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Post by murdock on Feb 15, 2008 17:10:23 GMT -5
My husband's cousin was 28 when she was murdered by an ex-boyfriend turned stalker. She was a recently divorced mother of two working as medical asssistant for a Dr. in Sherman Oaks. While working for the Dr., she met his son, who was the about the same age as she was. The son pursued her, but she wouldn't date him until she switched jobs about a year later. She dated him for a couple of months. She became concerned with his explosive temper and told friends and relatives that she felt he hated her children. She broke up with him. For the next year there were the obnoxious phone calls and driving by her home and then the stalking (waiting in his car for her to return home from work, waiting outside her job, etc.) She obtained a restraining order. For six months there was no sign of this guy. She had began dating someone else and was planning on getting married. Last April, he showed up at her house in full black camis and full black mask and hat, parked his car, wrote a suicide note, kicked her back door in and shot at her and her children with an assault rifle. She ran through the house screaming for her childrens lives. She was able to hide them under a bed before he kicked the bedroom door down and killed her and then himself. She was one of the most beautiful human beings I have ever know, both physically and spiritually. Her death was a huge loss for my husband, who is still unable to pick up the pieces. I try to talk about her often, so that he remembers the wonderful things about her even though I don't think you ever fully recover from something like this. My husband is still horrified by how scared she must have been with this monster in all black, face fully covered, comming in her home to kill her.
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Post by Saucy on Feb 15, 2008 17:16:07 GMT -5
this tragedy still gives me goosebumps. he killd her children too?
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Post by murdock on Feb 15, 2008 17:20:29 GMT -5
no, the kids were under the bed praying and screaming for their deceased uncle (her older brother who died of life time health complications a couple of months before) to come down and save them. They kept screaming "save us uncle, save us!" The sadest thing is the kids remained in the house for 3 hours, the police got a call of gunshots and went door to door until they got to her house.
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Post by Saucy on Feb 15, 2008 17:23:59 GMT -5
dam. is there any way her family could sue his family for wrongful death?
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Post by murdock on Feb 15, 2008 17:29:45 GMT -5
you know, I thought about writing a letter to the Dr. after her funeral asking him to put money away for the kid's college funds, but I didn't want to pry.... honestly, I don't think her mother or x-husband (she started dating him when she was 14) could make it through a trial. There isn't any liability either, he was 28 or 29... not a minor, can't go after the parents.
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Post by sheyd on Feb 15, 2008 17:29:46 GMT -5
OMG - that is totally my worst nightmare - except my fear is that I couldn't save my kids. I think I will be haunted by that story for a long time. That woman is my hero.
How are the children? Did they have someone to take care of them? At least she saved them! What a horrible tragedy! I am so sorry for your family's loss!
Shey
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Post by murdock on Feb 15, 2008 17:34:50 GMT -5
OMG - that is totally my worst nightmare - except my fear is that I couldn't save my kids. I think I will be haunted by that story for a long time. That woman is my hero. How are the children? Did they have someone to take care of them? At least she saved them! What a horrible tragedy! I am so sorry for your family's loss! Shey Thanks. The kids live with their father now, who had been remarried for sometime before this happened. My husband said that at her funeral the step-mom was holding the 4 year old the entire time, which I think is a really good sign. They don't have any kids other than his two sons. My husband has tried to get into contact with the dad a couple of times since this happened, but he is a musician and is frequently on tour. His family is all estranged. It is hard. My husband and his cousin were extremely close when they were kids. I was friends with his cousin and her x-husband since I was 19. My husband was friends with her x-husband since they were 13. I have wonderful memories of her. We partied together, spent our 21st b-day together. We hadn't seen her in a couple of years, but we were crushed when we found out. It is one of those things that you will carry with you your entire life.
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Post by sheyd on Feb 15, 2008 17:39:56 GMT -5
It is good to know that their daddy and their step-mom did take them in and seemed to love them... I just can't imagine how children survive through all that and come out healthy -but they probably will... She is undoubtedly watching over them, just as her brother seemed to.
Before my mother-in-law died of cancer, she told me she imagined heaven to be like in that cartoon, Family Circus. She said she will be watching over us and protecting us like the grandma and grandpa in that cartoon. I liked that. That is something that comforts. I am picturing their mom watching over them in the same way...
(Hey, if it helps me sleep tonight...)
Shey
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Post by murdock on Feb 15, 2008 17:46:20 GMT -5
You know, it's funny that you brought that up because shortly after her death I was with one of my girls drinking wine on her front porch and talking about this situation. I was crying and remembering and we were hugging and crying. All of a sudden this beautiful calico(sp?) kitten walks up and my friend starts talking about how wonderful this cat is. She was friendly and jumped on my lap and she kept purring. She was really just a beautiful sweetie (just like my hubby's cousin). We started thinking and we realized that this cat was born around the time that she had passed. I just felt her spirit at that moment and it made me realize that life doesn't end, it just changes form.
