The Washington Post and the metro melee coverage

I read an interesting column in the Sunday Washington Post this morning by the Post Ombudsman Andrew Alexander.

Brawl on the Metro: Where was the coverage?

By Andrew Alexander
Ombudsman
Sunday, August 15, 2010; A11

Post managers, from the top down, regularly remind the newsroom that coverage must have a “for and about Washington” focus. So when a large brawl broke out in the Metro system on a recent Friday night, it seemed a perfect chance to show local readers that The Post is their indispensable source for news.

His column discussed the complaints received from readers about the lack of coverage the Post had relating to the teen brawl that took place on the metro last Friday, August 6. He’s right, the coverage was very sparse.

On deadline, The Post gathered enough information for a news brief in Saturday’s paper, and a short story was quickly posted online.

I didn’t see anything about the melee in my Saturday paper. What I saw online Saturday was mostly in blog format, not a news article.

Throughout Saturday, it was among the most-viewed stories on the Web site, signaling intense reader interest. But as the day wore on, some readers grew frustrated that there was nothing more.

They did publish a story in last Sunday’s metro section but it wasn’t a lengthy article.

When a story for Sunday’s paper finally did appear, it offered little new. Promoted on the front page and tucked at the bottom of Sunday’s Metro section, it didn’t answer key questions: What caused the fighting? Were the people who were injured participants or bystanders? Was Metro beefing up security?

Why such thin coverage? Much of the explanation is that The Post responded with too little, too late.

So with a local news staff of about 70 reporters, why not call in reinforcements? Robert E. Pierre, the weekend editor for local news, said he saw no need. “It wasn’t about additional people,” he told me, noting that social media searches and an online appeal for witnesses had yielded little. And, he added, “the police didn’t have very much,” and what little information they disclosed was sketchy. The size of the crowd was in question, he said, and police couldn’t say how many were actually brawling.

The Post finally published a front page story on Monday, August 9 which included a family who witnessed the melee and a young man injured when riders fled the train. I was glad to see this on the front page because it is a major news story considering that thousands of folks take the metro everyday. But you know what? According to Mr. Alexander, Robert Pierre, the weekend editor for local news felt that last Monday’s front page story was given too much prominence.

When The Post finally produced a more substantive story for Monday’s paper, Pierre believes it was given too much prominence, even though it included eyewitness descriptions of multiple fights and bedlam as people tried to escape the pandemonium. The Post “overplayed it,” said Pierre. “It was a fight on the Metro. Kids get into fights.”

Say what? Dozens of teens are involved in a huge fight on the subway on a Friday night while dozens of metro riders look on and the weekend editor considered the front page story overkill? And you know why he felt that way. Cause kids get into fights. Would Mr. Pierre have said the same thing if those kids had gotten into fights with random adult metro passengers? Robert Pierre was also concerned about the racial aspect of the story. Give me a damn break.

Is Robert Pierre afraid of the reaction from black readers? Black folks take the metro too and many of us are sick and tired of the behavior of kids like those involved in the melee. We don’t all condone bad behavior. Is he afraid of some “so called black leaders” protesting in front of the Post if he puts more emphasis on this story?  Who cares? Let them sit on the train with the troublemakers, without the transit police in sight, and see what it feels like to witness mayhem and deal with harassment like the woman featured in a front page article on Friday.

‘Where was the security?’

Nationals fans clad in red pour off the Green Line at Gallery Place, creating a massive bottleneck. The crowd headed outbound to Branch Avenue is much smaller, and when the train arrives, six women in baggy shorts and polos with oversize collars board the same car. One starts doing pull-ups on the train’s metal bar. Another marches down the aisle, shouting “Check me out!” Other passengers — Nationals fans, people heading home from work, couples returning from the movies — smile and laugh.

Then the scene gets tense. One of the young women, who won’t give her name, starts mocking a 58-year-old woman named Carol who is studying a physiology textbook in the middle of the car.

“You look like my teacher, Mrs. Wright,” the taunting woman says. “You can’t fail me anymore!” The crowd laughs, more hesitantly this time. Then the barrage of insults starts. The woman puts her nose in Carol’s hair. “You smell like cat piss,” the woman says.

Carol looks down at her book, trying to ignore the assault.

