May 19, 1992, seventeen year old Damien Echols was arrested with his fifteen year old girlfriend Deanna Holcomb for breaking into a vacant trailer. They were running away together and, at the time of apprehension, were caught partially dressed and in the closet. According to his arrest report, Echols was charged with burglary and sexual misconduct. He was later convicted of breaking and entering and second degree sexual misconduct. He was remanded to Craighead County Juvenile Detention Center. While in detention, he expressed a plan for suicide, to tie sheets together and hang himself. He was sent to Charter Hospital in Little Rock for intervention and stayed there for a little over three weeks.
Echols seemed to believe there were more charges than this, telling his psychiatrist he was also charged with disorderly conduct and terroristic threatening, charges which he denied. Although not charged with making threats, he described his thoughts to his therapist
. . . while he was waiting in the police car to be taken to juvenile detention or jail following having been arrested, that he witnessed his girlfriend's father coming toward her as she waited with police offers in an aggressive manner. Damien states that he was able to work his fingers loose, moved over and was able to slip the safety off of the police officer's gun which had been left in the police vehicle. Damien freely admitted he had plans to shoot the girlfriend's father if he acted in an aggressive manner toward the girl. (p. 383, Exhibit 500. Page references below are also Exhibit 500 unless otherwise noted.)
gee...he MUST be guilty then :roll: :roll: :roll:
"don't waste your time with a person who has already made up their closed mind"..sounds like an ancient chinese saying...but i just made it up!
The same could be said for Mr. Vedder in this case...
none of us know if these guys are truly guilty or not..but we do know they did not recieve a fair trial and as Americans we should all be concerned when someone doesn't get a fair trial..because that could be you/me not getting a fair trial..& i don't see how that makes Ed close minded..I didn't read anything that said "hey i'm Edddie Vedder and i know for a fact these guys are 100% innocent..please donate money"
i also support a new trail for mumia abu jamal
and there is no doubt that leonard peltier was fucked by the FBI
i guess it's kind of a prerequisite to know about police/FBI/CIA/Gov corruption(falsifying evidence,jailing scape goats etc.) and all the dead and imprisoned innocent people they are responsible for to be able to grasp the fact that these guys could very well be not guilty!!
.what with DNA evidence and the likes these days surely they could get off if they had anything to go off? Obviosuly I should read the case before going further.'
"....and much more importantly, DNA and other forensic technologies have progressed to the point where items that were previously inadequate for testing are now providing the positive proof that Damien, Jason and Jessie have been waiting over a decade for.
The results of recent DNA testing have revealed that these three men couldn't have been involved in the murders because not one cell of genetic material has been identified that matches them. The nature of this crime as put forth by the State of Arkansas makes it very unlikely that the perpetrator could have committed it without leaving even the smallest trace behind. DNA evidence was, however found that matches a pair of individuals who had been together on the day the children disappeared. One of these individuals is the stepfather of one of the victims......."
When it comes to the delay between Ed writing the letter and posting it, I'm wondering if he does the same thing I do with my holiday postcards... buy them, write them and..... bring them back home in the suitcase because there 'wasn't really an opportunity' to mail them!
well lets turn that around, what if it was your kid? would you be so concerned about judicial fairness then?
If it were my kid, I would want to skin the GUILTY person alive. In this very publicised case, even just having the slightest doubt that the right people/person were in jail and having to look at people around wondering if it could then be them, would tear me apart. The would be absolutely NO closure.
a great example of the difficulties of quoting part comments.
Someone reading this may think i was totally convinced these guys are rabid murderers, but taken in the context of my full post I am clearly saying my comments are very 'vague' and 'general' given I have no info on this case at all, and was merely summising on the poster above mines interpretation of life generally.
Would I want a child butchering murderer locked up and left to rot even if the right processes were not followed? I'm sad to say yes, of course its unutopic and undemocratic but at the end of the day whether its a judgement consistant with the legal process/system means nothing to me, as long as they got the right man.
From reading further and to be specific to the facts involved here, the guilt is clearly very ambiguous...and herein lies the problem.
Sadly known murderers walk the streets because of lack of due process, that frankly is unacceptable even in the name of democracy.
reagardless of all I say good luck to Vedder for standing up for what he believes in, he has earned our ears, and earned his soapbox, and if he wants to use it to bring waht he perceives as some deserved activism ourway then so be it, we really dont have to go any further.
