White Trash Horror Story

The patriarch of the West Charleston, West Virgina Mallo family was sentenced to prison as one of the "responsible" adults overseeing what a Kanawah Circuit Judge deemed the filthiest and most degrading living situation, he, the Judge, has encountered. This is Cheryl Caswell's account for the Daily Mail:

"A Kanawha Circuit judge has sentenced the oldest of the Mallo family to one to three years in prison for ignoring the filthy and abusive environment of his home, saying he hopes he serves the maximum time.

Alexander Mallo, 68, who also uses the last name Doran, already has been incarcerated for 404 days and could come before a parole board to consider his release soon.  Judge Charles King denied a request by Mallo's public defender Shawn Bayliss for probation, saying the public good demanded a prison sentence.

'Anything less than a prison sentence is out of order given the facts and circumstances of this case,' King said. "I don't know if I've ever seen a home like this, ever. 'These conditions and the conduct that was going on ... there's no excuse. None. None. None,' said King.

The man lived in a house on Frame Street with several family members including grandchildren. One of them, 14-year-old Thomas Mallo, stabbed 82-year-old neighbor Phyllis Phares to death a year ago. Police called it one of the most disturbing crimes they'd ever investigated.

The juvenile, prosecuted as an adult, will be sentenced for that murder Wednesday by Circuit Judge Carrie Webster.  The investigation of Phares' death revealed the Mallo home as a nightmarish place of extreme unsanitary conditions and child neglect that included sexual crimes. Five adults and the juvenile were prosecuted.

Bayliss said, 'The home has been documented as a filthy, vile place'  that revealed 'a life out of control not only for a grandfather but for an entire family. .. torn apart, separated, isolated, incarcerated.' He asked for mercy for Mallo.  King declined, saying he didn't want the county probation department to handle him.

'They've already put enough time in on this family,' the judge said. 'Let the parole department supervise him. But I hope he serves every day of his three-year sentence.'

Prosecutor Mark Plants said he was satisfied with King's sentence. 'We wanted a prison sentence and I think it's justified in this case,' Plants said. 'Yes, the house was deplorable, but the real problem was the kids in the home being abused.  One of the main moral obligations we have on this planet is taking care of our children,' Plants said. 'And if you don't do it, you should be prosecuted and you should be in jail.'

Mallo told King he was sorry for overlooking what was happening in his house.

'I'd like to get back to my wife, to get our life back together,' the elder Mallo told King. 'I should be more in touch with what's going on in my house.'  He and his wife, Carolyn Mallo, were charged with child neglect. She was sentenced to ten months in jail and was released in April having served most of that time already. She attended the hearing Tuesday along with other Mallo family members.

One of them expressed outrage that reporters were writing about the hearing and taking pictures of her in the courtroom. As Mallo was led out by a bailiff, she strode over to a television cameraman and called him 'rude' because he filmed her crying. She also told a newspaper reporter she didn't want anything written about the sentencing."
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There's YouTube video footage of what the investigators found in this house of horrors.  I don't recommend watching it.  I've seen this sort of horror with my own eyes in my own lifetime within my own extended family. I am deeply disturbed by the long term consequences for the children and grandchildren raised in this feral setting.

Children deserve to be loved and cared for, this is the antithesis.  It's not lost on me that the adults convicted in these horrors were themselves products of not much better, cycle upon cycle, degradation upon degradation.  By the grace of God may the circle of crime against this family's children end in this generation.  The thing is--who is to know.  What system to we have to follow these children into their adult lives, and then the lives of their children?

Mother Gets Life Sentence For Drunk Driving Death of Her Toddler

This is from the Columbus Dispatch:

Mother gets 3 years in drunken-driving death of her toddler
By John Futty

"A mother whose drunken-driving crash killed her 2-year-old daughter was sentenced today to three years in prison.  'I blame myself every day,' Jessica C. McKinley said in Franklin County Common Pleas Court before sentencing. She pleaded guilty last month to one count of aggravated vehicular homicide and one count of driving while intoxicated. McKinley, 23, Dartmouth Ave., had a blood-alcohol level of 0.224 percent, nearly three times the level at which Ohio considers someone impaired, at the time of the crash.

