Get Bent

Dura lex sed lex. That’s Latin for “the law is hard, but it is the law.” Such will be a lesson learned by the defense in the courtroom today, I’m afraid.

What was scheduled to be a status hearing has turned into one of greater magnitude, and one that Casey must attend. She hasn’t appeared in court since the July, when her mother and brother took the stand over the admission of Cindy’s 911 calls.

While the status of the case will still be discussed, two defense motions will also be heard, and that will include counter motions filed by the JAC and the Orlando Sentinel. Defense attorney Ann Finnell recently filed a motion that asked Judge Perry to set a cautionary budget for costs she expects to incur to properly represent Casey prior to a sentencing phase; to be prepared if she is convicted of capital murder. The next motion will once again ask the judge to reconsider prior rulings over the public’s right to see Casey’s jail records, including phone calls, visitor logs and commissary purchases.

I don’t want to venture a guess about the money issue. The defense is requesting an additional $12,000 for investigative work on top of the money their mitigation specialist is asking for. This is too tough to guess, so I’ll focus on the issue over the disclosure of certain records.

First off, let’s make it clear that the defense is once again asking for more than the judge needs to give. In the MOTION FOR RECONSIDERATION, the defense cited a recent ruling by the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Bent v. Sun Sentinel, which ruled that jail “audio recordings of the defendants’ phone calls are not public records subject to release.” What this did, in effect, is put a temporary end to releasing phone calls, which are recorded surreptitiously for security reasons. On the other hand, the ruling did not address any jail logs whatsoever. This means who called, when and how long they spoke, are not subject to the ruling.

Right now, Casey has “three Standing Objections of Abuse of Florida Statute Chapter 119.01 complaining of the release of public records,” according to the Orlando Sentinel’s motion. The Sentinel went on to suggest that this defense “essentially asks the Court to shut down the media and the public’s statutory and constitutional right to public information.”

The Sentinel continues to argue that neither the public nor the media “are required to show a legitimate interest or purpose in order to obtain public or judicial records.” Here, I have one slight qualm with the Sentinel’s mention of judicial records. The jail does not fall under the judicial branch, and for that reason alone, the judge cannot rule in favor of the defense. He has made it abundantly clear he holds no power over the legislative branch, which governs this sort of disclosure. Timoney v. Miami Civilian Investigative Panel, 917 So. 2d 885, 886 n.3 (Fla. 3d DCA 2005) stated that “generally, a person’s motive in seeking access to public records is irrelevant.”

Judge Perry has, on more than one occasion, stated that he was not going to reinvent the wheel, meaning he will not rewrite Florida’s Public Records Act, which we recognize as Florida’s Open Government in the Sunshine law. Today, he will rule the same way he has in the past. There is no doubt that jails and prisons in Florida will comply with the Bent v. Sun Sentinel ruling and keep recordings locked up for the time being, but I am certain it will work its way up to the Florida Supreme Court and beyond.

The defense believes that the disclosure of jail records will deny her the right to a fair trial. I disagree and so does the Sentinel. Although I don’t care about Casey and her orders of nachos, I find it hard to believe her phone log, visitor log and commissary purchases would prejudice a jury. Instead, perhaps the defense should halt all post-hearing press conferences and ask the court to place a gag order on this case. The judge might be willing to comply.

§

Veritas vos liberabit! See you in court.

The truth about relativity

During 1960s, one of the mantras of the counterculture was to “never trust anyone over 30.” Civil rights and Berkeley free speech activist Jack Weinberger is widely credited with making that statement. To those of us old enough to remember the days of free love, we also recall turning on, tuning in and dropping out spoken by one of the day’s best known gurus, Timothy Leary. Oh my. To many, our 30s rapidly passed us by with no noticeable trepidation. In many instances, we have not only become our parents, we are rapidly turning into our grandparents.

Today is my father’s 80th birthday. I will be spending the rest of the day with family and only take an occasional look at my computer, if I take it with me.

Early last night, I spoke to my 91-year-old Uncle David, and to put things in a relative perspective, he said, “Gosh… your father’s going to be 80 tomorrow? Oh, I long for he day I could be 80 again.”

You see, my uncle’s mind is as sharp as it was a half-century ago, but his body is catching up with him. To each and every one of us we understand our own relativity, how it impacts our own lives each day and how much it changes with passing time. We are what we make of ourselves.

∞

Poor Mee - Reflux Redux

“My love is nt a game im real n dnt wnt a fake lien cheaten azz nigga”

- Jennifer Mee, from her Myspace page

On February 16, 2007, I wrote a post about the poor St. Petersburg girl who couldn’t shake off hiccups. Believe me, I could relate. Although hers lasted more than a month, mine only hung around for about 2 weeks. Doctors tried everything with her, but in my case, a heavy dose of one medication in particular knocked them for a loop. Today, at the first sign of a hiccup, I panic. No way do I ever want them again.

Interestingly, and in one of those “Whatever happened to…” moments, Jennifer Mee has resurfaced in the news, not that she ever reached an acclaim that gave us pause to wonder where she went to begin with. Today, the now 19-year-old sits in a jail cell in St. Pete, charged with first-degree murder, along with two cohorts. In a statement released late Sunday, Sgt. T. A. Skinner, of the St. Petersburg Police Department, said Mee had been arrested along with Laron Raiford, 20, and Lamont Newton, 22. All three had been taken into custody in connection with the death of 22-year-old Shannon A. Griffin. Allegedly, Mee lured the victim to a house where the other two robbed him. When he struggled, he was shot several times. Dead. They admitted their involvement to authorities.

This is a sad story. Where did she go wrong? During the course of her young life, nothing has come close to this, which I would describe now as a giant hiccup that will rob her of her freedom for years to come.  No one is accusing her of pulling the trigger, but in Florida, when someone dies during the commission of a felony, everyone involved in the crime can be charged with murder, even if Mee had no idea of the outcome. She had to have known a gun was involved.

Here is her profile, in her own words, at Myspace:

My name is jennifer, im almost 19 but dont let the age fool you, the struggles ive been through has made me grown up so much. Im always havin fun chillin or vibbin to some gucci:) im a down ass chick and all the others will never compare so dont try me like im the next hoe. Ive lived in florida for a while now but my heart is still in vermont? im trying to better myself and just move on in life. Im single& not lookin but if a real nigga comes along then im here:) hit me up if you need to kno anymore

Read more: http://www.myspace.com/jennifer_plies#ixzz13OqZA4JA

In any event, this is the story I wrote back in the beginning of 2007. My hiccup encounter was over 6 years ago now. By the way, Jennifer’s mother found my story and commented. You can read the original HERE, along with those comments.

♦

Poor Jennifer Mee. She’s the 15 year old girl from St. Petersburg, Florida who can’t seem to shake off the hiccups. She’s had them for more than 3 weeks now. I can definitely relate. Two years ago, I had them for a week and a half and they pretty much drove me nuts, or as my friends might say, nuttier than I already was. I did a lot of research on the Internet, trying to find any sort of cure. I experimented with just about everything I read, to no avail. I tried holding my breath. I put sugar under my tongue and in the back of my throat. I breathed into a paper bag and drank out of the wrong side of a glass. Nothing. Zero. Zilch. I could not sleep at night and I got desperate. Finally, I made an appointment to see a doctor. My doctor had died, so I had to find a new one, one who had never met me or knew of my medical history.

When I got in to see this new doctor, I (hic) explained (hic) my (hic) dilemma. He looked down my throat.

“I don’t like the redness I’m seeing,” he said. He listened to my neck, chest and abdomen. After a few minutes of careful examination, he made a diagnosis. “I believe you have a lung tumor.”

My heart sunk down into my butt. That should have been enough to scare the hiccups away, but it didn’t. “You’re kidding?”

“No, that’s pretty much what I think it is. I’ve had cases like this before and that’s what it generally has turned out to be. I’m going to schedule you for chest x-rays and an upper GI.”

“Oh, wow. In the meantime, can you give me anything, like Thorazine?”

“Thorazine? How do you know about that?” he asked.

“I looked it up on the Internet.”

“No, really, how did you know about Thorazine?” He gave me a rather sharp and puzzled look.

“I’m telling you, I tried looking for a cure on the Internet and read about it.” Thorazine (chlorpromazine) is a drug prescribed for schizophrenia. Seriously. It’s also used to treat chronic hiccups. I think he wondered if I had a history of schizophrenia or some other psychotic problem.

[I recall responding to my doctor when he asked me about Thorazine. After the second time, I turned my head to the right and openly told my imaginary friend to mind his own business; that I would answer. Be Quiet! It was at that point he laughed and realized I was a joker and that I was in complete control of my faculties. Ha!]

“Yes. I’m going to give you a prescription for that.” I felt a little relieved, in the hope that this drug would cure me. Hic, I mean, heck, I was more concerned with getting rid of this immediate problem than I was about dying of lung cancer. I left, and hiccuped my way to the pharmacy.

When I got home, I immediately unscrewed the cap and swallowed one of those pills. An hour later, nothing. Man, I thought, this is crazy. I took another one. About an hour after that, I was in some sort of la la land I had never been to before. Wow. I was somewhere up in the clouds and decided I needed to get into bed. That was it for me. I woke up the next morning and the hiccups were gone. Bingo! Cured! My first solid night of sleep in what seemed like forever.

The following week, I went to get the tests done and a few days later, I went back to see the doctor. As I was walking into one of those waiting rooms, he passed me in the hall and said he had some good news and some bad news, but don’t worry, the bad news isn’t that bad.

He walked in with some papers. “You do not have a tumor. You have a hernia on your esophagus. You also have one here and here.” He pointed to parts of my stomach. “You also have GERD.”

GERD is short for gastroesophageal reflux disease. I have always had bad heartburn and I knew I had damaged my esophagus through the years.

“I want you to get some Prilosec OTC and take 2 capsules (not one) a day.”

“For how long?”

“Until I tell you to stop.” which I interpreted as never. “I’m also going to write a prescription for an ulcer medication, not that you necessarily have one, but it will aid in the GERD.”

I had a couple of follow up visits and everything seemed fine. I never really got the hiccups again, at least not like that. Every time I do hic a few times, I get scared. Oh, by the way, I asked what I should do with the rest of those schizo pills. “Throw them away. You don’t need them.”

Yeah, right, like I was going to do that. Hah! At least, I never drove when taking them. That would have been crazy.

[To be truthful, I don’t believe I ever took them again. The hiccups were gone, but as a former Boy Scout, I learned to be prepared, just in case. - My heartfelt condolences go out to the Griffin family.]

To see larger images, click HERE

See Subject Charge Report

Linda Kenney Baden calls it quits

According to a WESH-TV news report, Linda Kenney Baden filed a motion in Orange County Court today to withdraw from the Casey Anthony defense team.

She was hired to do most of the forensic work, but Dorothy Sims will more than foot the bill. My guess is that we are seeing Cheney Mason at work. He tried to cash in his chips at the courthouse in April, when he filed a motion for Judge Stan Strickland to step down. This time, he’s shuffling attorneys around. There is no doubt he is well known in Florida and the two newest attorneys to join the team, Sims and Ann Finnell, hail from Ocala and Jacksonville, respectively.

No reason for Baden’s resignation was cited in the motion. Todd Macaluso resigned this past April stating that he is on “involuntary inactive status with the California State Bar…for an undetermined period of time.” Andrea Lyon resigned at the end of June. She blamed costs that the JAC would not pay, such as travel expenses.

See: WESH

Casey McDingles

HERE’S WHAT REAL WITNESS TAMPERING IS ALL ABOUT

There is a no-brainer running around like a chicken without its head who insists she knows what witness tampering is all about. She doesn’t, and this will serve to quash any and all rumors she keeps firing into wasted Internet bandwidth. At the same time, it will explain exactly what it is. Merely interviewing someone is not. Suggesting they change the truth most assuredly is.

In reality, two Texas EquuSearch volunteers told WFTV that a private investigator working for the defense tried to manipulate them into changing their stories about what transpired down along Suburban Drive in September of 2008.