Fucking hell RATM wouldnt do to well over on this forum would they???
a great example of the difficulties of quoting part comments.
Someone reading this may think i was totally convinced these guys are rabid murderers, but taken in the context of my full post I am clearly saying my comments are very 'vague' and 'general' given I have no info on this case at all, and was merely summising on the poster above mines interpretation of life generally.?
Sorry... Didn't mean to do that.. I certainly don't think this makes you think you are convinced they are the guilty ones.... I was trying to give a bit more info on the DNA status part of the issue. From your post, it was not obvious you (others) were/may have been aware that there had been DNA retesting, etc.
Would I want a child butchering murderer locked up and left to rot even if the right processes were not followed? I'm sad to say yes, of course its unutopic and undemocratic but at the end of the day whether its a judgement consistant with the legal process/system means nothing to me, as long as they got the right man.
And another quote which is a bit of the total post.... Gut instict would say f*** due process when one is 100% certain this child butchering murder is guilty (caught in the act?) - I'm a mother - there is no telling what I would do to this person. But the problem, it is VERY difficult to make a sound judgement and know for SURE you have the right man if this process is not followed. Even when it is, there are miscarriages. As you say... 'as long as they got the right man'
Damien Echols is a fucking disgusting piece of shit..........
Playing Devil's Advocate, what is your opinion of John Mark Byers?
PBM
"We paced ourselves and we didn't rush through it and we tried to be as creative as our collective minds would let us be over some course of time instead of just trying to rush through a record"
I was thinking about it... if Damien had been convicted of murder in 1993 here in Ireland, he would be on his last year or so of a full, unmitigated Life sentence....and free to go.
I am NOT comparing systems of justice or saying irelands is better ( actually Irelands is far too lenient in parts, especially murder sentences)...but context is a beautiful thing.
the guy is on death row in unclear circumstances. Speedy can say its clear-cut all he wants, but if there are questions over every aspect of the case (the evidence, the confessions, the charges, the witnesses, the trial, the instructions to the juries...etc etc)....then it is not clear cut. Some people genuinely are in the wrong place at the wrong time, or have bad backgrounds and get trapped by them. Punishing easy targets happens on every level of the justice system in every country. No man should be sentenced to death with that much confusion around the details.
Under most systems of justice (including USA's) mental conditions actually lower the sentence/punishment, in this case, prevent Echols being placed on death row. So if those conditions influenced his conviction, why werent they taken into account at his sentencing, ie: placing him in prison for life, without the death sentence?
The same could be said for Mr. Vedder in this case...
none of us know if these guys are truly guilty or not..but we do know they did not recieve a fair trial and as Americans we should all be concerned when someone doesn't get a fair trial..because that could be you/me not getting a fair trial..& i don't see how that makes Ed close minded..I didn't read anything that said "hey i'm Edddie Vedder and i know for a fact these guys are 100% innocent..please donate money"
i also support a new trail for mumia abu jamal
and there is no doubt that leonard peltier was fucked by the FBI
i guess it's kind of a prerequisite to know about police/FBI/CIA/Gov corruption(falsifying evidence,jailing scape goats etc.) and all the dead and imprisoned innocent people they are responsible for to be able to grasp the fact that these guys could very well be not guilty!!
"With the new DNA and forensic evidence that ties others to these dreadful crimes and demonstrates that our guys Damien, Jason and Jesse are innocent, we are confident that the truth will come out."
a great example of the difficulties of quoting part comments.
Someone reading this may think i was totally convinced these guys are rabid murderers, but taken in the context of my full post I am clearly saying my comments are very 'vague' and 'general' given I have no info on this case at all, and was merely summising on the poster above mines interpretation of life generally.?
Sorry... Didn't mean to do that.. I certainly don't think this makes you think you are convinced they are the guilty ones.... I was trying to give a bit more info on the DNA status part of the issue. From your post, it was not obvious you (others) were/may have been aware that there had been DNA retesting, etc.
No you are absolutely right, I wasnt aware of the retesting of theDNA and I wasnt having a go - was trying to just get across again I wasnt forming opinions on this case, just generally.
it seems an interesting case, and i would love to hear more as to why the guy remains inside following the retesting??
