(Batman/Superman 18)
Oh.
Well.
Okay then.
That’s. That’s.
*crawls off and dies*
Alisa U Zemlji Chuda
Peter Solarz

blake kathryn
trying on a metaphor
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸
NASA
art blog(derogatory)
d e v o n
$LAYYYTER
Game of Thrones Daily

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JVL
YOU ARE THE REASON

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let's talk about Bridgerton tea, my ask is open
Claire Keane
Cosimo Galluzzi
RMH

@theartofmadeline
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@profoundlystickywolf
(Batman/Superman 18)
Oh.
Well.
Okay then.
That’s. That’s.
*crawls off and dies*
greek mythology | cursed images
we’re really at that point in the year where no one cares about anything huh
My psych professor mentioned swaddling in lecture so I emailed him a picture of me being swaddled in my dorm room and asked if I could get extra credit because it was really hot in there and I got really sweaty and he was like “fabulous, sure”
I’m going to miss the Honors Advisor from my university.
I hope you don’t mind, but I slowed the gif down because that is a FANTASTIC move.
The sword clearly cuts his wrist and waist. I mean he took the guys sword away, sure, but also fucked up his own ability to fight at the same time. It’d be one thing if he was wearing armor, but this is like a dueling thing.
I think you give too much credence to a Sword’s ability to cut. This is from the manual I practice, “Il Fior di Battaglia,” “The Flower of Battle,” by Fiore dei Liberi. I have performed this maneuver, and I’ve gotta say, when done right, it feels good.
Point being, if you do it right, when you pivot around your guard and bring the pommel around the blade, your wrist does come into contact with the edge, but there is no sliding motion, and it’s that sliding motion that causes a blade to slice. You pivot, pull against the blade, and it goes flying as your wrist pulls away from the edge.
I’ve never made a blade go flying so far as the guys in this video, but even if I did, the blade doesn’t have the right kind of leverage and power behind it to cut into his waist there. It would strike him, and he might feel it, but I doubt it would even scratch his clothes.
I wrote one of my characters doing a similar move to disarm someone in a couple seconds, now I finally have a concrete picture of exactly how
by Jessica Warrick
Oh my god I am in love with the fishboys’ family portrait
Please reblog if you know anyone who might take party drugs.
this is so important
Also important information: A cop cannot arrest you for something you already took. You can tell a cop to his face that you just injected black tar heroin in your veins and as long as you don’t currently have any on you (including things like syringes or residue in a pipe), there’s fuck all he can do about it.
I take police reports for a living. The number of people who will happily tell someone “Well officer, this fight started because I smoked crack cocaine earlier,” is astounding and also not at all illegal. The criminal charge is for Possession of a Controlled Substance. If you don’t possess any at the time, there’s no crime. The only thing you can get dinged for is if you’re actively on a drug and driving, in which case - DUI.
Please, please, please tell EMTs what you took. They’re not going to rat you out to the cops and even if they did, you will still be okay.
Spreading the word, being honest with paramedics and doctors can save your life
rear wheel drive
@staff deleting all porn while ignoring blogs promoting violence, bigotry, and hate speech
Miss West Virginia
In 1996, 804 children were murdered in the United States. But there's one child that the public remembers to this day.
At 5:25 a.m. on December 26th, 1996, the Boulder Colorado Police Department received an emergency call.
Caller: Please!
911 dispatcher: What's going on there ma’am.
Caller: We have a kidnapping! Hurry, please!
911 dispatcher: Explain to me what's going on, okay?
Caller: There's a note left and our daughters gone!
Patsy and John Ramsey lived in a large house in a wealthy neighborhood. They had two children together, a son— Burke, age 9— and a daughter— JonBenet, age 6.
Police arrived on the scene shortly after the 911 call. But by then, two friends of the Ramsey’s had gone to show their support for the grieving family— contaminating the crime scene.
The police learned that Patsy had risen early— the family was due to leave for a trip to their summer home in Michigan— to find her daughter missing and a three page ransom note at the foot of the stairs. The letter was signed S.B.T.C.
It stated that if the Ramsey’s wanted their daughter’s return, they had to withdraw $118,000 from their bank account and wait for a phone call from 8- 10 A.M. The letter warned the parents not to call the police, if they did she would die. So, as the most obvious choice, Patsy called the police.
The 10 A.M. deadline passed without a call. Just before 1 P.M. Detective Linda Arndt told John Ramsey and Fleet White to search the house again for any personal items that might have been stolen— to keep John occupied. At 1:05 P.M. John found his daughter basement, in their unfinished wine cellar.
