Law and Order SVU Full Review: S20 E20 | The Good Girl (Spoilers)
Did you know that in some states it’s legal to marry a thirteen year old, with a parent’s consent?
The episode starts with a woman sitting pretzel style on her couch trying to meditate. But she’s disturbed by the fight between a father and her daughter.
The father won’t let his daughter have her phone (to text a boy?). The daughter goes ballistic, reminds him that he is her stepfather, and starts throwing knives and glasses. Hmm.
The meditating lady calls the police and the father and daughter try to play it cool, but daddy is bleeding and that teenager is looking a little crazy; they’re taken into the hospital.
When they’re at the hospital it is discovered that the 13 year old is *surprise* pregnant.
Of course the father is questioned about the paternity and he responds “Oh God! I know you have to ask but I would never”. In the interview he reveals that the mother passed a few years ago and that the biological father of the teen is a junkie in the wind.
Meanwhile, in the next room Rollins and Lieutenant Benson are questioning the teenager, Mackenzie. She reveals that she has been with an older man, an older man with a blue BMW. She clams up and won’t say anymore.
Carisi and Rollins visit St. Matthews school to investigate who the father is. They speak to two boys posed in a flirty Instagram picture with Mackenzie, the post referencing nudes.
The two boys reveal that Mackenzie is a flirt, constantly teasing by ‘grabbing their junks’.
The two detectives are led to the high-school drama teacher, Mr. Dryfus. He reveals he has a blue BMW and he is taken in for questioning.
Later on, Mackenzie’s father expresses that he has accepted the pregnancy, because it’s what his daughter wants. With all this Mackenzie still will not give details of her relationship.
Panning back to Rollins and Benson in the squad room, Rollins doesn’t like the idea of a court violating a child’s privacy by ordering a paternity test.
Rollins claims ” If one of the teen boys from that school is the father, why should the baby ruin his life too?”
Benson retorts “I didn’t know that babies ruined lives…”
“Did you let the father know before you…”
“Before I what?”
“Before you had the abortion?” Rollins said exasperated.
Benson sets the record straight and says she never said she had an abortion. “All I said was that regret can be a terrible thing to live with and you assumed…”
Anyways. Mackenzie finally confirms to her stepfather that her “boyfriend” was the drama teacher Mr. Drayfus. Once the unit catches wind of this they rush to Mr. Drayfus’s apartment.
There they find Mr. Drayfus laying on the floor, dead, with a bowling trophy next to him. On the couch, the stepfather, Garret is sitting in a daze.
Back in the interrogation room Garret confesses to the homicide, his defense being “he couldn’t stand the thought of anyone hurting his precious daughter”. Garret was offered 2 years, 1 year probation.
In the A.D.A.’s office, none other than Clinton Drayfus’s boyfriend walks in. He assures the A.D.A that Clinton was engaged to marry next summer. And that the bowling trophy was from an LGBTQ League. Meaning Mackenzie lied about her the relationship with Mr. Drayfus, because he was gay.
At this point Benson decides to coax the truth out of Mackenzie at the grocery store, where Mackenzie is shopping for veal chops to make dinner for her and Garret. Benson lets her know that Garret committed a crime because of Mackenzie’s lies. Mackenzie lets her know that Garret is not at fault as long as he was operating under the implications of the lie at the time he committed the homicide. (How would a thirteen year old know all that?)
Benson realizes Mackenzie is protecting Garret, and wants to bring her to trial.
The trial lasts all of two minutes when Garret’s defense attorney reveals that Mackenzie will not be able to testify of her conversations with her stepfather due to… SPOUSAL PRIVILEGE. It turns out Mackenzie and Garret are married.
A year after Mackenzie’s mother died, Garret got a marriage license for him and Mackenzie. Garret got parental consent from the biological father, in exchange for 10 grand.
In exchange for a deal for his charge on possession of drugs, the biological father agrees to testify that he was bribed by Garret to sign the marriage certificate, in the marriage annulment hearing. Unfortunately, Mackenzie tells the judge how good Garret was to her and her mother, how he loved her. With that, the judge ruled that the marriage was in good standing. This means the prosecution had a weak case against Garret, he would get off when the jury heard how much Garret cared for Mackenzie, he would be get off easy on the homicide.