I honestly feel her around me occasionally.
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Post by Saucy on Feb 15, 2008 17:54:11 GMT -5
when my time has come, i want to be a beautiful bunny baby!
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Post by sheyd on Feb 15, 2008 23:46:43 GMT -5
I want to be a pampered house cat... Loved, petted, and lazy!
Shey
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Post by JimB on Feb 16, 2008 0:47:11 GMT -5
This thing occurred about 40 miles from where I live, and about 20 miles from where I went to high school. I've spent a fair amount of time over the years on the NIU campus.
What I don't get is where people get the idea that a place like a college campus is "safe"? There is no such thing as "safe". "Safe" exists only in fairy tales. There's an element of risk involved in going out in public, and one of those risks is you'll encounter a nutball and you'll find your time has come.
About a week and a half ago we had 5 people die in a mass shooting at a Lane Bryant store in the south suburbs. Do I feel bad for these people? Yes, terrible. But <shrug> their time had come.
I'm very much of two minds about gun control. It's a shady business, just like drugs, alcohol, tobacco, or any other industry demonstrably harmful to human well-being. But as with drugs, more legislation creates more criminals, and a bigger black market. Nutballs who go on shooting sprees are still going to be able to get guns - it'll just cost them more in time and effort. I think the existing legislation needs to be tightened up a bit, particularly in the areas of handguns and automatic weapons. And I don't believe guns are a constitutional right. But you can't create "safe" from more gun legislation any more than you could create it from increased airport security, or lower speed limits, or cotton candy and ponies. It's a mean world, and it's the only one we've got, so we better get used to it.
Aside from all that, the number of people we lose in events like these is statistically insignificant. When you consider how many people live in this country and live out their entire lives without ever being affected by an event like this, it's pretty awe-inspiring. No place is perfect, but we do pretty damn well overall. People get all stirred up about this, but we don't give a rat's ass about the thousands of people who die every day from heart disease. Fricken media.
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Post by lumpy on Feb 16, 2008 1:40:13 GMT -5
But you can't create "safe" from more gun legislation any more than you could create it from increased airport security, or lower speed limits, or cotton candy and ponies. That doesn't sparkle with Princess Pinkie Pie.
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Post by goods on Feb 16, 2008 10:38:35 GMT -5
very sorry to hear that Murdock
Sheyd said:
Shey there is NOTHING stopping idiots from carrying guns right now... the gun laws only stop the non-idiots.
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Post by fluffypants on Feb 17, 2008 14:05:03 GMT -5
The students WERE hiding under desks, scrambling for doors, screaming, falling over each other - not exactly prime aim and fire surroundings! I don't care if they WERE a "better shooter" - they would have to be PERFECT - because unlike the one who was shooting basically randomly, someone trying to stop someone has to hit THEM and ONLY THEM. Ask the trained gunmen on this board how confident they would be about hitting a shooter in that chaos! Shooters like the one in Illinois, or any attackers like that, have the element of surprise. They are READY, and completely willing. No one else there is prepared. Honestly, I would not feel safer with two people with guns out in that chaos than with one. If you were shot by a "friendly fire" it would hurt just as bad! Not to mention all the time there ISN'T some crazed shooter in your classroom. I don't want some idiot carrying a loaded gun! That is where those "crimes of passion" come from! Including suicides. I think carrying a gun to a "safe place" - even if sometimes it isn't - is more dangerous than just taking your chances if something bad did happen. 99.9999999 etc. % of the time nothing does happen. If a bunch of exhausted, hung-over, heartbroken, stressed and depressed college students started carrying guns, I think the incidents are likely to go UP, not down. That is from someone who IS one of those students. School is tough enough at times, we don't need to have everyone carrying loaded guns to play with when they are at some of their worst moments! The argument in my class last night was bad enough - no way did I need to worry about loaded guns! (Or should I already be worried, geez, thanks!) Shey It is a bad situation all around with no good answers, but what you are not mentioning here is the importance of limited casualties during a shooting spree, if a law abiding person in the hall or a professor is carrying a weapon. Instead of 30 people getting blasted at VT and 6 getting killed at NIU (with many more getting sprayed with shotgun pellets) the damage that would ensue would be much less. It may not be the end all answer, but it would/could prevent a higher amount of casualties than if the only person with a firearm is the shooter. For the record, even in chaos and with a relative element of surprise--if you know your firearm well enough and are trained, it gets to the point where it is nearly an extension of your hand. It isn't that hard to pick off one solo nut on top of a stage, as it was in the NIU incident. And in the VT situation, there was plenty of warning and a limited element of surprise since it took that nut some time to go into the various rooms of the hall. A gun carrying professor or student would have had a chance to minimize the damage done from that madman. Keep in mind, you'd also be creating a major distraction for the shooter as well.
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