Not That You Asked, But...

Thinking of you, Lauren. “The sharp knife of a short...

Fri, 26 Aug 2011 12:14:50 -0400

Thinking of you, Lauren.

“The sharp knife of a short life…”

You deserved more time, you deserved better.

McDaniel has been charged with possession of child pornography:

Wed, 24 Aug 2011 13:31:57 -0400

Yes, indeed.

This is not surprising. I have long felt that Lauren’s slaying was sexually motivated, and there is a long history of sexually motivated murderers with affinities for child pornography regardless of the age/gender of their own victims. It is to be expected.

A few links I thought you might find interesting:
generationfiveDOTorg
restorativecirclesDOTorg

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:19:38 -0400

Very interesting indeed, thank you very much, I will be looking into these websites.

I realize that this is someone’s life we’re talking about and don’t mean to sound disrespectful, but I’m sure you understand as this is your line of work.

I’ve watched the interview with Stephen McDaniel several times. Each time I end up with more questions than answers. How did he get into Lauren’s apartment to read her email? He says “The police were called last night and they came and they looked around and they didn’t see anything, I mean, they went in, we looked (part 2)

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:17:01 -0400

You have just given me an idea for my next true update. To you and others who have posed questions about the interview and circumstances of the Wednesday-Thursday period of the investigation as Lauren was discovered, I will today write out a detailed analysis of the interview and my take on Stephen McDaniel’s behavior during that period of time.

To answer one part of your question quickly before class, Stephen entered her apartment with a group of her actual friends who were searching for her. It is interesting to note how he switches pronouns constantly, as in “I…we…” which is clearly an attempt to put distance between himself as an individual and the investigation, he wanted to be seen as part of a group. Something compelled him to agree to the interview, and I have some thoughts on that I will share at length within the next several hours. Thanks for reading :)

Barrister Hall set on my flickr account kathy63, you can see there is a window screen missing from the front lower left apartment, what was the vacant apartment I believe, when Lauren was discovered missing. There was speculation that the torso was pushed out the window and into the roll away trash can ( to avoid being seen ). I took these a few weeks ago around the 1st of Aug. Not sure how long the screen has been missing however.

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:09:47 -0400

THANK YOU. I felt that would be a viable option, using the window, considering its proximity to the trash bins aside the building. I will look at them ASAP.

are you married?

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:08:56 -0400

…

Yes. Sort of. I’m separated and my husband is back in Israel [he is of Jewish Moldovan/Buryat descent but is an Israeli national]. The silly things we do when we’re young…

I mean this to be completely complimentary, but has anyone told you that you have a sort of Wednesday Adams streak to you? Not that I know what I think a zombie prepping, zealous forensic psychiatry student would be like. Your range of interest are so interesting!

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:07:30 -0400

LOL, in childhood, when the movie came out, that’s all I ever heard! I had the hair, too. ;/

As someone who knew Lauren, I really appreciate your blog. We, some friends who graduated from Agnes Scott in 2006 with Lauren, have been constantly running through the few details we have of the case. Of course our biggest questions are why anyone would do this and how they did it. We wonder how because of course we hope she didn't experience much pain or terror. It's heartbreaking. The impact runs far deeper than Lauren's immediate family. Some of us, hundreds of miles away, are now afraid to be alone. If this could happen to Lauren, it could happen to any of us. I don't know if the killer intended to terrorise an entire community, but he has done just that. She was fierce, confident, physically & mentally strong, and damn you really could see her smile coming from across the college quad. Your very articulate perspectives have somehow been comforting to me. I'm so glad to know there are people, like you, who study the psychology of criminals. It gives me hope that maybe we can, at least in some cases, provide effective treatment for individuals who are capable of such horror.

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 08:05:42 -0400

I am humbled by the fact that anything I have written could provide comfort in some way for Lauren’s loved ones. I have spent a lot of time thinking of Lauren lately, not Lauren “the victim” but Lauren the individual. It has become more and more of an emotional sore spot for me, because my heart is broken that she was taken from such a beautiful and loving family at a time in her life when she had the entire world in front of her. I have also gotten to know several of her friends through correspondence, and judging from their personalities it seems she surrounded herself with so many incredibly intelligent, warm human beings. That says a lot about who she was.