Garret and Mackenzie are in the interview room. When the detectives realize they have a weak case against Garret, they decide to arrest Mackenzie, for telling a lie that got an innocent man killed. At the sight of Mackenzie in handcuffs Garret breaks down and says how it’s his fault.
Mackenzie claims “No it’s my fault. I was the one who told Mr. Dryfus about us after he asked who got me pregnant. He was my friend. He promised not to say anything.”
So Garret killed Mr. Drayfus because Drayfus knew about Garret’s intimate relationship with Mackenzie. Garret is offered manslaughter 1 and statutory rape. He’s hauled away in handcuffs, leaving Mackenzie in tears.
Benson later goes to visit Mackenzie. They go head to head for a while, Mackenzie maintains she’s practically a woman and Garret loves her.
Bensons gets her to see reason when she tells Mackenzie that Garret stole her childhood from her. She wasn’t out riding her bike or hanging out with friends, instead she was taking care of Garret.
Benson tells her “I didn’t know your mother but I bet she was a good mom. Just like you’re going to be a good mom to that baby”.
Mackenzie starts to cry, implying she had a miscarriage.
National Poetry Month: Bei Dao
Zhao Zhenkai was born in Beijing August 2, 1949. His pseudonym Bei Dao means ‘North Island’. He is the author of several books of poetry and has been nominated for the Nobel Prize multiple times.
Ramallah – Ben Dao
in Ramallah
the ancients play chess in the starry sky
the endgame flickers
a bird locked in a clock
jumps out to tell the time
in Ramallah
the sun climbs over the wall like an old man
and goes through the market
throwing mirror light on
a rusted copper plate
in Ramallah
gods drink water from earthen jars
a bow asks a string for directions
a boy sets out to inherit the ocean
from the edge of the sky
in Ramallah
seeds sown along the high noon
death blossoms outside my window
resisting, the tree takes on a hurricane’s
Ku Klux Klan killing: Wife admits murder of Missouri leader
Article via BBC
The wife of a Ku Klux Klan leader in the US state of Missouri has admitted shooting him dead two years ago.
Malissa Ancona, 47, was sentenced to life after pleading guilty to second-degree murder and other charges.
She had initially said her son, Paul Jinkerson, carried out the killing but in court on Friday said this was not the case. He still faces trial.
Frank Ancona, a self-styled “imperial wizard”, was shot dead in a bedroom and his body dumped next to a river.
In a deal with prosecutors, Ancona pleaded guilty on Friday at St Francois County Circuit Court to second-degree murder, tampering with evidence and abandonment of a corpse, the St Louis Post-Dispatch reported.
“I fired both shots that killed my husband,” Ancona told Judge Wendy Wexler Horn, the paper reported.
She admitted cleaning the walls of the room in Leadwood, Missouri, and removing bedding before dumping the body in nearby Belgrade in February 2017.
She then reported her husband, 51, missing and appealed for his return on Facebook. He had asked for a divorce, court records said.
She had initially said Mr Jinkerson fired the shots and agreed to testify against him.
Mr Ancona was a member of the Traditionalist American Knights of the Ku Klux Klan (TAKKKK), which describes itself as a “White Patriotic Christian organisation that bases its roots back to the Ku Klux Klan of the early 20th Century”.
Seagram’s liquor heiress pleads guilty to crimes related to New York sex cult, pyramid scheme case
Article via CNN
Two women who were part of an alleged pyramid scheme that involved sex trafficking and racketeering each pleaded guilty to related charges Friday in a New York federal court. Clare Bronfman, an heiress to the Seagram’s liquor fortune, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to conceal and harbor people who were not in the United States legally for financial gain and fraudulent use of identification. Kathy Russell pleaded guilty to one charge of visa fraud.
Bronfman and Russell were indicted in March on racketeering and racketeering conspiracy charges as part of the cult-like organization known as Nxivm, founded by Keith Raniere, who also was indicted and is now in federal custody. He faces sex trafficking and forced labor charges.
Bronfman was a member of the Nxivm executive board, according to a US Justice Department news release, and faces between 21 and 27 months in prison. Russell is Nxivm’s former bookkeeper and faces between six and 12 months in prison. Bronfman, who will be sentenced July 25, tearfully read a statement in court during her plea hearing.
“Your honor, I was afforded a great gift by my grandfather and father. With the gift comes immense privilege, and more importantly, tremendous responsibility,” Bronfman said. “It does not come with an ability to break the law, it comes with a greater responsibility to uphold it. I failed to uphold the following laws set forth by this country, and for that I am truly remorseful.”