“It’s because of you that I’m gay,” the woman continues. “It’s because of you that my children are mentally retarded.” The woman gives her friends high-fives after each insult, and they laugh together. A family in Nationals uniforms moves to the other side of the car.

Five Guardian Angels arrive. They stand at one end of the car, arms crossed, silent. The woman in the baggy shorts looks at the youngest Angel, who appears to be in his teens. “What are you, 12?” she screams. “What are you gonna do, skateboard?” The Angels, in trademark red berets, do not respond.

“Ha!” the woman exclaims. “These Angels ain’t guarding [expletive].”

After a few minutes, the Angels leave the car. The woman continues to viciously mock Carol.

Carol, her tormentor and the rest of her group get off at Suitland. One of the women tells Carol, “I’m sorry, it’s just that we’ve been drinking.” She puts her arm around Carol.

Carol walks toward a cab. “You know, I wasn’t scared by what happened in there,” she says. “I was embarrassed that everyone, especially the Caucasians, had to see one black woman insulting another black woman like that. Still, what if things had escalated? The Angels were there, but they didn’t do anything. Where was the security?”

As a black woman I want to know more about the August 6 melee.  I don’t like this tip toeing around because the kids are black. Hell I knew they were black. I’ve seen how some of these black kids act on the metro and it’s not a pretty sight. Do I care if the “so called black leaders” raise a ruckus? No I don’t. That will just prove to me even more so that they’ll continue with the excuses and coddle the hoodlums in the black community and as usual don’t give a damn about the victims unless it’s a white on black crime.

I would also like to say something about the Washington Post and its local news coverage. I have noticed that when it comes to the print edition for local news the Post is seriously lacking. You can read the Metro section in less than 2 minutes because it’s that thin. If you want to read any local news you have to go online and click on Local. And even then some of the local news online is in blog format and not a news article. Why bother with a print edition of the Metro section when you print mostly one paragraph articles about what’s going on locally in the Post? The Post use to be better than this. The print version of the Post seems to spend most of it time on national politics and of course Sarah Palin. I’ve seen news stories from around the world receiving better coverage than local news in the print edition. I guess that’s why they have a separate local section online. And the Washington Post wonders why they’re seeing a decline in subscribers. I’m seriously thinking about cutting back my service to Sunday only.

Maybe it’s because I’m old school that I still read the paper. It’s a habit I’ve had since I was a youngster. I also enjoy reading the news on the internet. I check out news sites from all over the country and the world. But when it comes to my local paper I would still like to enjoy reading the print edition of the Washington Post.

Young folks brawl on the metro

Most folks in the D.C. metro area have heard by now about the brawl on the metro last Friday evening involving up to 70 teens and young adults. The incident began at the Gallery Place Metro where dozens of young folks were fighting. The brawl continued on the subway platform at L’Enfant Plaza Station, terrifying other riders and causing a stampede.

So far three people have been arrested and four were injured. I’m surprised only 3 people were arrested. Two of the arrested were sixteen year olds.

Amid Metro brawl, family’s night out turns into ‘pandemonium’

By Valerie Strauss and Phillip Lucas
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 9, 2010; A01

It was bad enough when Kimberly Hay’s family, riding the Metro to the Kennedy Center on Friday night to watch “Mary Poppins,” saw three youths assault a terrified young rider reading “To Kill a Mockingbird” by aiming an aerosol can at his face and spraying.

But the brawl they witnessed on the way home several hours later, which involved at least 70 youths fighting each other in a frenzy, left Hay’s nieces “freaked out” and the 43-year-old wary of riding the Metro in off-peak hours.

“It was pandemonium,” said Hay, who had traveled to the District from Charles County with her husband, sister-in-law, 25-year-old niece with special needs and two grandnieces, 11 and 14.

“We were pushing our kids out of the way, trying to plaster ourselves against the wall so nobody would hurt us. There were five fights right in front of us. . . . Metro is very accessible but not safe all the time. I don’t know if I would ride it again in non-rush hours.”

It was the second reported big fight involving young Metro riders in the nation’s capital this summer, and some elected officials called Sunday for better security and new approaches to deal with the problem.

The melee highlights the difficulties authorities have in dealing with teen violence and how it can encroach on a Metro system that routinely carries commuters, families, tourists and late-night revelers.

