Am I telling of facts, or am I an accuser, there is a difference, isn’t there? While the tag of “accuser” has been hurled at me as if it is the most egregious transgression one can make, I know it is not true at all. If my statements were false they may slander, they may even endanger, and I want to address this idea, and I also want to share a quote from the publisher who started the Aspen Daily News many years ago – “if you don’t want it printed, don’t let it happen” The City of Aspen, Colorado lived under this statement for decades, and still does today.
But stepping back a little, first a crime is committed, a woman is raped, beaten, and she sees her rapist, perhaps even picks him from a lineup, law enforcement is really on it. She knows who did it. But there has not been a trial yet. And this woman who was raped, beaten, and saw her rapist names him. Yes, she tells one person, or tells a thousand that she knows who did it and she knows his name. Does she slander him? No, he raped and beat her, and all she does is say the name of the man she knows to have done this atrocity to her.
In this world of justice would you rather a man capable of such a crime to be named to warn others, or is it PC to stick with a vague description, but no name? The criminal has rights, yes indeed. The criminal’s rights begin to end right when he commits a crime. The right to be free before he is tried is not even guaranteed. He will be incarcerated unless he is granted bail, as he awaits trial. Sometimes he is allowed bail, sometimes he isn’t. His name is put in the news before trial, people tell other people about him before he goes to trial, his name is everywhere before he is determined to be guilty, or not guilty, and this is fact.
Morgan saw her stalker (not just his car, but also his face), while she was being stalked, at an intersection, at least four times. She saw him, and reported him by name (this is while there was a felony stalking case open to help her, and catch the suspect). And just so you know it was not just any meeting, he managed to be exactly in the middle of the intersection turning left to go down valley at the exact same time she was turning left to go up valley. Try it sometime…pick out a random car at a busy intersection and attempt to make a left turn at exactly the same time so you can come eye to eye with the driver of that random car as you pass in the middle of the intersection. I couldn’t do it. There are cars in front of you that mess with your timing, if they don’t turn you can’t either. The random car you are trying to meet up with has cars in front of it. Some drivers are more aggressive than others. I never came close. The driver would have had to pull over (and there is a perfect spot for it) and wait until he saw your car coming down the hill, across the highway, and then he could have timed it perfectly.
Keenan did this as part of Morgan’s stalking consecutively, and he would then engage in a cold threatening stare that Morgan said severely frightened her, causing extreme stress which would not pass in seconds, or minutes. Morgan would still be shaking when she got home, angry and scared, and I would hold her for the longest time. And these weren’t the only times she actually saw him and reported it.
Trying to calm a person that has been scared very badly is never easy, when it is your daughter there is another hurt that permeates, the wish to thrash out, the mothering instinct that says you have to protect your child.
Morgan named him based upon a positive identification, with certainty, to classmates, instructors, friends, her parents, Deputies, and Detectives.
Why do you think Keenan Van Ginkel was named so many times in the Sheriff’s reports? That is in the ‘REAL’ Sheriffs reports, and even they are far from correct, and complete. But that too will come another day.
And is this why she was killed? Was Morgan murdered days before she was to give video testimony before the Detectives? Is the state of law in Garfield County really such that if you murder your victim days before they give their testimony on camera about you, then there was no crime? Seems to be exactly what happened in this case. Wouldn’t you be furious? Wouldn’t you want to give a voice to your murdered child who can no longer speak out?
And just to keep a perfect record, kind of like our murder rate here in Garfield County, do you know that none of these friends, instructors, classmates were ever interviewed during Morgan’s Stalking? Not even a phone call. They have spoken to me and can not understand why the Detective would not have taken their statement. Why? And after her death none of them including us, Steve and I, her parents were ever interviewed about actual eyewitness sightings of her stalker. “We follow the facts and see where they lead us”. Which part of that got left out of the investigation of Morgan’s Stalking and death? Sometimes I feel like all of it did.
I thought you might appreciate this as much as I did. It’s a powerful statement by the Medina Ohio police department about stalking taken from their website:
Stalking in America
Stalking is a violent crime that has terrorized countless women for years, yet only recently has the criminal justice system and the public recognized stalking as a distinct crime. Beyond highly publicized cases involving celebrities and political leaders, there is still little understanding of stalking and how it affects “ordinary” people. The national Violence Against Women (NVAW) survey reports that an estimated 1,376,000 men and women are stalked annually in the United States.[1]
Women are the primary victims of stalking (78 percent) and men are the primary perpetrators (87 percent). [2] In contrast to highly publicized cases, the majority of stalkers know their victims; only 23 percent of all female victims are stalked by strangers.[3]
Stalking most often occurs within the context of domestic violence. Many criminal justice practitioners now advise that every domestic violence case should be treated as a potential stalking case. The NVAW survey found that 59 percent of female victims were stalked by current or former intimate partners. [4] The survey also revealed that intimates who stalk their partners are also more likely to physically and sexually assault their victims before the termination of the relationship.[5]
There are numerous cases in which stalking is a precursor to homicide. A recent study of the relationship between stalking and intimate partner homicide found that 76 percent of cases in which female victims were murdered and 85 percent of cases of attempted murder of a female partner involved at least one incident of stalking within one year of the murder. [6] Victims in 69 percent of female homicide cases were stalked while in a relationship with their stalker, and 88 percent of victims were stalked after the relationship ended.[7]
Stalkers may be charged under a variety of traditional criminal statutes, including harassment, battery, trespass, violation of orders of protection, forcible entry, or assault laws. Anti-stalking laws afford law enforcement the rare opportunity to intervene in cases before those cases escalate to more violent or even lethal tragedies. The persistence and potential lethality of stalking behavior have become primary considerations in shaping strategies and protocols for investigating and prosecuting such cases. Everyone involved in systemic response, from police dispatchers to prosecutors to judges, must come to understand the complexity of stalking and know how to intervene effectively through a victim-centered approach. A primary goal of any intervention is safety for the victim.
[1] Patricia Tjaden and Nancy Thoennes, “Stalking in America: Findings From the National Violence Against Women Survey,” National Institute of Justice and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Washington, D.C. (1998). Editor’s note: While victims and offenders of sexual assault are both women and men, the vast majority of victims are female and offenders are male (see Patricia Tjaden and Nancy Thoennes, above). For this reason as well as for consistency of style, this webpage refers to victims as women and offenders as men.
Thanks Catherine for sharing with us all.
I want to see people charged with kidnapping who drug another person to render them unconscious. It doesn’t matter if you take them somewhere else, you have taken control of their body without their consent. That is kidnapping in my opinion. “Kidnapping occurs when any person takes another person into his custody without the other person’s prior consent or, if the other person is a minor, the consent of her legal guardian. The issue of kidnapping in the United States is emotionally-loaded and complex, prompting states like Florida to est…”(From ehow.com) I want these threats to society to start paying serious criminal penalties.
Natalie Wood’s cause of death was recently changed from accidental to undetermined. All because one man, the captain of the ship, came forward years later to say they were fighting that night. How long ago was that? It’s an example of how people will remain silent to protect someone powerful, who employs them, or with influence in the community. When I was abducted / kidnapped, I believe they injected inflammatory breast cancer stem cells into my body. Now I have IBC. Hopefully, someone will step forward who knows something more about Morgan and justice will be served. Sometimes with time people become a little less afraid or their conscience kicks in. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/07/natalie-wood-cause-of-death_n_1656169.html