESTRUCTION, DEFACEMENT, OR VANDALISM OF PORTABLE TOILETS OR PUMPER TRUCKS.

SECTION 1.  Article 16 of Chapter 14 of the General Statutes is amended by adding a new section to read:

"§ 14‑86.2.  Larceny, destruction, defacement, or vandalism of portable toilets or pumper trucks.

Unless the conduct is covered under some other provision of law providing greater punishment, if any person steals, takes from its temporary location or from any person having the lawful custody thereof, or willfully destroys, defaces, or vandalizes a chemical or portable toilet as defined in G.S. 130A‑290 or a pumper truck that is operated by a septage management firm that is permitted by the Department of Environment and Natural Resources under G.S. 130A‑291.1, the person is guilty of a Class 1 misdemeanor."

SECTION 2.  This act becomes effective December 1, 2009, and applies to offenses committed on or after that date.

In the General Assembly read three times and ratified this the 21^st day of May, 2009.

Bad News For Huckabee 2012 Campaign

That shooter (still on the loose) who shot and killed four cops in Tacoma?  The suspect's name is Maurice Clemmons and:

Nine years ago in Arkansas, The Seattle Times reported, Mr. Clemmons was released from prison after Gov. Mike Huckabee commuted his lengthy prison sentence, over the protests of prosecutors. Late Sunday night, Mr. Huckabee’s political action committee released a statement saying that “a series of failures in the criminal justice system in both Arkansas and Washington State” would be to blame if Mr. Clemmons were found responsible for the shootings.

Not good for the "tough on crime" crowd.

Then again, Huckabee has been in this spot before....

Census Worker Death Ruled A Suicide

Kentucky state police have ruled that Bill Sparkman, the census worker found dead with a rope around his neck and "fed" scrawled on his chest, was a suicide. Sparkman apparently made his suicide look like a murder in the hopes that his son would get a pay out from his insurance policies.

Fort Hood Shooting

I guess everyone will have their own theories about why Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan opened fire at Fort Hood, killing 13, and wounding dozens.

How much of it had to do with the fact that he was a Muslim?

How much of it had to do with the fact that he was taunted as a Muslim?

How much of it had to do with his apparent opposition to the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars?

How much of it had to do with his pending deployment to Afghanistan?

How much of it had to do with his familiarity, as a psychiatrist, of the horrors of war and PTSD?

Experts will scour the Internet looking for clues, people will be interviewed, etc.  Hopefully, over time, a clearer picture can be drawn.  In the meantime, one could play these guessing games forever, and I supposed one's speculation at this point says more about the speculator than Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan.

BREAKING: Obama Signs Matthew Shepard/James Byrd Hate Crimes Legislation

Actually the Hate Crimes bill was tacked on to the 2009 Defense Appropriations Act, which Obama signed this afternoon, but it's still there, and Obama noted the significance of it:

So today I'm pleased to say that we have proved that change is possible. It may not come quickly, or all at once, but if you push hard enough, it does come eventually.

Now, speaking of that, there is one more long-awaited change contained within this legislation that I'll be talking about a little more later today. After more than a decade of opposition and delay, we've passed inclusive hate crimes legislation to help protect our citizens from violence based on what they look like, who they love, how they pray, or who they are. (Applause.)

I promised Judy Shepard, when she saw me in the Oval Office, that this day would come, and I'm glad that she and her husband Dennis could join us for this event. I'm also honored to have the family of the late Senator Ted Kennedy, who fought so hard for this legislation. And Vicki and Patrick, Kara, everybody who's here, I just want you all to know how proud we are of the work that Ted did to help this day — make this day possible. So — and thank you for joining us here today.

The new law strengthens existing U.S. laws by extending federal hate crime protection in cases where the victim was targeted because of their sexual orientation, gender, disability, or gender identity.

An Opening Paragraph We Didn't Particularly Enjoy Reading

From the Boston Herald:

RALEIGH, N.C. — Twenty murderers, rapists and robbers sentenced to life in North Carolina prisons in the 1970s will be released at the end of October as a result of recent court rulings.

Why?

Well, basically it comes down to this.  These murderers, rapists, and robberts were sentenced to life in prison in the 1970s as a result of their crime.

In 1981, the NC sentencing guidelines were revised.  Essentially, all sentences were cut in half.  The new guildelines were applied retroactively.

One industrious lifer argued to the court that, back in the 1970s, the sentencing guidelines interpreted "life in prison" as meaning "80 years".  Therefore, when the 1981 changes came along, that meant that their sentence was, effectively, 40 years.

Last week, the highest court of North Carolina agreed with this interpretation.

So, with some staturorily-recognized time off for good behavior, some "lifers" are now being set free, having served their sentence.  More will be released in the decade to come.

Thank you, legal fluke.

[For what it is worth -- since 1994, when North Carolina eliminated parole, a life sentence in North Carolina has meant the convict will die behind bars. But only first-degree murder can carry a life sentence, and now, the shortest sentence someone convicted now of first-degree forcible rape can serve is 12 years.]

Governor Perry Doubles Down on Willingham

This story is starting to get national attention.  Presumably, that's why Perry said what he said:

Gov. Rick Perry on Wednesday defended his actions in the execution of Cameron Todd Willingham, calling him a “monster” and a “bad man” who murdered his children.

Specifics?  Sure...

“Willingham was a monster,” the governor said. “Here's a guy who murdered his three children, who tried to beat his wife into an abortion so he wouldn't have those kids. Person after person has stood up and testified to facts of this case that, quite frankly, you all are not covering.”

Willingham, he said, showed how bad he was on the day of his execution.

“This is a bad man. This is a guy who in the death chamber in his last breath spews an obscenity-laced triad (sic) against his wife,” Perry said.

This is utter bullshit.

First of all, the prosecutor claimed that he beat his wife to abort his kids; his wife denied that at trail (and she really ought to know).  Did he beat his wife other times?  Yes, the evidence suggests that.  But is that a fact of the case?  Emphatically, no.  Neither does swearing to your wife while being put to death.  (She insisted he was innocent, until he was found guilty, and then she changed her mind, and failed to assist him for over a decade as he exhausted his appeals).  Frankly, if I were an innocent man sitting in death row, I might be inclined to cuss as well.

But here's the thing -- I don't care if Willingham was a bad husband.  It is entirely irrelevant as to whether he commited arson to kill his children.  There was (as I have blogged before) no eyewitness and the forensic evidence (we now know) indicated that the fire was not deliberately set.

This seems to be a thing with the Texas criminal justice system: if you are a bad man, you must have done everything that the prosecutor says you did.  It's been around a long time -- go rent (if you can find it) The Thin Blue Line.  An alarming number of people have been executed in Texas -- before their innocence is discovered.

Calling Willingham a "monstor" and a "bad man" is not evidence of guilt.  Perry is grasping here, because he knows he screwed up and allowed an innocent man to die.

Latest Update On The Execution of Cameron Todd Willingham

Looks like Texas's Republican Governnor Rick Perry is digging a deeper hole for himself.

The Houston Chronicle adds some more details about how Perry disregarded doubts of Willingham's guilt.  Three days before the execution, Willingham's attorney alerted Perry of a new arson analysis that cast doubt on the conviction.  The ultimate analysis came from a respected arson expert, Dr. Gerald Hurst, who helped exonerate prior death row inmates.

According to the Chronicle, the five-page Hurst report was faxed to Perry at 4:52 PM.  A "few minutes after" 5:00, Perry's office said he would not intervene.  They probably didn't even read it.  The execution occurred about an hour later. 

Perry is clearly trying to cover his tracks now.  As I wrote about two weeks ago, members of the Texas Forensic Science Commission were dismissed by Governor Perry, literally on the eve of the day when they were to receive a damning report from an arson expert.  The report conclusively stated that Willingham was innocent, and the arson evidence on which he was solely convicted (and eventually executed) was horrible.  The Chicago Tribune adds more:

Just months before the controversial removal of three members of a state commission investigating the forensics that led to a Texas man's 2004 execution, top aides to Gov. Rick Perry tried to pressure the chairman of the panel over the direction of the inquiry, the chairman has told the Tribune.

Samuel Bassett, whom Perry replaced on the Texas Forensic Science Commission two weeks ago, said he twice was called to meetings with Perry's top attorneys. At one of those meetings, Bassett said he was told they were unhappy with the course of the commission's investigation.

"I was surprised that they were involving themselves in the commission's decision-making," Bassett said. "I did feel some pressure from them, yes. There's no question about that."

Not good at all.

UPDATE:  Sam Bassett, the former chair of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, has now told the Houston Chronicle that lawyers for Perry told him the case was inappropriate, and that the hiring of a nationally known fire expert was a "waste of state money."

The Seventh Sense Silly Legal Advice Corner

Q.  I have a restraining order filed against me.  Can I still "poke" that person on Facebook?

A:  It depends on the terms of the restraining order, but the answer is probably "no".

A Hendersonville woman was arrested for virtually “poking” someone on the social networking site Facebook.

Shannon D. Jackson, 36, was arrested Friday, Sept. 25 for allegedly violating an order of protection.

According to the affidavit filed in Sumner County General Sessions Court, Jackson is accused of using the “poke” option on Facebook to contact a Hendersonville woman, thus violating the terms of the order of protection, which stipulates “no telephoning, contacting or otherwise communicating with the petitioner.”

Poking is a feature unique to Facebook that conveys no other message but informing a user they have been “poked” by another user.

Of course, this incident begs a question.  Since you can only "poke" your friends, why wasn't this Shannon D. Jackson already blocked by the alleged victim?

New North Carolina Laws Day

Being the beginning of another fiscal year, about 100 new laws go into effect in the State of North Carolina today.  They're all listed here (PDF).

But just so you know, here are a few:

• Local governments get to regulate golf carts now. Phew.  Our long national nightmare is... uh... over?
• It's now illegal to sell novelty lighters. (A "novelty lighter" is defined as a lighter which is designed to look like a "cartoon charactor, toy, gun, watch, musical instrument, vehicle, animal, food or beverage, or similar articles, or that plays musical notes" -- in other words, a lighter that might attract kids,  A regular lighter with a logo, however, doesn't count)  
• "Truth in Music Performances" Law: It's now illegal to give a live musical performance pretending to be somebody else (e.g., Elvis) unless you make it clear that it's a "tribute".
• You can no longer object to the location of an ABC store, if the municipality allowed the store to be located there after a public hearing.
• North Carolina will conduct a swine flu-related study to see if it needs to change the wild boar hunting season.
• Municipalities can take vehicles abandoned on public property to the junkyard if the vehicle is more than five years old and worth less than $500 (it used to be $100).
• It's still illegal for motor vehicles to stop on a highway in a way which impedes traffic, but now there's an exception for garbage trucks collecting garbage.  Lovely.
• Beaver traps with a mouth greater than 7.5 inches and less than 26 inches can only be placed in water where beavers hang out. [Insert your own joke here]
• Municipalities can go after chronic violators of public nuisance ordinances by serving a single notice.
• It's now easier for residential areas off of state roads to get speed bumps put in.
• Before, stray dogs and cats which bit a human could be tested for rabies and if needed, euthanized; now, it applies to stray ferrets as well.
• Safety rules which applied to skiers also apply to snowboarders and other winter sports people.
• It's still illegal to drive while watching TV or a computer screen, but GPS screens don't count.  Neither do factory-installed video screens which provide weather or radio information.  Glad we got that straightened out.
• Public wine-testing events were always legal (with a permit); now beer-tasting events are legal (with a permit) as well.  NASCAR enthusiasts rejoice.
• If you want to be a licensed marriage or family therapist in NC, they have to run a criminal background check on you now beforehand.
• Dealers who buy gold or other precious metals from the public have to be licensed. That law is probably a fallout from the Cash4Gold.com scandal.

Big intrusive government bastards.... messing with my beaver traps and boar hunting.

Oh, and while I'm on the topic, there are two other notable new criminal laws on the books:

• It's now illegal -- a Class 1 misdemanor -- to vandalize a Port-a-potty (NOTE: Actually, this law isn't effective until December 1, 2009, so you have a couple months of scot-free Port-a-potty destruction ahead of you, if you are so inclined).
• TEXTING WHILE DRIVING IS ILLEGAL -- Okay, this doesn't start until December 1, 2009, but don't do it anyway.  I'm driving NC roads...

Governor Perry (R-Tx) Trying To Bury The Willingham Case

I've blogged twice now (here and here) about Cameron Todd Willingham, the Texas man who was tried, convicted, and eventually executed on what now appears to be really bad "expert" testimony.  In a nutshell, arson "experts" were convinced that Willingham intentionally started a house fire intending to kill his children (all three died).  There was no other evidence against Willingham -- just the opinion testimony by arson "experts" who were, as it turned out, not experts at all.

This is, sadly, quite common in Texas -- people convicted and/or executed for "bad science" offered as evidence through opinion testimony.  So overwhelming pervasive is the problem that Texas decided to adopt a Forensic Science Committee.

