Huguely's violence: UVA victim wants emphasis off alcohol
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A year after the vigil for Yeardley Love, UVA unleashed a new wave of sexual assault policy reforms.tom daly -
Liz Seccuro attempted to convince UVA officials that she'd been raped back in 1984.File photo by Hawes Spencer
Although the 26-year sentence recommended for convicted murderer George Huguely may be winning acclaim, other aspects of the recent trial have dismayed a high-profile victim of violence at UVA, and she's speaking out about it.
In Commonwealth v. Beebe, Liz Seccuro pressed charges after one of the men who allegedly raped her in a fraternity house contacted her 21 years later to apologize. Six years ago, that case was decided in the same courthouse with the same prosecutors as Commonwealth v. Huguely, as well as the same defense team and even the same judge. But to Seccuro, there was yet another similarity, this one deeply troubling: an effort to transfer blame from a man to his alcohol.
"It's interesting that those very attorneys who defended both William Beebe and George Huguely used alcohol as the reason why their clients should be treated with mercy," says Seccuro, noting that in both cases alcohol wasn't employed merely to defend but to also go on the attack.
"Did I drink the night I was assaulted?" says Seccuro. "Yes. Did Yeardley Love drink the night she was murdered? Yes. I fail to see how that somehow would have exonerated a rapist and now, a murderer."
Seccuro recalls that Huguely's lead defense attorney Fran Lawrence, who had attempted to claim that a toxic brew of alcohol-plus-Adderall actually killed Love, closed his case by describing the 14th Street area near the crime scene as an alcohol-soaked "student ghetto." And in the jury plea for a light sentence, co-counsel Rhonda Quagliana noted that "George's drinking was out of control."
Published interviews indicate that even after Huguely jurors settled on a second-degree conviction, it was talk of overcoming alcohol that swung deliberations over the length of the term.
"I am surprised that the defense and jury focused so very much on alcohol issues and not on the underlying rage and violent bent towards women that served as the spark," says Seccuro. "Alcohol was only the gasoline."
Seccuro acknowledges that Huguely has an alcohol problem but contends that the judicial system– and particularly UVA– have allowed a bigger problem, violence, to go unchecked.
It was the fall of 1984 that Seccuro, then a first-year student, was attacked in what prosecutors later described as a gang rape. In 2006, the only publicly admitted transgressor, William Beebe, received a two-year sentence when pleading guilty to aggravated sexual battery.
"Violence against women at the University of Virginia has long been a look-the-other-way issue," says Seccuro, who, in the book she wrote about her own ordeal, alleges that she was dissuaded from obtaining a medical exam and from filing criminal charges.
She has said that after getting contacted by Beebe and reading about the efforts of other UVA women– particularly Annie Hylton McLaughlin and Kathryn Russell– she made another attempt to find justice.
However, she says she's discouraged to learn of Huguely's prior bouts of violence: fighting a Lexington police officer, allegedly attacking a sleeping teammate, and allegedly attacking Yeardley Love with his hands two months before her death.
"The trial brought up so many feelings for me," says Seccuro, who supports the verdict and sentence. "In the end, though, nothing will bring Yeardley Love back to her family. Mr. Huguely will be released from prison while young enough to pursue a life of promise, should he choose to. Will the University culture change at all now that the cameras are gone? Time will tell."
From her home in Alexandria, Seccuro followed the Huguely trial via dispatches on Twitter and says that what she read of his police interrogation video stunned her and should have let the jury realize they were hearing from a domestic abuser: "I just went over to talk to her." "I kicked in the door." "I didn't touch her." "She banged her head against the wall." "I may have touched her neck." "She was standing when I left." "I threw her on the bed and left."
"They could see the lies he told," says Seccuro.
There's no evidence that Love– allegedly placed in a choke-hold by her eventual killer two months earlier– ever approached authorities to complain about Huguely. But in the wake of the May 3, 2010 killing, the General Assembly passed legislation making it easier for unmarried people to get restraining orders against alleged aggressors. The move unleashed a torrent of such protective orders– a 15-fold leap after the law took effect– according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
"This is not a case about pretty people, lacrosse, privilege or alcohol," says Seccuro. "It's not a case about the University of Virginia 'ghetto' that Fran Lawrence so awkwardly stated. This was a case about domestic violence, plain and simple."
225 comments
sounds to me the entire fraternity / sorority system is to blame
Alcohol is a huge issue that needs to be addressed especially concerning fraternity/sororities. We're focusing on men becoming violent when drunk, but women become violent when drunk as well. And when women drink alot, they are not as careful about setting themselves up for something bad to happen. These things did not happen without the alcohol component and altho these men are guilty, this subject needs to be addressed. Also why did Jean Harris, headmistress of Madeira who took a gun and went and shot her lover, get only 15 years and serve 11. I don't know if alcohol was involved, but it's an interesting comparison.
I guess alcohol is a huge issue but I understand Seccuro's point.
Well over 99% of college drinkers, probably closer to 99.9%, never rape or murder anyone. Huguely is a monster first and foremost. Maybe in some alternative universe without alcohol, he wouldn't be, but that's not our our world, and it's not going to be our world. When someone is said to be a "great guy when he's not drinking", it's basically the same as saying he's a "great guy if he lived in Saudi Arabia instead of the U.S." If the only thing that stops a regular person from becoming a killer is a cheap, legal, widely available substance that is fun to ingest, might as well just call him a killer.
You can't be serious. Almost every woman I know had some sort of gang or attenpted sexual assault happen to them when alcohol involved, but it was never reported. Noone knows what happend that night, except George and he probably was in a blackout. We do know they had a physical altercation, which ended in tragedy, which the jury decided George did not premeditate and in video had no idea she had died. They had dinner together and were holding hands the night before. Alcohol at colleges has caused a tremendous amount of assault, physical and sexual that have come close to this, not including automobile and accidental deaths at colleges from alcohol. Check out article In Balt. Sun. Youth and Alcohol, a fatal combination and other articles regarding this case and alcohol. Easy to say George was a monster, but the jury did not find that to be true.
So all those rapists are "nice guys when they're not drinking"? Again, I think that distinction is meaningless in a country where alcohol is legal and cheap. It's like saying, "well, there wouldn't be rapes if we didn't let women and men socialize at night". Alcohol is reality, it's not going anywhere. Good men respect women even when they've been drinking all day. The problem is with the men committing the crimes.
And if men just can't help but rape and murder in a free society where you're allowed to drink alcohol, just like if men just can't help but rape and murder in a free society where they're allowed to socialize with women at night, then these are men that need to be a part of the criminal justice system as soon as possible - i.e, harsher penalties and longer jail terms for violence, and alcohol related crimes. Which of course, also requires more reporting of crimes, ideally.
The defense focused on alcohol because a person has to have the capacity to form the intent to commit those crimes. Alcohol can affect a person's capacity to form that intent. Also, it's naive to treat this as violence against women only. Seccuro talked about Huguely's attack on a teammate as well. So he apparently didn't single out women, and she knows that. The Hook should correct these mistakes in its story.
Reinhold-
Agreed, but at sentencing, the defense will also surely argue that the alcohol is a mitigating factor. When it should really be an aggravating factor. "Your honor, Mr. Huguely wouldn't hurt a fly unless he drinks any of this cheap, widely available substance that he has a terrible addiction to....sure if he does drink any, he becomes incredibly dangerous and violent, but let's focus on the positive."
Also, in articles by jury, they were considering either second degree or manslaughter. They decided on second degree, because in Huguely's letter he admitted to doing things he couldn't believe or remember when drinking, like the choking incident, so they knew he could go there when drunk. Alcohol was ruining his life, as he said. So they did not let him off for drinking too much, just the premeditation. It's just something that should be talked about on college campuses, and yes, should be addressed before something like this happens again. Still don't understand why Jean Harris and Betty Broderick, both only got 15years when they took a gun and shot their exlovers. And those do seem premeditated, but they were women, so received a lesser charge.
mT45--
They brought up alcohol at sentencing because it shows recklessness--i.e.., manslaughter--instead of malice. The jury got it wrong. That case was the definition of manslaughter.
mt45 - I actually agree that it should have been manslaughter, especially regarding other cases that received manslaughter. I was just repeating what jury said in articles and how they came to conclusion. It is pretty complicated, but most people I know who followed the case thought manslaughter as well. Really tough case on all levels.
My 'ol Granny used to tell me that "A drunk man does (says) what a sober man thinks".
Perhaps the severity of the crime should be increased when alcohol is involved, like it is with guns.
I agree, the jury got it all wrong, he should have gotten manslaughter! Wouldn't it be great if we could do a petition to get another trial? Maybe Hogshire will do the right thing and drop his sentence down. I am praying for that!
It all starts at home..............corny, I don't think so.
Perhaps mandatory military conscription would work toward solving the issue......the military teaches respect, if your family did not.
Anyone wishing to support George Huguely.....check it out
www.facebook.com/SupportGeorgeHuguely
Elizabeth, yes I was thinking maybe the sentence will be lessened at sentencing so as to avoid appeal, which he would probably get. I really don't get the extremely long sentence. And hopefully, he will get alcohol rehab in jail, so will be ready to come out. People really have to stop blaming his family. There's no basis.
@Elizabeth...Support GH? Have you been paying attention?
@Ann, if you don't get the long sentance...then who, or what do you blame?
Only in a "worldly, nuanced" town like Chvilee could a case be made for someone who...
a) rapes a woman while he is blindly drunk, or
b) kills a woman while he is deleriously drunk
...to somehow exonerate or minimize his actions under the guise of a little too much ETOH.
As the dad of a 7-year old girl, I feel so much safer that the culture finds some rationale in a male raping or killing a woman merely because one or BOTH of them had too much to drink.
I will surely remember that the next time I imbibe in a bit too much Crown Royal (or Chivas Regal....that was the drink of choice for Ted Kennedy, wasn't it??). I love my wife, but it seems I also have an out.
R.I.P.: Joe Strummer
That sentence is a first degree sentence in many states. And there's no probation in VA. Again, according to other manslaughter cases, this seems comparable. He did not go over there with a weapon, and he was reckless because drunk. He was trying to hook up with other girls. Sounded like a fight escalated with two drunk people. He's still getting blame with manslaughter. Still think alcohol needs to be addressed more at college.
Cosmo: "sounds to me the entire fraternity / sorority system is to blame"
Ann: "especially concerning fraternity/sororities"
George V wasn't a member of fraternity, right? And Ms. Seccuro's knowledge of student UVa life is remote by 25 or so years, right?
There is a giant non-sequitur here.
To all you supporting manslaughter...so I can go get drunk (a drug in which I have CHOSEN to use freely and abundantly)....and bust down a door, get into an altercation with someone I supposedly love, kill them and get off with manslaughter???? Smacked on the hand with five or ten years and go on with my life??? Sorry, but I so disagree with you completely. It's like saying the deceased person's life was only worth 5 or 10 years and that is just plain wrong. Please don't cite law in this, I disagree with it too. If you choose to use a drug and then end up killing someone because you were "limited in capacity" then too bad, you need to be held accountable. You CHOSE to be limited in capacity by using the drug to begin with.
Walt: I think as soon as the story broke, the fraternity he "supposedly" was an "alleged" member of completely "washed" him from their role. But that was just speculation in an article I read sometime back. Take that with a grain of salt.
As far as the fraternity/soroity system to be at blame, no one but GEORGE is to blame. He chose to do the drug alcohol.
Not condoning anything. But why is there never credit given for "contacted her 21 years later to apologize." It wasn't discovered, it was confessed out of the blue. This was an extraordinary act of moral courage by William Beebe, apart from the gang mentality crime that was committed by the same man. There are plenty of other frat boys out there who hopped on the train that have gone on to regular lives and silence about their misdeeds.
Ann - "People really have to stop blaming his family." You are correct on this one, no one is to blame but George.
There's always been more of an emphasis in fraternities for heavy drinking that hasn't let up in past 40 years. Seccuro's case dealt with fraternity boys, but sports teams have similar mentalities. Two boys at Duke in last year and half have died after partying with their fraternities, one falling down stairs after night with brothers and other in car accident while driving drunk with frat brother early one morning. Maybe it's just a coincidence the two were in frats tho.
"There's no evidence that Love– allegedly placed in a choke-hold by her eventual killer two months earlier– ever approached authorities to complain about Huguely. But in the wake of the May 3, 2010 killing, the General Assembly passed legislation making it easier for unmarried people to get restraining orders against alleged aggressors." - not that it would have mattered anyway, until Yeardley died, legislation wasn't in place for her to get a restraining order. REaction vs. PROaction.
Two cows, you are so right.
sorry, those cows.
And UVA student Andrew Alston, who stabbed a local fireman Sisk 20 times in drunk fight got 3 years for manslaughter. Served 2 1/2 Just saying.
those cows, saying you're sorry for something you did 21 years ago is NOT an "extraordinary act of moral courage" but rather a NORMAL action of attempted repentance. The fact that the rest of these rapists did not confess does not somehow make Mr. Beebe's actions "courageous".
It's not a matter of no good deed going unpunished, as gang rape is not a good deed.
Please stop condoning gang rape.
William Beebe was creapy. I worked with him long ago and always felt some sort of sixth sense about him - it was he wasn't "right". That was just my gut impression and always go with your gut.
I agree with Liz Seccuro and this statement, "Alcohol was only the gasoline."
There are many that drink, sometimes even "out of control" do they all murder and rape? Why should that be an excuse to do so? There has to be some sort of behavior and character issue there prior to the drinking.
As for you all out there wanting a lighter sentence, you all are nuts! May some man rape and murder you and get only 5-10 years max.
a bit ago (I guess about 10-15 yrs.) Tom Wolfe's book, "I am Charlotte Simmons" hit the bookstores. It is about college, young people, drinking, and making mistakes. It was well-written, entertaining, and informative. One of the male characters (the bad guy) was a big drinker and frat boy. However, his underlying personality was that of a narcissist and a...hole. Drinking didn't make him an a...hole, just a bigger and more dangerous one. Tom's book didn't get much critical acclaim. However, I think it should be required reading for college freshman. I gave it to my daughter when she went away to college a few months ago - I saw she left it on a bookshelf at home. For anybody who has gone to college, you will recognize the characters in Tom's book. There is also a lot about college basketball, including a lot of stuff even the hooples don't know.
