Lively Case Discussion #509 8/9 - 8/10/2006

[klaasend]

You all know the rules

[klaasend]

Did I loose you guys?  

[2NJSons_Mom]

like your avatar, blah...nice.

[San]

Did I loose you guys?  

Nope

[2NJSons_Mom]

Did I loose you guys?  

You calling us 'loose'???  

[Anna]

Here is the entire scoop on USAToday.  And with this, I have to go work and lurk. . . . .


quote="nonesuche"]Anna-

What about the windsurfer who vanished from the HI without a trace, or the young boy who vanished in the waters while jet-skiing with that older man? I wish I had kept that information.[/quote]

I have told him of those two other missing Americans but think he will respond that they are not officially listed as murders.   ONLY as missing.  Yeah, right!  But we know that trick now is how they keep their murder rate deceptively low.

But we will find the two or three more that will put Aruba definitely higher than the U.S. even with all the false classification they do to prevent the truth of the matter from being known.  And they have their all too willing accomplices in the MSM to assist them in preventing people from knowing what really goes on there.

I am also going to send him a little background on one of Aruba's most upstanding citizens, Michael Posner, as well.  


Here is the address of the man who wrote the article stating that there had only been one murder in Aruba in the past twenty years for USAToday

travel@davidgrossman.net


Here is his address at the paper.  You put Grossman in the subject line to see that it is directed to him:

travel@usatoday.com <travel@usatoday.com>.

This is a link to an article in USAToday and this Grossman who wrote it says that Aruba has had one murder in the last twenty years. I have already written to him protesting that statement but the horror of it is he made it apparently speaking to a group of travel agents!!

Please write to Mr Grossman if you feel so inclined and request that he correct this horrific disinformation. Here is the article and his email address is at the bottom of the article.

http://tinyurl.com/mg6ju

Justinsmama found this:

This what Grossman at USA Today wrote:

Quote:
Many people say they feel safe when traveling. But our sense of "safe" is often distorted by media coverage (or the lack of it) and distance, according to Tarlow. For example, the disappearance of Natalee Holloway gained worldwide attention and caused a decline in visitors to Aruba, even though it is the safest island in the Caribbean with only one murder reported in the last 20 years.


To report corrections and clarifications, contact Reader Editor Brent Jones at 1-800-872-7073 or e-mail accuracy@usatoday.com


So here we can have all the contact infomation at one place although you can go to the USATODAY website and write to the travel editor who is also the boss of this Grossman who write one murder in the last twenty years in Aruba and tells that to a group of travel agents!

[klaasend]

Did I loose you guys?  

You calling us 'loose'???  

Yes..and I never said I could spell..ha ha ha

[2NJSons_Mom]

Has there ever been a conspiracy investigation in Aruba, or in NL?  Guess I should do some research on my own, later.

[blah]

like your avatar, blah...nice.

thanks, Anna gave it to me.

[flyingmermaid]

Hi Monkeys!

I am finally in the office after 2 days of Monster.com training at a Beautiful Hotel in Fort Lauderdale!

It was awesome!

[ldstlou]

Posted: Wed Aug 09, 2006 4:01 pm    Post subject:    

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holy Cow!! I am gone a few days and I can't believe all the statements that have come out!! Going to cathch up tonight...but real quick...where did these staements come from? I mean who leaked them

??

[msmarple]

Folks - I mean Monkeys,

I know Anna and I have been blitzing Mr. Grossman. I think we need to start sending this stuff to the State Dept. I'm working on a better-than-blind contact name there. (No, I don't know Condi or anyone - I have simply requested a name, in an email from the web site.)

Our goal should be to get this place on the Travel Warning list (or whatever it's called). The strategy is that by picking out the crimes in the woodwork (wormwood?) on Aruba, we can disprove the stats the island officially release (or proclaim to the travel industry).

We need our Murders on Aruba thread back. Or start another one. We will need some sort of source if possible for each of the incidents we pull together.

Also. We need for someone to politely request the crime records for Aruba from ALE. Who would be a good person for that? Should it be a "name" - or just an innocent, potential tourist-type person?

[ldstlou]

Posted: Wed Aug 09, 2006 4:01 pm    Post subject:    

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holy Cow!! I am gone a few days and I can't believe all the statements that have come out!! Going to cathch up tonight...but real quick...where did these staements come from? I mean who leaked them

??

Klaas...did you already make a map showing where Deepak said he dropped off Joran on this latest statement? I can't picture it?

[klaasend]

Posted: Wed Aug 09, 2006 4:01 pm    Post subject:    

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
holy Cow!! I am gone a few days and I can't believe all the statements that have come out!! Going to cathch up tonight...but real quick...where did these staements come from? I mean who leaked them

??