The same could be said for Mr. Vedder in this case...
none of us know if these guys are truly guilty or not..but we do know they did not recieve a fair trial and as Americans we should all be concerned when someone doesn't get a fair trial..because that could be you/me not getting a fair trial..& i don't see how that makes Ed close minded..I didn't read anything that said "hey i'm Edddie Vedder and i know for a fact these guys are 100% innocent..please donate money"
i also support a new trail for mumia abu jamal
and there is no doubt that leonard peltier was fucked by the FBI
i guess it's kind of a prerequisite to know about police/FBI/CIA/Gov corruption(falsifying evidence,jailing scape goats etc.) and all the dead and imprisoned innocent people they are responsible for to be able to grasp the fact that these guys could very well be not guilty!!
excellent post.
it IS a VERY scary idea to think one could be wrongly imprisioned....for YEARS...or for LIFE....or executed! and it HAS happened in the past, and may well be the case right now for others, and i am not merely referring to the possibility for the WM3, but other prisioners as well.
'better 100 guilty men go free than one innocent man wrongfully put to death'....or something like that. these kind of cases truly scare the bejeebus outta me. and hell, one does not need to be *perfect* to be innocent. even pieces of shit can be innocent as well. just sayin'.
as to ed's christmas message - i truly enjoyed it! and i thank whoever posted it in it's entirety b/c i cannot SEE the news on the home page :evil: :evil: ....just a bunch of "N/A"s on the page b/c of that damned light blue backgorund that i canNOT change back to the original skin. ugh.
anyhooo....ed has ALWAYS been political, this is not news. i am not at ALL surprised that he takes every opportunity he can to share with his fans people/ideas/causes he believes in. no where in this message, or in others, do i see him saying DO THIS...not at all. he is sharing information, and he is also sharing HIS perspective, and us as the readers....can take this information any way we see fit, act or not......and so it goes.........
'better 100 guilty men go free than one innocent man wrongfully put to death'....or something like that. these kind of cases truly scare the bejeebus outta me. and hell, one does not need to be *perfect* to be innocent. even pieces of shit can be innocent as well. just sayin'.
and i thank whoever posted it in it's entirety b/c i cannot SEE the news on the home page :evil: :evil: ....just a bunch of "N/A"s on the page b/c of that damned light blue backgorund that i canNOT change back to the original skin. ugh.
Okay, go to the PJ home page while being logged in, click on the "Settings" and scroll down to the Block Configuration groupbox, check on the "current_news: block" (and others if you want), save.... and viola!
anyhooo....ed has ALWAYS been political, this is not news. i am not at ALL surprised that he takes every opportunity he can to share with his fans people/ideas/causes he believes in. no where in this message, or in others, do i see him saying DO THIS...not at all. he is sharing information, and he is also sharing HIS perspective, and us as the readers....can take this information any way we see fit, act or not......and so it goes.........
You said it, girl!
He's a multi-tasker and I hope he'll continue to write some more to us in the future. Nothing like sharing his letter with fellow PJ fans in the same place.
The same goes for the others - Stone, Jeff (he already did that once), Matt, and Mike (more, Mike!). Even Boom! I love Boom and his darling wife, Pinky. That woman kicks ass!
Ok, I'll unglue myself from the computer... but I'm listening to Bobby singing and playing on his guitar.... "Hey, J-J-Jaded!!!" Quite fitting for me, I think... :oops:
JA: Why do I get the Ticketmaster question?
EV: It's your band.
~Q Magazine
"Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
It's actually Damien Echols doing a cover of 25 Minutes To Go.
Bad taste? Sorry.
I thought it would ease the tension of the thread.
PBM
"We paced ourselves and we didn't rush through it and we tried to be as creative as our collective minds would let us be over some course of time instead of just trying to rush through a record"
Pretty much the same information we had before...Which isn't much...I really didn't understand the section Ed wrote about the fan club single...Might just be me?....Really nothing but reconfirming it takes a while to make one... :roll:
I would never presume to judge someone's guilt based on their past actions . . . try to keep an open mind until all the facts in the W3 case have been brought to light.
The Guilford Four & the Maguire Seven both spring to mind aswell.
Pretty outrageous cases of blatant miscarriages of justice. one of them ended up dying in prison. Similar public hysteria around the cases at the time too.
The Guilford Four & the Maguire Seven both spring to mind aswell.
Pretty outrageous cases of blatant miscarriages of justice. one of them ended up dying in prison. Similar public hysteria around the cases at the time too.
