I certainly don't. And why should anyone else? I have always found it funny, in an ironic way that the lowest level of scum even among the prison society has been child molesters. I guess the image of small children being taken advantage of physically, while they endure mental injury, and emotional battery, insults even the most violent criminal.
So, I am left wondering, what is the media's purpose of making such a HUGE deal about this latest prison killing? Are they trying to say that prison justice is equal to legal justice? Are the sex crimes of a priest more vile than those of your average deviant citizen? Or maybe they are just laughing at the sweet, sweet irony of it all.
Well of course, prison justice is to be frowned on, and we as a society don't want to condone this sort of thing, but I for one not only advocate the mauling and maiming of child molesters in prison, I applaud it.
Yes, you can say I find their acts beneath contempt and death is the only just end to someone who inflicts their sickness on the innocent mind and body of a child.
You will find no sympathy for this person here.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Dave
2 - Eric Olsen
Some people are just too twisted to live with other people in a civilized manner - how they go is of little concern as long as they go.
3 - Al Barger
Yahweh have mercy Dawn, but you are one vicious little Hebrew hillbilly. I'm going to have to invent some special custom made stereotypes just to describe you.
Somehow I don't think Geoghan would have made it to prison if he'd diddled a child of yours.
4 - Dawn
I pray nightly that I may never know what I might do, as it would be gruesome, painful and ultimately deadly.
Really, I am a nice person, just don't mess with my kids.
5 - TDavid
This defrocked priest should have been killed sooner than this.
Also irritating is knowing that the church is paying $$$ for what happened and where did all that money come from? Donations to God! I bet God is real glad to know that millions of dollars intended for the betterment of the church has actually resulted in paying for the horrible actions of one of its since defrocked priests.
For those who are on the fence and/or skeptical regarding religion, this only clouds the subject further.
6 - Rodney Welch
Imbecilic acts have a way of bringing out the imbecile in everyone, I guess --both fellow prisoners and the people who read about them.
7 - Rodney Welch
Was this the avenging angel you had in mind, Dawn? Geoghan's murder was a hate crime -- it now appears the suspect was a Nazi thug who was on Death Row in the first place for killing a gay bus driver who made the mistake of picking him up while hitchhiking.
8 - Eric Olsen
None of it is good - certainly whoever would have done such a thing (unless it had been an actual victim) was not going to be a Boy Scout. I don't think anyone is celebrating the killing, and absolutely not the killer, just saying they don't feel all that bad about it either.
While I despise anyone who would do what he did to children and see the killing as something akin to karma and/or poetic justice, I am even more contemptuous of the church that hushed his and similar crimes up, paid people off, moved pedophiles around without informing anyone of their propensities, and in general obstructed justice and conspired to allow the lives of innocent believers to be ruined. This bureaucracy is as corrupt as any in the world, or at least was.
9 - Al Barger
Everybody recognizes that the guy who killed Geoghan is an evil murderer. No one is saying he's a good guy. In this specific case, however, he killed somebody who badly needed killing. It won't get the guy into heaven, but it was still arguably a public benefit.
10 - Dawn
Rodney,
The specifics of his death are of no consequence to me whatsoever. I am for vigilante justice when it comes to heinous crimes.
He got what he deserved, I only wish it had been after some brutal prison love had been administered on him, which in his case might have been welcomed.
I hate pedophiles as much as I hate murderers. There is no crime worse than lording and abusing your strength and will over someone weaker than yourself, and to do so to the defenseless is to declare you are not of the human race and therefore the rules of civilized society do not apply to you.
As for the murderer, I hope he gets his too. Eye for an eye.
11 - Rodney Welch
You're for vigilante justice and you hope vigilantes get theirs too. Great -- let's just hand out guns and just start shooting each other right and left.
Please note though that in your original post you wrote: "I guess the image of small children being taken advantage of physically, while they endure mental injury, and emotional battery, insults even the most violent criminal." Was that the case here? Or was it maybe just a case of a violent lowlife piece of shit who was "insulted" by someone who was gay?
