• We have updated the guidelines regarding posting political content: please see the stickied thread on Website Issues.

Serial Killers

Now here's a name that I certainly recall from my childhood!
Texas is scheduled to release Genene Jones, a former nurse and suspected serial killer of children, early next year. Today, prosecutors in San Antonio moved to prevent her release, bringing a new murder charge against Jones in connection with the death of a child 35 years ago. ---

During a 15-month period between April 1981 and June 1982, the eight-bed pediatric ICU at Bexar County Hospital experienced a strange epidemic: 42 children — an extraordinarily high number — died there. Even more peculiar: 34 of the patients died during the 3-11 p.m. shift, and Jones, a licensed vocational nurse, had cared for 20 of them.

Several nurses had complained directly to supervisors about this disturbing pattern, later documented by a Centers for Disease Control investigation. But the supervisors had dismissed the notion that Jones — who spoke passionately about her patients — could be deliberately harming children. Certain something was terribly wrong, members of the medical staff began calling Jones’ hours on duty “the Death Shift.”
Click to expand...

https://www.propublica.org/article/prosecutors-race-to-keep-notorious-angel-of-death-behind-bars?
 
Australian Katherine Knight wasn't a serial killer, she killed her fella and ate his head, cooking off other bits of him and plating them for his family to discover .. with vegetables .. :eek:. She's the only woman in Australia's history to be given life with no chance or parole.

 
Last edited:
Blimey, Masterchef Australia is really hard-core.
BBC2 started a series on the Chillenden murders last night. I watched the first few minutes but my antenna went up when the clips showing the panel of 'experts' arguing started the programme.
I'll keep an eye on it, but the Beebs latest attempt at matching the impact of Making a Murderer looks to be yet another row show. Hope I'm wrong, because it's in very bad taste if it is.
 
Measuring Evil .. a documentary detailing as such ..

 
smokehead said:
Blimey, Masterchef Australia is really hard-core.
BBC2 started a series on the Chillenden murders last night. I watched the first few minutes but my antenna went up when the clips showing the panel of 'experts' arguing started the programme.
I'll keep an eye on it, but the Beebs latest attempt at matching the impact of Making a Murderer looks to be yet another row show. Hope I'm wrong, because it's in very bad taste if it is.
Click to expand...
It wasn't bad. It would have been better as one 90 minute program, there really wasn't two hours of material. The conclusion was pretty good I thought.

The case against the chap they put away (Michael Stone) was (is) non-existent, but in truth, we really didn't want him on the streets...

More here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/tv/0/chillenden-murders-happened-bbc-reexamining-michael-stones-guilt/
 
ramonmercado said:
Authorities have found a third body on the property of Todd Kohlhepp, the South Carolina real estate agent accused of murder and kidnapping.

The body, found Monday, was close to another body recovered the day before, Spartanburg County Coroner Rusty Clevenger told reporters. Not much is known about the two bodies. Tests by the coroner's office are to begin Tuesday.
"I can't state male or female, and ages," Clevenger said. "I can't state how long they've been deceased or how long they've been buried. There are a number of things I don't know at this moment, because I've got some more testing I've got to do."

Last week, authorities found the body of 32-year-old Charles Carver on Kohlhepp's farm near Woodruff, in northwest South Carolina. Carver was the boyfriend of Kala Brown, who was rescued from a metal shipping container on Kohlhepp's property.

Kohlhepp was arrested last week after authorities found the chained Brown, who was screaming for help. Kohlhepp confessed to a series of killings, authorities said.

The registered sex offender faces murder and kidnapping charges. Authorities say he could be connected to at least seven homicides.

http://edition.cnn.com/2016/11/08/us/south-carolina-murders-todd-kohlhepp/index.html
Click to expand...

Now footage can be shown. Vid at link.

Kala Brown: Freed from storage container
Kala Brown had been chained up in a metal storage container in South Carolina by Todd Kohlhepp.

Authorities have now released footage showing the moment she was released.

Kohlhepp has been jailed for the kidnap and rape of Kala Brown, and for a string of murders.

http://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-40241012/kala-brown-freed-from-storage-container
 
Coal said:
It wasn't bad. It would have been better as one 90 minute program, there really wasn't two hours of material. The conclusion was pretty good I thought.

The case against the chap they put away (Michael Stone) was (is) non-existent, but in truth, we really didn't want him on the streets...

