Category: Crime

Crazy People Are Dangerous

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Say hello to Ruby Taverner, 22, and while you’re at it, go ahead and say good-bye, because Ruby is dead. Ruby began life as a male named Martin Taverner, but it’s the 21st century and we’re all supposed to pretend that this is perfectly normal. But two other people are now dead, including Ruby’s “boyfriend,” who was actually a woman named Amber but called herself “Ray.” Everything in this story is crazy:

Police say that a transgender woman was found shot to death after she shot and killed her transgender boyfriend and her twin brother.
The lethal incident unfolded on Sunday morning at about 3:30 a.m. at an apartment in Independence Township, Michigan.
The Oakland County Sheriff’s Office said they called to the apartment over a report of shots being fired. When they arrived they found two victims shot to death, Ray Muscat, a 26-year-old transgender man, and 22-year-old Bishop Taverner. Muscat was previously known as Amber Muscat.
Neighbors told WDIV-TV that they heard a staggering number of shots coming from the apartment.
They identified 22-year-old Ruby Taverner as a suspect in the murders since she lived at the apartment, was in a romantic relationship with Muscat, and was the twin to Bishop Taverner. Ruby was previously known as Martin Taverner.
They warned at the time that Taverner was “armed and dangerous.”
One day later, they found Taverner dead, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Taverner’s body was found in a wooded area near the apartment house.
Investigators said that Taverner had three registered handguns and that one had been purchased just before the shooting.
WDIV also reported that police had previously gone to the apartment for several mental health and wellness checks prior to the lethal shooting. . . .
“This tragic situation has now been brought to a close, and our investigators will now pivot to see if we can answer the question on everyone’s mind — why,” Sheriff Michael Bouchard said.

You can save the taxpayers some money, sheriff, because I’ve got your answer here: Crazy People Are Dangerous. Case closed.




 

UPDATE: Vicky Sue White Has Died

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After last night’s post (“Fugitive Murder Suspect Caught; Woman Who Helped Him Escape Shoots Herself”), here’s the latest on the case:

Former Alabama corrections officer Vicky White has died from injuries after she and escaped inmate Casey White were arrested in Indiana earlier Monday, Sheriff Dave Wedding of Vanderburgh County told CNN.
She was hospitalized earlier with self-inflicted gunshot wounds after being taken into custody following a car chase in Evansville, Indiana, US Marshals previously told CNN. . . .
Before the chase ensued, officers conducting surveillance spotted Vicky White exiting a hotel with a wig on, according to US Marshal Matt Keely. Then, she and Casey White got into a car and drove away.
Authorities continued to watch them until a vehicle pursuit began, ending when a US Marshals task force member drove a vehicle into the Cadillac the pair were in. The car wrecked and rolled over, [Keely] said. Casey White was driving the car, according to the US Marshals, though Wedding had earlier told reporters Vicky White was the driver.
Officers were able to remove the inmate from the wrecked car, but Vicky White was pinned inside with a gunshot wound to her head, Keely said. . . .
The pair’s capture brought to a close an 11-day manhunt that gained widespread national attention and saw hundreds of tips flood in from all corners of the country, including one that ultimately led to the location and arrest of the fugitives.
That tip came Sunday night, Singleton said.
Wedding said the duo were believed to have been in Evansville since May 3. “It’s hard to believe they’ve been here that many days, but we’re lucky that we stumbled upon them today,” he said.
Singleton said Casey White, 38, will be brought back to Alabama. The inmate faces previous murder charges. Vicky White, 56, was first charged with permitting or facilitating escape in the first degree and was later facing additional forgery and identity theft charges.
“He will be in a cell by himself,” Singleton said. “He will stay in handcuffs and shackles while he’s in that cell and if he wants to sue me for violating his civil rights, so be it. He’s not getting out of this jail again. I’ll assure you that.”

“Well, I’m all broken up about that man’s rights,” and as for the deceased jailer-turned-criminal, let’s not hear any mourning over her, either. We’re never going to silence all the “social justice” crowd’s chatter about “mass incarceration” if we exhibit any sympathy for white criminals.