12 - Dawn
It's unfortunate that the convicted felon ex-priest was killed by an equally reviled convicted felon. Should it have been say a life-long crack dealer, or a jewel thief would you feel better?
They are both complete scumbags. But one who preyed on children is now gone, and maybe the guy who did it will get the death penalty for it.
I just can't get too worked up over a bunch of lowlifes killing each other, no matter what their agenda is. They were in jail for a reason, life in prison is hard and can be sometimes deadly - sounds like a good reason to stay out.
13 - TDavid
Well said, Dawn:
Long live prison justice. I just hope you or I are never falsely imprisoned. That does happen, of course, but not in either of these cases apparently.
14 - Rodney Welch
Well, count me completely out of sympathy with both of you. I don't like vigilantes, I don't like prison justice, I don't like the easy way out in general. I can no longer expend sympathy on people impatient with the slow grinding wheels of the court system, particularly when it leads to this line of thought-free I-want-my-vengeance-NOW-asshole line of thinking.
15 - TDavid
Rodney - anarchy evolves from a society where everybody takes the law into their own hands, so I wasn't -- before or now -- advocating widespread vigilantism through my comments. Quite a stretch, actually, for you to make from what I've posted anyway.
Why don't you read my first comments and you'll see that my irritation was really with the fact that people go and donate money to help out the church and look at what expenses the church has to pay out on: the priest who was molesting the donator's children!
The church that cries out that pornography is evil and how every man should covet his spouse and yet some of those devout religious folks are the worst when it comes to sex "sins" when stories like this come out.
Hypocrisy in the church 101.
With that said, prisoners having their own system of justice is quite different than an eye for an eye in every day society. Can't you see the difference?
What would you rather do? Bake this pedophile a cake and let him clog up the judicial system in bogus appeals and futile rehabilitation attempts? I can think of much better, more productive uses of my tax dollars, can't you?
Sure this point of view of prisoners like this pedophile (and his ilk that capped him) sounds extreme and cold-hearted, but in my book there is zero sympathy for a murderer (especially a self-confessed one) and worse than a murderer in my book is a pedophile.
Not all prisoners are scumbags and deserve what this pedophile got, of course, but again, that's the prison justice system at work -- and it is wrong to compare that to every day society. Capiche?
16 - Eric Olsen
Rodney, I believe you are mistaking cause and effect here: no one advocated anyone taking vigilante action, just said they weren't too upset about the fact it happened in this case.
17 - Rodney Welch
Quite the opposite, Eric.
Dawn: "I am for vigilante justice when it comes to heinous crimes."
TDavid: "Long live prison justice."
18 - Al Barger
He's got you there, Eric. The missus is flat-out supporting at least some limited vigilantism.
I am sympathetic to that urge to just goddam kill a particularly evil bastard, but I fear the lack of limitations inherent in vigilantism once you get started.
On the other hand, this guy was particularly deserving. It's tough to work up any sympathy for him at all. He had it coming.
As the bard said, all's well that ends well.
19 - TDavid
Rodney - what, did it take you about all of 5 seconds to snip that quote from me? How about addressing the other detailed points I laid out?
This is not intended to be a flame, mind you, but I am (slightly) curious if you have a real in-depth point of view or are just trolling? If you are in the latter group I won't waste my time responding to you heretofore.
20 - Rodney Welch
I agree that sympathy for Geoghan is a tough sell, but vigilantism brings no comfort; it goes against the idea of a government of laws and not men, and personally it brings to mind that famous picture of the two black guys who had been lynched. If there's any kind of a triumph in the Geoghan murder, and there isn't, then it's purely Pyrrhic -- that's the point I've found myself thinking more and more. The killer in this case was actually worse than Geoghan -- who at least did not kill anyone. (This is of course not to say he didn't seriously wound his victims emotionally and scar them for life, or that he didn't deserve his prison sentence, or that the Catholic Church which protected him is not seriously culpable for crimes against children -- all of which I believe.)