More here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/tv/0/chillenden-murders-happened-bbc-reexamining-michael-stones-guilt/
Click to expand...

I suspected it was something like that. I didn't see Confessions of a Copper but apparently some admitted to planting evidence to put someone away.
Who's to say? By the strict letter of the law there have been wrongful convictions but in the real world they may have saved lives by doing so.
I watched the first series of Line of Duty, which got a bit silly, and there was a different perspective, rather than protecting the public, convictions were seen as helping ambitious coppers rise through the ranks.
Perhaps there's a bit if truth in both. I suspect it's a genre we will see more and more of, I admire the principles of the documentary makers, but I wonder how many, if they were honest, would like their subject living next door?
 
smokehead said:
but I wonder how many, if they were honest, would like their subject living next door?
Click to expand...
If I had to speculate, I'd say that someone somewhere thought it likely the real killer was in prison and considered Mr. Stone better off where he was for the good of the public. He's a violent, dangerous criminal, innocent of this crime or not. In the USA he'd be on his third strike.
 
I've always thought there are unsolved cases which perplex the various real crime websites but actually the police know full well who did it.
I'm sure there are informants who don't want to be anywhere near the official record who have passed on information to them, something I bear in mind when the police are accused of neglecting an old case.
I have my doubts when possible police misconduct may be involved. I've only read Carol Ann Lees book about Jeremy Bamber but based on the evidence presented, which may of course be subject to bias and omissions, I couldn't have convicted beyond a reasonable doubt.
 
smokehead said:
I've always thought there are unsolved cases which perplex the various real crime websites but actually the police know full well who did it.
Click to expand...
I was pals with an ex-Met copper for a goodish bit and it was often interesting to see what the scuttle-butt was on various high-profile crimes and in general his info supports your thinking.

I often wonder what is meant by 'reasonable doubt'. 80% chance of guilt? 90%? 51%? Almost all crimes are prosecuted on inferences, circumstantial evidence allows you to draw an inference (or a probability of guilt), which strengthens with succeeding pieces of circumstantial evidence. I wonder if anyone has tried to quantify it?

As for Mr. Bamber? Hm. I think I'd like to see all the evidence presented in an unbiased way, but I know what I believe, although that's not a wholly formed or informed opinion.
 
Coal said:
... I often wonder what is meant by 'reasonable doubt'. 80% chance of guilt? 90%? 51%? Almost all crimes are prosecuted on inferences, circumstantial evidence allows you to draw an inference (or a probability of guilt), which strengthens with succeeding pieces of circumstantial evidence. I wonder if anyone has tried to quantify it? ...
Click to expand...

'Reasonable doubt' is a murky concept, and it's codified / handled in slightly different ways within different legal systems.

Generally speaking, probability doesn't enter into it at all. A jury is not supposed to be calculating, nor making decisions based on, odds. The usual standard concerns whether or not the prosecution has presented a case that demonstrates the defendant's guilt to an extent that leaves no room for at least one (reasonable) alternative explanation under which the defendant is not guilty as charged.

No amount of circumstantial evidence can effect the same 'force' as a single piece of evidence unequivocally and uniquely linking the defendant to the crime.
 
EnolaGaia said:
'Reasonable doubt' is a murky concept, and it's codified / handled in slightly different ways within different legal systems.
Click to expand...

Quite so, it's a moving target then?

EnolaGaia said:
Generally speaking, probability doesn't enter into it at all. A jury is not supposed to be calculating, nor making decisions based on, odds. The usual standard concerns whether or not the prosecution has presented a case that demonstrates the defendant's guilt to an extent that leaves no room for at least one (reasonable) alternative explanation under which the defendant is not guilty as charged.
Click to expand...

I agree, they're not calculating odds in any formal sense. However, if one is looking at a series of (possibly) coincident circumstantial events, then a probability is being arrived at, even if instinctively. And from time to time, in a purely circumstantial case, it's going to be wrong, however good it looks.

EnolaGaia said:
No amount of circumstantial evidence can effect the same 'force' as a single piece of evidence unequivocally and uniquely linking the defendant to the crime.
Click to expand...

Agreed. Nothing nails a case down more than this.

Referring to the Chillenden case, a shred of DNA would have nailed the case down for ever.
 