In June a youth was beaten over his shoes.

Violence among young people during the summer is a longstanding problem in the District, and it is the reason there is a curfew that requires city residents 17 and younger to be off the streets by midnight.

In early June, a fight that started on a Red Line train left a 16-year-old boy beaten unconscious by a group of people who had attacked him over his Air Jordan shoes, the boy’s mother said. Union Station was closed for about 30 minutes after a Transit Police officer responded and was backed up by more than a dozen other officers.

I only take the metro during the weekday to go to work and then go home from work.  Even then you have to worry about some of the young folks who board the train during the school year.  They can be very loud, obnoxious and down right vulgar. The young girls can be worse than the young boys.  I blogged about this back in 2007 and from reading yesterday’s article their behavior hasn’t changed one bit.

It was bad enough when Kimberly Hay’s family, riding the Metro to the Kennedy Center on Friday night to watch “Mary Poppins,” saw three youths assault a terrified young rider reading “To Kill a Mockingbird” by aiming an aerosol can at his face and spraying.

This_right_here. Spraying something in someone’s face? How trifling can you get? I swear it seems like some of these young folks don’t have any type of home training at all.  These kids (thugs, hooligans, whatever you wanna call them) are being raised on the streets by wolves!!

It would be nice if we can see more metro transit police on the trains.  But seeing how some of the young folks act they might fight the police.

Marriage counselor murdered by husband

I was reading an article at Salon.com when another article caught my eye. A marriage counselor was murdered by her husband.  I’m thinking wow. But then as I continued to read, something about this article amazed me.  The deceased, Tonya Hunter had met her husband Maurice Lyons in an anger management class she was teaching last summer and they were married in December 2009.

A few days later, Hunter was found in her garage, stabbed to death. Her little boy, who had been abandoned on a street corner, led police to her body. And her husband, whom she had met in an anger-management class she taught, was arrested.

The husband, Maurice Lyons, was taken into custody Monday and is being held on pending charges of aggravated murder and domestic violence. The couple, who married in December, had met when Lyons was a student in one of Hunter’s classes last year, Wairegi said. Lyons was released from prison last winter after serving three years for burglary and theft.

Maurice Lyons had been released from prison in February 2009 after serving 3 years for burglary.   Lyons is a repeat felon with a criminal record dating back to the late 1980’s.

Court records don’t list an attorney for Lyons, who also served prison time for a string of crimes in Missouri and Illinois between 1989 and 1998, including a 10-year term handed down for a carjacking in Bloomington, Ill.

Now I don’t like to blame the victim but why oh why did Ms. Hunter rush into a marriage with this guy?  According to her former secretary she was so in love with this guy.  Was she desperate to get married? A marriage counselor rushing into a marriage with a repeat felon with anger issues.  She had to have known about his background yet she still married him.  Did she think that he would change? According the article in Cleveland.com the couple was fighting after their wedding.

Darlene James, Hunter’s former secretary, attended the couple’s December wedding. James said Lyons was a student in a class Hunter taught last summer at Bryant & Stratton College.

“He was always sending her poems,” James said. “He would bring her lunch at the office. He was just trying to win her over.”

James questioned Hunter about why she would marry him so soon after meeting, particularly since he had a criminal record.

“She’s a marriage and family counselor,” James said. “It didn’t make sense that she didn’t give it time to develop. But she was in love. I have never seen her so happy.”

Others who worked in the Southgate Office Building where Hunter based her business said she and Lyons seemed a strange match.

“They were complete opposite personalities,” said Rob Weakely, who worked in the office next to Hunter’s.

The couple started fighting right after the wedding, James said, with Hunter sometimes calling in to cancel appointments after a fight. Lyons also complained if Hunter scheduled evening appointments, James said.

Hunter called Cleveland Police in late March to report that Lyons punched her in the back of the head in their driveway after an argument. After telling Lyons she filed the complaint, he told her, “If I go to back to jail, I will kill you,” according to court documents.

The media has been bombarding us with articles about how difficult it is for black women to find a good man.  And you have some folks telling black women to settle for less.  Is this what Tonya Hunter did?  This marriage killed her.

According to police, Hunter’s 4-year-old son Timothy was dropped off alone on a street corner about 10 p.m. Sunday and eventually led them to his mother’s body. The child remains in the custody of the Department of Children and Family Services but could be given to family members today.

