Most Murder Cases Aren't That Interesting

Sherlock Holmes would have no interest whatever in most of the 22,076 murders reported in the United States in 1994. [That's double today's murder rate.] Only 20 cases involved poison or explosives. Only 22 were by narcotics overdose. Some 78 murders were classified as involving rape. Just 15 involved prostitution and commercialized vice. Sniper attacks make good television, but only two such homicides occurred in the United States in 1994. About 1.7 percent of the murders involved romantic triangles. Although 1,157 of the murders were classified as juvenile gang killings…the police often overdo their coding of gang involvement. Thus, if a store owner gets shot in a robbery and the offender seemed to be a gang member, many police departments count that incident as a gang murder rather than something more plain. Gang members may be highly criminal, but that does not mean that most of the crimes they commit are of, by, or for the gang itself. Members do most crime for themselves.

Marcus Felson, Crime & Everyday Life, Second Edition, 1998

Thornton P. Knowles On Stag Flicks, Pornography, and The Speed Of Cultural Change

I remember when filmed pornography wasn't mainstream entertainment. Now they're called adult films. Back in the day, a short, beer-bellied guy with greasy hair and a neck tattoo would come to the party with his reel and projector. The grainy black and white film usually featured a middle-aged, paunchy woman having sex with a masked, hairy man. My first and last stag film viewing made me feel like a peeping Tom. Maybe that was because pornography itself was forbidden, clandestine and against the law. The way it was presented was also obscene. Perhaps the most shocking feature of the modern era is the speed and severity of cultural change. It's disturbing to think that what is now generally considered to be socially taboo could someday become mainstream, acceptable behavior.

Thornton P. Knowles

Thornton P. Knowles On Small Town America

By choice, I've never lived in the city. I wouldn't like the noise, the smell, the cost, the traffic, the pollution, the crime and the inconvenience of urban living. I like the less hectic, slower pace of a small community and consider myself fortunate to have enjoyed the benefits of small town life while it still exists. The day will come when America's small towns will fall into decay or be consumed by suburban sprawl. I'm glad I won't be around for that.

Thornton P. Knowles

Dr. Marian Antoinette Patterson: The Employer From Hell

     In 2018, Dr. Marian Antoninette Patterson, a 1995 graduate of the Medical College of Georgia, practiced medicine at the Family Medical Practice in Valdosta, Georgia. In February 2018, the Georgia Composite Medical Board suspended Dr. Patterson after members of her staff complained of being threatened by her of physical violence.

     According to one of Dr. Patterson's employees, the doctor threatened to cut this employee from her throat to her private parts. Another member of the doctor's staff reported the doctor's threat to cut off her head and roll it down the hallway, but not before she brought the employee's children in to witness the beheading. When terrified employees said they were calling 911, Doctor Patterson allegedly promised that they would be dead before the arrival of the police.

     An employee of the Family Medical Practice alleged that Dr. Patterson kept her from leaving the office by grabbing her arm. Dr. Patterson was also accused of throwing a reflex hammer at an employee. The doctor also, according a complainant, pulled her medical diploma off the wall and stomped on it.

     On March 5, 2018, the Georgia Medical Board suspended Dr. Patterson's license to practice.

     Valdosta police officers, on April 25, 2018, booked Marian Antoinette Patterson into the Lowndes County Jail on three counts of terroristic threats and one count of false imprisonment. Shortly after being taken into custody, the suspect posted her bail and was released. 

The Dr. Michael J. Davidson Murder-Suicide Case

     Dr. Michael J. Davidson, the director of Endovascular Cardiac surgery at Boston's Brigham and Woman's Hospital, after graduating from Princeton University in 1992, earned his medical degree from Yale University. He interned at Duke University Medical Center and in 2006 joined the staff at Brigham. The 44-year-old cardiovascular surgeon also taught at the Harvard Medical School.

     The doctor and his wife Terri, a plastic surgeon, lived in Wellesley, Massachusetts with their three children. Dr. Davidson had celebrated his 40th birthday by running in the Boston Marathon.

     Stephen Pasceri, 55, lived in a two-story colonial style home in Millbury, Massachusetts with his 63-year-old wife Teresa. He worked for the Waters Corporation, a company in Milford that manufactured specialized laboratory equipment. Known in the community as the "Church Guy" because he regularly knocked on doors to raise money for the Millbury Federated Church, Mr. Pasceri was considered a friendly, happy-go-lucky man. He and his wife had raised four children.

     On November 15, 2014, Mr. Pasceri's mother, Marguerite E. Pasceri, passed away after being treated at Brigham and Woman's Hospital. According to reports, Mr. Pasceri blamed Dr. Davidson for her death.

     At eleven in the morning of Tuesday January 20, 2015, armed with a .40-caliber pistol he was licensed to carry, Mr. Pasceri walked into the Carl J. and Ruth Shapiro Cardiovascular Center located on the second floor of the building across the street from the hospital's main entrance. He asked a member of the staff if he could speak to Dr. Davidson.

     A few minutes after Mr. Pasceri entered the Cardiovascular Center, following a loud exchange of words, Stephen Pasceri pulled out his firearm and shot Dr. Davidson twice at close range. He then used the gun to end his own life.

