Obsession (58 page)

If you feel you are the object of an obsession, close the emotional door
as soon as
you begin to feel uncomfortable. Don’t try to protect his or her feelings or “let him down easy.” They’re not worried about your feelings. And don’t assume they’ll “get over it.”

Instead of trying to “negotiate,” go into a protective mode immediately. Cut off communication, screen phone calls, make sure your name isn’t on the mailbox or assigned parking space at work, begin documenting any harassment or threats. Share information on potential stalkers with friends, neighbors, coworkers. Let them accompany you wherever and whenever possible so you don’t have to confront the stalker alone. Let other people be your eyes, ears, and extended protection.

Know where the local police, fire, and rescue stations are so you can get to one quickly if someone is following you. Keep gasoline in the car and get a portable phone and keep it with you so you can call for help.

If you’ve secured a restraining order or any other relevant court orders or legal documents, keep a copy with you so you can show the police at any time. If
the police will not help you, call the district attorney’s office, the state attorney general, the victim-witness program in your area, or the National Victim Center—1-800-FYI-CALL—for help. This is a prosecutable crime.

On the related front of domestic violence, the best defense is always to recognize a man who is prone to violence or a need to control women
before
getting into a relationship. Never make excuses for his potentially violent or threatening behavior; he’ll make plenty of excuses for himself. According to the Family Violence Prevention Fund, at least one out of every three murdered women is killed by her husband or boyfriend.

If he’s overly jealous, insecure, possessive, and/or controlling, if he tries to isolate you from your family, friends, or co-workers, if he’s hypersensitive and blames you or other people for all of his problems instead of taking responsibility, if he’s cruel to children or pets, verbally abusive, hits or threatens to hit you (or kill you), uses force in settling arguments or in securing sex, if he can shift quickly and abruptly from loving to angry and violent and back again, or if he has a history of hitting or abusing any of his previous partners, the advice is simple:
GET OUT!
Whatever it takes. There are widely available support services like Fairfax County’s Someplace Safe that can help you.

We should all be alert for the signs of domestic abuse in our friends and coworkers. Unexplained bruises, withdrawn or other unfamiliar behavior, or unusual absences from work are all things we should notice, and we should encourage an abused woman (or man) to seek help, while maintaining confidentiality.

The defense strategies are similar to the ones for stalking. Keep track of places you can go, such as
police stations, churches, homes of friends whose location he doesn’t know. Pack an emergency bag of things you and your children will need if you leave, such as ID, cash, credit cards, passports or birth certificates, medical records, and special toys. But if you think you may be in immediate danger, leave immediately, even if you don’t have this kit prepared. Shelters, police and social service agencies, even rape crisis centers, are there to help you.

As Gavin de Becker urges, trust your instincts and gut reactions. You have them for a reason.

We’ve got to change our attitudes about crime in general, and in doing so, we’ve got to radically adjust some of our values. I was amazed, for example, that there seemed to be more public outrage (certainly more traffic on call-in shows) about the incident in which heavyweight boxer Mike Tyson bit opponent Evander Holyfield’s ear in the ring than there was when he raped a young woman in a hotel room.

While I believe we are all responsible for the choices we make, sometimes those choices can be influenced by early intervention, as Samenow and others have pointed out. Had a Ronnie Shelton, a Joseph Thompson, an Alex Kelly, or a Robert Chambers, even a John Hinckley Jr. or a Jeffrey Dahmer—been recognized early enough, if the pattern of their early behavior had been detected, maybe something could have been done to change the way they thought. I certainly don’t think this would have worked across the board, but in a certain percentage of cases, there would be a good chance. And if we can’t change their thinking, we can certainly remove their opportunity to commit acts of violence.

So if you have or know of a child who is displaying early signs of aggressive or predatory behavior, seek help as early as possible, preferably before adolescence. There are some classic warning signs, such as
what we call the homicidal triad: persistent late bed-wetting, starting fires, and cruelty to animals or other children. Maybe these symptoms are a passing phase in a particular case, but I’ve seen this presentation too frequently in the serial offenders I’ve interviewed and studied to ignore it. This triad is unquestionably a red flag and cause for alarm. Even if you don’t see this in a child, there are many other indications, almost too numerous to list. But the important thing is that parents and teachers will recognize them instinctively in the context of an individual child’s behavior and emotional development. The key is what Samenow refers to as “an expanding and intensifying pattern.”

