More Details About The Karissa Boudreau Case

A reader just sent me this article. It’s hard to read. It’s unfathomable that a mother could do this to her child. It’s chilling, so please be advised. Here is another, even more graphic one.

For those who are new this blog, I called Penny Boudreau out the day I saw her plea for her daughter’s return on TV. Nothing about her plea sat right with me. You can read it here. To read all my thoughts on this case, click on the labels below.

Record-breaking Day

Today is a record-breaking day for “Eyes for Lies Blog”. We are surpassing our highest visitor count in one day, all before 2:00 PM today. We have another ten hours to go.

So far today, we’ve had 2,287 unique visitors, 5,012 page loads, and 146 returning visitors!

Just thought you’d like to know.

Update:
We broke all visitor record! The final tally for the day:

  • 10,148 page loads
  • 4,595 unique visitors
  • 320 returning visitors

My Thoughts on Ted Haggard

Ted Haggard was on Oprah this week. Did you see him? It was an interesting show. If you missed it, the entire show is on YouTube in four parts.

Read moreHaggard tells us that he is, in his own words, “not gay”, and that he is a “…heterosexual male with homosexual attachments,” according to his “first” psychologist. He doesn’t inform us what the other consulted psychologists have said. It sure does make you wonder, doesn’t it?

Haggard also tells us that he still faces temptation, but he no longer feels the need to be “compulsive”; in other words, act on his desires, simply because, he says, he has come forward with the truth and is speaking openly about it now.

Does that make sense to anyone?

Has anyone ever been cured of temptation because they confessed to their desire?

It sounds like the fancy language of denial to me, personally. Or, maybe Haggard is testing the waters to see how people respond to the word “homosexual”?

I don’t disagree with Haggard that he has an internal struggle going on inside himself right now, because having homosexual desires, and being an Evangelical pastor don’t go hand-in-hand. They are fundamentally at odds.

I personally don’t think we’ve seen the last of this story yet. There is likely going to be another chapter. Whatever chapter unfolds, I only hope it doesn’t harm other peoples’ lives again.

I truly hope that Haggard finds the strength, the courage and the fortitude to embrace who he really is. When we accept ourselves as we are, we find true happiness, and only then can we truly be our authentic selves.

Penny Boudreau Pleads Guilty

Breaking news this morning (thanks, Mike) that Penny Boudreau has plead guilty to second degree murder of her daughter, Karissa.

My thoughts go out to the Boudreau family.

From the Canadian National Post:

Court was told that Karissa and her mom had been fighting when Penny Boudreau followed her daughter out of the car with some twine and strangled her until she was dead. The girl’s last words were “Mom, don’t.” Penny Boudreau told police officers later that she “did what she had to do,” court was told.

I first wrote about the case last February. Penny Boudreau went on TV to plead for her daughter’s safe return, but the words she spoke didn’t sit right with me.

To read all my posts on Penny Boudreau, click on the label below.

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A reader just pointed out that I said last June I thought Penny Boudreau would confess. I totally forgot that! In hindsight now, I’m actually surprised it took her this long but we don’t know exactly when she confessed to police, do we?
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Q&A

Here is your forum. Do you have a question? Feel free to ask it!

One reader today asked me if I could discern if someone was lying by watching a video of them, even though I couldn’t understand the language spoken. The reader believed that because the person was calm, and relaxed, that this indicated they were not lying.

The answer to their question was no, you cannot use body language alone (any body language) to conclusively identify if someone is honest or deceptive. It simply cannot be done, and is dangerous to do.

It’s not all about expressions. Language does matter. Emotions matter. Words matter. Facts matter. Behavior matters. The show “Lie to Me” isn’t explaining the nuances of this ability very well.

It’s also important that people realize there is not one universal clue that can be applied “across the board” to spot deception. Not one. What one person does when he is lying, another will do when he is honest. There is always an exception to every clue. Always. That’s what makes deception detection so hard for the average person, because this is not about clues. It is about understanding human behavior, to the core.

Deception detection is more about the sum of inconsistencies, and the sum in total indicates deception. This is so important, and clearly not being communicated on “Lie to Me”. Microexpressions, and the other clues shown on the show, are used in the process of discerning a lie, but they are not conclusive of anything in and of themselves, outside of indicating a person’s emotional state of mind (which will just provide you with a clue).