Category: Alaska

‘Parents Would Be Wise to Monitor the Activity of Their Children Online’

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Kayden McIntosh (left), Denali Brehmer (center), Caleb Leyland (right).

So says U.S. Attorney Bryan Schroder, announcing new indictments in the bizarre murder of a 19-year-old girl in Alaska:

A federal grand jury on Tuesday indicted two of the defendants in the killing of Anchorage teenager Cynthia Hoffman on new child pornography charges.
The indictments represent the latest twist in a tangled case involving two young people whose online relationship, prosecutors say, crossed over into real-world murder plot that drew in five Anchorage teenagers and led to the killing of a young developmentally disabled woman.
“For all the good the internet can do, it can be a very dark place,” said Bryan Schroder, the U.S. Attorney in Alaska, at a press conference in Anchorage on Tuesday. “Parents would be wise to monitor the activity of their children online.”
Denali Brehmer, 18, now faces four federal child pornography charges in addition to state murder charges in the slaying of Cynthia Hoffman.
Darin Schilmiller, the 21-year-old Indiana man who prosecutors say offered Brehmer $9 million to “rape and murder someone in Alaska,” was also included in the indictment announced Tuesday.
He’d already been arrested on federal child pornography offenses last week. The new indictment includes five federal charges against Schilmiller, including conspiracy to produce child pornography, production of child pornography, receipt and distribution of child pornography and coercion and enticement of a minor. . . .
Prosecutors say the murder plot was a bizarre online “catfishing” scheme in which the rural Indiana 21-year-old posed as a millionaire named “Tyler” on the internet and recruited Brehmer to kill Hoffman.
Brehmer, in turn, involved four other Anchorage teenagers in the plan, promising them money, prosecutors say.
Hoffman was taken to the Thunderbird Falls trailhead in Chugiak where she was bound with duct tape, shot and left in the Eklutna River on June 2, according to charges. Authorities say Brehmer sent Schilmiller Snapchat images of Hoffman both before and after the killing.
Hoffman’s family has said she considered Brehmer to be her best friend.
Six people have been charged in her death: Schilmiller, Brehmer, 16-year-old gunman Kayden McIntosh, 19-year-old Caleb Leyland and two unnamed juveniles. . . .
Detectives found images of Brehmer sexually abusing a 15-year-old girl, which she then shared with Schilmiller, who was posing as “Tyler.”
Text message exchanges included in other criminal complaints in the case show the Indiana man asking Brehmer to “rape” the girl, who was said to be 14 but was actually 15. . . .
The indictments do not add detail to the narrative of the killing of Hoffman, or answer the many questions about the interactions between Schilmiller, a 21-year-old from rural Indiana who had a troubling history of befriending people online only to ask them for pictures of their children.

Hey, kids, be careful about people who claim to be millionaires on the Internet. Also, don’t rape and murder people. That’s not cool.

(Hat-tip: Kirby McCain on Twitter.)



 

Palin Helps Romney Win Alaska

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WASHINGTON, Pennsylvania
Mitt Romney has a powerful ally in his effort to win the Republican nomination: Sarah Palin, who told a Fox News reporter last night that she voted for Newt Gingrich.

Gingrich got 1,834 votes in the Alaska caucuses, giving the former House Speaker 14.2% of the vote, good for a fourth-place finish behind third-place finisher Ron Paul (3,105 votes, 24%), runner-up Rick Santorum (3,762 votes, 29%) and winner Romney (4,225, 32.6%).

Gingrich also placed fourth Tuesday in caucuses in North Dakota (962 votes, 8.5%) and Idaho (940 votes, 2.1%), and the primaries in Vermont (4,608 votes, 8.1%) and Massachusetts (16,756 votes, 4.6%). Gingrich placed third in Ohio (14.6%), Tennessee (24%), and Oklahoma (27.5%).

Gingrich’s vote total in Alaska was more than four times as large as Romney’s 463-vote margin over Santorum. In Ohio, Gingrich’s third-place total (175,375) was 16.7 times larger than Romney’s 10,508-vote margin over Santorum.

In related news, Texas Gov. Rick Perry — who quit the presidential race Jan. 19 and endorsed Gingrich — was still on the ballot in Ohio, as was former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman, who dropped out Jan. 16 and endorsed Romney. Between them, Perry and Huntsman got 13,843 votes in Tuesday’s Ohio primary.

UPDATE: This post seems to have stirred some anger from people who think that my summary of Neutral Objective Facts was intended as a personal disparagement of Sarah Palin.