He carried her body upstairs, and placed her beneath the Christmas tree. Her body was wrapped in a blanket, her arms bound with cord. She had been garotted with he same cord and one of her mother’s paintbrushes.
The autopsy revealed that she had died of ligature strangulation, and had a fracture and other minor abrasions to the side of her skull. Unidentified DNA— which was neither blood, semen, nor skin— was found beneath her fingernails and on her underwear.
Ninety two percent of children found dead in a family home are usually killed by a family member. So it wasn’t really a surprise when police started pointing fingers at the parents.
It was inconsistent. When police arrived, Patsy’s hair and makeup had been done. Her description of how she discovered the ransom note changed every time she told it. John had failed to report a broken window in their basement, that he closed at 10 A.M. The ransom note itself— unusually long and rehearsed in nature— was written using pen and paper from the Ramsey’s own house. It was also concerning that the amount of money the kidnappers were asking for was the same figure that John had received as his corporate bonus.
As the media circus danced around Boulder, stories of JonBenet and Patsy’s volatile relationship began to surface. The former Miss West Virginia must have been jealous of her beauty pageant- winning daughter, and lashed out in a fit of rage. The “kidnapping” was a cover up, provided by the Ramsey’s.
By the evening of December 26, both parents had hired a lawyer. They refused to sit down for taped interviews until four months after the murder. Their behaviour in front of cameras didn’t live up to the expectation of grieving parents. Many were quick to vilify them.
They were never officially named suspects in the case, they were just “under the umbrella of suspicion.” It was only until 2008, that they were officially absolved of any involvement in the crime.
With no one charged with the murder, a grand jury was convened to examine the evidence in 1998. The group of four men and eight women reviewed over 30,000 pages of reports and hundreds of pieces of evidence relating to the investigation. After thirteen months of continuously examining and re- examining the evidence,it was just not enough to convict anyone of the murder of 6 year old JonBenet Ramsey.
Theres a killer on the loose.
- Patsy Ramsey
Jolly Jane
In February of 1863, Peter Kellie dropped off his daughters— Nora and Dahlia— at Boston Female Asylum. As a mix between an orphanage and school, it taught girls basic things, then sent them off as articled servants. Unfortunately, Dahlia grew up to be a prostitute and died after a life of heavy drinking. Nora though, had a little more luck.
Eventually, Nora was placed into a home, back in her hometown of Lowell. Her guardians ended up giving her a new name— Jane. The next 20 years of Jane’s life would prove to be less than stellar.
She grew up with her “adoptive” sister Elizabeth (think Cinderella). And after Anne— Jane’s adoptive mother— passed away, her contract was turned over to her sister. Instead of going free, she was stuck. This all happened during the Gilded Age, when the rich became richer and the poor delved deeper into poverty.
In 1885, Jane finally was released of her contract. She ended up attending nursing school at Cambridge Hospital. However, she proved to be a bad pupil. Jane often lied, and got other students in trouble for her own deeds.
Her patients still loved her, though. And she loved them too—- loved to poison them. She regularly used morphine (her favorite) and put others into comas. She also injected her victims with Atropine, which countered the visible effects of poisoning. Throughout her stay at Cambridge, she continued to lie, and often stole from patients and the hospital.
In 1890, Jane was kicked out of Cambridge medical school before she was able to get her degree. Despite this though, she stayed in town. She started working as a private physician and— with some recommendations from other physicians— ended up working at Cambridge Hospital. Unfortunately though, many died under Janes care— more than normal. She was let go eventually, because many people thought she was incompetent.
In 1891, Jane had received the nickname “Jolly Jane.” She was called this because she always had a jolly smile on her face. She often wore this smile when making her trademark mineral water. This mineral water consisted of mineral water(imported from Budapest), morphine, and atropine. It was a mix made to poison. She usually gave this to her landlords, slowly killing them.
Every summer though, she’d be able to escape life in the bustling city and spend her time in Cape Cod.
In 1899, Elizabeth— Jane’s adoptive sister— invited her to visit her. So, on August 26, they walked on the beach and caught up. It was a particularly hot day though, so the girls went back inside to eat and freshen up. Being the nice person she was, Jane offered to get them a nice glass of mineral water. Elizabeth, parched, agreed, and Jane came back with a tall glass of her ‘special’ mineral water. A while later, Elizabeth fainted, and Jane turned into the loving caretaker everyone knew her to be.