21 - Dawn
Sorry Rodney, but I disagree with you about who is worse. Molesting at least 150 children had affected 150 lives, plus their families and anyone who is connected with those victims.
Murder is horrible and I find the person who strangled Geoghan exactly on par.
Do not attempt to lessen the severity of child molestation. There are plenty of people who feel dead inside because of their experience at the hands of a molestor and the effects can be far reaching.
Vigilante behavior should never be taken outside of the prison walls for justice has not been properly served, but inside, if you make your bed, then you must lie in it.
Why should prisoners be given freedom from crime and brutality when their victims surely were not.
Your logic makes you sound like a crazed person who hasn't taken his meds AND you are starting to aggravate me.
22 - Rodney Welch
Dawn -- Let's pull in your claws, kitty. Your last statement expresses my feelings precisely -- although I am glad you have at the very least come round to the point that vigilantism, if it exists at all, should exist only within prison walls. This is still, of course, completely wrong; prisoners absolutely have a right not to be killed. And what kind of man is it that tortures a 69-year-old man for seven minutes? That makes him worse in my mind. And it is not lessening the severity of child molestation to say that it is not worse than murder; I'm not persuaded molestation, rape or torture are worse than death.
"Why should prisoners be given freedom from crime and brutality when their victims surely were not?" Sounds like you're all up for them practicing crime and brutality as well. Sure, let them all kill each other -- that's the easy, Dawn Olsen way of thinking. Prisons should be full of riots, blood, tear gas, destruction. Do they get to kill guards as well? How about wardens? And then the National Guard comes in -- oh boy, what fun!
23 - TDavid
Rodney - you don't seem to understand what prison justice is all about. While I'm certainly no expert either, I think your logic is flawed here and here's why.
You are saying that this is vigilantism and that is not a completely accurate description. I've never been in prison, but from my limited understanding, prison justice is pretty simple to comprehend:
If you are a child molester you are a marked man; you are the lowest rung in prison and regular society. If you are a murderer you are not necessarily marked. If you are a warden, guard or civilian you are not marked. The guards and wards are the ones who make recommendations to parole boards and give privileges, what little of them there should be. Many of these prisoners, even some of the hardcore convicts, are also family men with children and perhaps they are in the hole because they killed someone in a fit of rage, accidentally or unintentionally or while clinically insane, but most of them wouldn't dream, even in their worst nightmare or insane act, of molesting a child. That is another level!
I'm not trying to minimize the act of murder because that is wrong when people outside the prison walls take the law into their own hands and sometimes it is wrong when taken inside. Just as a policeman can't pull his gun and shoot a speeding motorist in the head.
I can totally respect and understand that being sent to a maximum security prison is not like being sent to the Bahamas. Why should it be?
These inmates -- some of which are animals, not even human -- live by a second set of rules besides the rules that society has placed on them. They sit around all day and most of them have little more to think about but concrete, brief periods of sunlight, and how to make shanks out of their own toenails.
I can't believe anybody would even remotely stick up for a child molester in any context. He has rights? Is that what you are trying to say? I think his rights ceased, in a prison society, when he scarred a child for the rest of his/her life.
I don't care if today he's 69, 29 or 109, if he molested over a 100 children -- or even just 1 child -- he's just a plain bad seed and belongs on the lowest rung of society. He has lowered himself into the animal kingdom where some animals eat their own.
Is the convict who murdered him much better? Of course not! But in the scary world of prison ranking that guy will rise up the ladder of prison respect. He took care of a marked man. Our law and courts will deal with this murderer and he'll probably get what? The death penalty!
So please tell me if the death penalty and prison justice for child molestation as how I've just described are really any different?
As it stands, our laws and our whole society is based on action and consequence. The prison system is also, from my understanding, and unless there is a maximum security convict lurking around blogcritics to set me straight on this, it is going to be difficult to alter my perception of life behind maximum security prison bars being any different.