Klaas...did you already make a map showing where Deepak said he dropped off Joran on this latest statement? I can't picture it?

I'm not sure if I have that..been too busy preparting statements for Red to post.  You have no idea how much work there is that goes into it.  

As far as where they came from and why they are being leaked now that is a question for Red to answer.

[ldstlou]

Posted: Wed Aug 09, 2006 4:01 pm    Post subject:    

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
holy Cow!! I am gone a few days and I can't believe all the statements that have come out!! Going to cathch up tonight...but real quick...where did these staements come from? I mean who leaked them

??

Klaas...did you already make a map showing where Deepak said he dropped off Joran on this latest statement? I can't picture it?

I'm not sure if I have that..been too busy preparting statements for Red to post.  You have no idea how much work there is that goes into it.  

As far as where they came from and why they are being leaked now that is a question for Red to answer.

Gotcha Sweetie!!  Not really important where they came from...just glad we have them...I just wondered if it was public. knowledge..have a feeling I know where they came from anyway...I take it there are more coming!!?? Looking forward to jumping in tonight to analyze. Thanks for your comments!!

[ldstlou]

Posted: Wed Aug 09, 2006 4:01 pm    Post subject:    

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
holy Cow!! I am gone a few days and I can't believe all the statements that have come out!! Going to cathch up tonight...but real quick...where did these staements come from? I mean who leaked them

??

Klaas...did you already make a map showing where Deepak said he dropped off Joran on this latest statement? I can't picture it?

I'm not sure if I have that..been too busy preparting statements for Red to post.  You have no idea how much work there is that goes into it.  

As far as where they came from and why they are being leaked now that is a question for Red to answer.

Thanks again for all of your hard work Klaas!! You are terrific!!

[Smish]

the big hammer wrote:
van der Straaten

He handles interrogations of jvds, but not other two. He is directly involved w/ sloot throughout questioning, but never kalpoe.

This is another important piece. And something new (at least to me).

RE statement of June 13. As noted by others, van der Straaten signs this document on June 17, and presumably submits it then. This delay is a problem. This is not only strange, but is procedural breach. And in case so important to Aruba, this failure to follow procedure is glaring, and an oversight a seasoned, ranking police officer simply would not make.

Unless...there was a reason to.


Exactly, Hammer. What did van der Straaten have to do from Monday afternoon the 13th until sometime Friday the 17th before signing? Glaring is exactly what it is, imo.
Maybe we need to go back and see exactly what was going on in the so called investigation between june 13th and june 17th?What were they doing in this time period?

[Jacqueline]

Hi Monkeys!

I am finally in the office after 2 days of Monster.com training at a Beautiful Hotel in Fort Lauderdale!

It was awesome!

Missed ya my sistah!

Welcome Back!

[Smish]

Smish wrote:
[So if Joran already told Deepak that he would find a way home that night,why did Deepak wait up to make sure Joran got home?Could Deepak be lying here?Could he have told Joran he WOULD pick him up?
Just not a normal thing for GUYS to do....wait up for a"ok,I'm home"call from another guy friend.


Anna:
Smish,
Yes, I agree that this is just tremendously odd! None of the parents care enough to even know where these kids are or where they have been or how drunk they are and yet these two are oh so tenderly guarding each other to their home safely??

Besides, what would be to worry about since there is no crime at all on One Happy Island, what could possibly go wrong? I don't think I have ever seen such tenderness in two guys for each other in such casual circumstances. Never heard one of my sons calling some guy to say they got home OK. A girl, yes, but never another guy.
*****************************
I agree Anna.Deepak makes this waiting for Joran's call sound like something he is required to do,something he has done about 20 times before,something he was told to do as part of the whole PIMP game plan.

[msmarple]

Okay, Monkeys -here's another one from a site called http://www.lostremote.com/archives/005685.html . It's dated August 9, but I can't tell if it's 2005 or 2006. (However, the archives only include 2006.) Apparently it's a blog that critiques TV coverage of news events.

Maybe we have some 'splaing to do to him.

Notice the links at the bottom, which might be useful.

Aruba: Murder by numbers
As Coverage Mania of the Holloway story continues unabated, let's do some math. I know - we got into journalism precisely because we were told there would be no math. But let's do some anyway and answer empirically: Just how dangerous is that vicious, pirate-ridden, uncaring island of Aruba?

BY STEVE SAFRAN
LOST REMOTE MANAGING EDITOR

The population of Aruba is about 72,000 people. A conservative estimate of visitors in a given week is about 13,500. Total people on island at any given time? About 85,500.

