This was the first remembered lesson of not being a victim to the streets. The mother moved by deep love and fear for her children's safety did not want them to be victims of the violence out on the street. Unknowingly, she was inviting them to be the violence in the streets to avoid becoming a victim. There are two perspectives that can be taken from this scene. One, such a young age to lose the safety of innocence to the realization of violence that exists.
On January 29, 1991, a vile crime occurred in the Heikkila home in Basking Ridge, New Jersey. Twenty-year-old Matthew Heikkila, the adopted son of Richard and Dawn Heikkila loaded up a “sawed-off 20-gauge shotgun” (Sullivan). He labeled shotgun shells “Mom” and “Dad”, and shot his parents both in the head. Matthew plotted the murder to get the chance to steal his parent’s credit cards, and treat his girlfriend to a birthday dinner. Matthew then left his parent’s dead bodies on the floor of his home and he and his girlfriend enjoyed a night in NYC.
Johnny's brother and mother were impacted a lot by Johnny’s murder. During the court case Johnny’s brother Randy Allen had the following to say “I pray that Cyntoia will never be free into society again.” He told this to the court and along with this quote his mother also said the following "I do not know Cyntoia Brown, and I do not hate Cyntoia. I just hate the act that she did.” Johnny’s mother was more kind than her son was in the court trial.
Sharday, her mother, aunt, and the grandmother’s girlfriend went to the reporter’s house the day before MLK day. An incident occurred about a picture that was posted on Facebook. Each person listed had some kind of weapon, and they all stabbed the reporter, while the child was presence. Law Enforcement and the Sheriff Department were called to the home, and the reporter drove himself to the hospital. The reporter notes they took the child back with them.
Originally published in Sports Illustrated on September 17, 2002, The Boy They Couldn’t Kill: How Rae Carruth’s son survived and thrives is an article where the author, Thomas Lake, intends to inspire others to be open to forgive. Lake uses the story of Saundra Adams, a grandmother raising her grandchild, Chancellor Lee Adams. Saundra’s daughter, Cherica Adams, had been talking to a player on the Carolina Panthers football team, Rae Carruth, beginning the summer of 1998 (Lake 6). Lake states that by May of 1999, Cherica had become pregnant with a baby boy and celebrated this with her mother (Lake 9).
No parents should ever have to bury their children. For the Lee family they not only lost a child but still live with the horror of not knowing who took their daughter’s life. On January 13, 1999, Baltimore, Maryland was racked with drama and tension when Woodlawn High School senior Hae Min Lee disappeared after school. Her mutilated body was discovered behind a log in Leakin Park on February 9, 1999 by a mysterious man know as Mr. S. Reports pin the cause of death on strangulation. After a long and drawn out trial, Hae Min Lee’s ex-boyfriend, Adnan Syed, was convicted of the crime and sentenced to life in prison.
This shows how everything comes with consequences and how people need to step up. The only reason he got charged was because his mom admitted to. Overall, These were 3 people who changed him
I can't imagine how hard it was for them to see their son's place of death. Although I originally thought his parents had done some horrible things in order for their son to leave them, I see now that they were just normal parents. They just had a son who wanted to live independently. When he left, they were mad, which quickly progressed to worry before ending in grief.
It’s clear that he has no feelings of sorrow for this family as he says things like: “ *About her death* Will be on the news tonight, I reckon. That 'll be good. No, that 's not good.” and: “She 's what the kids would call a slut, which is a terrible thing to say about someone who 's just died, but apparently there 's no denying she was one.” He is portrayed in a feminine and over-dramatic with endless amounts of hyperbole.
In the book Just Mercy, by Bryon Stevenson, he shares the story of his upbringing as a lawyer and company Equal Justice Initiative in Montgomery, Alabama. Through his career, he was able to understand the full extent of mercy and its ability to bring out people’s humanity. Additionally, Stevenson argues how people who act upon prejudiced beliefs are just as broken as those who have been condemned to life in prison without parole and on death row, because they have all been defeated by a sense of hopelessness and animosity within their own lives. In my critique, I describe my new found understanding of the cruelty behind the death penalty. Moreso, the trauma and brutality it brings to all the players involved, especially to those who are placed on death row.
‘Now what are you talking about?’ ‘I’m saying the day I’m beaten just once more, your son is on his own.’... He loved his son no matter how he behaved toward him, and he knew I could do as I threatened. ‘At the rate Mr. Rufus has accidents,’ I said, ‘he might live another six or seven years without me. I wouldn’t count on more than that.’”
“According to experts, mothers who murder their children aren’t as rare as we’d want to think. Some estimate that it happens a few times a day in this country and at least 1000 times in a year!” Casey Anthony, mother of two year old Caylee Anthony, attended the courtroom for about two and a half months for being accused of murdering her daughter. Casey was the headline in every news article and the spotlight of the world, she was arrested in 2008 for murdering her daughter. On July 15th, Caylee was reported missing by her grandmother Cindy, and said she had already been missing for a month, and when Cindy questioned Casey where her daughter had been, she had many different stories, what mother is ok with her child being gone for such a long
Gary Kinder’s book, Victim: The Other Side of Murder, offers a disturbing record of the murder and attempted murder of five individuals in a murder/robbery planned by an individual who should have never been free to commit such a heinous crime to begin with. Kinder’s book allows the reader to essentially get into the heads of the people who must experience the fallout of this devastating event, and offers a unique perspective on how the indirect victims of crime can be impacted just as direct victims are. The purpose of this paper is to examine the experiences of a father, Byron Nasibitt and his son Cortney Naisbitt; one an indirect victim of crime and the other, a direct victim, both of whom were forced to deal with the devastating effects
1/5/23 Racial injustice has been a prominent issue in the American criminal justice system for centuries prior to Bryan Stevenson's entry in the criminal justice world. Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption, goes in depth on specific unjust criminal charges based on racial assumptions. Bryan Stevenson does work on ending these suffrages and freeing clients who have been unfairly accused on death row. Throughout the book, Stevenson addresses systemic racism through examples of jury selection, several case studies of unfairly incarcerated individuals, and police brutality which his advocacy for inmates overcomes by creating racial justice within the criminal justice system.
In the short story by Tim O’Brien, “The Things They Carried” the main character undergoes a huge transformation. Lieutenant Cross is a U.S. soldier in the Vietnam War who carries a lot of baggage, both mental and physical. He is in love with a girl named Martha back home, who doesn’t love him back, and that causes him to act differently, he doesn’t act like a soldier. Cross doesn’t act or behave like a soldier, he acts like a boy in love. “The Things They Carried” is a bildungsroman because Lt. Cross changes and matures throughout the story.