As time went on, Elizabeth only got worse. And as Elizabeth took her last breaths, Jane was in the bed, right next to her. Jane stated, “I held her in my arms and watched with delight as she gasped out her life.” After that though, she went back to Cambridge— as if nothing ever happened.
In January of 1900, Myra Connors— one of Jane’s friends— invited Jane over to visit also. Jane agreed and went on her way. Whether Jane was jealous of Myra, or she didn’t really care about her; by February 11th, Myra was dead. Jane had killed her. And after some sweet talking, Jane was able to walk away with Myra’s house and job too. However, one year later she was fired for poor workplace ethics.
That summer, Maddie Davis knocked on Jane’s door. She had been in town, visiting her daughter and thought why not visit Jane too. Maddie had come to talk about the fact that Jane hadn’t been paying the full rent in a couple months and her added up debt amounted to roughly $500 ($15000 today).
It was a hot day outside, and being the nice hostess that she was, Jane invited Maddie inside for a nice refreshing glass of European mineral water.
A while later, Jane suggested that she should go to the bank right then and take out the money that she owed Maddie. Madie thought that was a great idea and decided to go with her. Immediately after standing up, Maddie sat back down. She didn’t feel too well. Jane took her to go lay down and went into “nurse” mode. For a week, Maddie was drifting in and out of deep sleep and had seizures regularly. Jane then gave Maddie a huge dose of morphine and let it work it’s magic. A little while later, Maddie passed away.
Not long after Maddie died, Genevieve and Minnie Alden asked Jane to look after their ailing father— Jane agreed. When she got to the Alden’s residence, she decided that she wanted to get rid of the rest of the family, once and for all. Jane had to be smart about this though. So, she started building a case. She started setting things on fire, maybe because she wanted the family to blame each other of being unstable. She even told Minnie that she had seen Genevieve staring at rat poison.
A week later, Genevieve was found dead. Jane had told Minnie that she had seen a syringe in Genevieve’s room. Her death was ruled a tragic suicide. Two weeks later, Minnie’s father was gone too. That must’ve been hard for Minnie. In just the span of two weeks, she managed to lose both her sister and her father. Unbeknownst to her though, she would be meeting them pretty soon.
Minnie had ended up dead, just four days after her father had. This time it was different though, this time there was a witness. Minnie had a son— Jessie— who just happened to be staying with her. He was asleep when Jane had snuck into his room, picked him up, and took him to Minnie’s room. Unfortunately though, he couldn’t do anything but watch, as his mother seized and drew her last breath.
After though, she would go on to ask Minnie’s husband, if she could be his housekeeper— he said no. She then went on to try and seduce her late sister, Elizabeth’s, husband. He too rejected her. Jane had had enough. Maybe as a cry for attention, she had overdosed on morphine. She lived though, and was taken to a nearby hospital.
Though, just like Jane, not everyone is who they say they were. One patient in the hospital with Jane, was actually not a patient. He was an undercover, private detective hired by Paul Gibbs. He was Minnie’s father in law and suspected Jane of foul play. He decided to have minnie’s body exhumed also for further evidence. It all checked out, and Jane was arrested and charged with murder.
Though Jane could only name about 30 or so victims, it was suspected that her body count added up to around 100. It was a quick trial, Jane was deemed morally insane by the court. She was then sent off to Taunton State Hospital.
Life in a mental institution was hard, Jolly Jane’s smile slowly crept off her face. In the end Jane was killed by the paranoia that the nurses would do exactly what she had— kill her.
“Get the morphine dearie, and well go out into the ward, you and I will have a lot of fun seeing them die”
- Jolly Jane
And Then There Were None
Keith hadn’t shown up for work that day, which was… odd, to say the least. It was unlike Keith to miss work, much less without a phone call. By lunch, his boss had had it. He picked up the phone and called Keith’s mom. If his boss wasn’t concerned about Keith before the phone call, he was after.
Neither of Keith’s parents had seen or heard from him and they were starting to get worried. So, as the most logical option Keith’s parents called the police.
On November 17, 1987, police walked into the Dardeen’s Ina, Illinois home. There they stumbled upon a ghastly sight. Blood was everywhere, and there was streaks of it leading to the bedroom. What they found in the bedroom was equally, if not, more so terrifying.
Thirty year old Ruby Elaine Dardeen was found dead in her bedroom. She had been beaten to death with her son’s baseball bat. Elaine was heavily pregnant at the time and ended up giving birth during the attack. Unfortunately, neither her 3 year old son nor newborn baby were spared. Both were found lying next to her on the bed, bludgeoned to death as well.
