Shaun Webb's Blog, page 14

More Fearmongering

I’m not sure about your towns or cities, but where I live; Waterford-Pontiac-Detroit, the number one catchphrase among politicians running for judges, prosecutors, etc. has been “We’ll protect your children.” On all the ads the TV is running you hear “We’ll be tough on child predators, rapists and sex offenders.” On other ads, you hear the same people who are saying they’re going to be tough then criticizing the other side for not being tough enough on “Rapists, child predators and rapists.”  As far as I’m concerned, sex offenders, child rapists and predators have already been getting the firmest dose of the “toughness” as they’re collectively the most feared group in America.

Statistics don’t lie: The majority of sex offences are committed by NON- REGISTERED SEX OFFENDERS. How many different ways can it be told?  It’s the God’s honest truth. Sex offenders who are listed don’t re-offend nearly as much as the NON-REGISTERED OFFENDER. I know, I know….people say “See, the list really works. Sex offenders aren’t re-offending because they’re on the list.” Really? I highly doubt any list will keep a child molester from molesting if that’s what they want to do.  When and if they catch all the other non-registered folks that are offending, the list will grow ridiculously.  Soon it will drown itself out, as everyone in the country will be on, or know somebody who is on that list.

What is the list doing? It’s causing vigilantism, beatings, murder and more against sex offenders by non-sex offenders. I fail to see where that helps anything. The public is safer when a list exists?  How? Because you can see where they live and “keep tabs” on them? I’ll bet over 75% of the population doesn’t care one bit, while the other 25% are way over the top.

Politicians, do me and every other American a favor and find something besides JUST “protecting the children” to run on as a platform.  Stop scaring the public into electing YOU as a judge or whatever it is your running for because you’ll “protect” their kids

FYI.

By the way, the railroader Andrea Dean is getting these types of endorsements DESPITE trying to throw obviously innocent people in prison:

1. “Andrea Dean has the integrity and dedication to be a great judge for the Waterford District Court.  Her legal ability and experience make her the perfect fit to serve the people of Waterford.”-Colleen O’ Brien, Oakland County Circuit Judge.

2. “I strongly encourage you to vote for Andrea Dean. Andrea has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to our community, possesses unmatched integrity, legal ability and judicial temperament and will bring a strong work ethic to the bench.”- Richard D. Kuhn, Jr., 51st District Court Judge.

Is it just me, or do these people ignore her obvious breaking of moral and ethical codes as a prosecutor in exchange for convictions?  Are they simply not very smart? Do they actually think she brings “integrity” to the bench? If this woman is voted onto the bench in Waterford, the voters will get exactly what they deserved……

This country scares me half to death.

Filed under: Platforms Tagged: fear, public, vote, voter

Um…What?!?

What in God’s name is going on? This man was fired because the name of an adult website was accidentally shown in class?  The school districts act like these “incidents” are life and death matters.  Some kids curse, smoke, watch porn, have sex and do drugs.  Some teachers watch porn, some administrators watch porn, some  judges, politicians and prosecutors watch porn.  This country is in denial and scared half to death.  In fact, some judges and other politicians are using the “we protect kids” line to scare the shit out of the public and garner votes in the November election. The longer I live in this country, the more disgusted I become….Watch for my new book in Spring 2013.  I’ll talk much more about it then.

by Dustin Blitchoke, Oakland Press

A Walled Lake Western High School teacher who projected an Internet browsing history on a classroom screen that included the name of an adult website is no longer employed at the Walled lake Consolidated School District.-The “name” of an adult website?

The incident happened Tuesday, Oct. 16.  Walled Lake Western Principal Joseph Bell notified parents of the school’s students by email that afternoon.- Infamous scare tactic…

“I regret to inform you that there was an incident today in a classroom in which a teacher inadvertently projected onto the classroom screen a web browser history which contained the name of an adult website,” Bell said.- An incident?  The “Name” of a website is an incident?

“We do not consider the website to be school appropriate and I’m sorry if this was upsetting to students in the classroom.”-You mean upsetting to the 99% of the students who watch porn?

