Gang Rape Conviction

Back in November, I discussed a rape case that went to trial in Orange County, California and ended up as a mistrial. You can read about it here.

Today, Court TV is reporting that the re-trial ended up with a conviction for all three teens. You may recall the story as one of the boys was the son of a senior law enforcement officer. They were convicted of gang rape — and each is facing 16 to 18 years in prison.

I am relieved.

When I watched the boys and the rape victim tell their stories, it was clear to me who was lying, and it wasn’t the rape victim though she had a shady past.

Justice was served in this case. Thankfully.

Amber Frey: Oddities

Over the last few days, Amber Frey has been making the circles in the media, pushing her new book, Witness.

I’ve listened to her story, and while I feel she is simple girl who acts on emotions instead of logic, she isn’t coming clean about everything.

She talks to Matt Lauer on NBC.com in a video entitled “I was just so scared”. In the video (time marker 4:38), she says she was afraid to go home. That was December 29, 2002. She says she was so afraid that she didn’t go home for a week.

Now, in Oprah’s interview which airs today, and I believe in her book (though that is a guess) she says that Scott told her in one of their taped conversations later in February 2003 (more than five weeks later) that he left her a gift for her birthday in a nearby hotel. Amber Frey tells Oprah that she went and retrieved that gift out of curiosity. She doesn’t say a word about being afraid this time.

Isn’t that odd???

Clearly, something is amiss. If you are that afraid early on, you don’t become less afraid as the story thickens with insane lies, a full-blown police and FBI investigation. Something has to give here. What is the real truth, Amber?

Amber also gets very defensive with Oprah Winfrey when Oprah asks Amber if she had seen the breaking news. The whole country had seen the news. Amber flat out denies ever seeing the news or hearing about Scott Peterson’s story prior to being told by friends on December 29 that her Scott may indeed be “this” Scott.

It doesn’t sit well with me. Why did she ramble on about all the reasons why she didn’t watch TV for five days?? It was Christmas, she has a young child, she didn’t have time, etc. She didn’t read the paper, either? Not only did she get really defensive, but she stumbles for words. She wants to seem mad, but doesn’t quite pull it off.

I believe that Amber truly hoped and wished that Scott would be cleared and that he would come back to her. I believe she was in denial at times and could not accept the truth. Accepting the truth isn’t easy in the face of such a tragedy. Anyone would have a difficult time with this one, no doubt. It is understandable.

But on their first date when Scott Peterson first tells Amber that he is single, living alone, has never been married and doesn’t even own a dog (time marker 2:21), and then within three weeks on December 9, 2002, changes his story and says he had a wife but lost her, Amber should have gotten mad at him. He admits to his lie, plain and simple.

He lied, but instead Amber felt sorry for him and wanted to believe him. She didn’t question him. This is where she violated herself. She should have realized that a lie of this magnitude would never bode well for anyoneever.

Ghost sells for $65,000

Have you heard of the Indiana woman who put her father’s ghost up for auction on eBay because supposedly her son was convinced Grandpa was haunting the house? She hoped by selling his ghost (and the cane of her father), that her son would be convinced he left the house — and he would no longer be afraid. This is a true story.

It intrigued me so I went to investigate it for myself. I found a video interview of the woman and her husband on MSNBC.com. I wanted to see what they had to say firsthand. I wanted to know if this woman was honest. The story could be plausible, in a clever effort to rid a child of fear. However, it could be a ploy for money.

After watching the video, I do not trust this woman. More than likely, this is a person who is out for financial gain. Regardless, I am going to view this with a clean slate and see what I find…

Review of the Video – Ghostly Sale:
NBC’s Ann Curry interviews Mary and her husband, Mickey Anderson. Below I recount spots in the video that make me question the people and their motives.

  • Watch when Mickey Anderson is asked by Ann Curry whose idea it was to put the ghost up for auction. Listen to how Mickey responds. He stutters by saying “um, and “ah” a lot. He also says “she” when he means “he”. His answer doesn’t roll off his tongue. He clearly struggles in his reply. When a story is genuine, you don’t struggle. It flows naturally. I don’t believe he is being honest here.
  • Watch his wife’s response as he talks to Ann Curry about whose idea it was to list the auction. She is sitting there carefully listening to her husband’s every word. She makes stressed faces as he talks. Why? Is she fearful he might not say the right things? Did she coach him on exactly what to say — and she fears he may not say it exactly as he is supposed to? She nods her head in confirmation at other times concurring with what he is saying. Then when he finishes, she cracks a smile and looks relieved. Why? I think the answer is obvious: perhaps the answers were practiced?

