Jun 30, 2011

Casey Anthony's defense expected to rest case


My prayer for Caylee:

May this  despicable shameless media frenzy surrounding this beautiful two year old child''s murder end with haste..

Let these jury members see the truth, as it is so very clear -  to me and millions of others across the globe.
There is no "mystery"

Casey Anthony, acting alone, murdered, with pre-meditated aforethought and malice, her own innocent child. Her motivation, while is not necessary in determining that she is in fact guilty as hell, in my opinion was all about

 a) Casey Anthony obtaining freedom from motherhood becoming unencumbered by the responsibilities and constraints of a small child, heightened by the fact that her life revolved around such free wheeling behaviors as bar hopping, bed hopping, and other vapid and selfish pursuits.

I  believe that Casey Anthony is one of the more sinister and manipulative sociopaths that I have encountered throughout my years studying criminals that kill and or maim - and Ive seen a bunch.

Female sociopaths are not all too common, and when they do crop up within our society,  generally speaking they do not typically kill, although their manipulations deceptions and tendency to break laws and run roughshod over the rights of others, can be extremely destructive.  But while they may not kill as frequently as their sociopath male counterparts, when they do-they often get lighter sentences, or even wind up in mental facilities rather than the prisons that they clearly belong in.

Part of this may be our societal tendency, as is illustrated well by the judge presiding over the case refusing to emotionally compute the notion of a somewhat attractive and diminutive, young woman  from a respectable middle class upbringing, killing someone, much less her own child.


Tragically, this is a classic mistake that like so many, others in our society, erroneously believe; our courts systems, including otherwise intelligent judges attorneys sheriffs, prison guards you name it and an attractive young woman need only be a halfway decent sociopath, and seductress and she's going to receive special treatment both in and out of prison as well often will not receive the same verdict or sentences as a male who is accused of the same crimes with the very same facts within that case.

Our society seems to insist upon learning about violent crime and look ism, the hard way (remember Ted Bondy and or  Karla Homolka ( ie of the infamous Ken and Barbie rapist and murdering married tag team from Canada during the 90's?)

Tragically, this societal and judicial ignorance always, always, costs the innocent their lives. and the victims of crime their 'justice..

From early on in this case I noticed a distinctive red flag; an unnatural sibling-like rivalry that Casey Anthony seemed to have with her own child regarding her parents natural concern and deep love for their granddaughter little Caylee.  Their love was within normal parameters, there was nothing sinister about it nor suspect, I say this lest anyone out there reflexively thinks that Casey's jealousy of her own child was based in reality.
As a woman with a personality disorder Casey clearly resented the fact that her parents doted on her very own child, and saw this as competition and resented it. She wanted to be the eternal child. Rather than see Caylee as an extension of herself and thus, her parents love and concern when Caylee"went missing" ,
which was a healthy and indeed in this case they were so steeped in denial about Casey that it took the elder Anthony's who had divisiveness between themselves also, too long in my opinion to finally put their foot down and say ok where the hell is this child -- we are calling the Police in NOW.(It took a month of vague lies about non existent nanny's and then Casey's car smelling of a dead body before they finally were jointly willing to officially involve the authorities.

However, as an obvious narcissist and sociopath Casey Anthony saw her own daughter, as competition for her parents love and attention, as well equally seeing poor little Caylee as an object, a plaything, that she was tied of now jealous of and was getting more and more" in her way"  Caylee impeded Caseys lifestyle and the things that she wished to do when She wanted to do them; this does not go over well with a double narcissist/sociopath, never mind that she had Caylee at such a young age and was for all intents and purposes and single mother.  Add to the mix, an pre-existing  resentment for her parents because they were authority figures, whom Casey viewed as the ever critical enemy also constantly in her way"....the rest is very easy to figure out.
Casey had a lot of friction-with her parents that was clear, as was the fact that it was 99% of her own making as is the case with teens who have "oppositional-defiant disorder" which usually evolves into full blown anti-social personality disorder or Sociopath/psychopath as most people know it. There are a handful of personality disorders such as narcissistic PD, borderline PD, AVOIDANCE PD etc. What they all have in common is a disregard for other peoples rights boundaries and a disdain for rules and authority-be it parental, school, in the work environment, Police and other federal or state agencies etc. Most feel that THEY are different and that rules are for shmucks- if you'll pardon the language.


. To see a perfect example of Caseys jeolosyand resentment of Caylee who was dead at that point remember just watch the  infamous jailhouse phone conversations between Casey and her mom shortly after Casey's arrest, look listen closely. I believe that this jealousy largely perpetuated Casey's idea and thoughts of killing her child. Between this sick rivalry, which for a mature woman,would seem absurd, but for a
 young emotionally stunted sociopath, it wasthe perfect recipe for murdering one'schild -this combined with
 a desire to return to her previously held free-wheeling, partying lifestyle, a lifestyle that involved spending evenings with whatever young man of the moment, culminated in her premeditatively killing her darling 2 year old.