As police checked the rest of the house, they still hadn’t seen Keith. As time dragged on, hopes of finding him were low. At this point, Keith was a prime suspect in the slaughter of his family. However, those suspicions were squashed soon after. On November 18, the day following Elaine’s discovery, Keith was found. His body was butchered in a nearby wheat field.
Police had a hard time trying to catch the killer. It wouldn’t be until years later in December of 1999 that they would get a lead.
Tommy Lynn Sells was caught for the murder of 9 year old Mary Perez. He was held and was awaiting trial, while waiting he started to confess. Among these confessions was the the admittance to the Dardeen family murders.
All the evidence was there; Tommy told accurate facts about the massacre, he also happened to passing through the small town when the family was slaughtered. The evidence seemed to line up.
The police didn’t believe him though. The details about the killings Lynn could’ve gleaned from the media. When quizzed about details never made public about how Elaine’s body was found, Sells initially replied inaccurately, then blurted out the correct response.
“There was a lot of ambiguity” in his claims, Duncan said. “But there also was nothing about what he said that would make his guilt completely discountable.”
So the prosecutor was stymied, unwilling to pin Sells with the Ina killings based on a questionable confession and no physical evidence. He could have been the killer, Duncan said, but there’s “a fair possibility that the actual killer may still be out there.”
Rage don’t have a stop button.
-Tommy Lynn Sells
Tent Girl
Wilbur Riddle was off of route 25, collecting glass telephone pole insulators. He then found what looked like to be a bundled up green tarp. With a little prod from his foot, Riddle had sent the bundle of green tarp unfurling down the embankment. The green tarp unraveled to reveal a funny looking shape. Upon closer inspection, Riddle realized that it was a body. He ran to the nearest gas station to call the sheriff with this startling new information.
When the sheriff came and cut open the rest of the tarp, he was met with a gristly image. A white, teenage, girl with short, brown, hair; frozen in the position of trying to escape.
She had been dubbed “Tent Girl” for the time being, at least until someone came and claimed her. But, nobody did. Despite all the effort the police made, she was left to rot there, alone and forgotten.
It would be 3 years until “Tent Girl’s” body would be laid to rest. In 1971, she was finally buried in Georgetown Cemetery. Her story leaves us with a heartbreaking epitaph:
Tent Girl
Found May 17, 1968
On U.S. Highway 25, N.
Died about April 26 - May 3, 1968
Age about 16 - 19 years
Height 5 Feet 1 Inch
Weight 110 to 115 Lbs.
Reddish Brown Hair
Unidentified
Some decades later, Todd Matthews had started dating Lori Riddle— Wilbur’s daughter. Lori recounted the story of “Tent Girl” to Todd, and eventually, he became somewhat obsessed with the cake. Todd had looked at all the press coverage, and compared them to missing persons reports at that time. However in the age of pre- internet, Matthews only had interviews and press coverage to help him. For a decade, Todd had gathered shreds and shards of information from varying sources, though none of them could be valuable in aiding Todd.
Advancements in technology were being discovered, and soon the age of internet would be born. Todd was able to use this to his advantage. Distance would no longer be a barrier.
One day on the internet, Todd stumbled across a community of people looking into different cold cases. Looking through the posts, he saw something that made his heart skip a beat. In 1998, Todd discovered a post from Arkansaw. A woman named Rosemary Westbrook was looking for her older sister
“My sister Barbara has been missing since the latter part of 1967. She has brown hair and brown eyes, about 5 feet 2 inches tall, and was last seen in the Lexington, Kentucky area.”
Todd soon made contact with Rosemary and patched her in with Kentucky’s forensics department. “Tent Girl” was exhumed on March 2, 1998. Her body was sent to Frankfort, Kentucky for DNA testing.
Tent Girl’s identification confirmed her as 24 year old Barbara Ann Hackmann- Taylor.
Without her family’s knowledge, Barbara had moved to Kentucky. She left her husband, who was a carnival worker, and her 3 small children. Her husband George Earl Taylor, claimed that barbara had left him for another man and that he hasn’t seen her in years. When Barbara was identified, George had died of cancer in october of 1987..
George was never proven to be involved with the crime, yet Todd believes that he was the one who killed her.
In Georgetown cemetery, a new grave marker, under the old one, it says
“Bobbie”
Barbara Ann Hackmann
Sept.12, 1943 — Dec. 6, 1967
Loving mother, grandmother, & sister.