Brett Churchill and Brett Reilly have accused PI Jeremiah Lyons of slinging words their way that would cause them to alter their testimony about searching the area where Caylee’s remains were found three months later by Roy Kronk, another defense target.

According to the WFTV report, Lyons was recently in court examining EquuSearch records. The station reports that he’s keeping low key while talking to volunteers who are not very happy about it.

In this case, both volunteers are prosecution witnesses. Churchill has been deposed by the defense and Reilly has talked on record to investigators. Both have stated that the exact area where the toddler was discovered was under water and unsearchable at the time. According to Churchill, Lyons went to his house and lied about Reilly’s story. “He basically was asking me if what I said in my deposition was the exact story because he had others who fared differently, one of them being Brett Reilly.”

Reilly had earlier warned Lyons not to twist his words after witnessing what Casey’s defense had done to others involved in the case. Lyons promised him he wouldn’t.

Let me tell you, from first-hand experience, I know all about what a professional manipulator Jerry Lyons is. They don’t get any slicker, but in my case, the defense ended up with the short end of the stick. What he succeeded in doing was to somewhat change the tenor of this court. It abruptly went from Strickland to stricter. Strickland to stricter… trust me, they will be words that linger.

The report also states that Reilly complained to Cheney Mason and that both volunteers contacted the sheriff’s office.

A DATE WITH CASEY

Great news is coming right up for those who want to see what Casey’s new tooth looks like. She is slated to appear at next week’s hearing, which will be at 1:30 pm on the 29th. It had been scheduled to be a status hearing, but with her attendance announced, it signaled that there would be more to the hearing than just an update from the attorneys. She has not been in court since her mother and brother took the stand back in July. Of course, plain old status hearings don’t require her presence.

What this should mean is that Judge Perry will hear several arguments, two of which should be the simultaneously filed MOTION TO DETERMINE REASONABLE BUDGET FOR DUE PROCESS COSTS IN A CAPITAL CASE AND MOTION TO INCUR CERTAIN SPECIFIED COSTS filed recently by new attorney Ann Finnell, and quite possibly the prior rulings over the public’s access to Casey’s jail records. This would include phone calls, visitor logs and commissary purchases. In my opinion only, I don’t care if she pigs out on nachos or not. I do not need to know how many hair barrettes, hair pins, hair claws, banana hair clips or how many other products she buys, including female doodads. With the latest ruling in south Florida, this information may have to be rerouted through the state and released through document dumps instead of coming directly from the jail. Hopefully, I will know more about that soon.

With regard to the budget request made by Finnell, the funding agency, the JAC (Justice Administration Commission) doesn’t like her cost estimates. The commission filed a response last week that questions some of the estimates as being too high and others that shouldn’t be billed to taxpayers. In a post I published two weeks ago, I wrote:

The distance between Jacksonville and Orlando, from her office to the jail, is 145 miles each way. The distance from her office to Fort Myers is roughly 300 miles. She anticipates at least one trip per month to Orlando and back, and at least two trips to Fort Myers. Overnight lodging is expected for the trips to Fort Myers and some of the trips to Orlando, all of which is feasible. She’s asking for $4,000.00. Let’s see… a round trip from Jax to O’do runs about $134.00. Jax to Ft. Myers would be double that - $268.00. We are 7-8 months away from showtime, so 7-8 Orlando trips would run… let’s give her the benefit of the doubt and say 8 months. 8 trips would cost almost $1,100.00.  To Fort Myers and back twice would add up to around $540, bringing our total to $1,640.00, not including hotel stays, and I think it’s safe to assume she’s not going to spend the night at the No Tell Motel, but still, that’s over $2,400 in lodgings. Nope, that one should be questioned by the judge. If the court chooses to approve, it brings our tally much higher…

The JAC is requesting it shouldn’t have to foot the bill for attorneys’ travel expenses; that the costs should come out of the money the Baez Law Firm was paid by Ms. Anthony or be absorbed by the individual attorney.

Any way we look at it, the mere fact that Casey will be in the courtroom almost demands that some semblance of verbal chicken poop will be flying into the fan come next Friday afternoon. I’m looking forward to it, so I must admit, I will not quit. I will attend, as I intend.

As The World Burns

Brad Benson is the owner of a Hyundai car dealership in South Brunswick, NJ. In 2003, he offered Saddam Hussein a brand spanking new car if he would flee Iraq. That advertising campaign wasn’t successful and he pulled the ad after it ran only two days, replacing it with an apology for any offense that may have been taken by anyone, Muslim or otherwise.

To give you a little background, in the 1980’s, Benson established himself as an offensive lineman for the NY Giants, having played there for 12 seasons. Today, he is better known around the state for running his “Idiot Award” ads, where he’s singled out celebrities like Roger Clemens, Mel Gibson and Lindsay Lohan.

“We don’t have your typical car commercial,” he said, and to be frank, they have been quite effective. Three years ago, he was selling about 60 cars each month. Today, in spite of the present economy, that number has grown to over 500 cars per month.

The following story caught my attention for several reasons. I’m originally from NJ, having spent the first half of my life there, so I have a special connection with the state. Since 1981, I’ve lived in Florida, and this year, I had the opportunity to attend two University of Florida Gator football games thanks to the generosity and hospitality of a wonderful lady. She was born and raised in Gainesville, where the spectacle of pastor Terry Jones was met with great consternation. Jones, if you recall, had threatened to burn thousands of Qurans, the Muslim holy book, on September 11, in protest over plans to build a mosque and Islamic center two blocks away from Ground Zero, in lower Manhattan. Jones was never a fixture in Gainesville, and his self-titled “International Burn a Koran Day” became a conflagration of horrible proportion. He’s a total embarrassment to the sensible inhabitants of the respectable university town, where common sense prevails over opportunistic sensationalism and overzealous preachers of literal biblical translations.

Enter Brad Benson. In the midst of the international debacle,  he offered Terry Jones a new car if he promised to not burn one single Quran. Of course, September 11 came and went and no books were burned, but that was more than likely due to President Barack Obama’s very public urging, along with a phone call from Defense Secretary Robert Gates and a statement by Gen. David Petraeus, head of the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, who said that carrying out the plan would endanger American troops.

“I just didn’t think that was a good thing for our country right now,” Benson said about the Quran burning. Levelheadedness won out and the residents of Gainesville were able to breathe sighs of relief. Jones has since indicated that he will move away from the area, along with his flock from the Dove World Outreach Center. Hallelujah!

Meanwhile, a representative for Jones called Brad Benson’s car dealership to collect the 2011 Hyundai Accent, which retails for $14,200. At first, the dealer thought it was a hoax. “They said unless I was doing false advertising, they would like to arrange to pick up the car,” so he asked for a copy of Jones’s driver’s license. The reverend complied.

Of course, Jones told the Associated Press last Thursday that the offer of a car was not the reason why he chose not to burn the Muslim holy books. He said he hadn’t learned about the deal until after September 11.

Prior to making the determination, Benson asked his radio audience to help him decide whether to honor his promise. Over 2,600 people responded and the vast majority said he needed to keep his word. Views ran the gamut. One person suggested painting the car with verses from the Quran, the Talmud and the King James version of the Bible.

After the feedback, he said he decided to give Jones the car outright because he didn’t want to be connected to anything the pastor decides to do with it. “I don’t want to be involved in the politics of that.”

In the end, Terry Jones said he was not going to profit from the car. “We’re not keeping the car for ourselves.” Instead, he said he plans to donate it to an organization that helps abused Muslim women. Good luck finding one. Although the effort looks good on paper and in the media, it shows how out of touch the preacher is with the world and sharia, where many interpretations of Islamic law “are used to justify cruel punishments such as amputation and stoning as well as unequal treatment of women in inheritance, dress, and independence.”¹

If Jones can’t find an organization, perhaps he can establish one for abused Muslim women. If he does, let’s just pray that no one comes along and burns it to the ground with women, children and Qurans inside. By Muslims. How sad and ironic that would be.

Story collected from AP wire service

Political Raffling

Because I am a writer, I am on mailing lists, including press releases from political parties. Today, I received an e-mail. Lest you think I am going to give out my affiliation here, guess again. It’s no one’s business, but when I receive something in one of my accounts that’s specifically set up for this type of information and it causes me to raise an eyebrow, I do what I like to do: write about it.

Normally, I leave politics off my blog, but this one was a bit surprising. To be fair, the party itself isn’t what attracted me to it. It’s the person who’s carnival barking that did. At first glance, I didn’t think much of it, but after giving it some thought, I really can’t think of a time, in the annals of American politics, that a sitting president has ever offered any sort of sweepstakes with the one and only prize (3 winners) offered being an opportunity to meet him backstage at one of the final campaign stops he will be headlining for the fall mid-term election. I don’t want to think of my president as a carnival barker, but at the same time, it is not my intent to make any kind of political statement over this. I won’t. It is what it is and what you see is what you get. The graphics are mine, but the “Presidential Address” by Barack Obama to his party constituents is real. Incidentally, the message did not come out of the White House. It is being paid for by the Democratic National Committee.

Hurry! Hurry! Hurry! Step right up!

 HERE’S HOW TO ORDER!

There are 20 days until the election. I need you to go all in.

People like Senator Barbara Boxer in California, Congresswoman Mary Jo Kilroy in Ohio, and Congressman Patrick Murphy in Pennsylvania — who courageously fought alongside us for change — are facing millions in retaliatory attacks ads from special interests, made possible by a recent Supreme Court decision.

All around the country, members of Congress who stand up for the middle class are being targeted. Special interests hope to replace our allies with candidates who will give tax breaks to the wealthy, exploding our deficits at the expense of the middle class; privatize social security; even eliminate the minimum wage.

That’s why I’m doing all I can, traveling the country over the last critical days of this campaign to support our allies and remind voters of the choice they have in this election. These are the people who stood with us when health reform seemed unlikely, when the banks tried to bully us out of Wall Street reform.

I need you to do all you can as well. Keep organizing, keep talking to your neighbors, and keep donating whatever you can afford.

WILL YOU CHIP IN $3 RIGHT NOW TO HELP WIN THIS FIGHT?

Your donation today will not just help put organizers on the ground, resources in the hands of volunteers, or ads online in these final days of the election. Your donation is a statement — that you and I will not sit back and allow interest groups to buy their way back into power.

And, as Mitch told you earlier this week, your donation will automatically enter you win a trip to Las Vegas to meet me backstage. I’ll be there on October 22nd to stand alongside Nevada Democrats and Harry Reid, one of the best majority leaders the Senate has ever had, who has played a critical role in each of the historic victories you and I have achieved. He’s one of the people we need to fight for.

There are Democrats like Harry all around the country — folks who are under siege because they stood up to the status quo. It’s up to you to give them a chance to keep fighting. And if you don’t do it, nobody will.

I will be out there, making the case with you. And I hope to see you backstage at one of the final, most important, campaign stops I will make this fall.

PLEASE DONATE $3 TO BE AUTOMATICALLY ENTERED TO WIN A TRIP TO LAS VEGAS TO MEET ME BACKSTAGE:

https://donate.barackobama.com/Backstage

Thank you for all you do,

President Barack Obama

P.S. — Making a donation automatically registers you for the sweepstakes. You may also enter the sweepstakes without making a contribution either online or via text message — click here to enter online or here for instructions on how to enter via text message. No minimum contribution is necessary to be registered.

No purchase or contribution necessary to enter. Void where prohibited. You can enter the contest without making a contribution by clicking here. Only U.S. citizens or lawful permanent residents over the age of 18 who are residents of the 50 states or D.C. are eligible to enter. Entries must be received by 11:59 p.m. on 10/15/10. Three winners will receive one round-trip ticket within the continental U.S. to Las Vegas, NV; hotel accommodations for one; and a meeting with President Obama at a rally event on 10/22/10 (approximate combined retail value $1,200.00). Odds of winning depend on number of entries received. Promotion is subject to Official Rules, available here, including restrictions on eligibility.