The text messages that this presiding Judge wrongly disallowed from being entered into evidence, clearly showed this part of Casey Anthony's mindset and motivation to kill Cay lee, just prior to the murder, They spoke volumes to that motivation;  She wrote in her text to her then beau " in just another couple of days baby you can bring your ass over here any frigging night you feel like it!"

Now for some ridiculous reason that was certainly not based upon  common sense fairness or proper judicial/ criminal precedents, this judge,who in my humble opinion is not a very good judge
(he is very inconsistent
far too detached and presumptive and this particular decision that he made regarding the dis-allowance of these extremely pertinent texts to be entered into evidence, ie shown to the jury-whom he ordered  out of the courtroom while they were read out loud in front of the lawyers and families was a major mistake that cost the prosecution and the rest of the law abiding world-the truth-and justice for Caylee.

.And  by way of explanation for disallowing the incriminating texts to be seen or heard by the jury-This Judge claimed the texts were prejudicial and made no sense anyway".  He then elaborated  saying"I mean,whats she going to do- kill her parents too?!  This was rhetorical, The Judge did not want nor expect an answer.
But if I was that prosecutor I would have given him a very pointed answer; and yet for whatever idiotic reason the prosecutor didn't say a word and let the entire thing go.

This shows his incompetence. My best guess is he figured the judge was stubborn he wasn't going to get anywhere likely and made the mistaken decision that he probably didn't need the texts to win the case against Casey Anthony. Plain stupid. You always always argue a point when you know you are right, your deadvictims right to justice is at stake.
Now when the judge said whats she gonna do kill her parents to" he did so in a mocking tone, which I immediately recall thinking  Does he not know a thing about forensic psychiatry?

Or is he like so many other men-and a fair number of women in this country-fooled by Casey Anthony's age and fresh scrubbed appearance, rendering the mere idea that this petite young woman-a girl almost , primly
sitting, in a crisp white shirt, on a subconscious level....had the Judge fallen prey to"Caseyitis" It sure was beginning to look that way  as I watched the judges decision and his"reasoning" in making it.

Here is a young mother accused of killing her 2 year old child and throwing her in the trunk of her car where she was left for days in the heat to rot while Casey lived her typical daily life without a sign of even discomfiture or moodiness.

The days following Caylees murder were filled with video watching, dancing clubbing,drinking having sex with  the moment boyfriend  (note; I am reluctant to bring up a women' sex life within the confines of a criminal case however in this instance  it relate to Caseys state of mind following the murder  in this case,thus rendering it extremely pertinent to the case.
the "accidental drowning story" where Casey  tried to throw her father under the bus by claiming
out of nowhere that he disposed of Kaylee's little body how on earth could she be so emotionally disconnected as to behave as countless witnesses have testified she did, in the days and weeks that followed this supposed accidental death of her child?!

Shopping, Getting Tattoo's, chirping away and texting on her cellphone with friends, all whilst simultaneously fending off her parents growing concern and demands for answers re Caylee's
whereabouts.

Do the math Judge. the texts make perfect sense -we are not dealing with a nice  young gal that is built like you and I -in her soulless frame lies the heart of a manipulating sociopath;

Thus to disallow key evidence that points directly to motive, text messages clearly showing said motive for the murder of her child a la  Susan Smith style, you don't send the Jury out,call a sidebar and state that you are not going to allow such important evidence in because either
a)
you have no training in forensic psychology
or
b) because they make no sense and yet are highly prejudicial-
which is it Judge?
ie "was she gonna kill her parents too?!  The Judge asked the prosecutor after sending the jury out.
Too clarify:

At the time Casey and Caylee lived at the elder Anthony's home,  as Casey didn't work and in fact had lied for months at a stretch,telling her parents that she was working at a job, only for them to discover she wasn't and as was typical for her she was lying, trying to keep them off her back so to speak
 an attempt to fulfill their demands that she work if she lives at home, as well as any parents of a young adult who wants to show their adult child that one must pay their way even when their parents have graciously allowed that adult child-and her child to live with them, including intermittent free baby sitting by the Anthony's.

Yes-YES-YES!  It is completely within the realm of possibility that Casey Anthony might kill
her parents,or  one of them,whichever she thought might be in her way the most or even worse
turn her in.  You better believe that anyone that would kill a beautiful 2 year old child and then behave so disconnectedly and lie with such connivance,showing utter disdain for her crying mother who was literally  begging  (on the prison phone) for any little thing that Casey might be able to remember about (upposedly missing at that point )cayle via her imaginary nanny,  a lie that reciting to her mom  alone seemed to irritate Casey-as if she resented having to "explain herself" yet again to her mother or anyone else....and why they hell dont you people care about me I'm in Jail!

 Casey was barely able to sound convincing whilst sounding utterly disgusted and bored when finally suggesting to her mother"I don't know mom Ive told you everything already! Look up her family I think they lived in the Dominican republic or something"   She threw this half hearted bone at her clearly distraught and broken up mother who was there visiting her daughter in prison, where she sat on charges of murdering her own child.

