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.

SHARIA LAW AND RAPE: ANOTHER RELIGION OF PEACE UPDATE

The timing of this video couldn't be better in light of recent statements from the UK's top judge that Sharia law should be used in Britain.

VICE-PRESIDENT OF YOUNG DEMOCRATS AND SATAN WORSHIPPER CHARGED WITH RAPE AND ASSAULT

Wow! The DNC really is the "big tent party":

A Durham couple charged with kidnapping, rape and assault was involved with a satanic cult, a prosecutor said on Monday.

Joy Johnson and Joseph Craig appeared at a bond hearing Monday. A judge set Craig's bond at $590,000, but refused a prosecution request to increase Johnson's bond from $270,000 to $500,000.

Prosecutors said a man and a woman met Craig through a shared interest in Satan worship, but the pair never consented to physical abuse.

Craig shackled his victims to beds, kept them in dog cages and starved them inside his Albany Street home, prosecutors said. He was charged with beating the man with a cane and a cord and with raping the woman.

Johnson, who was third vice-chair of the Durham County Democratic Party and vice-chair for the Young Democrats, was charged with two counts of aiding and abetting. Prosecutors said she knew her husband planned the crime and watched as they were committed.

She has resigned her positions with the Democratic Party, said state Sen. Floyd McKissick, D-Durham.

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.

MASSACHUSETTS DEMOCRAT TO CHILD RAPE VICTIMS: I WILL DESTROY YOU

Democratic Representative James Fagan was in the Massachusetts State House yesterday railing against Jessica's Law, which would mandate 20-year sentence for rape of a child under 12. As a defense attorney he took offense to the idea that someone convicted or raping a young child should have a mandatory sentence imposed on them, arguing it would force him to attack the little girl in order to defend his client: