TheTrenchcoat Chronicles

Category: Crime

  • Zarate gets new home

    Zarate gets new home

    Suspect’s transfer called essential:

    Our favorite New Jersey psychopath is in the news again. Jonathan Zarate, accused of the murder and dismemberment of his 16-year-old neighbor Jennifer Parks, is in a new prison.

    He has been transferred out of the Morris County jail and into the Passaic County jail. Like I mentioned before, he was transferred because he is suing the Morris County jail over alleged abuses. What cracks me up, as if any actual humor could be found in this case, it’s his attorney and the things he had to say…

    “Jonathan Zarate is a man with very deep emotional problems,” his lawyer, Anthony Fusco Jr., said Monday. “He was not getting the treatment he needed in the Morris County Jail.”

    Ya think?

    Since his arrest July 31, Zarate has twice been charged with assaulting guards at the Morris County Jail. After the second alleged assault on Dec. 10, Zarate was sent to the Ann Klein Forensic Psychiatric Hospital in West Trenton. He was treated there until Feb. 2, when he was brought back to the jail.

    Fusco said his client’s mental condition has worsened since his return to the Morris County Jail — and Zarate has served notice that he intends to sue the state for depriving him of his proper medical treatment. On Friday, state Superior Court Judge Salem V. Ahto allowed Zarate to be transferred to another jail.

    Well, maybe if he didn’t kill and dismember a 16-year-old girl he wouldn’t be having these problems. It sounds like to me that they’ve been laying the grounds for an insanity defense for some time now.

  • Mr. Thompson Goes to Delaware

    Mr. Thompson Goes to Delaware

    Bill would limit sale of video games:

    Our favorite idiot lawyer from Florida is on the move again. This time he’s in Delaware trying to help State Rep. Helene Keeley, D-Wilmington South, get a law passed that would restrict businesses from selling M-rated games to minors. Never mind the fact that most legitimate stores won’t sell M-Rated games to anyone under 18 and that the majority of kids who get these games are getting through their parents. Jack never lets facts get in his way. Like this little nugget of misinformation from Jack…

    Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, the Colorado teens who massacred 13 of their fellow Columbine High School students in 1999, “literally trained on the game ‘Doom,’ ” Thompson said.

    Sure, they did Jack. Just forget all those tapes they made, showing them at a homemade target practice. I myself, and millions of other people, have played Doom and never picked up a gun in anger but again let’s not let facts get in the way.

    Jack also had this to say about the free speech ramifications…

    Thompson, meanwhile, said the First Amendment debate is misplaced.

    “This isn’t even speech,” Thompson said, holding up a video-game display box. “This is software that enables a machine to allow a player to play a game.”

    Does he really believe the lies that he’s spewing forth?

    When will politicians, especially Democrats, stop getting in bed with this assclown? It’s making them look worse than they already are.

  • Zarate Sues Jail

    Zarate Sues Jail

    Man charged in teen neighbor’s killing sues jail:

    This is just great, another frivolous lawsuit clogging the courts…

    The Randolph man charged with stabbing and dismembering a teenage neighbor will be moved out of the Morris County jail after having filed a suit against the facility following two fights with correction officers there.

    Authorities had not yet determined where Jonathan Zarate will be sent but said it will most likely be the Essex County Jail.

    For those of you who may have forgotten, 18-year-old Zarate, is accused of having ambushed 16-year-old Jennifer Parks in Zarate’s home and stabbing her, bludgeoning her, and dismembering her body, then trying to dump her body into the Passaic River in New Jersey.

    Let me give you a quote from prison officials when he originally attacked a guard…

    Jonathan Zarate, 18, of Randolph, allegedly punched a 26-year-old corrections officer three times in the face and head as he was being escorted back to his cell after a shower Thursday at 8:30 a.m., Warden Frank Corrente said.

    “This was unprovoked. He has issues with authority and has been a management issue since his arrival,” Corrente said of Zarate. “He shows violent behavior.”

    It would be a travesty if this lawsuit ever saw the light of day. Then again, this is New Jersey we’re talking about. He’ll probably be awarded a settlement.

  • Bonelli pleads guilty

    Bonelli pleads guilty

    Bonelli pleads guilty to all counts in mall rampage:
    Bonelli pleads guilty in mall shooting spree:

    I haven’t talked about Robert Bonelli in a really long time. He was the 24-year-old gunman in the Hudson Valley Mall shooting in Ulster, New York that wounded two people. When his home was searched, police found what they called “Columbine Memorabilia”. Bonelli pleaded guilty today to all charges against him…

    In entering his plea, Bonelli said that he had gone to the mall with the intention of committing “suicide by cop,” hoping to get killed by police officers.