Paid for by Organizing for America, a project of the Democratic National Committee — 430 South Capitol Street SE, Washington, D.C. 20003. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.

Contributions or gifts to the Democratic National Committee are not deductible as charitable contributions for income tax purposes.

Would I like to meet the president? Sure, he’s the president and he seems like a very approachable sort of guy, but that’s not the way I’d prefer doing it. Please let me know what you think. Does this diminish the integrity of the Office of the President of the United States? Or have we reached a point where meeting the president is just like winning a Thanksgiving turkey? Buy a raffle ticket. And who will be spared this November, the turkey or the president?

Barking up the wrong plea?

“I found my daughter’s car today, and it smells like there’s been a dead body in the damn car.”

- Cindy Anthony

You know, I really wanted to title this post, Cryogenic oven-trapping gas chromatography for analysis of volatile organic compounds in body fluids, but it was already taken. Darn those three, K. Watanabe-Suzuki, A. Ishii and O. Suzuki. They left nothing for another man’s creative imagination.

On July 24, 2008, Investigator Mike Vincent of the Orange County Sheriff’s Office sent Oak Ridge National Laboratory a carpet sample from the trunk of Casey’s Pontiac, the one that contained the damn dead pizza with squirrel topping smell. All kidding aside, what tests were performed on the air quality in that trunk was a very serious matter. Whether or not the judge allows the forensic report to be admitted as evidence in the case against Casey is of tantamount importance to both the state and defense, where the life or death of the accused may be in the balance. The judge will have to weigh heavily the type of science it is - something never used in a court of law. Is it truly a valid science or is it junk, as Casey’s defense has implied? To grasp the basic concept of what it is, we must understand it first.

To begin with, there’s nothing quite like real, live witnesses; the ones who will testify in court that the car smelled like death and decomposition. There’s no escaping it. Cindy smelled it, George smelled it, Lee smelled it, and certainly, lots of law enforcement officials running around the Anthony home on July 15, 2008, smelled it, and many of those officials were duly trained in detecting decomposition of the human body. Just like the pungent smell of marijuana, there’s no escaping its uniqueness. Once you smell death, you never forget it. I believe it is in our primordial genes. The very first time it impacts you, you know what it is. No need for an education. No learning curve. No one need tell you what it is. Coupled with the scientific results, it could smell, er, spell doom for Ms. Casey. Even without it, the odor is what it is: decomp. No squirrels or other organic matter was found, lest a few crumbs of dried up pepperoni, if that.

The carpet sample sent in July was not the only thing parceled out. On September 3, Dr. Neal Haskell included air samples from the trunk, paper towels, and a white trash bag, both containing fly pupae. Dr. Haskell is a forensic entomology expert - forensic refers to investigation into the cause of death and entomology refers to insects. He is part of the faculty (Biology Department) at St. Joseph’s College in Rensselaer, Indiana.

According to Oak Ridge, compounds in all the samples were identified by mass spectral library match, which means they were compared against known samples that exist in a library. Without getting too complex, verifications were determined from standards purchased from the Sigma-Aldrich Chemical Company. It’s like comparing samples of anything against a known bank of information pertaining to that subject matter.

The first carpet sample was placed in a sealed metal can. A preliminary analysis was performed by extracting a small amount of air from the can. It was injected into a Hewlett-Packard Gas Chromotagraph/Mass Spectrometer (GC/MS) equipped with a Hewlett-Packard Mass Selective Detector. If this sounds anything like the Turbo Encabulator, it’s not even remotely close. Hewlett-Packard never made one. Alas, only a few compounds were observed in the sample, primarily chloroform, and it became apparent the sample wasn’t strong enough, so it was deemed necessary to increase the sensitivity in order to find a lower abundance of compounds - if they were present at all. According to the report, the technique selected for concentrating the sample was cryogenic trapping, which can improve detection of organic compounds ten-fold. Cryo-trapping is widely used for the analysis of fragrances and odors.

For these analyses, cryo-trapping was performed by injecting air into a short loop of inert stainless-steel tubing connected between the injector of the gas chromatograph and the head of the GC column. The stainless-steel loop was cooled with liquid nitrogen which condensed the organic compounds present in the air sample, while allowing the nitrogen and oxygen to be vented away from the GC/MS. Normal heating of the GC oven during analysis cycle vaporized the condensed organic compounds in the stainless-steel loop and allowed them to traverse through the GC column into the mass spectrometer.¹

If you are not familiar with cryogenics, think of cryonics, which is the “science of using ultra-cold temperature to preserve human life with the intent of restoring good health when technology becomes available to do so,” according to the Alcor Website. Rumor has it that Walt Disney’s head is frozen and kept under the Cinderella Castle at Disney World, here in Orlando, but that’s not true. His whole body is on ice in a hidden chamber beneath Pirates of The Caribbean at Disneyland. Actually, none of that is true. Dearly departed Disney was cremated, head and all, and his ashes rest in Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California. Cryo no more.

Back to the matter at hand…

The carpet sample was removed from the metal can and placed in a Tedlar bag for 2 days at 35 degrees Celsius (C) and allowed to off-gas into the bag. Kind of like a silent, but deadly, if you get my drift. Tedlar bags have many uses in many industries, including air sampling, hazardous waste, and other gas sampling needs.

The report admitted that gasoline was found in the trunk and it was likely a source of significant hydrocarbon interference that caused an overlap with about 41% of the chemicals typically observed in decompositional events. This may wreak havoc on the state’s claims. The defense will jump on this like flies on… flypaper. Of the 51 chemicals identified on the carpet sample from Casey’s vehicle, 80% were consistent with decompositional events. A mere 17 of the 51 overlapped with known or possible gasoline constituents, leaving 24 compounds - 59% - associated with decomposing human remains potentially unaccounted for. In other words, there was no other way to explain their existence, such as pepperoni. There are lots more examples in the report, but to go into every aspect would be boring and quite tormenting. Suffice it to say that in its conclusion, the report summed up things nicely.

What the lab determined was that odor from early decomposition was present, including “an unusually large concentration of chloroform - far greater than what is typically seen in human decomposition.” There was also an increased level of sulfur containing compounds found, which are “particularly characteristic of decompositional events.” Certainly, of particular interest to the defense is the report’s conclusion that the possibility exists there could be a variety of products that could have contributed to the overall chemical signature.

How much credence should we, as untrained laymen, put into the Oak Ridge report? Laywomen, too. No discrimination intended or implied. Our opinions won’t count in court, but it makes for great discussion. What we may lose sight of are the lab tests conducted for OCSO because we keep wishing upon a star that Casey will be found guilty, so we sometimes skew the results. To be frank, we’re not even into what the defense experts will bring into battle, but we do have another report at our fingertips; the findings of Michael E. Sigman, Ph.D., Assistant Director for Physical Evidence at the National Center for Forensic Science on the campus of the University of Central Florida, right in Casey’s backyard.

Here is a list of what was analyzed and reported in Air Analysis Results: Caylee Anthony Missing Child Investigation²:

Some samples were not tested at NCFS, but an interpretation of the findings stated that“… dimethyl disulfide, tetrachloroethene  and Chloroform are known to be liberated from decomposition of human remains. These three compounds were not found in a representative gasoline sample in the NCFS database. Dimethyl disulfide occurs naturally in cabbage and onion.” Was that pizza ordered with onions and pepperoni? “Tetrachloroethene is used in dry cleaning and may be used in spot removers. Chloroform may be used as a degreaser and may be formed through the reaction of chlorine bleach with some organic chemicals.”

What Dr. Sigman concluded was that the presense of dimethyl disulfide, tetrachloroethene and chloroform did not conclusively demonstrate that human decomp was present in the trunk. There were too many other possible sources. 

These were the findings of Oak Ridge and NCFS, and not my opinion. In other words, I have no dog in this fight other than a cause similar to everyone else that’s compassionate about this case and looking for complete and final justice for Caylee. Speaking of dogs, though, the defense is going to look into all of this in a lot more depth and try to convince the jury a machine could never replace a canine nose. Therefore, it’s inconclusive. On the other hand, didn’t a dog also hit on human decompostion in that trunk? How is defense attorney Dorothy Clay Sims, a specialist in medical-expert witness cross-examinations, going to bark back at a dog?

I recommend reading Air science could be used for first time ever in Anthony case by Anthony Colarossi, Orlando Sentinel, October 8, 2010.

I Feel Fine

In honor of John Lennon’s 70th birthday

Google him

Announcement

I am slowly dismantling my WordPress blog. By the time you read this, it will be shut down. Marinade Dave is dead. This is my home now, and I’ve been slowly and meticulously moving things from there to here. There is still work to be done, but this has been my plan and I hope you feel welcome. On this site, I have a lot more control and freedom of design. Plus, I can guarantee it will be free of trolls.

All comments go into moderation here unless you sign up for a password. If you wish to do so, leave a comment on a blog post or e-mail me and I will set you up with one, along with a screen name. The only thing the screen name/password will do is keep you out of moderation.

If you can think of ways I can improve this site, please let me know.

THANK YOU

A formidable presence

As quiet as a church mouse, Ann E. Finnell entered into the Ninth Circuit Court, a Notice of Appearance last Thursday, September 30.

ANN E. FINNELL, the undersigned attorney, hereby enters her appearance on behalf of DEFENDANT, CASEY ANTHONY, joining attorneys Jose Baez, Esq., and Cheney Mason, Esq., inter alia as an attorney for Defendant.

Inter alia, for those not familiar, is Latin for “among other things,” meaning she is joining the crowd. The more, the merrier, so to speak.

What you may not have noticed, though, are two motions rolled into one that came attached with it; something she filed on behalf of her new client, Ms. Anthony. The nerve. Judge Perry wasn’t even given a chance to acknowledge her notification yet.

MOTION TO DETERMINE REASONABLE BUDGET FOR DUE PROCESS COSTS IN A CAPITAL CASE AND MOTION TO INCUR CERTAIN SPECIFIED COSTS

In this two-for-one motion, Ms. Finnell asks the Honorable Court to “set a hearing to detemine a reasonable budget for the penalty phase of a capital proceeding.” This is not in anticipation of a guilty verdict. No, this is more of a “just in case” scenario. Juries can go either way and it’s better to be prepared, and to be specific, this is a motion requesting money for services rendered BEFORE the trial, not after.

On March 19 of this year, Judge Stan Strickland officially declared Casey Anthony indigent and her defense stated that they would continue to work on her case pro bono. Regardless of how Florida taxpayers felt at the time, the state was ordered, through the JAC (Judicial Administrative Commission) to pay for her experts, investigators and other costs incurred. At the indigence hearing, her then-new attorney, Cheney Mason, said the total amount could be about $200,000. Unfortunately, I am of the opinion that it will exceed that price tag.

Ms. Finnell, in her motion, assumes that “since Defendant has been adjudged indigent for costs it would seem appropriate that undersigned counsel attempt to establish a reasonable budget for a capital case.”

I’m afraid, in this case, I have to agree with her, but it has nothing to do with siding with the defense. It is because Casey has a right, like any other who stands accused, to have a solid defense, particularly because of the nature of the beast. This is a capital case, and as Judge Perry has stated more than once, death is different. However, just because I agree does not mean he will write a check in the amount she is requesting. He has several options.

1. He can agree 100% and grant her wish.
2. He can agree and ask her to submit individual bills to JAC as they come in.
3. He can disagree and tell her to work with what she’s already got; Jerry Lyons and Jeanene Barrett. Is Mort Smith still in the equation?

Ms. Finnell is very good at what she does. She is a seasoned veteran at this sort of thing. I noticed elsewhere in comments that the defense doesn’t need this attorney since Cheney Mason is already death penalty qualified. Her joining the team has nothing to do with that. It is all about taking care of the penalty phase if Casey is convicted of first-degree murder. That is her specialty and in order to be fair and just, any defendant in a capital case needs someone precisely like her. Indigent or not, they usually get one, and Casey is no exception.

Just what is the Jacksonville attorney requesting? Let’s take a look.

