Thursday, August 21, 2008

Docs: Fractured Hyoid Bad for Health

City health officials are holding an emergency meeting Friday to discuss the slayings of prostitutes as a public health issue.
Janis reports that 26 women linked to prostitution have been murdered since 1997. Only six of those cases have been closed by arrest. Since April, five prostitutes have been strangled to death.
The latest victim, still unidentified, was found in Herring Run Park six days ago.

10 comments:

I am so wise said...

Treating violence as a disease in anything other than metaphor is a recipe for continued failure.

ppatin said...

Violence is a disease that can be cured with a three drug cocktail. Unfortunately we administer that "treatment" far too rarely, and only after years of bullshit appeals.

Baltimore_Yeti said...

Treating violence as a disease is dangerous. We are talking about murder, comparing it to a disease only gives justification to the murderer. What if the murderer views himself as a docter getting rid of a disease?

ppatin said...

Once a hoodlum, always a hoodlum.

addwords said...

Just to clarify, the treatment is for the victims, not the perps. Drug treatment for example, could keep them off the street and possibly save lives.

Anonymous said...

Honestly if you've been following the local news since 1997, I wouldn't have been the only person who saw the person. This is a serial killer and he has been in operation for some time. He started in the Park Heights area and then vanished for a while (or at least they stopped finding bodies) and now we're seeing all the stuff they show us on television. Dumping bodies in public places, brazen, bolder.

Not trying to dump on the city or anyone else, but quite frankly you'd really have to be nuts (me) to have seen this type of pattern :(

Anonymous said...

The Herring Run Park victim has been identified: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/baltimore_city/bal-victim0821,0,2570041.story

She was 19, not in her mid-30s as believed, and a college student. The prostitution angle is unknown. She was strangled.

Emptyman said...

Which appeal is the "bullshit" one? Which right of appeal should we remove from death row inmates? What safeguard should people sentenced to death NOT get, that people sentenced to anything else do get?

And how, exactly, does that cure violence? Has violent crime gone down since Maryland resumed killing its citizens?

ppatin said...

"Which appeal is the "bullshit" one?"

Shortly before his execution Steven Oken (who raped, tortured and murdered three women) tried to claim that lethal injection was cruel & unusual. I can't imagine a finer example off bullshit than that.

Dingo said...

So we should outlaw appeals claiming an 8th Amendment violation?

(PS -- Didn't work, did it? Just because you write "Appeal" on a piece of paper and sign it doesn't mean that you will succeed. Most last-ditch appeals are dismissed instantly.)

PPS -- What's with the 8-letter CAPTCHA codes? I have a hard time with five letters.