I'm guessing that the Messrs. Huguely and Beebe's of this world have bigger psychological problems than just drinking. Heavy drinking will bring out the worst in them, however, the worst was always there. I believe that there are more so called, "borderline personality disorders" on America's campuses than we know or want to know about.
I am truly sorry for Ms. Securo's plight. She must have suffered mightily these many years. I will say too that Mr. Beebe must have suffered in a twisted way. I guess he may have been looking for forgiveness. I don't know that he received it but at least he received some punishment. He may have been looking for that too.
I wish Ms. Securro good luck and peace in her future.
@Meanwhile Do read please. I don't need to "stop condoning gang rape," never having started to do so. And to come back and fess up after that much time, and no imminent threat of being caught, is courageous. Whether the person is or was a creep.
Come on Meanwhile you know you've got some parking tickets back in Newport that are waiting for you.
@SkipD "Perhaps mandatory military conscription would work toward solving the issue......the military teaches respect, if your family did not."
Absolutely not true. I spent most of my youth living near US military bases. Every base has a strip of porn shops and bars right outside the gates and young drunk GIs are just as much of a problem as drunk students if not more so.
Then there is the whole burning Korans and urinating on dead enemies thing. If my choice was between living among college students or the men and women assigned to Abu Ghraib, I'd pick even Liberty students above the soldiers.
@Ann - travesty of justice in Alston's case, so Hugeley should get the same travesty? Interesting...would love to hear more of your theory on that.
Regarding the alcohol issue...does anyone else believe raising the drinking age to 21 from 18 on beer contributes to the problem?
I was a student in the 1980-1986 era, and the minimum age on beer consumption rose from 18 to 21. As a result, the first time many students experienced alcohol and its effects were when they were living outside any parental supervision or control. I believe that some of the problems arise when a student has never been intoxicated and has never experienced first hand the effects of consuming alcohol. Add to this the peer pressure that exists within the Greek system and other significant social groups in the colleges to consume alcohol, and you have the makings of the tragedies that have befallen many young people away from home for the first time.
I do not believe it is purely a college issue. I have read reports of similar incidents involving young service men and women. The persistent theme is alcohol, sexual activity, and violence.
The problem is determining how to address the problem. Does the college advise parents to teach the child how drinking affects the child personally? Do we impose greater sanctions for underage drinking on campuses? The latter solution would seem nearly impossible to me, unless we want to raise the prospect of police raids on every college campus every weekend.
I have not read any studies about how raising the drinking age to 21 has diminished drinking in high school. Maybe it has, but I remember having access to just about anything I wanted in high school. At least on the occasions when a 16, 17, or 18 year old drank to excess, there was (hopefully) a parent or responsible adult to deal with the consequences.
I am not sre the "Chalk Talk" or whatever mandatory alcohol awareness class is helpful. Too many kids have already begun dringing, and the sarcastic remarks made during one of those films likely distracts form the message.
As for this most recent tragedy, I think alcohol was simply additional fuel for domestic violence. So long as we have jurors who ignore the concept that voluntary intoxication is not an excuse for a crime, we will have juries get hunp up on the role alcohol played in the crime.
The reason the University Sexual Assault boards fail is because, at the mere mention that alcohol was ingested, the campus cops and administration label an assault a 'communication" issue rather than a crime. Alcohol is the excuse UVA uses to rationalize/minimize deviant behavior and deny a victim justice. If Huguely had raped Love instead of killed her I doubt that he would have been arrested.
Here's a thought-provoking (and well-argued) essay on the Huguely verdict by a UVa law student that was published in the UVa Law Weekly. I know the writer (I'm her landlady), and after the essay was published she realized that Huguely had not, in fact, been previously arrested for domestic violence.
http://www.lawweekly.org/?module=displaystory&story_id=3655&edition_id=2...
Alcohol is no defense for anything!!
Yes, I read that essay yesterday, and it is very good. I was wondering what she was talking about--domestic violence.
backwoods - thank you for your calm comment...guess I am still too passionate about it to remain completely rational.
Great essay by Laura Tate, thanks for bringing it over. She'll make a great, compassionate lawyer and I hope we'll hear more from her in the future.
Susan Russell- agree with you completely, but I think our society as a whole looks at alcoholo as an "excuse" and reacts accordingly. When our society holds individuals responsible for their actions regardless of their choice of using alcohol, things at the University will not change.
I think Alston did get too lean a sentece since he stabbed someone 20 times. Just think Huguely got too stiff a sentence, since he didn't intend to kill her. That's what law is, a comparison of cases.
I have been the victim of domestic violence with my husband. We are post graduate educated professionals. He is a recovering alcoholic, and as his alcoholism progressed, so did his increased inability to control his behavior when very drunk. He often had no recall of what had happened the next day, and his violent outbursts left him baffled and deeply depressed in the days following an abusive episode. Yet, as an alcoholic whose brain had been physiologically altered through years of drinking, he was unable to stop drinking so the cycle continued and worsened with time until he did eventually get medical help.
When sober, my husband is a laid back, mild mannered, quiet guy who works hard to support our family. He is not aggressive, angry, or abusive at all ever. He's very very loving and kind to me and is good decent man. There is absolutely no simmering angry sociopath lurking beneath the surface of his sober self. It's just not there.
Yet, at this stage in his alcoholism, after 5-6 drinks, there is a marked change in his personality. He will start becoming increasingly euphoric and arrogant. After 8-10 drinks, he then can become more and more verbally aggressive and delusional. He will think that people are intentionally trying to sabotage him or are out to get him. After many hours of drinking, his eyes become inhuman, beady, and glazed. My husband has now mentally checked out, and has been replaced by the wonderful Mr. Hyde. Mr. Hyde is an utter jackass, and will try to provoke by throwing hateful daggers. In the past, I have become so angry and full of rage towards him that it has escalated to physical abuse on several occasions. This is always how the hitting, choking, or kicking
would go down.
Eventually, thank god, we had a formal intervention for him and he admitted he had his alcoholism and need for outside help. We got him some psychiatric help, and so far so good. Thank god. Our family is very fortunate so far that he is able to maintain sobriety (fingers crossed!)
I don't know why my normally gentle, loving, and decent husband becomes so twisted and aggressive when very drunk. It just affects his brain in this way. I liken it to how when I had post partum depression, and started taking Zoloft. I felt much much worse, and I had to stop. My friend took it, and it was a life saver for her. Drugs affect people in different ways, and alcohol makes my husband very delusional and aggressive at times. When sober, he has zero aggression issues ever.
For awhile, before he got medical help, it was terrible because his sober self rationally knew he had a big problem, but he still couldn't stop drinking because of his addiction. So round and round we went on the insane merry go round cycle of alcoholism.
There are meetings everyday in every town multiple times a day for people and their families suffering from this terrible affliction. We all know people with it. I know of many. I wonder why with almost 40% of all violent crimes reportedly involving alcohol there isn't more education and prevention concerning it's potential terrible risks? I wonder why Marijuana use and accessibility is so tightly regulated? Are there a significant number of pot smokers locked up for committing violent crimes while high? I wonder why alcohol flows so freely in our society and remains accessible to those who should have no access to it? The government certainly safeguards it's citizens against the perceived dangers of pot. Why not limit access to alcohol for risk prone drinkers since its destructive individual and societal effects are well established?
Excellent article by Laura Tate....A must read.
Warehol, you hit the name on the head.
Lets see, if I decide to take someone out, all I have to do is get drunk before I kill them and then I Only get convicted of manslaughter. Ridiculous!
The jury failed miserably in the Alston case, but the jury in the Huguely case more or less got it right. Though a longer sentence would have been more appropriate.
I have heard Liz Securro speak here twice, and I read her book. I have nothing but immense respect for her. Its too bad the other slimebags that participated in her rape were not also brought to justice.
Alcohol? If you can't handle it, don't use it. On the other hand, when I was at UVa in the mid to late 60s there may well have been more drinking. But no student murdered anyone- but doubtless there rapes in the fraternities. But then , there was no women's movement, no sexual assault awareness movement. We owe an immense debt to those who brought about these changes.
George Huguely did not recieve a fair trial because access to medical records by the defense were denied, eliminating practically any opportunity by the defense to challenge the prosecution's alleged cause of death. Enter: Adderall, killer of 20 people in Canada before the year 2005 when it was banned. You do the math on how many people have died in America since Adderall was put on the market. Canada has far less people and even by 2005 Adderall had killed twenty Canadians deader than a hammer. If George Huguely had killed as many people as Adderall has killed he would be the most notorious serial killer in all history of mankind. Not only was Adderall in Yeardley Love's room the night she died, it was in her body. George Huguely says Yeardley Love was alive when he left the night she died. There was a serial killer named Adderall, which has easily killed thousands of people, left with Yeardley Love after George Huguely left. That's called reasonable doubt. Blocking access to medical records in such circumstances is called judicial misconduct. Big Pharma is a corrupt megacorporation and if you don't think they control the coroners and hospitals to protect their products marketability I have some oceanfront property in Arizona for real cheap. If you think that if Yeardley Love had died from an Adderall induced heart attack like so many others have that Big Pharma's damage control team, the coroner, UVA, the police, and particularly the Commomwealth Attorney wouldn't be bending over backwards to make sure that information didn't come out in court, sending George Huguely to the Florida Keys and Adderall's manufacturers to jail instead (or at least helping to get their billion dollar product banned), I've got some great mountain view property in Iowa for real cheap. On a side note, if a drunk man who is bigger than you comes up to you looking for trouble, you brandish a knife, he doesn't back down but instead threatens to dislodge it from you and stab you to death (that's just what I read in this magazine I believe it was) , you have every legal and moral right to stab that person to death with decisiveness, and if you have any self-preservation instincts in that situation you're not gonna want to do a half-assed job of it. Andrew Alston should have walked, that's even more clear cut than the Huguely case.
John- Really? Adderall has not been proven to create self-induce head bashing..........he got 2nd degree- he is fortunate, because the medical records did not show a thing, or the defense would have brought it up in the sentencing phase.
How are they gonna bring up something they don't have? Sound's like you've been bashing your head against a wall. Perhaps your wall will actually leave some sort of evidence it had been bashed against...
You are beating a dead head.....he was convicted of murder 2 because the evidence was overwhelming and convincing, The defense didn't put boy george on the stand, so he wouldn't incriminate himself.
Adderall was not convicted of anything...............not even charged.
Do you have the evidence that Adderall should be charged? If so, perhaps the DA would like to see it and interview Adderall.
deleted
Twenty dead in Canada. And that's without a cover up.
Attacking the person and not the argument is a fools errand for sure. But I stand guilty as well, for you are indeed a fool, meanwhile.
Meanwhile, it's obvious to anyone who is not a fool that what I meant was "you do the math on how many people have died FROM ADDERALL INDUCED HEART ATTACKS in America since it was put on the market, not the sum of all deaths by all causes, which is what you allege I say while calling me an imbecile. Stop beating your head against a brick wall.
two automobile drivers approached a one lane bridge from opposite ends. Both drivers stopped before crossing the bridge. One driver yelled to the other, "I don't move for idiots." The other driver said, "well I do," and he moved his car out of the way.
Ha ha! Meanwhile can't respond to me because doing so would prove, according to his/her philosophy, that he/she is a fool!
two automobile drivers approached a one land bridge from opposite ends. Both drivers stopped before crossing the bridge. One driver yelled to the other, "I don't move for idiots". That driver was in a hybrid electric car, thinking he was saving the earth. The other driver, who was in a street legal monster truck (which is why the hybrid driver insinuated he was an idiot, said "neither do I", backed up off the road, drove down to the river's edge, and forded across past the idiot in his hybrid, yelling "see you later, idiot" as he frightened the hybrid driver with the noise of his engine.
ann - "since he didn't intend to kill her" - this is speculation by a jury with a video tape of an interegation. The only one that can actually tell us this as a fact is George and it would not be beneficial for him to say anything different. However, to kick someone's door down just to "talk" is a stretch at best. As far as his sentence being too stiff, I would agree with this only because the tax payers are going to have to support him during this time. Just ask Eric Abshire, if he ever admits his guilt, he never meant to kill his wife either, he got Murder 1 and LIFE.
I read the essay by Laura Tate and was intrigued by only one thing...just another person using alcohol as an excuse for someone being "limited in capacity" for reason due to "drug" use. Alcohol is a drug that is taken willlingly by choice, therefore, I believe alcoholism is a disease that the person risks acquiring willingly and knowingly. There is too much information out there about alcoholism for someone not to notice.
gg - I am so glad your husband received help and is recovering. It sounds like you have stayed by him during the hardest parts of his life. Admiration is glowing for you and him on this end. However, to use alcohol as an excuse for his 'bad' behavior is only enabling...something the partner of an alcoholic will fall into very quickly. Stay strong and again, I am glad he received help.
John Walton Giuliano - cause of death was blunt force trauma, not heart attack.
We've been hearing alcohol killed Yeardley, not George. Now we're getting Adderall killed this poor beautiful vibrant woman, not George. It's getting old folks. The world is missing the loss of Yeardley and all her potential, all the things she would have been able to contribute to us and this world.
George made conscious choices all the way from Lexington to assaulting a guy in his frat house, to choking Yeardley and having had someone intervene to save her. He admitted it was the drinking and yet did nothing to remedy his escalating violence. The morning of his police interview, there was lie after lie after lie, and he had NOT been drinking at that time. He left a bleeding helpless woman after doing God knows what to her, after pushing her on the bed callously, without a thought in the world of getting help for her. He was aware enough to steal her laptop with the fore thought of erasing implicating emails. He came back to his apartment and was sober enough to consciously LIE to them about where he'd been, and was behaving strangely. A drunk would not need to behave strangely, they'd be so out of it, etc...He knew enough to toss her laptop to not have evidence, etc...
He broke down finally in the interview about Yeardley's death b/c I suspect Georgie had a flash of his future as a murderer and was prematurely grieving over all he was gonna lose in the slammer. The raw sheer shock of having to take responsibility for his actions for maybe the first time may have elicted his cries and tears. Maybe a few shed for Yeardley, but when did he ever really think protectively about her? From what I see and what was presented, never. He was calling up new chicks on his way over to her place that night.