All we heard and saw from Casey Anthony, who remember now-in retrospect-is claiming at that point her daughter had long been dead-drowned in the family pool her little body disposed of conveniently by George Anthony, she suddenly says and yet what we saw and heard was a  Casey Anthony responding to her mothers pitiable beseeching re Caylee's possible whereabouts, with utter disdain.

Disdain sulkiness,resentment and bitterness -  and even boredom.
If you watch and listen to those tapes carefully, you'll see that Casey herself was so clearly sick and tired of being asked about Caylee -by her parents especially. It was bad enough she had to deal with the police and the lawyers, but she was not going to deal with her parents bugging her about this kid anymore.

Let this Jury see and feel the truth of Casey Anthony's evil and deception. Let them understand that Cindy Anthony has become caught up in a Stockholm like syndrome where she is now aiding and abetting her daughter desperately trying anything to keep her off of death row. She now claims that she searched the term chloroform"?!!!!!  She insisted that little Caylee could climb up to the pool herself and proffered photos depicting herself propping little caylee up with her hands at her little back as the toddler climbed the steps gingerly. I think we all can see whats happened here with Mrs Anthony. Her daughter has bamboozled her made up some lies about her father molesting her, stirred up media interest in her dads female friend trying to imply infidelity in order to hurt her fathers credibility.  And the tension  between Mr and Mrs Anthony can be seen from a mile away.

As is classic with sociopaths within a family dynamic they are experts at causing divisiveness all the better to divide and conquer.  From where I stand it is clear that Mrs Anthony has put herself i a thick state of denial re her daughter murdering Caylee. Shed much rather believe that Caylee drowned by accident and even if she doesnt really believe this, after listening to her lie under oath and claim that it was her that searched for chloroform on the computer I knew that Mrs Anthony had crossed over for wahtever personal demons she has to answer to. Its just too bad that she is wiling to aid and abet a child killer as well as throw her own husband under the bus in the process.


 But before we judge her too harshly remeber this, Socioapths are extremely adept liars and manipulators, the stories" about George anthony supposedly trying to molest Casey as well as Caseys brother, both of whom happen to obviously believe and know that Cseys is guilty of killing Caylee , these storiues were told at a very purposeful moment by Casey Anthony-she needed at least one parent on her side, so she worked out a scheme to solicit her mothers instinct to protect her own, she guilted her and she through the molestation bit in for good measure insuring that Mrs Anthony would begin to wonder....is it possible...oh my god maybe thats why Cassey is so messed up!" 

In the meantime a little girl desrves justice for her brutally stolen life.

Jun 20, 2011

Serving as a juror can be stressful, traumatic

It's about time the media focused upon the experience of being a Juror in a violent crime case especially involving murder.
The Groene case involving the murder of Dyan Slade Brenda and the kidnapping and assault of 8 year old Shasta, is forever embedded in my mind and my soul, I can only imagine what the Jurors in Dylan's murder case went through. They were forced to watch video that Joshpeh Dunan took of his sexual assaults upon Dylan, as well a taped episode where he nearly killed the boy by hanging him into unconsciousness by a wire whilst mastutbating singing and mocking the lords prayer.

For years, no one gave the Jurors post traumatic stress a thought, certainly no practical considerations. IE such as offerring in depth counseling and psychiatric assistance before and after the trial re. what they experienced and bore witness to, within the confines of thier service and "Duty" to their country. Kind of reminds me of how we treated and still in many cases treat our veterans; use them up and tosss em aside until the government gets a fresh batch.

Slowly, the states are coming around but again too slowly much too slowly. Peoples entire lives change after serving on a jury such as the Anthony trial or the petit family murder trials. Their sense of safety in this world is gone, theyve gained a new insight to the dark and avil side of humanity that they a;; wish theyd never been made privy too. Yet they have.
In the meantime, lets talk about it, lets write to our legislators about this important issue. The more awareness we can bring to the second and third hand trauma caused by various violent crimes, which needn't be in our community for us to feel the overwhelming pain grief and terror that the victim(s) suffered, and in this, take on a piece of it ourselves. It';s part of being a compassionate human being with empathy, and as much as the media has trampled on this notion through their incessant insistence of sensationalising even a childs murder for ratings and monetary gain - well we the good people of this world need to do something about this as well.

Remember...

"Evil exists when GOOD men do NOTHING."

A quote and a philosophy by Voltaire that shows us that apathy and "not wanting to "get involved" is worse than committing a heinous act - for you the good man or woman, knows better and within that knowledge is a responsibility to stop insulating your lives from anything and everything unpleasant, its avoidance and denial that make the ideal climate for a predator.

Casey Anthony trial: Judge scolds attorneys for wasting time

Jun 15, 2011

Prosecution finishes case in Casey Anthony trial

Update re the case of The State of Florida vs Casey Anthony for the murder of two year old Caylee Anthony, in a word;

The prosecution has rested it's case, the judge has rejected the defense's motion to acquit after making a relatively short Judicial soliliquoy in his by now trademark slow, deliberate speaking manner. The defense begins it's side of the case Thursday morning, and the jury has been given the standard instructions regarding not discussing the case, et al.