The adult website was not opened on the computer or projected on the screen, Bell said in the email.-Oh, I see…

On Wednesday, October 24th, superintendent Kenneth Gutman told district parents and staff in an email that the teacher was no longer employed in the district.-Because of the “name” of a website?

“We want you to know that the teacher is no longer employed by Walled lake Schools.”  Gutman said.-That should quell all the fear.

“We hold staff members to high standards of accountability.  When allegations surface, we follow our policies and engage in providing appropriate due process prior to taking action for any individual in question.  When situations like this arise, the District has an obligation to do a thorough investigation.”- They really mean a Kangaroo Court.

The teacher was placed on administrative leave as soon as the district learned of the incident, Gutman said in an email.

Filed under: website Tagged: adult, fired, porn, teacher

Fear Can Block Your Chance For Happiness

Reblogged from Hoke Springs Eternal

Can you be honest enough with yourself to admit the things that make you afraid?

If you take the time to analyze your fears, you can gain valuable insight about exactly what makes you tick.  When you take a candid look at your fears, you can also understand why you’re probably dissatisfied with some areas of your life.

Fears are fantasy because fear itself doesn’t exist- it’s only an attitude.  Just as you give life to any of your fears, you can also put them to their eternal rest.

Fears are based on the “what ifs” of life, an acceptance of a fantasy instead of a confrontation of reality.  After all, how many of your fears have actually happened?  Even if they did happen, you survived- so they couldn’t have been such big deals.  You’re always better off confronting a fear and finding if it’s justified, than staying afraid and never knowing.

Some people precondition most aspects of their lives with “what if” negative fantasies.  What if I lose some money?  What if my boss doesn’t like my idea?  What if I ask a dumb question and get embarrassed?

Successful people deal only in positive fantasies of the future, with no fear in their interpretation of the same questions.  What if I end up making more money?  What if the boss thinks my idea is brilliant?  What if I ask a dumb question and learn something?

Negative “what ifs” – if they prevent a person from taking action – eliminate positive possibilities.  They stop people dead in their tracks; while positive “what ifs” put them on the right track – even if the good expectation doesn’t materialize.

For example, a young man fantasizes about asking a young woman for a date.  If the fearful thought, “What if she turns me down?” prevents him from asking; he has eliminated any chance for a new relationship.  However, if the thought, “What if she says yes?” causes him to try, the possibility at least exists.

Because positive “what ifs” spur people to action, they no longer have to wonder about the answer to their “what if” question.  They don’t look back on their lives, wondering what might have been.

Such positive people also find a way to make any bad things that happen acceptable.  If the young woman isn’t interested in a date, the young man at least gained experience talking to the opposite sex.  If a marriage didn’t work, the couple had at least a short chapter of pleasure.  If a vacation out-of-state wasn’t particularly exciting, the traveler at least learned something about a different part of the country.

You cannot be happy if you’re afraid- you can only be passive.  Don’t kid yourself that the absence of pain is equal to pleasure.  Remember, the absence of stress is death.  Confront your fears, risk some pain and make pleasure more probable.

PEP happenings to put positive emotional power in your life:

1)  Practice honesty:  Pinpoint any fears that hold you back.

2)  Practice interpretation:  When anything bad happens to you, find something good about it to make it acceptable.

3)  Practice expectation:  Think only positive “what ifs.”

Filed under: Happiness Tagged: fear, happy, new, positive

Can I Get Some Answers Please?

This post will be very unpopular with a lot of my followers, readers and watchers.  Why?  Because my “faith” isn’t as it should be.  I have spent my life praying, yet none: NONE, of my prayers have come to fruition.  Can someone please tell me why?  Hold on one second: My prayers haven’t been for success, money or MORE faith:  They’ve been for relief.; relief from anxiety, panic and BPD.  Many of you will say “Well Shaun, your prayers have been answered because your afflictions have helped you write your books.  BULLSHIT!  My books come from emotional turmoil caused by a world full of evil.  My afflictions come from me not being able to protect my “inner child.”  Well, for one, I’ve had it.  If you walk around feeling good, healthy and happy, it must be because your faith is better than mine?  What kind of God would work in that manner?