I remember when the Guilford 4 were freed - I used to work right by the Old Bailey. There was euphoria but I still heard lots of grumble from people thinking that they MUST have been guilty or else they wouldn't have been charged and convicted in the first place. Quite shocking.
The Guilford Four & the Maguire Seven both spring to mind aswell.
Pretty outrageous cases of blatant miscarriages of justice. one of them ended up dying in prison. Similar public hysteria around the cases at the time too.
I remember when the Guilford 4 were freed - I used to work right by the Old Bailey. There was euphoria but I still heard lots of grumble from people thinking that they MUST have been guilty or else they wouldn't have been charged and convicted in the first place. Quite shocking.
Wow, thats nuts... Must have been quite a thing to be around for. It really was a staggering, bewildering thing...I mean the whole thing was insane wasnt it?
Nothing to say thats not the case here too. Of course it may not be, but its just so similar in so many ways.
Comments
gee...he MUST be guilty then :roll: :roll: :roll:
"don't waste your time with a person who has already made up their closed mind"..sounds like an ancient chinese saying...but i just made it up!
The same could be said for Mr. Vedder in this case...
I see your point...But, that doesn't make him a murder...{Well I guess he was convicted}..He does seem like he is shady though...
Jeremy
Shady is an understatement....
Damien Echols is a fucking disgusting piece of shit..........
Till there aint nothing left worth taking away from me.....
none of us know if these guys are truly guilty or not..but we do know they did not recieve a fair trial and as Americans we should all be concerned when someone doesn't get a fair trial..because that could be you/me not getting a fair trial..& i don't see how that makes Ed close minded..I didn't read anything that said "hey i'm Edddie Vedder and i know for a fact these guys are 100% innocent..please donate money"
i also support a new trail for mumia abu jamal
and there is no doubt that leonard peltier was fucked by the FBI
i guess it's kind of a prerequisite to know about police/FBI/CIA/Gov corruption(falsifying evidence,jailing scape goats etc.) and all the dead and imprisoned innocent people they are responsible for to be able to grasp the fact that these guys could very well be not guilty!!
a great example of the difficulties of quoting part comments.
Someone reading this may think i was totally convinced these guys are rabid murderers, but taken in the context of my full post I am clearly saying my comments are very 'vague' and 'general' given I have no info on this case at all, and was merely summising on the poster above mines interpretation of life generally.
Would I want a child butchering murderer locked up and left to rot even if the right processes were not followed? I'm sad to say yes, of course its unutopic and undemocratic but at the end of the day whether its a judgement consistant with the legal process/system means nothing to me, as long as they got the right man.
From reading further and to be specific to the facts involved here, the guilt is clearly very ambiguous...and herein lies the problem.
Sadly known murderers walk the streets because of lack of due process, that frankly is unacceptable even in the name of democracy.
reagardless of all I say good luck to Vedder for standing up for what he believes in, he has earned our ears, and earned his soapbox, and if he wants to use it to bring waht he perceives as some deserved activism ourway then so be it, we really dont have to go any further.
Fucking hell RATM wouldnt do to well over on this forum would they???
Sorry... Didn't mean to do that.. I certainly don't think this makes you think you are convinced they are the guilty ones.... I was trying to give a bit more info on the DNA status part of the issue. From your post, it was not obvious you (others) were/may have been aware that there had been DNA retesting, etc.
And another quote which is a bit of the total post.... Gut instict would say f*** due process when one is 100% certain this child butchering murder is guilty (caught in the act?) - I'm a mother - there is no telling what I would do to this person. But the problem, it is VERY difficult to make a sound judgement and know for SURE you have the right man if this process is not followed. Even when it is, there are miscarriages. As you say... 'as long as they got the right man'
Playing Devil's Advocate, what is your opinion of John Mark Byers?
PBM
Wishlist Foundation: http://wishlistfoundation.org
That made me laugh, pdalwosky! Thanks, I needed that... btw, I was at their show last year - UNBELIEVABLE!
I've never experienced such a show like that.... and once is enough, thank you! Phew...
EV: It's your band.