Russell, who will be sentenced July 31, said in court that she knowingly provided visa documents with false information in order to bring a woman into the US for work. “I know what I did was wrong and I am very sorry for the trouble that I’ve caused,” Russell said, tearfully.
Five Nxivm members were indicted and charged last year for crimes that included identity theft, extortion, forced labor, sex trafficking, money laundering, wire fraud and obstruction of justice. Bronfman, Russell and actress Allison Mack were among the five indicted and charged last year.
Nxivm touted itself as a professional organization
Prosecutors allege Raniere created the organization Nxivm (pronounced NEX-ium), which touted itself as a professional business providing coaching and educational services to “corporations and people of all walks of life.” The organization, prosecutors say, actually operated like a multi-level marketing pyramid scheme, and encouraged its members to continue taking pricey classes and recruiting other members in order to rise in the ranks of the organization. The organization also acted as an umbrella for other groups like “The Source,” described as a private arts academy, and the secret society DOS, which was founded in 2015 and is the subgroup where sex trafficking activities allegedly took place.
Under the sub-group DOS, prosecutors allege. women were designated as “slaves” until successfully recruiting others, at which time they became “masters.” All so-called slaves were at the service of their own masters as well as those above them in the pyramid.
The indictment claims many so-called slaves were branded on their pelvic areas with a symbol which, unbeknownst to them, incorporated Raniere’s initials.
Documents describe “branding ceremonies,” in which women were held down by others while naked and filmed as they were branded with a cauterizing pen. Raniere was the only male in DOS and the leader, according to court filings.
Prosecutors believe Mack, known for her 10-season run on the television series “Smallville,” was near the top of the pyramid with Raniere and “directly or implicitly required” her slaves to engage in sexual activity with Raniere. She also allegedly received financial and other benefits from Raniere in exchange for the women’s cooperation with their demands.Mack was released from jail on $5 million bond after being indicted last week. She pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy and racketeering relating to her alleged role in a sex trafficking case.Raniere remains in federal custody in Brooklyn. If convicted, Raniere and Mack each face mandatory minimum sentences of 15 years imprisonment, and up to life imprisonment.His attorney, Marc Agnifilo, had no comment on the remaining co-defendants. “We’re going to trial,” Agnifilo said. The trial begins May 7.
When They See Us | Official Trailer| Netflix
Ava DuVernay cowrote and directed this four part documentary based on the true story of the Central Park Five: five Harlem boys Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Yusef Salaam, Raymond Santana and Korey Wise falsely convicted of a brutal rape.
This series begins in the spring of 1989, when the teenagers were first questioned about the incident and will look at the Park Five’s lives over 25 years, focusing on their exoneration in 2002 and the settlement reached with the city of New York in 2014.
National Poetry Month: Richard Wright
Haiku (67, 75, 78, 93 & 95) – Poem by Richard Wright
Richard Nathaniel Wright was an African-American author of novels, short stories, poems, and non-fiction. His literature concerns racial themes, especially those involving the plight of African Americans during the late 19th to mid-20th centuries.
67
The day is so long
That even noisy sparrows
Fall strangely silent.
75
Spring begins shyly
With one hairpin of green grass
In a flower pot.
78
An apple blossom
Trembling on a sunlit branch
From the weight of bees.
93
Leaving its nest,
The sparrow sinks a second,
Then opens its wings.
95
Like a fishhook,
The sunflower’s long shadow
Hovers in the lake.
National Poetry Month: Sandra Cisneros
Black Lace Bra Kind of Woman – Sandra Cisneros
Sandra Cisneros (born December 20, 1954) is an American writer best known for her acclaimed first novel The House on Mango Street and her short story collection Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories.
Wachale! She’s a black lace bra
kind of woman, the kind who serves
up suicide with every kamikaze
poured in the neon blue of evening.
A tease and a twirl. I’ve seen that
two-step girl in action. I’ve gambled bad
odds and sat shotgun when she rambled
her ’59 Pontiac between blurred
lines dividing sense from senselessness.
Ruin your clothes, she will.
Get you home way after hours.
Drive her ’59 seventy-five on 35
like there is no tomorrow.
Woman zydeco-ing into her own decade.
Thirty years pleated behind her like
the wail of a San Antonio accordion.