    Ulster County District Attorney Donald Williams said Bonelli’s handwritten notes showed that he’d planned for months to conduct an armed rampage no later than April 20 of last year.

    Williams also maintained Bonelli had a lurid fascination with the shootings in Columbine.

    Personally, I don’t buy the “suicide by cop” theory. I think he luckily lost his nerve by the time he got to the mall, but I think his original intention was to kill.

    Between his fascination with Columbine and the fact that he planned for months to conduct some kind of assault with an April 20th deadline lead me to believe that his original intention was to kill as many people as possible.

    Anyway, he’s looking at a minimum of 20 years and a maximum of 40.

    Sentencing is set for May 19th.

  • Esmie’s abuse

    Esmie’s abuse

    Teenager pleads guilty in mother’s stabbing death:

    This is just another story about Esmie Tseng’s plea, but I finally get to hear what kind of abuse Esmie went through…

    In Esmie Tseng’s world, a test score of 96 might have gotten the 16-year-old grounded.

    Her mother expected more. Always more. And when the Overland Park girl fell short, she often was punished in ‘unfair and cruel’ ways, Johnson County District Attorney Paul Morrison said Monday.

    Sometimes, he said, Esmie’s mother tried to teach her a lesson by humiliating her: She made her daughter take off all her clothes.

    But Esmie also was under a lot of pressure, primarily from her mother, to perform at unrealistically high levels, Morrison said. Slight transgressions often resulted in punishments such as not being able to go outside for extended periods of time, he said, or not being able to do the kinds of things that teens like to do.

    “She lived in a highly structured environment,” Morrison said.

    “It was not uncommon for her to be ordered to take her clothes off as a way to humiliate her, if that gives you a flavor of what was going on.”

    I feel bad for Esmie. I really do. That’s not sarcasm. Mental abuse like that from a parent is one of the worst tortures that a teenager can go through. However, that abuse did not warrant the violent response that Esmie gave…

    Assistant District Attorney John Fritz said that Esmie had stabbed her mother with a knife. When her mother took away the knife, Esmie grabbed another and stabbed her multiple times. Esmie did not call for help, he said.

    The way Esmie’s mother treated her would have been grounds to call social services, not a multiple stabbing with two different knives.

    Also, did Esmie’s father know that this treatment was going on?

    Now that I know a little more about the events leading up to the murder of Shu Yi Zhang, I can offer an opinion on the sentencing.

    I think the suggested eight years and four months is very reasonable for the offense and what led up to it. As I said, I feel bad for Esmie, but stabbing her mother to death was a severe over-reaction, and she needs to be punished.

    She will still have much of her life ahead of her when she gets out.

  • Esmie Tseng pleads guilty

    Esmie Tseng pleads guilty

    Esmie Tseng pleads guilty to voluntary manslaughter:

    In a shocking turn of events, shocking to me anyway, Esmie Tseng, the 16-year-old Kansas teen accused of stabbing her mother to death, has pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter…

    Esmie Tseng, 16, pleaded guilty to the charge after agreeing to have her case moved to adult court. Sentencing was set for May 3.

    Prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed to recommend a sentence of 100 months in prison, or about 8 years and four months. The defense agreed it would not ask for probation.

    I’m curious as to why she pleaded guilty to an adult charge when so many people thought she should be tried as a juvenile?

  • Burned his girlfriend alive

    Police: Teen Burned Alive Over Pregnancy:

    A 20-year-old man in Ocoee, Fla., was charged with murder after he confessed to pouring gasoline over his ex-girlfriend and then setting her on fire because she may have been pregnant, police told Local 6 News.

    Winter Garden police officers investigating a report of a car fire noticed a small fire on the east side of County Road 545 on Feb. 25.

    When officers extinguished the flames, they found the body of Amelia Sookdeo, 17, burned beyond recognition.

    An investigation into the homicide led to Sookdeo’s ex-boyfriend, Dane Abdool, 20, who at first denied any involvement in the crime, according to the report.

    However, when police confronted him with inconsistencies in his story and presented a set of tire marks from his car photographed at the scene, Abdool confessed to the crime, Local 6 News reported.

    “He admitted that he had met his former girlfriend that night, she sneaked out and he picked her up and went to his apartment in Ocoee,” Winter Garden Police Chief George Brennan said. “From there they left and had an argument and he took her down County Road 545, forced her out of the car. He poured gasoline on her and ignited it.”