I will say that so far, my opinion is that other than an initial struggle [as evidenced by the presence of scratch marks on suspect Stephen McDaniel] I don’t believe the bulk of the horror was committed while Lauren was alive. I don’t believe she suffered greatly or for a prolonged period of time. I wish I could say with certainty that she did not suffer at all, but Lauren was a fighter, no easy prey for anyone, so I do believe she went down fighting. I also don’t think her killer wanted or anticipated that, because all signs point to him having been a COWARD. More specifically, I view him as what is termed an “internalizer” type, which basically means he did not want to truly face his victim while she was alive. He most likely blitzed her in an attempted sneak attack, knowing Lauren was a strong and willful woman. I believe he was partially unsuccessful in that part of his plan and she managed to struggle while somehow incapacitated. The reason I believe she was incapacitated/disabled in the initial blitz by her assailant is that in my view, he could not have taken Lauren in a fair fight. He most likely would have preferred to knock her out completely before going any further because I do not believe he had the nerve to face her. From all accounts I have heard, Lauren treated him very kindly, which makes this all the more enraging. I hate to think that the last thing she saw was the face of the outcast she tried to help and befriend for his sake, contorted into the face of a monster. But I take comfort in my belief that because of his cowardice, he made sure she was not alive to bear witness to his pathetic urges and sickness, she was in a better place by the time the bulk of his “work” was under way.

I have wept for Lauren, her family, her friends, especially after seeing the graciousness with which they conduct themselves publicly. It was like a knife to the heart when I read that they were simply hoping Stephen would help them to locate the rest of her remains. How dare he or anyone place a family in that position? They should not have to plead with him to reveal the location of their baby girl’s remains so as to give her a complete burial, how bewilderingly cruel.

To answer the why, although there never really is a sufficient answer to the why, I am beginning to believe Stephen McDaniel would fit a diagnosis of Schizotypal Personality Disorder comorbid with Antisocial Personality Disorder [aka sociopathy]. This in no way lessens his guilt, he knew what he was doing and tried very hard to control the flow of events, but his thinking most likely has never been entirely realistic. He most likely had an active and often depraved fantasy life since he was very young. He, in my estimation, was fixated on Lauren and she was about to move away from the apartment complex he most likely stalked her in for years, disguised as the odd but harmless next-door neighbor. He had a key to her apartment, he likely had full access to her home without her knowledge, and this allowed him to feel close and in control of her. He knew he would no longer have that luxury, and he knew he too was about to face the “real world” which is not so forgiving and understanding of eccentric social misfits as college professors tend to be. Something in him likely knew his life and accomplishments thus far would amount to little out there when stacked against the litany of character flaws and social issues he suffered. These two impending realities acted as a trigger, and Lauren was the target of his need to control something, anything, in lieu of being able to control his own [in his view] inevitable failure. Also, I’m sure he knew Lauren would fair far better than he would and, like a petulant child, he resented that greatly.

I believe the signs of his inevitable self-implosion and possible violence were evident throughout his childhood, but judging from what we’ve seen of his mother, it’s unlikely they were ever acknowledged or addressed. The key would have been to recognize his abnormalities and get him treatment, support, rather than to stay afloat in a sea of denial the way she appears to be handling herself presently, even going so far as to accuse an innocent man of being responsible for Lauren’s slaying.

I’m off to class, but I will be posting the beautiful video made in memory of Lauren that has touched me so deeply, I watch it at least once a day.

Thanks for your kind words, and please know how deeply sorry I am that Lauren has been taken from you and the rest of those who loved her.

-Angel M.

Just something that reduced me to tears. Let’s remember...

Tue, 16 Aug 2011 08:34:00 -0400

Just something that reduced me to tears. Let’s remember Lauren and never forget what was taken.

To Lauren’s family: I am so sorry, what a life to take.

No post on 6 days . A lot has happened. Do you know how SM planned to kill and how he planned to dispose of the body?

Tue, 09 Aug 2011 19:50:38 -0400

It’s been final exams week for me, just now getting over the trauma of that!

At this point in the investigation, it feels almost redundant to post every new rumor or detail I learn of. I will say that nothing has come to light that causes me to doubt my initial take on the case, the motive. In fact, the more we learn, the more confident I am that I, unfortunately, had the right idea. But now that I have more free time on my hands, I suppose it is time for me to do a re-cap. At this time, it’s not clear that *anyone* knows for sure how Stephen presumably killed Lauren, all that is known for sure, I will summarize in my upcoming entry along with my analysis of information thus far available. Thanks for the motivation!

