As I was getting ready for my last day at FMF (yes, it has come to an end), I was watching the Today show and they featured this story about a woman, Jaycee Lee Dugard, who had been abducted in 1991 at age 11 who has just be found alive, living with her abductor and their 2 children.Her abductor and rapist, Phillip Garrido, had kept her and the 2 children she had by him locked up in a compound, behind fences and tents in back of his home. He was finally found when he was spotted with his two children, both daughters, as he tried to enter onto University of California's campus to hand out religious literature.
Apparently, Garrido was planning on setting up a church of his own and become a full time preacher. In a blog that he kept, he is cited as writing that In he could "control sound with my mind and have developed a device for others to witness this phenomena." Weird, I know.
What is quite shocking about this whole circumstance is that Garrido had a very long rap sheet including other charges of rape and he was on lifetime parole. So why did it take 18 years to finally solve this case? Why wasn't he being watch more closely? Did his parole officer not see the compound of tents he had hiding the background?
Honestly, this story scares me. First off, to think that people could do this to one another, keep each other prisoner as their sex slaves. Secondly, that the laws and enforcement that are supposed to keep things like this from happening let something as large as this slip through the cracks. I am so glad that Jaycee is alive and is well, but others are not so lucky.
So what can we do to make sure things like this don't happen again? It's hard to answer, but I think that creating better awareness and pushing for stricter and more closely monitored sex offender laws will help instances like this not fall through the cracks. As far as stopping people from kidnapping and keep them as sex slaves, I'm not sure. But I find it very sad and very scary.
Photo courtesy of Julie McLeod on flikr.com
What is quite shocking about this whole circumstance is that Garrido had a very long rap sheet including other charges of rape and he was on lifetime parole. So why did it take 18 years to finally solve this case? Why wasn't he being watch more closely? Did his parole officer not see the compound of tents he had hiding the background?
Honestly, this story scares me. First off, to think that people could do this to one another, keep each other prisoner as their sex slaves. Secondly, that the laws and enforcement that are supposed to keep things like this from happening let something as large as this slip through the cracks. I am so glad that Jaycee is alive and is well, but others are not so lucky.
So what can we do to make sure things like this don't happen again? It's hard to answer, but I think that creating better awareness and pushing for stricter and more closely monitored sex offender laws will help instances like this not fall through the cracks. As far as stopping people from kidnapping and keep them as sex slaves, I'm not sure. But I find it very sad and very scary.
Photo courtesy of Julie McLeod on flikr.com
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