Well, guess what happened when the Forensic Science Committee was set to look at the case of Cameron Todd Willingham?  From yesterday's New York Times:

Gov. Rick Perry replaced the chairman and two members of the state’s Forensic Science Commission, two days before the commission was to hear evidence that Texas executed an innocent man. The new chairman canceled the hearing, at which an arson expert was to present a report critical of the arson analysis that led to the conviction of the man, Cameron T. Willingham. Mr. Willingham, above, was executed in 2004 after being convicted of setting a 1991 fire in which his three children died. Governor Perry, who was in office at the time of the execution, has expressed confidence in Mr. Willingham’s guilt. “This is like the Saturday night massacre,” said Barry Scheck, co-director of the Innocence Project, which has been working on the case. “It’s like Nixon firing Archibald Cox to avoid turning over the Watergate tapes.”

Scheck, who has said there is "no doubt" about Willingham's innocence, was alluding to former President Richard Nixon's firing of independent special prosecutor Archibald Cox, who had been probing the Watergate scandal in 1973.

The governor's office claimed that there was nothing unusual about replacing members of the Forensic Science Commission, saying that some of their terms have expired.

The Houston Chronicle adds some color to the story.  One of the commission members ousted by Governor Perry said nothing about his term expiring. 

The report by the arson expert (Craig Beyler) concludes that the findings at the heart of Willingham's conviction -- that the fire that killed his daughters was set deliberately -- "could not be sustained" by either modern science or the standards of the time.

Two previous reports by other experts also concluded that the fatal blaze was not arson, but Beyler's is the first commissioned by the state.

Regarding the Beyler report, the Chronicle writes:

Beyler, a nationally known fire science expert, was commissioned not by a newspaper or an advocacy group, but by a state commission chaired by Perry's own political appointee.

So, when Beyler concluded recently there was no credible scientific evidence to support the finding that the Willingham fire was arson, and likened the investigative methods used to folklore and mysticism rather than science, it appears that the governor had to find a way to silence him.

At first, Perry tried to discredit Beyler, using air quotes in an interview with The Dallas Morning News two weeks ago to refer to “latter-day supposed experts” who have cast doubt on Willingham's conviction.

Then, this week, days before Beyler was scheduled to present his findings to the Texas Forensic Science Commission in a public meeting Friday, Perry made a move so blatantly political that it was stunning even for a candidate locked in a tight primary battle.

He canned the commission's chairman, Sam Bassett, his own two-term appointee, and replaced him with a new chairman who promptly canceled Friday's meeting on the Beyler report.

It's pretty clear what's going on.  Governor Perry was governor when Willingham was executed.  He refused to grant clemency for Willingham, at the time ignoring the conclusions of many many arson experts who said that the conviction of Willingham was based on "folklore" forensics conducted by untrained non-experts.  Now, in the middle of a heated re-election bid, the governor is trying to sweep the Willingham execution under the rug by removing state investigators intent on looking into the matter.

More from CNN

My Take On Roman Polanski

Yes, the 13 year old victim, now in her 40's, has long since forgiven him.

Yes, the victim's mother at the time was apparently some freaked out fame wannabe, and put her daughter in that position.

Yes, it was a long time ago.

Yes, he's famous.

But here's the thing.  A crime is a crime.  He committed a crime.  He pled gulity to it, before he fled.  That's all that matters.  And crimes, by the way, are crimes against the state (that's why criminal cases are typical title "The People versus Joe Smith"), so it doesn't matter what the victim says now.

And it doesn't matter how long ago it happened (no statute of limitations once you've pled guilty).

And it certainly doesn't matter that he makes movies.

More on the Cameron Todd Willingham Execution

A couple of weeks ago, I blogged about Cameron Todd Willingham, a Texas man executed -- wrongly, it seems -- for the death of his daughters by intentionally committing arson (according to Texas prosecutors).

Hon. John Jackson, the judge in the case that led to Willingham's conviction, has spoken out.  I've excerpted his guest column in the Corsican Daily Sun.  I want to address his salient points, to show the poor quality of the judiciary in Texas:

In fact, the trial testimony you reported in 1991 contains overwhelming evidence of guilt completely independent of the undeniably flawed forensic report.

Always omitted from any examination of the actual trial are the following facts:

1. The event which caused the three childrens' deaths was the third attempt by Todd Willingham to kill his children established by the evidence. He had attempted to abort both pregnancies by vicious attacks on his wife in which he beat and kicked his wife with the specific intent to trigger miscarriages;

Then why does his own wife deny these so-called "vicious attacks"?  Besides, past bad behavior, even if true, carries only circumstantial evidentiary weight.  Not all wife-beaters commit murder -- in fact, most don't.

2. The “well-established burns” suffered by Willingham were so superficial as to suggest that the same were self-inflicted in an attempt to divert suspicion from himself;

"Suggest"?  That constitutes "over-whelming evidence of guilt"?  Besides, scientific experts believe that his burns were consistent with the type of fire at Willingham's house.

3. Blood-gas analysis at Navarro Regional Hospital shortly after the homicide revealed that Willingham had not inhaled any smoke, contrary to his statement which detailed “rescue attempts;”

According to this New Yorker article, Willingham didn't try to rescue his family, although he told investigators he did.  He fled from the burning house because he was scared.  He was ashamed of his cowardice (although he did try to go back in, only to be stopped by firefighters).  He admitted it later on.  But lying about "rescue attempts" is not evidence that he started the fire.

4. Consistent with typical Navarro County death penalty practice, Willingham was offered the opportunity to eliminate himself as a suspect by polygraph examination. Such opportunity was rejected in the most vulgar and insulting manner;

This is an embarrassment to the judiciary of Texas.  Polygraphs are inadmissible in court because they lack reliability as evidence.  Refusal to take a polygraph, likewise, isn't evidence of guilt either.  Willingham was (wisely) told by his lawyers not to take the polygraph, and he didn't.  To use that now as evidence of his guilt is incredibly corrupt.  Judge Johnson should know this.

5. Willingham was a serial wife abuser, both physically and emotionally. His violent nature was further established by evidence of his vicious attacks on animals which is common to violent sociopaths;

This is, again, indirect and almost prejudicial evidence at best.  It's like saying -- well, most violent criminal has a bad childhood; Person X has a bad childhood; therefore, he must have committed a violent crime.  Sorry, that doesn't cut it. 

By the way, a prosecution expert who testified that Willingham was a “sociopath” was expelled from his professional association just three years later for unethical behavior, including making diagnoses without examining people. Willingham’s former probation officer and a judge both directly refute any notion that he was a sociopath.

6. Witness statements established that Willingham was overheard whispering to his deceased older daughter at the funeral home, “You're not the one who was supposed to die.” (The origin of the fire occured in the infant twins bedroom) and;

A grievingfather telling his daughter she wasn't supposed to die isn't evidence of guilt.  There remains the distinct, indeed likely, possibility that he was speaking metaphysically -- i.e., that she was too young to die.  As for the origin of the fire, even the experts at trial (who, even the judge agrees produced a "flawed forensic report") couldn't find evidence of arson in the twins' bedroom)

7. Any escape or rescue route from the burning house was blocked by a refrigerator which had been pushed against the back door, requring any person attempting escape to run through the conflagration at the front of the house.

According to this, the refrigerator was covering a back door because there were two refrigerators in the small kitchen. The police detective and the fire chief who handled the case both now say that the refrigerator’s location does not support the theory that the fire was arson.

The judge adds:

Co-counsel Alan Bristol and I offered Willingham the opportunity to enter a plea of guilty in return for a sentence of life imprisonment. Such offer was rejected in an obscene and potentially violent confrontation with his defense counsel.

And isn't that how an innocent man might act?

Here's the bottom line.  Could Willingham have committed arson, intending to kill his twin daughters?  Sure, if you stack the evidence the right way, and ignore other evidence, it's certainly possible.  But we don't convict people, and certainly don't sentence them to death, on being able to construct a scenario in which the murder is a "possible" truth.  The standard is (even in Texas) "guilt beyond a resonable doubt".

Anyone assessing all the hard facts (or lack thereof) objectively would have a doubt, and that doubt is reasonable.  Flawed expert evidence and "circumstantial" evidence was enought to construct a plausible story about how Willingham could have murdered his children.  But those things, even taken together, should never have resulted in a conviction.

I alluded to it before, but this long read in the The New Yorker is worth it.

The Man Behind The Jaycee Abduction

As you probably know now, Jaycee Lee Dugard, 29, walked into an Antioch (CA) police station earlier this week, and told authorities she had been kidnapped in 1991 waiting for a school bus in South Lake Tahoe. Authorities have since arrested two suspects for the crime.

Here's the blog of the male suspect, Phillip Girrado.

His latest entry, from August 14 of this year reads:

During the month of July 2009 JM's Enterprises, 1215 Willow Pass Road * Pittsburg CA,(925) 439-8118 was the host to a powerful demonstration, the Creator has given me the ability to speak in the tongue of angels in order to provide a wake-up call that will in time include the salvation of the entire world.

You too can witness what the world believe's is impossible to produce! email: godsdesire@rocketmail.com. DON'T MISS OUT!

Yeah, he's formed a church called God's Desire, and he's the savior, and he claims to have the ability to "control sound with his mind".

Pretty soon he's going to hear the sound of the ch-chuck of slamming prison cell doors.

By the way, I vaguely recall this kidnapping when it happened.  It was shortly after the Elizabeth Smart some other publicized kidnapping, so it made the news.  It was just one of those things that you read about for a couple of days, and then forgot about.

Texas (Of Course) Executes Innocent Man

Take a long look at the picture:

That's Amber Willingham and her father, Cameron Todd Willingham.

In 1992,the Willingham house caught fire.  Amber and her two sisters perished.

Cameron, the father, was charged with murder.  He is the only person in history charged with murder where fire was the weapon.

There wasn't much evidence against him.  He was convicted largely on the testimony of Texas arson "experts" who claimed that there were twenty indicators of arson. 

By 2004, Willington has exhausted his appeals.  Much progress had been made in arson investigation techniques, and many (if not all) of the techniques used by the arson experts at Willingham's trial had fallen into disrepute.

For example, "crazed glass" -- cracked but not shattered glass -- was once thought to be an indicator of the use of a liquid accelerant.  But "crazed glass" is now classified by fire investigation experts as an "Old Wives Tale." Crazed glass can be caused by a liquid accellerant, it can also be caused by the rapid chilling of hot glass by water used to extinguish a fire.

"Crazed glass" was only one of the indicators used to convict Willingham, but the other so-called indicators are largely myth-based.

Despite that fact the myths of his alleged arson were well-known by 2004, Cameron Todd Willingham was executed by the state of Texas on February 17, 2004.  His last words included:

Yeah. The only statement I want to make is that I am an innocent man - convicted of a crime I did not commit. I have been persecuted for 12 years for something I did not do.

The story doesn't end there.  Following some high-profile forensic screw-ups, the Texas Legislature in 2005 created a commission to investigate lab error, negligence, and misconduct among forensic experts.  

Their first major review was the Willingham case.  The commission hired an outside firm to review the case materials and issue a report.  Their investigator, Craig Beyler, just released his findings, and his report is bonechillingly frank:

In a withering critique, a nationally known fire scientist has told a state commission on forensics that Texas fire investigators had no basis to rule a deadly house fire was an arson -- a finding that led to the murder conviction and execution of Cameron Todd Willingham.

***

Among Beyler's key findings: that investigators failed to examine all of the electrical outlets and appliances in the Willinghams' house in the small Texas town of Corsicana, did not consider other potential causes for the fire, came to conclusions that contradicted witnesses at the scene, and wrongly concluded Willingham's injuries could not have been caused as he said they were.

The state fire marshal on the case, Beyler concluded in his report, had "limited understanding" of fire science. The fire marshal "seems to be wholly without any realistic understanding of fires and how fire injuries are created," he wrote.

The marshal's findings, he added, "are nothing more than a collection of personal beliefs that have nothing to do with science-based fire investigation."

Way to go, Texas.

Should The Supreme Court Stay The Execution Of An Innocent Man?

Yes, right?

Well, maybe not.

Here's the story of the Troy Davis case:

Twenty years ago, a late-night scuffle broke out in a Burger King parking lot in Savannah. When Mark MacPhail, an off-duty police officer, tried to intervene, someone pulled a gun and killed the officer. Soon after, Sylvester "Red" Coles, came to the police with a lawyer, accusing Troy Davis of the shooting.

Witnesses say it was Coles, not Davis, who killed MacPhail, but once the man-hunt began for Davis, law enforcement officials wanted to believe he was the man responsible for the slaying, and pressured witnesses accordingly. At this point, most of the witnesses who testified at trial have signed statements contradicting their identification of the gunman. Other witnesses who fingered Davis have said they made their stories up, facing police threats.