She believes the utilization of a private investigator will be required to provide services in the realm of “locating and interviewing mitigation witnesses,” and“locating and securing documents and other evidence relevant to the penalty phase,” among others I will get to. One of the things that I get a kick out of are those pesky little “other evidence” phrases that one never quite understands. Exactly what it really means is anyone’s guess. It’s almost the same as saying, “well, that’s what they say” to back up a claim, only no one knows for sure who “they” are. Oh, you know, them, those, that evidence.

On with the show… Performing background checks is a reasonable request. So is “researching any other factual issue relevant to the penalty phase such as the credibility and character of the witnesses.” She adds that she does not anticipate the costs for investigative services to exceed $5,000.00 and specifically requests the court to “enter an Order authorizing such costs not to exceed $5,000.00 without further Order of the Court.” That’s rather interesting, because she places this fiscal limit on each of her court requests and it’s the first time I have seen any defense attorney related to this case take responsibility for any money at all, except for what the JAC is willing to pay, and there have been issues already. Judge Perry stated that any bill JAC refuses to pay falls back into the hands of the Baez Law Firm. This woman has, what seems apparent, experience in this department. On this particular issue, she says that the private investigator would be one with whom JAC has a contract and would provide services at JAC rates. So far, so good.

$5,000.00

The next matter at hand concerns the services of a licensed psychiatrist or psychologist at a “reasonable hourly rate” - whatever that may be. Of course, the JAC has a menu that lists recommended rates:

JAC is also rather particular about what it offers. “Prior to retaining an expert, defense counsel must file a written motion seeking authorization to incur the expert services. The motion needs to establish the basis for the expert services by setting forth the reason why the expert’s services are necessary for the defense of the case. The defense has the burden to show the particularized need for the expert’s services.”

Since this leads the court to assure the JAC that what it hands out will have to be meticulously explained by the defense, Casey and her team will get no free rides. In the case of “seeking a comprehensive forensic psychological examination of the defendant, the attorney should ask the expert the number of hours the expert anticipates will be necessary to complete the evaluation,” which translates into: the defense should obtain a good faith estimate from the expert first. I believe Ms. Finnell has done that.

Whoever the expert is would examine and conduct forensic testing on Casey and “render an opinion regarding relevant mitigation” and be available to consult with the defense regarding state experts’ cross-examinations. If necessary, it would include testifying at the penalty phase. The price tag? Her guestimate runs at $7,500.00.

Now, we’re up to $12,500.00

Next up in her list is $1,000 for copies, medical records, school records, photographs and “any other record relevant to any statutory or non-statutory mitigating circumstance or to rebut any aggravating circumstance, and the preparation of trial exhibits of said records.”

$13,500.00

The next item up for the defense is the mitigation specialist and here’s where the instructions are clear. Ms. Finnell does not seem to be asking for anyone new. Instead, she seeks money for who’s already there, in which case, I would have to point the finger at Jeanene Barrett, left over from the Andrea Lyon days. Here, Ms. Finnell “anticipates needing additional hours for the mitigation specialist who has already been approved by the court.” Bingo! She’s not looking for anyone else. She expects this expert to work for an additional 100 hours at a rate the court had already established, and if I can find that out, I will let you know, but if we assume it’s $75.00 per hour, we’re talking an additional $7,500.00, which pushes the bill over the $20,000.00 amount initially reported in the media.

$21,000.00

The esteemed attorney expects to travel “to and from Orlando, Florida and Jacksonville, Florida and Ft. Myers, Florida, to visit with Defendant and Defendant’s family, friends and associates. Multiple trips will be required prior to the start of the trial in this cause.” She intends to use her own vehicle, which is not a 1987 Yugo, incidentally. Let’s see, the JAC states that, “When travel is more than 50 miles or out‐of‐county, an expert may bill for mileage pursuant to section 112.061, F.S. The state rate for mileage reimbursement is $.0445 per mile.”

The distance between Jacksonville and Orlando, from her office to the jail, is 145 miles each way. The distance from her office to Fort Myers is roughly 300 miles. She anticipates at least one trip per month to Orlando and back, and at least two trips to Fort Myers. Overnight lodging is expected for the trips to Fort Myers and some of the trips to Orlando, all of which is feasible. She’s asking for $4,000.00. Let’s see… a round trip from Jax to O’do runs about $134.00. Jax to Ft. Myers would be double that - $268.00. We are 7-8 months away from showtime, so 7-8 Orlando trips would run… let’s give her the benefit of the doubt and say 8 months. 8 trips would cost almost $1,100.00.  To Fort Myers and back twice would add up to around $540, bringing our total to $1,640.00, not including hotel stays, and I think it’s safe to assume she’s not going to spend the night at the No Tell Motel, but still, that’s over $2,400 in lodgings. Nope, that one should be questioned by the judge. If the court chooses to approve, it brings our tally much higher…

$25,000.00

Ms. Finnell further anticipates “travel expenses for either one investigator or one mitigation specialist to travel to Ohio, to obtain records and interview potential witnesses.” Of course, this travel would have to require roundtrip airfare, lodging, and per diem expenses, which she expects to be approved at JAC rates. Air fare shouldn’t exceed $600.00 and total travel should not be any more than $1,500.00. That adds another $1,500.00 to our bill.

$26,500.00 grand total prior to trial

The final request is a very important one as far as I’m concerned, because it makes it clear when she expects this money. It makes absolutely no sense that the court would hold this amount until a verdict is rendered and the penalty phase begins, if Casey is found guilty. No, there’s not nearly enough time to collect all of this information. At the same time, something may come to light that is important to the outcome of the trial. This is money the state must hand out very soon in one form or another. Clearly, Ms. Finnell anticipates this because she says that “if this case goes to trial, travel to the site of the trial and lodging associated with the days required to attend the trial will need to be incurred at JAC approved rates. Counsel cannot at this time estimate the number of days required to select a jury, try the case, and conduct a penalty phase if necessary.” You see? This is money she intends to spend leading up to the trial, if it reaches that stage, which it will. The trial and possible penalty phase are not included.

We may not be happy with this price tag, but taking everything into consideration, and I mean everything, Ann Finnell has laid out an expense package that is within reason. Like I said, as much as some of us will disagree, it’s the first thing that’s come out of this defense that makes concrete sense. Finally, an efficient planner has emerged - one who’s not afraid to open her hand and show a couple of cards. No “I’ll have to get back to you on that,” or “I need to look into that.” Here it is, take it or leave it. Personally, I think Judge Perry is going to like her style. She’s no nonsense.

Well worth losing sleep over

FRIDAY

Last Friday evening, it rained. Of course, living in Florida, it can storm at a moment’s notice, bringing with it the wrath of rumbling thunder and lightning. Anyone who reads my blog understands that I take an Internet time out from 7:00 pm to 7:30 pm Monday through Friday to watch Jeopardy. Last Friday was no different until, suddenly, in the middle of the Double Jeopardy round and without warning, an intensely brilliant white light burst through the living room window, accompanied by an immediate explosion of sound, louder than anything I’d heard before. CRACK! In that split second, it was gone, and so was our electricity. Within minutes, power returned, but no cable. After the box rebooted, the living room TV cranked back up, but my show was over. Darn, I missed Final Jeopardy.

As sudden as the surge was, I quickly jumped to my feet to peer out the front window because I smelled electricity in the air. Sure enough, a wire was down in the front yard and it was hissing and spitting and reeling like a lithe snake in the dead of night, emitting an eerie orange glow that pierced the night air and glistened on the drops of rain that continued to fall. I walked to the phone to call 911, but there was no dial tone. We had switched to all cable only months earlier, so the phone and Internet were out-of-order. How funny, I thought, because the living room TV was working fine. I took out my cell phone and called to report the incident. Then, I called the cable company and the tech said the modem box that controls the phone and Internet was sending him no signal. Modem fried. The soonest anyone could come would be next Tuesday. To someone with a blog, that’s like… forever! Oh well, back to the matter at hand. I knew I would have the Internet the next day - for a few hours, at least.

Within minutes, the fire company arrived. There was no way I was going to set foot out there and risk a deathly jolt from the wet ground that lay ahead. As the fire/emergency crew assessed the situation, the power went off and off it stayed. The hissing line was dead in the water. Situation under control.

One of the things we know from living in the lightning capital of the world is to be ready, so a battery operated camping light alloted enough brightness for us to move around inside the house. Without power, the air conditioning wasn’t working, either, and it didn’t take long to warm up. After about 45 minutes, I decided to take a walk outside and scope the place out. I walked over to the power company truck and asked the driver when he expected it to come back on. Of course, he could only guess. He was awaiting another truck bringing someone to do the work. His job was to take a look and report. That’s after 27 years with the utility, he said. No more fixing lines. The younger ones do that now. One neighborhood child came by and asked the same question, but by that time we had already moved on to other topics. There was nothing any of us could do but wait. The driver and I talked for about an hour, until it was time for me to take my nightly insulin shot. He told me about some of his experiences with the company and how cutbacks have really streamlined things, but hadn’t made things better. It was more work, in other words, but with that came more hours and more pay. Not so bad, then. Not bad at all for a man in his fifties. I told him I write about the Anthony case. Interestingly, he was quite fascinated by it and he began asking questions like if she did it. He said his best friend’s son went to high school with her.

Someone drove by and stopped to ask what happened. He said he was heading up to the bar on the corner, G’s Lounge. The utility guy said, good luck, the power’s out there, too. He said that under normal conditions, it takes three surges to the substation to shut power off. In this particular case, after the third time, power remained on and he had to manually turn it off. I guess it fused something together. This took out a good part of the neighborhood. I asked him how many volts were in that downed wire.

“7200,” he responded.

Wow, that’s a lot of juice. We turned back to the Anthony case. I said that had I been many years younger and met her in a bar, I’d find her quite attractive, which is what your friend’s son must have thought. Of course, this would mean PRIOR to any murder. He agreed, but then he told me he asked the son if he had ever hit on her. Did he ever do anything with her? No, the son said. “She was passed around too much in high school. Everyone had her.”

That was an interesting observation and one that I wouldn’t ordinarily expect, but there are many surprises when it comes to this case. Of course, in a court of law, that would be hearsay and therefore, inadmissible, so take it the way you want, but it was a statement just the same.  Had it not been for the strike that burned a hole in the ground, I wouldn’t have known.

After a good conversation about other things, it was time to go inside. I wished him well and said good night. I went into the house and tried to sleep, but only lightly dozed until, just after midnight, the power returned and the cool, dry blast of the air conditioner fanned across my hot skin. Relief! Good, because I had a football game to go to and I wanted to be as refreshed as possible. Despite the lack of sleep, I woke up feeling fine. There was a big day ahead!

SATURDAY

Weeks earlier, I had published a 2-part series that began with Gainesville serial killer Danny Rolling, When karma strikes twice, and finished with John Huggins, Slowly, the wiles of justice churn. In the Huggins case, Jeff Ashton was one of the prosecutors and Chief Judge Belvin Perry presided. Of course, people like to comment and that’s where a lot of thought goes on. It brings my blog to life! During those ensuing comments, a dear reader and contributor, Nika1, offered to take me to a football game, the one against Kentucky, to be precise, and I took her up on that offer. She lives in Gainesville and told me about the wall in memory of those slain by Rolling in 1990.

In back-and-forth e-mails to-and-from my now defunct account, we set the trip up and finished it with a phone call. I didn’t want to drive my car that distance. She suggested taking the Red Coach. The Red Coach? I had never heard of it, but I took a good look. How could I not? It’s first-class all the way, with wide leather seats that fold down almost into a bed. There’s a movie, and wi-fi, to boot. The best part? It’s only $15 each way. Heck, it would probably cost me $20 in gas anyway. All I had to do was drive down to the airport and park. For free.

While waiting to board, riders were dropped off from Miami. I spoke to one gentleman from Ocala who knows the Brantley family, football players all. John Brantley IV is the Gator quarterback. It was nice to learn a little more background before the game.