With your knowledge of criminals of this type, and your impression of McD so far... if he is the killer, what do you think of the possibility that he may have buried/stashed the head somewhere he knew he could retrieve it later?
~SuperSleuth~

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 13:55:28 -0400

I think there is a good chance he did that if he’s the perp. It’s awful to imagine, but if he killed her due to an extreme infatuation it would certainly make sense for him to do a thing like that, for a sense of control and ownership.

McDaniel Mass Email Exchange With Mercer Students:

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 17:49:00 -0400

*The following is an email exchange prompted initially by McDaniel’s proposed hypothetical construct, which appeared to many as a veiled indictment of Obama and possible “communist” affiliation. He sent this out three weeks into his first semester, years back. This is unrelated to the murder of Lauren Giddings but provides a glimpse into the mind/intellect of “person of interest” Stephen McDaniel as well as the larger Mercer University’s law school community they were both part of. *

*There may be additional correspondence not covered here,as the discussion branched out in lots of sub-discussions, edited for privacy purposes or missing from source’s saved content but this was not intentional*

MCDANIEL:
The following is a hypothetical question aimed at determining one method of political mentality of the student body of Mercer University’s Walter F. George School of Law. Please take the time to read the hypothetical and respond to it by replying to my email account or dropping a note in my mailbox outside classroom A.
HYPO Beginning
Suppose it were to come to light that Senator John McCain, within the past 5 years, had been in extensive covert contact with a political
candidate in the fictional Eastern European country of Alteria. The candidate, Andre Kirpochev, aligned himself with militant Communists and
promoted replacing many of Alteria’s laws with doctrines expressed in the writings of Marx, Lenin, and other Communist writers. In the last
election, Kirpochev failed to secure the necessary number of votes to gain the office of President of Alteria. Kirpochev is a descendant of a
distinct group of settlers who originated in the Kirotan Valley in the Irovik Mountains of Northern Alteria. Kirpochev relied heavily on his
fellow Kirotan Valley descendants as both a major constituency and a means of intimidation of other groups in Alteria. Kirpochev alleged
voter fraud as the cause of his loss and instigated the other people in Alteria descended from the Kirotan Valley (now spread throughout the
entire country) to attack the supporters of his opponent, Peter Entimoff (the incumbent President), who are largely descended from the plains
region in southern Alteria. Kirpochev does not present definitive proof of the alleged fraud, but his supporters begin to attack people who
supported Entimoff. This violence causes thousands of deaths and displaces hundreds of thousands of people. Eventually, NATO stepped in
and brokered a peace agreement which gave Kirpochev power on par with Entimoff, appointing him Chancellor of Alteria, a new position. It
comes to light that Senator McCain had traveled to Alteria at taxpayer expense, and had appeared repeatedly alongside Kirpochev supporting his
candidacy. Not only that, but McCain aided Kirpochev in structuring the finances of Kirpochev’s campaign, and their offices had discussed
methods of using intimidation by ethnic descent as a means of winning the election. An investigative journalist goes to Alteria and finds
evidence of this communication, but before he can bring it to light, he is detained at gunpoint by Kirpochev’s forces and barely manages to get
out of Alteria. As a result of sloppy investigation, Kirpochev’s forces, when they collect all of the journalists belongings, unwittingly
pack the communications between Senator McCain and Andre Kirpochev, as well as Kirpochev’s communications to members of his own party
revealing Kirpochev’s motivations and methods.

HYPO Ending

If this hypothetical situation were genuine, would Senator McCain, irregardless of his other positions, be ethically or legally
obligated to leave the race for President? Yes or No?

Also, please explain why you answered as you did. Remember, this is a decision based wholly on the conditions of the HYPO,
and does not include any other positions or criticisms of Senator McCain.
Thank you all for your time and participation.

Sincerely,

Stephen McDaniel, a true-born “Son of Liberty”

************************************************** *************************

Student A Reply:
a.)

“Irregardless” is not a word. I am sure you meant either “irrespective” or simply “regardless”

It is logicaly absurd to combine the negative elements of “ir” and “less” within the same word.

b.)

unsubscribe me.

************************************************** *************************

McDANIEL:
a. Irregardless is a word. While it is considered to be a non-standard expression of the conceptual terms synonymous with it, such as ‘regardless’ and ‘irrespective,’ it is recognized as a legitimate term.

b. As the goal of the original message was to gather information about the methodology of political thought of the entire student body of the law school, it was sent to the entire student body with the hope that intelligent, thoughtful responses would be returned. Your choice to decline to involve yourself in an examination of the student body’s mentality regarding political thought reduces the representative nature of the effort, but you were not, in the original message, singled out with the intention of harassment. Should there be any further communications intended for those who choose to think critically about hypothetical political considerations, I assure you that, should you receive such a message, it is not intended for you, and I ask that you simply disregard it, rather than respond with an email to the entire student body which incorrectly alleges the incorrect use of a term that has legitimate, if non-standard, meaning.

************************************************** *************************

Student B Reply:
this is not a real hypothetical: http://www.washtimes.com/news/2008/o…-kenya-ghosts/

and the accuracy of these claims has been called into question: http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/465/

Student C Reply:
The goal of your original message, sir, was not to “gather information about the methodology of political thought of the student body.” It was a cowardice attempt at more Rovian smear tactics. Don’t sit here and act like your “hypothetical” wasn’t actually you passive agressively spreading what you heard about Obama on one of those ridiculous email forwards. We all have a friend who has sent it to us at this point. I think we can all agreee to disagree about who we are supporting at this point based on legitimate differences in stances on the issues. But for all our sakes, please keep this crap off of the student body list.

************************************************** *************************

Student D Reply:
If you want to be on law review, learn to not use “irregardless.”

Sincerely,
Senior Managing Editor, Mercer Law Review

************************************************** *************************

Student E Reply:
Everybody chill the **** out, and watch this video. It will change your life.

http://www.yesbutnobutyes.com/archiv…uena_as_h.html
************************************************** *************************

Student F Reply:
a. Using irregardless makes you look ignorant. Granted, you have only been here a few weeks, and you probably do not yet comprehend that this is a place of higher education. The correct thing to do in this situation is admit that you either copied and pasted your “hypothetical” from some political site, or you simply misused a made up word. Either way, trying to defend it as “non-standard” makes you look desperate. Just take responsibility for your mistake. Mercer has a legal writing program that will eventually address these flaws in your writing.

b. Using the email system to examine the methodology of political thought of the entire student body is absurd. If you want to have a political discussion, get a group of your friends together, order a round, and discuss your “hypothetical.”

c. If you find yourself without friends (which I highly suspect, given this absurd, unsolicited grasp for attention) you should get friends. Then, perhaps, you will be able to have people with whom you may discuss your “hypothetical.” I am sure you can find a “Non-standard Word Users Anonymous” meeting in the greater Macon area. If not, organize one.

d. See point (a) for reiteration that irregardless is not accepted or proper in is legal (or political) discourse.

e. There are enough real issues to discuss for this electoral cycle. Your hypothetical is unnecessary and frivolous.
********************************************************************Student G Reply:
Its official - I now have diarrhea. I encourage anyone who is backed up to read the below e-mails.

************************************************** *************************

Student H Reply:
As a liberated citizen of Alteria, I would like to apologize that our countries woes have brought such pains upon the student body. We recruited the True Sons of Liberty to help us gauge the “Political mentality of the student body.” We did not expect such disasterous results as Student G’s massive explosive diaharea or Mr. McDaniel’s public humiliation for sending a highly regretful e-mail.

However, there is a silver lining here. I am in possession of the late Titerian dictator’s fortune of $212,000,000,000.44. I am willing to share this fortune with you in exchange for your help in transferring the money to an American bank. If you are interested in helping me, please respond with your name, SSN, and the word “unsubscribe.”
************************************************** *************************

Student I:
The whole student body does not give a ****. Please quit hitting the REPLY ALL button before I go postal in this place.
************************************************** *************************

MCDANIEL:
I have not received any forwarded email concerning the matter concerning Senator Obama until after I sent my hypothetical, and the goal of my message WAS gathering an outlook on the interest of the student body in analysis of political current events. I wanted to examine whether the student body believed that such conduct, if true, was a disqualification for a person running for the office of President of the United States. I made no accusations, and only posed a hypothetical agreement. Any basis for my hypothetical was information that I personally researched and differentiated from baseless positing. Unless I were to receive information validating the claims as true, I would not use them in judgment concerning my political action. The hypothetical situation I proposed was a situation where there is an inherent assumption of genuine fact which may not have been yet found in any real events that are similar in construction.