What we're left with is a case in which a man was sentenced to death despite no physical evidence, based on the word of witnesses who have since recanted or contradicted their testimony.

What about the witnesses who say Cole shot MacPhail? They're anxious to say so, but their testimony was blocked by federal courts, citing a provision in the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act.

Yesterday, in a 6-2 ruling, the Supreme Court took the highly unusual step of ordering the lower court to hear the new evidence.

Scalia dissented, writing:

"This court has never held that the Constitution forbids the execution of a convicted defendant who has had a full and fair trial but is later able to convince a habeas court that he is 'actually' innocent."

Justice John Paul Stevens responded to Scalia:

"Imagine a petitioner in Davis's situation who possesses new evidence conclusively and definitively proving, beyond any scintilla of doubt, that he is an innocent man....The dissent's reasoning would allow such a petitioner to be put to death nonetheless. The court correctly refuses to endorse such reasoning."

Stevens is right.  But here's the thing -- so is Stevens.

A habeus corpus petition is a legal device that goes back to the Magna Carta.  It's what prisoners -- particularly death row inmates -- use when all their appeals have been denied.  Basically, it allows someone imprisoned for a crime to petition the court on the grounds that their incarceration is illegal or unconstitutional.  In effect, if the habeus petition is heard and granted, it amounts to another trial -- another bite at the apple to prove one's innocence.

Traditionally, most habeus petitions aren't even heard, and when they are heard, the court considers the arguments, and usually denies a new trial.  That's because, in order to win, the petitioner must show some defect in the trial that led to conviction.  An incompetent lawyer, a bribed jury, etc.  In other words, the prisoner must show that he did not get his constitutional right to a full and fair trial.

Scalia's point here is well-taken.  Troy Davis got a full and fair trial.  Did the witnesses who pointed their finger at Davis lie at the trial?  Well, it would seem so, but that doesn't make the trial "unfair".  Why not?  Because Davis' lawyer got to cross-examine those witnesses, try to expose them as liars, etc.  He failed, but that doesn't make the trial unfair or unconstitutional.

So yes, believe it or not, "actual innocence" is not an independent ground for a new trial. 

But of course, "actual innocence" can only be determined by a new trial in the first place.  Catch-22.

It should be noted that, by the strict letter of the law, Scalia is right.  The constitution does not protect an obviously innocent man who got a fair trial and was found guilty.

Stevens and the other five judges in the majojrity are, strictly speaking, going beyond the letter of the law, expanding the scope of habeus review, and allowing a hearing on whether this guy should get a new trial.  They are invoking humanity.  Or reason.  Or both.  They're not saying he's innocent; they're just saying that he has a right to have the new evidence considered so that a court could order a new trial.

Any way you look at it, it is an interesting development in habeus jurisprudence.

Squeaky Fromme To Be Released

Yeah, she's 60 now, but she hasn't disavowed Manson.  So, bad idea.

The Question Is "Why"

No meaning can be ascribed to meaningless killings like the ones in Pittsburgh last night.

Yet, the question still remains: "why".  Why would somebody do such a thing?  Revenge against a specific target?  A nut job?

The shooter (who took his own life) left behind an online diary of sorts.  We know why.  He was lonely.  Here is what he wrote on Monday:

"The biggest problem of all is not having relationships or friends, but not being able to achieve and acquire what I desire in those or many other areas.

"Everything stays the same regardless of the effert (sic) I put in. If I had control over my life then I would be happier. But for about the past 30 years, I have not.”

It's all there on his public website (mostly not available anymore).

[UPDATE:  Direct link to the "diary" here -- looks like the guy with some racial issues and a little self-obsessed with his "isolation".  Apparently, he never learned (nor was told) that EVERYONE lives a life of quiet desparation, and that has nothing with being single or married, popular or unpopular etc.  Besides, life isn't about the achievement of some goal (social, career, or otherwise), it's about the journey.]

Which raises more "why" questions than it answers.

Screenshot from last "diary" entry:

I don't know the guy and I'm not a trained psychologist, but it seems to me that perhaps he was having bad luck with the women because there was something about him which suggested that he could someday be a mass killer.  Some people just have that vibe, you know?

The Guy Who Wrote "You Light Up My Life" Is Finally Indicted

About time, too.  That song, written in 1977, is a crime which has gone unpunished for too long.

Wait, what?

Oh. My mistake. He was indicted on sex charges.  Date rape.

Holocaust Museum Shooting

It's all unfolding now.

Two people (perhaps 3) shot by a gunman in the Holocaust Musuem in D.C..  The gunman was also apparently shot and is in custody.

Too early, of course, to determine the motive, but since it was at the Holocaust Museum, one can surmise that the shooter was anti-Jew.  From there, it's not a far leap to suppose that the shooter was an islamic terrorist of some sort.

Then again, news reports say that the shooter was a white male "born in 1920" which doesn't exactly fit the "islamic terrorist" profile.  Could be just a demented old guy.

UPDATE:  Some sketchy reports that the shooter may not survive.

UPDATE:   MSNBC saying the shooter "had possible connections to hate groups or anti-government groups".  If this turns out to be true, and at this point -- who knows, this is another of those right wing extremist (like the Dr. Tiller murderer) that the DHS warned us about.

Ironically, this is what the Holocaust Museum looks like -- can you read the red banner?

 

UPDATE:  I got this from Twitter (really, the best place to get breaking news).  The gunman's name is James Von Brunn (confirmed by MSNBC just seconds ago)

My Google searches find this comment by James Von Brunn at a site called "The Black Jesus":

Jesus Christs tells us to love our enemies, forgive them, turn the other cheek, give them our cloak and coat; give away our personal belongings and follow Him. Have you done this?

Do you know any alleged Christians that have ?

Nietzsche said, “The last Christian died on the cross.”

One cannot love your neighbors and segregate them. Therefore. Multi-cukturalism is a prerequisite to being Christian. It is for that reason the POPE advocates open borders with Mexico. The word CATHOLIC means “UNIVERSAL” The Churdh ALWAYS has sought a united World under CHRIST. The ILLUMINATI too seeks One World Government – which may be why Henry Kissinger, ZIONIST, visits the Vatican so frequently.

He's apparently an artist.  But he's mostly known as a white supremicist: see here and here.  Here's his hate website: http://www.holywesternempire.org/

His site's bio:

James W. von Brunn holds a BachSci Journalism degree from a mid-Western university where he was president of SAE and played varsity football. During WWII he served as PT-Boat captain, Lt. USNR, receiving a Commendation and four battle stars. For twenty years he was an advertising executive and film-producer in New York City. He is a member of Mensa, the high-IQ society. In 1981 Von Brunn attempted to place the treasonous Federal Reserve Board of Governors under legal, non-violent, citizens arrest. He was tried in a Washington, D.C. Superior Court; convicted by a Negro jury, Jew/Negro attorneys, and sentenced to prison for eleven years by a Jew judge. A Jew/Negro/White Court of Appeals denied his appeal. He served 6.5 years in federal prison. (Read about von Brunn's "Federal Reserve Caper" HERE.) He is now an artist and author and lives on Maryland's Eastern Shore.

Here's his wikipedia profile, as written by him(?)....

User: James W. von Brunn, b.1920, attempted to place the Federal Resrve Board of Governors under legal, non-violent citizens arrest, 12-7-81. Von Brunn charged the FED with treason and other high crimes. The FED, a private stock-company, owned by International bankers, financed the construction of manufacturing plants in the Soviet Union during the "Cold War." War materials, produced by FED financed plants, were used by the Enemy against American military forces in Viet Nam, and elsewhere.

Von Brunn was tried and convicted by a Washington, D.C. kangaroo court; then sentenced to eleven years in federal prison by Judge Harriet Rosen Taylor; the sentence was confirmed by a racially motivated Appeals Court. Von Brunn was imprisoned for 6.5-years.

Von Brunn champions Western Culture,and the practice of Eugenics. He states that Marxism-Multiculturalism-Judaism is the Enemy of Mankind.citing Talmudic quotes to "Kill the Best Gentiles !"

Von Brunn was president of his college fraternity, SAE. He served as PT-Boat captain, USNR, during WW2, earning 4-battle stars and a Commendation Ribbon. His early business career was in NYC as copywriter, art-director and film producer; later as a real-estate broker; and lastly as a writer-artist.

He also wrote a treatise entitled "Kill The Best Gentiles!".  Here's the Table of Contents:

1. The Conspiracy
2. Khazars Invent Judaism
3. The Illuminati
4. Money
5. Spirochetes of Jew Syphilis
6. The “Holocaust” Hoax
7. Mendelism
8. The Negro
9. The Aryan Force
10. Parasitism USA
11. Pathology and Synthesis
12. Summing Up
APPENDIX
Glossary
Bibliography
Distinguished Personages
EXHIBITS:
Arson
Letter to US SecNav Webb
Letter from Admiral Crommelin
Gen. Anderson news item
Letter to Talbot County Council Star-Democrat:
Two (2) editorials in re Genetics
Poem by Josephine Beaty
Cicero ii

In a recent blog post, Von Brunn wrote that Hitler's "worst mistake" was that "he didn't gas the Jews."

I think we've got a good understanding of this guy....

UPDATE:  Brian Williams of NBC reports that he lives in New Hampshire...

UPDATE:  Also appears to be a sucker for the "Fox News" propaganda (Obama isn't really an American, etc....)

John Cole reacts:

How many acts of right-wing terrorism have to occur before DHS is allowed to start keeping track of it?

I really don’t get the conservative reaction to the original DHS pronouncement. No one is trying to lump angry Red State commenters in with honest-to-God terrorists…except, weirdly enough, the Red State commenters themselves.

There are crazy people out there shooting up abortion clinics and Holocaust museums. These people identify with causes normally described as right-wing. Deal with it. Tea bag away to your heart’s content. It’s not til you start plotting to kill people that DHS should take an interest. If anyone starts spying on you prior to that, then I, the ACLU, and dirty hippies everywhere will support your grievances.

Well said.

Reasonable vs Unreasonable Voices

I've written recently about the inflammatory rhetoric of Fox News, Bill O'Reilly, etc., and how it can lead to events like the murder of Dr. George Tiller this weekend.

Some people get it.  This is a thoughtful post from Rod Dreher, a conservative, at Belief.net:

Unsurprisingly, on this blog's comboxes and elsewhere, some are blaming the entire pro-life movement for Tiller's murder, and blaming specifically pro-life rhetoric for supposedly inciting the abortion doc's murderer. There's not much point in objecting to this at this point; the people who say such things are looking for an excuse to despise the pro-life cause, and this lawless vigilante has now given them one.

It is worth reflecting on, though, to what extent our words are seeds for violent deeds. It cannot be true, however much some pro-choicers may want it to be, that pro-lifers are obliged to shut up and go away because one violent kook killed an abortion doctor. Think about the harsh criticism of the US torture policy under Bush. If, God forbid, someone infuriated by that committed murder against one of the Bush officials who devised the policy, it would be a heinous crime, but most people would understand that torture critics could not be blamed for it. Nor would the severity of their moral indictment of torture be at issue. If torture -- or abortion, or war, or discrimination, or any other morally consequential issue -- is wrong, then we are obliged to speak out against it, no matter what. George Tiller was a violent man, and the fact that he died violently, at the hands of a criminal, does not change who he was and what he did for a living.

But we can't let ourselves off that easily. Our words are not spoken in a vacuum. In our media today, they are amplified to a degree previously unimaginable. It seems to me that this puts a special obligation on all of us, whatever our cause or political stance, to choose carefully what we say, and how we say it. I don't think there are any hard and fast rules here, but the virtue of prudence in speech really is important to observe. We live in a time when red-hot rhetoric, on both the right and the left, sells; I saw a TV producer friend over the weekend here, a guy who used to work for cable news back in the US, and told him how frustrated I was that there is no place on broadcast media for nuanced or moderate voices. They don't want light, they want heat, and the only way to get heat is to have intense friction. So our media culture valorizes intense emotion, and we are acculturated to embracing our passions, especially our anger, as a matter of justice and authenticity.

This will not end well for us. It never has.

And what of O'Reilly, who has over the last few years launched aabout 29 rants against Dr. Tiller?  What did he have to say last night?  Media critic Howard Kurtz:

O'Reilly is entitled to defend himself, and he in no way condoned what happened. But the man was murdered in church. I was surprised that, along with his reminder that Tiller had been called a baby killer, O'Reilly didn't issue a ringing denunciation of the shooting and anyone who thought it was justified. The occasion, in my view, called for it; he chose a different approach.

O'Reilly's approach was to condemn Tiller's murder (in passing), and then use the event to not only defend himself but, notably, reiterate his attacks on Tiller.  Nice.

By the way, Media Matters uncovered an O'Reilly radio show where he discussed "getting his hands on Tiller".

 

Remember That DHS Report?

Michelle Malkin apparently doesn't think the killer of Dr. Tiller is a "terrorist".  He's an "extremist".  She adds:

Interesting how the t-word has been rediscovered.