I really feel sorry for Tonya Hunter’s son.  Did he witness his mother’s murder?  My prayers go out to Ms. Hunter’s family.

Suspect named in mother-daughter murders

I turned on the news today when I got home from work and they mentioned the Largo mother daughter murders.  A Prince Georges County grand jury returned a seven count indictment against 27 year old Jason Thomas Scott for the murders of Delores and Ebony Dewitt.

The indictment includes two counts of murder and two counts of burglary.  Even though indictments haven’t been handed down in the murders of Karen and Karissa Lofton , according to the Prince Georges County police Jason Scott is still a suspect in their murders as well as the murder of a woman in Bowie, MD.

The Washington Post didn’t have a lot of info but when I did a Google I found that ABC News.com had alot of information.  At the time I checked out ABC News this was front page news with his picture shown.  Hopefully the Post will have more information later tonight or tomorrow.  The Prince Georges County Gazette also has information about the indictment.  According to the Gazette:

A Prince George’s County grand jury indicted a Largo man in one of two mother-daughter killings that occurred last year in the Largo area, county State’s Attorney Glenn F. Ivey announced today, and county police say the man remains the main suspect in the second mother-daughter killing and several other homicides.

Jason Thomas Scott, 27, of Pritchard Lane was indicted on two counts of first-degree murder in the March 2009 deaths of Delores Dewitt, 42, and her 19-year-old daughter, Ebony Dewitt. Scott is a 2001 graduate of Largo High School who has been in jail since July 2009 on federal gun-trafficking charges. If convicted on the murder charges, he could get up to two life sentences in prison, Ivey said.

During a news conference today outside the county courthouse in Upper Marlboro, Ivey said the state’s attorney’s office is seeking life in prison without parole, adding Scott is not eligible for the death penalty under Maryland law, but declined to elaborate.

When I blog about crime situations I don’t normally post the picture of the criminal.  But this time I will.

Maryland: Suspect Named in Possible Serial Mother-Daughter Killings

Jason Thomas Scott, 27-Year-Old With a Computer Science Degree, Being Investigated for Other Unsolved Killings, Police Say

By PIERRE THOMAS and ENJOLI FRANCIS

Authorities are hoping they have the answer to a question that has plagued them since early 2009: Who killed two mother-daughter pairs in a two-month period in suburban Maryland?

Jason Thomas Scott, 27, was charged today in the murder of Delores and Ebony Dewitt, a mother and daughter who were found in a burning car in March 2009. A Prince George’s grand jury returned a seven-count indictment against Scott, including two counts of murder and two counts of burglary.

Law enforcement sources told ABC News that they believe Scott also killed Karen and Karissa Lofton two months prior in their locked home.

Maryland Community Shaken

The horror began Jan. 26, 2009, in Prince Georges County, Maryland, as an intruder neutralized the Loftons’ home alarm system and slipped inside.

Karen Lofton, a 45-year-old nurse, was fatally shot as she tried to hide in a corner. Her daughter Karissa, 16, was repeatedly shot as she frantically dialed 911 from her bed.

Police were perplexed. The doors were locked and there were no signs of forced entry. Neighbors were terrified.

You can read it all here.

I’m so glad to read that this monster is off the streets. And to think that he’s connected to more crimes including more murders and home invasions.  According to the ABC New article Jason Scott worked at UPS and apparently used their database to help select his victims.  That’s some scary mess to read that that’s how he selected his victims.  Unfortunately he’s not eligible for the death penalty in Maryland.

In May 2009, Gov. Martin O’Malley signed a bill that restricts the death penalty to cases in which there is biological or DNA evidence of guilt, a videotaped confession or a videotape that links the defendant to a homicide.

In September 2009 the Prince Georges County Gazette.com did a special feature on the Dewitt and Lofton murders.  It’s called Waiting Room.

You can check it out here.

TGIF!!!

TGIF!!!  Yes indeed it’s Friday and it feels so good.

I haven’t been here in a while   Guess I haven’t had that blogging feeling in the past few months.  Anyway I’ve been suffering from the severe summer heat and humidity that we’ve been having around here.  It’s been horrible the past few days.  We’re talking 100 degrees.  This is not my kind of weather   Where is fall when you need it?

