Allison Leotta's Blog, page 18

A Hard Month for Parents

As a former sex-crimes prosecutor who is also the mother of two small children, I struggle to be a laid-back parent. I want my kids to grow up thinking the world is generally a good place. I don't want to frighten them with dire warnings. On the other hand, I've seen the terrible things that people do to each other. I worry.

I can usually strike a reasonable balance between caution and chilling out. But July was a hard month.

[image error]First, there was the death of little Leiby Kletzky. On July 11th, the parents of the eight-year-old Orthodox Jewish boy allowed him to walk home alone from day camp for the first time. It was only seven blocks, and they'd practiced with a dry run. But Leiby got lost in his close-knit Brooklyn neighborhood and asked a stranger for directions. That stranger took the child home, killed him, and dismembered him, police say. Most of Leiby's body was found in a dumpster. His feet were found in the man's freezer.

[image error]Then there was the attempted kidnapping, on July 15th, of the two-year-old boy from a Best Buy – while his father watched. The child was playing by the shopping carts when a 23-year-old stranger, high on PCP, grabbed him and ran. The father chased frantically, and the would-be kidnapper threw the toddler into a glass door with such force that it caused a web of cracks, say police.

[image error]Finally, Jaycee Dugard released her book, "A Stolen Life," in mid-July. It is an amazing book, written simply and compellingly by Jaycee herself. You know the story: when she was eleven years old, Jaycee walked to her school bus stop. A convicted sex offender, Joseph Garrido, drove up, tazed her with a stun-gun, snatched her and drove away. His wife helped. Garrido handcuffed the girl in a backyard shed and repeatedly raped her. She eventually bore two baby daughters by him. After 18 years in captivity, she was found, along with her now-adolescent daughters. The most stunning part of the story to me is that Garrido was on probation for his earlier rape, and was being supervised by the feds the whole time. Dozens of probation officers visited his house – and no one found the girl or the two babies living in the shed in the backyard. Jaycee's story is one of survival and courage, a shy, intellitgent little girl who deserved better, and a man who was as evil as evil gets. I could not put the book down, although it chilled me to the bone.

 So, how, as a parent, should I balance these terrible stories, and the terrible things I've seen on the job, with rearing kids who are secure and happy and have a sunny outlook on life – but are also safe? In mulling this, I looked at the statistics. Just over 1% of child abductions are perpetrated by strangers. What happened to these children was very rare. Most danger to our children comes from people they know: caregivers, relatives, friends of the family. If we're diligent about knowing the people our kids hang out with, we can reduce their risk. I've also put on my reading list the book "Free Range Kids," the bestseller by Lenore Skenazy, who argues that childreen need freedom in order to grow, and that the world is actually safer than we fear. Maybe that will counterbalance some of the darkness.

Meanwhile, if you've got a suggestion for how to strike the right balance, I'd love to hear it!

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Is this evil or what?

In 12 years as a prosecutor, you get used to hearing stories of crime and horror. But every once in a while, you see a case that really gives you shivers. I watched a trial like that last week: United States v. Jason Scott.

Jason Scott was a student at the University of Maryland's University College and an employee at UPS. He was smart – and evil. He used UPS databases to research homes. Then he dressed like a ninja, armed himself, and went out with his buddies to invade those homes, while the owners were home. His MO was to use a cinder block to break a window, then go inside, beat up the home owners and demand their valuables. He said this was "the new way" of doing things. Why wait for your target to go on vacation? It was so much easier to find their valuables if you broke in when they were home and you could threaten them with a gun.

In one home, he stole the cell phone of a 17-year-old girl. He looked at the pictures on her phone, and saw her friend, another 17-year-old girl who he thought was cute. He then tracked down the girl in the picture. One night, he dressed himself all in black (including a black face mask) and broke into the girl's home. She was home with her mother. He locked Mom up in a different room. Then he put a pillowcase on the girl's head, tied her up, and sexually assaulted her. He videotaped the whole thing.

Luckily, he let this girl live. Others were allegedly not so lucky. He's also being charged by the State of Maryland for killing several people during his other home invasions. (The feds generally don't prosecute homicide.) He's admitted to over 60 crimes.

In the case I watched, the U.S. Attorney's Office in Maryland charged Scott with carjacking, use of a firearm in a crime of violence, and the production of child pornography, among other things. The lawyering was terrific, including the U.S. Attorney, Rod Rosenstein, himself doing much of the heavy lifting. A jury came back with the verdict this afternoon: Guilty on all charges.

