Banishing Fear: A Conversation with Laura Caldwell

by Jamie Freveletti

Last night I had the privilege of attending a show called "Woman To Woman" that featured The Outfit's own Laura Caldwell and hosted by Jen Weigel and Mary Long, two former WLS radio announcers. The show also featured Jennifer Connor, the head of her own company that sells mustard, and Shea Vaughn a fitness and lifestyle expert.

The topics ranged from fitness to health to happiness. At one point all three women were asked what advice would they give it they could go back twenty years. Ms. Vaughn said she would advise others to "be more present in the moment." She cautioned that life passes and the moments won't come back. Good advice for those of us who are always looking for the next hill to climb and aren't paying attention to the here and now. Ms. Connor suggested that you need to follow the signs in your life that will lead you down the right path, and her story of signs involving mustard and the biblical mustard seed story was funny and really inspiring. And Laura said she'd banish fear.

For those who aren't aware, Laura was instrumental in freeing a young man wrongfully held in Chicago's prison system for six years without a trial. Her latest non fiction book: Long Way Home: A young man lost in the system and the two women who found him tells the story of the trial. Laura and her girlfriend, criminal defense attorney Catharine O'Daniel, worked together to defend the man. He'd signed a confession after being tortured, and as Ms. O'Daniel said "99% of signed confession cases end up in a guilty verdict."

Last night Laura made it clear that as she sat at the table waiting for the verdict to come back the import of what she was doing hit her. The man's life would be forever altered and as she said, "if he was convicted and sent to death row I would have carried that enormous burden for the rest of my life."

After the show Laura and I went to have a drink with the other attendees. Now, let me tell you there are no better late night companions than those on The Outfit. We always have a blast and with Laura I also always learn something while having fun. We talked about life, love, men, women, children and our careers and hopes and dreams. Laura is involved with the "Life After Innocence Project" and will be taking it to the next level in order to assist even more individuals who are falsely imprisoned, freed and suddenly find themselves out in the world.

To think that this woman has any fear at all is a stretch for me to imagine. She took on an enormous responsibility that, as a civil litigator, she need have never faced, and she worked to save that individual. I told her exactly what I thought (and which a couple of glasses of wine gave me the courage to say) that she seems to be powerful and frankly unstoppable. I have no doubt that her goal to take the Innocence Project to the next level will succeed just as I have no doubt that she will continue to banish fear. Laura was one of the first writers in the community that I met when I was starting out and I'm infinitely glad to count her as a friend. She's a rocket shooting upward and I'm grateful to be able to watch the blast off from the viewer's seats. I can't wait to see what she does next.

When Truth is Stranger than Fiction

We have a special guest today on the OUTFIT: crime fiction author Michael Harvey, whose third novel, THE THIRD RAIL, will be out this week. Along with THE CHICAGO WAY and THE FIFTH FLOOR, this novel features Chicago PI, Michael Kelly, and is based on the 1977 L accident in downtown Chicago as well as a 1993 Pentagon report on terrorism at home. But what you might not know about Michael is that he's a journalist and documentary film-maker who has won several Emmys and was nominated for an Academy Award. Today he posts about his current film project. Click here for more about Michael, his books, and his documentaries.




Michael's words: I am currently working on a story about a man who was sentenced to sixty years for a crime he didn’t commit. Below is a summary of the facts. I have changed the names because the project is not yet finished. For the rest of the story, you’ll have to wait until we finish shooting.


A man named Paul is sitting in his living room when he hears a knock at the door. He gets up and squeezes a look through the peephole. There’s a woman on his stoop. She identifies herself as a police officer and asks if she could talk to him. Paul is forty-three years old. White. No criminal record. Never even been inside a cop shop. Paul opens the door. Four cops tackle him, roll him onto his back and cuff him on his living room floor. Two minutes later, Paul is in the back of a cruiser. And the shit begins to roll.

Paul is brought into a room and told he’s going to be put in a lineup. What for? There’s been a woman raped. An anonymous tipster told police Paul’s the guy. He asks for a lawyer. The police tell him they’ll get him one. But the lineup first.

Paul is placed in one lineup. Then, a second. On the other side of the glass is a victim named Louise. Three months earlier, she’d been raped repeatedly in her home over the course of several hours. Louise tells police her attacker wore a mask. But Louise got a glimpse of his face. And so, the lineup.

Louise is scared. Louise is nervous. Louise is angry. She looks through the glass at the faces. The first time, she’s unsure. Police take her outside and talk to her. The second time, she’s certain. Paul raped her. The more she looks at him, the more certain she becomes. Paul raped her. And she wants him punished.