Today isn’t as bad compared to the past few days though.   But it’s still too hot for me.  Anything over 80 degrees is too hot for me, lol.  Around here summer started back in late May/early June before the official start date of summer.  That figures.  Add the usual Washington, D.C. area humidity and you might as well fry an egg on the sidewalk.

Interesting stuff going on while I’ve been on my blogging break.  Congrats to Serena and Rafa on winning their Wimbledon tennis titles last weekend.  Back in June it was the one year anniversary of Michael Jackson’s death.  Still can’t believe he’s gone.  I noticed the media is trying to turn one of the ten Russian spies into a media celebrity.  Why am I not surprised?  Even though she along with the others are being sent back to Russia don’t be surprised if Anna Chapman shows up on the cover of some American fashion magazine

Of course the usual crime stories continue in the D.C. metro area.  One of the saddest was the murder of Maryland State Trooper Wesley Brown.  Back in June Trooper Brown, who was off duty and working part-time as a security guard, was gunned down in front of Applebee’s Restaurant after he escorted an unruly and nonpaying customer. The unruly patron left the restaurant and returned about 30 minutes later and gunned down Trooper Brown in the Applebee’s parking lot.  The thug, Cyril Cornelius Williams, along with a friend of his who gave him the gun were later arrested and charged with first degree murder. The murdering thug Williams has a long history of drug convictions and was on parole at the time of the murder.  I hope they go for the death penalty in this case but knowing the state of Maryland they will probably get life without parole.  If this had happened in neighboring Virginia those two fools would be kissing their lives goodbye.

You can read more about the late Trooper Wesley Brown and those who knew him here at the Washington Post.

Steve McNair found shot to death in Nashville

It’s been a cruel couple of weeks when it comes to deaths. The latest news is the murder of former NFL quarterback Steve McNair.  Steve’s body was found in a Nashville condo along with the body of an unidentified woman.

Former NFL MVP Steve McNair killed in apparent double homicide

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Former NFL quarterback Steve McNair, whose most noted drive was the final one of the 2000 Super Bowl, was found dead with a gunshot wound to the head Saturday afternoon in a downtown condominium. Police said a woman was also shot dead.

McNair was 36 and played 13 seasons before retiring in April 2008. Police spokesman Don Aaron said officials tentatively identified the woman, but did not release her name. He confirmed she wasn’t McNair’s wife, Mechelle.

He said authorities were still investigating the shootings and that no suspects were in custody.

“I don’t have any answers for you now as to what’s happened, who’s responsible,” Aaron said.

“There are persons who were around the complex today, visitors, who have been taken to headquarters for questioning, just to see what they know, what they may have seen,” he said.

Aaron said officers went to the scene after receiving a call about injured persons inside the condo.

“When police officers arrived in response to that call, they found two individuals who had been shot to death inside the residence,” he said.

The condominium is one that McNair was known to frequent, but police spokeswoman Kristin Mumford said she didn’t know if he was the owner.

Even though he was never a Washington Redskin I still followed Steve McNair’s career including rooting for the Tennessee Titans in Super Bowl XXXIV against the St. Louis Rams.

Steve McNair graduated from Alcorn State in 1995 and he was drafted by the Houston Oilers who would later move to Tennessee.  They would become the Tennessee Titans.  He led the Titans to the Super Bowl in January 2000 where they lost to the  St. Louis Rams.  In 2006 McNair was traded to the Baltimore Ravens and retired in 2008.

Steve is survived by his wife Mechelle and four sons.

RIP Steve McNair.

Are you better off paying by cash in a restaurant?

Something to think about after reading that eight people plead guilty to a credit card skimming scheme in the Washington, D.C. area. The criminals involved netted more than $700,000 from restaurant customers credit cards.

Eight plead guilty in credit card-skimming scheme
More than $700,000 in fraudulent charges made

by Andrea Noble
Staff Writer

Eight people involved in a credit card-skimming scheme which netted more than $700,000 from customers of area restaurants pleaded guilty Monday to charges including bank fraud, access device fraud and aggravated identity theft, according to the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Joseph Artemus Bush III, 28, of Fort Washington; Aaron D. Gilbert, 25, of Bowie; and Erick V. Burton, 38, of District Heights pleaded guilty to paying servers at Washington, D.C. restaurants to steal the credit card numbers of customers between November 2007 and March 2009, according to documents from the District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia. The credit card numbers were re-encoded onto existing cards and used by Bush, Gilbert and Burton to purchase merchandise at area retail stores ranging from a Gucci in Chevy Chase to a Wal-Mart in Alexandria, Va.

The scheme resulted in thousands of transactions with an estimated loss of $736,393 that affected more than 50 financial institutions, said Dana J. Boente, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Three of the guilty parties plead guilty to paying restaurant servers twenty dollars per skimmed card. The restaurants involved include Clyde’s Restaurant, 701 Restaurant and M&S Grill in Washington, D.C.

In an affidavit filed in April by investigating Secret Service Agent Philip Soto, a server at Carrabbas Italian Restaurant in Bowie and hotel staff at Gaylord Hotel in National Harbor were also implicated in the scheme. United States Department of Justice spokesman Peter Carr said those employees were not charged in the scheme.

I know that carrying around a boat load of cash isn’t the safest thing the do, but is that restaurant worker you’re handing your credit card to trustworthy?  Do restaurant customers need to stand over the servers as they swipe your credit card? I’m sure the majority of restaurant employees are honest but a certain few can taint all.

What about the folks involved in this crime?  Was it worth it?  They put themselves in a sad and pathetic situation.  But this is the life they wanted to live and they will all pay the price.

Check out the entire article here.

Special Police Officer murdered by white supremacist

As most folks know by now eighty eight year old James Wenneker von Brunn, a well known white supremacist, murdered 39 year old Stephen T. Johns, a special police officer at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday.

James Von Brunn has a long history of hate offline and on the internet. His hate was geared specifically towards Jews and African Americans.

Stephen Johns, seeing an elderly man approaching the museum, was kind enough to open the door for von Brunn but lost his life in the process. Von Brunn pulled out a rifle and shot Stephen Johns in the chest. He later died at George Washington University Hospital. After von Brunn shot Mr. Johns two officers immediately returned gunfire shooting von Brunn in the face.

At a Monument of Sorrow, A Burst of Deadly Violence
Guard Killed, Suspect Injured Amid Scene Of Fear, Chaos

By Michael E. Ruane, Paul Duggan and Clarence Williams
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, June 11, 2009

At 12:40 p.m. yesterday a man stepped through the doors of the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. He took two paces, lowered his rifle at a security guard and, before anyone could react, opened fire in a popular national landmark.

The guard, who did not have time to draw his gun, fell bleeding and fatally wounded to the polished floor. Other guards fired back, cutting down the assailant. Terrified patrons, many of them children, dived for safety. And what moments before had been a bright weekday in June became a tableau of violence.

As described by bystanders and authorities, the attack inside the famed Holocaust museum turned the crowded building and Washington’s nearby tourist-thronged Mall into a scene of fear and chaos, with black-clad SWAT teams, hovering helicopters and racing emergency vehicles. Stunned witnesses described a fusillade of gunfire — five shots or more — the blood-streaked floor and the screams of frightened visitors inside the museum and on the street.

“It’s like a scene from a movie,” said Edward Bhopa, 54.

“A horror movie,” added his son Andy, 28.

The suspect, identified by law enforcement sources as James W. von Brunn, 88, of Annapolis, was said to be a longtime, “hard-core” supremacist whose Internet writings contain extensive, poisonous ravings against Jews and African Americans.

The slain guard, Stephen T. Johns, 39, of Temple Hills, worked for the Wackenhut security company and had been employed at the museum for six years, the museum said.

Officials at George Washington University Hospital, where von Brunn, Johns and an unidentified victim with less serious injuries were taken, said Johns suffered a gunshot wound to the chest and died there. Von Brunn was shot in the face, and the bullet exited his neck, according to a high-ranking police source. He underwent surgery and was in critical condition last night.

The Washington Post has several articles about von Brunn:

A Suspect’s Long History of Hate and Signs of Strain

Was He Capable of This? Yes.