I would ask that you show common decency and, should you find something in my hypothetical objectionable, address your concerns to me personally, instead of attacking me and calling me a coward in the public arena in an attempt to discredit me when I have made no claims about the validity of a situation that may bear resemblance to a hypothetical. If you choose to not involve yourself in my invitation to offer your personal political judgment, you are welcome to do so, but refusal to involve yourself does not require rude and insulting language directed at me.

*******************************************************************

Student J Reply:
As I am an individual who was accepted into our prestigious institute of higher learning (just as you were), I would respond by saying my intelligence quotient was not the issue of the hypothetical, and that personal insults which attempt to libel my reputation and my intellectual standing are rude and unethical. I also would make note that, instead of exercising critical thought and giving an honest opinion, or declining to do so for reasons of disinterest or personal bias, you elected to ignore the situation entirely and instead resorted to unfounded, defamatory personal attacks. Such conduct is disgraceful, coming from an individual who represents himself as a professional in the pursuit of involvement in the legal process.
************************************************** *************************

MCDANIEL REPLY:
Even here in the South, “room temperature” isn’t too high. Saying that my IQ is “slightly above room temperature” would be to say that my IQ was only in the range of 80-90 (roughly 5-15 degrees Fahrenheit above room temperature, as Fahrenheit is the typical measure of temperature used in the United States, not Celsius or Kelvin), which is far below the average of even the general population of this country, and as such, is a roundabout method of calling me ‘stupid.’ There is a distinct difference between a person asking for someone’s opinion and receiving an insult and responding with outrage when insulted. I maintain that unwarranted personal attacks are far different than a legitimate outrage at being insulted. I will not be ashamed of being outraged when someone defames me in front of my fellow students, nor will I be ashamed for stating that unethical and unprofessional defamation of my character is just that, instead of allowing myself to be clubbed over the head into submission when someone decides to attack me. Chastising me for standing up for myself when I come under attack shows a poor grasp of the situation on your part. If you wish to chastise me for standing up for myself, at least consider the context of my response instead of resorting to baseless shaming.
************************************************** *************************

Student B Reply:
for the love of god McDaniels, just go do your work and leave everybody alone. give it up. we don’t care anymore.
************************************************** *************************

Student J Reply:
Ok dude, I tried to let this slide, now you’re really starting to ****ing piss me off.

You’re a funny fellow with a lot of time on his hands. Unfortunately, I don’t have the same luxury with time as you apparently do. I say you (and me after this mail) save the rest of our peers the bother of clogging up their mails with your desperate cry for attention. You’re hurt and I understand that. What you did was very immature and you deserve to be chastised and verbally molested for it. Why? To teach you a lesson, so you never make such a boneheaded decision again. Alas, YOU call your own intelligence into question by continuing this mindless discussion.

Also, I’m not sure where you get off thinking you’ve big enough balls or the gall to try to take on the upper classes, especially after only being in law school for less than a semester.

Regarding your “reputation” TRUST ME after today you have none. I have neither the will nor the desire to continue this nonsense with you. If you have any problems with me, or what I just said, call me. We can settle this like men, instead of bickering like kids. Also, I’m not hard to find I’m in school everyday, so you may also say whatever you have to say to me to my face, not to the entire student body.

I wish you the best of luck in law school.

Hugs & Kisses

*******************************************************************

************************************************** *************************
Student K Reply

When I was in the fourth grade I won the lower school spelling bee by correctly spelling the word salmon. Needless to say, I was quite proud. The prize for my accomplishment was a cookie cake. I won the bee on a Tuesday and the cake was delivered to my school on Wednesday. During free time on Wednesday, Mrs. Steiger allowed me to enjoy “some” of my cake in the hallway closet (cloakroom) as to not make my classmates jealous. Before Mrs. Steiger could notice, I crushed the whole thing. I had just demolished an entire cookie cake in a matter of minutes (apparently, even in the fourth grade I had no concept of moderation). Aghast, Mrs. Steiger allowed me to return to my desk. Soon after, I asked Mrs. Steiger to use the restroom. Mrs. Steiger declined my request. She assumed I was merely trying to aimlessly wander the halls, which on any other day would have been a correct assumption. However, today Mrs. Steiger was sorely mistaken. After a few more rejected requests to retreat to the water closet - I **** my pants.

The news spread like wild fire. By lunch, the entire Holy Name of Jesus student body was aware that Student K had just **** his pants. The ridicule began. I was crushed, I didn’t know what to do. That night I asked my father for advice. Without hesitation, we went to the local sporting goods store and made a T-Shirt, a jersey of sorts. The name emblazed across my back: **** KING. Before long it became a joke and while I was still bullied and mocked - my lower school life was bearable.

