GOP Vixen

Report: Tiger victims had slingshots, empty booze bottle

This in today's New York Post:

"Two brothers who were injured when a tiger attacked them at the San Francisco Zoo had slingshots on them at the time, a source said.

An empty vodka bottle was also found in a car used by Amritpal Dhaliwal, 19, and his brother, Kulbir, 23, on the day of the mauling, which left 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr. dead, according to the source.

The discoveries could be an indication that the brothers may have taunted the 350-pound Siberian tiger before it leapt from its grotto."

Apparently those brothers haven't been cooperative with police, and haven't even talked to Sousa's dad. But they have hired Mark Geragos to sue the zoo -- even though both brothers are due in court on Jan. 15 for public intoxication and resisting arrest charges in a separate incident. If those brothers fired stuff at the tiger with a slingshot, taunted it while drunk, etc., then I hope Geragos is about as successful as he was defending Scott Peterson.

Sad ending to a difficult story

Before I left on wisdom-teeth hiatus, I posted about the inequity in coverage for two-year-old cases like Natalee Holloway and new cases that desperately needed media attention to bring the missing persons case to resolution, like that of Latasha Norman. I even penned a piece for Pajamas Media on the subject:

"...Are the media on the constant hunt for the next Lindbergh baby, that sensational case that they believe best captures public sympathy and stirs maximum outrage? Do the media jump toward the victim with the top connections, the best-oiled P.R. machine?

Or is selective media coverage of missing and murdered women a vestige of institutional racism that also discriminates on socioeconomic standing?

It’s a disturbing question, but cases like Latasha’s make the query too important to ignore. Consciously or subconsciously, the media are playing favorites on crime stories, and poor or minority victims of  foul play pay the price as fewer people even know about the case in order to provide that crucial tip to law enforcement."

I was truly crushed to hear that Latasha's body was found last Thursday. Her ex-boyfriend reportedly led police to the body, and he's been charged with murder. Sure enough, this didn't make many headlines, either.

My thoughts and prayers are with the Norman family.

Do you recognize this girl?

Well, neither did I. Her name is Latasha Norman, a 20-year-old Jackson (Miss.) State University student who went missing on Nov. 13 after leaving an afternoon class. This is obviously a crucial time period in the case: where if she's alive, she might be recovered; or if God forbid she's dead, important evidence would be fresh and suspects at hand.

The media is going ape today because of new searches about to begin in the two-year-old disappearance of Natalee Holloway in Aruba, and sharing the attention is the case of missing Stacy Peterson and her creepy cop husband in Illinois. But what about Latasha? Today was the very first time I even heard of the case, just because the police chief in Mississippi was blunt enough, thank God, to say what we all know to be the case: Latasha's not getting national press because she's black. More:

"'As far as the interest by the national media in the story, I think race probably had an impact,' said Jackson Police Chief Malcolm McMillin, who is white. 'It's a small college in the South. It's the daughter of simple people who maybe are not important outside of their circle, and maybe we don't attach the same importance to them that we do for other people.'

McMillin said the nation's eyes have been on a Chicago case in which a former police officer, Drew Peterson, is suspected in the disappearance of his wife, Stacy. The couple is white.

'We need to show the same kind of concern for this,' McMillin said of Norman's disappearance, adding that heightened exposure could help develop leads in the case."

The safest city in the United States

Nope, sorry, it's not Van Nuys, but OC wonderland Mission Viejo, according to the latest crime survey that ranked Detroit the most dangerous city in the U.S. So what can the Motor City learn from Mission Viejo to drop its crime rate? Well, everyone going to bed by 7 p.m. is a start...

Let's put a moratorium on granting marriage licenses to guys named Peterson

First there was Scott Peterson bumping off pregnant wife Laci. Now there's 53-year-old Sgt. Drew Peterson, whose third wife mysteriously drowned in the bathtub in 2004 after leaving the telltale "just in case something happens to me" notes about her bad marriage, and whose 23-year-old (creepy, anyone?) fourth wife Stacy is now missing.

And speaking of Amber Frey's ex-boyfriend, now on Death Row, the Fifth District Court of Appeal ruled this week that Scott Peterson cannot inherit Laci's $250,000 insurance policy. DUH!! How did this claim even get this high in the legal chain?

When it comes to proposals from Petersons, ladies, just say no...

Pervy 'prophet' found guilty

Warren Jeffs, self-annointed prophet and grand pooh-bah of polygamist sect Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, was found guilty today on two counts of rape as an accomplice for forcing a 14-year-old girl to wed and have sex with her 19-year-old cousin.

Predictably, Jeffs claimed he was being persecuted because of his religion. Well, there are a lot of religions with odd beliefs or customs around the world. But as politically correct and tolerant we are in our views of religion, it's important to know the difference between a religion and a destructive cult. One easy definition by former Moonie Steve Hassan, who now runs the Freedom of Mind Center to help people get out of cults:

"A destructive cult is a pyramid-shaped authoritarian regime with a person or group of people that have dictatorial control. It uses deception in recruiting new members (e.g. people are NOT told up front what the group is, what the group actually believes and what will be expected of them if they become members). It also uses mind control techniques to keep people dependent and obedient. ... Benign cult groups are any group of people who have a set of beliefs and rituals that are non-mainstream. As long as people are freely able to choose to join with full disclosure of the group's doctrine and practices and can choose to disaffiliate without fear or harassment, then it doesn't fall under the behavioral/ psychological destructive cult category."