Slain Museum Guard’s Kindness Repaid With Bullet

Museum Suspect’s Writings Had Not Triggered a Probe

Bonnie Sweeten blames black men for her ignorance

Sigh!!! It’s blame a black man time folks. Every so often a white person will murder a spouse or child or will claim they were assaulted by some mysterious black man.   I know there are other lessor known cases as well.  A mysterious latino man was blamed for kidnapping a white woman from Georgia a few years ago.  Alot of folks might not remember the infamous Scottsboro Boys case in 1931.

The latest blame a black man episode happened in a Philadelphia suburb a couple of days ago.  Bonnie Sweeten called 911 claiming that she and her daughter were abducted by two black men.  Well the real story is that she and her daughter hopped on a plane to Orlanda, FL so she could take her daughter to Disney World.

‘Abducted’ Mom Charged With ID Theft, False Reports
Woman, 9-Year-Old Girl Flew From Philadelphia to Orlando, Visited Disney World, Cops Say

By RICHARD ESPOSITO, JAY SHAYLOR and EMILY FRIEDMAN

A Pennsylvania woman who vanished after calling 911 to say she had been abducted and stuffed in the trunk of a car along with her young daughter apparently faked the abduction, booked a flight to Orlando, where she checked into a hotel under an alias and then took her daughter to visit a Disney theme park, law enforcement sources told ABC News.

Bonnie Sweeten, 38, was taken into custody in Orlando after being apprehended by the FBI and Orange County police at the Grand Floridian resort and is being charged with false reports and identity theft, Bucks County, Pa., District Attorney Michelle Henry said this evening.

Sweeten will not face any federal charges at this time, the prosecutor said.

Her 9-year-old daughter, Julia Rakoczy, was with authorities in Orlando and was to be picked up by her father, Henry said.

While Sweeten’s motive for fleeing was unclear, Henry indicated that domestic and financial problems were likely at the root of it.

She said Sweeten used a a co-worker’s driver’s license when she bought airline tickets and flew to Orlando after reporting the abduction.

Sweeten and her daughter disappeared Tuesday. She was last heard from about 1:45 p.m. when she called 911 to say she had been in a minor car accident in Bucks County, a Philadelphia suburb. She called a second time moments later to say she had been tossed in the trunk of a Cadillac by two black men, according to police.

“This was a total fabrication on her part,” Henry said this evening.

As the investigation developed, investigators became increasingly skeptical of her abduction tale, which was told against the backdrop of a probe into Sweeten’s alleged involvement in the theft of about $300,000 from her former employer, an attorney in Upper Makefield Township, sources close to the investigation told ABC News.

Yes we all know that a certain segment of the black community commits a disproportionate share of crimes in this country. But to falsely accuse black men of committing a crime cause you’re feeling suicidal and having domestic and financial problems is seriously f**ked up.

I will be thrilled when the mainstream media starts focusing on all types of victims of real crimes (not strange accusations) and give the white women in peril headlines a rest.   Maybe, just maybe one day the mainstream media like CNN, FOX News or MSNBC will do a major story on a missing black child.  Ya think???

Check out more about this case:

Black men didn’t do it

Julia Rakoczy reunited with her father

Investigators try to unravel abduction hoax case

RIP Baby Emanuel

I first heard about this case on the radio early this morning at work.  So of course I had to google it. I nearly blew a fuse after reading about the death of 3 month old Emanuel Wesley Murray.

Early Tuesday morning twenty one year old Richard Anthony McTear, Jr. beat his seventeen year old ex-girlfriend, Jasmine Bedwell, threw Emanuel on the concrete floor of her apartment, kidnapped Emanuel and threw him out of the driver’s side window onto the shoulder of southbound Interstate 275 in Tampa, FL.  Richard McTear has been charged with first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, kidnapping, felony battery and burglary with battery. He needs to burn in hell too. How in the hell can you throw an innocent baby out the window?

The mother of a 3-month-old thrown from a car onto the side of Interstate 275 early Tuesday morning had been frightened for months of the man charged today with murdering the boy.

Jasmine Bedwell, 17, started dating Richard Anthony McTear Jr. about 10 months ago, when she was pregnant with the child of another man, a man in prison.

From the beginning, McTear did not warm up to the boy, said the infant’s great aunt Roberta Thomas. Bedwell told Thomas she was frightened of McTear and feared for her boy’s safety.

“She was always scared of him,” Thomas said. “He didn’t care for the child.”