She has the memory of a moth.  It was only back in April when the Department of Homeland Security issued a report equating right-wing extremism as a possible breeding ground for terrorist acts.  The right wing reacted to the report with manufactured outrage, and even called for the resignation of DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano.  Michelle was on the forefront of the outrage.  Here's what she wrote:

DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano has turned her attention away from acts of Islamic jihad on American soil (which she now refers to as “man-caused disasters”). Instead, her department is sounding the alarm over an un-quantified “resurgence” in “rightwing extremism activity.” On April 7, DHS sent a nine-page warning memo to law enforcement offices across the country titled “Rightwing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment.”

The report includes a sweeping definition of the threat:

“Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups), and those that are mainly antigovernment, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.”

Hmmmm.  In retrospect, it certainly appears like the DHS was on to something....

Michelle went on:

The report offers zero data, but states with an almost resentful attitude toward protected free speech: “Debates over appropriate immigration levels and enforcement policy generally fall within the realm of protected political speech under the First Amendment, but in some cases, anti-immigration or strident pro-enforcement fervor has been directed against specific groups and has the potential to turn violent.”

The same, naturally, goes for anti-abortion fervor.

“Potential to turn violent?” So did the hysterical fervor whipped up by Capitol Hill over the AIG bonuses, which prompted ugly death threats from across the country. No mention here, though. Not “rightwing” enough. Nor will you see Obama DHS warnings to police and sheriff’s departments about self-proclaimed bank terrorists such as Bruce Marks of the aggressive Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America or the mob activists of ACORN who have committed burglary, stormed corporate executives’ homes, and vowed to conduct “civil disobedience” by “any means necessary” in response to the “current economic and political climate.”

Michelle, I think your attempts at obfuscation failed.  Epic fail.  The left wing -- even the fringe -- typically does not react to political frustration with acts of violence.  There's no evidence of that (not, at least, since the 60's). 

But just in case you really believed all the garbage you wrote, Michelle, I hope you found yesterday's events educational (although, this isn't the first time something like this has happened).

[UPDATE: The New York Times is reporting that Tiller's killer subscribed to a newsletter called "Prayer and Action News", which advocates justifiable homicide for abortion doctors]

Mark Kleiman reminds us of the DHS report's relevance.

Remember how Republicans in Congress were all in a dither about the DHS report on right-wing extremist organizations as potential terrorist threats? The Tiller gunman was affiliated with at least two of those organizations. In addition to his connection with Operation Rescue, he was a tax protester, a "sovereign citizen," and a member of the Freemen. Maybe someone should ask Rep. Peter King of New York (ranking Republican on the House Homeland Security Committee) and John Hinderaker of PowerLine whether they still consider the threat of right-wing terrorism to be mere Obama Administration fantasy. (That's beside the fact that the report was ordered up during the Bush Administration.)

Greg Sargent added this morning, "[T]he general intent of the report, which was chock full of warnings about 'lone wolf extremists' capable of violence, now looks perfectly defensible, even reasonable."

Steve Benen:

This really should have been apparent to the administration's detractors in the midst of the "controversy." There are some Americans on the fringes of society who are both radical and potentially dangerous. It only makes sense for the Department of Homeland Security to be cognizant of these threats, and communicate with state and local law enforcement agencies about the possibility of violence.

Yesterday was a painful reminder of this.

Will Malkin connect the dots between the DHS report and Scott Roeder (the murderer)?  Don't hold your breath.

But violent right wing extremists are out there.  Llike the Tiller killer, another member of the "sovereign citizen" movement was arrested yesterday, in a little-publicized story:

Federal authorities in Seattle have filed gun and drug charges against an alleged member of a secessionist movement after agents seized a weapons cache that included four silencers, body armor and a fully automatic rifle.

Filings in the case, currently before the U.S. District Court in Seattle, offer glimpses into the "sovereign citizen" movement and, prosecutors contend, militia groups loosely affiliated with it.

But Malkin and others on the right didn't get it.  Here's the Christian Broadcast Network's David Brody, April 15, 2009:

Abortion Groups Labeled as Right Wing Extremists by Department of Homeland Security

Watch out! The pro-life right wing nuts are on the loose! Be very careful....They could be lurking around any corner!

Oy-vey.

Hey, that’s basically the message coming from the Department of Homeland Security. In a new report, here’s how DHS defines right wing extremism in America:

Rightwing extremism in the United States can be broadly divided into those groups, movements, and adherents that are primarily hate-oriented (based on hatred of particular religious, racial or ethnic groups, and those that are mainly anti-government, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority, or rejecting government authority entirely. It may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.

Read the DHS report here.

The American Center for Law and Justice is outraged to say the least. Read a statement below from the group:

This is an outrageous characterization that raises serious questions about the leadership and direction of the agency charged with protecting Americans in the ongoing battle against terrorism,” said Jay Sekulow, Chief Counsel of the ACLJ.  “Why would the Department of Homeland Security single out groups like pro-life supporters when they should be focusing on identifying and apprehending the real terrorists – like al-Qaeda – groups that have vowed to destroy America? This characterization is not only offensive to millions of Americans who hold constitutionally-protected views opposing abortion – but also raises serious concerns about the political agenda of an agency with a mandate to protect America.”

Now let me just say there are plenty of “nuts” out there to be sure...on both sides. It’s not JUST on the right. Racism of any kind is just plain wrong and hatred with accompanying violence is unacceptable. But to invoke “abortion” into the language of the document can definitely come across as a disservice to all the law abiding pro-life groups out there. Abortion clinic violence is wrong. Don’t get my wrong but why not be more specific about that rather than generically lump it all together under the abortion umbrella?

P.S.  By the way, it is "terrorism".  Terrorism is defined as politically-motivated violence, against a law-abiding American on American soil, intended to scare, intimidate, and change U.S. policy.  Certainly one of the tacit sub-motives of Tiller's killing was not only to stop Tiller, but to discourage others from doing the kind of late-term abortion work (rare as it is) that Tiller did.

Finally, returning to Malkin's post today, she writes:

Unfortunately, some are not content to leave it at that for now. They fail to respect that there is a proper time and place to indulge in political battle.

You can go here, here, and here for all that. Another round-up here.

Tiller’s family is grieving. Those who have jumped to score political points before Tiller is even buried are no better than the Phelps family thugs of the “Westboro Baptist Church” who respect no bounds of civility.

Unfortunately, it’s too much to ask the cable news networks and hyper-partisan snipers on the Internet to have the decency to restrain themselves.

Prepare for a wall-to-wall onslaught of gleeful finger-pointing on the Left and heated responses on the Right.

Prepare for whitewashed hagiographies of Tiller’s career as an abortionist.

Prepare for DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano’s defenders to gloat about vindication.

Prepare for collective demonization of pro-lifers and Christians — and more gratuitous attempts to tar talk radio, Fox News, and the Tea Party movement as responsible for the heinous crime.

Prepare for the continuing redefinition of any and all sharp political disagreement as “hate” — a ruinous trend that inevitably comes back to haunt the hysterical accusers decrying “hate” the loudest.

How unhinged has the discourse gotten already? Here’s the left-wing Daily Kos going after the left-wing John Aravosis for going after Barack Obama because he didn’t go after “right-wing extremism” hard enough.

Cognitive dissonance much. Michelle?  I'm surprised the part of your brain that calls for no political sniping doesn't throttle the other part of your brain that can't help but engage in political sniping.

Sadly, No responds to Malkin's time-and-a-place-for-thee-but-not-for-me:

We concur. This is not the time for partisan sniping and name-calling. Also, Michelle Malkin is a manipulative sack of shit.

The Dr. Tiller I Knew

From a Daily Kos diarist:

Like many in this community, my heart is heavy today. There have been many great diaries that talk about Dr. Tiller's years of service to women, and the threats he has endured throughout the last years of his life. My story is a bit more personal and I want to share it with all of you to give you more insight into the man.

In 1975 my Mom noticed an indention in her left breast. She called and made an appointment with her OB/GYN, Dr. George Tiller. After his initial examination, he ordered a biopsy. While performing the biopsy he immediately knew that the lump was cancerous. Instead of just closing and scheduling surgery, he “grabbed a handful”, his words not mine. Her cancer Dr. credited this quick thinking by Dr. Tiller with saving her life, and due to this she didn’t even have to undergo chemotherapy.

Several years later my Mother and I were driving by his clinic in Wichita. Mom started complaining of chest pains, so I drove into his parking lot and ran in to get help. Dr. Tiller was by Mom’s side immediately, and stabilized her, before the heart attack could cause severe damage.

In 1980 I was pregnant with my first child. I had no insurance and couldn't afford a doctors appointment until I was approved for a medical card.. Mom told Dr. Tiller and he brought me into his office where he examined me, free of charge. I can credit him with the very first picture taken of my son.

The last story I have to share is about my friends who could not have children. Dr. Tiller’s office worked with several attorneys in the Wichita area to provide adoption services for his patients who wanted this option. My friends have a 10 yr. old boy now, who is loved and adored.

I’m not a great writer, so I apologize that this isn’t nearly as eloquent as some of the diaries on Daily Kos. I just wanted to get this story out to you, so you could hear how this man wasn’t just a tremendous fighter for women's rights. He was a brilliant physician, and a kind and compassionate human being. RIP Dr. Tiller and thank you for all you did for my friends and my family.

Commenter deekaa6

 at Balloon Juice, on his experiences with Dr. George Tiller:

In 1994 my wife and I found out that she was pregnant. The pregnancy was difficult and unusually uncomfortable but her doctor repeatedly told her things were fine. Sometime early in the 8th month my wife, an RN who at the time was working in an infertility clinic asked the Dr. she was working for what he thought of her discomfort. He examined her and said that he couldn’t be certain but thought that she might be having twins. We were thrilled and couldn’t wait to get a new sonogram that hopefully would confirm his thoughts. Two days later our joy was turned to unspeakable sadness when the new sonogram showed conjoined twins. Conjoined twins alone is not what was so difficult but the way they were joined meant that at best only one child would survive the surgery to separate them and the survivor would more than likely live a brief and painful life filled with surgery and organ transplants. We were advised that our options were to deliver into the world a child who’s life would be filled with horrible pain and suffering or fly out to Wichita Kansas and to terminate the pregnancy under the direction of Dr. George Tiller.

We made an informed decision to go to Kansas. One can only imagine the pain borne by a woman who happily carries a child for 8 months only to find out near the end of term that the children were not to be and that she had to make the decision to terminate the pregnancy and go against everything she had been taught to believe was right. This was what my wife had to do. Dr. Tiller is a true American hero. The nightmare of our decision and the aftermath was only made bearable by the warmth and compassion of Dr. Tiller and his remarkable staff. Dr. Tiller understood that this decision was the most difficult thing that a woman could ever decide and he took the time to educate us and guide us along with the other two couples who at the time were being forced to make the same decision after discovering that they too were carrying children impacted by horrible fetal anomalies. I could describe in great detail the procedures and the pain and suffering that everyone is subjected to in these situations. However, that is not the point of the post. We can all imagine that this is not something that we would wish on anyone. The point is that the pain and suffering were only mitigated by the compassion and competence of Dr. George Tiller and his staff. We are all diminished today for a host of reasons but most of all because a man of great compassion and courage has been lost to the world.

Profile Of The Killer

They've caught the guy who shot and killed Dr. Tiller. According to KWCH-TV:

Deputy Chief Tom Stolz w/ Wichita Police Dept. says Dr. Tiller died of a single gunshot wound. The Associated Press says the man detained in the Kansas City area is 51-year-old Scott Roeder of Merriam, Kansas, according to Law Enforcement authorities in the area. Roeder has not been formally charged with the killing at this time. Police say he was arrested without incident after a traffic stop.

Now, before reading further, take a guess at the personality of this guy.  See if this isn't predictable.  Via diarist FreeStateDem, Militia Watchdog previously reported of Roeder:

July 7, [1997], Kansas: Scott Roeder is sentenced to sixteen months in state prison for parole violations following a 1996 conviction for having bomb components in his car trunk. Roeder, a sovereign citizen and tax protester, violated his parole by not filing tax returns or providing his social security number to his employer.

He was also an active member of Operation Rescue; in 2007 a "Scott Roeder" posted this on the Operation Rescue website (which has been down throughout the day, probably more as a result of increased traffic than any sense of collective shame):

[May 19th, 2007 at 4:34 pm] Bleass everyone for attending and praying in May to bring justice to Tiller and the closing of his death camp. Sometime soon, would it be feasible to organize as many people as possible to attend Tillers church (inside, not just outside) to have much more of a presence and possibly ask questions of the Pastor, Deacons, Elders and members while there? Doesn’t seem like it would hurt anything but bring more attention to Tiller.

The Lawrence Journal-World and News relays that Kansas City station KMBC reported a post-it note with a phone number for Operation Rescue in his car at the time of his arrest.

