Teen in school plot posts bail:
Michael McDonough, the 17-year-old arrested in the plot to attack Connetquot High School and a Long Island McDonald’s, has posted his $50,000 bond.
I doubt there will be much trouble out of McDonough. I’d be more worried if his 15-year-old cohort makes bail.
No new charges for teen accused of killing principal:
A judge has ruled that the attempted murder charge recently alleged against Eric Hainstock will not be considered.
The judge rejected the additional charge, saying it would violate Hainstock’s right to a fair trial and would be prejudicial. He also cited concerns that Hainstock’s defense wouldn’t have time to prepare a defense against the charge, with the trial set to begin in under a week.
I thought the charge was frivolous anyway. Just pointing a gun at someone is not attempted murder. The prosecution does not need to get creative right now. Hainstock shot principal John Klang in front of multiple witnesses. The prosecution needs to play it safe and just get the murder conviction.
Court documents reveal new details in the cast of the “West Memphis 3”:
Details are being reported about the much heralded DNA evidence that is supposed to exonerate the West Memphis 3 according to their misguided followers…
New DNA testing by the defense shows that none of the genetic material recovered links Echols, Baldwin, or Misskelley to the crime scene. Instead the defense claims the tests found DNA from Terry Hobbs, the stepfather of one of the murdered boys.
Branch (I’m pretty sure that’s a typo and they meant Hobbs) told Action News 5 he didn’t do it. “I’d have to laugh at that and say there’s something wrong with someone who would think that,” he said.
Hobbs claims a private investigator from the defense team told him one of his hairs was discovered in a knot in one of the shoe laces used to tie up the three eight-year-olds.
“If Michael Moore or Christopher Byers had a piece of my hair on shoes strings, these little boys came to my home and played with our little boy pretty regularly,” Hobbs said.
The DNA results also reveal, according to court documents, that most of the DNA at the crime scene came from the victims, but some of it cannot be connected to the victims or the defendants.
So the DNA evidence I’ve been hearing so much about in the past few months is nothing more than a hair that belonged to the stepfather of one of the murdered boys. Like he said the boys were at his house all the time. I hardly think this exonerates Echols and his lackeys.
To those of you who have been blinded by biased documentaries, half-assed celebrities, and the rest of the hype this does not mean that Echols and Co. were not at the crime scene.
And Terry Hobbs is not the step-father featured in the documentaries. The toothless bastard you’re thinking of is Mark Byers.
To me, Damien Echols is the second coming of Charles Manson. Except Echols succeeded in one area where Manson failed. Echols has a legion of cult-like supporters who blindly follow his every word like it was delivered from God himself as the truth just because you saw some documentary or heard Henry Rollins talk about it. The supporters are nothing more than cultists. They just don’t realize it.
Questions still loom in Benoit case:
Again, if you won’t believe me that roid rage in the deaths of the Benoit family is not a foregone conclusion then how about Georgia’s top coroner?
Pro wrestler Chris Benoit had more than 10 times the normal level of testosterone in his system when he hanged himself in his home after killing his wife and 7-year-old son last month. But did that have anything to do with the slayings?
“I think it’s an unanswerable question,” said Dr. Kris Sperry, Georgia’s top medical examiner.
Test results released Tuesday neither bolstered nor entirely debunked speculation that anabolic steroids might have led Benoit, a wrestler with a family-man image, to commit the shocking crimes. Some experts believe steroids can cause paranoia, depression and violent outbursts known as “roid rage,” but Sperry noted that there is no consensus on the issue.
Even the high levels of testosterone should not be overanalyzed, Sperry warned. They could indicate the wrestler was being treated for “testicular insufficiency,” he said.
Well, I think we know that Chris Benoit had “testicular insufficiency” because only a nutless coward is capable of killing his family but I digress.
In the end, he said, authorities will never know whether the steroid could have caused the murderous outburst.
Not only that but if roid rage is as prevalent as some people falsely claim then how come there isn’t a murder a week coming out of Major League Baseball or the NFL?