Sigh of relief.

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Casey Anthony and the death penalty

Do prosecutors try too hard in high-profile cases?

[image error]I wonder if the Casey Anthony verdict would have been different if the prosecutors hadn't made it a death penalty case — because of the effect the ultimate punishment had on Casey's mother.

Mom was cooperative with the police at first, and seemed to believe that her daughter killed Caley.  But how can a mother help put her own daughter to death?

In a surprise twist at trial, Mom took the blame for some of the most incriminating evidence in the case. A bunch of Internet searches had been run on Casey's home computer, looking into killing with chloroform. Mom testified that she – not Casey – was the one who ran those searches, because her dogs were eating the yard plants and Mom was concerned about them ingesting chlorophyl.  So Mom looked it up on the computer.

Over eighty times.

While Mom was at work.

If you believe that, I have a bridge to sell you. That testimony was clearly a mother's last ditch attempt to save her daughter's life. It worked.

I wonder if Mom would've testified to such an obvious lie if her daughter's life wasn't on the line. I think prosecutors pushed her toward that testimony by threatening Casey with the penalty of death. 

Personally, I don't believe in capital punishment for many reasons (the subject of another post). But even pro-death-penalty prosecutors would be wise to consider the psychological effect that the prospect of the electric chair will have on jurors and witnesses alike.

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Violence in Movies and TV – a guest blog by Thomas Kaufman

[image error]Hope you had a great 4th of July! I'm excited to introduce today's guest-blogger: Thomas Kaufman, an Emmy-winning director/cameraman who also writes mysteries. His first book, DRINK THE TEA, won the PWA/St Martin's Press Competition for Best First Novel. It's a fantastic mystery featuring one of the funniest sleuths I've ever read. I stayed up late to find out whodunnit and laughed out loud throughout. Tom's second book, STEAL THE SHOW, comes out this week. I can't wait to read it! Tom's blog tour continues this week at International Thriller Writers, Murderati, and Gelati's Scoop. Meanwhile, enjoy his guest blog here with us! — Allison

I work in the film business, have done for longer than I might care to admit. And when I'm filming something, an event, there are many ways to depict it.  For example, a guy falling down the stairs. One way to film him would be to place the camera at the bottom, and in one take (that is, without cutting the camera and editing in another shot) we see Joe fall down the stairs. This kind of shooting is called a continuous take – the space and timing of the event are in tact.

Another way would be to shoot more than one angle, so we see Joe falling from the bottom, cut to an overhead shot as he passes through frame, then a close shot of his face in agony as it rushes past, then his body hitting the floor at the bottom. This kind of shooting is often called montage.

Given this second technique, you could even create what we call a motion continuum — you could actually edit a sequence of shots that would be much longer than the event itself. Say it takes five seconds to fall down this particular flight of stairs. I could shoot and edit a sequence that would take two minutes, or three minutes, or fifteen minutes. I could stretch out the event as long as I wanted. True, it would get boring pretty quickly. The point is, a filmmaker can stretch out an event, or let it stay whole, in real time.

You can also fragment an event, make it shorter than it is. Say, Joe (this is before he had that nasty accident on the stairs) is getting into his car and driving away. He's chasing someone, so he has to move fast.

So he runs to his car, opens the door gets in, closes the door, puts the key in the ignition, turns the key…are we having fun yet? Hey, it 's a chase scene, okay? Not a driver's ed film. So the director would fragment the action, using jump cuts.

As the name implies, a jump cut takes just a section of one action, then cuts further down the time line. You don't see every blessed second of what's going on because you don't need to. So after Joe flings open the car door, we cut to the key turning, then a low angle shot of Joe's car speeding away. 1-2-3, and it's chase time, baby.

Now, let's talk about violence on the screen. Let's take an event, say, someone getting riddled with bullets. How would we show something like that?

In the 1960′s, Arthur Penn directed Bonnie and Clyde. I hope I'm not ruining your day when I tell you they don't get away clean. In fact, Clyde gets shot multiple times in slow motion. An event that would've taken a two seconds gets prolonged to about thirty, though the use of exploding squibs and slow motion.

The use of slow motion in violence may give it the quality of dance, as the actor's body shudders and flails as the squibs get fired. John Woo, who directed many action films in Honk Kong before coming to America to direct FACE OFF and MISSION IMPOSSIBLE likes to intercut slow-motion with regular speeds when filming a shoot-em-up, as you can see in this clip from HARD BOILED:

This five minute clip (no, you don't have to watch all of it) gives you the idea. Lots of bullets flying, lots of squibs exploding, lots of slow motion, lots of action. But what's the result? Do we know any of the people involved?

