Monsters walk among us. - Page 5 - Big Big Forums

Jolie Rouge · 05-22-2007, 03:55 PM

John Leo in the NYSun today covers the case, blog coverage, and the politics of news. http://www.nysun.com/article/54934 John remembers the double standards in coverage of the awful Jesse Dirkhising case, which I also covered in 2001

The Politics of News
By JOHN LEO
May 22, 2007

Channon Christian, 21, and Christopher Newsom, 23, were out on a dinner date in Knoxville, Tenn., on January 6, when they were carjacked, kidnapped, raped, tortured, sexually mutilated, and killed.

Despite the press's taste for dramatic crimes, even crimes that do not involve missing blondes in Aruba, the story got almost no publicity. Conservative bloggers, who are beginning to buzz about the case, think they know why: the couple was white and the five suspects arrested in the case are black.

The mainstream press does not like to carry stories of black mayhem and white victims. First, there is the fear of stirring up more racism among Klansmen and neo-Nazis, as the Knoxville case has started to do. More importantly, the newsroom culture tends to view black-on-white crimes as responses to black oppression, and therefore not worth reporting. Whereas similar white-on-black crime is oppression itself, and thus crucially important to put before readers and viewers.

This classic newsroom double standard pops up again and again. A recent example is the "second rape case in Durham." In this eerie reversal of the Duke lacrosse story, a girl was allegedly raped in the bathroom of a Duke fraternity house during a party. North Carolina's News & Observer said the suspect being sought was in "his late teens or early 20s, about 6 foot 1 and wearing a do-rag, a gray sweatshirt and blue jeans." However, the story failed to mention that the suspect was black, the alleged victim is white, and the fraternity, initially unnamed, is African-American.

When the suspect is not immediately apprehended, the public is usually told by police and the press to look out for someone fitting a particular description. But it does little good if reporters tell us that the man being sought has a small mole on the side of his neck and parts his hair in the middle if we don't know what color he is. Newsroom squeamishness about even mentioning blacks, gays, and women as perpetrators is quite high.

Later the News & Observer mentioned the racial angle, as it had to. But the national press wasn't interested. Once it became clear that the suspect was black, the story lost any chance of journalistic traction. Even the strangeness of a rape report so closely following the other Duke lacrosse story attracted no attention.

The classic double standard crime story is the 1999 death of Jesse Dirkhising, a 13-year-old Arkansas boy who was drugged, tied to a bed, raped, tortured, and killed by two homosexual men. The big-time press was exasperated by complaints that, unlike the Matthew Shepard story, the murder of the Dirkhising boy virtually had no coverage outside of Arkansas.

Obviously the press can't cover all grisly sex crimes around the country. But aren't sex murderers of children often singled out for national attention? The 1994 murder of 7-year-old Megan Kanka became a large-scale story. The 1993 abduction and murder of 12-year-old Polly Klaas was even bigger — there were more than 3,000 news stories in 14 months of Klaas's murder, according to a computer search. The horrendous details of the Dirkhising death should have made the story jump out for national attention. But why did it not?

The Shepard case was legitimately a huge story, in part because it had the enormous symbolic power of both a lynching and a crucifixion. But there is something odd about the standard press defense: The Shepard story was news in a way that the Dirkhising story wasn't because it "prompted debate on hate crimes and the degree to which there is still intolerance of gay people in this country," according to a Washington Post editor. This comes pretty close to advocacy. Hate-crime legislation was in some trouble at the time, and gays were fighting to get included under existing laws.

A commentary on Time.com came even closer to an open admission that crime coverage is often shaped by newsroom advocacy. The commentary, by Jonathan Gregg, said Shepard's murder touched on complex and timely issues, whereas " Jesse Dirkhising's death gives us nothing except the depravity of two sick men. There is no lesson here, no moral of tolerance, no hope to be gleaned in the punishment of the perpetrators." Or, in plain English, Shepard's death advanced a cause we care about, and the Dirkhising death didn't.

The non-coverage of Dirkhising's case and the implication that murders by gays aren't as newsworthy as murders by straights, led to an explosion of anger on the Internet and talk radio. Some of this came from haters. But a lot came from people who sensed the double standard: If Jesse Dirkhising had been a gay youngster tortured and killed by straight men, the story would have gone national in a heartbeat.