Off we went! I brought my computer along to catch up on e-mails and comments, but alas, the wi-fi was not working. I tried to sleep a little, but Nancy Drew was blaring from the speaker above me. Our movie du jour.

When the bus arrived in Gainesville, Nika1 was waiting. I knew, as soon as I saw her, that she was my blogging friend and not there for anyone else. I got out and we lightly embraced. Aaaah, such a warm and friendly greeting! We walked over to her vehicle and stowed my belongings. I must tell you that sitting on the front passenger seat were a Gator t-shirt and hat, both brand new. Without hesitation, I took my shirt off in the parking lot to the delight of no one, but I was in Gator country, by golly, and I’m a Gator.

Off we went!

People were everywhere, all dressed in orange and blue, the university’s colors. Young, old, and everything in between, wore nothing else. We parked and took a walk to one of the book stores. The aromas of tailgating barbecues wafted in the air. The book store was a sort of mall with two food courts. We were hungry and it was time to eat. The bus left at 12:30 and arrived just before 3:00. The game wasn’t set to begin until 7:00, so there was plenty of time to kill. I’ll tell you, by the time the day was over, we must have walked 10 miles, but it did me a lot of good. As we milled around the campus, which is vast, she pointed out things of importance.

Tim Tebow is one classy act. That’s all I need to say about him. He’s above the rest, but he’d never admit it. Inside this building sits the NCAA Championship trophy. I saw it through a window. Game day, it’s locked up tight. Too many people.

There were plenty of sites to see and Nika1 was thrilled to show me everything. I had been to a number of games in the past, but not for years, and it was only to go up, see the game, and return home. This was a much more personal look, and I was eager to see as much as I could.

Soon, it would be time for the Gator Walk, where the football players, coaches and trainers walk down the street and into the massive stadium. It’s almost like a parade.

Cheerleaders chanted, to the excitement of the awaiting crowd…

One more…

Oh, heck… just one more…

It was at this time I turned to Nika1 and told her I will now admit I’m getting old. You see, each one of those girls looked, to me, to be no more than high school age. I couldn’t look at them as anything more than children. Time to move on…

The Gator Walk was about to begin!

We stood alongside a Gainesville police officer. He was one of the friendliest guys you’d ever want to meet. He said the motorcycle cop seen here, front and left, was hit by a car last year at a game and broke his left arm. I remember reading about it in the Sentinel or online. Nika1 had told me about how security was so beefed up for the game two weeks earlier against USF. The crazy preacher was going to burn Qurans and the stadium was an easy terrorist target. Fortunately, the threat abated and nothing happened, but 400 extra FBI and other federal/state officers were on hand. Good thing, too, because she said it was so brutally hot, people were dropping like flies. The extra security came to the rescue. She asked our friendly officer how he survived the heat. He said he prepares himself the night before by drinking lots of pickle juice. Pickle juice?!Yes, he learned it years ago as a boy growing up on a Gainesville area farm. Fascinating!

Along came the entourage…

Here they come! Nika1 told me head coach Urban Meyer makes his players wear a clean shirt and tie to the game. It instills discipline and shows respect.

If you look to your right in the above picture, you’ll spot Urban, also sporting a tie.

We still had over an hour to go before the doors opened, but we made the best of our time. There was plenty to do, believe me. A lot of vendors are set up all around the stadium. One is the insurance company, Nationwide, handing out small towels to dip in a trough filled with ice and water. You dab your hot face and neck to help stay cool. Fortunately, this was a night game and it wasn’t as hot as a day game.

Finally, we were let in. When I arrived at the bus station and we drove away, I noticed her drawl, but wasn’t completely sure where she was from. Why, right here in Gainesville, born and raised. Aha! At the game, she said she has been a season ticket holder for 36 years. That’s a dedicated Gator! She knew the people who sat around us, obviously, and before the game began, her niece and nephew arrived with their young daughter. They were just as welcoming.

Here’s the view from where we sat. Trust me, there’s no such thing as a bad seat and these were just perfect.

The game was going to begin soon and I came to watch. There’s a lot of history in The Swamp.

I took no pictures of the game. I wanted to see everything with my eyes, not through a camera lens.

It was a thrilling game. The Gators scored first and went on to win 48-14. The announced crowd was over 90,000 people. I had a wonderful and memorable trip, but there was one sad note. When the third quarter ends, it’s tradition to stand and sing together, We are the Boys from Old Florida. It’s sort of like the seventh-inning stretch, only college football. Then, the final quarter began. Within a minute after the song ended and play began, someone collapsed about 4 or 5 rows above and to the left of us. All I could see was someone frantically performing CPR on a person laid out on the bench. I never did see the gentleman. Police officers situated in close proximity jumped into action. Within minutes, a uniformed paramedic arrived and he was taken out. Everyone kept turning to look at the game and what was going on with him. When one officer passed by me, I asked how things had gone. Not so well, he answered. I asked him how old the guy was. He said very old. The officer was probably in his late 30s. When it was quite obvious the Gators had a lock on the game, Nika1 said we should probably leave before the crowd. I agreed, but on the way out, I stopped and asked another officer. I was concerned about the poor man. This officer was about my age. How old was the guy, I asked him. Oh, in his late 50s, early 60s. I guess age is relative depending on who you ask. He said it didn’t look good. The man was not breathing and his heart had stopped.

I want to take a moment to remember Jerry Lee McGriff, of Starke. A true-blue Gator fan, he died watching his beloved team. My sympathies go out to his family and friends. You can read more here.

SOUTHERN HOSPITALITY

When Nika1 and I were enjoying our pre-game lunch together - a lunch, I might add, she refused to let me buy - I mentioned that she must be a very trusting soul. Here I was, a virtual stranger, and she was ready and ever so willing to open her arms in friendship. She even offered me a place to sleep for a few hours until the bus returned at 3:30 am to take me home. She admitted that she is a very trusting person and always has been, but she also said she pretty much knew what sort of character I was from my writing. That’s a nice thing to know, that people trust me. I am harmless, after all, but it goes deeper than that. While Gainesville is a University city with a college, small-town feel, Nika1 exuded friendship and I was welcomed from the moment I stepped off that bus until I left to return to Orlando.

She lives in a very rural town south of Gainesville, and not far from Cross Creek, home of Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings. No? The name doesn’t ring a bell? Yes, it does. She was an author who won a Pulitzer for writing a book, The Yearling. Perhaps, you’ve heard of it.

There’s something inherently romantic about the deep south. That’s why my best friend Stewart and I like to take road trips. Over the many years of living in Florida, I’ve grown to love and admire the pockets of land still left that are truly remnants of Old Florida. Where Nika1 lives is just such a place. It’s something you can’t really explain. Although her house was built in the late 1800s, it’s more of a feeling and you know it when you’re there. It is a step back into a time when post cards and billboards didn’t exist. No roadside attractions. Citrus groves and cattle ranches abounded and you kicked your feet up on the front porch of your homestead at the end of a long day. Along with that is the southern hospitality we’ve all heard about. Nika1 is the embodiment of that, pure and simple. Not only did I have a bed to put my weary feet and head on, she had two books for me to take home, BEYOND THE BODY FARM and DEATH’S ACRE, both written by Dr. Bill Bass and Jon Jefferson. Tucked into one of those books were two tickets to the Gator’s homecoming game against Mississippi State, a game she can’t attend.

When I awoke after a couple of hours sleep, freshly brewed coffee awaited me, along with two breakfast sausage crescents, a banana, an orange juice and a bottle of water for the ride back.

While sitting at the bus stop in the dead of morning, we talked once more about the Rolling murders. She has a real sense of history. She said that the poor girl whose head was separated and posed on a bookshelf was an intern with the Gainesville police department. It was so sickening, seven officers left their jobs after they saw her. You may find it to be an odd thing to discuss, but at just after 3:00 am sitting in a parking lot, you keep your doors locked. So does the whole town because of people like him.

Yup, life is a lot simpler in the land where Nika1 lives. It’s too bad, but even there, she’s got to lock her doors at night.

I rolled into town about a quarter to six. I had practically missed a whole night of sleep, but it was well, well worth it. What better way to lose sleep than over a Gator game spent with a lovely person, surrounded by a cast of thousands? Nika1? I may have just met you, but I feel like we’ve known each other for years.

Tonight, the Gators face #1 ranked Alabama. Good thing it’s a home game, but still, this one scares me. Thank you, Nika1, for everything. Something tells me I know exactly where you are right now, and your TV is already warmed up and ready to go.

Tell the Lord Bugsy says hi

Every year at the Hardcore Car & Truck Club show held in Orlando, the crew puts on a memorial honoring one of their most dedicated members, Larry Neal Oliver. On November 24, 1995, the then 22-year-old was killed by thieves who stole his prized possession - his truck.  The annual event reminds everyone that, although he is now gone, he is certainly not forgotten. He lives on in the hearts and minds of his friends and family.

In February of 1998, Jermaine “Bugsy” Lebron was convicted of armed robbery and the first-degree murder of Oliver. I remember this crime distinctly.

Oliver was lured to a house in Osceola County, where Lebron and several others lived. Lebron offered to sell him some “spinners” for his truck. Spinners are hubcaps that spin independently inside of a wheel when the vehicle is in motion and they continue to spin once the vehicle stops. Shortly after Oliver arrived at the house, Lebron called him back to the bedroom area. As he entered the hallway leading to the rooms, Lebron forced him to lie face-down on the floor and then shot him at close range in the back of his head with a sawed-off shotgun, which he called “Betsy.” Although no one actually watched LeBron fire his weapon, they heard it. After Oliver was shot, he was all smiles and laughter, shouting, “I did it, I did it!”

He also described how it felt to kill the victim and what the victim looked like afterward. Oliver’s cash, checks and a credit card were taken from him, and the stereo was stripped from his truck. Lebron then told his roommates to burn Oliver’s ID papers, dispose of his body, and clean the area where he had been murdered. An attempt was also made to burn the truck.

Larry Neal Oliver’s body was later found in a rural area not far from Walt Disney World property, covered with a blanket and some shrubs, but it was still visible from the road.

During the time of the murder, Lebron admitted to his former girlfriend, Danita Sullivan, that he had killed a man. He later told his (then) current girlfriend, Christina Charbonier, the same thing - that he had shot a man for his truck.

Shortly after the murder, Jermaine Lebron high-tailed it to New York City, where his mother owned strip clubs, one a juice bar named Legz Diamond. He was eventually picked up by NYPD, but just prior to leaving the Kissimmee area, he, along with two other people, robbed a limousine driver. They zapped him with a stun gun, took him out to an orange grove and tried to kill him. As Lebron held “Betsy” to the man’s head, he said, “Tell the Lord Bugsy says hi.”

The gun misfired, affording the victim the opportunity to dart into the orange grove and to safety. He was so frightened by the experience, he fled the country and refused to show up for the trial.

Without going into more detail, there is no doubt Jermaine Lebron is one super bad dude. For the murder of Larry Neal Oliver, he was given the death penalty and after several appeals, the sentence still stands. What you may find most compelling about this case is that the Assistant State Attorney was none other than Jeff Ashton. The judge who sentenced him to death? Well, it was none other than Belvin Perry, Jr., who declared LeBron unfit to live. “Jermaine LeBron,” Perry said, “you have not only forfeited your right to dwell among us as a free man, but under the laws of the state of Florida, you have forfeited your right to live at all.”

Hey Bugsy! Tell the Lord I said hello!

See: Florida Capital Cases DC#472846

WARNING to all readers!

Someone from another Web site is playing illegal games and sending fake e-mails from my address. Whatever you do, DO NOT OPEN ANY LINKS! Throw the e-mail in the trash.

A Day of Discovery

While Casey Anthony’s defense team continues to depose forensic experts at Oak Ridge National Laboratory today, the prosecution released additional documents this morning. The lab conducted air tests on Casey’s car and claimed that evidence showed signs of human decomposition.