Police charge Paul with multiple counts of sexual battery. He’s denied bail, given a public defender and stuck in a county holding cell. In the cell with Paul is a man named Danny. He’s looking at a third felony conviction and possible life sentence when a detective pulls him out of the cell. Danny is offered the “deal of a lifetime”. If he testifies against Paul, Danny walks with a slap on the wrist. Danny’s all for it, but tells police he doesn’t know any details about the crime...because Paul didn’t tell him anything. Not a problem. According to Danny, the detective slides a police report across the table. Plenty of details in there. Then, according to Danny, he’s allowed to meet with the victim...so Danny can make sure he’s got it all straight. Danny takes the stand, points at Paul and gives the jury chapter and verse about how Paul raped Louise. It’s all a lie. Told by Danny and allegedly orchestrated by law enforcement. Taken together with Louise’s mistaken ID, and the lack of any forensic testing of the evidence, Paul doesn’t have a chance. After a trial that lasts less than a week, he’s convicted and sentenced to sixty years in prison.

Four months after sitting in his living room and hearing a knock on his door, Paul finds himself on a bus, hands cuffed to a belly chain. The bus turns a corner and Paul gets a first look at his new home -- a maximum security lockup where society houses its rapists and murderers. Once inside, Paul is told to strip and run through a delousing shower. Then he gets his prison uniform and bed linens. Paul stands at the top of a small ramp that leads into the main cell block. His hands and arms shake. His legs are like water. He’s crying, but barely aware of it. A female correctional officer reads out the charges. Fifteen counts of rape? They’re going to have fun with you. Paul tells the woman he’s innocent. She laughs and pushes him down the ramp. The noise builds. And then he’s in the house.

The cell block itself is five stories high and filled with four hundred inmates. Paul walks the main drag, holding his prison blues. Inmates love it. They yell at the fresh meat, tell him the many ways they’re going to shank him, rape him and otherwise own him. Paul climbs five flights to his cell and sits on his bunk. His neighbor next door pounds on the wall and screams at him. Paul listens to the noise, and wonders what happens next. He’s never been inside any sort of prison, never mind a max lockup. He’s got no money, no connections, no skills, no way to defend himself. Paul’s sentence is sixty years, but his life might be better measured in days. Maybe minutes.

That first night he rips his bed sheet into strips and prepares to hang himself. Something stops him. Maybe it’s the lies that put him there. Maybe it’s the truth that only he knows. Whatever the reason, Paul decides to walk a different road. The police have buried him. Society has washed its hands and walked away. But Paul is still alive. Doing another man’s time. And unwilling to hand over his life for a crime he didn’t commit. Instead, he decides to fight. And that’s where the story gets fun.

Growing the Outfit

by Libby Hellmann

It’s spring, and the growing season is upon us.

The Outfit is growing, too.

We’ve been posting as a group for nearly three years – hard to believe it’s been that long – and with the same cast of characters. (See the bar to the right) That’s got to be some kind of record in the blogosphere, but if it isn’t, we’re just proud we survived that long. I’m not sure any of us expected to last more than six months.

Whether you’re new to the Outfit or you've been reading us from the start, thank you for spending your precious time with us. Hopefully you’ve enjoyed our takes on writing, crime, and Chicago – eclectic as they may be -- with an occasional political rant thrown in. And hopefully, you’ll continue to follow us as we add three new voices.

With ten members we’ll each share a week-day, which should keep us more organized and will make it easier for you to keep tabs on us, too. We’ll have new blogs up pretty much every week day, and the topics we’ll cover, thanks to the infusion of fresh blood, should be fascinating. I’m pumped, and after you read our "made members'" backgrounds, I suspect you will be too.


Laura Caldwell is a Chicago trial attorney turned novelist. She is published in the legal field and is currently an Adjunct Professor of Law at her alma mater, Loyola University School of Law. She is also founder and director of the “Life After Innocence” Project, a program to help recently exonerated and wrongfully prosecuted people reclaim their lives; in fact, she’s currently writing a true-crime book about one of her cases. As for fiction, Laura began publishing thrillers and suspense novels in 2005 and has 7 novels under her belt. This summer Mira will release a trilogy of thrillers by Laura, starting with RED HOT LIES. All of them feature her new protagonist, entertainment lawyer Izzy McNeil. Follow her on Twitter at LauraACaldwell



David Ellis is an attorney, too, and he’s currently working as Counsel to the Speaker of the Illinois House of Representatives. In that role, he led the impeachment effort of former Governor Blagovevich. He is also the author of five acclaimed legal thrillers. In fact, David won the Edgar for his first novel, LINE OF VISION. Although he currently lives in Springfield, he used to practice law in Chicago, and he grew up in Downers’ Grove. That qualifies him as a Chicagoan.