Now the press is making the Dirkhising mistake again in the Knoxville case. It may have the same result: the story will spread anyway thanks to the Internet. Before the press start up again about "angry white males," let's notice that the blogger assault on the press's failure in the Knoxville case is being led by Michelle Malkin, who is Asian-American, and LaShawn Barber, who is black.

Before long, more news consumers will conclude that even crime news is in effect being politicized. Is this any way to protect an industry in trouble?

----

Jolie Rouge · 05-22-2007, 03:58 PM

Quote:

John remembers the double standards in coverage of the awful Jesse Dirkhising case, which I also covered in 2001.

http://www.jewishworldreview.com/mic...lkin031601.asp

Warning : graphic content

Why is trial involving marathon torture session by gays against a teen being ignored?

"JESSE slowly suffocated and died."

A jury heard those chilling words this week in the opening statement of a little-noticed Arkansas trial. A mother heard those heart-breaking words spoken about her 13-year-old son, Jesse Dirkhising, whom prosecutors say died at the hands of two men who raped and murdered the boy during a marathon torture session. The trial raises grave questions about society's increasing tolerance of gay pedophilia. But in New York and Los Angeles, the national presshounds were more interested in covering the trial of rap star Sean "Puffy" Combs than in reporting on the tragic death of Jesse Dirkhising.

The details are sickening: On Sept. 26, 1999, Jesse was at the Rogers, Ark., home of a family friend, 39-year-old Davis Carpenter, and Carpenter's roommate and alleged gay lover, 23-year-old Joshua Brown. According to a local Associated Press account, prosecutor Bob Balfe told jurors Wednesday that "the boy had been given a strong sedative, then restrained while his own underwear was stuffed into his mouth and held in place with duct tape. Brown then folded Jesse into position atop a bed while supporting the boy's body with pillows."

"While Jesse was bound and helpless and naked in this position ... he was repeatedly raped ... over a period of hours," Balfe said. "Jesse slowly suffocated and died." The prosecution says Brown raped and sodomized Jesse with various objects, including food, while Carpenter stood in the bedroom doorway watching and masturbating. According to a police affidavit, Brown took a break from the assault to eat a sandwich. When he returned, prosecutors say, he discovered that Jesse was not breathing. Carpenter then called police, who found the boy naked and near death on a bedroom floor.

Police gathered evidence from the men's apartment that included lurid drawings showing a bound person, written descriptions of a homosexual assault, pieces of paper describing objects with which Jesse was sodomized, and a printed grocery receipt listing duct tape and other items found near Jesse's body. The defense will argue that Jesse - outnumbered, overpowered, overdosed, and strapped helplessly to a mattress - was a willing and consenting participant in this sexual torment.

This was a child. A 13-year-old child. A boy who should be riding a scooter and wrestling with his friends and watching cartoons and doing his algebra homework. That the defense could even dare make a public case for consensual sex between a 13-year-old boy and two adult men shows how far this country has sunk into the cesspool of moral apathy and cowardice. Public leaders are so worried about not offending gay political interest groups that they remain silent about the mainstreaming of homosexual predation.

The defense of gay pedophilia has metastasized deep and far into the national conscience. As Mary Eberstadt wrote in the Weekly Standard recently, "Today's pressures to normalize pedophilia are not the result of some omnipotent and unstoppable taboo-devouring social and moral juggernaut; they are occurring one bookstore, one magazine, one publisher and advertiser, one author and editor and consumer at a time."

One of the nation's leading gay magazines, "XY," is targeted to readers as young as 12. It features photo spreads of half-naked men and publishes profanity-laced articles supporting lowering the age of consent. Instead of universal condemnation, the North American Man-Boy Love Association (which advocates normalizing and decriminalizing sex between adult males and boys) receives praise and sympathy from liberal magazine writers and literary critics.

NAMBLA is the subject of late-night comedy monologues and the beneficiary of pro bono legal aid from the American Civil Liberties Union. Opponents of the group are smeared as right-wing homophobes; they and others who have criticized the media for ignoring Jesse Dirkhising's death are tarred as anti-gay propagandists.