A writing teacher of mine once told me, if you're going to kill somebody, first you have to go to the trouble of bringing them to life.

Now, a second clip, from Howard Hawk's adaption of Raymond Chandler's THE BIG SLEEP, with Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. In this clip, private eye Phillip Marlowe has it out with racketeer Eddie Mars, whom the audience has seen before:

Since the audience has gotten to know Mars, and that Mars is one of the antagonists, gives this scene major impact.

Could these two clips be more different? Woo is constantly cutting, but Hawks frames his shots in an almost documentary way, and lets shots run for relatively long durations, then accelerates towards the end. And the thing about the Hawks clip? The violence is sudden, it happens quickly. And it is that very suddenness that makes violence so terrifying, because there is no way to prepare yourself for it – by the time you know what's happened, it's finished.

There you have it –two directors with different visions and temperaments. So let me ask you – which scene affects you more?

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Sea Change in the DSK Case

The case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn appears to be cratering.  Check out the breaking news in the New York Times.

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Ripped from the Headlines!

It's been a busy season for men behaving badly, right? These headlines are too good for the writers at Law & Order: SVU to pass up. Which news story will be the basis of an SVU episode next season? I made my guesses below – what do you think? (If you don't know who these real-life stories are about, the answers – and links – are on the bottom.)

The Great Seducer. Odds, 1:1. The snooty president of an international monetary agency, and shoo-in for the next president of France, is charged with raping a chambermaid at his posh New York hotel. SVU pretty much has to cover this one, right?

Look At My Weiner. Odds, 2:1. A New York Congressman sends nude pictures of his crotch to women he just met on the Internet. His beautiful pregnant politico wife is not amused.

The Adulternator. Odds, 3:1. A governor impregnates the family housekeeper, then keeps his love child a secret for over a decade. His wife travels back in time to have him castrated.

Teachers' Pets. Odds, 4:1. Professors at a state university are charged with running a massive online prostitution ring. It was a tip-off when they offered a course called "Intro to Pimp Studies."

Your Mother Should Know. Odds, 5:1.  An abstinence advocate, who also happens to be the daughter of a Vice-Presidential candidate, claims she unwillingly lost her virginity during a camping trip, while she was passed out drunk. Some advocates call for rape charges to be brought against the boyfriend.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up. Odds, 10:1. A male construction worker leaps to his death from a 50-story skyscraper after enduring constant harassment by female underwear models at the agency across the street.

Take your pick – or tell me another story that screams SVU episode!

Answers:

The Great Seducer – IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Look At My Weiner – Congressman Anthony Weiner.

The Adultenator – Governor Arnold Schwarzenneger.

 Teachers' Pets – Professors at University of New Mexico.

Your Mother Should Know – Bristol Palin.

You Can't Make This Stuff Up – actually, I did make that one up.

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Mean Season on the Bachelorette

With SVU on hiatus, I've been devouring cotton-candy summer TV. In fact, I'm addicted to The Bachelorette. Admitting my problem is the first step, right?

I take some consolation from the fact that half of America shares this fascination. This week, bachelorette Ashley Hebert graces the cover of People magazine and a bunch of tabloids, all of which marvel at her falling hard for the most villainous bachelor of all time. Bad-boy Bentley alternately woos Ashley and trashes her behind her back, saying things like, "I'd rather be swimming in pee than planning a wedding with her." Three episodes ago, he left the show under a flimsy pretense; since then, she's pined for him at the expense of the twelve other hotties earnestly vying for her affection.

All the headlines ask: How can she like this guy?

As a prosecutor of domestic violence, the dynamic looks familiar. Ashley has some serious self-esteem issues, and Bentley knows how to push her buttons. He props her up then pushes her back down, enjoying both the seduction and the destruction in equal measure. This isn't a typical abusive relationship – obviously, there's no physical abuse – but it has some of the psychological hallmarks: a cruel guy who gets a thrill from hurting the woman who adores him, and an insecure woman who wants to believe the lies her lover tells her, despite all evidence to the contrary.

In short, Ashley got played.