Aside from out-and-out behavior problems, we need to instill certain values and emulate sound role models. We’ve got to teach our kids that while sports and entertainment figures are glamorous and attractive, it’s the Hans Hagemans and Linda Fairsteins and Carroll Ellises who are the real heroes and heroines, along with all the victims who find a way to help others in their grief—not using their misfortunes or tragedies as an excuse to hurt others. Katie Souza had a terrible background, much more than most people can imagine. But she didn’t become a criminal or violent as a result. Rather, she dedicated her life to making things better for her children than they had been for her.

And there are certain things we have to learn to accept. We have to realistically recognize the limits of rehabilitation, and we have to create environments in which victims will feel safe.

Where I live, we have animal control ordinances that say, in essence, that your dog gets one “free” bite—after that, it’s labeled dangerous, and you, as the owner, are held to the same standard of strict liability as with any other potentially dangerous situation. I’ve never encountered a dog yet as vicious as the sexual predators I’ve studied. How long are we
going to continue giving them more than one free bite?

And we’re not only talking about a permanent loss of a loved and vital person, though that alone can be unbearable. Keep in mind that when a person succumbs to disease or natural causes, or even an accident that does not kill her instantly, she is surrounded by family, loved ones, emotional and medical support. When a person dies as a result of violent crime, she dies alone, despairing, unloved by anyone nearby, terrified and in agonizing pain. And this is no act of God. Another human being chose to make this happen.

You may say that I’m overly emotional on this subject: you may call this hot-headed rhetoric. I plead guilty on both counts. But I’ve seen too much of this. I’ve spent too much time with wonderful people whose lives have been irretrievably shattered by one of these monsters, and each time I think about how il could be my own.

We’ve got to encourage victims’ participation in the system and adjust that system so that it works for their benefit. Change the designation on serious crimes that are still classified as misdemeanors and make them felonies as they should be.

There is no conflict between civil liberties and victims’ rights. There is no conflict between a fair trial and a balanced trial. By giving victims a stake in the criminal justice system, we need not take away any benefit currently accruing to a defendant. All we’re calling for is balance. If a convicted defendant can tell the judge all the good things about himself in an attempt to avoid harsher punishment, why can’t the family and friends of the victim tell all the good things about her and what has been taken out of the world? Defendants want fairness. So do I.

As David Beatty says, “Probably the most misunderstood concept about the victims movement is that
it is a zero-sum game and that victims’ rights can only be gained at the expense of offenders’. That is not the case. We are not challenging any of the basic core rights that are indelibly protected by the Constitution, things such as due process.”

But one thing we should never do is let the perpetrators co-opt the status of victim. They made the choice that the crime be committed, not the victim.

That is one of the many reasons why I, like Gene and Peggy Schmidt, Jack and Trudy Collins, and an ever-growing groundswell across the nation support a Victims’ Rights Amendment to the Constitution.

Again, David Beatty: “What I think is interesting is the way that people are beginning to see that the constitutional protections for offenders have always been sold to them as, ‘These are your protections. If you’re ever accused of a crime, you’re going to want these protections.’ Well, guess what? If you’re ever the victim of a crime, you’re going to want these basic protections, too. And that’s what the amendment is all about. It’s to protect all of society.”

Stalking victims shouldn’t have to change their names, abandon their lives, move out of town, or die.

Domestic violence victims shouldn’t have to put up with ongoing punishment and abuse or have to resort to killing their abusers or being killed by them.

Victims shouldn’t feel they cannot get information out of the criminal justice system because they have no “standing” in the process. As Kansas victims’ rights coordinator Lynn Allen puts it, how would you feel going to a doctor who wouldn’t give you any idea what was going on? You didn’t ask to become sick, you didn’t make a choice, but you are. And he says to you, “We’ll do surgery and I’ll see you in a couple of hours. That’s all you have to know.” Survey after survey tells us that even more than a favorable outcome of prosecution, victims want to be shown some
compassion for their plight by the system. They don’t want to be told, as Don Gideon told the Schmidts, to “get over it.” They want to be shown that somebody understands and cares.

