Category: Violence Against Women

The Christine Blasey Ford Standard and the Sudden Destruction of Eric Swalwell

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Far be it from me to defend Eric Swalwell, now accused of rape and other “inappropriate” behavior by at least four women. If CNN is willing to vouch for the credibility of Swalwell’s accusers, then certainly I will not cast doubt on their veracity. However, I have never supported Swalwell, and have not voted for any Democrat for more than three decades, so my hands are clean — I bear no responsibility for Swalwell’s wrongdoing, and can applaud his destruction with a clear conscience. The same cannot be said, however, by CNN and other Democrat-friendly media venues which have spent years giving Eric Swalwell a platform without ever even hinting about his lecherous habits, which were apparently an open secret among Democratic Party operatives on Capitol Hill and elsewhere.

Has everyone forgotten Christine Blasey Ford? Her name came up in my column last month about the Duke lacrosse rape hoax:

The institutions of media and academia that had disgraced themselves in the Duke lacrosse rape hoax did not even seem to learn a lesson from their blunders. In 2014, another rape hoax was perpetrated at the University of Virginia, with an emotionally unbalanced young woman claiming that she had been brutally attacked at a fraternity house, a crime she blamed on an imaginary frat member she called “Haven Monahan.” The university immediately suspended fraternity activities on campus, as feminists proclaimed that the story in Rolling Stone magazine proved the existence of a rape epidemic among college students nationwide. Rolling Stone was found guilty of defamation, and the mysterious “Haven Monahan” was never found.
How many hoaxes has the news media helped promote since then? Somewhere there may be a full list, but certainly the “Russian collusion” hoax during Trump’s first term stands out in memory, and then there was the Christine Blasey Ford claim of a long-ago gang rape during the Brett Kavanaugh confirmation hearings. The lack of accountability — nobody yet has gone to prison for their role in the “Russian collusion” hoax, and most in the media won’t even admit that Kavanaugh was the victim of an outrageous lie — is what frustrates so many people who’ve grown tired of such shenanigans, which have an obvious political agenda.

Someone needs to speak to Mark Judge, who was collateral damage in the Kavanaugh affair, about this lack of media accountability. For myself, I consider Christine Blasey Ford to be a heinous liar, and have the same opinion of E. Jean Carroll. When all else fails, it seems, Democrats are always able to find some woman willing to make accusations of sexual wrongdoing by Republicans, and I’m sure Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas will testify that this is a long-established pattern.

Never forget what they did to Clarence Thomas

It is the political double standard in such matters that is objectionable, particularly in regard to the allegedly “objective” news media. Now that it is permissible to speak the truth about Eric Swalwell, the question everyone should be asking is, “Why now?” The accusations against Swalwell involve events that are not entirely recent:

On April 10, 2026, the San Francisco Chronicle published a story where a former Swalwell staffer claimed that Swalwell, 17 years her senior, had sexually assaulted her on more than one occasion, including when she was too intoxicated to give consent. A few hours later, CNN published a story in which four women alleged sexual misconduct by Swalwell, including a former staffer who said he raped her. Politico also reported that a former Swalwell employee signed a non-disclosure agreement pertaining to employment discrimination when they left his office. Although the agreement was not related to sexual harassment, it directly contradicted Swalwell’s previous claims that no one on his staff signed an NDA.
Swalwell described the allegations as “lies” and claimed that they were intended to damage his campaign for governor. The Los Angeles Times reported that Swalwell’s attorney had sent a cease and desist letter to the staffer and threatened to sue for defamation.
Multiple high-level staffers resigned from Swalwell’s gubernatorial campaign in advance of the report, including U.S. Representative and campaign chair Jimmy Gomez. Others, including the California Teachers Association, former state assemblymember Ian Calderon, and U.S. Senator Ruben Gallego rescinded their endorsements of Swalwell.

This happened very suddenly on a Friday, you see, even though the allegations involve incidents that happened as far back as 2019:

A former staffer of Rep. Eric Swalwell, a leading Democratic candidate for California governor, says that the congressman raped her when she was heavily intoxicated and left her bruised and bleeding, an allegation Swalwell strongly denies.
“I was pushing him off of me, saying no,” the woman told CNN of the incident, which she said happened in 2024 after she had stopped working in Swalwell’s office. “He didn’t stop.”
She said it was the second time Swalwell had nonconsensual sexual contact with her while she was drunk. In 2019, when she was still working for him, she said she woke up naked with him in a hotel room after a night of heavy drinking. She said she had no memory of what happened but could feel physically that they’d had sexual contact.

Keep in mind that Swalwell literally ran for president, campaigning for the 2020 Democratic Party nomination for several months in 2019 before dropping out, and yet this staffer didn’t speak out against him at the time. Allegedly, they continued to socialize for years after the 2019 rape, so that he could rape her again in 2024, but still she did not denounce him, until two months ahead of the California primary in which Swalwell was the leading Democratic candidate. The timing is rather curious.

You can see from the Real Clear Politics poll average that, in California’s open “jungle primary,” Swalwell was positioned to be the only Democrat to qualify for the general election, ahead of billionaire Tom Steyer and Rep. Katie Porter. These three Democrats were splitting the Democratic vote in such a way that, not only was Republican Steve Hilton the leading candidate in the race, but there was a serious chance that Republican Chad Bianco might finish second in the primary, meaning that there would be zero Democrats on the ballot come November.

Yet it seems Swalwell’s habits were an “open secret” in D.C.:

Swalwell was crowned the “Snapchat king of Congress” in 2016 over his enthusiasm for the app, which was then popular among teens and young millennials.
Social media creator [Ally] Sammarco claimed she messaged Swalwell on Twitter in 2021 asking about his history growing up in a Republican family.
She claimed he began sending her provocative late-night messages, referring to her as a “bad angel,” and eventually switched their communications to Snapchat where he allegedly shared photos of his penis.
He allegedly “ran by her apartment building several times,” giving her hugs but not coming inside.

That was five years ago, and Swalwell has twice been reelected to Congress since then, but for some reason Ms. Sammarco decided to say nothing about a congressman sending her obscene images until now?

“Oh, it’s nothing — a congressman who is on TV multiple times every week sent me a dick pic but I won’t say anything about it.”

As I say, however, it is not my intent to defend Swalwell, nor to cast aspersions on the numerous victims of his egregious actions. It’s just that there seems to have been a cover-up, an agreement among everyone who was aware of Swalwell’s pattern of predatory behavior, that nothing would be said publicly about it, until this week. Are we supposed to believe that, among the cable news anchors who interviewed Swalwell over the past several years, none of them ever heard any rumors about his sexual misconduct? Excuse me for being suspicious about this.

The Christine Blasey Ford Standard, as I’ll call it, is that whenever a woman accuses a man of sexual wrongdoing, his guilt is certain, because no woman would ever lie about such things. Her accusation is the only evidence necessary to convict him in the court of public opinion. Thus let it be with Eric Swalwell — “Guilty! Guilty! Guilty!” — but I’m still curious about why the media kept silent for so long, until this week.

 



 

Violence Against Women Update

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Clyde McLemore is ‘mostly peaceful’

Wow, has it been nearly two years since I used that headline? I created the Violence Against Women category specifically for the kind of “violence against women that feminists will ignore.” You can call it “intersectionality” or just call it hypocrisy, but if you pay attention a while, you’ll notice that there seems to be a double standard regarding this issue that feminists claim to care so much about. If the perpetrator of “violence against women” happens to be a Democrat, or a member of a key Democratic Party constituent group, then there will be no headline-making protests, no angry speeches in Congress, etc. Like everything else liberals in America claim to care about, this issue only matters when they see an opportunity to exploit it as a vote-getting trick for Democrats.

The problem with conservatives is that it is impossible for most of us to imagine how utterly cynical liberals really are. Everything they do is ultimately about trying to help Democrats win elections, without regard for whether Democrats actually do anything that helps the people liberals claim to care about. Because I was born and raised a Democrat, of the old-fashioned New Deal-era Yellow Dog type, this cynicism was never apparent to me until Bill Clinton (whom I voted for in 1992) became president, and proceeded to betray everything I’d ever believed in.