Before you assume that the stain is the outline of a body, take a look at the ruler. It’s there for a reason. According to Caylee’s autopsy report, specifically the UCF Report of Osteological Analysis, the summary concluded that Caylee stood between  36.061” to 37.82” tall. This places her within the normal range for girls her age, and it proves that the shape in the trunk is not the outline of a human body. That image is much too small, even if extended 6” outside of the spare tire cover. However, there is another analysis and it spans the width of the spare tire cover. This is merely to discount the outline on the right that some would speculate to be Caylee.

Autopsy Report Caylee Anthony

In today’s discovery, the State Attorney’s Office released a computer disk containing audio interviews, photos, and videos, one of which was shot by Joy Wray in May and June of 2009. It was taken at the site where Caylee’s bones were discovered in December of 2008.

The audio portion contains interviews with Texas EquuSearch volunteers who helped look for Caylee. One of the searchers, Joe Jordan, told a case investigator that the water was knee-deep in early September, 2008. “The water, the water was just too much.”

He said that he and the others with TES had only searched along Suburban Drive, never venturing into the woods.

Casey’s defense team recently fought for and won the right to interview TES volunteers who searched that area of the woods, but under strict guidelines. Her defense is basing a lot of it’s strategy on whether Caylee’s remains were placed in the woods after Casey went to jail. That way, she couldn’t have been the one.

Among the items were photos of Caylee wearing a shirt eerily similar, if not identical, to one that was found near her bones. Black & white versions of the photos were released last December.

Leonard Padilla and Black Water Divers searched the Econlockhatchee River at Jay Blanchard Park in November of 2008. That was my first foray into the case.

Raw Interview with Tim Miller 12/11/09

Interview with Lisa Hoffman 12/12/09

(Lisa Hoffman Transcript)

Interview with Daniel Ibison 12/10/09

(Daniel Ibison Transcript)

Interview with Joe Jordan

Seized Video (part 1) of Joy Wray

Seized Video (part 2) of Joy Wray

Joy Wray OCSO Seizure and Processing Notes

Interview with Douglas Reilly

(Doug Reilly Transcript)

Interview with Tony Rovinski

(Tony Rovinsky Transcript)

Carol Conaway Interview

Jennifer Conaway Interview

Richard Creque Interview

Brett Churchill Interview

Linda Tinelli Interview

Pie in the sky?

The term “pie in the sky” originally meant to be a promise of heaven while continuing to suffer through living in the material world. It was coined by Joe Hill in a song written by him in 1911. Joe was a Swedish-born itinerant laborer who migrated to the United States in 1902. The Web site The Phrase Finder described his songs as radical as he fought for labor organizations. “The phrase appeared first in Hill’s ‘The Preacher and the Slave’, which parodied the Salvation Army hymn ‘In the Sweet Bye and Bye’. The song, which criticized the Army’s theology and philosophy, specifically their concentration on the salvation of souls rather than the feeding of the hungry, was popular when first recorded and remained so for some years.”

You will eat, bye and bye,
In that glorious land above the sky;
Work and pray, live on hay,
You’ll get pie in the sky when you die.

Today, pie in the sky can allude to many things, such as asking for more than you end up with or expect, for that matter. You may ask for the sky and end up with pie, which is better than nothing. It reminds me of an experience I had while selling advertising for a newspaper many years ago. Ed Mack, now gone, was the editor. He was also a member of the Rotary, the Chamber of Commerce and very active in the Hunterdon County YMCA, volunteering many hours of his personal time.

Ed and I got along great. A wall about 7 feet high is all that separated the editorial department from advertising and my desk sat closest to the line of demarcation. The ceiling was high, so we could hear each other as one side got stories and the other sold ads.

One afternoon, Ed came over to my side with an idea. Bear in mind, in the world of newspapers, in particular, a common argument prevailed and it probably still does to this very day. The Advertising Department pays the salaries, we’d cry, while the Editorial Department would adamantly point out that its news that sells a newspaper and without news, there would be no newspaper. In the end, those key points were muted by the mere fact that, either way, we had jobs, and that’s what mattered most. Today, it’s not so easy.

Ed knew that I was a member of the now defunct Flemington Area Jaycees. On this particular afternoon, he wanted to know if I could get a band of fellow Jaycees together to man phones at the telephone company, which had already given its permission to do so. It was a simple request. The intent was to ask for donations from members of the Y and the general population in order to build the first installment of a large complex that was in the works, an Olympic-sized swimming pool to the tune of $150,000. He knew I was an officer of the club and, with mild coaxing, that I could easily table the idea at our next meeting. Sure thing, I said, and to fast forward, about 8 or 9 of us showed up to sit in open booths at the phone company the following month. Ed was the man in charge and he gave us stacks of 3” x 5” filing cards with the names, addresses and phone numbers of potential donors. My close friend, Frank Foran, was and still is a top-notch sales rep, and he was in fitting form for the occasion.

Of course, we all focused on the cards we had. Initially, I called people and introduced myself as a member of the Flemington Jaycees and that we were proudly supporting the YMCA in their effort to bring our area a large and highly professional educational and recreational sports facility. We all know the Y. All of Hunterdon County would shine because of it. Perhaps you saw it written up in the newspaper? Oh, yes, of course you did. Well, the first leg is the swimming pool and we need to raise $150,000. Could you please help out by donating $50 toward our goal? No? How about $25? No? Yes, I understand times are tough. [Gee, that was back in the late 70s.] OK, well, thank you, and if you can ever help, please call me at the newspaper and I will make sure you are contacted by the right people. That meant Ed, whose office was a mere stone’s throw away from my desk.

After about a half-dozen disappointing phone calls begging for money, I got zero results and I thought about it. I had to change my tune or I would end up a major flop to the man who was directly under the publisher, my employer. This wouldn’t sit well with Bengt Gaterud, the sales manager, either. I rewrote some of the lyrics. I had my eye in the sky for pie in the sky.

Hi, I said, as I gave the same opening spiel with the hundred-and-fifty grand price tag. There was no need to change that, but when they asked me how much I was expecting them to give, it wasn’t $25 or $50 I requested. Instead, I asked for $2,000. Yes, $2,000 would be great. Of course, they exploded with raw emotion.

“Two thousand dollars?!!! You gotta be nuts! I can’t afford anything like that!”

“OK, how about a thousand?”

“You gotta be kidding me?”

“No, I’m serious. How about fifty?

“Fifty, you got it.”

And with that change in tactics - the rapid-fire subtle suggestions, I ended up making the second-most money of the night and it was a huge success. Of course, Frank made the most, and no one expected less from him. He’s that good.

The next morning, Ed and I purposely crossed paths. He thanked me and the fellow Jaycees. I asked him how well we did. He said it was huge, a lot more than he figured. He told me one other thing.

“I don’t know what you did, Dave, but I gave you a list of deadbeats. I didn’t expect you to make any money at all, but you came in second. I gave you that list because you are a salesperson for this newspaper. I wanted to see what you had in you. You really surprised me.”

OK, now you may think I’m strutting my stuff, but I’m not. As long as I’ve known Frank, he’s encouraged me to go into sales. When he’s 95-years-old and I’m 90, I can hear him in his decrepid, soft and gravelly voice, “Dave, you need to go into sales.”

I never will. I’ve found my niche; it’s writing, and there’s a point to my story - the case against Casey. I constantly hear from people who think she deserves the death penalty, but won’t get it. Some people think she should get life without parole so she can live out her days in prison, wallowing in the memories of her precious daughter and what she, herself, could have become in life. Some people don’t think she’s guilty of murder, but none of that is my point. To use the old cliché and cut to the chase, the state has requested the death penalty. Does the state seriously intend to execute her? You bet, or it wouldn’t have been placed on the table to begin with. This ain’t no dress rehearsal, as my old friend Tom Corkhill always said. This is the real deal, only there is a ‘what if’ formula here, just in case. Because of the death penalty, the jury must be made up of people willing to sentence a person to death. It doesn’t automatically mean they will, but means they might be more prone to finding her guilty. The odds increase exponentially with a death qualified jury and the state knows it. There’s the sky, but will the aim be too high?

In the end, the defense is going to put on a much better show than originally anticipated by us, the general public. Perhaps, in all their seasoned wisdom, the state knew that as time went on in the sweet by and by, things would get tougher. Today, with the recent addition of several more well-seasoned defense attorneys, please allow me one more cliché. I think that, from now on, this is not going to be a piece of cake for the state.

Baez team announces new attorneys

The Baez Law Firm announced last week that Dorothy Clay Sims, an attorney specializing in cross-examining medical expert witnesses, had joined Casey Anthony’s defense team pro bono.  She specializes in debunking junk science and cross-examining medical experts. She is a founding partner of the law firm Sims & Stakenborg in Ocala, Florida and was the first woman chair of the Worker’s Compensation Section of the Florida Bar. Orlando attorney William Jay, who represents Anthony Lazzaro, said that she has been known to anger forensic experts.

At a press conference this morning, Sims said she hasn’t owned a television in more than ten years and has kept herself up-to-date with the case through the Internet.

Also at this morning’s press conference, Jose Baez announced the addition of two new pro bono attorneys, one to handle her civil case, and the other to help challenge the state’s demand for the death penalty.

Civil attorney Charles M. Greene, of The Law Offices of Charles M. Greene, P.A. replaces Jonathan Kasen, who had been representing Casey in the civil lawsuit filed by Zenaida Gonzalez through attorney John Morgan, of Morgan & Morgan. Greene specializes in a variety of civil and criminal legal areas, including criminal defense, civil litigation, trial practice and product liability.

Ann E. Finnell graduated from Duke University and the University of Florida School of Law. According to her Web site, she “has handled homicide and death penalty cases since 1981.  She specializes in complex homicide litigation including death penalty mitigation.  In addition, she has tried serious felony cases including second degree murder and manslaughter cases, capital sexual battery, and other sexual battery cases, kidnapping, armed robbery, armed burglary and violent personal crimes.”

She was featured in a 2002 documentary that won an Oscar. The film, Murder on a Sunday Morning, chronicled the successful defense of young man falsely charged of murder. She is very experienced. Baez noted that she will serve as the defense team’s death penalty expert. “Her experience is second to none,” he noted this morning.

Casey Anthony’s defense is filling up with distinguished attorneys. No matter how dumb anyone thinks Jose Baez and Cheney Mason are, they know how to surround themselves with smart lawyers who specialize in areas where they need the most help. I wouldn’t call those stupid moves. Not in the least.

Here’s some food for thought. It’s not the same as the Anthony case, but it illustrates how trials sometimes work. Originally, there was speculation that Miami attorney Roy Black would be joining the team. That turned out to be nothing more than a rumor, but in the criminal evidence workshop he runs at the University of Miami School of Law, he likes to cite a favorite example of a courtroom experience from some 50-plus years ago. An attorney was representing a murder suspect in a case where no body was found. He announced to the jury that the victim would be walking through the courtroom door at that very moment. When the jury turned to look, the attorney said that their turning proved reasonable doubt existed. Without missing a beat, the prosecutor stood up and replied that it was a cute trick, but while everyone turned to look, “I turned to look at the defendant, and he never turned around, because he knew she was dead.” [See Florida Superlawyers, Roy Black Bio]

Does that sound like banter that could come from a particular defense attorney and prosecutor in this case?

A Portrait of War

There isn’t a day that goes by where the thundering echoes of war escape us. Today, we live in a world filled with radical extremists, defiantly justified to maim and kill in the name of their god. The following story is my hideous wake-up call. It came at a time when wars were fought over more mundane causes - patriotism, democracy, communism, bigotry and territorial rights. This was back when building a bigger, better, bomb was all the rage and nations proudly strutted their hardware in a show of strength and unity in order to intimidate their neighbors and enemies. Today, they just strap on a vest and blow themselves up.