Your sending a “fun time,” politically oriented hypothetical to 450 glazy eyed, frustrated law students is akin to me shitting my pants. No matter how many times I explain that I had also had a huge breakfast that morning and I was just getting over a bout with the flu - I still **** my pants in the middle of class.

Regardless (I am still hoping to write on to LR next year) of you intentions, you sir, still sent a group of irritable intellects (all who would rather run face first into a table saw than read another hypo) a contentious hypo. This is not an attack, I can empathize. But do us all a favor, embrace it, make a T-Shirt, and be your own **** King.

——-
END

Ostensibly Stephen McDaniel's Mass Emails From Mercer:

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:52:18 -0400

I have received copies of what is purported to be Stephen McDaniel’s mass email exchange with the Mercer student body. This was unrelated to Lauren Giddings but gives one a glimpse into both his personality and the student body he was dealing with when he walked into Mercer. Let’s just say they are a prickly bunch?

I am formatting them and will post them tonight…

Do you have a facebook page? And has anyone ever told you that you look like Megan Fox? =)

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:11:14 -0400

I do have a Facebook page but I don’t really fancy the idea of posting it here because of the hate mail I’ve received due to this blog. I’ll consider it though.

Megan Fox…I hear that a lot to be honest but while I am flattered, I heard Angelina before that and everything from Brenda from 90210 to Kelly Kapowski from Saved By The Bell so I think what that means is “anyone famous with blue eyes and dark hair, you look like” lol.

I still say I look like Johnny Depp in terms of facial structure *sniff*.

Do you think it's possible that Stephen McDaniel had installed hidden surveillance in Laura's apartment or in other apartments since he had such intimate access to them? -b

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:06:30 -0400

That is highly possible but if he did he removed them and discarded them after the murder. I wouldn’t put anything past the profile of an obsessed next door neighbor/classmate, if indeed McDaniel was.

I still have a hard time looking at his face and seeing possible evil in it anywhere, he looks like the sweetest kid, but we have all learned in the past 40 years that that means nothing…

sorry for wearing this thing out :)
This is interesting... same highschool in Lilburn.
Wonder if that's where she got that name.

Barbara Elrod
Parkview High School
Lilburn, GA
Class of 1999

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 04:01:51 -0400

All of your questions/comments with the links [that was you, right?] are an example of superb sleuthing! I am iffy about posting those links because she is not the potentially accused and I’m hoping she has turned her life around by now, or something. Their family has enough to deal with right now.

However if she is a chronic criminal, that could be evidence of antisocial personality traits, and if McDaniel grew up under the same circumstances as his sister he could have similar conduct problems.

But she also may have had a substance abuse problem that drove her to resort to whatever she could to support her habit.

As for something you [I believe] asked about earlier, I was driving without a license. Funny story actually: That was right after I had graduated high school basically. All through high school I refused to get my license or even drive because I lost 2 close friends in 2 separate car accidents as well as several other people I knew in other accidents. Then after I graduated it became necessary for me to drive sometimes, but I tried to avoid it and had this mental block about getting a license because that would mean I was a “driver.” One night I got into a minor accident with a woman, on one of my limited driving excursions, and the police got me. Then I stubbornly refused to call anyone to bail me out because I kept saying there was no way I’d make someone get up at 4am and pay money to bail my dumb ass out. The processing officer basically forced me to call someone because he was so afraid of me being processed and turned over to gen. pop. after he was off duty. He scared me so I finally relented.

I’m glad that happened to me now, because I have at least a minor idea of what it’s like to have all your freedoms completely ripped away from you, even if just for a couple of hours. It makes you appreciate both sides of the criminal justice system, that’s for sure. I wish my little life of crime was more interesting than that, but nope, just stupid hard-headedness and irrational fear.

Since it was just brought up on WS, I'll post my thoughts on this:
The only thing they said they couldn't find was LG's Mercer Student ID.
I find this interesting because of her affiliation with the hashers run club.
As I understand it, it's common for students to only carry their student id card
on them when they go running. I still wonder if she didn't leave with someone
that night or early Sunday morning to go for a run, and so this was all she took with her.