He was a bombmaker, tax protester, member of the "sovereignity" movement, anti-abortion zealot and Operation Rescue member: the arrested suspect manages to fit every stereotype of right-wing militia teabagger.

Surprised?

Right Response, Wrong Response

National Right To Life Committee:

WASHINGTON – The National Right to Life Committee (NRLC), the nation's largest pro-life group, today condemned the killing of Dr. George Tiller.  The following statement may be attributed to NRLC Executive Director, David N. O'Steen, Ph.D.:
 
National Right to Life extends its sympathies to Dr. Tiller's family over this loss of life.
 
Further, the National Right to Life Committee unequivocally condemns any such acts of violence regardless of motivation.  The pro-life movement works to protect the right to life and increase respect for human life.  The unlawful use of violence is directly contrary to that goal.
 
The National Right to Life Committee has always been involved in peaceful, legal activities to protect human lives threatened by abortion, infanticide and euthanasia.  We always have and will continue to oppose any form of violence to fight the violence of abortion.  NRLC has had a policy of forbidding violence or illegal activity by its staff, directors, officers, affiliated state organizations and chapters.  NRLC's sole purpose is to protect innocent human life.
 
NRLC will continue to work through educational and legislative activities to ensure the right to life for unborn children, people with disabilities and older people.  NRLC will continue to work for peaceful solutions to aid pregnant women and their unborn children. These solutions involve helping women and their children and do not involve violence against anyone.

Operation Rescue:

Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue, led protests against George Tiller's late-term abortion clinic in Wichita in 1991.

Randall Terry, founder of Operation Rescue states, "George Tiller was a mass-murderer. We grieve for him that he did not have time to properly prepare his soul to face God. I am more concerned that the Obama Administration will use Tiller's killing to intimidate pro-lifers into surrendering our most effective rhetoric and actions. Abortion is still murder. And we still must call abortion by its proper name; murder.

"Those men and women who slaughter the unborn are murderers according to the Law of God. We must continue to expose them in our communities and peacefully protest them at their offices and homes, and yes, even their churches."

This Is Terrorism

Ann Friedman:

Dr. George Tiller, an outspoken advocate for abortion rights and one of the few late-term abortion providers in the country, was shot dead in church this morning.
Cara Kulwicki writes at Feministe:

This is the first time an abortion provider has been murdered in over a decade. I have friends who work in abortion clinics. This is terrorism. And right now, I just don't have the words.

The loss of Dr. Tiller is deeply upsetting, and Cara rightly identifies this as a terrorist act. It is the culmination of an ongoing campaign of intimidation and harassment against someone who was providing completely legal health-care services. I've been paying attention to the more militant strains of the anti-choice movement, so this news shouldn't have shocked me as much as it did. But, like Cara, I have friends who work and volunteer in abortion clinics. When violence against abortion providers was hitting a fever pitch 10 years ago, I was not strongly pro-choice identified. I remember reading about the murder of an abortion provider, but it certainly did not affect me the way this news has. Whether it's rational or not, today I'm afraid for everyone who works in a reproductive health clinic. And not only those who provide abortion.

I am also worried about what Tiller's murder means for women in Kansas and elsewhere in the country who need the services that he provided. The simple fact is there are almost no doctors who provide late-term abortions, especially in rural parts of the country. I was in Nebraska several years ago to interview Dr. Leroy Carhart (whose challenges to abortion-restricting laws went all the way to the Supreme Court), and Carhart and Tiller were the only two late-term providers in their region. If one wanted to go on vacation or got sick, the other had to fill in. There was no one else. Perhaps it would be a fitting memorial to Dr. Tiller to contribute to Medical Students for Choice, and encourage more doctors with a deep commitment to reproductive rights to become abortion providers.

Publius has some thoughts:

This violent act also bears quite directly on the whole "empathy" debate.  What's interesting about Obama's comments is that the empathy argument doubles as both a populist argument and a high-level theoretical assault on conservative jurisprudence. 

One tenet of both originalism and textualism is that consequences of constitutional interpretation should be irrelevant.  If you take both theories seriously, then you can't really allow consequences to affect your reasoning.  What matters -- the only thing that matters -- is what the text says, or what the text was originally understood to mean.  And for now, let's assume that conservatives take these theories seriously (rather than merely using them as window-dressing for political preferences).

The Kansas terrorism illustrates why it's important to look at the real world when interpreting the constitution.  For instance, there's a First Amendment dispute about whether and to what extent the government can limit abortion protests outside of clinics. 

The argument for aggressive protection (and thus a relaxing of First Amendment scrutiny) is that abortion protests have proven to be historically dangerous.  Doctors and staffers and patients face truly dangerous risks -- risks that were tragically reaffirmed today.  The law should recognize these concrete dangers and not pretend like these protests come straight out of a Norman Rockwell painting of a townhall meeting.  It's fun to argue about free speech in the abstract -- but we don't really have that luxury.

The real world matters.  It should be relevant.  It's somewhat amazing to have to argue this.  But that's where we are.

Ugly America

By now, you may have heard about the killing of Dr. George Tiller in Wichita, Kansas this morning.  It took place in (of all places) a church.

Dr. George Tiller has long been a target (literally and figuratively) of the religious right, Bill O'Reilly, Glenn Beck, and others because he performs late term abortions.  As Amanda Marcotte wrote:

[Tiller] is one of the two doctors in the country that specializes in the very small percentage of abortions performed late in pregnancy (but before viability) done for health reasons, usually because the pregnancy is a danger to a woman's health or life, or because the fetus is dead or dying.... He's been shot in both arms, stalked by the attorney general's office under Phill Kline ... and charged with the crime of performing a bunch of illegal abortions, for which he was acquitted.

This is perhaps something that needs to be emphasized: he performed abortions for women who wanted to have babies but couldn't.

While many abortion opponents are quick to condemn the killing (see, e.g., the Christian News Wire), the rank-and-file are, well, quite rank:

The comments on Free Republic are typically nauseating and vile as well.

This is a divided country on many issues.  But I don't see anyone on the left killing anyone on the right.  And if one did, there wouldn't be smatterings of applause.

In any event, if one is anti-abortion, I fail to see how this moves the ball forward.  More likely, the opposite.

As for the killer, who some will no doubt call a hero, all we know right now is this:

Wichita television station KAKE-TV reported that police were looking for a blue Ford Taurus with a K-State vanity plate, license number 225 BAB. Police described him as a white male in his 50s or 60s, 6 feet 1 inch tall, 220 pounds, wearing a white shirt and dark pants.

Latest Update:

KWCH Eyewitness News has confirmed the suspect in the shooting of Dr. George Tiller is in custody in the Kansas City area. Wichita police say the man was arrested near Gardner, KS at around 2:00 Sunday afternoon.

Crimes Committed During "Ferris Bueller's Day Off"

People are compiling a list.  So far:

By Ferris

Truancy

Many many many moving violations

Odometer fraud (tampering): 49 U.S.C. § 32703(2)

Odometer fraud (conspiracy): 49 U.S.C. § 32703(4)

Computer tampering (when he changes his attendance record): 720 ILCS 5/Art. 16D - 3

Car theft

Disorderly conduct (jumping on parade float): 720 ILCS 5/26‑1

Copyright violation (singing "Twist and Shout" on said float)

Trespassing

By Cameron

Violation of 720 ILCS 5/32-5.1: False Impersonation of a Peace Officer. A person who knowingly and falsely represents himself or herself to be a peace officer commits a Class 4 felony. (At the restaurant, on the phone with the Maitre D' he says, "This is Sgt. Peterson, Chicago Police.")

By Mulroony

Failure to report suspected child abuse (on thinking that Sloane and her dad had an incestuous relationship): 325 ILCS 5; see also 720 ILCS 640

Breaking and entering 

Binghamton Shootings

Death toll up to 13, some reports say.  It's not even clear, as I write this, if the situation is over with.  Some reports say a man was arrested, some say two men were arrested, and still others say there is a hostage situation.  [UPDATE 2:45 pm -- Now hearing it was a single gunman, and he is dead.]

It's too early -- waaaay to early -- to ascribe motive, but since the shooting took place at The American Civic Association -- a business that helps immigrants and refugees with counseling, resettlement, citizenship, family reunification, interpreters and translators -- it's a reasonable guess that the shooter was either a disgruntled immigrant, or a rightwinger with a bone to pick with immigrants. [UPDATE 4:00 pm -- NBC and FOX are reporting the shooter, now dead, was a 42 year old Vietnamese immigrant named Jiverly Voong.  Apparently this was on his driver's license, which suggests he was a legal immigrant.]

Anyway, there seems to be a spate of these lately.  Disturbing....

NC Nursing Home Shooting And Other Mass Killings

Somehow, this possible motive doesn't make the killings any less senseless.

Speaking of senseless killing, I'm not looking forward to next month.

On April 19, 1993, following a 51-day standoff, federal agents raided the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas. A fire, later determined to have been set by the Davidians, destroyed the compound and killed 57 of its residents.

On April 19, 1995, a bomb inside a rental truck exploded at the Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City, killing 168 people in what was then the worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil.  The killer turned out to be 27-year-old Timothy McVeigh. McVeigh’s ex-Army buddy, Terry Nichols, was also charged in the crime.

On April 20, 1999, two armed highschool seniors, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, walked through Columbine High School in Littleton, Colo. In the end, 12 students, one teacher and the two murderers were dead.

And on April 16, 2007, a 23-year-old South Korean student killed 32 people at Virginia Tech.

The first three are all connected.  McVeigh picked the April 19 date as a symbolic protest against what had happened at Waco two years earlier.  And Kelbold and Harris picked April 20 (the first school day after the 19th) to conduct the Columbine massacre -- although they had no political angle, it was their hope and desire to "outdo" McVeigh.

It doesn't appear that Sueng-Hui Cho, the Virginia Tech killer, picked his date in relation to any of the prior outrages.

Still, with next April 20 being the tenth anniversary of Columbine, who knows what some unhinged elements of our society might do.  In England, they've already thwarted one attempt to do a school bombing on April 20.

There's obviously been a lot of public programs designed to prevent another such occurence.  And that's a good thing.

But still.... if I were a high school student, I would seriously consider staying home on April 20.

Today's Favorite Lede Paragraph Of A News Story

AP:

FAIRFIELD, Conn. - Police in Connecticut say a woman attempting to reconcile with her husband handcuffed herself to him as he slept and then bit him on his torso and arms.

Yeah.  Um.  Yeah.  For some strange reason, her attempt at reconciliation didn't work.

Ok, ok.  Here's the 911 call...

2,116 North Carolina Sex Offenders Are On MySpace

CNN has the story:

More than 2,100 registered North Carolina sex offenders were found on the social networking site MySpace, the state attorney general's office said Tuesday.

In response to a subpoena from state Attorney General Roy Cooper, "MySpace turned over the names, IP and e-mail addresses of 2,116 convicted North Carolina sex offenders found on its social networking Web site," Cooper's office said in a written statement.

Cooper has requested similar information from Facebook, another popular social networking site, the statement said.

MySpace has told North Carolina authorities that the sex offenders it identified have been removed from the site.

***

North Carolina passed a law last year banning sex offenders within the state from social networking sites where children are members, making it a felony offense.

My first reaction is: OMG?  There are that many sex offenders in North Carolina?

I mean, 2,100 is a high number -- especially since it represents only those who are on MySpace.

But I went to the NC Sex Offender Registry, and found out that 27 registered sex offenders live within 5 miles of my house.

Very disconcerting....

What Hath Rush, Hannity And O'Reilly Wrought?

James Adkisson has been sentenced to life behind bars for the deaths of Greg McKendry and Linda Kraeger, the Unitarian Universalist church-goers who died during his assault on their church in Knoxville, TN last July.

What Adkisson left behind is his four-page handwritten manifesto, which can be read here (PDF format).  It's a reiteration of the talking points of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly, Ann Coulter and the whole hateful bunch.  This guy actually absorbed their eliminationist rhetoric and turned into action -- a killing spree in a "progressive" church. 

Some excerpts:

"Know this if nothing else: This was a hate crime. I hate the damn left-wing liberals. There is a vast left-wing conspiracy in this country & these liberals are working together to attack every decent & honorable institution in the nation, trying to turn this country into a communist state. Shame on them....

"This was a symbolic killing. Who I wanted to kill was every Democrat in the Senate & House, the 100 people in Bernard Goldberg's book. I'd like to kill everyone in the mainstream media. But I know those people were inaccessible to me. I couldn't get to the generals & high ranking officers of the Marxist movement so I went after the foot soldiers, the chickenshit liberals that vote in these traitorous people. Someone had to get the ball rolling. I volunteered. I hope others do the same. It's the only way we can rid America of this cancerous pestilence."