    Abdool told police that he was arguing with Sookdeo over her possible pregnancy and he was just trying to scare her, Local 6 News reported.

    Here’s the twist…

    “The medical examiner found no evidence that she was having a baby,” Local 6 reporter Mike DeForest said.

    Way to go, you scumbag. You killed your own girlfriend in one of the most brutal ways possible over something that is supposed to be so beautiful, like bringing a new life into the world, and she wasn’t even pregnant.

    I hope the fires of hell burn a million times hotter for you once you get there.

    My prayers and condolences go out to the Sookdeo family.

  • Dyleski facing life

    Dyleski facing life

    Dyleski could serve life without parole:

    Contra Costa County prosecutors have filed a special circumstance allegation against 17-year-old murder defendant Scott Dyleski, subjecting him to a life term without the possibility of parole if he is convicted.

    Prosecutors allege that Dyleski committed murder during a residential burglary.

    In court documents filed Wednesday, deputy district attorney Harold Jewett said Dyleski entered the home of Pamela Vitale with the intention of stealing, counterfeiting or fraudulently using access card information.

    Dyleski is accused of killing Vitale on Oct. 15, 2005. Vitale’s husband Daniel Horowitz found her stabbed and bludgeoned to death that evening.

    Dyleski cannot get the death penalty due to his age. Which is more consideration than Pam Vitale got.

  • Henderson speaks out

    Henderson speaks at hearing:

    Richard Henderson Jr., the Florida 20-year-old accused of bludgeoning his family to death on Thanksgiving Day, spoke out in court yesterday against the advice of his attorney…

    “I have something to say,” Henderson blurted out, to the surprise of his public defender, Steven Schaefer, who advised him to keep quiet. Henderson insisted, and Schaefer let him speak.

    “I want to plead guilty and get this over with,” Henderson said. He was dressed in a jail-issued blue jump suit and shackled at the wrists and feet. A dozen bailiffs stood by.

    He faces the death penalty if convicted.

  • We now interrupt this blog for A SPECIAL REPORT

    We now interrupt this blog for A SPECIAL REPORT

    A SPECIAL REPORT: HAZING

    Dr. Scott of Polite Dissent was nice enough to send me this article. In the wake of the Sierra Vista High hazing incident, the Las Vegas Review-Journal decided to follow it up with A SPECIAL REPORT on hazing.

    They interviewed some former high school athletes for their SPECIAL REPORT and read what some of them had to say about hazing…

    “It’s humorous, and a little cruel, but you think, hey, you know what, they (the seniors) did the same thing to me a couple years ago,” said former Centennial wrestler Chris Fletcher, 20, who acknowledged throwing clothed, younger wrestlers into showers and duct-taping others to chairs.

    And the cycle of abuse perpetuates.

    “They didn’t enjoy it while it was happening, but they enjoyed it when they were varsity players and got to do it,” said Ronald Tekpho, 20, who played football and ran track for Valley before graduating in 2003.

    Many of the former athletes expressed disgust with allegations surrounding a Feb. 3 incident at Sierra Vista that has left six basketball players facing expulsion and felony charges.

    The players are accused of pinning down a younger teammate while at least one of them penetrated his rectum with fingers.

    “Hazing is supposed to be fun,” Tekpho said, “not a violation of somebody.”

    Asked to elaborate on “fun” types of hazing, Tekpho described spraying a locker with a water hose while a junior varsity player was trapped inside.

    “He was screaming, ‘It’s cold, it’s cold! Let me out of here!’ ” said a chuckling Tekpho, a Community College of Southern Nevada student who aspires to be a police officer. “We let him out. We weren’t going to let him die in there.”

    While I’m glad that he is disgusted about sexual assault, the fact that he’s giddy over false imprisonment doesn’t make me feel any better. And the fact that he’s trying to be a cop makes me fearful.

    Playing varsity football for Chaparral in the late 1990s, Steve Puterski and his teammates had one rule after randomly choosing a younger athlete to haze.

    “There was no hitting in the face or the groin,” said Puterski, now a 25-year-old journalist in Greeley, Colo. “We just basically beat them in the arms and legs, so they’d be sore but not seriously hurt.”

    Puterski says he was similarly hazed years earlier as a junior varsity player.

    “They all just kind of took a turn. It was like a senior’s privilege,” he said. “Maybe 10 or 15 guys would come and give you three or four licks each, then they’d help you up, and one of them would give you a ride home. It was just a tradition.”

    So how long will it be before forced sodomy among high school athletes becomes “tradition”?

    We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.