I hope that by mentioning their names they havent predjudiced a fair trial by jury.
Mentioning their names won’t. One imagines, okay ‘hopes’, the tabloids have learned lessons from the mistrial of the Leeds footballers earlier in the year…
So very, very sad…
Oh dear…
2 bodies found in Mildenhall, Suffolk close to Soham (the girls home village).
It isn’t confirmed as Holly and Jessica yet but…
shit.
Watching it on the news now. Yer man’s father’s house is now cordoned off, too.
Are they POSITIVE it’s them? Absolutely positive?
I keep thinking of that one Ruth Rendell, somewhat recent…There was a search for a young black woman. The body of a young black woman was discovered, so it was her, right? Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your perspective, no.
But that’s it: there’s no happy ending to this. SOMEBODY’S dead, at any rate. I would say I hope it’s not Holly and Jessica, but that wouldn’t be fair, if it turned out to be two other kids, to their families.
I’ve been following this story since I stumbled across a BBC World broadcast a few days ago on PBS. Goddamnit, I wanted them to be found alive, but I’m not at all surprised about the discovery of their bodies (I know it hasn’t been confirmed yet, but going by the BBC articles it sounds pretty likely).
What the hell is wrong with people anyway…
Yes, but two bodies, 7 miles away from where they disappeared? There are so few murders in rural England anyway - it’s such a slim chance that it’s not them. I was convinced they’d find them, too.
If it is those 2 little girls (and I know there’s a slim possibility that it isn’t) then my most heartfelt sympathies go out to their families. What an incomprehensible senseless thing to have happened.
It’s times like this when I want to reject my profession.
Right now, I want to vomit - not metaphorically - quite literally. These girls were smiley_brat’s age.
I don’t know why this particular case has hit me in the guts - I know that it HAS hit me in the guts to the extent that I probably should abandon criminology.
Why would it make any difference whether they are the bodies of these two girls or of two other little girls, exactly?
Its one of the few things that can actually make me sick to the stomach by just reading about it. I know these dreadful events are comparatively rare, but there has to be a way that technology can help protect our children. I mean, some autos have chips in them which can be activated if the car is stolen to reveal the whereabouts; maybe a subcutaneous chip for a child? OK, Im thinking out loud here and I`m sure there are lots of problems, but there has to be some way to make things safer for our kids.
clairobscur, that is a very good point. Two bodies is terrible, whoever they are.
Thankfully ‘stranger danger’ is rare as hell, and in the UK at least, child abduction is incredibly rare (cop on the radio was saying that the most in the UK is 10 in one year, and some years there are none at all - that’s with a population approaching 70,000,000). I think the worst thing in the world would be to wrap kids in cotton wool. Having said that, I don’t have kids, and have no idea how scary it must be to have them out of my sight.
“Stranger danger” is as rare as hell largely because a significant proportion of paedophiles plan their behaviour very carefully, they are often extremely patient, and befriend and “condition” potentially victims often for YEARS before striking.
My cite for this is past interviews with two different police officers both with long career histories in child protection.
So you can’t even protect them from people they know, let alone people they don’t know. God knows what it must be like for parents these days, you can educate your child as much as you like about “bad touching” and “always tell Mummy” but if a violent, murdering paedophile decides the hour is nigh to strike, what then?
I don’t think you can protect your kids 100%.
Look at this situation. If everything turns out as it looks it will
The two people who did this are the school caretaker and a teachers assistant. Both were checked out and passed. Maybe the reason wasn’t sexual?
Maybe, maybe, maybe.
This is horrible. :mad:
I’m always interested to know about the people who do this because it’s just a long way from something I can understand – it’s not enough (for me) to say; “They’re evil”. There have to be explanations.
I say there “have” to be explanations but, of course, with Harold Shipman it’s still all pretty much speculation. As best I know, he’s still in some extremely strange emotional place.
Here though, it’s about 2 ten year-olds so the immediate presumption of many is paedophilia – fact is, we’re not going to know anything for sure (if at all) until after this (presumably) comes to trial.
Also worth remembering that paedophilia is not a crime; ‘child molesting’ is, ‘murder’ is but, as I understand it, paedophilia is a state of mind. For it to become a crime, thoughts must be acted upon. Assuming he did kill the girls and molestation happened, I hope we find out what caused him to go beyond thoughts.
As for the girls, their families, their friends and the community…I just don’t know what to say…
L-C
Its a very fine distinction between the concept of paedopilia not being a crime but yet child molesting is a crime, since ownership of child porn on any format, or belonging to any proscribed organisation that promotes the activities of paedophiles are illegal.
One might argue that the very things that are illegal in terms of this issue mean that to all practical extent paedophilia is outlawed, and moreorless ends up including the concept itself.
No paedophile could even begin to express their thoughts in open society.
No one can directly police the activities of a sick mind, but the fact that I use the term ‘a sick mind’ implies that at best it can be considered a charactor flaw, and certainly deviant.
I would think that this would be what psychologists would describe as anti-social and whose definition of the term has a much stronger meaning than the rest of us would employ.
L_C, I recommend The Jigsaw Man by Paul Britton, Britain’s first psychological profiler, for an explanation of what goes wrong in people’s brains to turn them into people who kill for pleasure or compulsion. It deals with very high-profile crimes from the 80s and 90s. Warning: it is extremely, extremely disturbing.
Who the heck is Howard Shipman? I googled and couldn’t find anything.
Dr. Harold Shipman, second worst serial killer the world has ever recorded, and the worst in the UK. By a very, very long shot.