Guys born with silver spoons in their mouths typically aren't use to having to ante up for their own bad behaviors, the trust monies or Daddy's money, usually shields these minor unpleasant details from their comfort zones and gets them out of these annoying trivial fiascos. Yeah, I bet Georgie had a massive flash of reality that morning hearing Yeardley was dead and he'd not had the protective shield of a lawyer there with him to have kept his rich mouth shut. He was probably wailing because he knew he'd said too much.
Oh, and let's not forget the anger attack George had on Daddy's boat that afternoon to where George 4 called the cops on his son, but little Georgie 5 decided to dive off the boat to avoid taking responsibility for that too.
We could write a book on what the family did or did not to to assist their son, but it's pointless, George is and was an adult, he is responsible regardless.
Jimbo - WELL SAID!! (sorry for the shout)
John Walton Giuliano seems to just wish to make comments on all Hook articles here just to start arguments. (For the record ALL drugs out there - read your warning labels there folks will have headache, nausea and heart failure - why? These side affects may have nothing to do with the drug but the condition or other conditions the patients have had.) My experience from working in the drug industry for a decade.
One thing to note here about all this - I heard from two young people who made a very insightful observation - why all the focus on him? Why all the focus on the person on trial when the real focus should be on the victims, Yeardley. I have to agree with this. Lives were ended or greatly altered by these criminals - and we all focus on them and if it is fair? Really?
Hey Darnit, thanks and you just gave a series of really good ones yourself. Made some very salient points and so much that it got me going and inspired to write my own comment. LOL. Touche on your synopsis of Tate's essay btw!
I never said Adderall killed Yeardley Love. I said George Huguely did not receive a fair trial due to his attorney's being denied access to medical records which were indeed relevant in light of the fact that Yeardley Love had been taking a substance banned in Canada due to twenty people dying from it and that if she had died an adderall induced heart attack it's obvious the system would work against that hence the medical records denial. Read it again.
C-ville Native your comments about side effect warnings like "death" being from the condition not the drug and your admission that you worked in the business of pharmaceuticals is patent evidence of how deadly drugs like Adderall continue to kill people in this country.
Jimbo, you nailed it!
GG, thank you for sharing that story. My father was exactly the same way as is many others who have drinking problems. Very happy that your husband got help.
Liz Seccuro erased any credibility she has to speak on this case or the issues within it when she chose to sit at home in Alexandria sending snarky tweets during the trial. Just scroll through the #Hugulely string of tweets to see the less than insightful drivel she contributed during this tragedy. Plus maybe I missed something about her situation, but what did "domestic violence" have to do with it -- or is it now "domestic violence" when a rape occurs between strangers?
More likely, Ms. Seccuro is latching onto the next new "hot topic" to sell more books or gain more speaking engagements. This is not meant to suggest it is in any way OK to have sex with a passed-out coed -- but rather question why her opinions have any relevance to this case other than Hawes is running out of angles to use to keep this tragedy on the front page of The Hook's website.
I have read the research on youth brain development supporting the 21 year old drinking age, but, like backwoodssouthernlawyer, I think raising the drinking age has contributed more to the binge drinking on college campuses than anything else. Plus, that law, coupled with the plaintiffs lawyers suing colleges a few years back over alcohol deaths among students, has forced schools to push the drinking at college off campus where they can't oversee it. Ironically, though, for those here who insist Huguely, at 22, was an adult and thereby deserves no mercy due to youth, that same brain research shows that the judgement and impulse-related regions of the brain are not fully developed until age 26 or so.
John Walton Giuliano - his defense never introduced their expert on that theory because they could find no expert who would testify to that fact.
Funny thing is I try not to take any drugs for any aliment unless needed but it isn't because of the experience I have had but the knowledge I have. Do you realize most drugs that have been pulled from the market were not due to the compounds themselves but due to the simple fact that doctors and patients would think or say, "one pill works well, two will work better"? Yes, most of the reasoning behind the pulling of drugs isn't the use but the over use of them and misuse of them. Educate yourself on this. We have parents who at the moment their child has the sniffles insist their doctors perscribe antibiotics. We have people out there who are sick with strep, take only four days of their antiobiotics and then relapse needing something stronger and thus creating a strep resistant to the original antibiotic. So the blame on drugs that are to help - partly is on the people out there.
It was obvious from the testimony that Ms. Love was using hers as perscribed. Not abusing or misusing them.
They had expert witnesses who testified to her health. He received a fair trial. All the real experts out there have stated just that - unless you have a law degree and you know something they all do not know?
I still think the focus in these cases is too much on the criminal and not on the Victim.
And you don't want me to be judge and jury on these cases because I would go with a life for a life. That would be in my opinion, justice.
Jimbo You are right. Not much sorrow on these posts for the victim. I wish George a fraction of the pain and suffering he caused this young woman. Too bad that noone thought about stopping him after he beat up a teamate and repeatedly beat up Yeardley. For the record, he was a fraternity member-and while they didnt intervene in George's previous assults, they sure cleaned his name off their website after he was arrested. Not much has changed in the old drunken boy network. Note that every one of the posts defending Georgie purports to come from a woman. Meanwhile woman's rights are being rolled back especially in VA. Of course, it is a woman's fault for getting killed in a world whenever they anger or arouse a man--its called the Taliban defense--Georgies legal team just added alcohol to the defense. Hey VA smart move passing that new gun law-wonder how many women will be killed wth guns now. All you would need to do is to say that you thought you saw a deer, it may even fly on Rugby road the way things are going.
Dear Liz Securro,
The world has had enough of your shrill attention-seeking. While most of us are sorry as hell that you had an allegedly horrifying experience at a fraternity house, we are just as sick of hearing about it nearly three decades after the fact.
Your 15 minutes are up.
Last time I was in Barnes & Noble, your book was on the deep discount shelf.
Please get on with your life.
Thanks.
^Like
Unfortunately, Yawn, the culture that spawned that rape is still alive and kicking or throttling at UVA. Morgan Harrington died not too very long ago, and that case and the very real possibility of UVA athlete involvement was minimized. What is even more disturbing, is the personal woman-hate exhibited towards any women from Cville who talks about her abuse or a family member's murder. But at least you got your gun bill and your ultrasound passed. Virginia is looking more and more like Pakistan (Taliban with alcohol). Next thing you know the "he's just an alcoholic" or the "she provoked him" advocates will be setting up fan clubs for poor Georgie. Nice touch that the defense got to smear Ms Love pretty nicely but we heard nothing about Georgie and lacrosse team coke use which sure could have upset Georgie and impaired his judgement. But that reveal wouldn't have been good for UVA. Want to bet that any drug test for Georgie was disappeared? Want to bet that his fraternity brothers and lacrosse teammates cleaned all the powder out of their apartments the day Georgie was picked up? No just go on being sorry for poor old alkie Georgie and his tragedy and hope that he can resume a normal life in a few years.
^dislike wild speculation completely unsubstantiated by any fact. Next, please.
So now we're supposed to think that 21 is no longer an adult because of some brain studies? We send kids to war, let em vote, drink, have babies, marry, drive, work, ect...but suddenly George's brain is one of an adolescent. Really? Was the jury supposed to look at every single aspect of why and how George is not responsible for murder, not adult enough, not sober enough, not getting the help he needed? This sentencing all about him and not the Victim?????? A precious innocent life snuffed out so unfairly, so grotesquely and so soon. Not one single expert testified to his so called "alcoholism", and yet here the armchair "experts" who have drunken violent fathers tell us otherwise? Wow, just too much to fathom.
Remember the jury already cut George a break with his drinking. How come 12 and 13 year olds get charged with being adults for murder and are held responsible and there's less hoopla over this and them than here with this over privileged adult and functional thug. Of all people this man had more opportunities and exposures to life and privileges............. and the good life no less, than most of us will see in a lifetime. But it seems like his father allowed his spoiled brat of a son to never man up to any wrong doings. Even his friends danced around George's bad behaviors and never drew a line. With family and friends like this who needs enemies? But also George was not in some vacuum off in space, he lived in the fast lane of this country clubbing world and continued to push all sorts of envelopes and risky behaviors. That Lexington incident where he threatened the police officer (to the extent of getting tased) demonstrates his lack of respect for law enforcement and shows his bad upbringing and manners. Oh, but this is all because his brain is not developed yet and he had too much to drink, silly ignorant, heartless me. How I forget that when George drinks it is an illness but when I drink and break the law, it's a reckless irresponsible crime. Boo Hoo. Most men his age demonstrate better judgment and respect for laws and life than this idiot. Sober or drunk.
I know of course alcohol removes inhibitions to all manner of things. There's warning labels on the bottle. Just like when I smoke a cig. I understand there's a huge risk of developing diseases. I have to make a decision don't I? Same with do I eat the burger and fries or have the salad. Get real people, life is nothing BUT a series of choices. What makes Georgie so different?
Then according to gg, we're supposed to go along with the fact if George's roommates brought him liquor, they are the ones responsible ultimately for him and would have to have be arrested instead of George since he was wearing some state sticker. Go figure. Wow, so now as a friend I have to be a psychologist/social worker and evaluate 24/7 my friend's behaviors and actions. And suffer the consequences if a crime is committed. Just unfrigging believable. Sounds like the movie Fahrenheit 451.
I think I'll become a drunk. I'll get my State issued sticker and not pay my bills on time and no problem, it's understood I can't take care of my life and business. Go ask my buddies for the money I owe instead. Married and neglecting my kids? Don't sweat it, just look for my sticker I wear all the time and let the state figure it all out. Or pay my child support, well I certainly can't do it. . Awwww, just had a binge this past week so you need to understand I just couldn't come up with the money as I spent it blowing it out last weekend. Ha!
Man I see where this is headed. This sort of thinking will collapse civilization as we know it in a decade if this sort of thinking takes off.
I'm a drinker and have had far too much to drink on occasion. I don't get violent, I get overly magnanimous and affectionate and want to make out with every woman I see. So people need to understand this and give me a pass as I offend and grope all sorts of women I will never see again because Gee Whiz, I am just under the grips of this disease *(plus my brain hasn't finished growing) and give me latitude folks. The next day when I am confronted with my actions, to heck with guilt and accountability and apologies, I'm gonna start blowing it off and telling the chicks to get over it, why aren't they more understanding of me and my disease? It's not fair. I can't help it, after all my brain isn't finished growing up and I didn't mean it. It's all about me and don't you forget it.
Heck folks, if we aren't teaching our kid's respect, responsibility, and self awareness for their actions and attitudes for themselves and for society, by 10 on up, we're as lost as they are.
As I understood the article, the point was that many people were dismayed by defense counsel's efforts to use alcohol as a mitigating factor in the crime. Most of the comments on this topic seem to agree with the article.
I believe it raises a larger issue that we only seem to talk about in the context of these tragedies. How do we properly instruct young people about the dangers of alcohol? I am not sure we do our children any favors by sending them into the world unsupervised until they have had personal exposure to alcohol's effects on them personally, and also until they have seen how alcohol affects others, so that they can see the warning signs.
This topic in many ways is a non sequiter to what Ms. Love suffered. The record suggests that she was in an abusive relationship with Mr. Huguely, and that he was particularly abusive when he had been drinking. The larger issue, it seems to me, is that alcohol is lurking on the sidelines as a factor in these types of crimes. This does not mean voluntary intoxication is an excuse, but until juries make it clear that alcohol does not mitigate the criminality of someone's behavior, trial lawyers will continue to make the argument.
Tate's last two paragraphs need to be read again so that this discussion gets back on track:
"If we brand George Huguely a monster and throw the proverbial book at him, we fail to address the root causes of his actions. If we label him evil, we assert that his act was unpreventable, that violence stems from an inflexible darkness in the character of those who harm others. I argue that it does not. I believe calling this crime what it was—a terrible and impulsive act, manslaughter without an explicit intent to kill, by an intoxicated youth with underdeveloped capacity for judgment and impulse control—gives us the best chance to prevent it from happening again. Going for blood like I first wanted gives us no insight into the pathology of violence and leaves us convicting and sentencing defendants out of fear and anger. Fear and anger aren’t proper ingredients for justice.
We did not need George Huguely to be convicted of such a severe charge and sentenced to over two decades in prison to make protective orders available to abuse victims in nonmarital relationships. We did not need the conviction to start a dialogue on this campus about domestic violence and the permissive collegiate culture that allowed this spiral of intoxication, rage, and jealousy to continue unabated and end in a horrific tragedy. We do need, now, to remember George Huguely is flawed and human . . . as are we."
As Tate and Seccuro both eloquently stated, this case is not about the privileged lacrosse players, or the university drinking issues -- it is about how WE as a society react to the few deviant behaviors that we encounter along the way. When a man attacks a woman and nothing happens, when a man verbally attacks a policewoman and she fails to arrest him, when a son embarrasses his father publicly and the father does nothing .... the bottom line is that everyone along the way enabled George to demonstrate poor behavior and not one person showed the fortitude to intervene. Therein lies the tragedy that led to Yeardley's death.
Over the past two years, UVA has had significant media coverage of how they turn a blind eye to campus crime. They sent their police officers to Richmond to walk the halls and lie about the circumstances of my daughter's attack to sway the legislators to vote no for HB 2490. There are many ways the University absolves itself from their responsibility of protecting students. If UVA wants the emphasis off of alcohol, then they had better hope the public does not start reviewing how the administrators themselves fail to react when they are advised of criminal activity that involves students - on and off the campus.
So much for all the concern about those ninny liberals in Charlottesville. Has there been a run on the Old Testament at the Barnes & Nobel at Barracks Road in the past few weeks??
To cat -- I recommend to you the following regarding your smear of the defense counsel in your 12:52 post above: http://www.snookandhaughey.com/news/huguely-evidence-casts-uva-students-...
And, your diatribe about cocaine use proves your one-sidedness in this debate -- although completely unsubstantiated, the initial allegations of cocaine use were not limited to the guys in this saga. But hey, since you appear to be a card carrying member of both the "women-can-do no wrong club" and the "male-patriarchy-is-responsible-for-all-of-the-world's-iIls club," guess you have to gloss over those details to make your points. And really, what on earth does the Morgan Harrington tragedy have to do with this case -- nothing other than they occurred in the same general area.
To Roseville and others -- no one here has argued that Huguely's alcohol use absolves him of criminal responsibility in this tragedy. So those mockingly saying they will get drunk before they next misbehave to avoid responsibility are just blowing smoke at the real issues here.