Jun 14, 2011

Jury set for Komisarjevsky trial |

The last four alternates have been picked and the testimony is scheduled to begin September 19th.
We can be assured that Bansley and Donovan Komisarjevsky's laeyers will pull some stunt in the form of another motion to attempt to push that date up, just as they did with the advent of jury selection--managing to stall the onset of that process by well over 2 months.

Jun 13, 2011

"The Modern Elite Ruling Class Notion of Justice"

This article is a must read.  

I am so impressed that I am posting the entire article as well as a link to the original, lest the contents become lost down the line via the hyperlink. I wasn't aware when I first began blogging that oft - times, many hyper-links to time - sensitive articles, especially within mainstream online publications become useless, "broken" leading the now piqued, unsuspecting reader to a cyber dead - end of sorts. This an average of 6 months to a year from the initial publication of the article being linked

As I became a more seasoned blogger, I discovered that clicking on hyper-link, including my own, within an older article,  invariably  brought me to a page that was marked "were sorry but that article is no longer available. Thanfully, not every online magazine or newspaper handles their dated articles this way and these are no surprise, the usually better publications, where one will find a message similar to that article has been archived, you may use our advanced search system to locate the article that you wish to read/.

Today, I am compelled to copy and paste a rather long article, of great substance; it's one of those rare articles that has the power to change things.

I'm putting up the very last paragraph of the article first. I felt that the words below perfectly  embodied the same passion and motivation that drive my own dogged pursuit of the good fight for Justice, a perpetual fight fought mostly via the power of the formidable pen, the words below summed up beautifully what we, as a people can do, must do, in order to invoke the changes that need to take place to better  insure the safety of our loved ones and ourselves, politics be damned.

 I once believed myself a Democrat. As I grew older and became more of who I was meant to be,  I discovered that the most essential issues facing our legislators and politicians should be non partisan; Public safety;, violent crime, child abduction, terrorism of the domestic kind, broken bones, sexual assault  and brutality.
 And behind it, the engine that drives it, never mind allows it, it keeps it all running; apathy and greed.

It is our unwavering right as human beings to procure sanctity for ourselves and eachother, from maiming and death at the hands of others, often who have often been in and out of our" correctional facilities' their whole lives.

The article begins in Italics below.




"CONCLUSION: Surrender or Fight?


What can be done about a travesty of justice system declared “impossible to defend” by a state chief justice?


Gail Canzano and Marilyn Flax, quoted at the outset, make clear the choice: Repeal the law or enforce the law. Indefensibly surrender to the indefensible or fight to make the system defensible.


Surrender is especially unjustified because, with great consistency for a very long time, capital punishment has had overwhelming public support, notwithstanding that very many have bought the repeatedly refuted claim that innocents are executed. The only choice is to fight – to fight those fanatically devoted to brutal murderers and unconcerned about victims.



The first step in that fight is to inform the public of the intolerable abuses shown here. The media have egregiously failed. Rectifying that failure is the purpose of this article.



By Lester Jackson, Ph.D., Guest Contributor

“[T]he death penalty constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. Not for those on death row but for the families of their victims”




—— Report on Connecticut Families’ Call for Death Penalty Repeal



“What I would like … is not [repeal] the law, but enforce the law.”


—— Marilyn Flax (57), widow of murder victim



“It’s difficult if not impossible to defend 29 years for a case to be in the courts.”


—— former Kentucky Supreme Court Chief Justice Joseph Lambert






____________________






INTRODUCTION


Days apart in early February, two Connecticut events dramatically highlighted how power-abusing elitists have sabotaged the death penalty. First, in the second protracted Petit robbery-rape-arson-murder case, defense attorneys fired a fusillade of motions to spare the life of a client they proclaimed so dangerous that the “public interest” required him to “never again spend a day in free society (4).” Second, a group of murder victim family members called for death penalty abolition, complaining it inflicted greater suffering on them than murderers. Dr. Gail Canzano asserted: “The death penalty ensnares people in the criminal justice system… result[ing] in … years of suffering … for the families left behind. … [E]very single court appearance re-traumatizes the family….”






This was further vindication of the ruthless strategy of so-called death penalty opponents: protecting barbaric murderers by abusing the legal system to drag out, for decades, cases in which there is no doubt about guilt, torturing victims in the process.




That it was not always this way shows that it does not have to be this way now.






OLD JUSTICE


■President William McKinley died on Sept. 14, 1901, eight days after being shot by Leon Czolgosz, who was caught in the act and confessed. On Sept. 23, Czolgosz went on trial and was sentenced to death three days later. He was executed on Oct. 29, 53 days after the crime and 47 after the president’s death.


■Unable to get near his first choice (75), President Herbert Hoover, Giuseppe Zangara settled on President-elect Franklin Roosevelt. On Feb. 15, 1933, Zangara’s errant shot hit Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak, who died on March 6. Caught in the act and having confessed, Zangara was executed on March 20, 1933 after 10 days on death row and 14 days after his victim died.


