May 2008 - Posts
By Jack Cloherty, Dateline NBC National Producer
In 30 years of covering crime, cops and courts, I've never heard a story so evil: a 22-year-old woman is abducted and taken to a "party" where she is humiliated, abused, gang raped and strangled. At least two dozen of her so-called friends are at this "party," but no one intervenes on her behalf. Her naked and battered body is dumped in a snowdrift off the interstate, and for 25 long years, no one goes to the police. That's the thumbnail sketch of Janet Chandler's murder, and it is so gruesome it makes you want to stop believing in the decency of human beings.
But on the flip side of this horror is one of the most affirming stories about the human spirit that I've ever covered: a college professor and a group of students at Janet Chandler's old college make a documentary about her case, and spark a new police investigation. A tenacious cold case team works more than two years to track down the killers, and cracks the decades-old conspiracy of silence. Then Assistant Michigan Attorney General Donna Pendergast and the prosecution stepped up to put on a bullet-proof court case, and by late 2007, six people had been convicted of Janet Chandler's 1979 murder. There is a measure of justice for Janet today, but only because dozens of people worked in harmony for years to to win that justice.
CONTINUED >>
By Dan Slepian, Dateline Producer
The email arrived on a Sunday morning, at 4:50 a.m.
I'm writing to you about a 25-year-old cold case from 1981 in which a woman named Barbara L. Winn was shot in the chest with a .38 Special after a violent fight.
A woman named Patty Bruce was writing about her sister-in-law, Barbara Winn, whose death in 1981 had been ruled a suicide.
The e-mail claimed Barbara had not killed herself, but that Barbara was murdered by her ex-boyfriend, Aaron "Bubbie" Foster. The e-mail revealed that Foster was currently a free man, working for the St. Paul Police Department.
We receive many e-mails alleging miscarriages of justice, but there was something about this one.
CONTINUED >>
By Vince Sturla, Dateline Producer
I was browsing through a bookstore a few years back when I glimpsed the head-stopping title "On Killing," by Lt. Col David Grossman. I thought, "What the … ?"
I picked it up and read the subtitle: "The Psychological Cost Of Killing In War And Society." The general point was that while killing is often presented as an almost casual act in action movies, more often than not, it’s a traumatic, life-transforming experience for a combat troop or police officer -- no matter how just the cause. It makes a great deal of sense, but it was something I hadn’t seriously considered before.
Several years later, I came across an academic paper by Lt. Col. Peter Kilner that came to the same conclusion as Grossman’s book. In his paper, Kilner cited a study done of Vietnam veterans that indicated the most severely traumatized were the ones who had killed. Few of us can read that and say, “Oh yeah. I know what they’re talking about.” The vast majority of us – fortunately – have no idea what it’s like to take another life. We have no idea of the conflicts that take place in the hearts and minds of combat veterans who killed in war. Most of us are incapable of offering any meaningful advice or words of comfort.
On the flip side, you have returning combat troops who are loathe to broach the subject of killing because they don’t want their families to know they’ve taken a life. That’s how we end up with, as Lt. Col Peter Kilner puts it, “The Elephant In The Room, no one is talking about.”
CONTINUED >>
By Cathy Singer, Dateline Producer
I’m thinking a lot about Myanmar these days. The cyclone that struck that country, also known as Burma, has been devastating. The images from the aftermath make me heartsick – and while I, like many people around the world, would have paid attention to this disaster because the death and destruction are so vast and shocking and sad, I am especially fixated and upset by the news because I was in Myanmar just a few months ago.
I went to Southeast Asia on a four-week journey with my sons in December and January and the last country we visited was Myanmar. I loved being in that country, a country that is largely closed to the world. The last time Myanmar was in the news was in August and September, when dissidents and monks led peaceful protests in the country, initially against the increase in the price of fuel, but which escalated to protest the military rulers’ oppressive control over the country, which has impoverished its people and crushed human rights (but not the human spirit). The government killed protesters, including monks, but it is unclear how many more died beyond the United Nations calculated death toll of 31. The junta also jailed hundreds – some say thousands - more to slap down and silence the rebellion.