     At ten-forty-five that night, Dr. Davidson, after undergoing emergency surgery, died from his wounds.

     Dr. Davidson's sudden, unexpected death at the hands of an unlikely killer sent shock waves through Boston's medical community and stunned people who knew Mr Pasceri. Because hospital shootings are relatively rare, the hospital's entrances do not feature metal detectors or security personnel to screen visitors and staff who might be armed.  

Thornton P. Knowles On Golf

Someone once said that a round of golf was a good walk spoiled. Except for people who do it for a living, golfers don't even walk anymore. You hit the ball, yell fore! then climb into your buggy. There are pursuits and goals in life I'll never understand. But I suppose diversity of tastes and interests makes it all a little more interesting. Golf. Why not?

Thornton P. Knowles

Dark Humor

     A friend of mine once told me about a guy who murdered his first wife and put her in a freezer. He had her in a storage locker and his second wife stopped paying the bill for it, so the contents were auctioned off, and one lucky buyer purchased a freezer with a dead woman inside.

     Gruesome certainly, but I could easily imagine a darkly comic story about such a situation.

Robin Hemley in How to Write Funny edited by John B. Kachuba, 2001

Wayne Carter: NJ Man Throws Intestines at Police

     At ten o'clock Sunday night, May 20, 2012, police in Hackensack, New Jersey responded to a report of a 43-year-old man who threatened to kill himself. Wayne Carter had barricaded himself in the bedroom of his house. Two officers kicked open the bedroom door and found Carter crouched in a corner holding a 12-inch knife. The officers ordered the disturbed and distraught man to drop the weapon. Instead, he stood up and began stabbing himself in the abdomen, legs, and neck.

     The stunned police officers, in an effort to keep this man from killing himself, showered him with two cans of pepper-spray. Immune to the pepper-spray, Mr. Carter reacted by throwing pieces of his bloody tissue and intestines at the officers. They backed-off and called in the Bergen County SWAT team.

     Members of the SWAT team overpowered and disarmed the bleeding and weakened subject. Paramedics rushed him to a nearby hospital where he underwent emergency surgery. He had stabbed himself 50 times, and was listed in critical condition.

     According to his family and friends, Wayne Carter had a history of mental illness and had abused drugs. He had also been arrested for assault and resisting arrest but has not been charged in this case. His bizarre behavior, coming as it did in the wake of the face-chewing case in Miami, and the college student's cannibalism in Maryland, has made people wonder where the epidemic of drug use and mental illness is leading this country.   

FBI: Tarnished Badges

     During J. Edgar Hoover's reign as the fourth director of the FBI (1924-1972), I don't believe a single agent committed a crime serious enough to send him to prison. During the bureau's entire history, I don't think a female agent has been put behind bars. Since 1972, however, dozens of male agents have gone from investigators to inmates. At least four have been convicted of murder, and several have been put away for espionage. Many others have been imprisioned for perjury, theft, and even child molestation.

Special Agent Darin McAllister and the Root Of All Evil

     After growing up in the Chicago suburb of Skokie, Illinois, Darin McAllister earned a degree in divinity from Oral Roberts University in Oklahoma. At age 26, he moved to Los Angeles where he became a staff minister at the West Angeles Church of God in Christ in south LA. His wife Judith, a gospel singer, became minister of music.

     In the early 1990s, the Los Angeles Police Department actively recruited African American officers in an effort to improve its relationship with the city's minority population. In March 1991, the Rodney King beating led to race riots in the city. McAllister joined the department that year as a patrol officer. In 1996 he applied to the FBI, was hired as a Special Agent, and assigned to the Los Angeles Division where he gathered street gang intelligence as an undercover agent.

     Seven years later, in 2003, the bureau transfered McAllister to the Nashville Resident Agency out of the Memphis Division. McAllister moved to Tennessee with his wife, three children, and a profit of $236,000 from the sale of his house in California. With that money, and mortgage loans from several banks, McAllister purchased, fixed-up and rented out several duplexes.

     The FBI agent/real estate investor was doing quite well until the housing market crashed in 2008. McAllister lost tenants and fell behind in his mortgage payments. His loans were called in, he couldn't pay, and the banks foreclosed. In 2009, after he filed for bankruptcy, bank examiners discovered that McAllister, when he had applied for the mortage loans, had inflated his personal income by hundreds of thousands of dollars.

     In May 2010, a federal grand jury indicted McAllister of wire fraud, false bank declarations, and other banking fraud related offenses, 19 counts in all. In December of that year, in a U.S. District Court in Franklin, Tennessee, a jury found McAllister guilty of several counts of mortgage fraud. The judge sentenced him to four years in prison, and fined him $675,000.

     McAllister's attorney appealed his client's conviction, claiming that McAllister was duped by shoddy real estate appraisers and loan officers.

     People have gone to prison for crimes a lot worse than McAllister's. He lied, and picked the wrong time to get into real estate. Had he been a member of congress, no problem. But he was a FBI agent, and he should have known better.

