Murder Case Threatens Anonymity for Website Comments

This is just ridiculous. Two beautiful people were raped, tortured and slaughtered by a group of scum and this is what the issue devolves into?

A judge in one of the nation's most brutal carjacking and murder cases has openly questioned in court whether news websites – such as those covering his trial – should be permitted to allow open and anonymous "comments" sections at the bottom of Internet-posted stories.

"I'm saying if there is a profit, there is a responsibility that goes with it," said Criminal Court Judge Richard Baumgartner of Knox County, Tenn., to an attorney for the Knoxville News Sentinel.

"This is not the Internet. This is a site created by you in which you invite comments," the judge stated. "This is something you control."

Richard Hollow, the newspaper's attorney, argued that a court-imposed policy on the "comments" sections would be an unconstitutional infringement of First Amendment free speech rights.

"What the court is asking us to do is … set up a board of censorship," Hollow said.

The legal wrangling is part of the trial of five suspects charged in the January 2007 carjacking, rape and murder of Channon Christian, 21, and her boyfriend, Christopher Newsom, 23, in Knoxville, Tenn.

As WND reported, five defendants face nearly 50 counts of kidnapping, robbery, gang-rape, murder and theft charges after Christian and Newsom were abducted, assaulted and tortured repeatedly over a period – probably of days – before being shot and killed.

Details in the aftermath of the slayings were not widely released, leading to a flurry of speculation – much of it unfounded – on the grisly details of the crime.

Internet "comment" sections also became a hotbed of discussion with particularly racial themes, as the victims were white and alleged perpetrators black.

Right. The "alleged" perpetrators were black. Which is the only reason in the world this website anonymity has become an issue. In case anyone has forgot, here's more on what actually happened to these people.

According to news reports, Christian and Newsom had gone on a date at a local restaurant on Saturday, January 6, 2007, but did not return home. During their night out, the couple was "hijacked, bound and blindfolded and taken back to Lemaricus Devall 'Slim' Davidson's rented house on Chipman Street."

Christian's parents found her abandoned Toyota 4-Runner two blocks away from the Chipman Street house the following Monday with the help of her mobile phone provider. An envelope recovered from the vehicle yielded fingerprint evidence that led police to Lemaricus Davidson and 2316 Chipman Street. When police went to the address on Tuesday, January 9, they found the home unoccupied and Christian's body in a trash can in the kitchen.

According to the testimony of the Knox County Acting Medical Examiner at the subsequent trial of Eric Boyd, Newsom was repeatedly raped and then blindfolded, gagged, arms and feet bound and his head covered. Barefoot, he was either led or dragged outside the house to a set of nearby railroad tracks. He was shot in the back of the head, the neck, and the back, and his body then set on fire. Christian's death would come only after hours of sexual torture, medical examiner Mileusnic-Polchan testified. Christian suffered horrific injuries to her vagina, anus and mouth. She was not only raped but savaged with "an object," possibly a broken chair leg, the doctor testified. She was beaten in the head. Some type of chemical was poured down her throat, and her body, including her bleeding and battered genital area, likely scrubbed with the same solution - all while Christian was alive, the forensic expert said. She was then "hog-tied," with curtains and strips of bedding, her face covered tightly with a small trash bag and her body stashed inside five large trash bags before being placed inside a large trash can and covered with sheets. Christian died slowly, suffocating, the medical examiner said.

These fucking animals commit what is one of the worst crimes I've ever read about and all our judicial system can worry about is making sure no one makes any racist comments about the murders? Has this country lost its damn mind? Wait, don't answer that. Of course we have.

CALIFORNIA MUSLIMS OUTRAGED THEY CANNOT INCITE MURDER OF JEWS

Religion of peace...

Muslim students at the University of Southern California are enraged by the school's recent decision to remove from a student group's website an Islamic text that encourages the murder of Jews.

Until recently, the website of the now-defunct Muslim Student Association, which is hosted on the university's servers, had featured the full text of the hadiths, the words of Mohammed that are not found in the Koran.

One of those hadiths calls on Muslims to "fight against the Jews and...kill them," and promises that even the stones and the trees will assist Muslims in that gruesome task.

MURDER RAMPANT IN THE LAND OF HOPE AND CHANGE

Obama's town. Is this what hope and change will bring us? Twice as many killed in Obama land as in Iraq during the same period.

An estimated 125 people were shot and killed in Chicago over the summer. That's nearly double the number of soldiers killed in Iraq over the same time period.