That experience was not only sufficient to drive me out of the Democratic Party, but it put me wise to the whole “caring” act that liberals had for so long been using to deceive chumps like me. Since becoming an ex-chump, I have tried to enlighten others about the nature of the Great Liberal Swindle. For the latest lesson, my friend Stephen Green at Instapundit called attention to recent events in Lake County, Illinois:

Newly obtained police records and body-worn camera footage shed additional light on a physical altercation involving Black Lives Matter organizer Clyde McLemore and a woman who worked with him at the Black Lives Matter Resource Center in Waukegan.
The incident prompted a police response on Jan. 12, 2026, at the center located at 668 Lenox Ave., after officers were dispatched for what was initially reported as an unwanted subject but later classified as a battery investigation.
According to a Waukegan Police Department report, officers arrived shortly after 12:30 p.m. and spoke with McLemore, who told police the confrontation began when the woman entered his office asking for money. McLemore said he told her he had no money and asked her to leave. When she refused, he said he attempted to leave the office but the woman grabbed him by the hood of his jacket and struck him, leading to what he described as a “tussle.”
Police observed a scratch on McLemore’s forehead and lip and noted that the office appeared disheveled, consistent with a physical struggle.
The woman involved in the altercation told officers a different version of events. She said she had been working on grant projects for the organization and had come to McLemore’s office asking about payment related to those grants. She alleged that McLemore became angry when she asked about money and shoved her in the chest, after which the two began pushing and shoving each other. . . .

Let us pause the narrative here, friends, to point out that this “tussle,” as Clyde McLemore called it, involved grants that his organization had received to do “projects,” and that the “woman who worked with him” believed she was owed payment for her work, but by his own admission, McLemore said “he had no money.” A quick check reveals that, in 2023 (the most recently available year) Black Lives Matter of Lake County collected more than $180,000 in contributions. For some reason, however, McLemore can’t pay this woman for her work.

And now let’s return to the narrative:

Officers observed that she had a small cut on her lip and several broken fingernails, which were captured on body-worn camera footage.
Body camera audio from the incident shows the two giving conflicting accounts to police. McLemore told officers the woman “stole on” him and that he wanted her removed from the property but did not want to press charges.
During her conversation with officers, the woman said arguments over money had occurred multiple times before and described the altercation as escalating from an argument into “tussling,” which she said involved pushing and body-slamming.
Police ultimately made no arrests, citing conflicting statements and injuries to both parties. Officers instead separated the two and advised them to have no contact.
Investigators later documented that a video circulating on social media showing McLemore involved in a physical fight was from a separate incident on Nov. 2, 2025, according to statements McLemore gave to detectives.
That footage has since spread widely online, including being shared by the popular social media account Libs of TikTok.
McLemore is no stranger to controversy in the region. The Waukegan activist previously gained attention in Kenosha following the 2020 unrest and has faced multiple legal battles in both Wisconsin and Illinois. Kenosha County Eye previously reported on McLemore’s arrest while on bail in a Kenosha riot-related case and his later conviction for taking photographs inside an Illinois courtroom, which resulted in a 40-day jail sentence.

So there was similar “altercation” in November before this “tussle” in 2025. The woman’s name is Nyesha Hill, and there is police bodycam video of her telling her side of the story:

“I told him, ‘It’s not fair that I come here and I work and you running around taking care of other things that don’t got nothing to do with Black Lives Matter with Black Lives Matter money,’” she later told cops. “I’m the one that make this joint work.”

What the woman is really saying is, McClemore is scamming. He’s collecting money in the name of Black Lives Matter and instead is “running around taking care of other things” unrelated to the stated mission of this tax-exempt “charitable” organization. The reason she’s upset is because she’s not getting her share of the grift.

It was a “mostly peaceful” argument.



 

Violence Against Women Update

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Four females ages 17 to 21 were kidnapped in Pennsylvania, held captive in a shipping container in Monroe County, where two of them were raped in a crime that shocked residents of the Poconos region in the hill country near the New York state line. The victims were rescued by police in a Wal-Mart parking lot in Mount Pocono, after having been kidnapped in Wilkes-Barre (about 40 miles away) where the victims reportedly were witnesses to a shooting. During their ordeal, the victims were first transported to a building (which had once housed a Salvation Army center) that one of the accused kidnappers owns in Pen Argyl. From there, the victims were reportedly taken to a “remote property” that one of the kidnappers owns in Smithfield Township, about 15 miles from Pen Argyl. It was at the Smithfield Township property that the victims were held in a shipping container and two of them were raped.