    (Let Mary’s expressions guide you. They will guide you more appropriately than will her words… )

  • When Ann Curry asks Mary if she is scratching-her-head (figure of speech) because the auction (at that point) was sitting at FIVE THOUSAND (odd) dollars, listen to Mary’s response. Ann Curry is in shock. Why doesn’t Mary respond that she, too, is shocked (at the price)? Wouldn’t you be if a non-material item on eBay was selling for thousands?

    Wouldn’t any normal person be shocked?

    I speculate a person who is lying wouldn’t be shocked. They’d suppress their feelings because they wouldn’t want to let out a hint of excitement about their true motivation — which would more than likely be monetary gain. An honest person would exude shock, like everyone else.

  • Mary says,”I figured who is going to want this? I figured we could get a penny out of it.”

    She says she could get a penny? Isn’t that a weird response? Who would think about a penny? Again, Mary is downplaying this – downplaying her interest in monetary gains.

    I suspect people would have one or two motives in this situation: to help their son (in a weird albeit abnormal funky mystic-kind-of-way) — or to get their hands on money like the money made by the crazy woman who sold a grill cheese sandwich just a few weeks before!! Which motive is Mary thinking about?

  • Watch when Ann Curry says, “What are you going to do with the money?”

    Mary blows air through her teeth and lips. That’s a true, trustworthy expression of frustration. It truly indicates how she is really feeling. Her reply, “If it…It really depends on what it (the amount) goes up to now….We told him he is supposed to get all the money…but if it goes up from there… we are giving to charity, too.” Mary fears Curry is honing in on her desires to take money — and she is sick of it! She doesn’t want to talk about it anymore.

  • Mary goes on to say that she has had tons of e-mail telling her what she should do with the money. Look closely, you see an expression of anger (a microexpression, I suspect)! She is mad about that. She doesn’t want anyone to tell her what to do with her money but she tries to hide it. Where are her thoughts about her son & charity? Does she not have any? Her emotions are not consistent with what she is saying.
  • Ann Curry goes on to ask…”Have you thought about ‘what if’ this doesn’t work? What if you sell the ghost and Collin still thinks the ghost is in the house? What are you going to do then?”

    Look at how cocky Mary is when she replies so confidently, “I don’t think that is going to be a problem (pause) because… I’ve been reading e-mails to him…” The pause between the word because and I’ve is interesting. She is thinking as she speaks.

    A mother whose son is honestly afraid of ghosts knows that situations like this aren’t that easily rectified. Mary’s confidence doesn’t add up to normal behavior.

  • Watch Mary’s husband as she talks about how excited her son is about giving the ghost away. Why is her husband so somber? If his son was excited, wouldn’t he be genuinely enthused as well? Would he be joyous? He’s not. Why? Does he know things are less than honest, perhaps?

Another inconsistency from Mary in other news stories is that she says her son says Grandpa was “mean” yet she swears he was the nicest man you’d ever meet in her actual auction description. This shows Mary is inconsistent. Inconsistency points to less than honest behavior.

When people don’t tell the truth, they just don’t respond normally.

In the end, what is even more odd to me is why the son, Collin, isn’t part of the interview. Why didn’t they have him on with them? People might say that is because they want to protect the identity of their child — but clearly that is not the case because they offered a photo of Collin in the video above. Were they afraid to have Collin speak? Children are usually brutally honest. Is Mary afraid of this?

In the end, I personally don’t trust what this couple is saying.

Was it a hate crime?

I am sure the face and story of Matthew Shepard are seared into the brains of most people. Young beautiful gay guy beaten, tied up and left for dead in Wyoming. The year was 1998. Matthew Shepard was a college student with a big bright future. That’s the story most of us know…

However last night, I decided to watch a video tape recording of ABC’s 20/20 from November 26th which had the first ever interview with the two convicted murderers: Aaron McKinney and Russell Henderson.