Of course, I would have enthusiastically supported Governor Palin, had she seen fit to run for president — see my coverage of her Labor Day speech in New Hampshire — but she decided against it. Another source of anger about this post was expressed by my young friend Jamie:

How come you hate Newt so much?

I replied in the comments, but given the rage reaction this post seems to have provoked, I’ll quote my reply here:

I don’t “hate” him, Jamie. But as a presidential candidate, Newt is utterly implausible. There is simply no way in hell a twice-divorced Republican, married to his former mistress — with whom he had an extramarital affair in the midst of the Clinton impeachment scandal — is going to be elected president of the United States.
Not going to happen. Period.
Gingrich’s rhetorical skills are admirable, but his biography makes him unelectable. This is just the reality of politics, and people who would like to ignore Newt’s biography are simply deluded.
It’s not a matter of policy or ideology. I don’t accuse Newt or his supporters of being insufficiently conservative. They are, however, insufficiently realistic about what it takes to succeed in presidential politics, and their admiration for Newt the Great Debater is blinding them to the unavoidable obstacle to Gingrich’s candidacy. Newt is wasting time and money (and his supporters are wasting their votes) on a campaign that was doomed from the outset.
These are, I assert, Neutral Objective Facts. You may dispute the facts, but I guarantee you that Newt Gingrich will not win the GOP nomination.
Not this year. Not ever.

This is my summary of what is, rather than my personal opinion of what ought to be, and I understand that many people wish that Gingrich’s debate skills were sufficient to offset the liabilities of his biography, but they’re not.

It seems that the online world has become a place where we are so accustomed to people expressing opinions that we have become prone to regard simple statements of fact —e.g., “Newt Gingrich will never be elected president, nor nominated by the Republican Party for that office” — as if they were merely opinions, which might be argued out of existence.

Having supported a lot of long-shot underdogs over the years, I recognize why people might vote for a completely hopeless candidate like Newt. But when the hopelessness was so obvious before his campaign ever began, it ill behooves Newt’s supporters to disparage the motives of those who are guilty of no sin more grievous than stating Neutral Objective Facts.

Doesn’t Mercede Johnston Reminds You of That Line From ‘Gone With the Wind’?

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The one where Scarlett O’Hara says of India Wilkes, “Why, if she thought anybody would take after her, she’d walk down the street naked.”

Mercede Johnston is following in her brother’s footsteps and taking it all off for the cameras.
Two years after Levi Johnston bared his bum for Playgirl, his 18-year-old sister will be featured in a four-page nude pictorial in Playboy’s September issue, a magazine spokesperson confirms to Us Weekly. . . .

Mercede has a blog, which might as well be called “I Really, Really Hate Bristol Palin and You Should, Too.” That’s all she ever writes about.

If Sarah Palin decides to run for president, the biggest downside is that Mercede might get a 16th minute of . . . well, it’s not quite “fame,” is it?

Unless you’re reminded that her brother Levi was Bristol Palin’s ex-boyfriend, your reaction to her name is, “Mercede Johnston? Who’s that? And why didn’t her mama know how to spell ‘Mercedes’?”

Kinda sucks when your name looks like a typo.

Guess we’ll see what the rest of her looks like soon enough.

Go, Willow, Go!

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Ever on the lookout for the latest Palin scandal, TMZ reports that 16-year-old Willow Palin was clocked doing 84 mph in a 65-mph zone. And I just want to say, “Hell, yeah. You go, girl!”

It’s obviously hereditary. Willow’s dad is a championship snow-machine racer, so she gets it honest. And I can totally relate, because my granddaddy ran some ‘shine down in Alabama back in the day. Ask anyone who has ever ridden with me: I was born with that hillbilly NASCAR go-fast gene.

Eighty-four miles an hour? That ain’t even what I call “fast.” I hit 84 mph between here and the corner store. During the famous NY-23 campaign in 2009, Republican consultant Ali Akbar took a few rides with me. Ask him what that was like.

But one thing Willow — 84 mph in an SUV?

Uh-uh. The center of gravity is too high, and it’s unstable in tight curves. To drive safely at high speed, what you want is something low to the ground, like maybe a brand-new Ford Mustang.

“Daddy, I need a new Mustang. Don’t you want me to be safe?”

Also, a radar detector. Call it an “investment.”

How Much Longer Until Levi Johnston’s Fifteen Minutes of Fame Expire?