Strange to say, this crime has apparently gotten zero attention from feminists, who have made violence against women a subject of their activism for more than three decades. Likewise, we have heard nothing from the White House about this horrific crime, despite the fact that President Joe Biden frequently touts his credentials on the issue, as in this March 2022 press release:

This week, President Biden signed into law the Violence Against Women Act Reauthorization Act of 2022, bipartisan legislation passed by Congress as part of the Omnibus appropriations package.
One of the driving forces of President Biden’s career has been fighting back against abuses of power. That force led him to write and champion the groundbreaking Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) as a U.S. Senator, landmark legislation that first passed in 1994. In the nearly three decades since, he has worked with Members of Congress from both parties to pass legislation to renew and strengthen VAWA three times: in 2000, 2005, and 2013. Each time, he worked to expand access to safety and support for all survivors and increase prevention efforts. Preventing and responding to gender-based violence wherever it occurs, and in all of its forms, has remained a cornerstone of the President’s career in public service . . .

Yes, we must “increase prevention efforts” to stop “gender-based violence wherever it occurs,” as the president says! We can therefore expect him to demand that the Department of Justice assist with the investigation and prosecution of the suspects in this crime. That presidential call for action should be forthcoming any minute now, right?

From ABC News: “Authorities have charged Davaun Carlon Jackson, 29, with a slew of charges, including kidnapping, rape, and other offenses. The second suspect, Isaiah Rogers-Keeney, 19, is also being charged as an accomplice.” Having read several news stories about this case, many details are confusing or mysterious, with different stories reporting the case differently. It seemed obvious to me that this probably wasn’t Jackson’s first crime, and research turned up a listing in a local weekly paper from November 2016: “Davaun Carlon Jackson, 21, of Tobyhanna – charged with retail theft, receiving stolen property and criminal attempt of theft by deception.” When I mentioned this to my brother Kirby, who is familiar with the area from his years as a long-haul trucker, he told me there was an Army facility in the area. This is Tobyhanna Army Depot which, with more than 3,000 employees, is “the largest employer in northeastern Pennsylvania.” It is logical to surmise that Davaun Jackson had some connection to this facility, either having been stationed there in the military, or working as a civilian employee, or possibly having family members working there.

Whatever the case may be, we don’t have any background about how Jackson became the owner of at least two properties in the area, one in Pen Argyl and one in Smithfield Township. What we do know is that, in Pen Argyl, “neighbors have been concerned about the building ever since it was sold by the Salvation Army”:

301 West Main Street, Pen Argyl

“They’d be in there working late at night. We’ve called the police several times because of the noise,” said the man. “In the morning, the kids sit on that steps over there to get the school bus, and there’s a lot of kids. So we were concerned because this guy seemed a little shady.”
He said there was even an incident with a young woman in distress running away from the property last winter.
“She was barefoot, knocking on doors, and nobody would let her in, but they did call the cops, and I guess by the time the cops got here, she was gone,” said the man.
The borough sent us a statement, saying police have investigated the complaints about the building.

Is this “incident” last winter with a barefoot woman fleeing the building owned by Jackson somehow related to what happened recently with the kidnapped women? We don’t know, although again I think it is logical to surmise some kind of connection between these two incidents.

This crime spans three counties in Pennsylvania — Pen Argyl is in Northampton County, while Smithfield Township is in Monroe County and Wilkes-Barre is in Luzerne County — and one would hope that state officials are coordinating the investigation involving so many jurisdictions. Monroe County District Attorney Michael Mancuso offers even more interesting information about this case:

Mancuso said his office has actually been following Jackson for some time.
“There has been an investigation that has involved him over the course of the last several months,” said Mancuso.
Jackson is facing 14 charges, and Rogers-Keeney is facing 23 charges. Both include kidnapping, sexual assault, and false imprisonment, but Mancuso said they could face more charges in the future.
“We needed to make the charges that we thought were most appropriate now, but everything’s on the table,” said Mancuso.

Feminists must be following the case closely, right?



 

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‘A History of Domestic Violence’

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Jennifer Cruz was 33 years old when she was fatally shot near the Royal Inn motel on U.S. 15 north of Sumter, South Carolina. She was also 35 weeks pregnant; doctors were able to deliver her baby alive, but the infant was last reported as being in critical condition. According to the sheriff’s department, security camera video recorded at the scene shows Cruz’s estranged boyfriend ambushed her as she arrived at the motel where she had recently been staying, The ex-boyfriend fired several shots at the car Cruz was riding in, chasing the vehicle down the street.