If I live a good life, I’ll be granted entrance into Heaven and eternal joy, peace, etc.  I have to ask:  The God I worship has given me free choice, yet if I make the wrong choices, I burn in Hell for eternity.  What kind of God would do that?  We’re said to be loved and saved by the blood of the cross, yet if you screw up, it’s damnation for you;  A furnace.  What did I miss?  Did something slip by me that I didn’t See?  What differentiates between a good and bad life?

Is it a trick?  Is it a joke?  I have spent my life in turmoil.  A lot of people talk about Heaven being the ultimate end result of the grind.  Is it because they know?  Is it because they’re sure?  That’s not what I think.  I don’t think people are sure and act like they are.  Do we all live with anxiety, panic, OCD, depression and other horrible afflictions?  Do we all have issues that suck, only a little different from the next person?  That’s what I think.  This life is cruel. Period.  “You could be in a wheelchair.  It could be worse.”  Well, I’m not living in a wheelchair, yet.  Is a wheelchair or cancer worse?  Please tell me.

All the people who hate me:  Do you know who your hating?  Do you have any understanding of the human being you despise?  I don’t think so.  You cast a “Scarlet letter” on me and act like you’re doing humanity a favor.  You know what?  You don’t have the first idea what you’re doing or who you’re doing it to (Not just me).  You think you have it all figured out and you’ll “conform” to what you’ve been taught as “ideal”.   What is ideal?  Please…answer my question.

I watch what steps I take, I watch who I talk to, I even watch what the Hell I’m saying…No more.  We have prosecutors, vigilantes, sheriffs, police, schools, churches and society telling us what we should think, do and see.  Guess what?  I’m tired of it.  If I say one thing, I support a certain group.  If I say another, then I support another group.  Hogwash.  I support me and I support my writing and I support the people who mean everything to me.  No more conformation.  Am I “compliant”?  Well I better be, huh?

I’ve gotten close to some people in the advocacy of reform.  Do they ever call or write to ask how I’m doing?  NO.  Why?  Because they have their own issues and complexities.  I understand and I don’t get angry with them because they know no better…Just like me.  I could’ve called them or dropped them a line, but I chose not to.  Why?  Because I only care about me and the ones close to me.  Am I a conformist?  Am I a selfish human being?  Please enlighten me.

If I’m off base, please let me know.  I’m sick and fucking tired of people preaching that they have the answers, but they don’t have the first clue.  I have questions.  Would anyone like to answer them?  NO.  Because they don’t know how.  Why do I grind my teeth?  Why do I lack proper sleep?  Why do I worry “what if?”  Is it the same worry you have?  Is it the same shit you go through?  Maybe I’m just another human that will die and take his thoughts to the grave.

I’ve been taught since I was one year-old to conform.  I refuse.  I won’t do it.  Oh yes, I’ll do what I’m asked by our corrupt system to stay afloat (Out of jail).  “Don’t smoke” (I smoke).  “Don’t drink” (I drink).  “Don’t be a bad guy”….We’re all bad guys…and gals.  Where does the buck stop?  With the people forcing us to behave?  It took me 45 fucking years, but I get it now.  I see how it is.  Don’t ask questions, but wait for answers.  Don’t challenge authority, but let authority challenge you.

Oh, I’ll write.  I have a lot to say.  I’ll continue to express my opinion.  I’ll also continue to have shitty dreams, wonder why my marriage isn’t working and consider how my “faith” hasn’t served me in the least.  They say God works in mysterious ways?  OK.  I accept that much….but hey God,  when are you getting around to this side of the globe?  I know you have like 6 billion others to cater to….Don’t forget me over here.  HELLO!  I am here…..Oh well….I’ll take a number!

 

 

Filed under: Pissed Tagged: ??

Andrea Dean Thinks She’s Above The Law.