"I thought I'd do something good for this Country Kill Democrats til the cops kill me....Liberals are a pest like termites. Millions of them Each little bite contributes to the downfall of this great nation. The only way we can rid ourselves of this evil is to kill them in the streets. Kill them where they gather. I'd like to encourage other like minded people to do what I've done. If life aint worth living anymore don't just kill yourself. do something for your Country before you go. Go Kill Liberals."

Adkisson also admits this: "This was an act of political protest."  Therefore, by his own admission, he was committing an act of domestic terrorism.

That's right.  Let history record that the right-wing talking heads incited an act of domestic terrorism.  Reflect on that.

Dispatch From Red America

Life in NC is a Del Shores play:

NC man shot by his stepfather ends up in same jail

JACKSONVILLE, N.C. – A man who police said was shot by his stepfather ended up in the same jail with him after officers discovered outstanding arrest warrants against the victim. Police told The Daily News of Jacksonville that 37-year-old Richard Hayes shot his stepson Thursday night.

Authorities say 21-year-old Michael Bass was holding a bloody towel to his abdomen when paramedics arrived, saying his stepfather shot him.

Deputies then discovered Bass had for failing to appear in court and took him to jail after he was treated and released from the hospital.

Police said Hayes told investigators he has a bad neck and shot his stepson because he thought Bass wanted to fight him.

The men remain in jail. It's unclear if they have attorneys.

Blago Arrest

I guess everyone knows about the arrest this morning of Illinois governor Rod R. Blagojevich and his Chief of Staff, John Harris -- on corruption charges.

What surprises me was how blatant his corruption was.  I mean, the governor of Illinois gets to choose who fills Obama's now-empty Senate seat, so he literally auctioned it off.

Or as the governor himself said (according to wiretaps): "I've got this thing and it's [expletive] golden, and, uh, uh, I'm just not giving it up for [expletive] nothing. I'm not gonna do it."

And noting that he was under political fire for suspected corruption, he thought maybe the Senate seat would serve as an escape hatch for himself: "And, and I can always use it. I can parachute me there."

Don't think that's gonna happen, now, governor.

Breaking News: O.J. Sentenced

A good long one, too.  16 years.  Eligible for parole in 6 years.  Good.

I guess it's really good for the "real killers" who won't have O.J. on their trail for a few years.

You Remember How They Used To Say That Things Would Go On Your "Permanent Record"?

In one case, it's frighteningly true.

Georgia law tries to keep sexual offenders from living within 1,000 feet of a child-care facility.

Noble idea.

The problem is what Georgia deems a "sex offender".

Wendy Whitaker was 17, a sophomore in high school.  And one day, she performed consensual oral sex on another sophomore.  The other student was 16, five months shy of turning 17.  They were caught.  Wendy was charged with the crime of sodomy under Georgia law.  She pled guilty and had five years probation.

Because Wendy, at age 17, had engaged in a sexual offense with a minor (the 16 year old), she has to register with Georgia's "sex offender" database.

Wendy is 29 now.  She's never has engaged in any sexual crimes since then.  In fact, Georgia modified its "sex offender" laws in 2006, adding a "Romeo and Juliet" clause.  The "Romeo and Juliet" clause basically states that teenagers of like age who commit sodomy are not required to register as sex offenders. 

But that clause was made retrooactive only to 2001.  Wendy's "act" took place twelve years ago, in 1996, so she must register as a sex offender for life.  That means her face will be on the internet for life as a "sex offender", she is required by law to notify all her employers, etc.

And, as stated, she can't live within 1,000 feet of a school, child care facility, pools, gyms, or other places where minors congregate.

Wendy is married now.  She and her husband have a house within 1,000 feet of a child-care facility.  She believed it was okay, because there is an exception for homeowners (basically, it is unconstitutional for the government to take your property, even if you are a registered "sex offender", and Wendy's name is on the deed).

Long story short, there is a 29 year old woman in Georgia who is facing eviction -- on Thanksgiving no less -- because twelve years ago she gave a blowjob to a fellow high school student.

Something went wrong with the system, I would say.  The Southern Center for Human Rights is on the case.

The Georgia sex offender law is extreme in other ways, too.  It prohibits church volunteering in any form.  It prohibits registrants from giving full voice to their faith by singing in the church choir, playing the piano, or reading scripture before a church congregation.  Stupid.  Even for a real sex offender (which Wendy Whitaker is not), I'm not so sure it is a good idea to isolate them from the rehabilitative influence of faith-based organizations.

Georgia needs to look at this.

Senator Stevens (R-AK) Who Immortalized "The Internet Is A Series Of Tubes" Is Convicted

As the Wall Street Journal notes, this has some historical significance.  Sen. Stevens is a sitting senator, one of only five in all of history to be convicted of a crime, and the first since 1981.

Stevens is 84 years old -- soon to be 85 on Nov. 15 -- and is the longest-serving Republican with almost 40 years in the Senate representing Alaska.

He's been running for re-election this year, despite the trial.  His Democratic challenger has been edging ahead by 1 or 2 points in the polls, but Stevens' conviction will, I'm guessing, lock it up for the Democrat.  This means Democrats are one seat closer to the ideal 60 seats.

Here's Stevens from this past summer, pallin' around with a friend of his, who once served as director of the 527 group Ted Stevens Excellence in Public Service, Inc.

I Was About To Weigh In On The Ashley Todd Story....

You know what I mean, right?

Ashley is a 20 year old McCain volunteer.  In the wee hours of yesterday morning, she stopped at an ATM in Pittsburgh "on the wrong side of town" and was robbed.  Sixty dollars were taken.

The reason it made headlines (asn was HEAVILY promoted by Drudge) was this: she claimed that her assailant (a black man) saw the McCain sticker on her car, and went ballistic on her.  He beat her and even carved a 'B' (for "Barack" presumably) on her face.

Oh, those Obama supporters.  They're so unhinged.

Right away, I smelled something rotten about her story.

First of all, this woman twittered the whole thing.  Her Twitter page has been taken down since then, but The Smoking Gun managed to screen capture it.  Key entries (most recent entry is first):

atodd: Thanks to everyone for your thoughts and prayers- I'm phonebanking so let's all work together and get John McCain elected #litf08
Thu, 23 Oct 2008 18:55:41 +0000
*

atodd: Oh the blog I will be making soon... Its been a rough night #litf08
Thu, 23 Oct 2008 03:52:58 +0000
*

atodd: Pretty sure I'm on the wrong side of pittsburgh
Thu, 23 Oct 2008 00:45:59 +0000
*

atodd: Stubbornly searching for a bank of america to avoid ATM fees.
Thu, 23 Oct 2008 00:23:21 +0000

Now, I know we live in a world where people give status updates, but it is odd that she would that she would give a status update about GOING TO THE BANK as well as her REASONS FOR BEING ON THE WRONG SIDE OF TOWN (i.e., to avoid ATM fees).  People typically don't twitter such insignificant things.

Then, of course, came the picture of her post-crime injuries:

 

The Obama campaign release this statement: ""This is a horrendous act of violence. Our thoughts and prayers are with the young woman for her to make a speedy recovery, and we hope that the person who perpetrated this crime is swiftly apprehended and brought to justice."

The McCain campaign called the attack "sick and disgusting".

Okay..... but hold on.  Notice anything about the 'B' that was allegedly carved in her cheek?

It's backwards.  Gee, it's as if the 'B' had been carved by someone looking in a mirror.

Undeterred by the obvious fish-smilliness, conservative bloggers went ballistic over this, somehow equating this attack with the kind of nutjobs that Obama supporters really are.

At Redstate, theycomplained about the media -- how it covers McCain supports who shout "Kill him", but they never cover the supposedly violent protests of Obama supporters.

Jim Kouri at Renew America:

Once again, the mainstream news media are bending over backwards — except for Fox News Channel, talk radio and the blogospehere — to avoid covering a breaking crime story that occurred in western Pennsylvania that may cause Barack Obama political problems....

....Watch how the news media attempt to discredit and smear this woman with the help of their comrades in the Democrat Party.

Dan Riehl writes (in a post "Thugs For Change"):

Well, I'm sure the Kos Kidz will get some real laughs out of this. Obama's run his campaign just like a street thug out of Chicago. Now we get to see what some of his worst supporters are like.

Over at Powerline, Hindraker writes:

I also think that a great many voters, some of them heretofore uncommitted, will see this incident as symbolic of a race in which every voter who has not jumped on the Obama bandwagon has been subject to various forms of harassment and bullying. Americans, generally speaking, don't like to be bullied. This, as much as anything, explains why the McCain campaign still has a chance.

Some more cautiously, the exectiive VP of Fox News wrote this:

It had to happen.

Less than two weeks before we vote for a new president, a white woman says a black man attacked her, then scarred her face, and says there was a political motive for it.

Ashley Todd, a 20-year-old white volunteer for John McCain’s presidential campaign, says she was mugged at an ATM machine in Pittsburgh (my hometown) by a big black man. She further says he threw her down, then disfigured her by carving the letter “B” into her face with a sharp implement when he saw that she supported McCain, not Barack Obama.

Part of the appeal of, and the unspoken tension behind, Senator Obama’s campaign is his transformational status as the first African-American to win a major party’s presidential nomination.

That does not mean that he has erased the mutual distrust between black and white Americans, and this incident could become a watershed event in the 11 days before the election.

If Ms. Todd’s allegations are proven accurate, some voters may revisit their support for Senator  Obama, not because they are racists (with due respect to Rep. John Murtha), but because they suddenly feel they do not know enough about the Democratic nominee.

If the incident turns out to be a hoax, Senator McCain’s quest for the presidency is over, forever linked to race-baiting.

[Emphasis mine]

[UPDATE:  Credit where credit is due --  Michelle Malkin -- one of those most fire-breathing unhinged conservative pundits out there never once bought into the story, to her credit.

Anyway, I was in the middle of writing this post on my suspicions about Ms. Todd's claim, when the news came out:

Police: Campaign Worker Admits Making Up Story

A Pittsburgh police commander told KDKA Investigator Marty Griffin that Ashley Todd confessed to making up the story & is facing charges

PITTSBURGH (KDKA) ― Police sources tell KDKA that a campaign worker has now confessed to making up a story that a mugger attacked her and cut the letter "B" in her face after seeing her McCain bumper sticker.

Ashley Todd, 20, of Texas, initially told police that she was robbed at an ATM in Bloomfield and that the suspect became enraged and started beating her after seeing her GOP sticker on her car.

Police investigating the alleged attack, however, began to notice some inconsistencies in her story and administered a polygraph test.

Authorities, however, declined to release the results of that test.

Investigators did say that they received photos from the ATM machine and "the photographs were verified as not being the victim making the transaction."

This afternoon, a Pittsburgh police commander told KDKA Investigator Marty Griffin that Todd confessed to making up the story.

The commander added that Todd will face charges; but police have not commented on what those charges will be.   

Yeah, I saw that coming...

This campaign worker was attempting (I hope without endorsement by the McCain campaign) to create a Willie Horton moment, a political game-changer in the state of Pennsylvania.  It backfired.  It became a Tawana Brawley/Duke rape moment.  And THAT's the story that will be talked about.  Just the sort of things that hurts McCain.

I Would Have Acquitted Ivins

Yesterday, the Federal Bureau of Investigation outlined a pattern of bizarre and deceptive conduct by Bruce E. Ivins, an Army microbiologist who killed himself last week, in an attempt to show, in the court of public opinion, that Ivins (and Ivins alone) was behind the 2001 anthrax-by-mail attacks which killed 6 people.

I'm not saying that Ivins was innocent.  I'm just saying that ALL the evidence against Ivins was circumstantial:

* The FBI Identified a "genetically unique" parent material used in attacks called RMR-1029 from single, specific flask; "created and solely maintained by Dr. Ivins;" "no one received material from that flask without going through Dr. Ivins;" ruled out all persons who could have had access to flask, except Ivins

The piece of evidence required the creation/refinement of new scientific techniques allowing more definitive identification of specific DNA family of anthrax used in mailings; these techniques were not available earlier in the case, until 2005 when the FBI had this "breakthrough".  So forensically, this "new scientific technique" is basically untried, and one has to wonder how flawed it might be.

* Ivins skilled in techniques necessary to create weaponized spores; Ivins had access to freeze-drying machine called "lyopholizer" used to create dry spores from wet material; other technicians consulted him on the proper use of this machinery, demonstrating his expertise

Yeah, he had access to a lyopholizer, because WaPo even acknowledged, Ivins:

did at least one project for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency that would have given him reason to use the drying equipment, according to a former colleague in his lab.

Glenn Greenwald did a little investigative work of his own on this matter:

This morning I spoke with Dr. Luke D. Jasenosky of the Harvard School of Medicine's Immune Disease Institute. Dr. Jasenosky said that it is "very common" for someone engaged in the vaccine research of the type Ivins did to use a lyophilizer, and that he "would actually be surprised if they weren't using one."

