I have to address this one outrageous idea, that victim blamers keep repeating about Morgan’s murder, “Why didn’t Morgan’s parents hear her being attacked, if indeed she was attacked?”
Try to put yourself in Morgan’s shoes for just one moment – it won’t be easy if you have never been the target of a stalker. But just try for a moment. You are exhausted from four months of stalking, you are frightened and on-guard every moment of every day, just waiting for for the next attack to happen, you are hyper-vigilant, and all of a sudden you wake up and your stalker is in your room! He is probably armed with a gun. And imagine, as we believe, he is not alone. You glance towards your panic button, but it’s not there! (the stalker has removed it), your brain races as you think of how you are going to escape. You are looking at a weapon, more than one person, and process a verbal threat to be quiet or else… you freeze!
Victims DO report this happening to them, and that is just the ones that survive the attack. Morgan did not survive, so we are forced to draw possibilities from the facts. The sheriff’s investigators wrongly believed there was no intruder in her room, because we didn’t hear her scream, yet victims not resisting their attacker is a very well studied and documented FACT. That very morning, within minutes of arriving, the sheriffs told us her death had NOTHING to do with her stalker. They did this by ignoring the fact of a victim not resisting, and made matters worse by not treating the crime scene as a crime scene. The same reason, for so many years, that law enforcement and the courts did not believe or pursue a rape case, if the victim of a rape did not scream or fight back at the time of an attack. Now of course we know some victims suffered in silence for years before gathering the courage to tell of their attack. In the case of rape and improper sexual advances, understanding and laws have changed. Unfortunately in the case of a victim of stalking, who is found murdered in her own home, that type of archaic thinking has not changed at all.
In Morgan’s case, we don’t really know if she was even conscious at all – to not resist her attackers. There is ample evidence she never had a chance to scream out, just as there is ample evidence of intruders in her room that night. Yet the sheriffs did not tell the pathologist to collect evidence in a rape kit, or test for chemicals that could have subdued her. The pathologist told us that unless he is directed by the sheriffs to do these things he does not. So NO simple blood test for any type of chloroform or substance that could have been put over her face, while she was sleeping, to subdue her, was ever made. NO evidence was collected for a rape kit. No fingernail scraping were taken to look for DNA, even though 3 nails were broken and there were abrasions on the top and bottom of that same hand. None of this was done because the sheriffs told the pathologist that it was not necessary…how is that an investigation?
As a little side note to this – did we have a lead that a substance like this was used? Yes, we did – when the first responders arrived and realized Morgan was already dead, they started to ask questions. One of their questions was about Carbon Monoxide detectors in our home. Steve showed them our detectors, and the one plugged into the the wall, above the counter, in the laundry room, had a one-time super high reading that night – Steve was shocked. The sheriffs were not interested in this one-time super high reading, because it didn’t fit their “no intruder” theory, so they ignored it. Months later, after other doctors looking at Morgan’s case were convinced it was a homicide, Steve looked up the data on our exact Carbon Monoxide detector and found, to his shock, that it is plausible for chloroform fumes to cause a one-time super high reading without triggering the alarm. Based on that we surmise that an intruder could have poured chloroform over a cloth on the laundry room counter, before entering Morgan’s room. We told the pathologist, as well as the sheriff of this discovery, as well as many more facts that absolutely establish the presence of at least one intruder that night, but our FACTS have always fallen on deaf ears – they did not care. They proved this by there actions. When too much evidence piled up showing there had to be at least one intruder, they closed her stalking case, claiming there were no more leads to follow up on. That shows they don’t care.
Now some scientific facts, showing why victims may not scream or fight back, by experts in the field…
Freezing in the context of an attack seems counterintuitive. However, tonic immobility may be the best option when the animal perceives little immediate chance of escaping or winning a fight (Arduino & Gould, 1984; Korte, Koolhaas, Wingfield, & McEwen, 2005).
Why So Many Rape Victims Don’t Simply ‘Fight Back’
A new study shows it’s common for women to experience involuntary paralysis during sexual assault.
The following is a Washington Post article about, “Why Many Rape Victims Don’t Fight or Yell”
Quote from the article: “Countless victims of sexual assault describe just such responses. Too often police officers, college administrators, even friends and family think to themselves – and say out loud – “Why didn’t you run out of the room?” “Why didn’t you scream?”