Re Bamber I can only go on what I've read and the testimony of a possibly embittered ex girlfriend who initially named someone who had absolutely nothing to do with it would have made me doubt her evidence.
Access to White House farm by relatives who may have benefited financially from Bambers conviction, the late discovery of the suppressor and the claim that those same relatives were tasked with cleaning up the crime scene would have made me doubt the finding of Sheilas blood on it.
To me that would constitute reasonable doubt, hence my reluctance to convict.
 
I'm reading an anthology of writing about the Rolling Stones, edited by Sean Egan.
There is a good section about Brian Jones, which also covers his death.
Author Terry Rawlings who wrote a book about it titled Who Killed Christopher Robin? states that the policeman who inherited the original investigation told him, "Your book got pretty close to it, but the things I could tell you, which I can't, is a book in itself, but it will all come out eventually"
Not that it has, nor do I have any informed opinion on the case, but it's instructive how much the oft denigrated PC Plod knows.
 
smokehead said:
Re Bamber I can only go on what I've read and the testimony of a possibly embittered ex girlfriend who initially named someone who had absolutely nothing to do with it would have made me doubt her evidence.
Access to White House farm by relatives who may have benefited financially from Bambers conviction, the late discovery of the suppressor and the claim that those same relatives were tasked with cleaning up the crime scene would have made me doubt the finding of Sheilas blood on it.
To me that would constitute reasonable doubt, hence my reluctance to convict.
Click to expand...
Yes, seems compelling, but for myself, I'd like to see the evidence in an unbiased way. It's too murky now, with invested parties for 'guilty' and not 'guilty' and money could motivate either side.

The silencer thing is odd, but you can equally argue it indicates guilt, as a smart person would, possible even while staging a 'suicide', find the silencer was going to contra-indicate. It would depend on the precise chain of evidence I guess.

(I discount the lie detector test on Bamber, it's at best only 60% or so able to discriminate truth from deceit, less in the case of someone who has had training or is, shall we say, 'emotion deficient'.)

I note though something of a discrepancy between those who claim he was a nice guy and those who claim a rather different story. A casual glance suggests a charming and manipulative individual and while that's not evidence of guilt, it might indicate the nature of the man. But that's not evidence.
 
I'm guilty of having my own bias, being all too ready to believe the middle-class capable of anything where money is concerned.
It's my opinion that the main concern of his ex girlfriend was not so much the loss of Bamber but the prospect of losing out on the inheritance. Unfair probably.
It's a chilling thought that if guilty, he shot his entire family, including two 6 year old lads, just so that he could buy a Porsche.
Against that is the context of the times, conspicuous consumption, yuppies, brick sized mobile phones etc, he was probably no different to others in his situation, although he along with a few other people in the book come across as utterly superficial admittedly.
Perception is important, an interview with another journalist saw him described as polite, articulate and charming, albeit with the vague sense there was 'something missing'
I've read he has offered a million pounds to anyone coming forward with information that could free him.
It's difficult to avoid the suspicion that his claim of innocence may be motivated by the amount of compensation he will receive. Again unfair, but it's there.
Oddly I've read it was something Steven Downing, wrongfully convicted of the murder of Wendy Sewell used to almost brag about.
 
smokehead said:
I'm reading an anthology of writing about the Rolling Stones, edited by Sean Egan.
There is a good section about Brian Jones, which also covers his death.
Author Terry Rawlings who wrote a book about it titled Who Killed Christopher Robin? states that the policeman who inherited the original investigation told him, "Your book got pretty close to it, but the things I could tell you, which I can't, is a book in itself, but it will all come out eventually"
Not that it has, nor do I have any informed opinion on the case, but it's instructive how much the oft denigrated PC Plod knows.
Click to expand...

As against that, there are quite a few cases where the police have decided on a certain 'doer' who subsequently is found not to have done it and the police seem unable to recalibrate, as it were. Don't get me wrong, they have a very difficult job and someone's got to do it, but I'm no believer in 'intuition', any more than Hercule Poirot.
 
Cochise said:
As against that, there are quite a few cases where the police have decided on a certain 'doer' who subsequently is found not to have done it and the police seem unable to recalibrate, as it were. Don't get me wrong, they have a very difficult job and someone's got to do it, but I'm no believer in 'intuition', any more than Hercule Poirot.
Click to expand...