Dean

A candidate for the 51st District Court in Waterford Township is  being sued for defamation following public remarks she allegedly made  insinuating that a man many consider falsely accused of raping his then  14-year-old autistic daughter was guilty of the crime — over four years  after the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office dropped the charges against him due to lack of evidence. Andrea Dean, who is challenging 51st District Court Judge Jodi  Debbrecht in the Nov. 6 general election, allegedly made the comments at a public forum last month that “has since been rebroadcast,” the  lawsuit filed yesterday, Tuesday, Oct. 16, states. A former assistant Oakland County prosecutor, Dean was asked by a  reporter about her current sentiments on how she approached the case of  Julian Wendrow, who spent three months in jail on the charges that he  sexually assaulted his disabled daughter and that his wife, Thal,  allowed the abuse to happen. The lawsuit, which is now before Oakland County Circuit Court Judge  Rudy J. Nichols, states that a reporter asked her the following  question: “I was startled to read in sworn testimony you gave during the civil lawsuit years after the [criminal] case had been dropped the following  statement (and I quote) ‘I would do this case again in a heartbeat, and I think the allegations are true.’ Is that an accurate summary of your  sentiments today, and if it is, on the basis of what conceivable  evidence would you prosecute the Wendrows for assaulting their  daughter?”

http://images.spinalcolumnonline.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/10/02.WENDROW-SUIT.pdf

(Click to view PDF)

According to the complaint, Dean responded by saying, “It is a true  statement absolutely. I would do that case again in a heartbeat.” Calling that statement “malicious and false,” the lawsuit states  that Dean defamed the Wendrows last month by claiming “that the Wendrows are guilty of child abuse and/or that there exists or did exist  sufficient evidence to prosecute them for abusing their children.” Other statements Dean allegedly made at the forum on an expert  witness in the case — who the reporter said “debunked the only evidence  in the case,” according to the lawsuit — are also called “malicious and  false” attempts to defame the Wendrows. The case arose in 2007 after a controversial practice known as “facilitated communication” produced what prosecutors believed at the  time was evidence that the girl, now 19, had been sexually assaulted by  her father since she was 7-years-old. But the case — which drew substantial local and national media  attention — unraveled after her testimony in court when, using the same  facilitated communication technique that the lawsuit says is “controversial and scientifically ridiculed,” she was unable to answer a series of simple questions. David Gorcyca, who was the elected Oakland County prosecutor when  the case was in court, decided to drop the charges against Julian and  Thal Wendrow in March 2008. Both Wendrows had been jailed, their  children were placed in foster care, and Thal Wendrow lost her job with  Oakland County, in addition to the family being “devastated in every  conceivable way,” the lawsuit states. “It has taken so much effort to try to rebuild our lives, to try to  provide as much support and security as we can to our children to allow  them to move forward in a positive way — to hear Andrea Dean, once  again, publicly stating that we are guilty of the most heinous act any  parent can commit, when she knows this to be untrue, is devastating to  us,” Julian and Thal Wendrow said in a statement provided by Deborah  Gordon, their attorney. “It reopens old wounds.” The Wendrows, who Gordon is representing in both the defamation  lawsuit and a separate but related civil case that is now in the U.S.  District Court of Appeals in Cincinnati, Ohio, are seeking more than  $25,000 in damages. It wasn’t just the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office that bore  criticism for its handling of the Wendrow case. The West Bloomfield  Township Police Department paid the Wendrow family a $1.8 million  settlement for what the lawsuit says was its “contemptible handling of  the matter,” and officials or former officials with the Oakland County  Sheriff’s Department, Walled Lake Consolidated School District, West  Bloomfield Township, and the Michigan Department of Human Services were  all named as defendants in the lawsuit that is currently in the hands of the appellate court in Cincinnati. District court judges serve six-year terms and are currently paid $138,272 annually. The lawsuit claims that Dean refused to retract her statements about the Wendrow case, and that she threatened to sue the Wendrow family and their legal counsel if the defamation lawsuit was filed. Messages seeking comment left with Dean yesterday were not returned prior to press time.

By Kirk Pinho, Spinal Column

Filed under: Uncategorized

Railroaders III

By Brian Dickerson, Detroit Free Press

We don’t publish rumors, so let’s stick with what we know for sure:

We know some anonymous donor is trying to buy himself a couple of seats on the Oakland County Circuit Court.

We know he’s dishonest.

We know he’s a coward.

We know he’s prepared to spend upward of $1.2 million on behalf of two  little-known candidates who have made themselves scarce on the campaign  trail and appear to have raised little or no campaign funds of their  own.