~Q Magazine
"Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
I am NOT comparing systems of justice or saying irelands is better ( actually Irelands is far too lenient in parts, especially murder sentences)...but context is a beautiful thing.
the guy is on death row in unclear circumstances. Speedy can say its clear-cut all he wants, but if there are questions over every aspect of the case (the evidence, the confessions, the charges, the witnesses, the trial, the instructions to the juries...etc etc)....then it is not clear cut. Some people genuinely are in the wrong place at the wrong time, or have bad backgrounds and get trapped by them. Punishing easy targets happens on every level of the justice system in every country. No man should be sentenced to death with that much confusion around the details.
Under most systems of justice (including USA's) mental conditions actually lower the sentence/punishment, in this case, prevent Echols being placed on death row. So if those conditions influenced his conviction, why werent they taken into account at his sentencing, ie: placing him in prison for life, without the death sentence?
"With the new DNA and forensic evidence that ties others to these dreadful crimes and demonstrates that our guys Damien, Jason and Jesse are innocent, we are confident that the truth will come out."
Yes he did.
What in the hell happened???? :? Post went weird....
No you are absolutely right, I wasnt aware of the retesting of theDNA and I wasnt having a go - was trying to just get across again I wasnt forming opinions on this case, just generally.
it seems an interesting case, and i would love to hear more as to why the guy remains inside following the retesting??
but i am off to work now....
and i will be more than happy to discuss the west memphis 3 child murderers tomorrow....
have a good day my friend..........
Till there aint nothing left worth taking away from me.....
So he deserves to die? Bit of Dictator hidden inside you is there?
excellent post.
it IS a VERY scary idea to think one could be wrongly imprisioned....for YEARS...or for LIFE....or executed! and it HAS happened in the past, and may well be the case right now for others, and i am not merely referring to the possibility for the WM3, but other prisioners as well.
'better 100 guilty men go free than one innocent man wrongfully put to death'....or something like that. these kind of cases truly scare the bejeebus outta me. and hell, one does not need to be *perfect* to be innocent. even pieces of shit can be innocent as well. just sayin'.
as to ed's christmas message
anyhooo....ed has ALWAYS been political, this is not news. i am not at ALL surprised that he takes every opportunity he can to share with his fans people/ideas/causes he believes in. no where in this message, or in others, do i see him saying DO THIS...not at all. he is sharing information, and he is also sharing HIS perspective, and us as the readers....can take this information any way we see fit, act or not......and so it goes.........
Let's just breathe...
I am myself like you somehow
I can only assume it is going through the whole appeal process.
*nods in agreement*
So did I...although a little weenie too excited way too early...
Okay, go to the PJ home page while being logged in, click on the "Settings" and scroll down to the Block Configuration groupbox, check on the "current_news: block" (and others if you want), save.... and viola!
You said it, girl!
He's a multi-tasker and I hope he'll continue to write some more to us in the future. Nothing like sharing his letter with fellow PJ fans in the same place.
The same goes for the others - Stone, Jeff (he already did that once), Matt, and Mike (more, Mike!). Even Boom! I love Boom and his darling wife, Pinky. That woman kicks ass!
Ok, I'll unglue myself from the computer... but I'm listening to Bobby singing and playing on his guitar.... "Hey, J-J-Jaded!!!" Quite fitting for me, I think... :oops:
EV: It's your band.
~Q Magazine
"Kisses for the glow...kisses for the lease." - BDRII
It's actually Damien Echols doing a cover of 25 Minutes To Go.
Bad taste? Sorry.
I thought it would ease the tension of the thread.
PBM
Wishlist Foundation: http://wishlistfoundation.org
"I got 24 minutes to go"............................
Till there aint nothing left worth taking away from me.....
Hi,
Pretty much the same information we had before...Which isn't much...I really didn't understand the section Ed wrote about the fan club single...Might just be me?....Really nothing but reconfirming it takes a while to make one... :roll:
jeremy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Milgaard
I would never presume to judge someone's guilt based on their past actions . . . try to keep an open mind until all the facts in the W3 case have been brought to light.
Pretty outrageous cases of blatant miscarriages of justice. one of them ended up dying in prison. Similar public hysteria around the cases at the time too.
I remember when the Guilford 4 were freed - I used to work right by the Old Bailey. There was euphoria but I still heard lots of grumble from people thinking that they MUST have been guilty or else they wouldn't have been charged and convicted in the first place. Quite shocking.
Wow, thats nuts... Must have been quite a thing to be around for. It really was a staggering, bewildering thing...I mean the whole thing was insane wasnt it?
Nothing to say thats not the case here too. Of course it may not be, but its just so similar in so many ways.