■On July 2, 1881, Charles Guiteau shot President James Garfield, who died on Sept. 19. Immediately caught, Guiteau boasted of his deed. He was placed on trial for murder on Nov. 14 and found guilty on Jan. 25, 1882. After an appeal rejected May 22 and a denied request for an orchestra to play at his hanging, Guiteau was executed on June 30, 1882, nine months after his victim died.


■William Kemmler murdered his wife on March 29, 1889 and was sentenced to death 45 days later, May 13. He appealed the new execution method, electrocution, which was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court May 23, 1890. Even with the aid of high-priced lawyers hired by George Westinghouse, his execution occurred August 6, 1890, 15 months after the murder.


■On March 20, 1927, Ruth Snyder, aided by paramour Henry Gray, strangled and bludgeoned her husband to death to collect insurance. In fewer than 10 months, January 12, 1928, they were both executed.


There was never any doubt whatsoever about the guilt in these cases. Justice was done – swiftly. This is now inconceivable, both in unpublicized and high-profile cases. In today’s murderer-friendly, victim-hostile judicial and legislative environment, incontrovertibly and boastfully guilty assassins and other murderers spend years, even decades, on death row – if sentenced to death at all. Consider the following few of limitless examples.






MODERN JUSTICE




■On Nov. 5, 2009, Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan shot 45 mostly military people, killing 13 and wounding 32. After 17 months, it remained uncertain whether Hasan would face capital charges or even be court-martialed. Although apprehended in the act of murdering, he is, in today’s argot, still merely an “accused” murderer.


■On April 19, 1995, Timothy McVeigh bombed a federal building in Oklahoma City, murdering 168 innocent people. He boasted of his guilt. Nevertheless, he was not executed until June 2001. Had he not dropped his appeals, there is no telling how many more years would have elapsed; indeed, he might still be alive after 16 years, which is routine nowadays.


■On parole from a sentence for beating a neighbor to death, Robert Alton Harris kidnapped and murdered two boys, one “crouching and screaming,” and “giggled …, saying he had blown … Baker’s arm off. [He] amused himself by imagining be[ing] a police officer … report[ing] the boys’ deaths to their families. … [He] laughed, commented he had really blown the boy’s brains out, and then flicked the bits of flesh into the street.” Executed after “only” 14 years, the New York Times bitterly attacked the Supreme Court’s “Rush to Kill.”


■John Jacob Dougan made several tape recordings bragging about the 1974 murder of an 18-year-old boy, which were mailed to the victim’s mother as well as to the media: “He was stabbed in the back, in the chest and the stomach, ah, it was beautiful. You should have seen it. Ah, I enjoyed every minute of it. I loved watching the blood gush from his eyes.” 37 years later, Dougan remains on death row.


■Spared a death sentence for murder, this mercy enabled Clarence Ray Allen to communicate with and order associates outside prison to murder witnesses against him. It took another 26 years to execute him.


No ground for delay is too preposterous in today’s courts. So shameless are death penalty opponents that, after being kept alive to have a second bite at the murder apple that cost three more innocent lives, Allen’s lawyers actually argued (n362) he should not be executed because just thinking about the prospect might cause him to have a heart attack. In this vein, two justices have taken seriously the abolitionist demand that any murderer who succeeds in gaming the system for decades should be rewarded for the delay he himself has caused – by voiding his death sentence because execution would be cruel and unusual punishment after so long. In other words, grant mercy to the parent killer on the ground that he is an orphan.


In 1882, Guiteau got nowhere with his demand for an orchestra to accompany his permitted pre-hanging reading of his poetry, which he insisted would be “very effective” with music. Today, when judges take seriously the claim that a brutal murderer should be spared execution because he won a dance contest or would not be a threat in prison because he “only preyed on elderly women,” Guiteau’s demand, alone, would likely be good for a delay of a year or two.




Equally absurd but far more serious is the routine argument that a murderer never intended that anyone be murdered, even when he showed up with a loaded gun and a lethal knife, planned an armed robbery, stabbed his rape victim 53 times (93-4) or smuggled a chest filled with guns into a prison to help two convicted murderers escape. In the Petit case, lawyers argue Joshua Komisarjevsky never intended (3) for anyone to be murdered, but they fail to explain why, if this is so, he deserves an actual life sentence in “the public interest.” (There is evidence, from his own cell phone, that he was an active, willing participant. His partner probably could not have committed the crimes alone, nor even tried.)


Such absurdities help explain why the point has been reached where Virginia is held up as a veritable death penalty paradise (8) by some capital punishment supporters because it can execute the clearly guilty in an average of “only” seven years; and why former Kentucky Chief Justice Lambert conceded that it is “difficult if not impossible” to defend multi-decade cases. But given judicial obtuseness regarding victims, it is, first, vital to stress that these cases further victimize the law-abiding in the name of purported “due process” for the most brutal lawless.






VICTIMIZING VICTIM FAMILIES


Murder victimizes survivors in two ways: (1) the loss and pain of family members and others who care about the homicide victim; and (2) the agony inflicted by the modern travesty of justice system.