And we know he may well succeed in his stealth campaign, all  without forfeiting his anonymity or revealing his motives or violating a single state or federal law.

It’s impressive, really, as these increasingly common exercises in dodging campaign disclosure requirements go.

But is it any way to pick judges who are supposed to uphold the rule of law without fear or favor?

Five incumbent Oakland County Circuit Court judges — Leo Bowman, Denise  Langford Morris, Phyllis McMillen, Wendy Potts and Michael Warren — are seeking election to new six-year terms on Nov. 6.

Langford  Morris, Potts and Warren were appointed to the Oakland Circuit bench by  former Gov. John Engler; Bowman and McMillen by Engler’s successor,  Jennifer Granholm.

But because judges are nominally nonpartisan,  all five incumbents will appear on the ballot without a party  designation, identified only by their names and the title they share:  Oakland County circuit judge.

This so-called incumbency  designation, enjoyed exclusively by those seeking re-election to  judicial office, has proved such a powerful advantage that not a single  incumbent in Oakland Circuit Court’s 150-year history has lost a  re-election bid (including some found unqualified back in the days when  the Oakland County Bar still dared to express an opinion about such  things).

But challengers Deborah Carley and William Rollstin are out to make history this election cycle.

Carley and Rollstin both work for Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette.  Neither has made many public appearances since a political action  committee bankrolled entirely by three conservative GOP donors based in  Pennsylvania, Oregon and Virginia paid for the collection of petition  signatures and other organizing expenses earlier this year. And neither  participated in a videotaped candidates forum sponsored by the Oakland  County League of Women Voters, the Oakland County Bar and the Free Press earlier this month.

But Carley and Rollstin are likely to get  some name recognition on the strength of a $1-million-plus TV ad buy  placed by a couple of opaque, Virginia-based outfits called Americans  for Job Security and the Judicial Crisis Network.

Until this  election cycle, Americans for Job Security served mostly as a conduit  for donors who wanted to bankroll conservative gubernatorial and  congressional candidates anonymously. Rich Robinson, executive director  of the Michigan Campaign Finance Network, calls AJS a “rental political  assassin,” and notes that it funded attack ads targeting  then-gubernatorial candidate Pete Hoekstra in the GOP’s bruising 2010  primary fight.

The Judicial Crisis Network has lobbied primarily to block judicial nominees appointed by Barack Obama.

But in this election cycle, the two groups have purchased more than $1  million in local TV time to attack incumbent McMillen and promote the  candidacies of Carley and Rollstin.

Who’s footing the bills?  Republican fund-raisers backing the incumbent five judges have been  fingering the same figure, a local businessman said to have lost a key  ruling in McMillen’s court.

But neither AJS nor JCN is required to say who gives them how much, and so far no one has produced evidence of the local businessman’s participation. His spokesperson failed to  respond to my e-mails and phone calls requesting an interview.

Right now, you’re probably asking: If we don’t know who he is, or even whether he’s a he, how can we know he’s a dishonest coward?

That’s easy.

We know he’s dishonest because the attack ad he’s bankrolling is bogus. It accuses McMillen of sentencing a “career criminal” to probation, but  fails to mention that the probationary sentence was something the judge added to the one-year jail term recommended by the Oakland County Probation Department.

We know the same donor is a coward because no one with a legitimate beef would require anonymity.

McMillen says she’s heard rumors about her attacker’s identity but declines to  give them credence until someone provides proof of a connection.

Carley and Rollstin? They didn’t respond to questions I e-mailed and left on  their voicemails, although Carley reportedly told voters attending a  meeting of the 11th Congressional District Republican Committee last  week that she didn’t know anything about the ads attacking her opponent.

Uh-huh.

BRIAN DICKERSON is deputy editorial page editor of the Free Press. Contact him at 313-222-6584 or bdickerson@freepress.com .

Filed under: michigan Tagged: Carly, Rollstin, Schuette

Wendrows sue former Oakland County assistant prosecutor over remarks

What gives this former Oakland County Prosecutor the right to continuously harass a family she railroaded into jail for 81 days?  They were cleared of any wrongdoing and their case dropped, but Andrea Dean seems to think it’s just fine to go around telling people that they’re guilty and that she’d re-try them “in a second.”  Here, read for yourself below.  Maybe some time in jail would do Dean some good….