 

Fugitive Murder Suspect Caught; Woman Who Helped Him Escape Shoots Herself

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Updating last week’s report (“Some Ladies Love the Bad Boys,” May 4) about the case of Alabama murder suspect Casey White, who escaped jail with the assistance of jail administrator Vicky Sue White:

A former Alabama jail official and the murder suspect she is accused of helping escape from custody were apprehended Monday in Indiana after more than a week on the run, law enforcement officials said.
The two fugitives were caught in Evansville, Indiana, after U.S. Marshals pursued their vehicle and then crashed into it, authorities said. Casey White, 38, surrendered and Vicky White, 56, shot herself, and was taken to a hospital, authorities said.
“This has ended a very long and stressful and challenging week and a half. It ended the way that we knew it would. They are in custody,” Lauderdale County Sheriff Rick Singleton of Alabama said.
The arrest of the pair, who are not related, ended a nationwide manhunt that began April 29 when Vicky White, the assistant director of corrections for the jail in Lauderdale County, allegedly helped engineer the escape of Casey White, who was awaiting trial in a capital murder case. Vicky White had told co-workers she was taking the inmate from the jail for a mental health evaluation at the courthouse, but the two instead fled the area.
The car they took off in was later found abandoned in Tennessee, but there was no trace of the pair until U.S. Marshals received a tip Sunday that surveillance photos from an Evansville car wash showed a man who closely resembled Casey White exiting a 2006 Ford F-150 pickup truck, the Marshals Service said.
On Monday, officials learned that the pair was spotted near the sheriff’s office, said Vanderburgh County Sheriff Dave Wedding in Indiana. As officers arrived, the pair fled in a vehicle and led police on a pursuit, he said. U.S. Marshals collided with them “to try to end the pursuit,” he said. Casey White was injured, not too seriously, in the ensuing crash and Vicky White then shot herself, causing “very serious” injuries, he said.

Another crime solved by video surveillance. What do you think caused the complaints about “mass incarceration” that inspired the demand for “criminal justice reform” in recent years? Don’t you suppose that a major factor is because technology — including widespread video surveillance — has made it more difficult for perpetrators to get away with their crimes? Back in the day, fugitive criminals might evade capture for years, but now video cameras are everywhere, and the same technology that helped authorities apprehend Casey White also helps police solve robberies and murders. And let’s face it, criminals can’t expect a jury to acquit them on the basis of some phony alibi when there is surveillance video proving their guilt. Nowadays, when a store gets robbed, police don’t just offer a description of the robbers, but instead give the media video of the crime as it happened, and next thing you know there’s a call to the Crime Stoppers hotline identifying the perps — whoosh! — a one-way ticket to state prison. Arresting and convicting criminals is so much easier now that the Party of Crime (i.e., Democrats) had to cook up some kind of excuse to help keep their voters out of prison, so “criminal justice reform” became a slogan, and George Soros poured millions of dollars into electing pro-crime politicians like Chesa Boudin, George Gascón, Kim Foxx and Larry Krasner as district attorneys, enacting turn-’em-loose policies to ensure that Democrat voters (i.e., criminals) don’t go to jail.

Excuse that long digression, but it’s not often I get such a perfect occasion to explain what’s actually happening to our criminal justice system.




 

Aspiring Rapper Update: Misdemeanor Charges for Homeless Lunatic in L.A.

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Say hello to Isaiah Lee,23, a homeless man and “aspiring rapper” who jumped onstage and attacked comedian Dave Chappelle during a performance this week at the Hollywood Bowl:

The brother of the man arrested for the onstage assault of Dave Chappelle at the Hollywood Bowl says he’s stunned by the incident — and he wants people to know his younger sibling has struggled with mental health issues and being unhoused.
Police say Isaiah Lee, 23, stormed the stage Tuesday night at the Netflix Is a Joke festival and tackled the comedian before security intervened. Lee had a replica gun that could eject a knife blade in his possession when he was arrested and later booked on suspicion of assault with a deadly weapon, authorities allege.
Lee’s brother Aaron Lee tells Rolling Stone that Isaiah has been in and out of shelters in Hollywood, California, for much of the last decade and has lots of friends in the transgender community. Still, Aaron doesn’t believe his brother would “lash out” as an act of activism against Chappelle, who recently drew ire from the LGBTQ community for jokes about trans people.
“I don’t have anything negative to say about Isaiah. He’s a performing artist who tries to stay as positive as possible. He does have a history of mental health issues. He does take medicine. Maybe he missed out on taking his prescription. But he’s not the type to just lash out. I don’t understand,” Aaron, 31, says.
The younger Lee has rapped under the name Noname Trapper and posted a song online two years ago titled “Dave Chappell.” His brother says Isaiah only picked that title to get search engine hits. Aaron says he never heard his brother express any ill will toward the comedian.
“That song wasn’t even about Dave Chappelle. It’s just that Dave Chappelle has a world-recognized name. People are searching Dave Chappelle all the time, so he hoped it would help him get more attention, more attraction, so people could find it,” Aaron says. “He doesn’t have any type of animosity toward him that I know about.”
Aaron says he hasn’t seen his brother recently and thought he was staying with another family member, “getting better.”
“He does take psych medicine, and that probably was a factor. And then maybe something triggered him acting like that. I don’t know,” he says. “He’s not the type of person to attack you for no reason. But if he’s not on his medication, and if he feels everyone is against him, maybe that’s it.”
As for speculation that the assault caught on video may have been tied to Chappelle’s controversial comments about the transgender community, Aaron was unsure. “He does have a connection with the transgender community,” Aaron tells Rolling Stone. “He used to stay at a shelter that helps transgender people. He’s been homeless since 11. He came out to California [from New York] after our grandmother died, and basically was in the streets getting help from different programs in Hollywood, like My Friend’s Place. He went to a lot of different organizations out there that help transgender people. Yeah, it could have definitely been a factor, but I really don’t know.”