The more puzzling question is why Bentley would play the uber-villain with such reckless abandon. Even jerks can keep their bad behavior in check for the length of one TV show. But in the midst of a season of men behaving badly (see Weiner, Schwarzenegger, and Strauss-Kahn), Bentley is a serious contender for the title of America's Most Hated Man. Late-night comedians are even beating him in effigy:

I have to wonder if the Bachelorette producers paid Bentley to play the cad, perhaps sealing the deal with a confidentiality agreement. It would make sense. Ratings have gone through the hot tub.

Meanwhile, the producers themselves are getting a bit abusive, right?  Roasting Ashley as part of a group date?  Making the guys kick-box each other until one gets a concussion?  This is the modern version of watching lions devour gladiators. Only with higher heels and more romantic lighting.

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What Should Weiner Do Next?

Congressman Anthony "no pun intended" Weiner is apparently going to resign his seat today, according to various news sources. His wife came home from her trip abroad with Secretary Clinton on Tuesday, and presumably they had a long, awkward conversation about his and their future. (Can you imagine! "Hi Honey, did you miss me?")

[image error] Weiner has a lot of important people telling him what to do these days, but the advice all seems to be of the unhelpful "resign and try to disappear forever" variety. But a narcissistic former Congressman with a lot of time on his hands can't just spend his days hanging around the gym, taking pictures of himself. What do you suggest for his next move? TV host with Governor Elliot Spitzer? Dancing with the Stars like Rep. Tom Delay? Celebrity Apprentice like Governor Rod Blagojevich? Or star in a bunch of Terminator movies, now that the Governator is taking some time off?

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Did Anthony Weiner Commit a Crime?

It's the biggest sex scandal of the week, but is it a sex crime?   New photos surfaced on TMZ Monday, showing Congressman Anthony Weiner taking semi-naked pictures of himself with his Blackberry in the mirrors of a Congressional gym. Certainly stupid, possibly pathological.  But were any of the Congressman's actions criminal?

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Professor Howard Ellerman of Folsom Lake College had a great analysis on Weiner's reckless sexting. Check out his full blog here.  Here are some good points Prof. Ellerman makes:

The question is whether Congressman Weiner violated any criminal or civil laws, or ethical standards in his conduct, and what would be the consequences if he did. These facts are undisputed: Congressman Weiner now admits that he:

Took pictures of himself in various lewd or sexually suggestive positions
Sent them, along with sexually explicit texts, to at least six women who are, according to him, as young as 21 over the course of three years;
In the process of trying to tweet the picture to one of them, he inadvertently published a picture of his turgid penis in boxer briefs, making it and her identity available to his 45,000 Twitter followers for less than an hour;
Took other pictures of himself in various forms of undress — some apparently from his office — and sent them privately to other women; and then
Lied about the twittered picture when it was discovered, saying he didn't send it but allowing that it might be him

Criminal Statues Implicated:

 Cyberstalking or sending pornography to children. If any of the women he was conversing with was under 18, criminal cyber-stalking laws would come into play. Ignorance of their age is not relevant.

Using federal resources for personal use. If that is Weiner's congressional office in the photos, or computers at the office or phone lines were used, anything but de minimus use of them for personal use would violate federal law. There is no possible way to define these actions as constituent services, given their purely private nature and the fact that the participants were not, as far as we can tell, voters in his district.

Lewd Conduct. There are state statues that variously criminalize the depiction or showing of an erect penis in public, even if it is covered. Washington and D.C. law would come into play. Further, there is an allegation that there is another picture out there of an explicit nature; that picture would be subject to the same state laws. However, both crimes require a victim, and no one here seems to be complaining about receiving the pictures.

Lying to Federal Investigators in the context of an investigation is a violation of federal law and a felony — just ask Martha Stewart, who served jail time for it. It looks like Weiner was careful to avoid asking for a federal investigation based on his lies; time will tell if in private conversations with Capitol police or the FBI he lied. If he did, it's a crime.

　

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What's His Defense?

Whether it's a Kennedy cousin, a professional athlete, or the head of the International Monetary Fund, it's always shocking when a wealthy celebrity is charged with rape. Could that man in the suit really have been that beast in the bedroom? Why would a millionaire risk trading his life of champagne and yachts for three hots and a cot? What will his defense be?