Mon, 25 Jul 2011 03:22:02 -0400

I do find it interesting, I don’t know if it will amount to much though…the only reason I can imagine someone stealing something like that aside from the desire for a souvenir is to access facilities on campus, but it could just as easily have been in her pocket. I will re-post this on WS but I know when I need access to online databases for school I need to have my ID card out so I can enter my number…she was studying a lot at the time she died. Sometimes I will stick my card in my pocket or my bra even if I’m using it a lot in the day to study with the online databases and other than that I never use the thing.

**Note**

Many of you post as Anonymous, which I understand as unless you have a Tumblr I’m pretty sure you have no choice, but keep in mind I don’t know who you are or what other posts you’ve made necessarily unless you ID yourself somehow. I can’t always answer the questions/comments left, for some reason Tumblr doesn’t give me the option for certain messages, and other times there are links in the messages I don’t want to publish but cannot censor.

Do me a favor and ID yourselves in your messages if you don’t mind :) Even just a temporary moniker for this blog would be fine, I just like to know in case you refer to a prior question or comment.

*In response to a prior question I did not publish*

Lol, I was driving without a license years ago ;/

This is getting quite interesting indeed.
I still see two possibilities for bringing in the national media spotlight.
1. They couldn't find the evidence they need to charge McD,
so their case is going cold and they could have a killer at-large
2. They know from talking with the FBI that they have the evidence
to charge McD, they're just waiting for paperwork so they can file the charges.
(no rush, he's in jail). So, they can take this to the national media now,
then they can get their man and get all that attention.

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 15:15:17 -0400

I think the national media spotlight was inevitable either way, but I agree that the possibilities you listed are very plausible. I do feel that if police had strong reason to believe McDaniel is innocent, they would make that clear by now.

I've been reading your informative, and impressively accurate, posts both here and on the WS website in the wake of Lauren's shocking murder, and I'd first like to applaud the analytically neutral tone of all of your posts. Analyzing and theorizing about something this awful is inevitably emotional and people too often allow those emotions to obscure their ability to rationally process the facts before them. Second, I believe I read that you were tipped off to some family photos of McDaniel. If they are in fact the same photos I viewed a few weeks ago, you might be interested in a taking a gander at those taken during the holiday seasons. I can't be sure of which year, as I have forgotten how I managed to find them, but I believe it was 2009. There is a series of photos in that particular album that show McDaniel showing off what I assume is a new handgun he may have gotten for Christmas. Also depicted in these photos is what appears to be McDaniel's machete, which is attached via a belt clip. Other than the obvious, one observation that jumps out at me is the fact that McDaniel was not wearing the machete on his hip in any of the previous holiday photos, which leads me to believe it may have been a more recent requisition than I thought (assuming, of course, that those photos were in the 2009 album). Given the fact that the photos would certainly fan the flames of guilt, I understand if you don't want to post them. I just thought I'd alert you to their existence.

Sun, 24 Jul 2011 15:10:29 -0400

I really appreciate it.

I haven’t gone through all those photos yet, I just noticed the ones with the children and him smiling, which I was glad to see. Some people might think it’s bizarre that a person could at once suspect another of such atrocious crimes and still feel sympathy for that individual, but not only is McDaniel presumed innocent and not even charged with murder, he’s also a human being like the rest of us. He has a family and a place in the hearts of many people who love him, I’m sure.

I am still on the fence about posting the photos I have been sent from the holiday album, there are strong opinions against that. I don’t think I’ll be doing that until some more clear-cut information is announced, sweet or suspicious photos. I will definitely be looking back through those photos now though.

I will say that both I and my cousin are notorious for collecting strange weapons, it’s not at all uncommon among our generation, so even if McDaniel had a machete fixation that could point to little more than him being a fan of the Zombie genre [like us]. Machete’s are regarded as a great weapon for hypothetical “zombie combat” [lol] and a lot of kids who follow the genre will collect things like crossbows, swords, machetes, scythes…my cousin and I have each of those things. It can be a totally innocuous little hobby, if a bit strange.

It can also start out innocently and morph into something sinister if other urges take hold of a person who happens to have weapons like that. At any rate, we know McDaniel was an avid gamer, and it is not at all unusual for gamers to collect real life versions of the weapons they use in the games they play obsessively. It’s just usually they don’t harm anyone with the weapons they collect. Usually.

no one has released any information regarding the torso. teath marks can match.

Fri, 22 Jul 2011 14:10:53 -0400

Teeth marks can be ID’d depending on the nature of the bite.