In May, cbs2chicago.com began tracking city shootings and posting them on Google maps. Information compiled from our reporters, wire service reports and the Chicago Police Major Incidents log indicated that 123 people were shot and More.. killed throughout the city between the start of Memorial Day weekend on May 26, and the end of Labor Day on Sept. 1.

According to the Defense Department, 65 soldiers were killed in combat in Iraq. About the same number were killed in Afghanistan over that same period.

In the same time period, an estimated 245 people were shot and wounded in the city.

MAN TRIES TO PAY HITMAN WITH NASCAR MEMORABILIA

Just another "Ford" vs. "Chevy" argument gone wrong:

Your local yellow pages doesn’t feature a “Hitman” or “Murder for Hire” section, but if it did my guess is none of the ads would include the phrase “We accept cash, check, credit card and Kasey Kahne collectible pins.”

Today’s PITTSBURGH POST-GAZETTE introduces us to Allen Bridges, 53 and his 18 year-old son Jacob of Everett, PA who were unaware of the fact that NASCAR memorabilia is not an accepted form of currency.

Allen, who was already locked up in Bedford County jail on charges of selling the powerful painkiller, fentanyl, was in need of a hitman to take out witness testifying against him. The down payment received for such services would be “a bulging black trash bag” containing a portion of Allen’s NASCAR collection.The hitman who would meet Allen’s son Jacob to receive his payment was not actually a hitman, he was “state police Detective Steve Shelley posing as killer for hire” thanks to a tip from fellow inmates of the Bedford County jail to the police. Allen and Jacob “have been charged with solicitation of murder, conspiracy and retaliation against a witness.”

As if those charges and the jail time that awaits them wasn’t bad enough, Allen’s collection was also called “a bunch of junk” by Bedford County District Attorney William Higgins.

CHINA LOSES CONTROL: GOVERNMENT BUILDINGS ATTACKED

A follow up to a story we reported yesterday:

The Chinese authorities momentarily lost control over public information this weekend when their desperate endeavours to cover up the rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl lead to violent riots in the south-western Guinzhou province. Web users destroyed officials' attempts to downplay the enormity of events by continuously posting images and accounts of the protests.

Online accounts say that after her body was found in the river, local residents said that Li Shufen had been raped and murdered by three relatives of Yuhua county officials. However, the three accused were released without charge after eight hours following the results of a basic autopsy which reported that she had committed suicide. When her uncle, who she lived with, complained about procedures, he was so badly beaten that he was taken to hospital. Information about the attempted cover-up soon got onto the internet and people started speaking about it on forums and chat sites such as Baidu and Tainya. Asian TV went to interview Li's uncle, a teacher, in hospital. Three hours later he died. Discussions escalated until Saturday, when a reported 10,000 people took to the streets to protest the handling of the case.

Videos and photos of the riots (below) show chaos as a local administration building burns and cars lie overturned in the road. Web users managed to keep the documents online for a few days by constantly re-posting them onto different sites as the censors worked to remove them. Today, however, accounts of the incidents have completely disappeared. The only information available to the public comes from official news agency Xinhua, which states: "some people who did not know about the exact context of what had happened were instigated to mob the police station and the office buildings of the county government and Communist Party committee". The authorities are appealing for rioters to turn themselves in and have so far arrested almost 200 people.

AHMADINEJAD TARGET OF MURDER PLOT

OK, who dropped the ball on this one?

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the target of an assassination plot at the UN food summit in Rome earlier this month as well as during a trip to Iraq in March, an aide said on Monday.

Ahmadinejad last week himself revealed the purported Iraq murder plot -- an announcement greeted with astonishment in some sections of the local press -- but this is the first time a conspiracy has been linked to his Italy trip.

Ahmadinejad said on Thursday that enemies had planned to kidnap and kill him in Iraq but the plot was foiled after the Iranian delegation changed their travel plans.

According to Zabihi, the plots were "in line with the order given by (US President George W.) Bush to kill Iranian leaders." He did not give further details.

Ahmadinejad faces a battle for re-election in summer 2009 against a background of popular discontent over rising prices and exasperation amongst some conservatives over his repeatedly provocative statements.

But some moderate newspapers have already started questioning the validity of the president's allegations of an attempt on his life during the trip to Iraq, the first ever by an Iranian president.

The Iranian people won't buy this story, but the American media will.