Huguely's lack of sobriety the night in question (to put it mildly) was a defense under Virginia law to the most serious charge leveled against him, and it can have some affect on the appropriate sentence for the charge he was convicted of. Criminal sentences are generally to be based on three components: 1.) punishment for the crime convicted of; 2.) deterrence to the convicted defendant and others who may commit that crime in the future; and 3.) protection of society if the facts suggest the convicted party is a threat to society going forward (likelihood of rehabilitation comes into play here). The debate over the sentence on this site has generally broken down into two camps -- those who were unhappy that Huguely was not convicted of Murder 1 think the sentence is too light. Those who think the appropriate finding was some level of manslaughter think the sentence was too harsh. His alcohol use (abuse) comes into the picture when evaluating the third element above, and interestingly all sides seem uncomfortable with the revelation by some jurors that one on the jury used his or her professional experience with alcoholics to sway the jury on the appropriate sentence in this case. Time will tell what the judge does with that information, and I guess it is good for The Hook that formal sentencing will not occur until this summer.
backwoodssouthernlawyer -- I agree that parents should address alcohol use with their children before sending them off to college.
John- she died from getting her head bashed in......Get It? HEAD BASHED IN! And I still have to say that Adderall did not BASH HER HEAD IN!
Hugeley got as fair a trial as anyone could- his defense team did their job- created the reasonable doubt by finding experts who would support their theory- it worked! He got M2, not M1............
go to sleep will ya?
@Susan Russel...
That was a load of bs...
Evil does exist in the world, put on your big girl panties and deal with it...
An Observerver, you got a lot of things right. I was in the jury room when verdict and sentence were decided. the first thing we did when we got back into the jury room to decide sentence was we each wrote down a number we thought was appropriate for 2nd degree murdur in this case. One juror wrote down 5 years, two jurors wrote down 40 years, but the majority wrote down between 20 and 30 years. BEFORE any rationalizations were made. Mr. Glomski was a little too liberal when he said that "we" were influenced by the opinions of the addiction professional in our midst. Though I'm sure her opinion influenced herself and Mr. Glomski and maybe some of the jurors who originally wrote down 20 years or less to some degree, I can assure you that each of the 12 had 12 different individual mixtures of rationale as "we" came to agreement on one sentence: 25 years. After 2.5 hours discussing the sentence, "we" ended up at the same result as the average of our first, non-binding, vote. It is unfortunate that Mr. Glomski's comments have been taken by some to mean that a major reason "we" settled on 25 years had so much to do with Mr. Huguely's alcohol abuse, or the likelyhood of his rehabilition at any given age of release. I hope Judge Hogshire is also not unduely influenced by that assumption.
To An Observer: Actually I am a member of the Why-on-earth-do-people-in-Charlottesville- blame-the-female-murder-victim club, which your link epitomized. Who cares if Ms Love had alcohol in her system? She was at home in her apartment when Georgie broke down the door and bashed her head against a wall. They were unfaithful to each other? When did they get married? As to the issue of drug use, nice attempt to smear the victim on your part. Look at the fact that this "man" bashed her head in and evidently noone bothered to get his blood alcohol levels or drug levels. But they sure managed to test, and to release the alcohol blood levels from Ms Love's corpse. Charlottesville has a long standing history of sweeping female assult issues under the carpet, coupled with attitudes like yours, where you seem to feel that blaming the victim is normal. This attitude was even worse in the Morgan case with no support from UVA. At least, with Ms Love, her existence on campus was acknowledged. Finally, I live in a state where they actually try to solve crimes against women and don't pass them along to campus cops and student "honor courts" I have heard that UVA policy has now been changed, but the underlying woman-hating attitudes sure show up nicely in the link you featured, complete with the "oh she wasnt so squeaky clean snarky remarks." She is dead, that is what troubles me. Why doesnt it bother you?
Roseville, why are you so opposed to people brainstorming ways to keep your wife and daughter safer from alcohol fueled crimes. Don't you know that 75% of college sexual assaults and 40-50% of violent crimes are reported to involve alcohol? Why are you so horrified by the idea of George Huguely having been issued a visible alcohol ankle monitoring device after the Lexington incident where he accosted the female officer? If Yeardley had reported the choking incident, he could have been booked for assault and issued one. What if he had been forced to wear this for a year, and this could have increased his likelihood of achieving sobriety? Maybe he would have gotten his life back on track, and she would still be alive. What is so terrible about someone like that having their license to purchase alcohol taken away and making it illegal to have it in their
residence? It's technically illegal to give your friend some of your Xanax, so why not hold others culpable for knowingly giving alcohol to minors as well as those wearing those ankle devices. Okay, I see how making others culpable could get really tricky and messy so I see your point there. I don't get why you are so opposed to a tag or ankle monitoring device that tons of states already use if it decreases those very high stats of alcohol related crimes by limiting alcohol access to problem drinkers. Your wife and daughter, if you have one,
would be a little safer.
Also, how do you associate someone wearing something like the ankle sobriety device with being given a free pass not to pay bills, child support, take care of their family, or go to work? I'm not sure where you are going with that, and how the person would be somehow left off the hook for the above.
We see widespread problems in society, and work to improve the state of things. Are you also opposed to fast food chains like McDonald's lowering the fat in their burgers and fries because of the obesity epidemic? Do you think it's too imposing on the rest of us have to have our Big Macs altered just because those gluttonous fat people can't control their appetites? And no, I don't think overweight people should wear obesity monitoring devices as they don't go around wielding knives at your throat or molesting you to get a bite of your apple turnover. And no, we shouldn't be arrested for giving chubby folks Cheetos. So don't bother with that retort.
Yet problem drinkers, like George and those that comprise that 40% and 75% ( MY GOD, look at that statistic ...it's HUGE...it's a societal PROBLEM) statistic, do go around lethally wielding fists and knives and sexually assaulting others while under the influence of their drug. It makes sense to me to focus on prevention by implementing ways to restrict these people's access to alcohol if they prove to be a danger to the rest of us and to themselves.
Again, if George had been issued an alcohol monitoring ankle device or tag, she could still be alive. And the cost of that device to us taxpayers is going to be a whole lot less expensive than housing him in prison for 26 years.
And Roseville, your wife, daughter, and granddaughters, if you have them, and YOU are going to be a bit safer in this world. So why are you so opposed to that? Why do you equate implementing measures to restrict the potentially dangerous alcoholic offender with giving them some free pass in life?
I meant that Mr. Glomski was a little too liberal in his use of the pronown "we", not a little too liberal in the political sense.
Thank you Juror 13 for a reasoned response. It is much appreciated by me anyway and needed here. I have to say the article with the first juror that came out in the interview and spoke about the drinking and deferring to the juror with professional knowledge, definitely was eye popping and added a dimension of exclusive concern for George to the exclusion of Yeardley that I found upsetting and controversial.
I too hope the judge in this case reads your point of view and does not give too much weight to the other jurist. I was quite surprised by that jurists interview and frankly it made me not think well of the whole affair and direction taken. Too bad he took it on himself to think he was speaking for all of you. I just am relieved that you spoke up and did so very well. Many thanks.
Coroner's never cover up anything, they never doctor evidence, especially not when the interests of billion dollar corporations are at stake, that's all I'm saying. Neither do D.A.'s, neither do judges, neither do police officers. It's ridiculous not to just take them at their word, isn't it?
Because if we didn't the whole system would come crumbling down.
Jurur 013 - Thanks for the input and clearing a few things up.
Juror 013--
The media's description of Huguely's response when he found out Love had died suggested he had no idea she'd died. Also, he'd had enough alcohol that premeditation was out of the question. So what was the jury's reasoning for finding malice, which lead to second-degree murder instead of manslaughter?
To further clearify, I don't blame Mr. Glomski for saying what he did,. Many of us were approached by the media in the immediate aftermath of the trial. I had to get very assertive with several of them, and didn't feel safe until I was on my way home. I think if I had chosen to talk that day or any time in the next week I too might very well have said something ill advised. I think we all were suffering from severe emotional distress from what we had heard and seen in that courtroom. I know I was and still am. I also know Mr. Glomski was, although I think for reasons that were not necessarily my own. What bothered me was not so much what he said, but the fact that the media and the "blogosphere" seemed to pick up on the meme that "we" came to our decision based on the idea that Mr. Huguely might be less likely to be a danger to society if released in his late forties or fifties. Some jurors may have taken that into consideration, but that was NOT universal. Two things that Mr. Glomski did say that I very much agree with seem to be overlooked by many commenters, and I only paraphrase: "We had a very good, well informed and thoughtful team" and Justice was served".
Reinhold, I did not want to address this originally, but there does seem to be a secondary meme concerning the 2nd degree murder vs. manslughter decision, What most of the commenters don't seem to take into account is that "intent", "malice" and "heat of passion" are 3 very different things as legally defined by the judge in his instructions to the jury. Within minutes of entering the jury room we uninimously agreed that George had no intent to kill Yeardley. So murder 1 was out from the get-go. We spent hours on the "malice"/"heat of passion" debate. But one of the instructions was that words alone, no matter how inflamitory or hurtful, are enough to incite "heeat of passion". Nothing Yeardley could have said through her closed and locked door could have induced that state in George, drunk or not.
Bottom line, I'm not going to go into my reasoning right now , nor my assumptions as to the other jurors reasoning, All I can say is that "twelve good jurors and true" decided unanimously that malice, and not heat of passion, as defined by the judge, was in play, and that made the difference between 2nd degree murder and manslaughter.
Another of our instructions was that we vote as one, and that each of us feel comfortable explaining ourselves to family, friends, if necessary the media. I also think that if St. Peter exists, guarding the Pearly Gates, I might not get in, but it won't be because of my decision in this case.
What role did recklessness play? Under Code Section 18.2-36.1, involuntary manslaughter is conduct that is "gross, wanton and culpable as to show a reckless disregard for human life." Huguely's behavior seemed to be at most reckless. Sure he'd been drunk before and made mistakes while he was drunk. But the evidence did not show that he'd tried to kill anybody. So I'm missing the connection between drinking and malice.
well, reinhold, I think the malice came in when he stole the computer and lied to his roommates about where he'd been. If he had simply gone home, sans computer, and passed out in his bed - that might be recklessness. But he had the presence of mind to steal her computer (but not to check on her after he beat her) - and then lie about where he'd been (so he knew he did something bad, but was not going back and checking on things or trying to correct the situation). That, for me, is where the malice came in.
Walt ... pretty sure the behavior is understood and promoted regardless of affiliation.
i.e. GH ran with frats and i am pretty sure that Love was in a sorority.
the environment and atmosphere is charged as is ... just add alcohol.
College admission officials pay much attention to every applicant's GPA, SAT or ACT scores, extra curricular activities, leadership positions, sport abilities, musical, artistic and other talents, but too often disregard an applicant's civic responsibility and integrity. Research shows that most college students with "alcohol issues" began drinking in middle or high school. Over half of high school student-athletes in grade 12 drink alcohol and those participating in contact and team sports report even greater usage. High school athletes are more likely to drink alcohol than non-athletes and are more likely to suffer behavioral and psychosocial consequences as a result of drinking. Too many parents, high school administrators, teachers, coaches and athletic directors are more concerned with a student's transcript rather than if the teenager has safe, healthy behaviors (i.e. underage drinking) because that is what colleges consider for admission. The situation becomes more about where the teen is admitted to college rather that if they are law abiding and healthy. The willingness to overlook or dismiss a high school or college athlete’s unhealthy, inappropriate and/or illegal behaviors in lieu of their impressive sport performance is a shameful reflection on our culture and must be exposed for what it is doing: destroying our most precious assets- our youth. It is imperative we recognize that alcohol abuse is the #1 caustic element in all youth and adult behaviors of concern. The students a college accepts create the environment and culture of that school. Colleges should recruit civic-minded, responsible students as a way to change the drinking culture on their campus. In addition, if parents and high school personnel knew colleges were interested in law abiding and healthy students, they would cease giving pardon to underage drinking and other substance abuse. Suffice it to say that without alcohol abuse as a factor, it is highly unlikely that George Huguely would be in jail for the murder of Yeardley Love. Proactive prevention is the key to optimal health, safety and well being!
Walt ... also ... the frat / sorority system has not changed in 25yrs
LEGACY baby LEGACY
Jurur 013 -- thank you for your valuable input. It really does all come down to the jury instructions. If the press would work to get access to and then publish those instructions, they would perform a tremendous service in educating the public in legal matters such as this case. But, it is more fun to fan the flames of vengeance than to educated the public on the law, I guess.
Good info Juror. Regarding other, I thought George threw out computer and lied to his roommates about whereabouts, so he wouldn't have to explain the same old drama between him and Yeardley. Also noone's forgetting Yeardley Love, but all the evidence had to be put out and the truth was she was also very drunk and had adderall in her system. We already know George was ridiculously drunk. Seems like the jury did what they thought best considering the definitions put forth. Personally, I think he bashed in the door because she wasn't anwering his emails and he thought she was with someone, not to accost her. We'll never know for sure what happened, but if you're mad at someone is that malice. I just don't really understand the malice vs heat of passion. Don't most heat of passions have some malice. REALLY hard for jury I'm sure.
Ann- I have a tough time believing that GH bashed that door in because he thought she was with someone and all he wanted to do was scare them...nope, not one minute do I believe that. GH had a history of violence and he was there to do harm to someone period. I do agree, however, that it was difficult for a jury and I do agree with you on the malice vs heat of passion...regardless, there is malice. Somehow society has downplayed the role in temper and anger saying "this person wouldn't normally do this, but in the heat of passion..." Regardless, a person should be held responsible for their actions and punished accordingly when the results are dire.
waiting and waiting - you forgot kicking the door in...malice started there. You don't kick someone's door in just to talk as GH claims he did.
He saw she wasn't with someone, so then wanted to talk. Just a theory. Noone knows. My point is is that manslaughter is heat of passion. Isn't there always malice in the heat of passion if someone is killed. That's why there's a hard distinction between the two, I would think. Why do people keep saying that if someone gets manslaughter they are not responsible for their actions. Of course he should be responsible for his actions, but there are different levels of punishment regarding the situation.
@Chopped liver: I have put on my big girl panties and dealt with it. I put my name and face out there and it is forever etched in the internet. Everyone in Charlottesville knows what I tried to do to change the laws to protect the victims of campus crimes in Virginia. You, on the other hand, hide behind a stupid pseudonym and spew crackle. If you have personally been a victim of crime, then you and I can have a decent dialogue. Otherwise, stick to the facts.