Lonely Hearts Club
When someone says, “I’d kill for you,” do they really mean it? For Martha Beck and Raymond Fernandez, they did. From 1947 until 1949, they lured women through personal ads, only to kill them later. They weren't kidding when they said that love kills.
Raymond Fernandez started off as part of Spain’s Merchant Marine. After that, he became part of British intelligence during WWII. On a boat heading towards America, a steel hatch fell on Raymond, damaging his frontal lobe. He endured permanent damage to his brain and everything went south from there.
Once, when Fernandez was imprisoned for theft, he had acquainted himself with another inmate. Fernandez then proceeded to claim that this inmate taught him voodoo and black magic. He also assterted that he now had “irresistible power over women.”
After serving his time in jail, Raymond started answering to “lonely hearts” ads in the local newspaper. He would take them out, then he robbed them for their money, jewelry, and valuables.
Martha Seabrook was a teenage runaway. Raped by her brother, then beaten by her mother, she had finally had enough. She ran away to California, only to come back pregnant out of wedlock. She claimed that the father was a serviceman who had died in war. Later, she got pregnant again, this time by a bus driver named Alfred Beck. Soon after Martha told him she was pregnant they got married, only to divorce 6 months later. However, she still kept his last name.
After placing a lonely heart’s ad in the newspaper, Martha met Raymond, and they started a letter writing relationship. Months later, they met in person in New York, and Raymond managed to convince Martha to abandon her children. On January 25, 1948, Martha dropped her kids off at the Salvation Army.
Raymond saw this as proof of her unconditional love and divulged his crimes to her. Martha overlooked this and decided to stay with him. She even acted as his sister, which put many at ease, and made them easier targets.
In 1949, Martha and Raymond committed the the three murders of which they would later be convicted. The first of the three murders would be of 66 year old Janet Fay. Fernandez had been “engaged” to Janet for a while. One night, Martha saw them in bed together, she picked up a ball- peen hammer and struck Janet. If she wasn’t killed by the hammer, she was by Raymond choking her with her own scarf. They buried her at Raymond’s (actual) sister’s house and covered her in cement. From there, they moved on to Grand Rapids, Michigan.
In Michigan, Raymond met Delphine Downing, and soon started dating. A couple weeks later, they started sleeping together, and Martha became jealous. When Downing started to suspect that something fishy was going on, Martha encouraged her to take sleeping pills to calm down. After Delphine fell asleep, her daughter Rainell started crying. Becoming annoyed by the child, Beck choked the infant until she passed out. Although, she left bruises on the child’s neck. Fearing what would happen when downing would wake up and see the marks on her daughter’s neck, Fernandez shot and killed her. Two days later, Martha drowned Rainell. They buried both of the bodies in the basement. After burying them, they both went to the movies. A little after they came back, they were greeted by police officers.
Raymond and Martha were apprehended and only tried for the murder of Janet Fay because at the time, New York had the death penalty, Michigan did not. Raymond later confessed to the murders of Janet Fay, Delphine and Rainell Downing, and more murders that they have committed. Later he would also confess to taking the blame to protect Martha.
On March 8, 1951 both Raymond Fernandez and Martha Beck were executed by the electric chair, still professing their love for each other.
“I wanna shout it out; I love Martha! What do the public know about love?”
-Raymond Fernandez.
“My story is a love story. But only those tortured by love can know what I mean.”
-Martha Beck
Star- Crossed Lovers
Somewhere on the internet, two quiet teenagers, living in broken homes two states apart, found one another.
Nicole, 16, loved her music, so much that her neighbors said she spent hours alone at home listening to CD’s. Billy lived in Willimantic, a respectful but troubled 18-year-old who worked at McDonald's and loved driving his black Chevy.
Something between them clicked, and the relationship evolved. A few weeks later, Nicole Kasinskas and Billy Sullivan decided they wanted to live together in Connecticut.
They had a problem, though. Nicole's mother objected. So, according to police, Billy and Nicole decided to kill her.
A select few knew that Nicole had a boyfriend. Billy, told some friends about a girlfriend he had out of state. But mostly, it seems, they kept their relationship to themselves.
Nicole was a straight A student. As a result, she was often bullied. Nicole’s dad had left her after her parents’ divorce, so it was just her and her mom. Nicole didn’t really have friends, because of this her mother became her best friend. They were inseparable— joined at the hip.