On a distant morning of 1967, one of my classmates was quietly asked to get up from his desk and follow the administrator out of the room. I remember that day and wondering why. Did he do something wrong? It didn’t take very long before the school principal came on the P.A. system to announce that his uncle, Van Dyke Manners, was killed in action in Vietnam. He was one of the first from Hunterdon County, New Jersey to die in the line of duty. I didn’t know him personally, but I remember it well because it was a solemn day. My friend had lost a loved one. Greg did not come back to class that week. To a 14-year-old, those echoes of war were a distant sound that lightly flickered in our young minds. We never thought of death then. We were invincible, but with each passing day, the reverberation grew louder and louder, and reality hit us fast and hard. The Vietnam War was in full boom.

Back then, what was going on in our own back yards seemed more important than anything else, but the Vietnam war was lurking out there. Despite our youthful dreams and aspirations, the war never escaped us. We saw it on our black & white televisions. We heard it on our AM radios. It made headlines in the daily newspapers. Everywhere we went, the specter loomed large and it cut deeply into our subconscious minds.

Early in 1968, a girl who lived up the street from me asked if I would be interested in creating a portrait of her boyfriend. Back in those days, a small town was just that. Windows were left open because air conditioning was a luxury. Doors were left unlocked, and neighbors knew all the gossip. I was known as the left-handed artistic kid. Ask Dave. He knows how to draw.

She was a little older than me, and her boyfriend had enlisted in the Army. She offered to pay me and I accepted. I asked her to round up whatever photographs she could so I had something to work with. I asked her if I could meet him. To an artist, it’s good to know something about a subject that photographs can’t tell you. Because of that request, I got to know Mike Baldwin. At 21, he was a man. At 15, I was not. He was old and mature. I was still a kid. He shaved, I didn’t. With a war going on, I was in no hurry to buy my first razor.

His girlfriend asked me to draw the portrait as big as I could. When I went to the store to buy materials, my old “Be Prepared” Boy Scout lessons taught me to have a back-up plan, so I purchased two poster boards, just in case I messed up. I couldn’t just go to the store back then when I was too young to drive.  Well, I didn’t mess up, so I had a blank sheet and decided to draw another one, identical to the first. Buy one, get one free. I don’t know what compelled me to do it, but I’m glad I did. Maybe I thought if the relationship didn’t work out years later, at least he would have one to share with his family. That must have been the reason. Maybe the death of Van Dyke put apprehension in my heart. You know, one for his mother, just in case.

When I finished my work, I made a date to deliver the artwork. My neighbor had invited Mike and his mother to “attend” the presentation. Everyone was very pleased with the job I had done, especially his mother, who was honored to have her son’s portrait captured by a local artist.

Soon afterward, he left for Vietnam. He went because he believed in a cause. He believed in America and freedom. In school, we were taught about the Domino Effect. Red China didn’t exist on any of our maps and globes. It was just a grayed out mass of nonexistent land. Call it Peking duck and cover. Back then, it was a theory that if any country fell under the influence of communism, then the surrounding countries would follow. North Vietnam was one of those countries. South Vietnam was not. Today, it is one country, but back then, 58,000 red-blooded Americans gave up their lives. Michael Baldwin was one of them.

43 years ago today, he became a statistic. His body was zipped up in a bag and shipped home. That was the day I awoke to the tragedy of war. It was my first real experience with the horrors of conflict and someone I knew was dead because of it. 

One of the things I learned, and it’s very important, was that Michael Baldwin put his country before his life. We lost so many and what did we gain? I know I gained a whole lot of respect for our fellow citizens who march off to fight. He was a man and I was a boy back then, but I still look up to him and I am now 41 years older than he was on the day he died. To this day, I’ve wondered what if he had lived. Would he have married my neighbor or someone else? Would he be bouncing his grandchildren on his knee today? Would he be happy? Or would he be mourning the loss of his children and grandchildren in our present day wars? The more war changes, the more it remains the same because death is still death and the loss of loved ones over religion and politics is still just as senseless as it was when Michael Baldwin died.

Today, he would be 66-years-old, soon to be 67. I will remember him as a true American hero; a very proud young man. As for the identical pictures I drew, they are lost and gone but not forgotten. In my mind, the memory of them will forever remain a haunting portrait of war.

Sgt. Michael Richard Baldwin (7/19/1947 - 9/12/1968) KIA - Binh Long Province, South Vietnam, ambushed while on reconnaissance 5 kilometers Northeast of Loc Ninh, along with:
Ssgt. Phillip Kenneth Baker - Detroit, MI
Pfc. Eugene Russell Boyce - Spartanburg, SC
Sp4. Wayne Daniel Jenkins - Bryson City, NC
Pfc. Kenneth Leroy Martin - Los Angeles, CA
Pfc. Marion Luther Oxner - Leesville, SC
Pfc. Dale Arden Palm - Toledo, OH
Pfc. Kurt Francis Ponath - Cudahy, WI
Sp4. J C Williams Jr. - Muncie, IN
Pfc. William Wittman - Binghamton, NY

September 12, 1968, was a long and sad day for Alpha Company, 1st Battalion, 28th Infantry, 1st Infantry Division.

Pfc. Van Dyke William Manners (11/10/1945 - 2/15/1967) KIA - Kontum Province, South Vietnam

To all our brethren lost in wars, rest in peace. Your deaths will never be in vain.

I first published a different version of this story in 2006. Michael Baldwin’s cousin searched his name on Google and found my blog about a year later. She wrote me and said, “I just found your website and read your article about Mike.  I just wanted to say thank you…  It touched me and helped me remember my cousin very fondly.  He was a good guy and the last of the Baldwin men in our family.  He is remembered fondly by many of my friends who still [live] in Flemington, as well as my family.

“I also wanted to let you know that Aunt Peg didn’t handle Mike’s death very well.  She couldn’t even bring herself to go to the funeral.  I do remember that both she and my Uncle Alvin (Mike’s Dad) did attend the memorial at Ft. Dix after his death.  That was really all she could handle.  She always said she preferred to remember people while they were alive.  I can’t say that I blame her.  I didn’t understand it in 1968, but I get it now.

“Mike left a large impact on me.  The memorial service was really something and I can still remember the 21 gun salute at his funeral in the cemetery in Flemington.”

Mike’s mother passed away in 1993. His sister contacted me right after her cousin got in touch with her. Here is what she told me:

“My cousin called me and told me about your blog.  She had seen Michael’s name in it and read the story.  I read it too and also your reply to her.  I am Mike’s youngest sister.  You made me cry—but it was a good cry.

“My family and I are so pleased that we are not the only one’s who remember Mike.  Looking through your blog and your e-mail to Mary, I found it so interesting that there are so many things we are connected through.

“I go to church at Kirkpatrick Memorial Presbyterian church in Ringoes. Van Dyke’s mother went there before she died a couple of years ago and there is a stained glass window dedicated to him.

“My father worked for the Forans in the foundry they owned in Flemington.  My father was friends with Walt Foran. [My friend Frank’s father.]

“When I read your blog, I could feel that you knew Mike well.  He was a great kid and we loved him.  You talk about my mother—you may not know it but I had a brother who was older than Mike—his name was Alvin—we called him Skip.  He died in a car accident on Sept. 13, 1958.  No, I didn’t confuse the dates, it was one day short of 10 years later that Mike was killed.  It was a blow that my parents never recovered from.

“I am so glad that you wrote about Mike, it makes me feel that we are not the only ones who remember. Thank you again for keeping his memory alive.”

Please see: NJ Vietnam War Memorial - Michael Baldwin

Rick Rescorla - A True American Hero

This is not about the Anthonys. This is about someone who should never be forgotten.

Originally published in 2006, this is my account of but one man. I plan on posting this every September 11, in honor of Rick and all who perished that day. I will do this until I can do it no more.

Rick Rescorla was born in England. He enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1963 and retired as a colonel in 1990. Rick was a bonafide hero of the Vietnam war. In 1965, at the la Drang Valley battles, Lt. Gen. Hal Moore described him as “the best platoon leader I ever saw.” Rescorla’s men nicknamed him “Hard Core” for his bravery in battle. His heroism was documented and highlighted in the 2002 movie “We Were Soldiers” from the book “We Were Soldiers Once… and Young” co-written by Gen. Moore.

Since 1985, he worked in corporate security, subsequently becoming Vice President of Security for Morgan-Stanley/Dean-Witter, the largest tenant in the World Trade Center. After the 1993 attack, he trained all employees to evacuate the building. He maintained a structured, quarterly drill carried out by all staff to orderly get out. He is the man who predicted 9/11. Please see The Richard C. Rescorla Memorial Foundation.

On that fateful day, he safely evacuated all 2,800 Morgan-Stanley/Dean-Witter employees but himself and a few of his security staff. After doing his job, he returned to rescue others still inside. These were not even his people. They were all his people. He was last seen heading up the stairs of the tenth floor of the collapsing WTC 2. His remains have not been recovered. He left a wife and two children. This man is widely recognized as being solely responsible for saving over 3,000 lives. Is it of any importance that he became an American citizen after Vietnam?

Rick Rescorla is but one hero who perished that fateful day, but what a man he was and what a soul he has that will and should live forever in the hearts and minds of all who cherish freedom. All over the world.

See also: Calegion Post 149

MICHAEL NAGLE / NEW YORK TIMES / REDUX

 The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which holds approximately 2,000 pieces from the original WTC site in a hangar at JFK airport, has recently stepped up its efforts to find permanent homes for the artifacts. Any town or city, anywhere in the world, can apply for permission to take away a piece from the collection and build their own memorial around it. In this photo, a piece destined to become part of a memorial in York, Pennsylvania is secured to the bed of a trailer.

Slowly, the wiles of justice churn

PLEASE READ THIS POST FIRST

“Carla was my very best friend. We talked about everything and anything together. It didn’t matter where we lived. If Carla was there, it was home to me. Now I feel very alone.”

- Jim Larson in 1999

When John Huggins was arrested for the murder of Carla Larson in 1997, several ministers who knew him said no way. He was not capable of doing such a horrible act. After all, they proclaimed, this was a gentle giant, anointed by God to do great work. He had become a born-again Christian. He volunteered to go on many missionary trips to Haiti to help build schools, churches, and to run clinics. No, the preachers collectively agreed, John was a good man. For the sake of Carla and all her loved ones, law enforcement thought otherwise.

On her final day, Carla drove to a Publix supermarket a mere five minutes away from where she worked. Located at the intersection of International Drive and Osceola Parkway, she spent $8.63 for pita bread, pretzels, grapes and cherries. She never had a chance to eat any of her purchase.

While Carla’s life came to an abrupt end in 1997, John Huggins is still alive and kicking, and it’s taken some strange twists and turns along the way. This is what happens on death row, and this is why a life sentence without the possibility of parole may be a better punishment than the torture victims’ families must endure for many, many years to come. In some cases, it’s worth the wait. In others, it’s not. I guess it depends on who justice truly belongs to. It is not us, it is the likes of Jim Larson and all who suffer to this day. It is for Carla’s soul which still cries out. It is for John Huggins to own up, something he has never done, and to accept the punishment the state of Florida doled out to him. Like most murderers, he never will.

Here is the twisted journey of John Huggins.

Toward the end of January 1999, Huggins went on trial for the brutal murder of Carla Larson. A career criminal, he had already been convicted and sentenced to life in prison for robbing a bank just three months before he committed murder. This is a man who duped ministers of God, but he would never be able to fool the Almighty. Ultimately, he couldn’t fool a jury, either, and on February 4, less than a month later, he was pronounced guilty as charged; convicted of first-degree murder, kidnapping, carjacking and robbery.

In the fleeting moments after he heard the verdict, he looked at Jim Larson. Larson met his gaze and thought, bye, bye. It was his way of saying go to hell. If anyone had a right to ask for death, it was him, and death he wanted. One week later, a nine woman, three man jury concurred by an 8-4 vote, after deliberating a mere two hours.

The prosecutor had asked the jury to imagine Carla Larson’s last moments. She must have realized she was going to die. “When those hands went around her throat, she was fully and completely aware the last face she would ever see was that one. As she slowly lapsed into unconsciousness and died, that was her final memory.” [To anyone following the Anthony case, does that sound vaguely familiar?]