GOODBYE ROSCOE: HOW THEY FINISHED FATTY ARBUCKLE

From About.com:

At a raucous, three-day party in 1921, a young starlet became severely ill and died four days later. Newspapers went wild with the story: popular silent-screen comedian Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle had killed Virginia Rappe with his weight while savagely raping her. Though the newspapers of the day reveled in the gory, rumored details, juries found little evidence that Arbuckle was in any way connected with her death.

What happened at that party and why was the public so ready to believe "Fatty" was guilty?

"Fatty" Arbuckle

Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle had long been a performer. When he was a teenager, Arbuckle traveled the West Coast on the vaudeville circuit. In 1913, at the age of 26, Arbuckle hit the big time when he signed with Mack Sennett's Keystone Film Company and became one of the Keystone Kops.

Arbuckle was heavy - he weighed somewhere between 250 and 300 pounds - and that was part of his comedy. He moved gracefully, threw pies, and humorously tumbled.

In 1921, Arbuckle signed a three-year contract with Paramount for $1 million - an unheard of amount at the time, even in Hollywood. To celebrate just having finished three pictures at the same time and to celebrate his new contract with Paramount, Arbuckle and a couple of friends drove up from Los Angeles to San Francisco on Saturday, September 3, 1921 for some Labor Day weekend revelry.

The Party

Arbuckle and friends checked into the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco. They were on the twelfth floor in a suite that contained rooms 1219, 1220, and 1221 (room 1220 was the sitting room).

On Monday, September 5, the party started early. Arbuckle greeted visitors in his pajamas and though this was during Prohibition, large quantities of liquor were being drunk.

Around 3 o'clock, Arbuckle retired from the party in order to get dressed to go sight-seeing with a friend. What happened in the following ten minutes is disputed.

Delmont's version:

"Bambina" Maude Delmont, who frequently set-up famous people in order to blackmail them, claims that Arbuckle herded 26 year-old Virginia Rappe into his bedroom and said, "I've waited for this a long time." Delmont says that a few minutes later party-goers could hear screams from Rappe coming from the bedroom. Delmont claims she tried to open the door, even kick it in, but couldn't get it open. When Arbuckle opened the door, supposedly Rappe was found naked and bleeding behind him.

Arbuckle's version:

Arbuckle says that when he retired to his room to change clothes, he found Rappe vomiting in his bathroom. He then helped clean her up and led her to a nearby bed to rest. Thinking she was just overly intoxicated, he left her to rejoin the party. When he returned to the room just a few minutes later, he found Rappe on the floor. After putting her back on the bed, he left the room to get help.

When others then entered the room, they found Rappe tearing at her clothes (something that has been claimed she did often when she was drunk). Party guests tried a number of strange treatments, including covering Rappe with ice, but she still wasn't getting any better.

The hotel staff were contacted and Rappe was taken to another room to rest. With others looking after Rappe, Arbuckle left for the sight-seeing tour and then drove back to Los Angeles.

Rappe Dies

Rappe was not taken to the hospital on that day. And though she didn't improve, she wasn't taken to the hospital for three days because most people who visited her considered her condition to be caused by liquor.

On Thursday, Rappe was taken to the Wakefield Sanitorium, a maternity hospital known for giving abortions. Virginia Rappe died the following day from peritonitis, caused by a ruptured bladder.

Arbuckle was soon arrested and charged with the murder of Virginia Rappe.

Yellow Journalism

The papers went wild with this story. Some articles had Arbuckle crushing her with his weight and others had him raping her with a foreign object (the papers went into graphic details).

In the newspapers, Arbuckle was assumed guilty and Virginia Rappe was an innocent young girl. The papers excluded reporting that Rappe had a history of numerous abortions, with some evidence stating she might have had another a short time before the party.

William Randolph Hearst, the symbol of yellow journalism, had his San Francisco Examiner cover the story. According to Buster Keaton, Hearst boasted that Arbuckle's story sold more papers than the sinking of the Lusitania.

The public reaction to Arbuckle was fierce. Perhaps even more than the specific charges of rape and murder, Arbuckle became a symbol of Hollywood's immorality. Movie houses across the country almost immediately stopped showing Arbuckle's movies. The public was angry and they were using Arbuckle as a target.

The Trials

With the scandal as front page news on almost every newspaper, it was difficult to get an unbiased jury.

The first Arbuckle trial began in November 1921 and charged Arbuckle with manslaughter. The trial was thorough and Arbuckle took the stand to share his side of the story. The jury was hung with a 10 to 2 vote for acquittal.

