Tag Archives: Crime

News

Should convicted murderer Steven Hayes get the death penalty?

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WARNING: This story has graphic descriptions of evil and despicable acts.

Story from the Hartford Courant.

Excerpt:

A Superior Court jury today sentenced Steven Hayes to death for the murders of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her daughters, Hayley and Michaela, during a seven-hour home invasion, robbery and arson at their Cheshire home in July 2007.

Outside the courthouse after the verdicts, Hawke-Petit’s father, the Rev. Richard Hawke, said “There are some people who do not deserve to live in God’s world.”

Asked what he had in his heart, Dr. William Petit Jr. struggled with his answer. “….Probably many of you have kids,” he said, pausing to choke back tears. “Michaela was an 11-year-old little girl…tortured and killed in her own bedroom, surrounded by her stuffed animals….”

Petit then talked about his daughter Hayley’s bright future and her strength and the children that his wife, Jennifer, helped.

“So, I was really thinking of the tremendous loss” during the verdict, Petit said, adding that he was pleased with it, but “mostly I was sad for the loss we have all suffered.”

Asked if he thought there’d be closure now, Petit said, “There’s never closure. There’s a hole…. with jagged edges…that may smooth out with time, but the hole in your heart and the hole in your soul” remains.

“This isn’t about revenge,” Petit said. “Vengeance belongs to the Lord. This is about justice.”

[…]The jury sentenced Hayes to death on six counts: killing Hawke-Petit and Michaela and Hayley in the course of a single action; killing a child under the age of 16; killing Hawke-Petit in the course of a kidnapping; killing Hayley in the course of a kidnapping; killing Michaela in the course of a kidnapping; and killing Hawke-Petit in the course of a sexual assault.

[…]Hayes, 47, of Winsted, was convicted Oct. 5 of breaking into the Petit home, beating Petit, tying up and torturing the family as Hayes and another man ransacked the home for cash and valuables and tortured the family for seven hours. Testimony during Hayes’ trial showed that at one point in the break-in, Hayes forced Hawke-Petit to go to the bank to withdraw money. During that time, according to testimony, Komisarjevsky sexually assaulted Michaela Petit, 11.

When Hawke-Petit and Hayes returned from the bank, Hayes raped and strangled Hawke-Petit. The house was doused with gasoline and set on fire as the intruders fled, testimony showed. Hayley, 17, and Michaela died of smoke inhalation.

[…]Prosecutors used the words of Hayes’ younger brother Matthew to counter testimony that home-invasion crime was an aberration in Hayes otherwise troubled but basically nonviolent life.

Matthew Hayes portrayed his brother as a conniving, sadistic, violent thief who saw Matthew take countless beatings from his brutal father for Steven Hayes’ misdeeds. At one point, Steven Hayes held a gun to Matthew’s head, according to the statement, which was given to state police after the home invasion.

Examples of Hayes’ sadistic behavior toward his brother included hooking Matthew to the garage door by his belt and raising the door up and down, and holding Matthew’s hand to a red-hot burner. Matthew said his brother’s life of crime was not a result of bad parenting or poor childhood. He said Hayes never learned to take responsibility for his actions.

“Steven is what Steven is because he’s a coward,” Matthew Hayes wrote.

I know that some people are very pro-life and yet don’t support the death penalty, and then there are leftists who favor killing innocent babies, while letting guilty murderers live. I am just curious about whether any of my readers is willing to come out and explain why Hayes should not get the death penalty. I think he should.

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News

In France, unionized thugs riot against maturity and responsibility

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Here’s a story about the public sector union riots in France from Bloomberg News. (H/T Mary)

Excerpt:

French refineries remained shut, trains were on half service, schools closed and gas stations ran dry as unions held their fourth strike in two months against President Nicolas Sarkozy’s plan to raise the retirement age.

Sarkozy has refused to retreat from a proposal to increase the retirement age for a full pension to 67 from 65. His plan would bring France closer to Germany and the U.S., which are moving toward setting 67 as the full-retirement age, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

The French Senate is set to vote on the pension measure this week, giving final parliamentary approval to a plan to eliminate the retirement-system deficit by 2018.

“This reform had been postponed for too long and the deadline couldn’t be push further anymore,” Sarkozy said at a press conference in Deauville, France. “I hope that everyone stays calm so that things don’t go beyond certain limits. We cannot live without gasoline. I will see to it with the security forces that public order is guaranteed.”

Some protests turned violent, with youths today fighting police in the Paris suburb of Nanterre. In Lyon, some demonstrators broke shop windows and pillaged stores, L’Express magazine said on its website. Television reports showed snaking lines of drivers waiting to fill up on gas as about a quarter of the country’s 12,000 service stations carried signs saying they’d run out of fuel.

Government ministers said France has enough fuel to last several weeks and that they’ll continue to use police to break up barricades at oil depots.

[…]France’s 12 refineries have been on strike for a week, and no crude is arriving at the ports of Marseille, Le Havre and Nantes.

[…]Exxon Mobil Corp. declared “force majeure,” in France, saying it will be unable to meet some of its oil supply obligations and that it has begun shutting down its Gravenchon refinery, the larger of its two oil-processors in the country.

“A complete shutdown of the refinery is now under way,” Catherine Brun, an Exxon spokeswoman in Paris, said by phone today. “We cannot deliver products out of tanks.”

Total SA, the country’s biggest oil company, said a quarter of the 4,000 service stations it operates in France face shortages of one or more fuel products because of the strike.