But I’m not here to talk about politics in Myanmar. I want to share a bit of what we experienced there so that people will know a little more about the country than the headlines about a repressive government and now a natural disaster with suffering beyond comprehension. While most tourists cancelled their trips to this exotic Buddhist country in the months since the protests last fall, we decided to stick to our initial plans – and I am so glad we did. For a week we were allowed a peek into a country filled with gentle people, half who live as they have for generations in villages without electricity or indoor plumbing.
Our first stop was in the more or less modern city of Yangon, formally known as Rangoon. It’s the country’s largest city and former capital with a population of six million. I’m not sure what I expected of Yangon, but what we found was a lovely city with tall leafy trees, wide boulevards, lakes, colonial buildings and the gloriously gilded Shwedagon Pagoda, the most spectacular Buddhist temple we saw in the four countries we toured.
In the center of town, we walked through crowded open-air markets and past men enjoying late-afternoon socializing at outdoor cafes, most of whom wear what we would call skirts. The women also wear long skirts, although they are wrapped and tied slightly differently. Many women (and children) also spread “thanaka” on their faces, a yellowish-white paste made from wood which functions as both make-up and sunscreen, a practice that dates back more than 2,000 years.
CONTINUED >>
By Fred Rothenberg, Dateline Producer
The next decision in the Michael George murder case -- the so-called “Comic Book Murder” -- could be a game-changer and and hugely controversial.
On Thursday, May 15, Judge James M. Biernat will hear oral arguments as the defense asks the judge to overturn the jury's unanimous guilty verdict. In legalese, the defense has asked for a directed verdict. Lawyers for both sides, who already have submitted written briefs, say the judge could make a decision immediately after the oral arguments, or days later.
It appears he has three choices, two of which would be remarkable.
CONTINUED >>
by Keith Morrison, Dateline correspondent
If the images of Nona Dirksmeyer's fresh open face convey a certain vulnerability, it shouldn't be too surprising; at 19 years old, though she sang beautifully, looked wonderful, and had been winning some local and entering state beauty pageants, she was still struggling with an awful secret.
Secrets, of course, do not survive murder investigations, and the details of Nona's troubles spilled out for all the world to pick over.
Certainly her mother was shocked and dismayed when Nona told her that her own father sexually abused her when she was a little girl, and that later on she began to cut herself. Imagine then, how horrifying for Nona's grieving mother when the whole town learned about not just that, but eventually, in open court, the extremely personal details of Nona's love life.
Repeatedly in recent years I have found myself in the company of parents who must struggle to make sense of the senseless death of a child, to go on after a murder. How Nona's mother Carol managed it, especially when her daughter's own secrets became such a significant part of the case, I do not know.
I left her understanding very well how important it was for her to find some form of justice... some answer.
So it was hard to fault her deep suspicion of Nona's boyfriend, Kevin. After all, the local police and prosecutors -- the only authorities she could trust -- were convinced that he must have killed her. And this was a boy she had long since begun to treat as a future son-in-law!
CONTINUED >>
Chris Hansen, Dateline correspondent
Every once in a while a story finds you. Such is the case with the hour-long investigation we'll bring you on Friday night, May 2.
I think it's one of the most unique and interesting stories we've done this year and it came to us in an equally unique and interesting way. It was a tip from a Texas-based cameraman that got the ball rolling. In the past, Izzy Cardoza had done some work for NBC News and so he felt comfortable calling NBC after he says a so-called producer/reality show host didn't pay him for a project Izzy and his crew shot.
Izzy, as it turned out had kept all the tapes as collateral and when the producer/host never came up with a promised certified check, Izzy and his crew walked off the job with the tapes.
Guess who has the tapes now?
That's right, Dateline. And they not only make for compelling television, they allowed us to track down a group of contestants who say they were duped into believing they were going to appear worldwide on a reality show. The group was told that the winner would get $50,000 and the possibility of a big time modeling contract.
The host/producer was a fellow named Gemase Simmons. He claimed to be a former supermodel, but as our investigation would reveal, that and so many other things he claimed couldn't be confirmed or just weren't true.
As you'll see, Simmons puts the contestants through the kind of grueling physical contests that have become reality show fare, but it's what was going on off-camera that was really bizarre.
We'll show you that, and also what happens when we go looking for Gemase Simmons to ask him what he was really up to.
'Reality Bites' aired on Friday, May 2. Click here to read Gemase Simmons' response after the broadcast.