After learning about Billy and Nicole’s relationship, Jeanne accepted encouraged their relationship. Unfortu, this would prove fatal for her in the end.
According to reports, the teenagers said in separate interviews that they had tried to kill Jeanne three times. The fourth time, however, they succeeded.
The first idea was to stage an accident that would set the house on fire. The plan was to use a candle to burn Jeanne's bed or mattress, but it failed because the bedding was made of fire-retardant material.
Then, they tried to poison her by putting Dimetapp, Benadryl and other drugs into coffee creamer in the refrigerator. After Jeanne used the creamer but didn't die, they added bleach to the container, according to the reports. It is not confirmed whether she consumed the creamer spiked with bleach though.
Their final failed attempt involved blowing up the fuel oil tank in Jeanne’s house. Billy and Nicole tied two ropes together to serve as a wick and intended to ignite the rope with a lighter. This scheme ``was also unsuccessful,'' according to a document that did not elaborate further.
Jeanne Dominico was 43. She was a single mother devoted to Nicole and her 14 year old brother Charlie. On August 6, she was found face down in a pool of blood on her kitchen floor; her throat and neck slashed repeatedly.
Billy told police he did it. Nicole told them she helped plan the attack. She also told the police about their deal: if Billy killed Jeanne, Nicole would clean the mess.
Rather than running away to Connecticut— as planned— Nicole and Billy are now in separate prisons. They will spend the next 30 years in prison.
The brutal killing caused shock and puzzlement in two communities.
How could such a pleasant mother, who lived a seemingly ordinary life in an unremarkable house, find herself caught up in a cold-blooded plot, hatched by two love-struck teenagers?
And what of these teenagers? Who by most accounts were largely invisible in their respective schools, doing little— good or bad— to distinguish themselves?
Family members have been reluctant to talk. Friends and acquaintances interviewed over the past two weeks say they know little about Nicole Kasinskas and Billy Sullivan and the lives they led.
“The whole thing is unbelievable,'' said Douglas Milroy, a truck driver who owns property next to the house where Dominico died. “It's like a Sunday night movie.'' Milroy said he is convinced Billy must have manipulated Nicole. She was a “sweet, cute kid'' whom he watched grow up and in whom he never saw signs of trouble.
In Willimantic, neighbors and acquaintances have much the same of Billy. “He's quiet — he didn't really like to talk,'' said Danny Goss, a student at Windham High who has been friends with Billy. “But he was good in school and didn't get in any trouble.''
Official reports released by the courts present a dramatically different picture. Although the court records do not indicate how Jeanne reacted to these attempts, tension in the house was apparent.
Nicole told police that her mother objected to her plans to move out and live with Billy. She also wrote letters to her mother about troubling issues in their relationship.
Billy had been staying at the house, for the week leading up to Jeanne’s killing. Although a neighbor in Willimantic said he saw Billy outside his home about 2 p.m. the day she died.
A neighbor in Nashua, Alissa Bettencourt, said she arrived home about 8:30 p.m. the night of the killing to find police swarming inside and around the small, residential street.
The police had been called about an hour earlier, when an acquaintance of Jeanne had gone to the house and found her body.
Bettencourt said she quickly found out Dominico had been killed and said that her first thought was how devastated Nicole and Charlie would be.
Friends
Oscar Wilde once said, “a true friend stabs you in the front.” Many people take this quote many different ways. One way is that you can tell your friends anything. A more grim take on it is that you expect it less when your friend turns and stabs you. Thats the way one family took it one August morning.
Her family called the police, they were worried. They hadn’t heard from Patricia Steward for a while now. Nor had she shown up for work that day. It was August 25, 2017, and police were unprepared for what they’d find that day.
On the block of Balmoral Drive in Glasgow Village, police arrived to find a grisly scene. Three males and one female, found in different rooms of the house; all had been shot and killed. The youngest, Terrence Dehart age 10, was just recently adopted by 56 year old Patricia. Her son Joseph Corley and his best friend Deandre Kelly, ages 20 and 18, were also found dead.
Initially thought of as a break in, it was quickly ruled as a surprise attack because of how untouched the house seemed. It soon turned into a 4 month long investigation and many started to lose hope.
It was Friday when they arrested Ja’Vonne Dupree. He was found on Arsenal St. in St. Louis. Dupree was a family friend of the Steward’s, and he had killed them.