Political correctness is slowly suffocating our sense of public outrage over behavior that is perverse, coercive, and wrong. This is why the brutal death of Jesse Dirkhising has been met with deaf ears and a cruel collective shrug.

realheaven · 05-22-2007, 04:53 PM

here is a video with a link of the person who is somewhat responsible for the media coverup with email address, fax number, address. His name is Adam Yeomans Chief of Associated Press in Brentwood Tennessee ayeomans@ap.org

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KucFmHZfh_Q

DtroitPunk · 05-22-2007, 06:05 PM

For detailed info on the Jesse D. Case http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/ar...TICLE_ID=29026

I am about to say some decidedly un PC things. 1. This is the result of more and more americans accepting Homosexuals and attempting to normalize this deviant behavior. I have nothing against any individual person, but homosexuality is SIN plain and simple.
2. The parents of this kid who thought it was OK to let their son hang out with a gay couple that they KNEW were drug users is nothing less than criminal negligence and child endangerment. They probably still have the other 2 kids too. Take away the kids and give them to a loving foster family and kill those SOB parents.
3. I know that its not PC to think that just because someone is gay that they will hurt kids, but lets be honest even gays who arent attracted to kids are enamored by teenage boys and just ask one sometime, they may not advocate sex with children themselves but they WILL NOT condemn it either.
4. I would not leave my kid with a man that I thought was straight unsupervised this is just plain foolish.
5. Maybe all this Political Correctness has made Americans stupid and gullible.
Sounds crazy, but I have a 14 yr old and a 6 yr old and they have NEVER been touched innappropriately because they have never been away from my or my wifes care and they have had age appropriate discussions about what is acceptable and what to do in situations. And I have made it clear since pedophiles prey on fear that if anyone ever trys to hurt my kids, there will be no need for police. I am a former Soldier and grew up on the streets of Detroit. My kids know they dont need to be afraid of some pervert saying he will kill the whole family yadda yadda.
6. take responsibility for your own family. No one else has a duty or responsibility to protect you and yours. Police are a clean up crew most of the time and you can not sue for failure to protect, check it out if you dont believe me. Schools dont have to protect your kids either. Just try suing a public school that covers up a 12 yr old rapists conduct. Even after it happens again, they are not responsible.

DtroitPunk · 05-22-2007, 06:08 PM

Lets remember that the Media has an agenda. When a civilian uses a gun to thwart a crime thats no story, but when a criminal or anyone who shouldnt have gotten a gun in the first place kills a bunch of people, thats huge and if he shot up a daycare thats national all the way baby. This is because most journalist think that the average person doesnt deserve a gun that you cant be trusted. And by scaring the crap out of people they know that they have better results when pushing for new gun reform. Why dont we just enforce the laws we already have on the books instead of constantly plea bargaining?

killbarney · 05-22-2007, 11:23 PM

Not if we were smart. I don't give a **** what the sexual orientation of these pieces of scum was. Our "cause" here should be the death penalty for ANYONE who rapes/molests a child-we do have a law, and there is currently ONLY ONE MAN that has been sentenced to death under it. How many cases are there that SHOULD have this sentence?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jolie Rouge

Or, in plain English, Shepard's death advanced a cause we care about, and the Dirkhising death didn't.----

Bubblescc · 05-22-2007, 11:49 PM

heres some articles when they spoke to the parents of Christian and Newsom, please everyone remember to pray for them, I cannot imagine how terrible this is for them.
http://www.wbir.com/news/local/story...2&provider=top (Christian)
http://www.wbir.com/news/local/story...5&provider=top (Newsom)

Jolie Rouge · 04-18-2008, 12:30 AM

GUILTY:
Eric Boyd's Christian-Newsom murder accessory trial over
Apr 17, 2008
Rob Pratt

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WVLT) -- The first trial ends with the first guilty verdict in connection with the deaths of Channon Christian, 21, and Christopher Newsom, 23.

The only one of the five suspects not charged with murder, Eric DeWayne Boyd is guilty of being an accessory, according to the jury.

The jury has spoken, convicting Eric Boyd of two counts.

After five hours of deliberation, they found Boyd guilty of being an accessory after the fact, and concealing a felon, agreeing with the prosecution that he helped hide murder suspect Lemaricus Davidson from police, while failing to report his crimes.

This battle is over, but the victim's families know the war will be long.