By L.L. Brasier Detroit Free Press

The Oakland County family wrongly accused of sexually assaulting and abusing their severely autistic daughter is suing the former assistant prosecutor who handled the case — and who is now running for a district court judgeship — after she insisted publicly that she would try them again.

Andrea Dean, who is trying to unseat Judge Jodi Debbrecht of the 51st District Court of Waterford, was sued Monday by Julian and Thal Wendrow, formerly of West Bloomfield. The Wendrows allege Dean defamed them and intentionally inflicted emotional distress when she said, during a candidates night forum Sept. 12, that the allegations against the Wendrows were true and that she would try them again “in a heartbeat.”

Attorney Deborah Gordon of Bloomfield Hills filed the suit on the Wendrows’ behalf.

“The chutzpah, the audacity to continue to publicly smear this family when you were the one responsible for having harmed them in the first place is horrible,” Gordon said. “Either Andrea Dean is incapable of absorbing the facts, or she is intentionally lying.”

Dean’s attorney, Steve Potter, called the suit “ridiculous” and said he would file a motion to have it dismissed. He also accused Gordon of working to help re-elect Debbrecht. Gordon said she gave Debbrecht’s campaign $250.

West Bloomfield police arrested the Wendrows in 2007 after their then-14-year-old daughter, who does not speak or write, reportedly typed out statements with the help of a school aide that indicated that her father had been raping her and her mother had done nothing to stop it.

Experts have widely debunked the typing method, known as facilitated communication because it has been shown repeatedly that the aide is the one doing the typing. Cognitively, the Wendrow girl operates at the level of a 2  1/2-year-old, numerous examinations show.

A physical exam of the girl found no signs of sexual assault.

Nevertheless, Dean argued to keep the parents in jail — Julian Wendrow spent 81 days there — and the children in foster care, arguing that the girl was indeed communicating. But at a hearing in 48th District Court, the child could not type out a single answer if the question was asked while the aide was out of the courtroom.

All charges were eventually dropped, and the family was reunited.

Dean was dismissed from the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office when new county Prosecutor Jessica Cooper took over in 2009. Dean now works in private practice.

The Wendrows sued Oakland County, Walled Lake Schools, the State of Michigan and the West Bloomfield Police Department when the charges were dropped. The Police Department settled for $1.8 million. The other matters are pending in federal courts.

The Wendrows have moved from their West Bloomfield home to a nearby community, they said, with the hopes of building a new life. They say Dean’s comments are causing them more harm.

“It has taken so much effort to try to rebuild our lives, to try to provide as much support and security as we can to our children to allow them to move forward in a positive way,” Thal Wendrow said Tuesday. “To hear Andrea Dean, once again, publicly stating that we are guilty of the most heinous act any parent can commit, when she knows this to be untrue, is devastating to us.”

The case is assigned to Oakland County Circuit Judge Rudy Nichols and seeks in excess of $50,000 and an injunction preventing Dean from continuing to insist the Wendrows are guilty.

 Contact L.L. Brasier: 248-858-2262 or lbrasier@freepress.com

Filed under: Andrea Dean Tagged: harass, prosecutor, slander, wendrows

The Railroader II

Abuse Charges Against Michigan Teacher Dropped As Prosecutor Faces Bar Disciplinary Action Published 1, August 22, 2008 Bizarre , Criminal law , Society13 Comments

Andrea Dean, Prosecutor

A highly controversial prosecution of a Michigan kindergarten teacher has ended with a new team of prosecutors dropping all charges “in the interests of justice.”The admission did not come until after James Perry, 34, was put through two trials — the first resulted in an overturned conviction due to conflicting evidence.  In the meantime, one of the prosecutors responsible for the case will find himself on the defense side of a bar charge for prosecutorial misconduct.  Oakland County Prosecutor David Gorcyca will have to answer for his controversial actions in the case.  Assistant Prosecutor Andrea Dean in the case argued that possession of movies like Harry Potter should be considered “non-erotic pornography.”