[…]In France, the average retiree gets a net 65 percent of his average qualifying wage in government pension payouts, compared with 61.5 percent in Germany, 47 percent in the U.S. and 44 percent in Britain, according to the OECD.

I’m not sure why, but the word “extortion” pops into my mind. Or maybe I was thinking of “arrested development”. What is it called when grown men and women refuse to grow up and take responsibility for their own lives and insist on receiving entitlements provided by their harder-working neighbors?

Could a public sector union pension crisis happen here in the USA? Well, consider this article from The Economist, a radically-left-wing pro-Obama magazine. (H/T ECM)

Excerpt:

CHUCK REED is the Democratic mayor of San Jose, California. You might expect him to be an ally of public-sector workers, a powerful lobby in the Golden State. But last month, at a hearing on pension reform held by the Little Hoover Commission, which monitors the state’s government, Mr Reed lamented his crippling public-pensions bill. “City payments for retirement benefits have tripled over the last ten years even though our workforce has declined dramatically, and we have billions of dollars in unfunded liabilities that the taxpayers must pay,” he said.

Mr Reed estimated that the average cost to his city of employing a police officer or firefighter was $180,000 a year. Not only can such workers retire at 50, but some enjoy annual pension payments greater than their salaries. They are also entitled to cost-of-living increases of 3% a year, health and dental insurance for life and lump-sum payments for unused sick leave that could reach hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Plenty of similar bills are looming in America’s public sector: in municipalities, in the federal government, and especially at state level. Defined-benefit pensions, which link retirement income to salary, are expensive promises to keep. The private sector has been switching to defined-contribution plans, in which employees bear the investment risk. But the public sector has barely begun to adjust, and has built up a huge liability to its staff. Worse, it has not funded the promises properly.

Joshua Rauh, of the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, and Robert Novy-Marx, of the University of Rochester, estimate that the states’ pension shortfall may be as much as $3.4 trillion and that municipalities have a hole of $574 billion. Mr Rauh calculates that seven states will have exhausted their pension assets by 2020—even if they make a return of 8%, a common assumption that looks wildly optimistic. Half will run out of money by 2027. If pension promises are to be kept, this will place immense strain on taxes. Several have promised annual payments that will absorb more than 30% of their tax revenues after their pension funds are exhausted (see chart 1).

Now the problem is making headlines, especially in California, where taxpayer groups have been highlighting the generous pensions of some former employees. More than 9,000 beneficiaries of CalPERS, the largest state retirement plan, receive more than $100,000 a year.

The stage is set for conflict between public-sector workers and taxpayers. Because almost all states are required to balance their budgets, any extra pension contributions they make to mend a deficit will come at the expense of other citizens. Utah has calculated it will have to commit 10% of its general fund for 25 years to pay for the effects of the 2008 stockmarket crash. But attempts to reduce the cost of pensions are being challenged in court and will be opposed by trade unions, which still have plenty of members in the public sector.

It’s not good for people to go through life becoming more and more accustomed to bailouts and redistributed wealth from their neighbors. Everyone should have to earn their own money and provide for themselves during their own retirement years. It’s not good to be dependent on other people – it’s better to make your own way in the world, and to share with others who have less than you do.

Commentary

Neil Simpson’s report on his recent prison ministry event

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Here is Neil’s post at 4Simpsons.

Introduction:

The Kairos prison ministry weekend went really well.  As always, it was exhausting and amazing.  This is probably my favorite ministry.  I’ve never seen anything that has such broad and dramatic impacts on so many lives.  I’ll share a little background, then a few observations.  If you want more background on the ministry there is additional information at the bottom.

Overview of the ministry: It is an opportunity to share the Gospel with those who aren’t believers (No one is pressured, though).  Many of the participants are already Christians, so it is a great opportunity to fellowship with and encourage them.  And it is just an all-around way to share God’s love with people who are often depressed and forgotten.  It is educational in laying out Christian principles for living and creating a Christian community wherever they are.  It helps teach them how to love and forgive others (and themselves). It has a dramatic impact on recidivism, which means less victims and lower costs for society.

Kairos doesn’t advocate for either the prisoners or for the criminal justice system. A transaction took place between the state and the prisoner. The prisoners did the crime and are now doing the time, so we don’t get in the middle of that. We just reach out with Christian love to all and with Christian fellowship to believers.  We try to show that they aren’t forgotten.

There is also a Kairos Outside program for the moms / wives / daughters of the prisoners.  It is completely free, including transportation to the event and childcare if necessary.

Then he has a list of exciting things that happened while he was ministering to the prisoners.

Here’s an excerpt from the list:

  • A prisoner at the closing ceremony told everyone to go home and tell and show your kids that you love them.  A few of the inmates came from solid homes, but most did not.
  • Another interesting moment at the closing ceremony: One guy asked how many people were raised going to church.  Lots of hands went up.  Then he asked how many were taught the Bible at home.  Most hands went down.  See Ephesians 6:4, Christians!  We need to teach this to our kids ourselves.  What they learn at church is just a bonus.
  • One guy noted how he thought love was just something in books and movies, and that he never experienced it until this weekend.
  • The birthday cakes and cards brought a lot of tears, especially by some who never had them growing up.

Everyone always wonders why I put so much emphasis on marriage and parenting in my posts. It’s because we really need to stop this idea that marriage is something we get into for fun. Relationships with the opposite sex are NOT primarily about fun, (for Christians). You are trying to create a stable environment in which to raise new disciples who will have an impact for Christ, and you are trying to pick a person who you can love self-sacrificially in close quarters without feeling used or burned out. When marriages don’t stay together, then the kids are raised without both parents (usually without a father) and things go badly for the children.