Incidentally, the jurors were never told about Jim Larson’s sister, murdered seven-and-a-half years earlier in Gainesville, by Danny Rolling.

On February 26, Carla may have thought justice was served had she been around, because the judge agreed with the jury. Her father, Mert Thomas, said,“That’s the way it should be. It still doesn’t bring her back.”

What the judge had to say was very damning to John Huggins. In his 14-page sentencing order, he read, “One can only imagine the alarm, the anxiety, the apprehension, the fright and the terror that she felt as she was forced to ride to her demise.

“What fear and horror she must have felt when she was forced to walk from her vehicle into the wooded area - Carla Larson’s own death march to Bataan. No one can truly know the emotional strain and physical pain she had to endure as she struggled to breathe as the defendant strangled her to death.”

The judge spoke a total of 30 minutes. “John Steven Huggins, you have not only forfeited your right to live among us as a free man, but under the laws of the state of Florida, you have forfeited your right to live at all… You shall be put to death in the electric chair by having electrical current passed through your body in such amount and frequency until you are rendered dead… John Steven Huggins, may almighty God have mercy on your soul.”

This did not bring the Larson and Thomas families any happiness, but they were willing to move on. Sadly, if you think this is where it ended and the world went merrily on its way, guess again. This was only the start of things to come.

♦

Within weeks of the conclusion of the trial, Preston Ausley, an engineer working for the Orange County Courthouse, contacted Huggins’ defense attorneys and told them about information the state knew but never disclosed. On March 25, 1999, his defense filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in court, alleging that the state withheld evidence that would have been favorable in direct violation of Brady, which consists of exculpatory (or impeaching) information that is material to the guilt or innocence of a defendant. It’s based on the U.S. Supreme Court case, Brady v. Maryland, where the court ruled that suppression of evidence by the prosecution to the defendant who has requested it violates due process.

In a detailed written order, the same trial court and judge found that the state violated the dictates of Brady and granted Huggins a new trial. Of course, the state appealed the ruling and lost. Here’s what the trial court ordered:

On June 16, 1997, an individual named Preston Ausley spoke with Detective Daniel Nazarchuk of the Orange County Sheriff’s Office. Mr. Ausley had contacted the Sheriff’s office with information regarding the Carla Larson case. Mr. Ausley told Detective Nazarchuk that a white Explorer cut him off in traffic [in Orlando] and that he had written down the tag number. Mr. Ausley told Detective Nazarchuk that he had verified within one digit that the license plate number he had recorded was the same as that of Carla Larson’s Explorer. As a result of this conversation, lead sheet 302 was created from Detective Nazarchuk’s notes. The lead sheet wasprovided to the defense during discovery.

At the evidentiary hearing, Mr. Ausley claimed that he told Detective Nazarchuk that the individual he saw driving the vehicle was a white female in her late twenties to early thirties with blonde hair justbelow the shoulder. However, Detective Nazarchuk’s notes indicate that Mr. Ausley said he saw a white male of the same description driving the vehicle. Detective Nazarchuk recorded the date of thesighting as June 12, 1997. However, Mr. Ausley believes it was June 11, 1997. At the hearing, Mr. Ausley explained that he is very bad with dates and came to the conclusion that he encountered Ms.Larson’s truck on June 11, 1997, by verifying the date through other sources.

 Thereafter, on February 1, 1999, the day after seeing Angel Huggins on television during coverage of Defendant’s trial, Preston Ausley went to the Office of the State Attorney to speak with the State Attorney for the Ninth Judicial Circuit, Lawson Lamar. Mr. Lamar was unavailable. Mr. Ausley was directed to Assistant State Attorney Dorothy Sedgwick who spoke with him briefly. Ms. Sedgwick asked Pat Guice, an Investigator with the State Attorney’soffice, to speak with Mr. Ausley and take a tape recorded statement.

In the recorded statement provided to Mr. Guice, Mr. Ausley stated that when he saw Angel Huggins on television it struck him that she resembled the white female with blonde hair he had seen driving the white truck with a license plate that matched Carla Larson’s within one digit on the morning of June 11, 1997, on International Drive.

After he had given his statement, Mr. Guice requested that Mr. Ausley return the next day so that the attorneys, who were at that very time prosecuting Defendant’s case in Jacksonville, could speak with him.

The next morning, the Assistant State Attorney who was prosecuting the case in Jacksonville spoke to Ausley by phone. After this conversation, the prosecutor determined that Ausley’s name had been given to the defendant in lead sheet 302, and that his statement did not support what he ”believed the defense’s theory of the case would be, and Mr. Ausley’s statement was of little value.”

Therefore, the state decided not to disclose the tape recorded statement or the information about what Ausley said he saw. As a matter of fact, this particular prosecutor was in court that same day and never disclosed it. The trial concluded later that week.

In overturning the verdict, the trial court judge analyzed every bit of evidence presented at trial and determined that prejudice ensued as “the suppression of Mr. Ausley’s statement resulted in a verdict that is not worthy of confidence.”

With that, John Huggins was granted his new trial. All charges against him were vacated and upheld by the Florida Supreme Court on appeal. Of course, he was still in prison for the bank robbery, if that had any redeeming value.

♦

To Jim Larson and all of Carla’s family and friends, it was like living through another devastating nightmare, but justice came once again. This time, the trial took place inside an Osceola County courtroom, but it didn’t serve Huggins any better. Hours after firing his lawyer, which seems to be consistent with the strange minds of convicted derelicts, he was convicted again on July 25, 2002. Jurors deliberated for five hours instead of two before deciding he was guilty of first-degree murder, carjacking, kidnapping and petty theft. What brought one charge down from robbery beats me. A pear-shaped diamond engagement ring and other jewelry isn’t petty, in my opinion.

His defense attorney this time was Orange-Osceola Public Defender Bob Wesley, if you remember him from Casey’s indigence hearing. He failed to sway jurors that it could have been his friend Kevin Smith, the man who let Huggins keep the SUV at his house until he torched it. The Assistant State Attorneys showed proof that Huggins had been staying at the Days Inn directly across the street from the Publix where Carla was abducted.

Like the Casey Anthony case, the evidence was primarily circumstantial. Witnesses testified they saw a man driving a white Ford Explorer that looked like hers. The man behind the wheel looked like Huggins, too, and her jewelry was found hidden in his mother-in-law’s back yard shed. Very incriminating, indeed, but still circumstantial.

As soon as Huggins fired his Public Defender, he told the judge, “We’ve come to an impasse on strategy for the penalty phase.”

The judge cautioned him, but agreed. He then ordered Wesley to remain on stand-by. “I think nothing is more personal than a decision to live or die,” Wesley said of Huggins’ decision.

Foolishly, he did represent himself during the penalty phase, one which showed him to be unemotional. It lasted all of one hour. In his argument against death, he said that he had a difficult childhood. He spoke of the wonderful work he did serving the sick and poor people in Haiti, tending to the afflicted no one else wanted to help. Imagine how much good he could “contribute to the prison community if given a sentence of life without parole.”

With no reservation, the judge told him, “You have not only forfeited your right to live among us as a free man, but under the laws of the state of Florida, you have forfeited your right to live at all.” Shades of deja vu.

Clearly, the judge had considered those mitigators, but in the end, he said they were far outweighed by five aggravating factors, including his prior felony record and the fact that Larson was kidnapped before she was killed. He also noted that jurors, who recommended the death penalty, unanimously found Larson’s murder to be “especially heinous, atrocious or cruel.”

“The horror, the agony, the emotional strain and fear she must have felt knowing of her impending death is beyond comprehension,” the judge exclaimed.

♦

Four years later, in November of 2006, John Huggins had a new attorney willing to take up his cause. While we may question why, this is the way the justice system works, and this is why I will never deny Casey Anthony a proper defense, no matter what. If scum like Huggins deserve it, so does she.

This time, it was a matter of his competence., and it was the first time it had come up in his case, according to his Tampa-based attorney, Eric Pinkard, who said he became concerned when he had trouble communicating with his client, according to a report in the Orlando Sentinel. [I do find it interesting that death row inmates tend to lean toward incompetence when all else fails, but that’s just my own personal observation and opinion, and one that Casey may pursue many years down the road if she is convicted and sentenced to die.]

The following day, the judge decided he was incompetent after three doctors agreed that Huggins couldn’t help his defense prepare his appeal case, and that he needed psychological treatment, including anti-psychotic prescriptions. In the state of Florida, an inmate on death row cannot be executed while receiving treatment. Slowly, the wheels of justice turn.

The judge ordered him to remain in the custody of the Department of Corrections and to be treated by doctors from the Department of Children & Families. “I’m OK with this,” said Jim Larson. “This is how the system works.”

The judge also ordered DCF officials to submit a report in 90 days.

John Huggins knows how to manipulate the system. After so many back and forth arguments over his competency - yes he is, no he’s not - the trial judge decided on October 20, 2009 that he was, in fact, competent. This came after he heard testimony from a psychologist who found him to be a liar who also exaggerated the truth. For three years, he was in a legal state of sanity limbo; in and out of a world of competency. Finally, he was deemed sane enough to proceed with his legal appeal! Or so we thought.

In November, only a month later, his attorney had another evaluation done by Tampa-based psychologist Richard Carpenter. At a July [2010] hearing, Carpenter testified that Huggins demonstrated signs of mental illness. “He expressed these delusions about the Feds, the Dixieland Mafia and that he was being framed,” and here we go, all over again, twelve years after the murder of Carla Larson.

In that July hearing, prosecutors noted that the issue of Huggins’ competence has lingered for years and suggested that his repeated evaluations could have taught him how to trick those tests. The judge expressed frustration over the time it took from tests done in November and when the motion was filed, more than six months later, and to complicate matters even more, Huggins filed his own documents requesting that his legal team be removed. He refused to meet with his attorneys and Carpenter. Quite clearly, this has been one mess after another, and it clogs up the system. Had John Huggins only put his talents to good use.

Meanwhile, his attorney argued that an upcoming hearing on post-conviction appellate claims should be delayed until the question of his competency is settled.

The judge insisted that the hearing would take place next month while that is being decided. Also, there are remaining issues over claims involving ineffective counsel and prosecutorial misconduct. “This case is mired in quicksand,” he said, and he’s not convinced whether Huggins is delusional or trying to delay the process.

Now, we come to August, and how far have we advanced? Once again, the judge asked court-appointed experts to try to come up with an opinion regarding Huggins’ competency by reviewing doctor’s notes. “I am competent,” he told the court. “My mental condition is sound and always has been sound.”

Huh?

During the hearing held in the final week of the month, guards had to forcibly remove Huggins from his cell at Florida State Prison in Starke so he could attend. An electronic stun belt was attached to his body that would shock him if he acted out. A deputy stood by ready to zap him with 50,000 volts. Needless to say, it wasn’t necessary, although he was anything but cooperative, and he has shown a history of animosity toward this particular judge.

As the latest hearing wrapped up, Jim Larson said he was planning on taking a trip up to Gainesville to attend the 20th anniversary remembrance of his younger sister, Sonja, murdered and mutilated by serial killer Danny Rolling, now executed, as John Steven Huggins continues to legally mutilate the justice system.

Larson said he was confident this is the countdown to Huggins’ execution. “I was there for the last one [at Rolling’s execution] and I’ll be there for this one, front row. Maybe he’ll send for me.”

♦

Oh yes, there’s just one more thing of special importance. After attending Casey’s last status hearing, I spoke to Jeff Ashton about John Huggins on the way out of the courtroom. You see, he was the prosecuting attorney when it all began. He was the one throughout all these years of trials and motions. It was Jeff Ashton who represented the state time and time again. I asked him what he thought. How would this latest hearing turn out? “I don’t know. I really don’t know. It’s in the judge’s hands.”

The judge? Oh, yes, that would be Chief Judge Belvin Perry, Jr., the same one who found Huggins to be incompetent, but the same judge who sentenced him to death. Twice.

See also: Commission on Capital Cases