From the outset, the case against Perry was extremely weak.  He was first accused by a five-year-old boy who alleged that Perry raped him within three hours of the first day of classes in October 2005. However, the boy later said that a 4-year-old classmate was assaulted with him and, in an interview with police, then denied any attack at all.

Prosecutors decided not to bring charges on such evidence.  However, when a new set of managers took control of the office, they pursued Perry again with a blind vengeance.  They interviewed the second boy and brought charges of rape of both boys.  A jury convicted Perry despite the contradictions in September 2006.  To the credit of Judge Langford Morris, the court stood up to intense public criticism and overturned the conviction. Judge Morris cited various contradictions.

The new trial resulted in a hung jury. A special education teacher and several aides testified that the attack could not have occurred because  the classroom was full of students and others throughout the day since special education children ate lunch at their desks. Notably, eleven jurors voted to acquit.  The sole holdout was a person who lived around the corner from Perry and should probably have been struck from the jury.

The prosecutors who replaced Gorcyca found that the evidence did not support a charge.  They told the court: “The decision of whether to further pursue prosecution of this case is made in light of the totality of the facts and circumstances. The evidence as it exists after the conclusion of two jury trials indicates that it is not possible to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.”

It was a bit late since prosecutors had been hounding Perry, including fighting his right to live in his home due to the close proximity to a school.  Gorcyca is not the only prosecutor who made controversial statements in the case.  Assistant Prosecutor Andrea Dean actually argued that movies found in Perry’s home, like “Star Wars,” the “Harry Potter” films and “Little House on the Prairie,” constituted “non-erotic pornography.”  According to Dean, that would make hundreds of millions of people in possession of “non-erotic pornography.”

http://www.deanforjudge.com/  (Don’t let it happen.  Yikes)

http://www.freep.com/article/20110615/NEWS03/106150431/Sex-abuse-claims-Wendrow-case-fall-apart-court

http://www.topix.com/forum/county/oakland-mi/TI47K9RIFO5MG227E

 

Filed under: Andrea Dean Tagged: ??, crook, liar, railroader

The Railroader

Rob Giles

Robert Giles is a Senior Attorney for the National Center for the Prosecution

of Child Abuse at the National District Attorney’s Association. Mr. Giles trains

on a wide variety of topics relating to investigation and prosecution of child

abuse. As an Assistant Prosecuting Attorney in Oakland County Michigan, Mr.

Giles prosecuted child sexual assault cases for nine years. Mr. Giles also was

Section Leader of the Child Sexual Assault Unit at the Oakland County Prosecutor’s

Office. Prior to joining the Oakland County Prosecutor’s Office, he was

a Law Clerk to the Honorable Damon J. Keith, Judge on the United States

Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit. Mr. Giles received his J.D. from the University

of Detroit Mercy School of Law and his B.A. from DePauw University.

Rob Giles

Senior Attorney

National Center for

Prosecution of Child Abuse

703.519.1656

Email Rob Giles

http://www.zoominfo.com/#!search/profile/person?personId=32729141&targetid=profile

http://courts.delaware.gov/childdeath/docs/BalanceScales.pdf

 

Filed under: Railroading prosecutor Tagged: cheat, fraud, liar, prosecutor

The REAL Sex Offenders

The Sexual Sadism of the Michigan Department of Corrections



         By: Kevin Gosztola

A consortium of civil liberties, religious and health organizations and experts including the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) are challenging a strip-search procedure prisoners in Michigan’s Women’s Huron Valley Correctional Facility (WHV) are forced to submit to that is nothing less than sexual sadism by the state. In the prison that operates under the umbrella of the Michigan Department of Corrections, women are forced to remove their clothing and spread the lips of their vagina so that a guard can peer inside. Female prisoners are forced to do this after they meet with family members, religious workers, their lawyers or anyone else who may visit them in prison.

Women who have been subjected to this depraved procedure are given voice in a letter submitted to the state’s Corrections Department. Rather than outline what guards in the facility do, here are a few descriptions from victims:

They place you in a chair. You are completely naked. I had the officer then tell me, “spread your pussy lips.” Then I had one tell me to put my heels on the chair and use my hands to open my lips. … I feel like I’m being prostituted by these officers … I am an abused woman, and every time this happens I feel completely lost again.