You will perhaps not be surprised to learn that, because this happened in George Gascón’s district, the attacker will not be charged with a felony. Basically nothing is a felony in L.A. anymore, except voting Republican.

Dave Chappelle never missed a beat:

Making light of a scary situation. After an audience member recently attacked Dave Chappelle on stage, the comedian claimed that a few of his celebrity friends broke the man’s arm — but the quip was just part of his routine.
“I felt good my friends broke his arm. I felt good,” the Chappelle’s Show alum, 48, said at the afterparty for the “Netflix Is A Joke” event on Tuesday, May 3, per an audio recording obtained by TMZ. He also quipped — in addition to his claims that Jamie Foxx and Busta Rhymes assisted with beating up the attacker — “How bad does a [N-word] have to be that Jon Stewart would stomp him?”

That there’s funny, I don’t care who you are.




 

Some Ladies Love the Bad Boys

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In December 2015, Casey Cole White went on a violent crime spree in two counties on either side of the Alabama-Tennessee border:

In one night, he staged a home invasion and carjacked two vehicles at gunpoint, shooting one person in the arm, WHNT reports.
At the home, he fired multiple rounds and killed a dog.
The crimes were followed by a chase where speeds reached more than 100 miles per hour.
It ended with a stolen car stuck in a field south of Huntsville, and officers — who were evidently well known to him — pleading with him to put down his gun and give himself up.
He was charged with attempted murder, two counts of kidnapping, first-degree robbery, first-degree burglary, third-degree burglary, breaking and entering a vehicle, animal cruelty for shooting a dog and attempting to elude.

White was sentenced to 75 years in prison where, in 2020, he sent a letter to authorities in Lauderdale County, Alabama, to whom he confessed the October 2015 murder of 59-year-old Connie Ridgeway, who was killed in her apartment in the tiny town of Rogersville, about midway between Florence and Athens, Alabama. Despite his confession, White pleaded not guilty at his arraignment, and was in jail awaiting trial for Ridgeway’s murder when he somehow struck up a romantic relationship with a female jail guard named Vicky Sue White. She helped her new boyfriend escape, and both of them are now wanted fugitives.

She had worked nearly 20 years at the Lauderdale Detention Center and authorities were stunned to discover that she’d been in a relationship with an accused murderer for nearly two years. But Vicky Sue White, 57, had been dealing with an invalid husband who died in January after a long struggle with Parkinson’s disease. Her late husband’s mother speculated that Vickey Sue had been “brainwashed” by Casey White: “Maybe he’s got her brainwashed. But I don’t know how he’d have had a chance to get her brainwashed, because he was in prison.” However, there is a word for what likely happened:

Hybristophilia is a sexual interest in and attraction to those who commit crimes, a paraphilia in which sexual arousal, facilitation, and attainment of orgasm are responsive to and contingent upon being with a partner known to have committed a crime. . . . In popular culture, this phenomenon is also known as “Bonnie and Clyde syndrome”.
Many high-profile criminals, particularly those who have committed atrocious crimes, receive “fan mail” in prison that is sometimes amorous or sexual, presumably as a result of this phenomenon. In some cases, admirers of these criminals have gone on to marry the object of their affections in prison.

Some women just can’t resist “bad boys” and a murder suspect like Casey White might seem a strange choice of partners, but he is 6-foot-9, 260 pounds — almost any man that tall would have a strong appeal to many women (who always go for the tall guys, as if such attraction were hardwired into their DNA). But this is likely to be a fatal attraction, given his history of violence toward women, including the ex-girlfriend he attempted to murder during his 2015 crime spree:

Casey Cole White, the murder suspect who escaped from an Alabama jail Friday morning with the alleged help of a prison official, warned cops in 2015 that he’d kill his ex-girlfriend if he got the chance, according to court documents.
“He stated that he wanted to kill her and have the police kill him,” a police report from December of that year concludes. “His only regret was that neither was successful. He stated that if he was released he would kill the victim.”