Sheriff Anthony Dennis said “Cruz and [Troy] Wells had a history of domestic violence.” Because the suspect knew that Cruz was pregnant, the sheriff described the shooting as “callous and cold-blooded.”

Don’t expect to see this story on CNN. The only reason I know about the murder of Jennifer Cruz is that, in an idle moment, I decided to Google “suspect manhunt.” This is something I do occasionally — Google some phrase like “mass shooting” or “stabbing suspect” and see what kind of stories turn up in the search results. Our news media establishment picks and chooses which crimes deserve national coverage, and I don’t trust their judgment in such matters any more than I trust them to deliver unbiased political coverage. On an average day, there are roughly 50 homicides committed in the United States — 355 homicides a week, more than 1,500 a month — and if the only murders you know about are the ones that get national media attention, you don’t have an accurate picture of crime in America. Much of the public is therefore misinformed about crime and law enforcement, and this misunderstanding has serious political and social consequences. As voters, how can we assess public policy in regard to the criminal justice system if we don’t have the basic facts about how and why and where and when crime happens? Beyond that, in terms of public safety, how can you act to prevent crime — to avoid becoming a victim — if you aren’t fully informed about the risk factors involved? Risk is not randomly distributed in society, but rather follows certain patterns and, if you are aware of the patterns of criminal behavior, you can reduce your risk of becoming a victim of crime.

All of this is to explain the rationale behind my occasionally doing searches for phrases like “suspect manhunt,” which is how I became aware of the March 23 murder of Jennifer Cruz in South Carolina.

The good news is that the suspect Troy Wells is no longer at large. He surrendered to Sumter County authorities on Thursday, and is now in custody, charged with murder and attempted murder:

“I say this was ‘cold-blooded’ because it was premeditated. Wells lay in wait for the victims, and he knew Cruz was pregnant,” said Sumter County Sheriff Anthony Dennis.
“We believe he intended to not only kill both occupants of the car but the unborn child as well,” he added. . . .
Wells has had numerous encounters with law enforcement. His convictions include lynching, domestic violence, drug charges, larceny, traffic violations, and failure to stop for a blue light.
Sheriff Dennis added, “We believe that anyone who would commit a crime like this is a danger to the community and we are pleased that he is now in custody.”

One of the facts about crime that the media don’t tell you is that criminals seldom begin their criminal careers with murder. Which is to say, most murders are committed by people with prior criminal histories — repeat offenders, like Troy Wells — and therefore leniency toward such habitual criminals represents a menace to public safety. Speaking of patterns of behavior, local NBC affiliate WIS-TV reports:

“The baby was everything to her,” said Ashley Cannon, Cruz’s sister. “She was just so excited she was having another child.”
Cannon said Cruz had a tumultuous romantic relationship with Wells that had been going on for about year. Recently, Cruz had cut ties with him.
“They had lots of physical altercations,” Cannon said. “Not to the point where she would call the cops. She told me a few things, but she didn’t want to tell me much, because she knew I would get upset. I think she hid a lot from me, but I do know that he has been abusive to her before.”
Cannon also said Wells had threatened to kill people multiple times.

It’s a pattern of criminal behavior, you see. But this won’t be reported on CNN, and feminists — who love to lecture us about “violence against women” — haven’t mentioned this case, for some reason.



 

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Violence Against Women Update

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Herman Brightman, a/k/a “Nazir Griffiths”

How many times do I have to repeat myself? Online dating is for losers. Ask yourself, who uses dating apps? People who can’t get a date with anyone who actually knows them in real life, that’s who. Merely by downloading a dating app, you’re making a statement about yourself, and it’s not a good statement, OK? Beyond the fact that the people on dating apps are all losers — if they were winners, they wouldn’t need the app, see? — some of them are actually dangerous. As I’ve said before, “Dating apps are a great way for women to meet violent sexual predators.” But hey, it’s not like there are any dangerous people in New York City:

An accused serial predator who met his victims on the popular dating app Hinge was behind bars Tuesday after threatening to carve up a terrified girlfriend with a knife in her Queens apartment.
Handcuffed defendant Herman Brightman, 30, was held with bail following his arraignment in Queens Criminal Court on a seven-count indictment. He is accused of menacing the 28-year-old woman during the chilling Aug. 7 attack following a quarrel at her home, authorities said as the defendant stood mutely in a beige sweatshirt and a COVID mask.
The 5-foot 9, 220-pound suspect, who also goes by the name Nazir Griffiths, climbed on top of the woman, poked her with the tip of his blade and placed his hands on her mouth before threatening her life, according to Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz. Brightman and his victim had met on Hinge months earlier, her office said.
“This defendant terrorized his girlfriend in her own home,” the prosecutor said in a statement. “Wielding a knife, he threatened to gut her, he threatened to kill her. She is fortunate to have escaped with her life.”
Brightman faces additional accusations of threatening two women in the Bronx and a third in New Jersey after contacting them through Hinge, with law enforcement sources saying the FBI was considering bringing charges against him.
In the August attack, Brightman allegedly asked his girlfriend which part of her body she wanted him to cut first before directing her to turn up music playing in the background and peering out a window to check for neighbors before stating his intention to kill her. The defendant taped her mouth shut, bound her wrists behind her back and ordered her to sit in a corner of the room, prosecutors said.
The attacker spent the next six days inside the apartment before the victim convinced him to leave, according to authorities. He initially faced only misdemeanor charges until the case was declared domestic violence, leading to new charges and the decision to call for his imprisonment, the DA’s office said.
The defendant asked for a chance to speak as Tuesday’s hearing wound down, but the judge rejected the request.
Though Brightman claims on his LinkedIn page to be a nurse practitioner at the prestigious Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, a hospital spokesman said they have never employed anyone by that name. Assistant District Attorney Marina Shew said the defendant had attempted to trespass at the hospital and also falsely claimed a job at Stony Brook University Hospital on Long Island. . . .
Before Brightman threatened to slash his girlfriend, he busted her computer monitor during an argument in her Queens Village apartment where he was staying after they began dating, sources said.
The fight escalated, with the defendant destroying her cell phone with a knife before threatening to butcher the woman and tying her up, they added.
The victim was eventually able to calm Brightman down and convince him to untie her, a source said. He broke down in tears at some point, the source added, and the victim was able to go to work.
Six days later, the source said, the victim told Brightman he had to leave the apartment because she had relatives coming to visit. The attacker complied, the source said, and the woman called him a short time later to end the relationship.
Brightman wasn’t done, the source said, and he asked another one of his victims, a 30-year-old Bronx woman, to call the Queens victim, apparently in an attempt to smooth things over.
But when the two women spoke, they bonded over their shared experiences with Brightman and decided to report him, the source said.
On Sept. 8, they each filed a report with the NYPD, with the Queens woman leaving to stay with relatives in Pennsylvania over fears of Brightman’s wrath, according to the source.
The Bronx woman was victimized on Sept. 6, according to court papers, in a confrontation in front of a Mott Haven building on Cypress Ave. in which he allegedly punched the woman in her arm and then grabbed her in a chokehold, one arm around her neck, the other covering her nose and mouth.
Two days later, Brightman attacked the same woman three blocks away, hurling an orange construction cone that struck her in the foot, court papers said. He then allegedly flung a 2-liter bottle of soda at her but she sidestepped it.
Brightman was arrested on Sept. 14 and charged with criminal obstruction of breathing, misdemeanor assault, harassment and weapons possession. Police tacked on a charge of obstructing governmental administration because he allegedly spit in an NYPD sergeant’s face as he was being placed in a holding cell.
He was released without bail and immediately rearrested for the Queens case. He was again released without bail because the charges, all misdemeanors, were not bail eligible, though he was ultimately indicted for second-degree kidnapping, a felony.
But while he was free, Brightman on Sept. 28 attacked another Bronx woman in her apartment on Metropolitan Ave. in the Parkchester section of the Bronx, authorities said.
“I’m going to show you who I truly am,” he said to the 29-year-old victim, according to court papers. “You think I am playing with you?”
When the victim tried to leave, he blocked the door and then threw a glass vinegar bottle at her, court papers stated. The woman retreated to her bedroom and locked the door. Brightman allegedly kicked it in, repeatedly punched her in the head and choked her until she lost consciousness, authorities said.
“Look at me,” he allegedly said before the victim blacked out. “I have nothing to lose. My dad is dying. We don’t work together anymore.”
The woman regained consciousness but the beating continued, the papers said, with Brightman yanking her to the ground by her hair.
“Kneel down,” he allegedly commanded. “You ever been beat before? This is a night you will never forget. You are not going to make it out alive tonight.” , , ,

So far as we know, he hasn’t killed anybody yet, but unless they put him behind bars, it’s probably just a matter of time. How did this monster keep getting arrested and released? Is this some kind of “criminal justice reform,” to turn loose violent predators? Meanwhile, feminists — who claim to care about “violence against women” — haven’t said a peep about Herman Brightman, for some reason . . .