Yeah you have to be careful. As Conan Doyle more or less said "It is a capital mistake to theorise without data". Once you've 'decided' who did it, then conformation bias especially will ensure that evidence 'for your theory' will be noticed and acted on more than 'against' and 'evidence against' will often literally go entirely unnoticed.

The whole 'gut instinct thing' is a big red herring for the most part. There's an argument that instinct is the result of cumulative experience and knowledge, and this might be true, but even one's instinct will be subject to the same biases I'd have thought.
 
Coal said:
... There's an argument that instinct is the result of cumulative experience and knowledge, and this might be true, but even one's instinct will be subject to the same biases I'd have thought.
Click to expand...

IMHO the key word here is 'cumulative', which implies an overall / generalized viewpoint. A 'gut feeling' can be useful early on in sorting through a range of possible generic categories of explanations to help decide where one might most constructively explore.

It's not worth much as a heuristic when dealing with particulars, and it's utterly worthless as evidence itself.
 
Guilty. From examples of behaviour I extrapolate entire personalities and life choices.
Sounds a cliche but there was a baseball cap on the bus. He ate a Snickers and sounded like he was trying to eat it through a snorkel.
He also took swigs from a can of coke. When he got off he left the empty wrapper and can (still some in ) on the seat.
My instinct is he is not an upstanding member of the community. Mea culpa.
 
smokehead said:
Guilty. From examples of behaviour I extrapolate entire personalities and life choices.
Sounds a cliche but there was a baseball cap on the bus. He ate a Snickers and sounded like he was trying to eat it through a snorkel.
He also took swigs from a can of coke. When he got off he left the empty wrapper and can (still some in ) on the seat.
My instinct is he is not an upstanding member of the community. Mea culpa.
Click to expand...
Yeah it's normal behaviour, which is why it's so hard not to do it.
 
No good for jury service then.
"Don't bother with the evidence m'lud, he definitely looks like the sort of bloke who would do this kind of thing".
I must watch the very long documentary on the O.J. Simpson trial again before it disappears from the iplayer.
There is a suggestion the jury found him not guilty because they were pissed off of the months of being sequestered and the way they were treated.
 
smokehead said:
No good for jury service then.
"Don't bother with the evidence m'lud, he definitely looks like the sort of bloke who would do this kind of thing".
I must watch the very long documentary on the O.J. Simpson trial again before it disappears from the iplayer.
There is a suggestion the jury found him not guilty because they were pissed off of the months of being sequestered and the way they were treated.
Click to expand...
I think jury trials are very iffy myself.

It's interesting we still have them, given what we know about the biases in peoples' thinking and how they can be manipulated. We cling to the idea that 12 random strangers can somehow return a rational result, based on critical evaluation of two expertly assembled arguments from barristers, who are literally experts at critical thought and building convincing arguments.

If you cloned the jury and each jury listened to just one side only, they'd convict/acquit ten out of ten times.

One day we'll have it done by AI, as long as the AI hasn't got any human biases built in it'll probably do a better job.
 
Coal said:
I think jury trials are very iffy myself.
Click to expand...
I do too.
It's amazing just how many members of a jury will go on 'feelings' rather than facts.
 
Mythopoeika said:
I do too.
It's amazing just how many members of a jury will go on 'feelings' rather than facts.
Click to expand...
A (almost pathologically rational) pal of mine did jury service on a shop-lifting case. The accused, a well to-do middle class lady was bang to right on cctv. Absolutely guilty. There were two on the jury who wouldn't return 'guilty' despite the clearest evidence of guilt one might wish for. As as my pal remarked wryly, "they were of a similar demographic".
 
Coal said:
A (almost pathologically rational) pal of mine did jury service on a shop-lifting case. The accused, a well to-do middle class lady was bang to right on cctv. Absolutely guilty. There were two on the jury who wouldn't return 'guilty' despite the clearest evidence of guilt one might wish for. As as my pal remarked wryly, "they were of a similar demographic".
Click to expand...
A bit like this Tracey Ullman sketch ..

 
Loved that.
I don't know how long ago it was, this year sometime but I was sitting in the Metro at Wolverhampton and apropos of my interest in real crime decided to take in as many details as I could about a random stranger outside.
I can't even remember their gender now. Perhaps it's just me but it's something I bear in mind when two entrenched posters start insulting each other based on the supposed gospel testimony of a witness.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top