Simply put, when you hurt other people you cease to be entitled to use a defense of "religious persecution" when called to answer for your crimes. The turning point in this case was the brave young woman who spoke up about her abuse. Hopefully this case will put on notice those cult figures who continue to deceive, buy influence, force or coerce their members into marrying, etc. And hopefully everyone will see that destructive cults didn't die with the 1970s.

L.A.'s biggest tabloid saga might end on a high note

It may be Sin City's arrest, but a successful prosecution of O.J. Simpson could bring a bit of peace to L.A. years after a massive miscarriage of justice. Read all about it in my Los Angeles Daily News column today:

"...Like the Zodiac killer sending greeting cards to the San Francisco Chronicle and calling police to report his own crimes, Simpson has expressed a creepy, sociopathic desire to make sure the heinous Brown and Goldman slayings stay at the top of the news.

'Let's say I committed this crime - even if I did do this, it would have to have been because I loved her very much, right?' Esquire magazine quoted Simpson in 1998. This before he wrote the almost-confession, how-to-kill handbook 'If I Did It,' which sparked so much public outrage that its release was canceled. When a judge subsequently awarded the book rights to the Goldmans, 'If' became tiny print on a cover that put 'I Did It' in huge, red letters.

Released on the same day as the alleged holdup and shooting to No. 1 on Amazon, commenters on the book powerhouse site were advising other readers to buy the book to back the Goldmans, then throw it in the trash.

And trash is what O.J. keeps producing. Perhaps feeling invincible because of double-jeopardy laws, and feeling if he got away with murder he can get away with anything, he has heaped even more shame on any Angeleno who grotesquely cheered his acquittal.

Except now, there's no Johnnie Cochran around to get him off the hook..."

Read the whole thing!

Britney isn't the only one with YouTube groupies...

O.J. heist all on tape

This only confirms my growing belief that Harvey Levin should be the next president of the United States. Not only would TMZ find Osama, but they'd know the last time the terror leader did blow, went cruising with Lindsay Lohan and went to rehab.

The tape of the alleged armed robbery is pretty indisputable. And, as TMZ notes, Simpson is clearly the ringleader. Seems Sin City may succeed in squeezing the Juice into a jail cell.

Tortoise torturer pleads no contest; his sis' makes cold-hearted 'turtle' comment

18-year-old Tony Mosqueda pleaded no contest this week to kidnapping and slashing the throat of Ventura County tortoise Bob (as well as chopping off one of Bob's toes, stabbing his shell, throwing him against a wall and leaving him for dead in an alley), and will probably be sentenced to less than a year in jail.

To add injury to injury, pet parents Dorothy and Bill Sullivan have been the target of threats throughout the case, and days before Mosqueda pleaded no contest their 12-year-old miniature dachshund was apparently poisoned to death:

"But along with the well-wishes came the threats — at first, mostly phone calls from anonymous men and women urging the family to drop the charges against Mosqueda, something the couple had no authority to do.

The threats, which the family reported to police, escalated over the weekend. Sullivan found a rock in her yard with an attached note that said if she did not drop the charges she 'would get one in the head.' She turned the rock and the note over to police.

The rock incident followed a phone call several weeks ago where the caller told Sullivan that her 'little brown dog would be next,' she said.

On Tuesday, a day after Flapps had been euthanized, the latest caller said, 'woof, woof' then hung up, Sullivan said."

When asked about the threats outside court Wednesday, Mosqueda's sister, Celia Ramirez -- obviously a deep, thoughtful, brilliant, empathetic woman *cough cough* -- said, "We don't bother them. We don't really care about the turtle."

Where does one start? First, with Mosqueda. His attorney claimed he's "a young, 18-year-old kid with almost no record." Almost only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. I fail to see how the court can adequately sentence a guy like this -- for the protection of society at large -- without a complete psychological evaluation. A person who tortures an animal for enjoyment and gets a thrill out of causing pain to a living being is only one step away -- that being the presentation of the perfect opportunity and ideal victim -- from killing a person. Would this court have that kind of blood on its hands by slapping the wrist of a clearly disordered offender?

Next, to the threats and the death of the Sullivans' dog. Come on, people, this is so obvious. Who else would have the motive to terrorize the family and demand they drop charges? I hope that the police not only pursue the obvious suspects, but offer some protection to the Sullivan family.

And, finally, the sister and her "we don't care about the turtle" comment. Not only does Celia clearly need a zoology lesson for her turtle/tortoise confusion, but her lack of empathy is truly sickening. However, she should be reminded that, conversely, very, very few readers care about her tortoise-torturing brother -- and hope he goes away for a lot longer than a year.