@John Walton Guiliano: You wrote, "Coroner's never cover up anything, they never doctor evidence, especially not when the interests of billion dollar corporations are at stake, that's all I'm saying. Neither do D.A.'s, neither do judges, neither do police officers. It's ridiculous not to just take them at their word, isn't it?"
I agree with you - if we don't take them at their word, then the whole system would come crashing down. However, I have seen police officers omit evidence from a report that is necessary for a Commonwealth Attorney to formulate an investigation. I have seen police officers add innuendo and falsehoods to a police report and then refuse to remove those details once they were proven false. I have witnessed a campus police officer lie to the General Assembly during public testimony. It happens, maybe not in the Huguely case, but it happens.
Susan, I'm glad someone can admit that. Does anyone think that the jury in this case, with the whole country watching, would want to been seen as blaming the victim? Not a chance. The whole system was working towards Huguely getting blamed for Love's death, only if Adderall had just been banned in the United States a week before the trial began, with a huge media buzz about all the people who had died from it, could Huguely have even begun to get a fair trial. When was the last time Adderall, which has easily killed thousands of people, got put on trial for murder with national coverage? When was the last time you even heard about anyone dying from it in the news? The media didn't utter a word about the fact that it was banned in Canada after killing twenty people, seven years ago. Ban Adderall, allow full disclosure of the number of people it has killed while its dangers were covered up, and put it in the mainstream national news a week before retrying George Huguely. See what happens.
maybe adderall is indeed bad for one if it is used in conjunction with alcohol and somebody beating your head and choking you. The woman was presumably sleeping peacefully when georgie kicked in her bedroom door. As georgie said, "she was getting all defensive like." Too bad she wasn't armed and got defensive. Maybe the fda should require a warning on adderall, "avoid getting beat in the head and being choked while using." If symptoms persist, like death, consult your physician immediately.
Another topic for discussion: should college students, especially women, be armed with firearms? If so, what training should the college require?
@john Walton Guiliano: Once George kicked the door in, he became the sole reason for Yeardley's death. He is responsible, nothing and no one else brought her to her death. You cannot blame the adderall or the alcohol.
Yet that is what is done every time a woman reports a rape at UVA. It seems to me that the man is never assigned the responsibility for committing the crime. My daughter was also in the safety of her own home. Curtis entered the home with the intent of attacking her and he did - and like all other affluent UVA boys with bad behavior, he got away with it. Former Commonwealth Attorney Rick Moore said to me, "Your daughter had been drinking, what did she expect would happen?" Imagine how a young crime victim feels when asked that question? There are no words to explain how numbing it is to realize no one with authority cares - so why should any of the public care. President Sullivan apologized to my daughter for having gone through that experience - what she should have done was call the police and report that a rape had taken place on her campus. I'm sure she apologized to Yeardley's mom, too - but an apology is not enough to correct the life altering situations these women have endured.
As I have said earlier, if George had raped Yeardley, nothing would have been done to him and based upon his previous behavior, he knew that no one would challenge his aggression. Unfortunately, the alcohol fueled his rage that evening and he made a horrific mistake - one that he could not escape. Unfortunately, we allowed it to happen by allowing the University to turn a blind eye to student-on-student violence towards women.
Ms. Russell --
I understand the the cause of your ire, as I am also a mother. But, your most recent posts suggest that you have lost all perspective regarding UVa and how the University addresses allegations of sexual assault today.
I don't mean to derail the topic of this thread, but since you have chosen it as a forum I am going to ask -- what do you hope to achieve by continuing to lash out at UVa for actions or inactions by another administration 7+ years ago? If your goal is to just to extract some revenge against the school by continuing to try an embarrass it, OK, but does that really help your daughter, or anyone else for that matter?
If your goal is revenge for your daughter, why don't you renew your focus on the real bad guy in her case, the perp, Curtis Ofori. If your goal is to help other rape victims get rapists off the streets, why not focus on educating young women on the steps they should take if they are raped -- starting with getting to the emergency room for a sexual assault exam to collect the evidence needed to prosecute the criminal case -- rather than insisting it is the University's responsibility to carry that water?
My goal is to alert young women to the basic facts that the system doesn't support them when they report violent acts. It didn't 7 years ago - and it doesn't now.
There are many ways to help young victims - I choose to help change the laws. I can't do it alone - the community has to become involved in the letter writing to the delegates and legislature. So far we have two aspects of the law changed. I will keep fighting until the laws are robust and tightened to get rapists off the campus.
This issue is personal for me - but it is not about me.
Thank you for your reply -- after spending some time reading through your website, I think I better understand your goals. Candidly, I don't think coming on these unrelated threads taking swipes at UVa is a very effective way to further, them, though.
I share your view that sexual assault allegations should not be adjudicated as a regulatory matter by universities, but my concerns go beyond yours. To me, the allegations are far too serious for a university tribunal which does not offer -- and per the new DOE regulations may not offer without the risk of losing federal funds -- appropriate due process protections to the accused. It is every bit as wrong for a school to brand an innocent male student as a rapist and throw him off campus as it would be for them to allow a proven rapist to remain at the school.
It is also wrong for school to dissuade women to come forward to report these crimes. That is the culture that needs to be addressed and changed. There will always be crime, no one and no law can prevent crime from happening - but we need to stop blaming victims and create a structure that allows open reporting. I saw what happened to Liz Seccuro repeat itself 20 years later when it happened to my family. You'd think that in 20 years the school would have responded differently, but it didn't. The culture was the same. The death of Yeardley Love further illustrates the lack of action taken when a woman is threatened. Schools are nothing more than corporations with the goal of attracting donors. Until the investigation and adjudication of such crimes are removed from the University and handled by local authorities, the scenario of violent crime involving student-on-student will continue to exist.
I think if Yeardley had reported something, UVA would have done something, but she didn't. And she was holding hands and having dinner with his family the night before so I don't think she believed she was in danger. There does need to be more education at universities regarding domestic violence and alcohol use. Alcohol use can put women in precarious situations unfortunately.
I think we both agree that rape allegations belong in the criminal justice arena and not in our colleges and universities.
In my view schools should neither dissuade nor encourage students to prosecute their rape claims. The schools should be out of it entirely until the case has gone through the criminal justice system. For that reason, I don't hold UVa accountable for Yeardly Love's death.
That said, I am not sure I am completely with you on the proper role of the UVa Police force. Should it be administrative or part of the criminal justice system? I am still thinking through that one.
Ann - I respect your opinion and your theory, I just think it's misguided. Take all the focus off of George and put it on Yeardley..think if she were your daughter, how would you react then? Would you be so compassionate toward her killer?
I couldn't possibly answer that but I do know I would want everything done so that something like this would not happen again. Two families destroyed.
Ann - again, I respect your compassion toward the families, that IMHO is not misguided at all. Your desire for everything to be done so something like this doesn't happen again is understandable and very noble. But GH needs to understand the level and depth of his crime and how it has effected these families. I don't think he will get that with a mere smack on the hand.
@ Susan Russel " We do need, now, to remember George Huguely is flawed and human . . . as are we."
Very few humans are that flawed. It was a travesty what happened to your daughter, I have 4 daughters myself. But I must say that there is a difference between a man kicking a door in or being invited into a girls apartment to spend the night, a man she did not know. Some personal resposibility has to be a part of ones destinty.
Ann - back up to your earlier comment on UVa acting if Yeardley had reported something...UVa has had women report rapes and they did NOTHING. In fact, they encourged the women NOT to report the crimes. The university would have swept Yeardley's complaints under the rug as they have the rest. UVa has been too busy with "damage control" that they have lost focus of what they in business for, to educate. Let's hope and pray this tragedy doesn't go completey unnoticed by President Sullivan and she makes the changes that are so desparately needed. You may then get your wish of something being done so this never happens again.
@choppedliver: When a man targets you and forces himself upon you, or slaps you around, he is committing a crime. His behavior changes your destiny, no matter how responsible and accountable you are.
@Ann: It's the "I would want everything done so that something like this would not happen again" part that is the most difficult to define and enforce.
ya know, georgie may have had sex on his mind when he went to Ms. Love's apt. that night. The evidence at trial showed he made several calls to at least 3 females, two of whom he barely knew. They all blew him off. He must have sounded horribly drunk. I am wondering if in his drunken state, he thought he might actually go to Ms. Love's and try to romance her and eventually have sex. When she locked her bedroom door he became enraged, and we know the rest of the story. Several posters maybe on other boards questioned what happened to Ms. Love's bottom and top (maybe bra too but maybe she did not sleep with it). Apparently she was not wearing her usual clothing when the paramedics arrived. There was virtually no testimony about whether georgie may have ripped off her clothes. The police who questioned him did not get into that line of inquiry. Nevertheless, I suspect that georgie had some sort of sex on his mind when he went to her apt. I do not believe he went there just to "talk." I guess these ramblings are meaningless considering that he wound up killing her, but maybe georgie was not schooled in the oft said, "no means no." Perhaps there was where the school and his coach may have come into the picture several years before.
mike - from the texts he sent it was not apparent that he was drunk - they were apparently comprehensible texts - or at least that's what I remember from what the jury said about them. so it is mere speculation about what it is he wanted when he went to her room. If she had been raped - presumably that would have come out. the beating she received makes me believe that is was less sex on his mind than pure anger and rage at her.
the only person who knows what happened to her clothes ain't talking - he is the only one who would really know about that detail. but I could see him doing that out of pure anger.
Susan Russell March 5th, 2012 | 8:47pm
@choppedliver: When a man targets you and forces himself upon you, or slaps you around, he is committing a crime. His behavior changes your destiny, no matter how responsible and accountable you are.
Of course I agree with your first sentence and half of your second. But I don’t agree with “no matter how responsible and accountable you are.” Women who go out drinking, pick up drunken men on the way home they don't know well and invite them to spend the night are not showing the same responsibility as women who don't. Rape is, short of murder, the worst thing one human can do to another, no excuse for it...none. With my daughters, the education starts at home, but for those girls who don't have that opportunity, the state should educate them on personal safety and responsibility. I would be happy to see tax money spent on that. The harsher the penalty the better for rape in my opinion, I commend you for your efforts.
Wow Chopped Liver Wow. You are coming across as clueless. Mrs. Russell's daughter was very young, young and trusting, and had probably no clue men thought the way her perpetrator did.
So women that wear bikinis as opposed to wearing one piece suits are not demonstrating self concern? Women are basically undressed at the beach and yet there is the expectation they are not to be touched without their permission, drunk or sober or whatever. Rape is rape and is acted upon regardless of whatever. Let's place the clear responsibility where it belongs.
I can say little except that I am in total agreement with what Susan Russell, Jimbo, and some others have to say.
Now I agree it is not wise for a woman to pick up a strange man at a bar -but that does not mean she should be assaulted, nor that it absoves the perpetrator.
One other point. Its not just women. I had a gay male friend who would get drunk at a bar and invite some strange man home-and sometimes get beaten and robbed. The same applies.
Jimbo says..."Wow Chopped Liver Wow. You are coming across as clueless. Mrs. Russell's daughter was very young, young and trusting, and had probably no clue men thought the way her perpetrator did."
That’s my point. Why was she clueless? Why she was never taught to be careful? Anybodies guess. Your second paragraph is ridicules...It's a parents responsibility to teach young men respect for woman, it is also their responsibly to teach young woman to be aware that there are men that are dangerous. Risky behavior is just that...risky.
Additionally, it is obvious that the UVA police are cluless about rape. Serious crimes should be turned over to the local police.
On campus police vs. town police -- with all due respect to Ms. Russell, her tribulations do not constitute a scientific analysis of the effectiveness of campus police. We have her story and nothing else to draw conclusions from. It is not as if the the Durham police distinguished themselves in the "Duke no-rape" case, when they took charge of that investigation instead of the Duke University police.
If only it were "my tribulations" ...... however, the Virginia Crime Commission conducted a study during the summer of 2011 and obtained information from 33 campuses across Virginia. Their findings are posted on the web at: http://services.dlas.virginia.gov/User_db/frmvscc.aspx?ViewId=2715
It's a very lengthy powerpoint presentation. I would direct your attention to slide #32. In 2010 there were 31 reported forcible sexual offenses investigated by campus police departments which resulted in 0 arrests. It has always been my position that campus police are not capable of investigating felony crimes, nor should they bear the responsibility for investigating felony crimes that occur on the campus. Currently the General Assembly is considering HB965 (a spinoff of my bill, HB 2490) which requires campus police to enter into mutual aid agreements with a local law-enforcement agency or the State Police for cooperation in providing assistance with the investigation of deaths and alleged rapes occurring on college campuses. This will allow local law enforcement and campus police to work in collaboration with each other when these crimes occur. It's a win-win for both sides.
@Chopped Liver: My daughter was not clueless. She was powerless to fight off her attacker. Enough said.
@Ann....Yeardley DID NOT have dinner with George the night before her murder. She simply ran into him and his family and was polite, spoke to the Aunt, nieces and mother. She was polite!!!!!!!!!!!!! Please get your facts straight! He broke her door down and beat the crap out of her. How is that HER fault? What the hell is wrong with you?
I feel so much better after reading the Juror posts here. Thank you!!!
I also believe women should be taught to not physically fight with a man. I know many women as well who get violent when they drink too much. The man will always win because he's stronger. As far as giving women guns to protect themselves, well that would be a disaster. I still don't believe George broke the door down to assault her, but the whole situation got out of control once he did. This just was not a cut and dry case. I think college kids do need more guidance re alcohol and violence education in school. I know there was none when I went,
Shay, I didn't realize you had better facts. What I heard is that they were holding hands in video. This is not to blame Yeardley. This is to explain that this relationship was more complicated than a cut and dry case and that women need to be more alert to domestic violence and the signs. Don't know why you're getting so violent acting with me.