Last year in Aruba there were two murders - possibly just one, depending on which stat you believe. We'll go with two anyway. No tourists were killed. That's a murder rate on Aruba of a little over 2 per 100,000, but we’ll call it an even 2. Or look at it this way: The Aruba murder rate is .0002.

Still, you can't go a minute without hearing about Natalee and you're worried. Maybe you're switching your vacation from Aruba to Jamaica. Bring some Kevlar. Murder rate: 32 per 100,000.

You'll be twice as safe in Puerto Rico as you would be in Jamaica. Still, it's eight times more dangerous than Aruba: 16 per 100,000 folks in Puerto Rico are going to meet an untimely end this year (with or without Greta Van Sustern caring).

If you're fine with 10 in 100,000 murders per capita, we can suggest Mexico, Estonia, Belize, the Dominican Republic and maybe Barbados during a bad year. Feel a little more secure in Costa Rica. Of your 100,000 friends, 99,994 won't get capped.

So, stick to the U.S. Virgin Islands. We run it. How bad could it be? Turns out you better leave behind a lot of clues if you're going there: 25 murders per 100,000. That's worse than ANY American city, save for New Orleans where shooting guns into the air is considered good, clean fun. The British Virgin Islands are more polite, but say “cheerio” to 11 per 100,000 chaps.

Screw it, you think, I'll just stay home. Now you're only three times as likely to be killed as if you went to Aruba, with the U.S. murder rate at about 6 per 100,000. The murder rate in New York City, from where Fox News constantly reminds us how dangerous Aruba is, was 7 per 100,000 people in 2002. And if your home is in, let's say, Alabama, up the murder rate to 7.5 per 100,000. Then wonder if one of your congressman will call for a boycott of your own state.

Obviously, there are safer places to vacation than Aruba. Go to Slovenia, Tunisia, Indonesia, Saudi Arabia or Qatar and you're golden. Go to Canada, and you're as safe as you could be. Of course, it's colder than Aruba, but the murder rate is tiny. And it's much less likely your family will be pestered by Nancy Grace. She's from the south. She hates the cold.

I got a certain amount of hate mail regarding my last column on Aruba media insanity. (Ironically, Aruba Today's editor said she loved it.) One eloquent writer asked "Do you have a life?" I think it's pretty obvious the answer is "No, of course not. I work in news." One person asked, simply "What is your point?" Context. That's my point. I am not mocking this tragedy, nor the importance of it to the family. What I am so troubled by is a national media obsession that is making Aruba look as though it is run by the Sopranos. Before we ruin the Aruban economy, which is dependent on tourism, here is a little more context:

Natalee disappeared on May 30, 2005. Also on that date, five U.S. soldiers died in Iraq: Corp. Jeffrey B. Starr died in Ramadi, and SSGT. Casey Crate, Captain Derek Argel, Captain Jeremy Fresques and Major William Downes died in Jalawah.

There are currently 19 kids from Alabama listed as missing at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children website. (2 are from before 1980, some are indeed "family abductions" or "runaways".)

In South Africa, two young tourists were murdered the day after Natalee went missing.

LaToyia Figueroa, a 24-year-old pregnant woman from South Philadelphia, has been missing since July. She is Black. There has been just about no media coverage (except for stories wondering why there's no media coverage). Contrast that with the non-stop madness surrounding Laci Peterson, a 27-year-old pregnant woman from Modesto, California, who was white.

35,000 children are forced to work as prostitutes just across the sea from Aruba, in Colombia.

It's unlikely you’ll be murdered in Aruba, and it’s even more unlikely the news will care. Of course, there are ways to skew the numbers. It turns out you can geometrically expand the odds of having your story covered if you’re a cute white girl with an articulate mother during a slow news cycle. This should generate a significant spike in ratings numbers; after all, that’s the only stat that really matters.

Sources:

Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), International Comparisons of Criminal Justice Statistics 2001-Home Office Bulletin 12/03 http://www.ascotadvisory.com/News_Bulletin/9961.html

Georgia State U. Department of Criminal Justice Statistical Analysis Bureau: http://www.cjgsu.net/initiatives/HomRates-2004-05-14.htm
Iraq Casualties from Centcom.mil, via Iraq Coalition Casualty Count http://icasualties.org/oif/ Black America Web: http://www.blackamericaweb.com/site.aspx/bawnews/figueroa808
Colombia Journal Online: http://www.colombiajournal.org/colombia111.htm

With assistance (and math help) from: Julia Renfro, Editor in Chief, Aruba Today; RD Sahl, Anchor, NECN: Jeff Gralnick, MSNBC; Tom Melville, Asst. ND, NECN Posted by Steve Safran on 08/16/05 | Link | Comments (21)