She was driving at least 64 mph in a 35-mph zone when her car struck a traffic barrier on Nelson Road on Jan. 6, 2009. Her daughter, Lanyah McKinley, was in the back seat unrestrained and in an unsecured booster seat. The girl died at Nationwide Children's Hospital.

Judge Tim Horton sentenced McKinley to three years for the vehicular homicide and six months for drunken driving, to be served concurrently. He also imposed a five-year suspension of her driver's license.
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While you see that the Court's sentence seems lenient consdiering the consequences, in fact any mother, any real parent understands why this post says Mrs. McKinley received a "life sentence."

Star: My Sisters

Star was my first child sex abuse client.  I talked about her matter last year when I described how it is that I pursued child molesters and sex abusing priests.  As a result of an unexpected visit by one of my sisters, yesterday I have been thinking about Star's father, one of the most evil and vile men I ever encountered.  My father was by degrees, only slightly less criminal.  Star's father got caught and paid a price in the physical world; my Dad was able to manipulate and play his children and family against one another creating by crimes, generations of injury and harm.  Two of my sisters spent some time over the weekend trying to get a grip on some of the parameters of the injuries he inflicted on his children and possibly grandchildren.  Unfortunately, the subject intruded like an uninvited guest at my 4th of July festivities. 

I love my sisters and brothers, but it is not lost on me that the estrangement among us is a continuing pattern of behavior fostered by the child molester, our father, to cover-up his crimes against my sisters and the other young women he had contact with throughout his lifetime.  We brothers and sisters continue to act out and keep one another at arms length and maybe blame one another for injuries he inflicted on us.  I've seen cats sit at a screen door and stare out at an interloper cat on their front porch, only to attack one another.  We do this.

Star's father molested every child in his family but primarily the three sisters.  Star was a a "Harley chick" and a tattoo centerfold, years before tatoo'ing went "mainstream."  Star's sister was a banker, and looked like a banker.  At the trial of their father, the banker sister got on the stand and attacked Star as a liar and manipulator and cheat and drug addict.  I asked the sister: so who taught Star to be a liar, cheat, manipulator, etc.  Her honest answer:  our Dad.  A jury awarded Star $5.5 million dollars (like most of the millions of dollars of verdicts I racked up over the years, substantially "uncollectable.")

My sisters, to some degree or another, have come to view one another less than charitably, I think.  My one sister has admittedly made some awful choices, my other sister has stepped in and helped her out with parenting, my other sister has been until receently--broken-hearted and uncommunicative with both of her sisters.  It goes on and on and while we are all adults and responsible for our conduct, we have forgotten who manipulated our feelings and why he did those things to us.  He did those things to us so he could commit crimes against children and others!  That we don't see that we are perpetuating these harms against one another is just one more crime he is committing against us from beyond the grave.

I gave my father too much free rent in my head over the years.  I used his crimes against me and my sisters as a reason to relapse into alcoholism after 12 years of sobriety.  The self-righteous bastard I became as a lawyer--who was incompetent to even run a business--justified his mis-guided and ultimately self-destructive crusades as a war of angels against devils.  This is my father's legacy.  Fuck him!

For my sisters and brothers, I love you and I wish you peace, and grace, and love.

Child Abuse, No Excuse

The IndyStar.com has this report of the step-father charged with two felony counts of shooting his 10 year old step son with a paintball gun and kicking the child with steel toed boots. 

Often I report that I have tremendous pain and depression over some of the dark stories that I encounter at the local news websites that I review for stories on Bad Lawyer--this is bad, evil in fact, but not so nauseating that I can't talk about this story.  Unfortunately most of the stories that I shy away from profoundly hurt me and I wish I had not seen them--purely evil.  Like I've said about child porn, God forbid you've seen it--because once seen, you can't un-see it.  Darkness.  Black holes of pain and suffering.