Cops: Plot went beyond school:
This is definitely a new one on me. It seems that the 15-year-old accused in the plot to attack Connetquot High School referred to himself as Dante and referred to Michael McDonnough as Randal. If those names don’t mean anything to you they’re the main characters in the movie Clerks. They’re probably referring to Clerks II though since that movie takes place at a fast food restaurant. Except Dante and Randal never intentionally plotted to kill somebody.
Anyway, more details are emerging including Michael McDonnough’s role in the plot.
One of the teens — Michael McDonough, 17, of Holbrook — said that at a June 30 sleepover, he and his 15-year-old friend made a video talking about using pipe bombs to destroy the McDonald’s on Veterans Highway, according to McDonough’s statement. At about midnight, they headed to the restaurant carrying three eggs, which they threw at the building as a “rehearsal” for what would happen next, he told the Suffolk detective.
In a written waiver of rights that accompanies each statement, the teens declined legal counsel before providing the statements last Tuesday to the detective, who wrote down their accounts. The mother of the 15-year-old was present when he gave his account.
The younger of the two, a 15-year-old Connetquot High School student whom police would not identify because he is charged as a juvenile, said he “had angry thoughts about killing people at Connetquot High School because I don’t feel they’ve done right by me.” People taunted him for living in a trailer park, the statement said.
The 15-year-old said he shared his plan to attack McDonald’s with McDonough, but said he didn’t remember telling his friend about the school plot: “I mention killing people and shooting up the school quite a bit in my journal, but I don’t remember saying it to Mike.”
In McDonough’s statement, he says that depression and suicidal thoughts led him to go along with the 15-year-old. He said the two hatched the plot against Connetquot High in February while they were on a school break.
McDonough told the detective he “didn’t care where life was going to leave me next. I told [the 15-year-old] that I was on board and would help him shoot up the Connetquot High School.” He said the 15-year-old talked about “killing his whole school, hundreds of people.”
And we’re getting more proof of the 15-year-old’s mutancy…
The two aimed for a date for the school attack — calling it J-Day, short for judgment day — April 20, 2008, the ninth anniversary of the Columbine High School killings. The younger teen seemed to model his plan after Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who carried out the Colorado attack, McDonough said.
Now let’s give the excuses…
The younger of the two, a 15-year-old Connetquot High School student whom police would not identify because he is charged as a juvenile, said he “had angry thoughts about killing people at Connetquot High School because I don’t feel they’ve done right by me.” People taunted him for living in a trailer park, the statement said.
The 15-year-old said he shared his plan to attack McDonald’s with McDonough, but said he didn’t remember telling his friend about the school plot: “I mention killing people and shooting up the school quite a bit in my journal, but I don’t remember saying it to Mike.”
In McDonough’s statement, he says that depression and suicidal thoughts led him to go along with the 15-year-old. He said the two hatched the plot against Connetquot High in February while they were on a school break.
McDonough told the detective he “didn’t care where life was going to leave me next. I told [the 15-year-old] that I was on board and would help him shoot up the Connetquot High School.” He said the 15-year-old talked about “killing his whole school, hundreds of people.”
So we have depression and a trailer park as excuses. As time goes by the excuses keep getting more pathetic. I’ve seen pictures of the trailer park. In Long Island that might be a trailer park but in the rest of the country it’s more like a housing development. Come to North Carolina sometime and I’ll show you some scary trailer parks. As far as the depression goes I have two words. Get help. It really isn’t that bad. But I’m sure we’ll hear the excuse that he was either on or wasn’t on meds. You really can’t go wrong, either way, these days.
Here is a copy of the statements they gave to police.
GBI: Benoit had steroids in system:
Yeah yeah yeah. Chris Benoit had steroids in his system. No big shock there. He was a professional wrestler after all. But before all of you roid rage zealots start pointing fingers at me with your “I told you so” attitudes you may want to unbunch your panties for a second. Chris Benoit also had Xanax and Hydrocodone in his system, a sedative and a pain-killer. Now I’m not a doctor, I don’t even play one on the internet, but I’ve been prescribed both drugs, luckily not at the same time. Taking either one has pretty much knocked me on my ass. I’m not a small guy either. I’m over 6 feet tall and I hover around the 200 lb. mark. Not as big as Benoit but not a small guy either. So in my estimation, I think the inclusion of the Xanax and Hydrocodone pretty much precludes any ‘roid rage’ that so many of you have been shouting from the rooftops.