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Gabriella Hoffman whacks that punk upside the head:

Levi Johnston recently unveiled the cover of his book, Deer in the Headlights: My Life in Sarah Palin’s Crosshairs, slated for release on September 27th, 2011. This tell-all tripe details how the opportunist was “exploited” by the Palin family. . . .
The narcissist impregnated Bristol Palin, later became a father to their child Tripp, and left her to raise the boy alone. After his failed relationship with Bristol Palin, Johnston went on an anti-Palin bashing spree, hung out with crass comedian Kathy Griffin, and shamelessly posed nude for PlayGirl magazine. Now, he is living off of his notorious “achievements”. Not exactly the venerable route for an American male. . . .

Notice that Levi’s victimhood pose is the entire selling point of his book. I guess the publishers rejected Dude, I Banged the Governor’s Daughter and Cashed in for Undeserved Notoriety as a title.

BTW, you should follow Gabriella on Twitter. She’s also got herself a blog, and describes herself thus:

She is one of the foremost conservative activists at UC-San Diego, having interned with Young America’s Foundation at the Reagan Ranch Center in Summer 2010. Additionally, she works on The Rick Amato Show in San Diego (KCBQ 1170AM) as the Executive Assistant and is the Director of College Outreach for Eagle Forum of San Diego.

She’s obviously destined for New Media stardom.

You’re Supposed to Be Shocked

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The Republican governor of Alaska has nominated a conservative for the panel that approves state judges. Democrats want you to scream in horror to learn that Don Haase thinks sex outside marriage should be against the law:

One blog post on the Eagle Forum Alaska site praised efforts at criminalizing adultery in Michigan, and [Democrat state Sen. Joe] Paskvan asked Haase if he thought it should be a felony in Alaska.
“I don’t see that that would rise to the level of a felony,” Haase said.
Paskvan: “Do you believe it should be a crime?”
Haase: “Yeah, I think it’s very harmful to have extramarital affairs. It’s harmful to children, it’s harmful to the spouse who entered a legally binding agreement to marry the person that’s cheating on them.”
Paskvan: “What about premarital affairs — should that be a crime?”
Haase: “I think that would be up to the voters certainly. If it came before (the state) as a vote, I probably would vote for it … I can see where it would be a matter for the state to be involved with because of the spread of disease and the likelihood that it would cause violence. I can see legitimate reasons to push that as a crime.”

This is really shocking, right? Except for the fact that, within living memory, most states criminalized non-marital sex:

Prior to the 1950s and ’60s, most states had a network of laws, well-rooted in the Anglo-American tradition, that had the cumulative effect of outlawing every manner of sex except between husband and wife.
Adultery, fornication, sodomy — one way or another, if you were messin’ around with anyone except your lawful spouse, you were outside the law. Frank Sinatra was once arrested on a charge of “seduction,” a New Jersey law that made it illegal for a man to use a false promise of marriage to entice a woman into sex.

Of course, people found many ways to circumvent those laws, which in general were only enforced when someone complained. (Sinatra beat the rap because the woman who accused him was a liar.) Our modern idea that all sex between consenting adults must be legal comes from two sources: (a) Alfred Kinsey, who in 1948 claimed that a majority of American men commited sex acts then regarded as crimes, and (b) the 1957 British “Wolfendon Report,” which recommended that “homosexual behaviour between consenting adults in private should no longer be a criminal offence.” (Emphasis added.)

Over time, laws were “reformed” to do away with the old common-law tradition that treated all non-marital sex as illegal. And among the consequences of that change is the great difficulty of prosecuting what we nowadays call “date rape.” In the old days, all that was necessary would be to prove that (a) they had sex and (b) they weren’t married, and the accused party would be guilty under one of the various laws. Whether that legal regime was altogether fair is one question, but it certainly avoided the “he-said”/”she-said” disputes over “consent” that surround so many date-rape cases.

Don Haase’s arguments for returning to the old common-law tradition will, no doubt, cause head-exploding reactions among liberals (and also for many conservatives unfamiliar with the legal history of the “consenting adults” standard), but it is not really so bizarre as it seems.

Lawrence v. Texas — now that’s what I call truly bizarre.

What Did Alaskans Vote For?

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Apparently, Lisa Murkowski considers her write-in re-election a mandate for the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”

Really?

Maybe I missed something. Was that even an issue during the campaign? And what other mandates will Murkowski now claim from the Alaska electorate?

The fact that Joe Lieberman says he’s now got 60 votes for repealing DADT suggests this may be the first of the many surprises we can espect from Senator Murkowski over the next six years.