This love story is unlikely to have a happy ending.




 

Back Where She Belongs

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Kathleen Kane is behind bars, after being arrested for a probation violation and returned to Montgomery County Correctional Facility in Norristown, Pennsylvania. A judge ordered her arrest after Kane was charged with drunk driving after a March 12 car crash in Scranton.

In case you didn’t know it, Kane was once a “rising star” of the Democratic Party after being elected as Pennsylvania’s first female attorney general in 2012. In her victory speech, Kane boasted that her election had “expanded the boundaries for women in Pennsylvania.”

As it turned out, these expanded boundaries would include getting locked up and disbarred. Kane was sentenced to jail after a jury in 2016 convicted her of felony perjury and multiple misdemeanor charges related to a scandal over leaked grand jury evidence.

What happened was that a story appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer about Kane’s decision to drop prosecution of a case that one of the prosecutors in the attorney general’s office had developed against six black Democratic legislators in Philadelphia. Stung by the bad publicity and believing that the prosecutor in that case had leaked information to the media, Kane set about retaliating in 2014 by leaking confidential grand jury information to the Philadelphia Daily News in an effort to discredit the prosecutor. This in turn provoked an investigation that resulted in the charges against Kane, who claimed she was the victim of political enemies seeking to “overturn an election of somebody they just don’t like.” At her 2016 trial, part of the evidence was an FBI recording of two Democratic political operatives discussing Kane’s decision to leak the grand jury information:

Kathleen is unhinged,” [consultant Josh] Morrow said, in the recording. “She doesn’t even have a strategy to do this — just throw everything at the wall and see what sticks.”
[John] Lisko, former chief of staff to state Treasurer Rob McCord, used an expletive in response to Kane’s request that Morrow help her leak the documents, adding: “I just don’t see. It doesn’t even make sense.”

It was just a tawdry scandal all the way around and — after resigning from office, exhausting her appeals, and being disbarred — Kane went to jail in November 2018, sentenced to 10-to-23 months. She was released from jail in July 2019 after serving eight months, but was still on probation when she got busted for DUI in March, so now she’s back where she belongs. Of course, I believe pretty much all Democrats should be behind bars, but we’ve got to start somewhere, and a former “rising star” who “expanded the boundaries for women” is a good start.




 

Killadelphia Update

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Say hello to Rahajahi Taylor Batchelor, 19, who pleaded guilty earlier this month to gun trafficking charges in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania. Batchelor was only 17 when he was arrested in September 2020 and, despite his youth, prosecutors said he was one of the “masterminds” of a major illegal firearms trafficking operation:

A Norristown man who as a teenager was accused of being one of the ringleaders of a multi-county gun trafficking network that illegally obtained and sold 44 firearms using straw purchase schemes has admitted to his role in the organization.
Rahajahi Taylor Batchelor, now 19, of the 1100 block of Green Street, pleaded guilty in Montgomery County Court to charges of corrupt organizations, dealing in proceeds of unlawful activities, illegal sale or transfer of firearms, criminal use of a communication facility, possession of a firearm by a minor and conspiracy in connection with incidents that occurred between March and August of 2020.
Judge Thomas C. Branca deferred sentencing so that court officials can complete a background investigation report about Batchelor. Branca said Batchelor will remain in the county jail without bail while awaiting his sentencing hearing, tentatively set for June.
The open guilty plea means Batchelor has no deals with prosecutors regarding his potential sentence. Batchelor potentially faces more than a decade in prison on the charges. . . .
“This 17-year-old was one of the ringleaders that orchestrated the straw purchases of 44 firearms by three adults and then illegally sold those firearms to people who could not legally buy firearms for themselves,” District Attorney Kevin R. Steele said in November 2020 when Batchelor was ordered to stand trial as an adult. “This defendant, along with his co-conspirators, has done a tremendous amount of damage to the safety of our community here in Montgomery County and in the greater southeastern Pennsylvania region.”
At the time of the arrests in September 2020, Steele alleged the organization’s “sole purpose is to make money by putting firearms in the hands of people who cannot lawfully buy and possess guns.”
Authorities alleged the gun trafficking organization was led by Batchelor, Terrence Barker, 21, of Philadelphia, and Mikal Scott, 19, of the 7900 block of Rolling Green Road, Cheltenham. Barker and Scott are still awaiting trial on corrupt organization and related charges.
Earlier this year, Anthony Jamaris McCrary, 26, of Philadelphia, pleaded guilty to charges he purchased 35 firearms via straw purchases at federally licensed gun dealers in the three counties between July and August 2020 on behalf of the gun trafficking network led by Batchelor, Barker and Scott. McCrary is awaiting sentencing.
A straw purchase occurs when a person with a clean background purchases firearms on behalf of another person to conceal the true ownership of the firearm. Those who are unable to legally purchase firearms include convicted felons, domestic violence offenders, juveniles and mentally ill individuals.