     Today, the FBI and the Department of Justice is in the midst of a scandal involving dozens of alleged crimes, most of which are against America's most cherished principle: democracy. It could be argued that the FBI is at the lowest point of its history and my never recover from its breach of trust with the American people. As a former FBI agent who has followed and written about the history of the bureau, I regret saying this.

The Toy Gun, Gun Image, Gun Facsimile and Gun Gesture Hysteria in Our Schools

     Zero tolerance generally equals zero discretion and good sense. However, if there is one zero-tolerance police we should have in our schools it should be a ban on idiot teachers and administrators. That, of course won't happen. If it weren't for public education and the government, where would these fools work?

     It won't be long before some neurotic kid approaches his teacher with a disturbing confession. "Ms. Fox," he says in a trembling voice, "I had a bad thought. Last week, while in your classroom, the image of a gun crept into my head. I am so sorry. It will never happen again. How many days will I be suspended?"

     "It depends," Ms. Fox replies. "Was it an assault weapon?"

December 2012: Tamaqua, Pennsylvania

     A seventh grade student at the Tamaqua Middle School in Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania formed his hand in the symbol of a gun and pointed its finger-barrel. He aimed his .25-caliber appendage at a fellow student. The Pennsylvania State Police were called into the case to, among other things, determine if the "shooter" had said "POW!" If he didn't make the muzzle sound it was probably because he was pretending to be firing a handgun with a silencer. (Just kidding.) Police said the boy will be charged with disorderly conduct, and suspended from school. (Not kidding.)

December 2012: Chickasha, Oklahoma

     A five-year-old elementary school student was suspended for a day after he made a gun gesture with his hand. The offender pointed the nonexistent weapon at another student. Had the other kid gestured first, the student in trouble might have acquired a pretend student attorney and claimed self-defense.

January 2013: Trappe, Maryland

     School officials at the Marsh Elementary School in Trappe, Maryland punished two 6-year-old boys with suspension for "shooting" each other with imaginary guns and bullets. In a game of cops and robbers, they were using their fingers to replicate firearms. (If I were running this school I'd only punish the kid pretending to be the robber. What do they have against cops in that school?)

January 2013: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

     A South Philadelphia elementary school student was chastised in front of her class for coming to school armed with a piece of paper crudely shaped in the pattern of a handgun. Students made fun of the girl with the gun-shaped piece of paper, calling her a "murderer." I would advise these kids to be careful; this paper-toting kid might come to class one day with a big sheet of paper in the general shape of an assault rifle, or an Army tank.

January 2013: Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania

     A 5-year-old kindergarten girl in Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania was suspended for threatening to shoot one of her playmates with her Hello Kitty gun, a toy in the general shape of a firearm that blows soapy bubbles. School officials characterized this as a "terroristic threat." While unregistered, the semi-automatic bubble-gun had been purchased legally by a kid with no criminal record or a history of schizophrenia. Moreover, the girl had not brought the weapon to school. She was simply talking about something she planned to do at home after school. A real lawyer jumped into the case and got the girl's ten day suspension reduced to two. The lawyer is now fighting to have the girl's "record" expunged. If anything needs expunged, it's the idiots and fools at the Mount Carmel Elementary School.

January 2013: Modesto, California

     A 17-year-old Modesto high school student was suspended three days after making gun gestures with his hand. Witnesses reported that this student was not only pointing his finger, he was moving another finger in a trigger-pulling action. Oh my. To compound this kid's offense, he also raised an umbrella in a aggressive rifle-like gesture. If I had a school-aged kid, I'd tell him to leave his umbrella at home, and keep his hands in his pockets, or holsters.

January 2013: Hyannis West, Massachusetts

     A 5-year-old boy at Hyannis West Elementary School on Cape Cod got into big trouble when he used lego bricks to build a crude toy handgun. Because he was a repeat offender--the kid had been punished for making a gun gesture with his hand--a written warning was placed into his file. School officials told the boy that if he commits the "crime" a third time, he will be suspended for two weeks. Let's hope this little menace doesn't hook-up with the Hello Kitty girl. We don't need another Bonnie and Clyde on our hands.

 January 2013: Sumter, South Carolina

     A kindergartner was expelled from Alice Drive Elementary School in Sumter, South Carolina after she brought her brother's toy Airsoft gun for show and tell. The girl is not allowed to be on school property, even when accompanying her parents picking up her siblings. She has been assigned a home-based instructor from the school district.  While Alice Drive Elementary School is a safer place, school administrators are worried about the safety of the home instructor.

February 2013: Florence, Arizona

     A freshman at Poston Butte High School in Florence, Arizona was suspended because he had a background picture of an AK-47 on his school desktop computer. It's a good thing the kid didn't have a photograph of an atomic mushroom on his school computer. The entire state would have been on lock-down.

February 2013: Loveland, Colorado

     A second grade boy at Loveland, Colorado's Mary Blair Elementary School was suspended for the terroristic act of pretending to throw a nonexistent hand-granade at a nonexistent target. He was pretending to be a super-hero saving the world. Next time, to save himself, the kid should learn to lie. Grenade? What grenade? I was pretending to toss roses at my wonderful teacher.