[thanks to Wolf]
The Commercial Appeal
TO SAVE OTHERS
Trial's message: Heed any signs of violence
Date: March 22, 1994
Section: Viewpoint
Page: a8
Memo: editorial
Edition: Final
"YOU BETTER get to know your kids.'' That's the message that West Memphis Police Inspector Gary W. Gitchell said he had taken from his 10-month immersion in one of the most shocking and grisly murder cases this region has known.
It's a message that every parent should keep in mind.
Damien Wayne Echols, Charles Jason Baldwin and Jessie Lloyd Misskelley have been found guilty of murder in the savage killings of three young boys. Echols has been sentenced to death by injection; Baldwin, to life imprisonment with no possibility of parole; and Misskelley, who received a separate trial earlier, to life imprisonment plus 40 years.
The details of the crimes horrified the Mid-South, and people in other parts of the country as well. The murders were linked to satanism. There were reports that the defendants had killed animals ritualistically before they killed the three boys. Last June, less than two weeks after the defendants were arrested, Crittenden County juvenile authorities acknowledged that they had become concerned about occult activity a year earlier after reports of animal sacrifices in the county.
How much the occult figured into the murders may never be known, unless the convicted killers tell more than they have so far. That's not likely until they've exhausted all legal appeals.
But evidence and testimony in the case leave a strong impression that Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley had become deeply involved in fantasies that warped their thinking and made them insensitive to any feelings of conscience. Evidence indicated that Echols was influenced by the writings of the late Aleister Crowley, a proponent of human sacrifice.
For a long time -- years perhaps -- there may have been signs in the behavior of one or more of the killers that they were having serious emotional and psychological problems.
Parents and teachers sometimes assume that ``weird'' or antisocial actions are just a stage that children or teenagers go through. But over the past 20 years or so, the evidence has accumulated more surely than in the West Memphis trial that the impact of drugs, the occult and themes of anger and violence in youth culture can poison young minds and destroy lives.
It's possible that nothing could have been done to prevent the murders -- that no amount of parental supervision would have controlled the desire for violence in this case.
In general, however, greater sensitivity about how young lives can go wrong and quicker responses to danger signs might at least stop more youngsters from making victims of themselves.
The people of Crittenden County are relieved that this ordeal -- pending the inevitable appeals -- is over. But, as a 12-year-old boy remarked, after a lesson that no one so young should have to learn, "It could happen again. There's some sick people around.''
The ordeal will have some benefit if it raises awareness enough to help protect other possible victims.
Document Number: CMA03220109
The Commercial Appeal
TO SAVE OTHERS
Trial's message: Heed any signs of violence
Date: March 22, 1994
Section: Viewpoint
Page: a8
Memo: editorial
Edition: Final
"YOU BETTER get to know your kids.'' That's the message that West Memphis Police Inspector Gary W. Gitchell said he had taken from his 10-month immersion in one of the most shocking and grisly murder cases this region has known.
It's a message that every parent should keep in mind.
Damien Wayne Echols, Charles Jason Baldwin and Jessie Lloyd Misskelley have been found guilty of murder in the savage killings of three young boys. Echols has been sentenced to death by injection; Baldwin, to life imprisonment with no possibility of parole; and Misskelley, who received a separate trial earlier, to life imprisonment plus 40 years.
The details of the crimes horrified the Mid-South, and people in other parts of the country as well. The murders were linked to satanism. There were reports that the defendants had killed animals ritualistically before they killed the three boys. Last June, less than two weeks after the defendants were arrested, Crittenden County juvenile authorities acknowledged that they had become concerned about occult activity a year earlier after reports of animal sacrifices in the county.
How much the occult figured into the murders may never be known, unless the convicted killers tell more than they have so far. That's not likely until they've exhausted all legal appeals.
But evidence and testimony in the case leave a strong impression that Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley had become deeply involved in fantasies that warped their thinking and made them insensitive to any feelings of conscience. Evidence indicated that Echols was influenced by the writings of the late Aleister Crowley, a proponent of human sacrifice.
For a long time -- years perhaps -- there may have been signs in the behavior of one or more of the killers that they were having serious emotional and psychological problems.
Parents and teachers sometimes assume that ``weird'' or antisocial actions are just a stage that children or teenagers go through. But over the past 20 years or so, the evidence has accumulated more surely than in the West Memphis trial that the impact of drugs, the occult and themes of anger and violence in youth culture can poison young minds and destroy lives.
It's possible that nothing could have been done to prevent the murders -- that no amount of parental supervision would have controlled the desire for violence in this case.
In general, however, greater sensitivity about how young lives can go wrong and quicker responses to danger signs might at least stop more youngsters from making victims of themselves.
The people of Crittenden County are relieved that this ordeal -- pending the inevitable appeals -- is over. But, as a 12-year-old boy remarked, after a lesson that no one so young should have to learn, "It could happen again. There's some sick people around.''
The ordeal will have some benefit if it raises awareness enough to help protect other possible victims.
Document Number: CMA03220109