Since I am fascinated with lies, I was really interested to watch these two guys. However, they proved much harder to read than the average guy. They are polished. Plus other sources in the story added to the mix and confusion as they weren’t trustworthy either.

Certainly these two young killers had years of practice at lying and deception as they were heavily involved in drugs scene, most specifically with meth. McKinney, the instigator of the killings, says he was strung out on meth for an entire week without sleep prior to the murder. He says he just wanted money and more drugs — so when Shepard, drunk in a bar, asked for a ride home from him as they sat and talked that night — McKinney says he saw an opportunity to rob Shepard. Henderson said he quickly realized the plan of action.

I believe them here. I believe the motivation for the crime initially was money for drugs.

McKinney continues to say the killing wasn’t motivated by Shepard’s sexual orientation. It was when he answered Elizabeth Vargas that I saw a expression (I suspect what experts would call a microexpression –an expression that flashes on someone’s face for an instant — which most people aren’t privy too). He squinted his eyes with a deep sincere anger for a flit of an instant. It made his statement completely convincing. By this expression, you knew he was really pissed off by the fact people thought this was a hate crime when it was really just a case of drugs, money, robbery and murder. However, he didn’t want people to see this emotion. He was trying to hide it.

As for Henderson, when Vargas asked if he had an prejudice against gays, he flat out lied. He paused, looked around and didn’t have a good answer. He truly had problems with gay people but apparently he didn’t beat Shepard. He just never stopped McKinney and helped save Shepard.

McKinney goes on to say that on the ride to Shepard’s home, he had planned to pull a gun on Shepard to rob him but Shepard put his hand on his knee — and that send him into a rage. He said he then just beat Shepard with a gun and continued to beat Shepard. He said it was a rage that once was started couldn’t be stopped.

Meth is known to cause violent outburst for the most benign circumstance. I believe McKinney here. I have no doubts.

Several people spoke on 20/20 about McKinney. They said he was known to have sex in a threesome: two men and a woman. The mother of his child says today she believes he is bi-sexual because before all of this, he asked her to be part of a threesome with two guys. Another man, a limo driver named Copp, also spoke about stories he had supposedly heard about McKinney having sex in a threesome. When asked how he knew, Copp then switched his story and said he knew because he was one of the guys. Copp was lying. You could see it by the phony machismo face he made. It wasn’t sincere at all.

The facts of this case are overwhelming. I don’t believe McKinney hated gays. I believe him when he says this killing wasn’t motivated by hate. Nor does anyone ever offer anything to the contrary — that McKinney did talk about hating gays — yet a simple gesture for sex is what started a violent outburst from McKinney and caused him to kill Shepard.

What a FINE LINE.

Another odd fact: McKinney says he didn’t know Shepard prior to the killing — yet multiple people spoke out on 20/20 stating that they did in fact see them together. However, none of the people speaking up were convincing. I don’t believe they were lying but due to the fact they were all drug users, I don’t trust their perception which leaves a gray area for me.

Was McKinney bisexual and keeping it a secret?

Did he know Shepard beforehand — and perhaps had some secret encounters with him? Is that why when Shepard put his hand on McKinney’s knee that night, McKinney flipped? Did McKinney flip because he knew Henderson hated gays and would never let him live it down??

It’s all so intertwined and twisted! I do firmly believe:

  • McKinney didn’t hate gays.
  • Henderson did.
  • McKinney intended to rob Shepard, Henderson just followed along.
  • McKinney didn’t plan on killing Shepard but did in a rage.
  • McKinney was bi-sexual.

I wonder:

  • if McKinney knew Shepard beforehand. I suspect yes, he is lying but I am uncertain. McKinney is hard to read here.
  • if McKinney had secret sexual encounters with Shepard before (pure speculation).

48 Hour Rape Case Review

CBS News: Eye Of The Beholder, November 19, 2004

In Orange County, California, three 17-year-old guys are accused to committing rape against a 16-year-old girl who is officially being called Jane Doe. 48 Hours starts out their report showing Jane Doe reading a poem from behind to protect her identity. You hear the girl speak sincerely. She is clearly feeling violated. Her feelings are sincere.


Photo courtesy of http://www.freefoto.com

Next, you see one of the accused boys, Kyle Nachreiner, answering 48 Hours interviewer, Bill Lagattuta’s questions, “Did you rape her? Or, was it consensual sex?”