The story of Step "father" at the IndyStar reminds me of something I saw as a long time ago.  Many years ago when I was briefly single, I had an apartment with a third story bedroom window that looked out on a short perpendicular cul de sac separating two rows of houses, that the local police had trouble patrolling thereby creating a weird pocket of drug houses and routine criminal activity in an otherwise nice suburb.  One 4th of July weekend I watched this toothless moron attired in a muscle shirt and smokeless tobacco baseball cap tossing fireworks down from a second floor balcony onto what turned out to be his step-children.  The children fled in tears, screaming--while he cackled.  I called the police--I had to be emphatic with the dispatcher that I was watching an assault and battery upon children by an adult.  The police did respond and did arrest the drunk "step father" who apparently been out on parole for less than a week.

In my career, I represented adult and child survivors of child sex abuse as well as physical abuse.  During that representation I had more than one client kill herself.  The civil law was a very poor mechanism for dealing with these crimes against children.  I was honored to have worked with some of the nationally-famous advocates; and I briefly served as a director on the OurTown Center for Prevention of Domestic Violence for which I am eternally grateful for the training and education.  In litigation I've taken many, many depositions of psychologists, psychiatrists and other mental health care providers.  This education, you would think would help me square away my feelings, but it has not.  I used to be outraged, now I am I am more horrified.

Why are children abused by adults?   We know some of the answers.  Adults abused as children learn abuse, and when they grow up those adults abuse children.  Alcohol and drugs erase even minimal inhibitions.  If co-custodial adults and neighbors tolerate or ignore child abuse we enable it.  Then again there is evidence in today's news that we enable child abuse as a matter of foreign policy, check the photo on the front page of this AM's NYT, of two Somali children armed with assault weapons courtesy of US foreign aid.

Injuries from child abuse to children are terrible.  If the injuries were, only, physical!  Can you think of any more damaging way to abandon a child than to physically or sexually abuse a child?  I can't.  I amd my siblings know, personally. 

That we can do something about it and we don't--is there any defense to that?

Ann Arbor Author--Shot Her Father In the Ass, Going to Jail

Back in November I told you about the case of Lisa Reardon (pic), an Ann Arbor crime novelist who showed up her parents' house and opened fire on her father, George Hicks, as he hightailed it through the kitchen in an effort to avoid hot lead. 

The original news reports of the attack reported that Ms. Reardon's beloved cat, Godfrey, died;  and, there was speculation that this may have represented the last important "anchor" to her then,  domesticity. 

A little research turned up her author's web page with titles and plot summaries that suggested a backgound steeped in alcoholism, child abuse, self-mutilation and other childhood horrors. 

So no surprise that Ms. Reardon's pre-sentence investigation is replete with references to her being a victim of child molestation by the piece of shit that she blasted. Lisa Reardon entered a plea of guilty to two counts of atttempte murder and if I understand the news account at AnnArbor.com she will do 4-6 years.  Good luck to Ms. Reardon.  I hope she finds some peace.

Delaware Judge William C. Bradley is a Child Molester

Delaware Judge William C. Bradley is an admitted child molester.

 

According to Delaware Online the Judge issue a statement admitting he molested an 11 year old boy more than 30 years ago--attorneys for Gregory Kelly had lined up 10 other adults who were prepared to testify about their molestations by the jurist and a second "John Doe" case was also pending.  Both Mr. Kelly's case and "the John Doe" case were settled.  An aspect of the settlement was Judge Bradley's written admission which was handed out in front of the courthouse where the Judge served for many years.

"John Doe" lawsuits are civil actions brought anonymously and subsequently amended "under seal" so that the parties knoe the identities of those bringing the suit. 