He had taken their electronics, their clothes, and their silver Ford Fusion. Dupree was charged with four counts of first-degree murder, four counts of robbery, nine counts of armed criminal action, burglary, stealing a motor vehicle and tampering with physical evidence. He is being held in the St. Louis County Justice Center without bail.
Behind Closed Doors
Family.
What does that mean?
To some, family is just that. A group of people— usually consisting of parents and children— living under one household. To others, family are the bonds that we make along the way. For most of humanity, family usually means the latter. They are to die for, and in some cases, even kill for. Unfortunately though, this is not the story of star crossed lovers, killing people for each other. This is the story of a man, who killed his family.
It looked like any other house on the block. Pink ruffled curtains, wooden lawn ornaments and an in-ground swimming pool. The Wasserman family’s suburban home, looked as welcoming as ever. However, the house held a few secrets.
Steven Lee Wasserman was a “quiet man with a temper.” Neighbors occasionally heard unsettling shouts from inside the home as the 44 year old, bellowed at his daughter, son, and girlfriend.
Nothing in the family’s past, however, prepared neighbors for what police officers discovered in the home one Tuesday afternoon.
In the garage, Steven was seated inside a 1985 Chevy Blazer alongside his son, where they had died of carbon monoxide poisoning. On the first floor of the home was his ex-girlfriend, Valerie Soto. She had been beaten to death with a baseball bat. And in an upstairs bedroom was the body of his daughter.
The daughter’s body lay more decomposed than the others, leading investigators to suspect that she had been killed before the rest.
The killings left residents of the quiet street staggered. Despite Wasserman’s shouting, he seemed to be a responsible father.
Patty Frye’s four children often played with Wasserman’s children. She never suspected that the children had been abused or endangered. “We would bring them to church sometimes and the kids would come over to play,” Frye said. We just didn’t get to know the parents as well as we should have, apparently.“
The deaths also left police and child welfare officials combing through files in order to determine whether the family had a history of child abuse. Police Chief Robert Doyle said there were indications that a child abuse complaint had been filed at the address in 1996. However, it was unclear whether Wasserman lived there at the time. Doyle said that the police had not responded to any calls to the Brooke Avenue home in recent years. In years past though, the police were called to Stevens former address for reports of domestic disputes.
Neighbors said they occasionally saw people they believed were child welfare case workers visit the home. But spokesman for the state’s Division of Youth and Family Services declined to comment on whether they had ever investigated allegations against Steven.
Although his parents lived in the house before he and his children moved in. He was a presence on the block for more than a decade. Neighbors though, said he rarely socialized and was not well known. The police said this afternoon that they still had only sketchy details about Wasserman’s past.
Camden County prosecutor— Vincent P. Sarubbi— said that Steven had been divorced several years ago and that his former wife, Lisa Asquith, now lived in Michigan. Wasserman had worked at casinos in Atlantic City, but it was unclear what his job was and whether he was currently employed. In a lengthy suicide note he left in the home, he bemoaned his troubled relationships, sporadic employment and family problems.
James Bell, a construction worker who built the house next to the Wasserman’s home, said Mr. Wasserman had appeared troubled about money. ’‘He approached me about repairs to the house,” Mr. Bell said. “We’d send people over to fix stuff, but he could never afford it. He just wasn’t a happy guy. He never had a smile on his face.”
Today, as neighbors dropped by to leave flowers, stuffed animals, and poems outside the home in memory of the children, many said there had been no hint of the depth of Wasserman’s despair. He had reportedly fought to gain custody of the children. And on a street like Brooke Avenue— where many homes have large wooden playsets visible in the backyard and bicycles on the front lawn— people respected his willingness to take on the challenge of single parenthood.
Rosie Nagle, who lives a few doors away, said she had not yet found a way to discuss the killings with her two young children. When her son saw the police removing the bodies Tuesday afternoon, Nagle told him that the victims were sick and going to the hospital. Today, as she left red roses at the base of an oak tree in front of the Wasserman’s home, Rosie appeared to be struggling to make sense of the tragedy herself.
“Why did he have to hurt the children?”
-Rosie
Blurred Lines
Oh, should I travel through the woods? Or should I not wishing I would? For above me lurks within the trees, No one could hear my deathly screams. The palest man, the blackest suit, Bigger than the tallest brute. Six black arms will grab you up, Or stalk you till you just give up. A top hat bares upon his head, Makes your soul fill up with dread. He takes you when you least expect, Boil you up, and eat your neck. He'll leave your body not to eat, But staple your corpse on a tree.