To lay persons, this may seem too obvious to mention. But not to many judges. The idea that, on behalf of convicted murderers, the courts cruelly punish murder victim families flies in the face of the denial they are victims at all. In a virtually unreported but highly revealing statement, Justice Stevens calls it a “misnomer” to label as “victims” the family members and others who love and care about murder victims because they are merely “third parties.” Really?! Consider these few examples:


■David Brewer raped, strangled and stabbed Sherry Byrne 15 times; he slit her throat. This “ruined the lives of everyone close to her.” Her mother was hospitalized and divorced; her husband, who “wanted to die,” was twice hospitalized for psychiatric care.


■One mother stated: “When Shannon died, we died.”


■Dr. William Petit considered suicide because he lost: “a wife and two wonderful daughters, where you’re defined by your family. … children are the jewels … all your hopes for the future are in your children… Your wife is your partner, your team-mate … you lose it all.’


■It is unlikely that Stevens will descend from his ivory tower to face Diana Harrington, who flatly declared (368-75) herself “a victim” of the brutal murders of her sister, brother-in-law, niece and nephew.


Also, Stevens finds it “troubling” (7) to “rouse jurors’ sympathy for the victims and increase jurors’ antipathy for the capital defendants.” Indeed, if some justices (once a majority) had their way, victims’ families would have the courthouse doors slammed in their faces.


Solicitude for murderers and callous unconcern for victims go a long way toward explaining why judges have no qualms inflicting cruel and unusual punishment on the latter.


Justice Ginsburg suffers stress and cries; and Justice Blackmun found executing barbaric criminals “particularly excruciating” (153). Yet one can search in vain for similar expressions by them about victims. Hence, on behalf of those whose guilt is uncontested, these justices often have compounded geometrically the anguish of losing loved ones. That is why family members have said it is they who endure cruel and unusual punishment.


Justice Stevens worried that it might take 11 minutes rather than 7 for a condemned killer to die. But he voted to stay the execution of Earl Wesley Berry to decide only if lethal injection, previously advocated by Stevens as a lethal gas substitute, was inhumane. The justices voting for this stay said nothing about further victimizing the family of Berry’s brutally murdered victim. A local paper called it cruel not to execute Berry: “ironic that a man who beat and stomped to death a woman now hopes the justice system will save him from a death he believes is ‘cruel and inhumane.’” The daughter referred (n319) to suffering caused by “hav[ing] to deal with court proceedings and appeals processes” for two decades.


Although executing the most barbaric murderers causes stress, tears and excruciation for the likes of Ginsburg and Blackmun, they are heedless of the torment expressed by a son 30 years after his father was murdered: “It never ends for families … It’s just not right that it goes on and on.” Having waited 25 years for execution of her family’s murderer, Harrington (367) said the “loss of loved ones is enough agony that one should bear, much less the constant reminders of the criminal’s appeals, protests and constant complaints ….”


Doubly victimized – and Stevens denies they are victims at all!!


Now, judicially, legislatively or both, the Petit survivors are likely to suffer elite contempt for victims.




THE PETIT ROBBERY-RAPE-ARSON-MURDERS


This case has been reported widely, in detail. Briefly, in July 2007, Komisarjevsky and Stephen Hayes broke into the home of Dr. William A. Petit. They forced his wife to withdraw money from a bank, brought her back, tied up, sexually attacked, doused with gasoline and burned alive her and her 11 and 17-year-old daughters. They also attacked Dr. Petit, who survived.


Two points are especially significant.


First, because there is no doubt whatsoever as to guilt of either perpetrator, this case shows clearly how the legal system has been debased into a weapon to torture already victimized loved ones of victims of the clearly guilty. Although Komisarjevsky’s lawyers conceded (4) he is so dangerous that permanent incarceration is required, they sought four months for jury selection alone, followed by two more months before his trial finally begins, while accusing (3) the trial judge of “cringing accommodation to …. speed demanded by the victim….” For his part, the judge pointed out (6): “By the time the jury in this [second] case is impaneled, over four years will have elapsed since the crime.”


Second, most murder victim families and trials receive very little attention; here there has been enormous coverage. However, while the coverage has been unique, the suffering inflicted by the dysfunctional nature of the American “justice” system is not unique at all. Elites – not only judges but elected legislators – have callous contempt for victims, be they publicized or unknown. Prior to signing the highly unpopular Illinois death penalty repeal, Gov. Quinn refused even to meet with the mother of a viciously raped, tortured and murdered girl. Connecticut’s elected governor and legislators strove mightily to show their scorn for democracy generally and Dr. Petit particularly by trying to repeal capital punishment even before Komisarjevsky could be tried. That appears to have been temporarily averted. But those who side with murderers are relentless and promise to come back after the trial, so that the public and Dr. Petit will sooner or later receive their contempt. Repeal is “inevitable,” they promise.


Much delay results from duplicitous abolitionist legislators who seek to deceive the public by voting for popular death penalty legislation only after they insert poison pill provisions to render it ineffective. Such politicians will not fix the system (8) to enable enforcement when their true goal is to make this impossible.