* In days leading up to each mailing, Ivins was working "inordinate" number of off-hours, particularly at night and also on weekends, in the lab; records show he did not work such hours either before or after the attacks; Ivins was never able to provide "satisfactory" answer as to why he was working strange hours

Circumstantial.  And of course, no answer would be "satisfactory" to an investigative body trying to pin a crime on someone

* Demonstrated "consciousness of guilt" -- examples: during search, took "highly unusual" steps to hide book on DNA coding; submitted "questionable sample" of his parent spores to FBI when requested (presumably to deliberately get a false negative on a comparative test)

Circumstantial and a matter of opinion; hardly factual evidence

* Made "far-reaching" efforts to blame others and deflect attention from himself

Isn't that what an innocent person might do, too?

* Made detailed threats to kill people in his group therapy sessions

This allegation comes exclusive from a social worker in those group therapy sessions, Jean Duley, who took out a retraining order against Ivins two weeks ago (a week before Ivins commited suicide).  But Duley is no model citizen; she's got a string of DWI arrests, as well as charges for spousal battery, and possession of drug paraphenalia with intent to use.  Furthermore, her retraining order against Duley was made only after the FBI, who was targetting Ivins, suggest that she make it.

Duey, by the way, never actually heard Ivins make death threats.  She was told by some third party that Ivins made those threats.  THAT is what we call hearsay, and it would have been inadmissible in court.

* Ivins had a history of mental health problems

Well, depression and anxiety, for which he was treated with medication, which he took.  Like millions of other Americans. 

* Throughout his adult life, had frequently driven to other locations to send packages under assumed names to disguise his identity as the sender; admitted to using psuedonyms; was a prolific writer to Congress and the media (thus demonstrating his interests and habits seemed congruent with the "Amerithrax" mailer)

Actually, Ivins had PO boxes under an assumed name.... to receive porn.  Oooooohhhh.

* Envelopes used in attacks were all pre-franked sold only by post offices during 9-month period in 2001; analysis shows defects in ink on pre-printed portions of envelopes; this defect is similar to defects in printing sold by the post office in the Frederick, MD area (where Ivins lived and maintained a PO box); spokesman calls it "very likely" envelopes were purchased in Frederick MD

Why is it "very likely"?  Because both things have a connection to Frederick, MD?

Now, that's just some of the so-called "evidence" against Ivins, and most of it is circumstantial.  The only forensic evidence was the questionable and untested "new scientific technique" which linked the anthrax to that particular lab, not necessarily to Ivins.  (In fact, the NYT today reports that more than 100 people had access to that particular strain of anthrax in the lab).

And, of course, Ivins use of the lyopholizer, which, as I said, he would have used anyway for legitimate purposes.

But what is more alarming is what the FBI couldn't get in terms of hard evidence against Ivins:

*  The FBI couldn't place him in Princeton NJ, where the anthrax letters were mailed

*  They couldn't find a single spore of the particular anthrax strain in Ivin's car or house.

All in all, not a whole lot of things there -- certainly not enough to convict.  (And indeed, the Grand Jury still hadn't handed down an indictment against Ivins, so there's no telling if they were convinced).

It should also be remembered that the FBI set its sites on another suspect back in 2002 -- Steven Hatfill.   Hatfill responded by fighting fire with fire -- he held press conferences and initiated many legal efforts, culminiating in getting the FBI to not only back off.  In short, the FBI got it wrong.

But Ivins was a different kind of guy, a gentler man.  When he became the target, Ivins got depressed. Then killed himself, apparently.

Again, I'm not saying Ivins was innocent.  I'm just saying that, based on what the FBI has presented to date, I wouldn't have convicted.

For some interesting reading on this subject, I suggest the blog of Dr. Meryl Ness, who is (like Ivins) a specialist in the field of anthrax vaccines.  And Glenn Greenwald (see link above) is all over it too.

Let Us Not Bicker About Who Killed Who

Wow.  This paragraph is astounding:

In other words, the Adkisson case provides a case study in the secular demonology of the left. We’re seeing the politics of hatred in action. It’s marked by demands for vengeance and modes of discourse seeking to protect the perceived purity of the liberal sensibility. It is irreligious and opportunistic. It is the repudiation of decency. It is the absence of divine soul. With it, we see the Bush adminstration, John McCain, Bill O’Reilly, and Fox News attacked as the manifestation of the Fourth Reich.

He's talking about the killing in Tennessee the other day, where Jim David Adkisson walked into a Unitarian Church and opened fire, killing two.  Adkisson wanted to commit suicide-by-cop, and chose that church for one reason and one reason only: because it was "liberal" (it welcomed, for example, gays).  Adkisson's home was later searched and found to have the standard conservative fare -- books by O'Reilly, and Michael Savage and so on.  Adkisson hated liberals.

And liberals on the Internet, myself included, have pointed out this fact.

But somehow by making this point, it is the liberals engaging in the politics of hatred, not the man who shot at liberals because they were liberals.  That's what the above paragraph is trying to say.

No, sir.  The "politics of hatred in action" happened on Sunday in a little church in Tennessee.  Not on the Internets.  Adkisson's actions were the by-product of an entire market -- in books, radio, and television -- to demonize liberals.  It's a market replete with eliminationist rhetoric, like the time Ann Coulter quipped (as a "joke", of course) that "we need somebody to put rat poisoning in Justice Stevens' creme brulee"

Or when Limbaugh said (as a "joke", of course):

"I tell people don’t kill all the liberals. Leave enough so we can have two on every campus -- living fossils -- so we will never forget what these people stood for."

Try as they might to plead that nobody point out the obvious, conservative pundits simply can't escape the fact that Adkisson, while clearly mentally ill, was a creature of the rightwing hate machine industry.  And it's not a stretch to lay indirect blame at the feet of those incidiary conservatives who talk (you know, as a joke) about killing, maiming, incarcerating, deporting liberals.  When you start hearing this stuff enough, it's not surprising when some people stop thinking you're "joking" (because, after all, it isn't funny to begin with), and starting thinking it's serious.

The Sun Will Come Out Tomorrow

A nice blog report about the services at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church.  As you may know, the gunman interrupted a church performance of "Annie" which (obviously) never reached the final curtain.

Today, the kids sang "Tomorrow".  That's very Unitarian.

Shootings at Unitarian Church In Tennessee

You know, it's both laughable and disturbing that pundits like Michelle Malkin can make their daily bread by referring to liberals as the "unhinged left", accompanyed by such adjectives as "deranged" and so on.

When was the last time a disgruntled liberal started shooting people he disagreed with politically or socially?  Ever???  It just seems to me that even at its most fringiest extreme, the left just doesn't do eliminatiost rhetoric.  But you find a LOT of that on the right side of the spectrum.

And it's not just talk.  Yesterday, as posted on The Moderate Voice, there was a shoot-up in a Knoxville church.  Two people were killed; several injured, somce remain in critical condition.

Terrible news this morning. Some man entered our church with a shotgun and started shooting

I was not there this morning as we had friends visiting from out of town. But we seriously considered attending with our friends. This is such a shock to the community here. Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church is such a welcoming community. Though it’s decidedly more liberal than East Tennessee as a whole, we have very good relations with the rest of the community. I don’t understand why anybody would do this. All we know right now is that the suspect was not connected to the church in any way. I have no idea if the man had some sort of political or cultural agenda (TVUUC had just put up a sign welcoming gays to the congregation), or if it’s just some lunatic acting for no reason at all.

This morning we learned the answer to the reason why:

The shotgun-wielding suspect in Sunday’s mass shooting at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist Church was motivated by a hatred of “the liberal movement,” and he planned to shoot until police shot him, Knoxville Police Chief Sterling P. Owen IV said this morning.

Jim D. Adkisson, 58, of Powell wrote a four-page letter in which he stated his “hatred of the liberal movement,” Owen said. “Liberals in general, as well as gays.”

Atkinson entered the church during a performance of "Annie, Jr."

While I can understand that there are bigots out there who dislike gays, I just can't understand the mentality of someone who would shoot up a children's musical, in a church, because of their hatred for gays.  Boggles the minds.

UPDATE:  Being closest to a UU member myself (to the extent I am affiliated with any religion), I was touched by rousing defense of the religions, as expressed by Sara at Ornicus:

We are an odd group, we Unitarians.

Conventional wisdom says that we're soft in all the places our society values toughness. Our refusal to adhere to any dogma must mean that we're soft in our convictions. Our reflexive open-mindedness is often derided as evidence that we're soft in the head. Our persistent and gentle insistence on liberal values is evidence of hearts too soft to set boundaries. And all of this together leads to a public image of a mushy gathering of feckless intellectuals that somehow lacks cohesion, backbone, focus, or purpose.

You can only believe this if you don't know either the history or the modern reality of Unitarian Universalism. The faith's early founders, Michael Servitus and Francis David, were executed for the radical notion that belief in the Trinity -- which excluded Muslims and Jews -- should not be a requirement for participation in 16th century public life. Four hundred years later, in the same part of the world, other Unitarians died in concentration camps for having the courage of their humanist convictions. Viola Liuzzo, a 39-year-old mother from Michigan who was killed by the Klan in the days following the Selma march in 1965, was one of ours, too.

And then there are the thousands of us who lived to fight another day -- surviving not because we were weak and indecisive, but because we were unshakable in our convictions and unwilling to back down out of sheer cussedness. That Unitarian-bred belief in the nobility of the human spirit was the spiritual foundation on which a plurality of America's founders found sure footing as their convictions crystallized into revolution against tyranny. It fueled the passionate oratory of Daniel Webster, the wisdom of Ben Franklin, and the incisively clear writings of Tom Paine. It sent Paul Revere out into the cold of an April evening, and set Thomas Jefferson to the task of writing a Declaration. It recklessly bet the church's entire existence -- and the lives of its leaders, who willingly and knowingly committed a capital act of treason -- in order to publish the Pentagon Papers.

Unitarianism and Universalism lit the spark of progressive change that drove Susan B. Anthony, Lucy Stone, and Julia Ward Howe to organize for women's rights. It sent Jane Addams, Dorothea Dix, Albert Schweitzer, and Clara Barton forth to bring health and hope to the poor. It gave voice to poets from Whitman to Plath to cummings, novelists from Dickens to Melville to Vonnegut, and musicians from Bartok to Grieg to Seeger. It fueled the boundless imaginations of Bucky Fuller and Rod Serling and Frank Lloyd Wright. It kept Christopher Reeve alive and breathing and working for his causes. I still hear it crackling hot and fresh every time UU-bred Keith Olbermann goes on one of his trademark rants.

These are not fearful people. Nor do any of them seem to be bedeviled by a lack of conviction. "Mushy" or "feckless" are about the last words I'd use to describe any of them. ("Stupid" isn't anywhere on the list, either.) When you sign up to become a UU, this is the legacy you take on, and from then on attempt to live up to. It's not God's job to make the world a better place. It's yours. This has never been work for the faint of heart, mind, or spirit -- and in this era of conservatism gone crazy, it still isn't.

I'm thinking about all this tonight as I sift through the incoming news that seven people were shot when 58-year-old Jim Adkisson pulled a shotgun out of a guitar case and opened fire during a kids' performance at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist church this morning. Two have died; four are in critical condition as I write this.

One of the dead, Greg McKendry, apparently took a shotgun blast full in the chest while trying to shield other members from the line of fire. Three other members of the congregation almost immediately charged the gunman and took him down, breaking his arm in the process. Still other members acted sanely and calmly to quickly get the dozens of children out of the sanctuary, and summon the police.

Those are the Unitarians I know. Smart, tough, fearless, calm in a crisis, committed to right action. It could have been any UU church in America, and they'd have behaved pretty much the same way.

It could have been any UU church in America -- and that's the problem.

***

After 25 years of right-wing eliminationist rhetoric about liberal hunting licenses and scaring us out of our treason and keeping a few of us alive as museum exhibits, it's natural that some of us would jump to the thought that maybe, at long last, somebody finally decided to grab a shotgun and go bag himself some libruls -- and decided (not unreasonably) that down at the local UU church, they'd be as thick on the ground as quail on one of Dick Cheney's private hunting trips.

Whatever the reasons turn out to be, there are at least two lessons I hope y'all take away from today's events.

One is that you can bet that the members of this congregation will find a novel way to approach their healing -- and in doing so, they'll set example for the rest of us to watch carefully. If (when) mental illness becomes the issue, they will respond to this man and his family with compassion and justice, because that's the UU way. And if hate turns out to be part of the story, too, then Knoxville, TN is about to have a dialog on hate crime that will leave nobody in town untouched or uninvolved. That's the UU way, too.

The other is that this congregation's cool, brave response shows, once again, that it's past time to drop that old stereotype, and stop underestimating the courage and intelligence of the religious left in America. We've gotten incredibly short shrift over the past few decades -- not only from the religious right, which thinks we're the minions of Satan on earth; but also from fellow progressives, who think that "religious" is a synonym for crazy, dangerous, irrational, and definitely not an asset to the movement.