This report of the civil litigation against Judge Bradley serves to illustrate a larger point made, here, on Bad Lawyer that child molestation and abuse knows no boundary, no class, no socioeconomic, race or creed limitations.  For several decades we fought to establish acceptance of this idea in the courts, that you have a well-respected jurist admitting that he too, is a child molester should tell you how far the effort has come. 

12 Year Old Heroine

Steve Mayes of the Oregonian completed a gut-wrenching, detailed three-part series about a 12 year old girl the reporter calls "Ashley" who confronted her narcissitic-rapist father in court, the father who raped and molested her for three years.  

On Octeber 22, 2009, Bobby Gene Palmer, 40, was in Clackamas County Circuit Court about to start the rape trial.  His daughter sat in a corner on a folding chair out of his sight-line.  In a delaying move, Palmer sought a continuance for a "mental evaluation," the Judge wanted to hear from "Ashley."  Ashley could not find her voice but she provided a written statement that prosecutor Shannon Kmetic read into the record.  Reporter Mayes relates:

"She had not seen her father since his arrest three months earlier. When the time came for her to speak, "Ashley" could not [talk], 'She didn't think she could do it,' said prosecutor Shannon Kmetic, who read Ashley's statement to the judge.

Ashley wept as her words were read. 'I love my dad to death, and he needs to say, 'Yes I did it,' because I can't handle it anymore. It is killing me,' Ashley wrote. 'My whole body is hurting. I am only 12 years old. I'm too young to be having to do this.' 

Clackamas County Circuit Court Presiding Judge Steven L. Maurer denied Palmer's motion and ordered the trial to proceed, a few hours later, Palmer entered guilty pleas.  As he stood in front of Judge Maurer for sentencing this piece of garbage insisted he was a loving father.  Judge Maurer said, "It defies description that you can utter the words that you love your kids and will always be their dad," Maurer said. "The horror of this is you have never been her dad."  Judge Maurer sentenced Palmer to 58 years in prison. 

I urge you to read Steve Mayes original articles, and weep for Ashley and all lost children.

Art!

The New York Daily News has this report on the artist, Michaelangelo, no not that one, the pedophile photographer who finds himself in U.S. District Court facing 15-30 years for child porn.  Yes, Judge the pictures of me sleeping with an 11 year old girl on my laptop are real, . . . yes, Judge, she's a minor, but I took the pics in Colombia, . . . and these images are ART.

Goodbye, Michaelangelo.

If you look at local news websites around the country which I do, you endlessly encounter reports of men being prosecuted on child porn charges.  Hell, occasionally there's an adult woman in the mix.

A couple of thoughts occur to me:  the wide-dispersion of computer technology in the late twentieth and first decade of the twenty-first century (is there a verb I can use here without using a pun?--oh, well) exposing a lot of pedophiles?  Secondly, trying to justify, rationalize, excuse child porn sure faces steep odds, at least in this country. 

These observations might sound incredibly obvious to you but for those of us who grew up in eras that preceded the personal computers, child porn existed--in fact, as an attorney who brought hundreds of actions arising out of the sexual abuse of children, some of this pre-digital garbage was discovered as part of the lawsuits.  I don't know the numbers, but according to Wikipedia, since 1997, the number of images on the internet has grown an estimated 1500%! Computers did not create child porn, but computers created the resource for law enforcement to identify and prosecute consumers of this material.

Years ago I brought a claim against a step-father on behalf of his newly adult child.  Of course, the defendnat denied abusing his step-daughter.  I set the defendant's discovery deposition; just, before the scheduled examination one of the defendant's ex-wives (for another amazing story of a disgusted wife click the link)delivered a manilla envelope with dozens of black and white images that appear to have been processed in a basement darkroom.  During the depositon, I pulled image after image out of this manilla envelope this defendant visibly wilted.  His attempted explanation, ART!  He compared the photos to the work Robert Mapplethorpe.

Um, I'm not an art critic, (well actually I am), but this was not the work of an artist.