If prominent victims can be tortured, what chance is there for those who suffer unnoticed?


Dr. Petit, his family and friends already have endured not only agony from the barbaric crime, but also from the system. Tragically, this seems likely to continue.


TORTURING THE INNOCENT TO SAVE THE GUILTY


For years, death penalty abolitionists have tried to convince the public that there have been rampant executions of the innocent – even in recent years, with multiple layers of appeals and procedural restrictions. This repeatedly (7-19) has been refuted. In reality, nearly all death penalty litigation lasting decades (374) involves the sentence, not guilt. Even justices who have done the most to undermine capital punishment concede: “a substantial claim of actual innocence [is] extremely rare. … [C]hallenges to … death [sentences] are routinely asserted … [But] …claims of actual innocence are rarely successful.”


Alleged innocence is just a convenient propaganda tool irrelevant to the true objective. Abolitionists do not oppose the death penalty for fear of executing the innocent. They oppose executing the guilty, period. Hence, they fear seeking the truth, lest it limit endless duplicative litigation to drag out any case – regardless of savagery and number of murders committed, recidivism, and overwhelming weight of evidence.


Leading opponent Bryan Stevenson called it “misguided” (25) to focus on the “wrongly convicted.” Carol and Jordan Steiker warned against “too much enthusiasm” for innocence. They cautioned that DNA tests used to attack the death penalty, by claiming “exonerations,” ultimately would provide additional support for and “salvage capital punishment” by establishing guilt conclusively.


So the main weapon is not to claim innocence but to incessantly manipulate the legal system, tying it in knots. Justice Scalia observed (12, 17): “It is just a game, after all.” The name of the game is: delay, delay, delay. When sentence challenges fail, much more delay is caused by litigating execution methods (16-20) for murderers who have inflicted maximum drawn out torture on their victims. As noted, any absurd argument will do.


Endless delays not only cause huge expenditures (not necessarily more than life imprisonment) and strain judicial resources; far worse, as documented above, they further torture already victimized survivors. Opponents thereby seek to compel death penalty supporters to surrender to total abolition. Having grossly abused the system, abolitionists use that very abuse (6) as an argument to end the abuse by ending capital punishment. On March 25, PBS premiered a “documentary,” No Tomorrow, again arguing the death penalty is too costly – based on the case of a brutal triple killer “neither sympathetic nor plausibly innocent”!


Abolitionists will never admit to having anything but compassion for victims, even purporting to act for their benefit. For example, Komisarjevky’s lawyers feigned concern for the Petit family in the very flood of motions attacking that family (e.g. (6), as the “Petit posse”) – contending (3) that not granting a motion would “do a disservice to… the surviving victim and the victims’ loved ones and supporters.” In declaring a 300-pound man’s rape of an 8-year-old girl, requiring painful surgery, insufficiently depraved to warrant the death penalty, a 5-4 U.S. Supreme Court claimed (32) to lessen the victim’s ordeal of aiding prosecution – as though she would not have to testify in a non-capital trial!


Gov. Corzine (NJ) said he signed a death penalty repeal to spare loved ones from being “more deeply hurt by long delays and endless appeals….”


Despite this faux concern for victims, those who most stridently oppose the death penalty as cruel and unusual punishment for the guilty have absolutely no compunction about perverting the law to impose such punishment upon the innocent. And so much the better if a public relations coup can be extracted from even a few tortured victims seemingly experiencing Stockholm Syndrome – so that, rather than protesting the abuse inflicted upon them, they submissively join their tormenters to seek abolition of the death penalty on the precise ground that it is cruel and unusual punishment for them instead of convicted murderers.


WAS THE OLD JUSTICE WORSE THAN THE NEW?


“The demands of justice have been satisfied,” began the long July 1, 1882 front-page New York Times report on the Guiteau execution. Today, the same paper deems it injustice to execute even a presidential assassin proud of his deed. Nevertheless, countless polls show the 1882 Times closer to 2011 public values.



Other than abolitionists, few would deny that justice requires not only prevention of convicting the innocent but also protecting the law-abiding and expeditiously meting out punishment deemed just by society (not judges or elite newspapers). Yet, those who now dominate the legal system have no use for an ancient maxim: “justice delayed is justice denied.” For them, justice delayed is justice. However, Chief Justice Burger worried that delay would “drain even a just judgment of its value,” thereby undermining essential public confidence in the courts.




The Sixth Amendment provides: “the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial.”

Decades ago, the Supreme Court held that the right to a public trial is not confined to the accused because the public has a right to be informed. By the same token, if the securing public safety is the first duty of government, justice demands a right to a speedy trial for the public as well as the accused. On its face, it is grievously unjust when, as in the Petit case, it takes more than four years to bring to trial a defendant whose lawyers seek life imprisonment in the “public interest” while complaining about too much speed. Is that what the Constitution’s Framers had in mind? Did their concept of justice intend defendants to have two rights, both to speed and endless delaying tactics subjecting victimized survivors to endless ordeals? Was such cruel punishment of victims “usual” when the Constitution was adopted?