We can't compare any of this to a minimum security prison where people are there for tax evasion or drug possession, etc, so throw those thoughts out completely as those people aren't likely going to kill this child molester in that prison environment, they are on a limited stay and can see freedom in the distance. Most of the maximum security prisoners are lifers -- or deathers if they are on the row -- expecting nothing more except to live out what's left of their meager existence with their own set of rules and pennies a day income.
Therefore, I still don't think this is outright vigalantism, but a way of putting the fear both inside prison -- and to those on the outside also who would ever dream of sexually abusing a child -- that whether or not the judicial system does its job (which we could both debate for hundreds of posts is failing on a number of levels with these type of criminals), the prison system will brand the convict forever.
And no matter where the convict goes, how old he grows, what penance he practices, his hell is now on earth.
24 - Dawn
Rodney, I did in fact, pull in my claws, that was my measured response. You should have seen what I didn't post.
As for your argument: what TDavid said, who may from this point forward speak on my behalf on this matter, as he summed it up exactly. My logic is not faulty, but my means of expressing it may be.
25 - Rodney Welch
TDavid -- You are in no position to lecture anyone about this so-called "prison justice" which you find so romantic and which appears to have come from watching too much Court TV. Neither am I, but then again, I'm not trying.
You state: "You are saying that this is vigilantism and that is not a completely accurate description." Actually, that's exactly what it is, as vigilantism is by definition taking the law into one's own hands.
"If you are a child molester you are a marked man; you are the lowest rung in prison and regular society."
No question. This is a virtual cliche.
"If you are a warden, guard or civilian you are not marked."
Depends. Ever visited a prison? One particular graffito stands out in my mind: "Outside of freedom, the objective is to kill the fucking guards." This is particularly so on Death Row, where you don't have anything to lose.
"Many of these prisoners, even some of the hardcore convicts, are also family men with children and perhaps they are in the hole because they killed someone in a fit of rage, accidentally or unintentionally or while clinically insane, but most of them wouldn't dream, even in their worst nightmare or insane act, of molesting a child. That is another level!"
Gee, I hate to disabuse your notions of prisoners as people of superior morality, but let me try. Ever heard of Pee Wee Gaskins? He was the most famous murderer in recent South Carolina history -- sent to Death Row with something like eight deaths on his bloody hands. He believed in your "prison justice," too, so long as there was a price for it. When a murderer named Rudolph Tyner was sent to prison, Pee Wee (already on Death Row) was hired by the family of one of Tyner's victims to knock him off, which he did -- by wiring an explosive into the guy's radio that took Tyner's fool head off. Pee Wee was tried again and convicted again, and was ultimately executed. But you know what? Pee Wee had a certain fondness for children as well. In his memoirs, published just before his death, he recounted in sickening detail the circumstances of his most mind-blowing orgasm: killing a pregnant mother and then raping her infant daughter as he strangles her.
Was Pee Wee on the lowest rung at Carolina Correctional Institute? No. He was feared because he was pure bloody evil.
"I'm not trying to minimize the act of murder because that is wrong when people outside the prison walls take the law into their own hands and sometimes it is wrong when taken inside."
"Sometimes." Interesting. Who decides when it is okay? You?
"I can't believe anybody would even remotely stick up for a child molester in any context. He has rights? Is that what you are trying to say?"
Trying to say? You mean I haven't said it? Of course they have rights -- just as all these prison "animals" of which you are so fond have rights.
"I think his rights ceased, in a prison society, when he scarred a child for the rest of his/her life."
Well I guess by that logic so do all people who commit murder -- in fact, there's even at least a more logical case for killing them, at least on the old eye for an eye basis.
"I don't care if today he's 69, 29 or 109, if he molested over a 100 children -- or even just 1 child -- he's just a plain bad seed and belongs on the lowest rung of society. He has lowered himself into the animal kingdom where some animals eat their own."
Again, all I'm hearing is just your vehemence. We're getting into this strange, rather subjective area of degrees of evil; you say molestation is worse than murder. Sorry, I don't see it -- all I hear is your insistence that it is so.