Kyle clearly lies when he replies something to the fact that she really wanted it and it was consensual. That was all I needed to see to have a deep seeded feeling that Kyle was the one lying. I suspected the problems lied with the three boys.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t always side with the women. Many women are motivated to lie in situations dealing with rape accusations (to gain money) — but in this case, this girl was being honest.

From that point forward, I was dying to learn the facts of the case to see if my gut reaction, my feelings of a lie, were accurate. As it turns out, I believe they were.

In my opinion, Jane Doe was a girl who was troubled and lost — and didn’t respect her body. She started hanging with the wrong crowd and lacked good judgment – there no doubt about it but when it came to the night of the alleged rape, she did not deserve what she got. She was violated.

The night before the alleged rape, the guys claimed that they discovered the following morning to their total surprise that while they partied at a pool in the backyard — they each had slept with Jane Doe at separate times — unaware that their friend(s) also had. They were shocked. When one of the guys, Greg Haidl, stated this, it was believable as strange and as contradictory as this seemed. I knew he was being honest. Weird.

What I believed happened in this situation is that these three guys felt “used” when they discovered they weren’t the only object of her affection that night. They felt violated and betrayed. And so hence they plotted to “use” her back in a very sick and twisted way — as pay back. That day after the discovery that they were each “used”, they called and invited Jane Doe back over for that evening.

One of the guys clearly states on camera that she came over and the first thing she said was “Hi. Can I have a beer?” Another lie. Yes, Jane Doe drank. She got drunk but she didn’t walk in the door and demand a beer.

Jane Doe admits to sleeping with two of the three boys the night before the rape. When she states this, for some reason I doubt her honesty about it. She seems evasive. I think she may have slept with all three of the boys as Greg Haidl said, but I am not certain.

In a deeper twist, as the story continues, you find out that the alleged crime took place at the house of Greg Haidl, whose father is the Assistant Sheriff in Orange County — second in charge in the county– while the Assistant sheriff himself was home. He was also home the night before with his wife when the boys had consensual sex with Jane Doe.

Furthermore, the boys recorded the entire event on video tape. The Assistant sheriff’s son, Greg Haidl, loved to make video movies — and according to him “someone” — one of his friends — turned on the camera that night and recorded the whole event. When he said he didn’t know who turned it on, he was clearly lying. You could see it in his face. I could feel it. He knew exactly who turned on that camera. I suspect it was him.

According to the D.A., Jane Doe is unconscious during the recording of the sexual act where the three guys have what they call “kinky sex” with the girl using not only their bodies but different objects. Since Jane Doe is supposedly unconscious in the video, it is considered rape by California state law because she wasn’t able to give consent. The big question is, did she?

The next morning, the guys drive Jane Doe home and she has no memories of what happened to her. It wasn’t until the Assistant sheriff’s son brought over his prized video tape to a friend’s house to show him — that he hung himself. He accidentally forgot to take it home with him — and another woman found it. She was appalled by what she saw and shared it with her neighbor who was a cop. The cop questioned if this woman was even alive still so formal charges were pressed against the boys. That’s when Jane Doe’s father gets a call and Jane Doe finds out.

The case went to trial and it was a mis-trial. The jury couldn’t agree if the girl was conscious enough to give consent. She had a pillow under her head which confused them and they say she kissed one of the boys. The jury deadlocked. It is now scheduled to go to court again in January 2005 which doesn’t bode well for the boys. Second trials have a statistically higher likelihood of ending in a sentence of guilty.

The Assistant sheriff’s son has since tried to commit suicide twice, and has been charged in raping another 16 year old girl (who claims this sex was consensual) — but this time he is 19 years old and she is clearly a minor (at least I suspect that is true in California). He is currently sitting in jail on suicide watch.

And Jane Doe? She’s been arrested for using meth and is now suing the Assistant sheriff’s family, the Haidl’s, who are well-to-do, for millions of dollars.

In any case, the victim isn’t a clean character — nor are the guys who raped her. Anyone can see that — which makes this case all the more difficult. It isn’t cut and dry. But clearly, to me, the guys told lie after lie after lie. All three of them. Jane Doe stretched the truth once, and perhaps lied one time though I am not certain. She seems much more believable.

Update:
Second Trial Results (March 23, 2005)