Many people are obssed with the horror genre; from watching scary movies in the dark, to sitting around a capfire, telling stories. People have this pull towards the frighning. But, how deep is too deep? How far down the road can you go until the line betwen fiction and reality becomes too blurry?
Saturday, May 31, 2014
It was a special morning for the Geyser family. It so happened to be Morgan Geyser’s birthday. Anissa Weier and Payton Leutner were at her house. It was Morgan’s 12 birthday and her friends had slept over the previous night.
What started off as a normal day quickly grew into a grotesque, macabre, and morbid story of betrayal. The three girls had woken up and ate doughnuts and strawberries for breakfast. Then Morgan asked her mother if they could go to the park, thinking nothing of it she said they could. Unbeknownst to Payton and the rest of the world, that day, Anissa and Morgan had ulterior motives.
A year before the incident, Anissa and Morgan had gotten into creepypasta. Creepypastas are essentially short horror stories passed around the internet. They present the same harm that a scary story told around a campfire does. However, mixed with the wrong mind— a developing one at that— and a lot of time in the dark to let that mind wander, is a recipe for disaster.
One creepypasta that Anissa and Morgan were especially infatuated with was Slenderman. As a person who regularly surfs the internet for hours on end, I’ve read an article or two about him. Anyone who uses the internet, and has a fascination for all things horror has most likely heard about Slenderman at some point or another. He is a tall, faceless man with tendrils coming out of his back. He stalks children, and those unfortunate enough to be chosen by him are never seen or heard from again.
They wanted to prove that slenderman was real, in fact they wanted to be his proxies (his servants). They wanted to prove all the skeptics wrong. How were they going to do that? The original plan was to kill Payton at Morgan’s house, put the covers over her to make it seem like she was sleeping, then run— all the way to Nicolet National Forest.
However, Morgan wanted to give Payton “one more day.” They ended up going to the park and played on the playground for a little while. They soon went to the girls bathroom and the plan there was: kill Payton, drain her blood, sit her up in a stall, lock it, then run to Nicolet. Not feeling up to the task right then and there, Anissa and Morgan decided to stall.
With plans A and B out the window, Anissa and Morgan continued down the list. They settled on playing a game— hide and seek. Payton didn’t want to play, but Anissa assured her that she could pick the next game. So they went on with the game and Anissa dragged Payton further and further into the woods.
That’s when Anissa and Morgan decided to strike. They hit Peyton, enough to daze her and got on top of her. Morgan sat on her legs and waited for Anissas “ok” before being told to “go ballistic, go crazy.”
Payton was stabbed a total of 19 times. She was stabbed in her arms, legs, and torso. Her liver, pancreas, and stomach were punctured. Fortunately though, they missed her heart by a hair. Anissa and Morgan told Payton that they would go get help, but had really left her there to die. Payton, not taking any chances, crawled her way to a trail and was found by a passing cyclist.
A little over four hours later, Anissa and Morgan were found near Interstate 95— on their way to Nicolet National Forest. When they were picked up, Morgan was carrying one of her mother's purses. That purse contained some snacks, water, and a kitchen knife with a five inch blade.
When questioned why they did this, Anissa said that it was “necessary.” If they didn’t, Slenderman would come for them and their families. They believed that slenderman was real, which is understandable. At the age of 12 the line between fact and fiction isn’t as distinct as it might be, compared to a mind to that of an adult. Throw in oppositional defiant disorder, schizophrenia, and nobody to talk to about this, and it’s a perfect brew for a killer.
Both Morgan Geyser and Anissa Weier were charged with attempted first degree murder. They were both tried as adults at Waukesha County Court. And on September 29, 2017 Anissa and Morgan were sentenced to 40 years in a mental hospital.
When professor of psychiatry, Frank Ochberg, was brought in to tell his view on the events, he said, “We are intrigued by the oddity, the horror, the irony of little girls doing terrible things. It doesn’t go with the age or gender.” I, however, find this comment to be very sexist, because if you think about it, little girls doing terrible things has been going on since the 17th century. Take the salem witch trials for example, a group of little girls were bored and decided to cause a mass hysteria, which resulted in the death of 20 innocent people.
Through the ages, society has created the mold for girls: that they should be caring, kind, and sweet, little princesses. Humanity has managed to encase them so tightly in the mold, that it is horrifying even more so when they break it.
Maybe that’s why this story is so frightening? It’s the story that says, no matter who you are, the line between fact and fiction, might not be as clear as originally thought.
Beware the man, The Slenderman. For he could do, What no one can.