 

Violence Against Women Update

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Anastasia Gilley (left); Marquis McCloud (right)

Jackson County, Florida, is one of those out-of-the-way places most people don’t think about when they think about the Sunshine State. It’s a mostly rural county that sits up against the Alabama state line, south of Dothan, and the only reason most people ever go there is to pass through on the way to Panama City Beach. Now it’s in the news:

Jackson County is reeling from tragedy after investigators found the body of a 19-year-old pregnant woman who had been missing for a week and arrested a man in connection with her murder.
Anastasia Gilley, who was four months pregnant, had last been seen at her home on May 3, the Jackson County Sheriff’s Office said in a news release. Her disappearance touched off “around the clock” efforts to find her by JCSO and the Houston County Sheriff’s Office in South Alabama.
“The investigation quickly led to the arrest of an Alabama man, who has been in custody since earlier this week,” JCSO said in a news release. “The suspect has been uncooperative throughout this entire investigation.”
Marquis Devan McCloud, 33, was arrested on a charge of capital murder during a first-degree kidnapping, authorities said. More charges are pending.
Following leads from interviews and other “investigative techniques,” law enforcement searched various locations in Jackson and Houston counties. Early Wednesday, investigators found a deceased victim near Headland, Alabama, a small town outside Dothan, Alabama.
“Investigators believe this to be the body of Anastasia Gilley, pending an autopsy,” JCSO said in the news release.

The New York Post refers to McCloud as Gilley’s “boyfriend,” but police haven’t actually said anything about such a relationship:

Cops said McCloud — whose violent rap sheet includes a rape conviction — had already been in custody for several days but was uncooperative during the frantic search for his alleged victim.
The Alabama man was being held on a probation violation before investigators hit him with the new raps after finding Gilley’s body. . . .
In addition to the rape cases, McCloud’s criminal history includes terror threats, robbery, battery and violation of sex offender laws. . . .
Detectives zeroed in on McCloud after discovering that he had corresponded with Gilley prior to her disappearance.

Don’t expect to see this case on CNN, nor should you expect that feminists — who love to denounce “violence against women” — will mention this case as an example, for some reason.



 

 

Violence Against Women Update: Some Cases Are Just So … Unpredictable

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Say hello to 40-year-old Robert Castillo, a Minnesota resident who we might guess, based on the prominent tattoo on his neck, is a member of the notorious Latin Kings gang. You might be surprised (but probably not) to learn that in 2001, “Castillo was charged with first-degree assault for stabbing a 22-year-old man in his back, head and neck in Vadnais Heights. Castillo accused the man of telling his girlfriend he’d brought another woman to their apartment complex, according to a criminal complaint.” Gosh, whoever could have guessed that such a fine-looking fellow as Robert Castillo might have a criminal record?

As you recover from your sense of astonishment, brace yourself for the revelation that Castillo’s sister told police that he “had a thing about carrying a knife all the time to protect himself.” You may ask, protect himself from whom? Well, it turns out the police were looking for Castillo — I’m sure this is shocking news to you — because “he had an active Department of Corrections warrant for alleged violations of conditions of his release.” This had nothing to do with the 2001 stabbing incident, however, but rather because he had “received a 10-year sentence” for a 2014 incident in which he assaulted a woman with a hammer.

So let’s add up the clues here:

  1. 2001 stabbing a man;
  2. 2014 attacking a woman with a hammer;
  3. Warrant for his arrest on probation violation;
  4. Carried a knife all the time “to protect himself”
    and
  5. Latin Kings tattoo on his neck.