The victims' families celebrate the word they've been waiting to hear for more than a year: Guilty.

Eric Boyd's conviction today is the first, but family members pray it won't be the last.

Channon Christian's father Gary Christian says, "One down, four to go, baby. We got more to go on this one too. Eric boyd's gonna hear from us."

What Eric Boyd heard from the jury today will likely mean 15 years in federal prison, after sentencing August 12th.

Next year may bring four more trials, death penalty cases against the four accused murderers.

Even on this day, Chris Newsom's mother is thinking about that.

Mary Newsom says, "They really, really tortured them beyond a normal killing, so whatever the others get, that's what they deserve."

Knoxville Police Sgt. Tim Snodderly says, "This is just a small part of what we've got going on. This is just a first step, and we're extremely happy with the verdict we got today. We've got a long way to go but this is a little bit of justice for the family."

These families say they heard Eric Boyd's brother on television last night, saying he feels their pain. But the words mean nothing to those who lost loved ones.

Deana Christian, Channon's mother says, "Let them lose one of theirs, and then go through the hell we went through, and then maybe they can say something."

Gary Christian says, "Channon's sitting on our shoulders."

http://www.volunteertv.com/home/headlines/17827469.html

Gary Christian speaks out for first time since Boyd trial
Apr 14, 2008
Brian Gregory, Rob Pratt

KNOXVILLE, Tenn (WVLT) -- "Do you not think that if they would've put a gun in her hand, one of two things would've happened: She'd still be here to talk to us, or she'd have took one of them with her."

Channon Christian's father isn't staying quiet anymore.

For the first time since the case against Eric Boyd began, Gary Christian talked to Volunteer TV News Court Reporter Rob Pratt.

Christian told Pratt someone reminded him over the weekend that Channon doesn't have a voice anymore, and he needed to be her voice.

Gary Christian's statement this morning was in reponse to what Lemaricus Davidson's girlfriend said in court testimony Friday. Daphne Sutton testified that she was told that Channon was forced to shoot and kill her boyfriend, Christopher Newsom.

Christian says that's ludicrous. He says Channon had been trained about guns, and knew how to use one.

He says he was really irked that the media chose to report that detail as the main focus of some coverage on Friday.

Testimony in the second week of the trial against Boyd is continuing at this hour. Boyd is not charged in the murders or the carjacking, but he is charged with being an accessory. Prosecutors are trying to prove that he knew about the crimes, but still helped one of the suspects, Davidson escape, and did nothing to help police.

Click the video link to watch his whole unedited statement

http://www.volunteertv.com/home/headlines/17657224.html

Channon Christian's parents speak exclusively to WVLT
Apr 17, 2008
Reporter: Rob Pratt

Knoxville (WVLT) - One day after the end of the first trial connected with their daughter's death, Channon Christian's parents are sharing their thoughts in an exclusive interview you will see only on WVLT.

Eric Boyd's conviction as an accessory to one of the murder suspects in the deaths of Christian and Chris Newsom is just the first step in what will be a long journey.

Volunteer TV's Rob Pratt went to the Christian's home and brought back their story. "I don't plan to go to hell. I plan to go see my daughter. I think, when I see God, I'm going to tell him, I'm glad I'm here, because I done spent my time in the other place. This is it. It don't get no worse," Gary Christian said.

Gary and Deana Christian say they live with pain that few can even understand. Though the last two weeks at Eric Boyd's trial have forced them to focus on the way their daughter Channon died, they say she lives on. The friends who always came to see Channon still make regular trips to the Christian home. "We all sit around and we talk and we laugh, and we try to remember the good times, so we can get through the bad," Deana Christian said.

The good times... "I remember the first day that I held her, just like it was yesterday," Gary said.

The child... "She was a little spoiled. Her mother did it to her," Gary said.
"I didn't do it, we both did," Deana said.

But soon after their child became a beautiful woman she was gone, and it's the times they'll never share that haunt these parents. "She would have gotten married one day, her daddy would gotten to walk her down the aisle, she wanted four children, I'd have had a house full of grandkids, they took that away from me," Deana said.

Though the family was happy about Eric Boyd's conviction yesterday as an accessory, Gary said outside courthouse that this is not the last Eric Boyd will hear from them. He declined to comment further. I asked him tonight if he meant Boyd should be charged with more crimes?

