Abduction of Quinn Gray on Dateline

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Originally posted September 2011 (re-run)

If you didn’t see Friday night’s Dateline, you missed a whopper of a story.  It was two-hours of action, deception and lies.  I would have to say this was one of the most hotspot littered cases I think I’ve ever watched.  Quinn Gray couldn’t have been a better subject!

For those of you who saw the show, here is Quinn Gray’s ransom note. 

So many hot spots:

  1. Notice Quinn’s normal bubbly written text?  When people are held at gunpoint, they get nervous and nervous hand writing isn’t so sweet and smooth! Hello.

  2. Quinn writes, “I need you read this and be calm!!”  Who under duress is going to think like this?   Just be calm, honey!

  3. Quinn writes, “…do not be a hero.”  Hero?  Who would think about heroes when you have a gun pointing to your head? 

  4. Quinn writes, “This is professional.”  What victim of a crime is ever going to think her abductors are “professional”?   I could see law enforcement calling someone professional, but not a victim unless they were talking about a crime in hindsight–not during the actual crime.  How does she know they are “professional” at this point? She hasn’t seen them do anything, if this is real and they just broke into her house. It’s ridiculous.

  5. I find it very odd she tells her husband they want $50,000, but he cannot get more than $9,500.00 out of the bank.  Had she tried at one point?  Would you know this if you were held at gun point?  Very odd information for a “victim” to have… She could have called the bank with the kidnappers and asked about  how much she could withdrawal, but she makes no mention of it.

  6. Then she says they only have $7,000, which makes it even more perplexing that she should would know about the $9,500 number because why ask if you don’t have it?

  7. Her use of the word “stupid” stands out to me as well.  When you are facing life and death, and you may not see a loved one again, and I can’t imagine you would worry about them doing stupid things.  You would worry about their life instead.  It’s odd to say the least. She doesn’t seem worried about him at all, does she?

  8. It’s odd how she is so sure she will be fine if he just gets the money.  Why would she be so sure?  A kidnapper wouldn’t give her the time to write that over and over again!  Time is of the essence if they are all standing around in her house, mind you.

  9. She writes, “Please do this honey!” Honey?  Again, its ridiculous!! 

Clearly, by her own word choices, she was not a woman under duress.  Had I found this ransom note, I couldn’t help but chuckle!!!! It tells a heck of a lot information, and while you couldn’t write it off, I would have been very skeptical. 

Word choices tell us so much…

When Eyes Deceive – Eyewitness Testimony

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Are you a risk taker?

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Bungee Jump - Interlaken, Switzerland

I thought this was a fun survey from NatGeo:  Are you a risk taker? 

Well, are you?  Do you know before you take the survey? 

Was the survey accurate? 

Anyone want to guess what they think I am? 

Clearly the man who is bungee jumping is risk taker, and what is so fascinating is in this moment, where most people would be expressing fear, he has none!  Risk takers rarely show fear or insecurity on their face (they almost never feel fear or insecurity).  Just a little fact from my observations.

Have fun!

Monserrate Shirley Arrested

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While I didn’t post this on my blog, there was a discussion about this case on my Facebook page and on my suggestions page.

A house exploded in an Indianapolis neighborhood which killed two people back in November.  This is the owner of the house speaking about the explosion above.  I found her behavior suspicious writing the following comment on my suggestion page:

Monseratte does not show genuine sadness though she truly wants us to believe she is sad. I see a lot of inconsistencies in her story. Does that mean she blew up the house? No. It simply means she knows more than she is saying, if you ask me.

 Consequently, and to no surprise to me, Monserrate Shirley has been arrested in connection with the explosion and the deaths of her two neighbors.

Denial

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Not Now

Denial is something that we all witness on a regular basis. It’s when a person doesn’t want to accept or cannot accept the truth, and hence they push it away. They either deny what is obvious to others, or they refuse to talk about, or they discount anything said to them is logical.

Denial is a mechanism that can be used by our own body to preserve our sanity, or it can bring us to the brink of insanity.

Denial can happen in two ways:  subconscious or conscious denial. 

When children kill, I have seen parents go into a subconscious denial. It’s quite common and its a coping mechanism for survival.  The idea that one’s own flesh and blood has killed someone is simply too much for the brain to cope with, and hence the body literally rejects the idea at every turn. It’s understandable.  It would not be easy for a parent to rationalized that they produced a killer in physical form, if no other.

Other parents of homicidal children display indications that they are living in plain old conscious denial.  They know the truth, but don’t want to accept or talk about it. That’s the difference.  In subconscious denial, they have no idea they are in denial whereas conscious denial they do, but reject the concepts with knowledge of their inconsistency.

Some of you have asked me, how do I know if I am in denial?  This is an excellent question.

When people disagree with you, and you refuse to consider their point of view–this is the simplest form of denial that can lead to a growing problem. If you get defensive when someone doesn’t agree with you, and you can’t listen to an opposing opinion–take note!  A good sign of this is you get into heated discussions with people about your topic and can’t find people who agree with you.

To ensure you are not in denial, you need to not only be able to calmly listen to other people’s opinion and be able to take them into fair consideration, but you must be able to rationalize your thoughts to most people and have a sense that you are understood by others.  It’s when we can’t agree with others and we are isolated in our opinion that denial becomes a distinct possibility.

So how do you know you are truly understood?  I would look for true interactive discussions. If people are sharing back supportive ideas with you, and elaborating on your thought process with their own independent ideas, you have a good idea that your thought process is not just your own, but congruent with other people.

It’s when people don’t elaborate or get into discussions with you, but simply politely smile back at you and nod their head, without having a discussion that you should take note. It could be simply because they don’t want to have a discussion, or it would be that they think your thinking is off and that you are not seeing something clearly.  

So, how do you find the answer to this question?  You simply engage more people!  If a handful of people refuse to engage in a conversation with you–people who you know normally would, it’s a red flag.  Or if a handful of people disagree with you and cannot see your perspective — you need to do some self-assessing. You could be in denial.

People who are in conscious denial will slowly isolate themselves away from the people who disagree with them, and they will protect their denial by isolation and removal.  They will then try to seek out people who agree with them and try to hang out with those people–rejecting the others.  Or they will fight frantically to keep their beliefs powerful.  They may rage at simple and normal discussions because they feel they are being threatened in their belief system.

A person who is an independent thinker and who is not in denial will be able to engage in discussions, share ideas, ponder different points of view, and will feel confident about their opinions without any negative feelings.

Happy Holidays!