Keep your heart medication handy, folks, because you might go into cardiac arrest when I tell you that Robert Castillo had been arrested again, and is this time charged with murder after he stabbed his girlfriend 20 times during a Bible study at his sister’s home:

Castillo’s sister, who lives at the residence, told police they host Bible study at the home every Tuesday night and Woodhull and Castillo came over for it. They “were acting normally” and Castillo held Woodhull’s hand and kissed her, the complaint said.
They’d been at the home for about 90 minutes before the stabbing and Castillo’s brother also said he hadn’t seen “signs of hostility.” When he returned from the bathroom, he saw Castillo standing over Woodhull with a knife in his hand.
Castillo’s sister said she saw Castillo stab Woodhull with a hunting knife with a 6-inch blade. . . .
While police were taking Castillo to jail Tuesday, he asked an officer, “Is she going to be OK?,” according to the complaint. . . .
When police told Castillo that Woodhull died, he said, “No, she didn’t,” and shook his head in disbelief.

We’re all shaking our heads in disbelief. Who could have predicted that this guy was capable of stabbing a woman to death?

Feminists, who love to lecture us about “violence against women,” have said nothing about this case, for some reason.



 

 

A Criminal History

Posted on

Kaitlin Roberts (left) and her mother Rebecca Shaw

The weird thing about the YouTube algorithm is its apparent randomness. Saturday night at dinner with my podcast partner John Hoge, I went off on a tangent about the bass riff on the 1966 Simon and Garfunkel hit, “A Hazy Shade of Winter” — something I picked up watching a YouTube video — and then started talking about the guitar parts on Beatles songs, which I’d been studying with YouTube videos by Mike Pachelli. You watch one video like that, YouTube will keep showing you more, and it’s the same with police chase videos — watch one of them, and the algorithm will continue feeding you similar suggestions. My interests are sufficiently eclectic that I get a good variety of YouTube suggestions, especially because I frequently search YouTube for videos related to stories I’m writing about. Still, I have no idea what it was that caused the YouTube algorithm to suggest “Mother shares legacy of daughter killed by ex-husband,” except that I’d previously subscribed to the feed of WUSA-TV news (the CBS affiliate in Washington).

In 2011, Lemuel Roberts was 22 when he was convicted of assault and battery and abduction for a 2010 incident in which he “rammed a woman’s vehicle with his vehicle, then pulled her out of the vehicle and kidnapped her. He beat the woman, with whom he had previously lived, then took her to the Red Roof Inn”:

Roberts was sentenced to 2½ years imprisonment, with two years of the sentence suspended. In 2012, while out on probation, he was charged with drunken driving in Winchester. Police said he fought with them when they tried to arrest him and they had to shock him twice with a Taser to get him handcuffed.
While jailed in 2013, Roberts completed anger management and addiction recovery courses. However, [in June 2019], police said an informant for the Northwestern Virginia Regional Drug and Gang Task Force bought 14 grams of cocaine from Roberts, leading to police raiding his Oakmont Circle home. They said they seized marijuana, hashish oil and $15,000 in cash.

In 2015, Roberts got involved with Kaitlin Jones. The couple married in 2017, and had two children together, but divorced in 2018. Despite the divorce, however, they continued living together, but their domestic situation was not peaceful, and police were repeatedly called to their home near Winchester, Virginia. He killed her in 2020:

A jury found a Virginia man guilty of first-degree murder on Thursday for his involvement in the 2020 stabbing death of his ex-wife.
Lemuel Lee Roberts, 34, of Winchester, Virginia is scheduled to be sentenced on Friday, April 21, 2023, at 9 a.m. for his alleged involvement in the following incident.
Shortly after 2 a.m. on Jan. 11, 2020, a 911 caller reported finding a body in the roadway at English Muffin Court and English Muffin Way in Frederick, Maryland. The victim was later identified as Kaitlin Nichole Roberts of Winchester, Virginia.
Investigators determined that Lemuel Lee Roberts traveled to Frederick, Maryland with his ex-wife Kaitlin Roberts and stabbed her 32 times and ran over her body while driving a Buick Enclave.

Well, it was just the randomness of the YouTube algorithm that brought this story to my attention, with the video of Kaitlin’s mother:

 

There’s this from the Frederick paper’s account of the trial:

After the verdict was announced, a member of Lemuel Roberts’ family stormed out of the courtroom. As she was leaving, she said, toward Kaitlin Roberts’ family: “She’s going to stay dead. It doesn’t f—— matter.”

Just a crime I learned about because of the YouTube algorithm. These things seem random, but some people think there must be a pattern . . .