It was big news when the bust went down in September 2020:

Authorities dismantled a gun trafficking network operating in Montgomery, Bucks and Philadelphia counties, alleging nine adults and five juveniles, including some from Norristown and Cheltenham, illegally obtained and sold 44 firearms using a straw purchase scheme. . . .
Ashon Jared Pearson, 23, of the 1400 block of Arch Street, Norristown, Jamil Brown, 19, of Philadelphia, John McDonald, 21, of Philadelphia, and Clarence Codada, 18, of Philadelphia, also were charged with allegedly participating in the gun trafficking network. Four other juvenile males who ranged in age from 14 to 17 also face charges. . . .
“Oftentimes, some of the members of the gun trafficking organization accompanied the straw purchasers to the gun stores and helped choose the weapons,” Steele said.
“After the straw purchasers filled out the federal and state paperwork and lied on it, vowing that this gun was for their own use, they walk out of the gun store, they hand over the gun or guns to other members of the gun trafficking organization who immediately sold it, arming the people the law says cannot have a gun,” Steele added..
The charges lodged against all or some of the alleged participants include corrupt organizations, conspiracy, dealing in proceeds of unlawful activities and illegal sale or transfer of firearms. Bail was set for those charged and their preliminary hearings are pending.
“We may never know the true extent of the damage from these 44 illegal guns since guns obtained using a straw purchaser are typically immediately resold to people who can’t legally buy a gun for themselves. Then after an illegal firearm is used in a crime, it’s resold to other felons and the damage grows. It’s a domino effect,” Steele said.
Steele revealed only six of the 44 firearms have been recovered, including one that was linked to a shooting incident in Cheltenham and another seized during a traffic stop of a juvenile in Abington.
Thirty-eight of the guns remain on the streets.

Hey, did I mention that Philadelphia had a record 561 homicides last year? And that Joe Biden got 81% of the vote in Philadelphia? As our friend Dana Pico has frequently pointed out, the per capita homicide rate in Philadelphia is actually higher than Chicago’s. Dana recently did some more arithmetic and figured out that this year’s pace of murders in “Killadelphia” is lagging slightly behind 2021, so that there would be only 537 murders in the city, at the current pace — about 10 murders per week, on average. If any of the perpetrators are Trump voters or NRA members, this hasn’t been mentioned in the news coverage.




 

Humans Dying in Mayor Frogface’s Town

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As Chicago’s first Amphibian-American mayor, Lori Lightfoot has difficulty relating to the problems of mammals. While it may be unfair to accuse Mayor Frogface of anti-human prejudice, she just doesn’t seem to have a lot of sympathy for us warm-blooded creatures:

At least 35 people were shot, five of them fatally, Friday into Sunday morning in Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s (D) Chicago.
ABC 7 / Chicago Sun-Times reports the weekend’s first fatal shooting occurred around 1 p.m. Saturday “in the 4700-block of South Cottage Grove Avenue.” The gunfire followed an argument.
Two men were killed in a drive-by shooting “in the 1900-block of West Garfield Boulevard” just after 7:30 p.m. One of the men was 42-years-old and the second was 48.
The weekend’s fourth fatal shooting occurred Saturday night around 11:30 p.m. Officers arrived on scene in the 6200-block of South Francisco Avenue to find 26-year-old Alexis Daniel Velazquez Guadarrama had been shot in the chest. He died at the scene.
The fifth fatal shooting of the weekend occurred at 4:45 a.m. Sunday, when a 57-year-old man was shot multiple times following an argument. The shooting occurred “in the 400-block of South Pulaski Road” and the gunmen fled the scene and remains on the loose.
Breitbart News noted 14 were shot, one fatally, in Chicago during the same time-frame — Friday into Sunday morning — last weekend.

Science has not yet solved the mystery of how frog DNA got mixed up in Lightfoot’s chromosome sequence. Meanwhile, human life has no value in Chicago. The homicide rate is slightly down so far this year, compared to 2021, which was the worst year for homicides in Chicago since 1996.