Last week, anti-immigration activist Shawna Forde was convicted of murdering nine-year old Brisenia Flores and her father Raul Flores. On Tuesday she was sentenced to death by an Arizona jury.
Forde and her accomplices led a group of anti immigrant vigilantes on a raid of the Flores home where they pretended to be immigration agents and barged through the door. The father was shot and then the child. The mother faked death and survived.
According to the Huffington Post:
The case was not designated as a hate crime, despite Forde’s long history with anti-immigrant organizations. She once maintained a Tea Party blog, was a member of Minuteman Civil Defense Corps and has presented herself as a representative of Federation for American Immigration Reform. (All three have since distanced themselves from her.) After being cast out from the Minuteman group due to erratic behavior, she formed her own vigilante group, called Minutemen American Defense, which also patrolled the United States-Mexico border trying to detect illegal immigration.
This is an example of what happens when a person just goes too deep into their ideological. How sad that hatred can turn anyone into a murderer. Hopefully, Forde will not become a martyr.
How do we know when anyone has gone into ideology too deep? When does interest become cult-like? What has become of her accomplices?
I don’t understand why it wasn’t designated a hate crime. I don’t support the death penalty, though. This woman should never be free again, but killing her is another horrible thing to bear.
I think a lot of people have gone way too far with denigrating migrants. People frequently go too far with hatred of marginalized groups, but the ugliest manifestations of hatred are usually condemned by society left AND right. Like Fred Phelps. Or this woman. I don’t suspect any anti-immigrant group will be rushing forward to support her. She crossed a major line. I guess I believe that we’ve made progress since the days when groups of people could band together and convince each other of the rightness of something like murder (lynching). I don’t see hatred being as literal now, though ideologies can also kill people if extremist exclusionary policies are legislated. Excluding people from society can literally kill them.
Well, all I have to say is you’re a better man than I. I could throw the switch on this woman then go home and sleep like a baby. I don’t care if they call it a hate crime or not, as long as she rides the lightning.
A nine year old kid? What the hell is wrong with people?
@Cato the Elder
I’m for a public execution–a good old fashioned necktie party would probably work. There is a certain indignity to hanging. Unless the federal government gets illegal immigration under control it just may be that more things like this will happen–this kind of stuff in contagious.
Sigh….. switch-thrower here also.
@George, I do definitely believe in having trials first. I am more comfortable with the death penalty now DNA testing has become more refined.
Cato, market dip-stick pls?
I prefer the middle age technique of tying a person down with chains in an open area with the sun beating on them and then pouring honey and milk over them. Allow the elements, insects and animals to have at it.
There is a special hell for people that kill kids.
Or no death penalty. Just wake her up with a beating every day. Before breakfast. She goes to bed knowing that the next morning will bring pain. Lots of pain. And we give her the option of requesting execution.
And then we deny it.
And keep waking her up. Every. Morning. With. Pain. For. Years.
(I really shouldn’t read this stuff before coffee. Execution is fine. Get it over with. She’s breathing air that could be used by human beings.)
Flip the switch…
Watch out for a failed bounce and stay out of the way.
Justice has been served. Shawna Forde is the ultimate teajadi.
Is it a hate crime if the person if so clearly off their rocker? Personally I think hate crime laws are “A Savage Hypocrisy” to quote the kids on South Park. She deserves the death penalty and she got it.
Hey Starry, Kiss my butt. Troll.
Ahem! Cargo, that is a word you have used yourself many times. Starry is not a troll, even though you might not agree with him.
Rick, in this case, I agee. It doesn’t get more serious than the death penalty. I think hate crime can be applied in certain cases but not this one. It is overkill. Pardon the pun.
I would love to, cargo.
@Moon-howler
It wasn’t the teajadi part.
It was implying that Shawna Forde is the ultimate end result of being a Tea Party member. And that type of comment is trollish. He came to insult.
Flip it so she can rot in hell.
Probably a just result, even though I have reservations about the death penalty (I’m hopelessly conflicted on this because intellectually and religiously I appreciate the arguments against it, but know that I could pull the trigger on several categories of malefactors).
I wish the whole concept of “hate crimes” would get a new airing. I don’t see that it adds anything to tack on penalties to an obvious crime (e.g., assault, murder, battery, etc.) because some motivations for such crimes are considered worse than others. Throw the book at the bastards for the underlying crime, and worry less about what motivated it.
I think the hate crime designation is more for the victims. If you belong to a marginalized group and are assaulted for no other reason than existing, it does seem to call for a specific affirmation from society that your life is valued. The crime committed against you is bigger than the physical assault. It’s a pointed attempt to negate your worth as a human being. And you could say that all victims of crime feel demeaned, but I honestly think it’s different if you’re attacked just for being yourself. It’s much more personally degrading than if someone steals something from you or even attacks you in anger over something other than your core essence.
I think the woman is wacky and I don’t really have a problem with the death penalty conceptually for heinous crimes as long as it is applied fairly. I don’t think that’s the case — minorities, poor people and men (as opposed to women) are more likely to get a death sentance. I don’t know how you correct for a rich person hiring the highest power lawyer vs a public defender for the poor. I don’t know how you adjust a jury verdict to compensate for ugly and uneducated defendants as opposed to pretty, well-dressed and well-spoken. There have been enough studies that have shown past and current bias in applying the death penalty that I can’t get behind it.
@Bubberella
I can’t support the death penalty as a thing in itself but am in total agreement with the rest of your comment.
@Starryflights Maybe you would prefer stoning instead? Speaking of cold vengeance.
Let’s just put it another way. No more ad homenem remarks. Anyone.
I also struggle with the death penalty. What other industrialized nation still carry’s out the death penalty?
@Elena, no struggle here. My struggle days ended with the Boston Stranger, I think. Actually, it was a woman from Frostburg, MD. She was tortured and burned alive. 2 evil people who were not put to death. This case made a believer out of me.