[image error] By now you've seen the footage of the head of the IMF, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, being led on a perp-walk by the NYPD. Until last this week, DSK was the French politician most likely to challenge Nicolas Sarkozy and become France's next president. His reputation as a womanizer had also earned him the nickname of the "Great Seducer." On May 18th, he was charged with sexually assaulting a maid at a posh Manhattan hotel, where he was staying in a $3000-a-night suite. According to news reports, the maid went into DSK's suite to clean it; he allegedly emerged naked from the bathroom, grabbed her, forced her to perform oral sex on him, and tried to further assault her; she escaped, ran from the room, and reported the incident to her supervisor.

Since his arrest, we've heard a couple of different theories of his possible defense. 

He's got an alibi:   Hehad checked out of the hotel and/or was lunching with his daughter when the alleged crime occurred, so he couldn't have raped the maid. Gee, what a terrible mix-up this all must be.

The Vast Global Conspiracy: Sarkozy's cronies set up Strauss-Kahn to eliminate him as a political rival. Dan Brown, start taking notes!

I doubt he'll go with either of these two defenses. I was a federal prosecutor in D.C. for twelve years, specializing in sex crimes for the last eight. I've seen countless sex-assault cases, although admittedly few involving French diplomats. But this isn't how such a case is typically defended.

An alibi defense is simply too risky (unless, of course, it's true!). With credit card receipts, ever-present security cameras, and GPS cell phones, there are too many ways authorities could disprove a false alibi. And advancing an alibi squanders one of the few great advantages that a defendant has at trial – the prosecutor's heavy burden of proof. Sure, technically the prosecutor still has to prove her case beyond a reasonable doubt even if she can poke holes in the defendant's alibi, but in practice the jury is likely to think they're picking between two theories. If the defendant's alibi is wrong, the prosecutor's theory must be right.

As for the conspiracy theory – I'm a thriller-writer, but it's too far-fetched for me. New Yorkers are a skeptical bunch. I don't think they'll buy a story where French politicians use the NYPD to carry out a grand conspiracy. If this were a set-up, it's a risky one. Could the alleged victim maid hold up under the spotlight that all the media in the free world is about to shine on her – not to mention cross-examination by experienced defense attorney Benjamin Brafman? Michael Corleone did it much better with the dead girl in the Senator's hotel bed.

 Instead, I predict Strauss-Kahn will go with the usual defense that powerful men opt for:

Consent.

This has been the defense of choice since there have been sex scandals. It's powerful because it often could be true – whether an alleged victim consented can be a blurry concept, and mistakes can be made. As a strategic choice, a consent defense takes advantage of two enormous challenges prosecutors face: (1) rape usually happens with no witnesses, aside from an often vulnerable victim, and (2) the government has the burden of proving every criminal case beyond a reasonable doubt, the highest standard in American law. This defense also plays into the biases and prejudices in our culture. Someone on the jury might see a woman who had sex with a wealthy man, and think she must have wanted it.

These days, DNA testing often proves that the sexual contact took place. That leaves a defendant unable to claim – for long – that he never had sexual relations with that woman. But who is to say that she didn't consent – except, of course, for her? The consent defense sets up a he-said / she-said situation, which is difficult to overcome by a beyond-a-reasonable-doubt standard.

Not impossible to overcome, of course. Forensic evidence such as vaginal tearing might demonstrate that the sex was forcible. But that kind of evidence is quite rare, and it seems even less likely to exist here, where there may have only been oral contact. Prosecutors will look for other injuries on the maid and DSK consistent with a struggle. They'll also search for any other corroborating evidence. Did she immediately call the police or family after the alleged assault? Did he flee the scene? Did anyone else see or hear anything during the encounter? Has he done this before? In the absence of such corroboration, a lot will ride on the victim's sheer credibility – a heavy burden for any woman to carry.

Meanwhile, the defense team has no obligation to state DSK's defense until after the results of the DNA testing come back. In fact, they don't have to say anything until trial – or even during trial. Every defendant has the right to sit back and simply hold the prosecution to its burden. But if history is any guide, DSK's attorneys will say this was just another case of the Great Seducer wielding his famous charm on a willing woman.

The prosecution will continue to work the case from every angle, searching for any evidence that goes to this question. The men and women of the NYPD and the Manhattan DA's Office are excellent law enforcement authorities. If they believe the charges cannot be proved, they will dismiss them.

And if this really turns out to be a vast global conspiracy, it will launch a new generation of political thrillers.

 Allison Leotta is the author of the legal thriller, "Law of Attraction."  She was an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Washington D.C. for eight years, and a trial attorney with the U.S. Department of Justice for three.  All views expressed here are hers alone and do not necessarily represent the views of the Department of Justice.

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