And now the good times are coming. Girl,
I tell you, the good times are here.
National Poetry Month: Alice Walker
Desire – Alice Walker
Walker is an activist, short story writer and novelist. Her most famous work includes The Color Purple.
My desire
is always the same; wherever Life
deposits me:
I want to stick my toe
& soon my whole body
into the water.
I want to shake out a fat broom
& sweep dried leaves
bruised blossoms
dead insects
& dust.
I want to grow
something.
It seems impossible that desire
can sometimes transform into devotion;
but this has happened.
And that is how I’ve survived:
how the hole
I carefully tended
in the garden of my heart
grew a heart
to fill it.
N.J. Woman Pleads Guilty In Homeless GoFundMe Hoax, Faces 4 Years In State Prison
Article via NPR
A New Jersey woman pleaded guilty Monday to theft by deception for perpetrating what began as a story of redemption that was revealed to be a ruse.
Katelyn McClure appeared in New Jersey Superior Court, admitting to her role in duping thousands of people out of $400,000 through a fictionalized GoFundMe page purporting to benefit a homeless veteran said to have bought her gas.
McClure, 29, will serve a four-year-term in a New Jersey state prison under the plea, according to the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office. Sentencing is set for June 3.
The homeless man, Johnny Bobbitt, 36, also pleaded guilty in federal court to one count of conspiracy to commit money laundering, which comes with a maximum 10 years in prison and a fine of $250,000. He has not yet been sentenced.
Bobbitt was admitted last week into a drug treatment program, which could help him avoid prison time.
“However,” the Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office said in a statement, “if Bobbitt fails to adhere to the tightly-structured regimen of treatment and recovery services, which includes frequent testing for drug use, he could be sentenced to five years in state prison.”
A third person, Mark D’Amico, McClure’s then-boyfriend, is also charged with theft by deception. His case is set to be presented next month to a Burlington County grand jury for possible indictment.
McClure’s lawyer has said D’Amico was the driving force behind the scheme, and prosecutors say that McClure and Bobbitt have agreed to testify against him.
In November 2017, McClure and D’Amico created a GoFundMe Page titled “Paying It Forward.” It said McClure was driving home from Philadelphia on Interstate 95 when she ran out of gas when Bobbitt, a homeless veteran, came to her rescue, spending his last $20 to buy her gas. With a photo of the duo standing by the road, the page solicited donations to help get Bobbitt off the street, with the goal of raising $10,000.
The money came pouring in after the media picked up on the story. Fourteen thousand people donated $400,000 in less than three weeks, according to prosecutors, none the wiser to the fact that McClure had never run out of gas and Bobbitt never spent $20 to help her.
But D’Amico and McClure were quick to spend the money on themselves, prosecutors say, blowing through the bulk of the $400,000 on gambling, a helicopter ride over the Grand Canyon, a BMW, clothing and Louis Vuitton handbags.
But the cover soon began to fall apart.
In December of 2017, the then-couple deposited $25,000 in a bank account they set up for Bobbitt, according to authorities. When Bobbitt realized most of the money had been squandered, he sued them.
Authorities said they found text messages from McClure admitting to the hoax, as NPR’s Vanessa Romo reported in November:
“After scouring more than 67,000 texts on the couple’s phones, officials discovered a text exchange between McClure and a friend written less than an hour after the GoFundMe page went live that appears to confirm it was all a hoax.
” ‘Ok, so wait. The gas part is completely made up but the guy isn’t,’ McClure allegedly texted. ‘I had to make something up to make people feel bad. So shush about the made up stuff.’ “
Burlington County Prosecutor Scott Coffina said that McClure and Bobbitt had known each other for at least a month before setting up the fundraising page. Coffina noted that Bobbitt had previously posted a tale of a stranded woman with an empty gas tank to whom he gave the last of his money in 2012. “I don’t think that’s a coincidence,” he said.
But federal prosecutors allege it was McClure and D’Amico who concocted the story and only informed Bobbitt about it after donations started pouring in.
In December, GoFundMe announced it was refunding donors who had contributed to the campaign.
Dallas police make an arrest after transgender woman beaten
Edward Dominic Thomas was arrested Sunday night on a charge of aggravated assault causing serious bodily injury, two days after the attack on a transgender woman was recorded on video. Police said the case is being investigated to determine if it meets the criteria of a hate crime. Read more – https://www.dallasnews.com/news/crime…