Re campus police -- there are a variety of statistics in the report linked above. Slide 32 lists a total of 31 allegations of forcible sexual assaults in CY 2010 to the 24 Campus police departments responding -- of those 16 were classified as rape. There were no arrests by the campus PD for those (report does not indicate whether any of those 16 were referred to other agencies for investigation/follow-up). There were 15 reports classified as other types of sexual assaults, including forcible fondling (agin, no info on whether any were referred to other PD's. there were 3 arrests by campus PD's for forcible fondling in 2010. There are other slides that show some aggregate numbers on reports sexual assaults in the Commonwealth. A rough cut shows an arrest rate at or below 33% on such cases for the years listed. As is often the case with statistical compilations, there is data to support a variety of positions in this report.
Ann, Shay, others -- there were so many "facts" released by various news media during the pretrial and trial stages of this case, some of which were down right erroneous. There was a lot of other information released only to the jury. And, most significantly, the crucial evidence, what EXACTLY happened in Ms. Love's room that terrible night, no one knows because the witnesses were either drunk, are dead, or both.
It is hard to keep track of what is "known," because folks seem to hear/remember that information which supports their view of what happened here. For example, Shay remembers the CA's description of the encounter on 5/2 at Boylan as Ms. Love just being polite. Others rely on the report that Ms. Love had her arm around Huguely. That sounds like more than being "polite," but who knows . . . . Same with the texts to the other women. The Hook reported those texts as the night of 5/1. Other media reported them as the night of 5/2. I contacted Hawes during trial and asked him to check his notes. He responded that his notes reflect 5/1 as did a reporter for one of the national media covering the trial. The DP reporter he asked thought it was 5/2. So again, who knows.
@Susan...oh, I see, inviting a strange man, who was intoxicated, to spend the night in your apartment is a prudent thing to do? I guess if you drove your car into a telephone pole it would be the pole's fault.
@choppedliver: You remain nameless. I don't address taunts or innuendoes. Thanks for trying to put a spin on a story that isn't correct.
@Susan, fair enough. If I have stated an untruth, please correct me. I'm just emphasizing that we need to teach our children well to prepare them for the mean ole' world out there. What happened to your daughter is every parent’s nightmare, not meaning to be disrespectful towards you.
@Shay, you can stop trying to reason with Ann, she obviously has this pity for GH at this point that comes across as completely clueless. She thinks that after he kicked in the door he meant no harm after he found her sleeping...yeah, ask his teammate he jumped on and beat the crap out of while he was sleeping and yelling "sweet dreams, punk" as he was leaving. No way women should fight back??? Yeah, just stand there and let them beat the crap outa ya yelling "oh, help, police!!" see how far that gets. GH (contrary to the essay cited by BJ Nordin above) IS an monster...a Jeckyll and Hyde so to speak..one minute completely sane, the next enraged and out of control to the point it takes an officer THREE tases to bring him down. The guy is dangerous and needs a long sentence to reflect on his actions and their consequences for the victim, which I may remind Ann is not here to defend herself any longer. A shorter sentence would be conveying the message that Yeardley's life was not worth any more than that.
Shay and Chopped Liver, You both are full of anger and hate and totally missed my point. You two could use some help.
"It was obvious from the testimony that Ms. Love was using hers as perscribed. Not abusing or misusing them."
C-ville Native
"maybe adderall is indeed bad for one if it is used in conjunction with alcohol and somebody beating your head and choking you. " - Mike
Are you people serious? You're supposed to take amphetamine salts and alcohol together?Mike, you even admit Love was mixing amphetamine salts and alcohol (a deadly combo -http://www.naturalnews.com/025858_drug_child_Adderall.html) the night she died but still adamantly assert that there's no way that could have caused death. Utterly ridiculous.
And don't tell me "the cause of death was ruled as blunt force trauma" when the interests of billion dollar corporations were at stake in this case. My point is that the coroner might have been LYING. In other words, NOT ALL CORONERS ARE HONEST TO A FAULT.
@John Walton .... maybe have a little reality check with yourself and take a walk around the block.
there has been much chat on here about rape on or about the campus and what UVA does or does not do for the victim. Here is a story that just appeared on wtop.com where the issues are similar. I hope the url works> I don't know how to make it into a link.
http://wtop.com/?nid=109
@ Ann...you're nuts.
JWG, Are you serious? She died from adderall just at the moment that GH was beating the life out of her?
When there was no evidence of her head hitting the wall, when he says she was alive when he left but "like a fish out of water" (sounds like a heart attack), when she had been mixing amphetamines and alcohol, when medical records are denied to the defense by the judge, when an expert witness was blocked from testifying who would have challenged the alleged cause of death, then yes, I have reasonable doubt that George Huguely is guilty of murder.
Yeardley could have died of adderall and alcohol, but probably didn't. The jury thoughtfully found George contributed to her death in some way, without intent, so they did their best job. Who knows what the final sentence will be but will be close to what jury recommended. If it makes certain people more comfortable to think he is just a monster, then they will sit with their limited judgment. Then there's no point for discussion on how to prevent things like this happening in future, because there will always be "monsters" out there.
observer, I know one of the girls who was texted. it was the night of the murder.
Ann, you are so right: there are and will always be monsters out there. Yes this is the point. Monsters will do whatever needed to do what they will; they will say and do the precise thing that will exploit their victim. There is no complete preparation one can do for the victim when they are up against a monster.
What makes them a monster is that they know inherently there is no defense against them and there is no complete preparation a parent can do to ward them off. That's why they are the monsters they are.
George must have learned early on that he never had to pay for his actions. Someone always bailing him out or never saying no to him. With no repercussions, there is no limits.
Your mistake is you are projecting your naivete or ethics onto him and seeing that caricature his lawyers created: the bumbling clumsy drunken athlete.
Try telling that to the numerous people he victimized, for surely without being tased there's no telling what he would have done to that female officer. And we know what he did to an innocent sleeping fraternity brother.
Thank God the jury got him off the street, and not because of the alcohol either.
John- get some rest.....its over. He killed her. Adderall was not charged. The defense did not fight the non-release of medical because they saw the material and you did not..........
Non-release = Did not see the material. Wake up, Skip. It's not over by any means. Huguely can appeal.
Ann - we ALL know what happened. He admitted it. Just because he didn't know she was dead (if in fact is true or not one of the many lies he told that night) doesnt mean he didn't intentionally kill Yeardley. Where did you hear that the jury didn't deem him a monster. Georgey should be on death row. He actually just might be anyway...
Again, all are entitled to their view of the world, but I continue to shudder when commenters here claim to know who George Huguely is/was based on the news reports and the story -- yes the story-- told by the prosecutor at trial. I have followed this tragedy as closely as anyone, from the get go. The two things I would never profess to "know" based on my careful study of this case are: who George Huguely is and what exactly happened that night, including why he went over to Ms. Love's apartment. If the rest of you want to speculate on those -- I guess you are entitled to.
I will, though, call out misstatements and hyperbole -- including two in Jimbo's post above: 1.) "innocent sleeping fraternity brother" -- first there has never been any confirmation Huguely was in a fraternity. It was widely speculated on from the beginning that he was a fraternity member, because a number of lacrosse players from his class and the class or two below him were in one fraternity. But that fraternity is one of the few who had pledge class lists on the internet, and a check of those lists immediately upon news of his arrest did not find his name. There is a slight chance that someone removed his name that quickly, but I doubt that was the first priority that terrible morning. The other guy was a lacrosse teammate. Second, I am fairly confident Huguely is not the first guy to slug another guy who kissed his girl friend. Cold cocking the kid when he was sleeping was pretty low, maybe even cowardly, but I don't agree that suggests what Jimbo does. 2.) "There's no telling what he would have done to that female officer," seriously? That officer was a trained police woman in a college town. I am confident she has seen her share of drunk and disorderly college students. If she feared for her life, the charges would have been substantially higher than what were filed against Huguely for that incident.
There is no question Huguely had "issues" before this tragedy occurred. All signs indicate that alcohol was one of them. But none of us here is qualified to say what his psychological issues are with any degree of certainly. Nor are we qualified to declare whether he will or won't be able to emerge from prison two decades from now to become a productive member of society. Ann, seems to be as am I, hoping he will. For those of you so sure he cannot, please pass along your crystal ball when your are done with it.
ann, elizabeth and john whatever ur name is (or are you the same person) Are you seers.y supporting a self professed murderer.
Ann - all your friends were sexually assaulted and gang raped? Seriously? So, bashing ones head in should be a lesser crime than stabbing. Hmmmmmm
John - what were your words of wisdom? They did discuss adrenal in the trial and she had an insignificant amount in her body. Really?! He smashed and bashed the poor girls head into the wall, tried to smoother her and finally threw her down on the bed to die.
I only wish the judge could add some years! If the jury knew it was only a recommendation, they prob would have made it longer!
For those of you "supporting georgey boy" your either related to him or you are one of those weirdos who marry the guys on death row. Have fun in prison, George. At least your still alive unlike Yeardley.
ann- you are nuts as can be. That said...why are you defending a murder??? So sad. You are so pathetic. Can we look forward to seeing you and eliz on Jerry Springer hoping one day to marry Georgey boy? Maybe Johnny G can be the best man. Hmmmm. Even after 20 years in lock down, Georgey prob won't be interested....so so sad. Why don't you get on with your "life". What kind of being defends a self professed murderer? The defense got lucky. MURDER ONE!
lET US BE CLEAR - BASHED HEAD IN!!!
Bye bye Annie...
An observer- I hope he doesn't make it out...for every woman's sake. Do you have daughters? Alina does. Tell her to think about defending her murdering godson! God forbid it was one of her angels who badger head BASHED In!!! I'm out - for those defending Georgee boy...sick. And as for juror 13...do u really expect us to believe you were actually a juror?
AngieL, your 8:59 post got your point across...but by 9:32, the wine had kicked in...lol
I think we are all having a case of Huguely trial withdrawals and cannot break away from the Hook page.....
Hawes, you did a great job keeping this issue alive. But folks, we need to move on......
AngieL --
She did not have "insignificant" amounts of adderall in her system. She had a therapeutic amount, which according to the experts was not enough to kill her.
"Smashed and bashed the poor girls head into the wall"-- if that is true, why was there no blood, makeup, DNA on the wall? Why was there no damage to the wall? Why were the pictures on the wall unmoved?
"Tried to smother her" -- maybe, maybe not. That is one possible explanation for the damage to the tissue inside her upper lip.
"Threw her down on the bed to die." Really? She died, but the jury members are not the only ones who disagreed with your conclusion that he intended her to die.
It is disturbing to see the number of commenters who equate being meticulous with facts with "supporting" Huguely.
^^
just saw the last three of AngieL's screeds -- yes, I do have a daughter.
Is it wine -- or past time for her meds??
It's spelled Adderall, not adrenal.
The toilet seat was up. Please tell me that after he was done throwing her around, he did not take a moment to ......
Ok...he did not take a moment to...
Good catch, Johnny. I spelled a word wrong. You r so so amazing. Whatevvs Annie. Crawl under a rock until ur big wedding day. U r meant for each other. Don't come crawling back to us on that day that he First assaults you...see ya'll later.
Johnny - did I spell everything correctly? I guess I must have had wine because I dont agree with you. I'm outta here, losers
An Observer: Okay, so it wasn't an innocent frat brother, it was another innocent human being asleep minding his own business getting assaulted by George. Just like he came to Yeardley, alone, asleep and in her own room minding her own business. Seems like Georgie has a pattern of sneaking up on people in their own space with his agenda. Low, sneaky, violent behaviors that have seemingly surpassed being a simple bully. Was George even drunk that night he beat his teammate up? Did he not any where along the way begin to learn from his own violent behaviors? It seems not, and that is where George is separate from the occasional acting out drunkard. He wouldn't learn for whatever reasons and continued to behave in the ways he desired. This was no helpless drunk. This is someone on a path of demonstrating out of control and violent acts with no remorse or desire to change. Of course someone was gonna get hurt severely in a matter of time.
George had the money and where with all to get into any rehab program anywhere, or hire the best therapist money could buy. He grew up with more privileges than most people will in a lifetime. What it seems it did have not in his favor, was a father who wanted to be George's friend and drinking buddy, and that speaks volumes. But it's certainly not like George grew up in a ghetto, with grinding poverty and unloving parents. George is responsible for throwing the first half of his life away. No one to blame but himself and out of this massive arrogance and growing violence, an innocent lost her life.
As far as the female cop having to come up against George, yes, I think cops too get scared when confronted---even by disorderly drunk students. Just because they may see their share of drunks and fights doesn't mean it's okay, doesn't mean they aren't faced with frightening decisions and reactions. Nor does it mean because they are in college towns this sort of behavior is somehow typical and to be expected. As far as the charges? You must be kidding if you think the charges are related to her level of fear. It was a first time charge and who knows if his father had something to do with how those charges played out.
I'm with the poster above: just wish the judge could add to George's prison sentence. Yeardley had everything bright and good to offer the world, while George was simply wallowing in the basest aspects of himself, quickly becoming a rich thick headed thug.
Maybe it was a Freudian slip and not a misspelling, AngieL. What was she drinking that night, anyway? Caffeine is deadly when combined with amphetamine salts to. I imagine she would know that but she might not know if caffeine was in her alcoholic beverage. Just throwing that out there.
John Walter G. , are you from Canada? Sure do sound like it to me.
From Wikipedia:
In law, extenuating circumstances in criminal cases are unusual or extreme facts leading up to or attending the commission of the offense which, though an offense has been committed without legal justification or excuse, mitigate or reduce its gravity from the point of view of punishment or moral opprobrium.
According to English procedure, the jury has no power to determine the punishment to be awarded for an offense. The sentence, with certain exceptions in capital cases, is within the sole discretion of the judge, subject to the statutory prescriptions as to the kind and maximum of punishment. It is common practice for juries to add to their verdict, guilty or not guilty, a rider recommending the accused to mercy on the ground of grave provocation received, or other circumstances which in their view should mitigate the penalty.
Quite independently of any recommendation by the jury, the judge is entitled to take into account matters proved during the trial, or laid before him/her after verdict, as a guide to determining the quantum of punishment.
Under French law (Code d'instruction criminelle, art. 345), it is the sole right and the duty of a jury in a criminal case to pronounce whether or not the commission of the offense was attended by extenuating circumstances (circonstances atténuantes). They are not bound to say anything about the matter, but the whole or the majority may qualify the verdict by finding extenuation, and if they do, the powers of the court to impose the maximum punishment are taken away and the sentence to be pronounced is reduced in accordance with the scale laid down in art. 463 of the Code penal. The most important result of this rule in earlier times was to enable a jury to prevent the infliction of capital punishment for murder (now abolished).