Because the first trial ended with a hung jury, Arbuckle had to be tried again. In the second Arbuckle trial, the defense did not present a very thorough case and Arbuckle did not take the stand. The jury saw this as an admission of guilt and deadlocked in a 10 to 2 vote for conviction.

In the third trial, which began in March 1922, the defense again became pro-active. Arbuckle testified, repeating his side of the story. The main prosecution witness, Zey Prevon, had escaped house arrest and left the country. For this trial, the jury deliberated for only a couple of minutes and came back with a verdict of not guilty. Additionally, the jury wrote an apology to Arbuckle:

"Acquittal is not enough for Roscoe Arbuckle. We feel that a great injustice has been done him. We feel also that it was our only plain duty to give him this exoneration. There was not the slightest proof adduced to connect him in any way with the commission of a crime.

He was manly throughout the case and told a straightforward story on the witness stand, which we all believed.

The happening at the hotel was an unfortunate affair for which Arbuckle, so the evidence shows, was in no way responsible.

We wish him success and hope that the American people will take the judgment of fourteen men and women who have sat listening for thirty-one days to the evidence that Roscoe Arbuckle is entirely innocent and free from all blame."

"Fatty" Blacklisted

Being acquitted was not the end to Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle's problems. In response to the Arbuckle scandal, Hollywood established a self-policing organization that was to be known as the "Hays Office."

On April 18, 1922, Will Hays, the president of this new organization, banned Arbuckle from film making. Though Hays lifted the ban in December of the same year, Arbuckle's career had been destroyed.

A Short Come-Back

For years, Arbuckle had trouble finding work. He eventually began directing under the name William B. Goodrich (similar to the name his friend Buster Keaton suggested - Will B. Good).

Though Arbuckle had begun a come-back and had signed with Warner Brothers in 1933 to act in some comedy shorts, he was never to see his popularity regained. After a small one-year anniversary party with his new wife on June 29, 1933, Arbuckle went to bed and suffered a fatal heart attack in his sleep. He was 46.

About.com

CHAOS ON THE US / MEXICO BORDER: DOES ANYONE CARE?

Is anyone paying attention to the events occurring in Mexico near the US border? Mexican troops and police are involved in combat with Mexican drug cartels who are seeking to secure their operations of smuggling drugs, weapons and in some cases, people into America. Nearly every day there is a new story of either police or cartel members being killed in intense fighting. The drug cartels operate openly and freely for the most part. In some cases, as reported yesterday, going as far as to place "help wanted" to attract new "employees". This activity is taking place in many towns along the US and Mexico border and no one, including our government, seems to care. Just this week reports surfaced that Mexican drug cartels are operating paramilitary training camps on the border with Texas. WORLD AT WAR

If al-Qaeda were at the U.S. border kidnapping and decapitating people while circulating videos of its exploits, Americans would be apoplectic. It would mean that terrorists were no longer "over there" in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iraq, but instead right at our doorstep.

For some reason, though, this country doesn't seem terribly alarmed that Mexican drug cartels are kidnapping, torturing and even beheading their victims – and posting videos of it on the Internet. They've established border-area training camps and amassed arsenals of assault rifles, grenades and armor-piercing ammunition.

Mexico has deployed about 22,000 troops and federal agents to major border and coastal zones in the past 15 months, including 2,500 troops and federal agents sent last week to Ciudad Juárez.

That far exceeds the U.S. troop commitment in Afghanistan after the 9/11 attacks. But since this is the war on drugs, our nation seems not to be terribly concerned. We should be. It's time for a change in psychology because this threat is real, it's imminent, and it's happening right next door.

Nearly 200 people have died in Ciudad Juárez this year in a mafia-style turf battle between rival cartels.

After listing several high-profile assassinations of Mexican officials as well as U.S. citizens caught up in the violence, Thomas A. Shannon, an assistant secretary of state, told a congressional panel in February, "We can no longer just warn of this violence spilling over into the United States; we must acknowledge that it has."

For our side of the border, this remains strictly a law enforcement problem and does not require a military response. But we do believe Congress needs to act quickly on President Bush's Mérida Initiative request of $1.4 billion to help Mexico and Central America train police and coordinate programs to fight the cartels. And this country must stop handicapping our neighbors by failing to halt the flow of U.S. weapons and laundered money that fuels these gangs.

Let's face it: Drug gangsters are drawing straight from al-Qaeda's playbook to terrorize the Mexican public. If it's unacceptable overseas, we certainly shouldn't tolerate it next door.

dallasnews.com