Nancy Benoit also had Xanax and Hydrocodone in her system as well. Daniel Benoit had Xanax in his system which leads me to believe that Chris Benoit sedated his son before killing him. What a freakin’ humanitarian.
Prosecutors are trying to get an additional charge of attempted murder pressed against Eric Hainstock. Hainstock is accused of shooting and killing Weston Schools principal John Klang.
Prosecutors allege that Hainstock also pointed the gun at his own special education teacher, James Nowak, prior to the death of Klang. Nowak is the same teacher who Hainstock allegedly threw a stapler at.
Of course, the defense is not happy…
“We have eight business days between now and the day we pick a jury and go to trial,” said Rhoda Ricciardi, one of the Madison-based attorneys representing 16-year-old Hainstock. “And now we are also supposed to defend against an attempted homicide? If that’s not prejudice, sir, I don’t know what is.”
The prosecution offered this explanation…
Sauk County District Attorney Patricia Barrett said she previously mentioned the possibility of additional charges to Hainstock’s defense team, but only recently received the transcripts of prior testimony necessary to go forward with the additional charge. She said there is no new evidence defense attorneys must study.
As much as I’d like to see Hainstock get as much time as possible I doubt the attempted murder charge will stick or even be allowed.
The trial is set to start on July 26th.
Teen in bomb plot case may be indicted as adult:
The 15-year-old accused of plotting to attack Connetquot High School may be charged as an adult. This coming after the other teen accused in the plot, 17-year-old Michael McDonnough, signed a four-page confession of his involvement in the plot. Again his exact involvement is still yet unknown to the public.
McDonough’s family had hoped to gain supervised release for him, saying he had no previous criminal history, and his lawyer said he was not guilty of the charges.
But Jeremy Scileppi, chief of the Suffolk County District Attorney’s major crime bureau, told the judge that bail should not be reduced because authorities have a four-page confession from McDonough admitting to conspiracy to buy weapons and explosive powder. “The bail is not a punitive matter, but it’s an issue for the security of the community,” Scileppi said in court. “The evidence at this time is getting better.”
More on this as information becomes available.
Versace’s mansion, 10 years after murder:
This is something that’s been sticking in my craw for 10 years now.
Back in 1997, serial killer Andrew Cunanan went on an interstate killing spree. It started in Minnesota when he killed his friend Jeffery Trail. Two days later he killed architect David Madson also in Minnesota. According to Wikipedia police recognized a connection, as Trail’s body had been found in Madson’s Minneapolis loft apartment, and started an intensive nationwide manhunt. This barely made a blip in the national media.
Next Cunanan killed 72-year-old real estate developer Lee Miglin in Chicago. Cunanan escaped Chicago in Miglin’s car. His next murder kind of hit home for me. Cunanan’s next victim was William Reese from Pennsville, New Jersey. In 1997 I was living one county over from Pennsville. The local media exploded all over the story but still hardly anything on the national front.
Cunanan stole Reese’s truck with which he drove to Miami where he claimed his most famous victim, fashion designer Gianni Versace. That’s when the story blew up on the national media. Yet all the focus was on Versace. Very little mention was made of Cunanan’s other victims. Eight days later Cunanan killed himself in a Miami houseboat.
All I saw on the national media at that point were stories about other celebrities who lived in the Miami area who feared for their ‘lives’ while Cunanan was on the loose after Versace’s murder. Again little to no mention of Cunanan’s other victims.
Fast forward to today. Yesterday was the 10th anniversary of the death of Gianni Versace and nothing has changed. No disrespect intended to the Versace family but again the article I linked to above made no mention whatsoever of Cunanan’s other victims.
So what’s my point? Well besides the fact that the national media obviously doesn’t really care about murder victims unless they’re famous, my point is that not everyone has forgotten the names of Jeffery Trail, Dave Madson, Lee Miglin, and William Reese.