Ironically, it is the innocent who benefit from speed,while interminable delay is the ally of the guilty at the expense of justice for their victims. The examples provided here, both old and new, involve the indisputably guilty. Whatever the claimed defects of the old justice system, today’s safeguards (9-12) make wrongful conviction in capital cases rare at worst, leaving abolitionists in a desperate futile search for an actual execution of an innocent person. By tragic contrast, murders are far from rare: 738,000 homicides in 38 years!






Also far from rare is decades-long litigation aimed, as noted, at saving the guilty, not avoiding conviction of the innocent. The whole purpose of abolitionist tactics is to prevent all executions, using every ludicrous pretext either to void death sentences or keep murderers alive until natural death.






Is it justice when fresh victims are murdered by previously convicted recidivists, causing yet more suffering (3, 10) for loved ones? (The Petit savagery was committed by paroled recidivists.) Is it justice to inflict cruel and unusual punishment on victims in order to enable the barbaric guilty to avoid just punishment?






Surely, there is much to be said for the old legal system. Moreover, by maintaining modern protections for the innocent and abolishing judicial and legislative subterfuges to avoid justly punishing the guilty, a combination of the best of the old and the new can be created.






CONCLUSION: Surrender or Fight?






What can be done about a travesty of justice system declared “impossible to defend” by a state chief justice?
Gail Canzano and Marilyn Flax, quoted at the outset, make clear the choice: Repeal the law or enforce the law. Indefensibly surrender to the indefensible or fight to make the system defensible.






Surrender is especially unjustified because, with great consistency for a very long time, capital punishment has had overwhelming public support, notwithstanding that very many have bought the repeatedly refuted claim that innocents are executed. The only choice is to fight – to fight those fanatically devoted to brutal murderers and unconcerned about victims.






The first step in that fight is to inform the public of the intolerable abuses shown here. The media have egregiously failed. Rectifying that failure is the purpose of this article.





Note; Lester Jackson has written articles showing how the media has enabled the Supreme Court to undermine the death penalty. He views mainstream media misrepresentation and suppression of the truth as essential to harmful judicial activism. A former college teacher, he has a Ph.D. in Political Science.
Copyright ©: 2011 Lester Jackson, Ph.D.
Post Published: 19 May 2011
Found in section: Lester Jackson, More From Our Pundits































 
















Jun 12, 2011

The Casey Anthony Trial, a Cult of Infamy

One of the better articles out there regarding Caylee Anthony's murder and the trial proceedings.
However, immaturity and dysfunction do not explain Casey Anthony,nor what to many seem unfathomable behavior and utter callousness
as displayed in the excerpt of her courthouse note to a fellow inmate. All of this nonsensical attention over the so called mystique and
mystery surrounding how a "attractive young woman" could kill her child and be so distanced from her own despicable actions(as to
rent videos go out dancing and get tattoos in the weeks and months following the murder) is really becoming very old very fast.
With all of this incessant writing concerning this case all of the ludicrous media attention, we rarely see or hear or read the word: SOCIOPATH.

Even Huffington Post, usually a decent Blog with decent writers, of varying degrees, are either reluctant to "go there" I am ssuming
because Anthony is a female and what the writer perceives as a "young attractive" one at that or out of ignorance, which considering the rest of the article and its relative insightfulness, I find unlikely.

So there you have it; if an intelligent legal analyst/writer cannot seem to bring themself to hastily arrive at this obvious conclusion, what are they doing haranguing about the worldwide attention due to the "mystery" of how this women with anti-social personality disorder, did what sociopath's do?

In the meantime, lets pray for Caylee's perfect little soul and Justice for her brutal death.

Komisarjevsky Trial To Continue As Planned

We've got all necessary Jurors and the trial is going to  continue on schedule, thank God.  The Komisarjevsky defense "team" has literally tried every sleazy trick in the book, with absolutely no conscience, in order to stall the inevitable: Justice for the assaults and murders of Michaela, Hayley and JJennifer Petit. And lest anyone forget the near fatal baseball bat assault upon William Petit jr.head and brain, from which he certainly still suffers from daily.

They've petitioned the appellate and supreme courts, when they've gotten nowhere with Judge Blue, they've buried the prosecution and the judge, in a veritable snowstorm of paperwork for the dual purposes of
encouraging a white flag plea bargain from what they invision as the beleagured prosecution and Petit families, and if nothing else stall stall and stall some more.   All of this is of course a glaring abuse of the system, as well the bit of power that they have as officers of the court.

I've personally read nearly every single motion that these lawyers so eloquently comprised (with help from their team of minions)they are all show no go--not one issue that they broach and meander endlessly about is viable; legally, judiciously or ethically-Athough I think by now, the latter has become a non- issue, as the moral turpitude that is the Joshua Komisarjevsky's defense has been thus recognized from quite early in the process and certainly by now the people of the state and other caring onlookers,know what were dealing with.