Secular progressives don't seem to understand that while politics is all about how we're going to make the world better, progressive religion tells us why it's necessary to work for change, and what "better" will look like when we get there. Liberal faith traditions offer the essential metaphors and worldview that everything else derives from -- the frames that give our dreams shape and meaning. It has an invaluable role to play in helping our movement set its values and priorities, understand where we are in the larger scheme, and gauge whether we're succeeding or not.

The conservative movement knew from the get that it would not succeed unless it could offer people this kind of deeper narrative. Providing that was one of the most important things the religious right brought to their party. Progressivism will not defeat it until we can offer another narrative about what America can and should be -- and our liberal churches have longer, harder, better experience than anyone at developing and communicating those stories, and building thriving -- and on occasions like today, literally bulletproof -- communities around them.

And then there's that long, tough history to draw on. The UUs, along with the Congregationalists and Quakers, have been at the beating heart of American liberalism since before the country was founded. We've faced down the ignorant and the arrogant, the terrified and the unreasonable, the cops and the courts and the Congress so many times that it's not even news any more. Civil disobedience is built into our bones (yes, *sigh,* Thoreau was one of ours, too), and we've come to regard it as one of our more important sacraments. These days, it's not only in our defense of gay rights and our gathering fury about torture, but also in our leadership role in the New Sanctuary Movement defending immigrants from ICE raids.

If the right wing ever does turn its anti-liberal crusade into a shooting war, it's easy to predict that the country's UU churches will be among their first targets. What's less predictable -- unless you know the people, the theology, and the history, or took careful note of everything that happened in Tennessee today -- is just how surprisingly fierce and fearless that response is likely to be.

Grief and pride taste strange together, but I am full of both for the people of the Tennessee Valley UUC tonight. After all, it could be any UU church in America. That's the bad news. It's the good news, too.

Also, local blogger James Protzman adds:

When I talked with my daughter today about this Tennessee shooting, the only word she could find between her tears was the word "ironic." She can't understand how one of the most peaceful of all spiritual homes could be viciously assaulted by a person who believes liberals are the source of all the world's problems. She also wondered aloud about all the other deaths that can be laid at the feet of right-wing political hate. Abraham Lincoln. Martin Luther King. John Kennedy. Robert Kennedy. Will it ever stop? she asked.

I hope so, but I fear not.

Maybe the man who committed this crime is indeed insane, which would at least make a modicum of sense. But I suspect he is not. I suspect he is a product of an angry and hate-filled conservative movement headed by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and John McCain, people who joke openly about murder, assassination, and genocide. And I suspect it will get worse before it gets better. Lunatics on the right are already expressing hope that President Obama will be shot within hours after being sworn in. Some are no doubt plotting to bring their hopes to fruition.

Those very same lunatics are also using this tragedy to make their case for fewer restrictions on guns. Preachers, they say, need to face the harsh realities of life in these United States and start packing heat behind their pulpits. Only then, in a perverse echo of mutually assured destruction, will peaceful congregations be safe from their kind.

I can't help linking all of this madness back to the misguided ego trip taken by Christian churches more than a thousand years ago. Back before they put earthly possessions and power ahead of paradise and peace, evangelical leaders had the chance to be an unequivocal force for good in the world. Today, however, far too many are anything but. It's deja vu all over again, Crusades on Parade, with so many Christian soldiers armed and ready to kill at the drop of a hint.

This isn't just another crazy conservative off his meds. This is politics, pure and simple.

Necrophilia In Wisconsin

Hi, guys.  It's quite obvious, looking at you, why you are unable to have sex with an actual living girl....

And I know, man.  We've all been there, especially at the awkward pimply face age.

But, I gotta tell you, digging up girls to have sex with?  So, not cool.

Their intended victim was a 20 year old nursing assistant who was killed in a motorcycle accident.  That's a tragedy as it is, but the story gets even more twisted....

A few days after Tennessen's death, three Wisconsin men spotted her obituary, and obviously found her quite attractive, and decided to dig up Tennessen's body to have sex with her. Nicholas Grunke ( son of a Methodist minister), his twin brother Alex, and their friend Dustin Radke all plotted this disgusting act.

Police said the three Wisconsin men were carrying shovels, a crowbar, and a box of condoms to the cemetary to dig up the dead body of Laura Tennessen, who had died the week before in the motorcycle wreck.

Nicholas Grunke had viewed her photo in the obituary and asked his brother and friend to aid in helping dig up her corpse so that he could have sexual intercourse with it.

The three guys used shovels to reach her grave, but were not able to pry open the vault. After seeing the abandoned car, police questioned Alex Grunke, who was acting very nervous, and he admitted to police the scheme, and that his cohorts were digging up Tennessen's coffin.

Now, the reason I write about this, aside from my natural moral outrage, is because of the legal aspects of it.

It seems that Wisconsin (where these events took place) has no law against necrophilia.  So what's a prosecutor to do?

Well, curious about the legal aspects of this case (which the media only glazed over), I perused the recent opinion (pdf).

The State of Wisconsin charged the young men with (a) attempted theft and (b) attempted third degree sexual assault.  They were convicted of attempted theft (which carries a light penalty), so let's forget about that.

As to the other more serious charge (attempted third degree sexual assault), the trial court dismissed it, holding that it does not apply when the intended victim is deceased. 

On appeal, the Wisconsin Court of Appeals affirmed.  The higher court noted that, under the statute, sexual assault (or attempts thereof) is a crime if the victim does not give consent to sex.  But the statute also says that "consent is not an issue" in certain circumstances.  For example, if the victim is unconscious or mentally impaired or intoxicated, lack of consent by the victim is presumed.  Unfortunately, being dead was not listed as one of those circumstances where lack of consent is presumed. 

Confounding the analysis is another part of the statute which says that the "entire statute" applies regardless of whether the victim is dead or alive at the time of the attempted sexual contact.

A bit confusing?  Yeah, that's what the Court of Appeals thought.  But they came to the conclusion that the crime of sexual assault -- while obviously applicable to assaults and attempted assaults on living victims -- can be applied to dead people in only one circumstance: when the victim becomes deceased as the result of the sexual assault.  And that's not what happened here (Ms. Tennessen was already dead.  And buried).

So the case gets appealed to Wisconsin Superior Court, the highest court of the state.

They got it right.

They said the statute wasn't ambiguous.  Like the courts below it, the Wisconsin Superior Court said that being dead isn't one of those circumstances (like being unconscious) where lack of consent is presumed. 

But what does that mean?  Here, the Wisconsin Superior Court differed from the lower courts.  Since the exception doesn't apply and we can't presume lack of consent automatically, all that means is that the State has to prove (beyond a reasonable doubt) that the victim didn't give consent.  In this particular situation, where the victim couldn't have given consent because she's, well, several weeks dead, the State has a pretty easy job of proving "lack of consent".  But just because something is easy to prove, doesn't make the statute ambiguous.

Interestingly, two justices dissented.  They just thought that the legislature, when it drafted the statute, didn't intend it to cover necrophilia.

(Side note:  since this case came down the pike, Wisconsin now has a specific necrophilia statute.  But it can't be applied retroactively, since that would be unconstitutional.)

Don't Just Stand There!

What is wrong with people?

This happened last Friday in Hartford, Connecticut.

The Two Stupidest Burglars In The World

You'll want to watch this....

Tracy Lett's Bug Has A Body Count

This I didn't know:

This creepy but not entirely successful 2006 psycho-thriller about paranoia and insect infestations was directed by William Friedkin, most famous for The Exorcist.

Despite dealing with a few murders and plenty of craziness in its own plot, the crime it inspired was considerably more horrific and strange. In January, blaring headlines like “Millionaire executive unhinged by horror film killed daughter” announced the tragedy, apparently trigged as stressed-out insurance executive Alberto Izaga watched Bug in a theater with his wife. (It was the only movie playing that had available seats; perhaps this tragedy could’ve been avoided, ironically, if the film were more popular?) Soon after, his wife would find him babbling incoherently in the middle of the night, shouting about the film, the Devil and death. Experiencing what his wife would call an “extreme and sudden” breakdown, he bludgeoned his two-year-old daughter to death while yelling “God doesn’t exist! The universe doesn’t exist! Humanity doesn’t exist!” Judged not guilty by reason of insanity, the judge passed sentence thusly: “This is a truly agonizing case. No sentence I pass can ever match the sentence you will pass on yourself.”

I have a feeling the hubby was pre-disposed to insanity, and it really wasn't the movie's fault.

Rape Victim Pleas For Help On Youtube

This is painful to watch:

CNN:

The video is hard to turn away from. A sobbing 16-year-old sits in her bedroom and, staring into a camera, says she has been raped.

"Hi, my name is Crystal ... I need some help. I didn't want to do it this way, but it's the only way I know that's going to work, that someone out there in the world is gonna listen to me."

The teen, whom CNN interviewed but is not identifying by her last name, is among dozens of young people who are turning to social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace to talk about sexual assault.

For an online generation, the Web offers what traditional counseling does not. It's a chance to communicate without having to face someone or fear their judgment. Some people are seeking legal advice and medical information, and many younger victims believe they can warn others about their accused attacker, counselors say.

There also are people like Crystal, whose case was dropped by the Orange County, Florida, state attorney's office, who feel slighted by the justice system.

I hope this is not a hoax.  Then again....

NC Man On Death Row Freed

This is the kind of thing that makes my blood boil:

For the second time in two months, an innocent man is being released from North Carolina's death row. Levon "Bo" Jones spent 13 years on death row after being convicted of the 1987 murder of Leamon Grady. Federal judge Terrence Boyle vacated Jones' conviction and death sentence in 2006 after finding that Jones' trial attorneys "utterly failed" to investigate the crime. (Read the Order here.) Duplin County District Attorney Dewey Hudson, who tried Jones in 1993, vowed to retry the case. This week Hudson was forced to admit that he has no evidence against Jones, and is expected to ask the court to release Jones today.

From his appointment until a month before trial, Jones' lead counsel - Graham Phillips - did virtually no work on the case. According to the District Court's opinion, Phillips "interviewed no witnesses, filed no motions, sought no evaluation of Jones, and conducted no mitigation investigation." Phillips did not even request the second counsel to which Jones was constitutionally entitled. The second lawyer, Charles Henderson, was appointed only upon the request of the District Attorney, less than a month before trial.

There was no physical evidence against Jones, and no eyewitnesses to the shooting. The State's star witness, Lovely Lorden, was Jones ex-girlfriend. Although counsel's strategy for the trial was to discredit Lorden's testimony, they never interviewed her. Had counsel bothered to run a simple criminal record check, they would have discovered that Lorden had a number of convictions relevant to her truthfulness, including fraud and worthless checks. Counsel also failed to obtain all of Lorden's statements to police, which were inconsistent with one another and with her testimony on the stand. Finally, counsel did not investigate Lorden's history of mental health problems. Counsel failed to cross-examine Lorden about what she claimed to have seen, instead questioning her mainly about the paternity of her children.

Counsel never bothered to review the District Attorney's file in the case, which contained evidence pointing to the guilt of another man. Allen Bizzell, who along with George Overton led police to Grady's body, gave four very different statements to police. At first he said that he and Overton left work at 3 AM to buy beer for their boss from Grady. Then he claimed that Overton left work alone and returned ten minutes later with a six-pack he had stolen from Grady. Next Bizzell claimed that Overton left alone and returned acting strangely and asking Bizzell to tell the police that he had accompanied Overton to Grady's house. FInally, Bizzell told police that Overton returned to work and told him that Grady had been killed, but suggested that they go to his house and "roll" him before calling the police. Overton, too, told different stories to police. He left town shortly after the murder, but was arrested within a week for rape.

From the District Attorney's files, counsel could also have learned that Lovely Lorden changed her story about who accompanied Jones to Grady's house that night. At first she identified Larry Lamb and "Tootie" Matthews as Jones' accomplices. When it was revealed that "Tootie" had an airtight alibi, Lorden shifted her testimony to blame Tootie's brother, Ernest Matthews. Across five statements, Lorden also changed her mind about the color of the car Jones was allegedly driving, how many shots were fired, what time the accomplices were picked up, and where else they went that night.

In April, Jones' attorneys provided the court with an affidavit from Lovely Lorden in which she states, "Much of what I testified to was simply not true." She further asserts that a detective coached her on what to say at Jones' trial. Had trial counsel looked in the prosecutor's file, they would have found an SBI surveillance tape of a conversation between Lovely Lorden and Larry Lamb, in which Lorden stated that the police were hassling her about the Grady murder and that she wanted to come up with a plan to save herself and Lamb. Lamb repeatedly denied any involvement in the murder.

Based on Lorden's testimony, Larry Lamb is now serving life in prison. Ernest Matthews pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was released in 2001.

The Governor's Office paid Lorden $4000 for her testimony. Will it pay Bo Jones for the 13 years she cost him?

Can you imagine if punishment against Mr. Jones had been swift, and he had been executed within a year of his conviction?