In January 2007, the world stood up and took notice when U.S. Border Patrol Agent Nicholas Corbett gunned down an illegal immigrant without provocation. Still…as it’s been for the past eight years, people chose sides on this one. Siding with the immigrant was Mexican President Felipe Calderon, encouraging a complete investigation.

Francisco Javier Dominguez Rivera, 22, of Puebla, Mexico, was crossing the southern Arizona desert with two of his brothers and one of their girlfriend’s when Corbett caught the group and began to arrest them. According to Dominiguez’s companions, he was going to his knees to surrender when Corbett shot him. However, the defense attorneys said that the agent shot in self-defense after Dominguez tried to hit him with a rock.

In the end, an Arizona judge declared a mistrial after a jury deadlocked in the case against Agent Nicholas Corbett on three possible charges: second-degree murder, manslaughter or negligent homicide.

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Once upon a time in New York, a black man named John White was found guilty of fatally shooting a white teen. However, in December, 2007, one of the jurors came out of the courtroom closet, so to speak, stating that he helped convict the man for shooting and killing the boy but felt pressured by other jurors and the judge to change his vote to guilty during a deliberating session.

Convicting White (54) of second-degree manslaughter in the August 2006 shooting of 17-year-old Daniel Cicciaro, Jr., the man faces a prison term of five to 15 years and remains free on bail. Defense attorneys argued that White feared a “lynch mob” had come to attack his family when a group of white teens came to White’s house to confront his son.

Juror Francois Larche said that during a long weekend where the jurors were stuck in a room trying to come to a decision, he endured a lot of “pressure” by fellow jurors and the judge to close this case and go home.

“I thought about my family and the families of the other jurors,” Larche said. “It was not worth it in the end.”

Jury forewoman Maureen Steigerwald denied that the judge, a 12-hour deliberating session on Saturday — the fourth day of deliberations — or the holidays played a role in the jury’s decision.

However, if one juror is feeling badly about his final decision, this brings up a big problem. Although this case was closed (until the appeal) several months ago, the juror’s statement should still be mentioned today. With a man’s life at stake, better instructions and possibly a time limitation (that exclude weekends and offer break periods) may need to be considered. After all, sending someone to prison for many years to wrap up a case isn’t a fair deal. But then again, who ever said the law was always fair?

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I’m running out of words regarding the pedophile epidemic. Why the law protects pedophiles rather than locking them up and losing the key is beyond me. And to make matters worse, lawmakers turn around and act surprised when yet another child gets harmed and sometimes killed. Pedophiles are the most dangerous offenders out there because they prey on children, preventing them from having a chance at a normal life. They are the cause of future corruption including (but not limited to), suicides, drug addiction, prison overcrowding, teen crime, and psychological disorders such as depression. Pedophiles are proven NOT to ever get better, meaning, pedophiles will always strike again. And pedophiles roam the streets in every town of every city around the world. Is your child safe from them? No. Are they recognizable? No. In fact, pedophiles are highly manipulative people who make you believe they are the “good guy.” Helpful, trustworthy-appearing, and friendly is their MO. Hidden so well, they are commonly a member of your own family and you don’t even know it. Easier to point fingers at a stranger, pedophiles who are related to you know this and are able to remain hidden for years, if not life, because no one is willing to see the small elephant in the room. Maybe that is how Brooke Bennett, a 12-year-old Vermont girl, was able to vanish with her uncle, never to return alive.

Michael Jacques, the young victim’s uncle, is facing federal kidnapping charges and possible murder charges if the death of his niece is ruled a homicide, said U.S. attorney Thomas Anderson.

After finding Brooke dead in a fresh grave off a road in Randolph, Jacques was arrested Sunday on a charge of sexually assaulting Brooke as well as another young relative, according to an affidavit filed in U.S. District Court in Burlington, Vermont. And also charged with sexually assaulting the other relative was Brooke’s former stepfather, Ray Gagnon.

Got all that?

Let me sum it up for you. Both men joined together to form a child pornography ring and who better to use as prey than those children who trusted them most? Opening up to detectives was the other relative who is still alive. She stated that Jacques had been having sex with her since she was nine-years-old and Gagnon slept with her in June, 2007. According to the relative (who’s name is remaining out of the media), it first began when she found a note under her pillow stating that she had been chosen for a sex program called “Breckenridge.”

Taken to a party on June 25, the girl told police she was informed that Brooke would be “[initiated] into the ‘Breckenridge’ program that day, and that she would have sex with adult males.”

The young girl watched Brooke go upstairs with Jacques at his home and she never saw her again. When Vermont Attorney General William H. Sorrell was asked if a ring of child abusers was at large, he replied, “There’s nothing from this investigation that’s been turned up, nor otherwise are federal and state authorities aware of any ongoing efforts to recruit young girls or boys here in Vermont to have sex with adults.”

Obviously, this guy is in serious denial as is anyone else who believes our children aren’t in danger. It’s time to stop dancing around the issue and put these guys behind bars forever. Otherwise, this ongoing problem will get bigger than we can handle, if it hasn’t already.

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