"We firmly believe so, yeah," Gary said.

What specific crimes, Gary would not say. There are four death penalty trials ahead, but Gary says there easily could have been more people charged with something. "Was there a lot of people that knew things and didn't report it, yeah a whole bunch of them, we've only scratched the surface of them the way I understand it. But will they ever go to prison, I don't know? Will they be arrested, I don't know, a lot of them won't," Gary said.

Though he has previously been hesitant to call what happened to his daughter a hate crime, he says he's reconsidered. "When they got ahold of my daughter, and Chris Newsom, they started to hate. At some point they started to hate. Because what they did, you don't do unless you hate," Channon said.

Hate was never a part of Channon's life. The love friends felt for her is apparent in page after page of the photo album friends lovingly made for her family just days after she died. "Her smile would light up a room, she just had this way about her, she love life she loved her friends," Deana said. "She was beautiful on the inside and out."

The Christians say the Newsoms are a part of their family now too. They want to make it clear that they are happy with the way police and prosecutors have handled this difficult case.

Interview video link with Channon Christian's parents
http://www.volunteertv.com/home/headlines/17879924.html

Jolie Rouge · 04-18-2008, 12:56 AM

Jury searched souls about Boyd verdict, foreman says
By Jamie Satterfield
Thursday, April 17, 2008

In a scene reminiscent of the climactic ending of John Grisham's "A Time to Kill," which itself involved a racially charged criminal trial, the 10 women and two men tapped to decide Eric Dewayne "E" Boyd's fate closed their eyes Wednesday and searched their souls, the foreman recalled in an interview.

With evidence examined and re-examined and votes already cast, this jury could have walked back into U.S. District Court and announced without qualm its verdict, but jury foreman Steve Ahillen said that wasn't good enough for this panel of 11 whites and one black impaneled to make a decision in one of Knoxville's most horrific and racially charged cases in recent times. "We said, 'One more time. Close your eyes. Think about this verdict.' We did that," he said. "That's something we repeated I'd say five times - a lot of people said they did not want to go home thinking they made a mistake. We were certain Mr. Boyd did this, obviously. But we felt like we owed it to Mr. Boyd to carry on discussions even beyond what was necessary and go over and over it again."

Five hours after deliberations began, the jury deemed Boyd guilty of charges he helped hide out the alleged ringleader in a fatal carjacking.

Ahillen is the executive sports editor for the News Sentinel. He, like nearly all potential jurors polled, was well aware of the January 2007 slayings of Channon Christian and Christopher Newsom and the racial divide spawned. There were complaints of racism on both sides from white supremacist rallies to Boyd's defense claim that Davidson's white girlfriend got away with the very crime for which Boyd was charged.

U.S. District Judge Tom Varlan instructed jurors each day to avoid any media accounts of the case. Ahillen said all jurors honored the instruction, but it proved tough because of the pervasiveness of the coverage. "It was everywhere," he said. "One time I was pumping gas and when I went inside to pay, it came on the radio (piped inside the store). I had to walk out of the store and tell them I'd be right back to pay for my gas."

Worse, perhaps, were the graphic details of the young couple's deaths.
"It affected me when I saw the picture of (Christian's covered body) in the trash can," he said. "You'd have to be a mighty cold person not to be affected."

But Ahillen insisted - and as jury foreman was proud - the jury did not let emotion over the slayings, for which Boyd has been implicated but not charged, sway them. "We knew what our trial was about," Ahillen said. "Our role was to examine Mr. Boyd's actions and what his role in all of this was. The case was about him protecting someone who shouldn't have been protected. We stayed really focused."

Ahillen grew emotional when asked about his jury experience. "These are just normal people who get called in to do a job," he said. "You see, they just got their number called, they didn't ask to do this. They knew all the pressure on it, and still they did their jobs. They were really sincere. It was just honorable, good people trying to make the right decision."

http://www.knoxnews.com/news/2008/ap...about-verdict/

renaissanceman · 04-18-2008, 01:58 AM

Im actually surprised this person got a fairly lengthy term. HOPEFULLY, this means that all the people actually involved will get the Death Penalty?

PrincessArky · 04-18-2008, 08:29 AM

I hope the others get death