In cases of what is termed "crime passionnel," French juries, when they do not acquit, almost invariably find extenuation; and a like verdict has become common even in the case of cold-blooded and sordid murders.
I meant Shay and Darnit not chopped liver, full of anger attacking me, -oops sorry chopped liver. Angie L. - WOW......
JWG- Wikipedia? Really? that's a reliable source of crap.............
I think the jury spoke after hearing all the evidence presented. Give it a rest. Again, the defense is not pursuing it, why would you?
Hey Ann - don't forget AngieL, she called you nuts! Give credit where credit is due!
Darnit. Yes AngieL should be calling other people nuts. Look at the source. Once again, I haven't said a bad thing about any of you. Not much of a discussion when you guys just rage at comments. Alot of good comments otherwise.
Ann - no raging at your comments from me, I simply said you were misguided and a lost cause. I have come to the conconclusion you are a very tender hearted person, have a great apathy for indivduals, but seem really naive when it comes to some matters. That can be considered a good thing, but your comments come across like you are defending GH. He needs or deserves no defense (unless you are one of his relatives and then I would definitely consider you a complete lost cause). His dad paid highly for the defense he got. Commenting on things like "girls should be taught not to fight back with boys"...it sounds like you are saying "just stand there and take it" - that's one instance I find you naive. In that light, would you say to a woman that is being beat by her husband, "don't defend yourself honey he's stronger than you, you should just pray he doesn't kill you this time and wait for a chance to leave"? I am totally confused by this type of mind set.
I'm not defending Huguely at all. Just want more education for alcohol and domestic violence. I actually saw a serial rapist and murderer being interviewed say "Do not fight back because the women who fought back I knew I would kill". Either scream or run or other. Also do not start fight with men that is physical. That is all I meant.
observer-
i very much respect your perspective and thought process and I am wondering what you think of the job the defense did? I am not talking about the fact that one was sick, or the inappropriate e-mails at all. just the defense they put out. personally, i thought they could have used an expert on alcohol.
would love your thoughts on if you thought the defense was sufficient. I realize hindsight is 20/20. but I was really floored that they didn't seem to put up much of a fight.
The only goal they had was to introduce reasonable doubt and get him off the M1 hook....they did that and left the scene.
They did as good a job with the dog squeeze they had to defend as anyone could............
Skip D, from your above comment you should be able to answer your own question that you posed to me "the defense it not pursuing it, why would you? The defense knew after the "I should have killed you" that the jury was going to convict him of murder no matter what. They knew the jury had no idea Adderall was banned in Canada after killing twenty people, and if they told them that the jury would immediately interpret that as blaming the victim and convict him of 1st degree murder. They knew the odds were stacked against him and instead of gambling his entire life's freedom on what in the circumstances was a long shot manslaughter-extenuating circumstances conviction they did what they though was in Huguely's best interests, for better or for worse. And "all the evidence presented" to the jury was not all the evidence offered by the defense. Much of it was blocked by the judge. I'll give it a rest when you stop saying all the evidence was looked at.
And if they did tell the jury Adderall had been banned seven years ago in Canada after killing twenty people Hogshire would have held them in contempt for biasing the jury with a "witchunt".
And they'd probably both be disbarred for disobeying judicial orders in a murder trial.
Now if Yeardley Love had been taking Vioxx that would have been a whole nother story. After all, that was in the news.
Waiting -- I appreciate the kind words. It would be very hard to issue a fair critique of the either the defense team or the prosecution team for one not involved in the case. As just a member of the public, I can't know what evidence was in the file for each side to work with or work around. Moreover, since I followed the case and the trial through the news media reports and some other's twitter posts, I don't know how the in-court presentations went really. Finally, I don't know what each side's real goals were in this case or what, if any, plea negotiations occurred. SkipD could be right on the defense's goal, but it sure didn't look like that was the case when the verdict came in.
A couple things to keep in mind when considering what defense counsel do or don't do in a criminal trial. The burden of proving the charges against the defendant lie 100% on the prosecution. The defense need only poke holes in the prosecution's theory of what happened; they don't need to prove what did actually happen. That is why, in many criminal trials, the defense does not call any witnesses. They make whatever points they believe they need to through cross examination of the prosecution's witnesses and then argue that the prosecution did not meet it's burden.
This case was a tough one for the defense because there were two pieces of evidence they couldn't escape. Yeardly Love died and their client had been in her room that night. So, this was not a case where they would have alibi witnesses or other evidence to show he couldn't have been the cause of her death. They also had to deal with Huguely's video-taped statement to the police. I would love to know what the police told him about the purpose for questioning him before they read him his Miranda rights, because if they had told him Ms. Love was dead I suspect he would have shut up and asked for counsel. Another real hurdle for the defense, though legally it should not have been, was the very sympathetic nature of the victim. Who the victim was, what she looked like, her age, etc., does not make one iota of difference under the law, but practically speaking, it made a huge difference here. Just read through all the comments on this and other message boards. Adding to the sympathy factor were the gruesome photos. Finally, the defense had to deal with Huguely's "other bad acts." Because they did not relate directly to the charges in this case, the prosecution was precluded from putting in testimony about the Lexington incident or the incident of him slugging his teammate for kissing Yeardly the year before. However, that testimony could come in if the defense tried to put on testimony to humanize Hugely for the jury or to show he was a good guy. Moreover, given all the notoriety this case brought to those groups who might otherwise have been counted on to support Huguely, they were't even present on his side of the courtroom. Finally, they really couldn't put Huguely on the stand because of his prior statement. My view is that he was likely so liquored up he probably didn't remember what exactly happened when he was in Ms.Love's room the night before, but if he deviated from the parts of the statement the prosecution liked, he'd get hit with the equivalent of were you lying then or are you lying now? All in all, the defense was left with little it could introduce in Huguely's defense.
On the subject of experts, I will admit that I did not understand what the defense argument was with respect to the medical experts. This case did not jump out at me as one for a "battle of the experts," and the couple of jurors who have spoken to that point seemed to ignore both side's experts since they concluded Huguely at a minimum put into motion the events that eventually lead to Ms. Love's death. They were not hung up on how she died. Unfortunately for the defense, their own error precluded them from completing that part of their case, and further, Ms. Quagilana's illness precluded her from giving or participating in the closing where they might have been able better to explain their theory. Since his drinking was only a defense to the first degree murder charge, I am not sure an expert on alcohol would have been of much use. Now, if the defense would have been allowed to put on a brain development expert to testify that the judgment and impulse functions of the brain are not fully developed until age 26, that might have been helpful in negating malice.
Based on the media reports and tweets during the closing arguments, a couple things struck me, and I wondered whether they affected the outcome of the case. FIrst, just based on the tweets of the arguments, I did not hear what I would have expected to hear from a defense counsel in closing argument on a case like this. The Commonwealth Attorney had just made an emotion-filled closing. But, the big weakness in his case was it was almost entirely based on "circumstantial evidence." There were no eye-witnesses to what transpired in Yeardly Love's room that night, so the prosecutor was forced to argue HIS THEORY of what happened pieced together
from the evidence he did have -- primarily the broken door, the autopsy photos/results, and Huguely's statement. (Which, ironically, the CA accepted in part -- the parts he liked, and derided in part, those he didn't.) For example, in the opening argument the CA said she died from him hitting her head against the wall, but in his closing he abandoned that theory because it came out during the trial that there was no damage to the wall. The C.A.'s new theory was he smushed her head into the floor, instead. I never heard that Mr. Lawrence acknowledged the emotion in the C.A.'s argument and advise the jury they needed to disregard it. More surprisingly, I did not hear him point out that the C.A.'s argument was just HIS story, based on his view of the facts. I did not hear him point out that the C.A. was shifting his story, nor did I hear him posit alternate explanations of the events that night. The burden of proof is on the Commonweatlh -- the defense attorney need only instill doubt about the prosecution's theory of the case to prevail. Mr. Lawrence may have done all this, though, and it was just not picked up by the news media.
The second thing that struck me about the closings was the .Commonweatlh Attorney's over-the-top emotion in his argument. There were numerous comments from local media to the effect that they had never seen him break down into tears during a trial before. That caused me to question was that an act? If not, and I really don't think it was, why this case?? This C.A. has been at it a long time. He has tried many murder cases. He should have been able to keep it together. Did his emotion sway the jury at all?
From the get go, I thought this case was overcharged, as the facts negated premeditation on their face -- and as the jury quickly concluded. When a year+ after the fact, the prosecutor piled on the felony murder charge and the other felony charges of Robbery, Burglary and Grand Larceny, I became even more concerned that the prosecutor was being overzealous in this case. To me, based on the evidence reported, the correct verdict was either some form of manslaughter or Murder 2. I asked for other examples of charging decisions by this C.A. in past-similar cases, but got none. To this day, I still wonder why the C.A. took the positions he did, because contrary to those calling for justice for Ms. Love, that really isn't the C.A.'s job. His responsibility is to do justice for the Commonwealth based on the facts before him. Now, one possibility is those extra charges were kind of insurance to steer the jury toward Murder 2. After all the uproar over the Alston verdict several years ago, maybe the CA was expecting a compromise verdict. So instead of the leaving the jury to choose between involuntary manslaughter, voluntary manslaughter, and Murder 2 -- with the risk they would compromise on voluntary manslaughter, he loaded up the charges so that Murder 2 looked more like a middle ground.
Of course, all of the above is just my opinion.
(Please excuse any typos in the above -- the single-spaced, small type is hard to read.)
I gotta say, JWG...I'm with the others on the you gotta give it a rest suggestion. They were hopeful (knew M2 was likely and why not shoot for vol. manslaughter) to pull off the "hey, folks, surely you understand... College kids, intoxicated on lifestyle, sex, booze and drama...fueled emotions...sure, did a bad thing but of course never meant to" blah, blah. That was pretty much it, and I thought they did a poor job, almost ill-prepared, but in a way attractive as you only gotta lock one juror in on your side.
It's kind of painful to watch you hang onto the adderal thing. Do you really think it's got more to do with that than a raging jealous drunken guy beating her about? It's what it is...it's as simple as she'd be alive had he not blown a fuse and he does bear responsibility. It just wouldn't have happened w/out him. Whether she was dead when he left or not, no matter how lit he was, he still knew right from wrong (as evidenced by actions) and made choices...leading up to, during and after. So I guess my thoughts along these lines go out to others purporting the issues of college drinking, sports/wealth cultures, etc. and why (to some, not all) we need to cut this kid some slack. Yes, I agree those are issues requiring thought, discussion and action but, in the end in this case, it boils down to what I outlined above...the guy knew himself, had enough intelligence to make choices, and chose some ugly sh*t. I'm w/ the others who subscribe to "yeah these things all contribute, but 99.9 of the countless college kids kill..." Anyway JWG...it just seems you talka da smack...I seriously hope you don't really subscribe to that load to the extent I think you seem to.
Uh, you know I meant to type "99.9% of countless college kids Don't kill." Strange read otherwise...curse these little smartphone keyboards.
@JWG, what is the ratio of Adderall deaths to users? Just curious...people die from getting struck by lightening.
Why do you care, it doesn't make a damn bit of difference to you or anyone else here. If you really want to know, prove it - look it up and come back and tell us all. And be sure to include the statistics on those who die after mixing Adderall and alcohol, and caffeine too, since her alcoholic beverage very well could have contained caffeine (particularly lethal when mixed amphetamines) without her realizing it. (Of course I'm sure the police were looking into exactly what she had been drinking that night while they interrogated Huguely and saved the bottles/cans for the jury to examine.)
@WhoaNelly, while your running down your assignment from jwg, see if you can find statistics for deaths amongst adderal users who are drinking and getting beat in the head and choked or suffocated.
Well, which is it? Beaten? Choked? Suffocated? There's a medley of confliction for you.
no confliction (is that a word?) all words based on evidence adduced at trial.
Whatever.
Mike @ 10:56. That was really good- thanks.
JWG- I'm amazed you're still at this. Doesn't matter if it was one or all three, as far as I am concerned- the guy, through his choices and actions, is responsible for her death. Period.
Adderall, generic amphetamine and dextroamphetamine, is a stimulant used to treat children and an increasing number of adults for a condition known as Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Reports of adverse effects made to the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) have linked Adderall and other ADHD drugs to death and other serious side effects.
Important Adderall information was contained in a February 2006 FDA report that cited 51 deaths in patients taking ADHD medications. These drugs, which include Adderall, have been clearly linked to cardiovascular problems, including high blood pressure, heart attacks, stroke, hypertension, and arrhythmia, in both children and adults. These drugs have also been tentatively linked to some cases of sudden death in children. The FDA has declared that it will conduct thorough research on the safety of Adderall and other ADHD drugs.
Between 1999 and 2003, there were 24 deaths of patients in the U.S. linked to Adderall, a higher death rate than for any other ADHD drug. There were 16 deaths in that period linked to Ritalin use and 11 deaths linked to other ADHD drugs. Another 30 deaths were reported from other sources outside the U.S.
If you or someone you love is currently taking Adderall or another ADHD drug, familiarize yourself with the side effects and consult with your health care provider about alternative forms of treatment. If you or your child has suffered injury or other damages caused by taking Adderall, you may be entitled to compensation. Your first step is to have your case evaluated by a qualified Adderall attorney. See Adderall Attorney and Lawyer – How to Hire to find someone to help you with your claim.
I had a close friend who grew up taking Ritalin and took it into his adult life. He had a heart attack at age 19. Now he's dead. Nobody bashed his head in either.
JWG is from Canada. He doesn't have enough to do up there and is fixated on making life annoying for the Hook readers. He's a dog with a bone and if it's not Adderall it's something else.
Maybe consider a hobby JWG: baking/pastry making could be quite therapeutic for you. Have you tried it?
It's annoying 'cause it's true.
AngieL: I don't really care if you don't believe I was a juror. If you look carefully I've identified myself as Juror 013, not Juror 13. If any of my fellow jurors are reading this thread (and apparently they're not), they would know exactly who I am. As would Judge Hogshire (though I had my back to him most of the time after voir dire), Corporal Feggens, Deputy Jackson, the prosecution and defense teams, GWHV himself, Sharon and Lexie Love, and anyone else sitting in the first 3 rows of either side of the courtroom with any regularity.