Sentences shouldn’t be structured so that violent predators can go out and commit the same crime in relatively short order. If they are, as David Beatty states, then “the government comes close to being a coconspirator in the next crime that that person is going to commit.
Rights without remedies equal rhetoric.
”

We shouldn’t be more interested in the privacy and reputation of convicted sexual offenders than we are in the safety of our children.

And our moral outrage at what some people do should not be eroded. Our obsession must be just as strong as the bad guys’. That’s the only way we have a chance of winning this war.

Abscam scandal, 156

Acton, Jay, 454

Adams, Agnes, 396

Adelson, Michael, 347–48

Adler, Jim, 432–34, 435, 445

Air Force, U.S., 202, 221, 226, 318

Allen, Lynn, 421, 465

Alley, Sedley, 198–99

American Law Institute Model Penal Code Test, 34

America’s Most Wanted
, 419

Anderson, Robin, 241

anger rapist, 104, 108–09, 118, 126

antipsychotic drugs, 389

anti-Semitism, 147, 166

antistalking laws, 274, 275–76, 279, 326, 331

Army, U.S., 3, 28, 35, 36, 202, 255, 293, 388

arson, 36, 104

Askins, Jacqueline, 394

assassinations, political, 287–88

attempts at, 288, 290–92

Atascadero State Hospital, 31, 328

Atlanta Child Murders, 39–43, 45

Attica State Prison, 36

Ault, Dick, 40

autopsies:

photographs of, 3, 149–50, 212

reports on, 3, 7, 150, 214

Baltazar, Patrick, 43

Barber, Aisha, 273

Bardo, Robert John, 317–36, 331

Barshop, Steve, 346–47, 349

Bates, Ruby, 164–65, 166

Bazan, Martha, 273

Beatty, David, 280, 283, 286, 302–03, 314, 328, 341, 352, 356–59, 363, 444, 445–46, 464–65, 466

Bell, Eldrin, 260

Berkowitz, David, 9, 16, 35–38

Berlin, Richard, 455

Bernardo, Paul, 339

Bhatia, Lucy, 243

Bhatia, Vinay, 243

Black, Laura, 295–315, 321, 338, 339, 341, 352, 356, 358, 360

Black Sunday
(Harris), 364

Blaufuss, Jim, 424, 438

Bloch, Robert, 371

bodies:

condition of, 1–2, 7–8, 12, 148, 149–50, 207, 213, 423

dumping of, 3, 39, 40, 44–45, 46, 137, 204, 396, 420

evidence of torture on, 12, 45

mutilation and decapitation of, 31, 32, 33, 115, 368–71, 395–96

nude, 1, 7, 21, 46

body fluids, 148, 176, 184

DNA analysis of, 54, 56, 57, 59, 79

Boone, Carole Ann, 386

Bork, John, 425

Boston Strangler, 9

Bowman, Margaret, 386

Brady, James, 314

Branch Davidians, 29

Brannen, Melissa, 219

breaking and entering (B&E), 17, 49, 50, 52, 54, 62, 65, 68, 69, 71–73, 74, 77–78, 86–87, 100, 105

Bremer, Arthur, 288–89, 292, 325

Brewster, David F., 425–28, 441

Brown, Cyril, 393

Brzonkala, Christy, 273

Bulow, Claus von, 156

Bundy, John Culpepper, 375

Bundy, Louise Cowell, 374–75

Bundy, Theodore Robert

“Ted,” 9, 88, 153, 374–87, 388, 397, 399, 401

Burgess, Allen, 104

Burgess, Ann Wolbert, 37, 103, 178–79, 180, 182

burglary, 4, 38, 57, 59, 79, 97, 115, 117, 121, 134, 146, 150, 154, 159, 192, 380

Butcher of Plainfield, 366–74

Butler, Marian, 68–69

California Department of Motor Vehicles, 322, 326

California State Medical Facility at Vacaville, 31

California State Prison, 324

Campbell, Caryn, 380

“Candlelight Vigil of Courage, Hope and Remembrance,” 273

Cannon, Dyan, 316