Last month, Bedwell sought an injunction against McTear for domestic violence. She didn’t appear in court Monday, and the case was dropped. Thomas was trying to help Bedwell navigate that legal system to keep her and her son Emanuel Wesley Murray safe, she said.

But before any of that happened, Bedwell’s fears came true.

Early Tuesday, Hillsborough County sheriff’s deputies say, McTear battered Bedwell and threw Emanuel on concrete, kidnapped the infant and threw him out of the driver’s side window onto the shoulder of southbound Interstate 275, just south of Fowler Avenue.

Thousand of people drove by the crime scene that snarled the morning commute.

McTear was charged with first-degree murder, aggravated child abuse, kidnapping, felony battery and burglary with battery. It was the second time this week that an infant was killed. Sunday night, deputies say a Lakeland man killed his wife, two of his sons, aged 8 and almost 5 months, before turning the rifle on himself. A 13-year-old son managed to escape to a neighbor’s house.

Horrific Find

Sometime early Tuesday morning, Bedwell, who had been out, returned to her apartment with her baby, according to the Hillsborough County Sheriff’s Office.

There, she found McTear. He had broken in, said HCSO spokeswoman Debbie Carter.

According to a report:

When Bedwell closed the door, McTear began to beat her with his fists. He choked her, leaving abrasions on her neck. He bit her on the right arm and shoulder.

Then he threatened her and the baby. “I’m gonna kill the both of ya’ll,” he said.

Emanuel was in a car seat. McTear picked it up and threw it across the apartment.

He picked it up and threw it again. Emanuel fell out, onto the concrete floor.

Bedwell then ran out of the apartment, leaving her baby behind, to call for help. Deputies received a call from her shortly after 3 a.m.

When she left, McTear grabbed the child, put him in his Chevrolet Impala and drove off, eventually heading southbound on I275, where he tossed the baby out of the driver’s side window onto the shoulder.

Apparently McTear has a rap sheet a mile long. And according to the Hillsborough Circuit Judge Walter Heinrich:

the case might involve the death penalty.

He’s right, the case should involve the death penalty. This monster should be thrown off the tallest building you can find. Let him get a taste of this own medicine.

Heinrich recounted McTear’s criminal history, which police said includes dozens of arrests, several of which accuse McTear of domestic violence.

McTear’s criminal history includes dozens of arrests, several of which involved domestic violence, Tampa police spokeswoman Andrea Davis said. His first arrest on domestic violence charges came when he was 14, Davis said. Details on that case are unavailable because he was a juvenile.

In 2007, McTear avoided prosecution on felony criminal domestic battery by strangulation charges when the victim waived prosecution. That case didn’t involve Bedwell. In that incident, police said, he beat his girlfriend up, stole her car with their 3-year-old child in the back seat, gave the child back and burned the car.

McTear should have been in jail a long time ago.

I hate to criticize the mother cause she’s going through hell right now but what is it with young women like Jasmine Bedwell who continue to hook up with men like McTear? Her home life growing up wasn’t the greatest but is she only attracted to thugs?

Bedwell had been a child of abuse, said Jeff Rainey, chief operating officer of Hillsborough Kids Inc., the umbrella agency that oversees the county’s child services providers. He said Bedwell came into his system “through abuse and neglect by her caretaker.”

She has several prior arrests for battery, including a June 2008 arrests in Pasco County. She was a juvenile, and details on those arrests weren’t immediately available.

She has been with Hillsborough Kids for about three years and is receiving independent living service, which helps teenagers transition out of foster care and into adulthood. Now, she will be offered grief and crisis counseling, Rainey said.

She was doing well through the program, Rainey said.

Jasmine started dating McTear 10 months ago while she was pregnant with Emanuel.  The father of her child is in prison right now.

The child’s father, also named Emanuel Wesley Murray, is in a Florida prison. His release date is slated for July 5, 2011. He is serving a three-year sentence for being a felon in possession of a firearm and possession of an illegal weapon, Plessinger said.

Murray would not be eligible for a furlough to attend his child’s funeral because his custody level is too high, but he could ask for local law enforcement to take him, Plessinger said.

Check out these articles to read more about this case:

Mom of baby found dead on I-275 feared suspect, her mom says

Authorities:  Suspect in baby’s slaying threatened harm before

Offenders like McTear can sliip through system

RIP Emanuel.