As for you, JWG, there was ample evidence from toxicologists. Dr Mistry also performed mulitple electorcodiograms on Yeardley and every other athelete on aderall, and no heart abnormalities were found. Also, that night was not the first time Yeardley mixed alcohol and adderal. There was NO DOUBT in the jury's mind that Yeardley would have woken up alive the next morning if it wasn't for the damage inflicted by George. Maybe it was unfortunate that we didn't have the testimony of the doctors of the Canadian Health Service, that bastion of cutting edge government sponsored biomedical research (end sarcasm) at our disposal. But none of you, including you, JWG, saw the "after" pictures. There was no doubt that GWHV caused Yearley's death, not adderal and alcohol.
If she might still be alive had she not been mixing adderall, alcohol, and God knows what else (which is impossible to prove otherwise - a burden the prosecution is held to unequivocally) then it doesn't matter whether she would have been alive had George never been there that night. Apparently the judge never explained that to you. It's called extenuating circumstances.
If you need any more evidence Huguely did not recieve a fair trial and never had any hope of recieving a fair trial, just look at juror 013's sarcastic comments on Adderall's dangers and his/her inability to even recognize that the above documented deaths came from the FDA and not from the Canadian Government, which had the sense to ban it after it killed so many there in short order.
I wonder how many jurors were giving Adderall to their children or taking it themselves. I'm sure the jury selection process weeded them out meticulously.
Did Yeardley Love have a few drinks before her cardiology exam? How about those other athletes?
WTF, Still At It? Who gives a shit If it's the Canadian Health Service or the FDA? There was ample evidence presented that adderall and alcohol did not cause Yeardley's death. You weren't there. You did not see all the evidence. I'm tired of all this.
Al and An Observer are the only 2 I've seen (the last 2 days I've only been skimming this, so my apologies to any I may have missed) who've had any modicum of reason in this. The rest of you need to chill.
Seriously folks: What part of "YOU WEREN"T THERE" don't you understand?
May I remind you that you weren't there either. And if by "ample evidence" you mean Dr. Mistry's completely irrelevant, jury biasing, never-should-have-been-admitted alcohol-free cardiogram, then yeah I'm sure you got your money's worth. Of course plenty of contradictory evidence was blocked by the judge, a fact which I find myself having to point out as quickly as people forget/ignore it. If this comment board was a jury pool (which in a way it is) you'd be kicked out of here for conflict of interest anyway. It's too hard to admit someone might be rotting in jail for the rest of their life because of a mistake you can't reverse. Not that I don't welcome your comments, you've helped poke even more holes in this watering can.
I wasn't there? Are you freaking kidding me? You need help JWG.
You mean you saw George Huguely kill Yeardley Love? Well why didn't you just say so...
Or did you just mean your were present at the toxicology exam? Just want to be clear here.
You are clearly not a native born son of the planet earth. Get some sleep JWG.
I mean, you've already cited completely irrelevant and biasing testimony as part of the reason you found the way you did, demonstrating yourself to be unfit for jury duty due to lack of intelligence. It doesn't matter if you were there in the courtroom if you're a retard. In fact, that actually strengthens my case that Huguely didn't recieve a fair trial. Retarded jury. It could be precedent setting.
Still At It and JWG is AIC Bond: the kook from Kanada. Go bake your butter pies Bond and shut up you sound as nuts as you are. Go somewhere and tell your story where ppl care. Cos we don't here.
But you're still responding a 3:04 in the morning. Beware the leaven...
And no, I'm not AIC Bond, you just want to believe I'm the only one out there with a brain. Don't flatter me.
I'm petty sure JWG is from Charlottesville.
http://george.loper.org/trends/2007/Feb/994.html
Juror 013--
Regardless of Adderall, why would you have not considered the killing reckless, instead of with malice? There was no evidence that Huguely had killed anybody or ever come close to killing anybody. So if he didn't have the intent to form premeditation, how could he have had the intent to form malice? If he was so drunk that he couldn't have committed first-degree murder, how could he have known he had left her injured? He'd been drunk and violent before, though I'm not sure the jury had evidence of that. But if you did, it seems as though it'd be only reckless for him to do it again. The report of his reaction at his interrogation suggests he had no idea she was dead.
Thanks b17. How depressing. You are most likely right as that JWG sounds as rabid and intense as the one here. Got thrown off by the Canadian stuff. How unfortunate for us here that one so similarly obsessed is attached to this crime and so in favor of the perpetrator being so set up.and innocent of wrongdoing.
Now I only hope I have not invoked the real AIC Bond to come here. I don't think I could take the 2 of them together.
Reinhold - do you consider hitting someone when you are angry (remember he kicked in her door) reckless or with malice? Alcohol is NOT an excuse.
"The report of his reaction at his interrogation suggests he had no idea she was dead." This I half disagree with after hearing Hawes' rendition of the interrogation tape. He repeated the same thing too many times to make me believe he was trying to convince the police. He was trying to convince himself that he had not done to her what he did. I don't think he knew she was dead from the first part of the interrogation, but he did know he hit her...more than once out of anger.
While you bring up some good ways to split hairs, you will never convince me the jury didn't do the right thing and I hope Judge Hogshire will do the right thing as well by upholding the jury's recommendation.
Just a reminder of "Seriously folks: What part of "YOU WEREN"T THERE" don't you understand?" from Juror 013.
b17 and FedUp - If JWG is the same in B17's post, it's not depressing...it's sick.
@Mike...that was my point. Look at my earlier post where I asked JWG how it was she died from some drug at the same moment GH was beating the life out of her. 20 people died of Adderall? What.. 20 out of 2 or 3 million on the drug? It's a non-starter.
Darnit--
The standard is beyond a reasonable doubt, not anyone's hunch of what happened. And as Dean Broderick--of UDC Law--pointed out, he was a hulking athlete. Anybody with a brother knows it's not uncommon to put holes in walls or doors. On top of that, he was drunk. The sentence is, as Dean Broderick put it, crushing. The prosecution has to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that it was more than recklessness. I think they failed. I'd like to know from a juror whether I missed something or whether they had access to something that the public didn't that would, beyond a reasonable doubt, tip the balance.
Darnit--
Huguely didn't have the burden to make anybody believe anything. The prosecution had the burden to prove the evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. There's plenty of doubt, hence the debates on here. I think some of the doubt is reasonable. To have a powerful role in putting Huguely in prison for 26 years, you'd better be able to argue persuasively why you believed that the prosecution proved beyond a reasonable doubt that he showed malice and not recklessness. The evidence the public has shows pretty strongly that it was recklessness. I'm interested to know whether the jury's decision was grounded in evidence the public never heard.
Reinhold -- the VA model jury instruction on Malice, which some believe was the instruction given to the Huguely jury, might hold the answer here:
"Malice is that state of mind which results in the intentional doing of a wrongful act to another without legal excuse or justification, at a time when the mind of the actor is under the control of reason. Malice may result from any unlawful or unjustifiable motive including anger, hatred or revenge. Malice may be inferred from any deliberate willful and cruel act against another, however sudden.
Heat of passion excludes malice when that heat of passion arises from provocation that reasonably produces an emotional state of mind such as hot blood, rage, anger, resentment, terror or fear so as to demonstrate an absence of deliberate design to kill, or to cause one to act on impulse without conscious reflection. Heat of passion must be determined from circumstances as they appeared to defendant but those circumstances must be such as would have aroused heat of passion in a reasonable person.
If a person acts upon reflection or deliberation, or after his passion has cooled or there has been a reasonable time or opportunity for cooling, then the act is not attributable to heat of passion."
And, see: http://www.snookandhaughey.com/news/day-10-of-the-huguely-case-jury-inst...
I agee with Attorney Snook, that his instruction is clear as mud, but it is essentially appeal-proof if it is in the "Model Instructions."
Based on the publicly available evidence, I may have found reasonable doubt on malice because the Commonwealth had only "theories" on what went in Ms. Love's room that night. The breaking down the door doesn't sway me, because I have college-age kids. I have seen college dorms, fraternity houses, and apartments at the end of a school year -- they often look like the surface of the moon, they are so pock-marked with holes in doors/walls/ceilings, etc. That said, I did not see the autopsy photos. I interpret what Juror 013 to be saying is the condition of her face is what swayed the jury to "malice." I am sure that is why the defense fought so hard to have them excluded as prejudicial. Maybe a productive avenue of defense would have been to provide testimony on what Ms. Love's face would have looked like to Huguely before he left her room versus the appearance hours or even days later, when the photos where taken. The autopsy photos was the biggie, but then they also looked at his knowledge of his lack of control when drinking and the fact that if he had sought help for her immediately, Ms. Love might be alive today. I am sure seeing Mrs. Love and Lexie Love every day, plus hearing no testimony to try and "humanize" Huguely, also played into their findings.
Darnit -- I have not listened to Hawes's rendition of the tape transcript, but come on. Hawes has had an agenda since the beginning of his reporting on this case. It is not reasonable to draw conclusions about Huguely's feelings/knowledge, etc., based on Hawes's "dramatic reading" of the transcript of that tape. Fortunately, the jury saw the actual tape.
I wonder if the sentence would have been different if the jury knew 1.) that the rough average in VA for a conviction on second degree murder is 19 years, and 2.) in a very recent case in Charlottesville the jury recommended 15 years on a Murder 2 conviction where a middle-aged man stabbed his wife 10+ times, killing her. That is where I have a problem with the length of the sentence -- the disparity with other, similar cases. I don't see Judge Hogshire reducing Huguely's, though. The jury provided him plenty of cover.
An Observer--
I'm sure the defense fought to have the photos excluded because they wanted the outcome to be based on the law, not on emotion. I don't think heat of passion was a good argument because there's nothing to suggest he acted in the heat of passion. But the facts we have suggest recklessness. If the jury concluded that he could not have the mental state to premeditate because he'd had at least 15 drinks that day, that would seem to contradict the conclusion that he had the mental state to know she was badly hurt and thus call for help. If the jury reasoned some other way, I'd love to hear it. But if your theory is right, it appears the defense was right--the probative value of those photos should have been outweighed by unfair prejudice.
You're right Darnit, it's sick. 100% sick. And sickening to continue to hear this loser beat his dead horse.
Reinhold get a grip, the jury found it to be malice. Because you don't like it or think this monsterous thug got a too long a sentence is just too bad for you. Juror 013 was there and saw what they saw, you weren't. Deal with it.
Why you want to see this thug's sentenced reduced for taking an innocent life is beyond the beyond. Even reckless behavior such as this should get 26 years.
I'm so tired of drunks and these types getting behind the wheel of car and b/c they are drunk, after they've killed someone, say I was drunk and didn't know what I was doing. Is that reckless or malice? I say malice b/c we've known now for too many years the damage drunks do when they drive. If a person is out drinking and gets behind the wheel of a car and kills someone that in my book is Malice. It could even be premeditated if the person knows they are a chronic drunk and have blackouts. When are we gonna hold people responsible for their irresponsible and wicked, purposefully neglecfful, arrogant behaviors, and with malice? I for one am tired of the damage and losses these types bring to those of us who are law abiding citizens.
I'm also tired of their apologists.
Fed Up--
That's an interesting opinion. But Huguely wasn't driving drunk. The evidence--as far as we know--didn't show that he'd ever come anywhere near killing someone--before Love--while he was drunk. So that would make his behavior, at most, reckless. Just because we don't approve of the behavior doesn't mean he deserves 26 years. If you're dissatisfied with the law, lobby the legislature. But under our current law, all of the evidence the public has been privy to suggests a reasonable doubt about malice, but not recklessness. If the jury saw or heard some other persuasive evidence, I'd love to hear it.
I honestly don't understand the world some of these posters here see around college kids and drunk people.
The drunk people who beat up others when at the time they're sober, they're meek as lambs. Then the poster above saying college kids rooms look like the surface of the moon?. Are you kidding me?
My husband and I own an apartment bldg that is primarily rented to college kids. We have the "occasional" punched wall period. There are heavy deposits on these apartments and practically every kid at the end of the year wants that money refunded to them. Most all college kids are not animals and not violent out of control animals in the way that is being portrayed by those who choose to defend George H. My goodness, you'd think college is a zoo or circus to hear people go on and on about how ill mannered these kids are. I had 3 children who all went to college and were in dorms, apartments and frat/sorority houses. Never did I see this sort of damage. Most people have raised mostly well behaved children as far as I can see living in a college town and owning property, having known children of friends and my own kids. If there is the occasional acting out of either sort-a fight or having too much fun, ect... the police are called before things get too out of hand and /or other kids break it up.
It is getting old to hear the excuses being made for George H.'s violent and criminal actions. Most all college kids are light years from him.
If a police officer approaches you but does not place you under arrest, you are under no obligation to converse with that police officer. You have every legal right to walk away from him if you ask him if you're under arrest for some crime and he says "no I just want to talk to you." The police officer did not place me under arrest, but instead violated my freedom of movement by summoning another officer to surround me and prevent me from leaving even though they still knew they couldn't arrest me for anything, least of all making death threats, without putting their house in jeopardy. So they didn't. They continued to block my freedom of movement without cause (harrassment), I expressed my distasted for their actions, called the police seargent by his first name, they viewed my displeasure at being harrassed as a behavior they could weave a loophole with, I got detained and tortured for ten days without charges, juries, or any of that other good stuff George Huguely got. I contact the media in hopes of bringing attention to this police misconduct, and instead of saying to me "we agree with you we'll do a story to expose this" they pretended they were empathetic to my plight and then libelled me in print stating that I had made death threats, a class six felony I was never charged with or convicted of. I threatened to sue them and they printed a retraction in a tiny little blip. If my legal rights had been respected from the get go, I would never have contacted the media whose report you cite (not even original source by the way). In short, I know what it feels like to be denied justice, locked up, and libelled by the media and public and so I empathize with George Huguely. But go ahead and have your fun.
Of course if I had the money George had I would have just skipped the media, gotten a good lawyer , and I'd be in living in that cops house now.
FedUp! I really couldn't have said that better!!!
Dear Jimbo, John Boy, Fed Up, Isabelle (who are all the same person),
You need to gracefully bow out of here for your sock-puppetry and for misusing a real person's email address that's not your own. And, really, this whole thread has turned inane, so I'm turning off new commenting on this story, and I'll turn them off on other stories if I think comment policies are being violated.--hawes spencer