Another woman:

[A]fter a visit with my brother, I was [] searched in the chair by [a guard], who ordered me to get completely naked, sit on the edge of the chair, open my legs wide, touch myself and open the lips of my vagina. No lining paper or sanitizer were provided. … I looked at the chair and saw spots from other prisoners’ bodies. I could not seat my naked body on these spots, my stomach turned and I became nauseated. In order to comply with [the guard]’s order, I had to place my shirt on the chair, the shirt that I wore back to my housing unit after the strip search, before I sat down butt naked, with disgust. … After the [] search was completed, there was no soap available at the sink to wash my hands, after I touched myself. I have not had a visit with my brother in a long time to avoid this torturing procedure. I become literally sick before and after each visit. … Additionally, I am Muslim, and the Muslim religion prohibits women from exposing themselves in any manner or shape, especially in the manner I was being ordered to do so. This procedure violates my religion.

From a woman forced to submit to a group search:

There are no words in the human vocabulary that can express how I felt as I was forced to strip down butt naked in front of other women. … I [saw] naked bodies that I didn’t want to see, and I felt as if I was being raped all over again, like I had been raped in the streets. It broke my self-esteem down so low because I have these ugly scars all over my body from the beatings that I suffered in the streets from different men when I was getting high off of drugs. But this time I had to face the abuse sober … . I realize that we have very little privacy once we become inmates, but we are still human beings and we still have rights.

And, if you aren’t nauseous from reading those firsthand accounts of sadism:

Because I am a survivor of domestic abuse, this [] search incident has caused me extreme emotional distress and has resulted in flashbacks of the abuse that I endured in my thirty-year marriage to an abusive spouse. When the Officer, a person of authority, ordered me to pose naked in a degrading and humiliating way that I viewed as sexual in nature, I was powerless to refuse; and, I experienced the same feelings of shame, helplessness, and vulnerability that I experienced while being victimized by my abusive husband. Now, just the thought of a visit causes me to have anxiety attacks for the [] search that I know awaits me and it dredges up those memories of past abuse that I am working so hard to forget. Any student of history knows that using one’s position of authority to force another person to strip completely naked and pose in a degrading manner in their presence is a technique used to humiliate, degrade, and strip away a person’s last vestige of dignity. It is the ultimate form of control, domination, and humiliation designed to break an individual …

To be clear, this is not something that happens every so often and female prisoners feel violated. This is a routine procedure guards are ordered to carry out on prisoners after any prisoner is visited. They are also carried out after “women’s shifts in prison jobs, after women receive medical care and at other times.” And, if the prisoner objects to the “spread-labia vaginal search,” physical force is used or they are put in solitary confinement.

Sometimes this perversion is utterly absurd. One time, “four kitchen workers were subjected to spread-labia vaginal searches in full view of one another because a guard believed that some chicken might have been stolen from the kitchen.”

Steps to assure sanitation are not taken. The women are “exposed to the menstrual blood or other bodily fluids of other prisoners when they sit on the chair, including those suffering from serious communicable conditions such as HIV and hepatitis.” Disposable liners for the chairs aren’t typically provided, women are unable to wash their hands or sanitize the chair after the search.

And, the worst part is not what happens to women during the search. The worst part is that it is used on women in the prison at all. The ACLU explains it serves no “practical purpose” because “the procedure is piled on top of two standard strip search maneuvers that already permit officials to detect any items smuggled in body cavities.”

Not repulsed by the sadism of the Michigan Department of Corrections that seems like something out of a women in prison grindhouse film? The ACLU asked for a “log of recovered contraband.” The department told the ACLU no log is kept and refused to turn over any records on how much “contraband” had been yielded from the use of this procedure.

This traumatizes women, exacerbates mental illness and makes it even more likely that, if released, they will commit another act that leads them to end up back in a correctional facility again. Furthermore, by putting women in a situation where they do not want to meet with their family because they will have to be searched, women have a harder time achieving rehabilitation.

Filed under: Uncategorized Tagged: guards, prisons, sadism, sex offenders