Dave Heinzmann has covered crime for the Chicago Tribune for nearly a decade. He covered the Chicago Police Department beat from 2002 to 2007, and has written extensively about street gangs, drugs and murder, gun-running, as well as police misconduct scandals and a range of other criminal justice and political issues. He started his journalism career with the Associated Press in Baltimore and Atlanta. He lives in Oak Park with his family. Dave’s first crime fiction novel, A WORD TO THE WISE, will be published by Five Star in December. In it, his lawyer protagonist, former FBI agent Augustine Flood, is faced with a case that carries him deep into Chicago’s crooked politics, wheeler-dealer development and organized crime. His website will be up soon, but you can follow him now on Twitter at davidheinzmann.


As long as I'm posting pics, you might like to see an original Outfit photo, taken by Crain’s Chicago about 18 months ago.





The new schedule will start somewhere around the middle of May. As always, we love your feedback – whatever it is – so don’t stop. This is your blog as much as ours. Thanks again, and please welcome our new members with a comment or two.


PS Don't forget about Indie Day, Friday, May 1. Go to your favorite independent book store and buy that book you've been thinking about...

Coming Attractions -- Crime in Chicago

by Libby Hellmann

Welcome to 2009! I can’t remember a year with so many criminal developments, investigations, and trials on tap for Chicago. For blogs like the Outfit, you couldn’t ask for a better line-up. It’s every bit as exciting as the coming attractions at the movies. Here’s just a sample of what’s coming…

Roddy, We Hardly Knew Ye.
But we’ll get to know him a lot better this year. Apart from his impeachment –practically a done deal -- and subsequent trial in the Illinois Senate, there’s also US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald’s criminal complaint, which will be followed by another indictment and trial (assuming Blago continues to maintain his Nixonian innocence). Whatever happens, it’s safe to say we will have him to kick around all year. Btw, the ethics law that prompted some of Blago’s behavior went into effect January 1. For an interesting history of how it almost didn’t come to pass, click here.


Rezko: Round Two Everybody’s Favorite Fundraiser, Tony Rezko, will be on trial again in February. This time, he’s accused of a $10 million loan fraud scheme involving state deals. In part, he’s accused of asking a state official to draft a letter that got him big loans from the state to finance his pizza business. Oh, and Las Vegas would like to know why he skipped out on nearly half a million dollars in gambling debts.
Pepperoni, anyone?


The Cop you Love to Hate
We ought to be hearing more from the States Attorney’s office about suburban cop Drew Peterson’s role in the murder of Wife Number Three and the disappearance (and presumed death) of Stacy, Wife Number Four. Unfortunately, the unlawful gun charges against him – which could have put him in jail for a while – were dropped in November. Still, this guy’s arrogance and narcissism make OJ – and even Blago -- look like pikers. Oh, and he’s engaged – again. Can you say “Run .. don’t walk?”

The Other Peterson
Kevin has kept us up to date on the other Peterson situation, the murder of dermatologist Dr. David Cornbleet. (See below). Check out the show, Personal Justice, on Discovery this week.

Fast Eddie Slows Down
Former Alderman Ed Vrdolyak, who made daily headlines twenty years ago for, among other things, leading the “Council Wars” against Harold Washington, the city’s first black Mayor, will be sentenced this week for receiving kickbacks on the sale of a building. Ironically, Fast Eddie got his name, in part, for eluding the law – he’d been investigated for a number of shady schemes for years. (Think he was Blago’s mentor?) Now, though, thanks to Stuart Levine -- a guy who seems to know everybody’s dirty laundry, btw – Eddie skidded to a stop. He pled guilty last November.


Not So Entertaining
Although it involves a well-known Chicago entertainer. An indictment has been issued against the man accused of killing the mother, brother and nephew of Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson.


Pretty impressive list, right? But I’ve barely scratched the surface. Time for you to report in. What have I missed? Which of these Chicago stories do you think will be the most compelling?

Jon Burge and the Theater of Corruption

by Libby Hellmann

Studs Terkel once said Chicago is not the most corrupt American city… it’s the most theatrically corrupt.”

If that’s so, turn on the stage lights and cue the actors. The dénouement of one of the Chicago’s longest running police scandals is about to unfold. The villain is former Police Commander Jon Burge; the hero is U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald; and a supporting role will be played by Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow. If past is indeed prologue, we’re in for high drama next spring.


For those of you who aren’t familiar with the scandal, Jon Burge was a police commander in Area Two on the South Side of Chicago. For over 20 years, mostly during the ‘70s and ‘80s, he and his men allegedly tortured over 200 suspects into confessions for crimes they may or may not have committed. We’re not talking about your run of the mill police pressure, interrogations, or threats. We’re talking cattle prods. Alligator clips attached to body parts. Electric shocks. Suffocation. Radiator burns. Mock executions. And, of course, beatings, as described in the following trailer of a 2007 documentary:




Never before has there been such an extraordinary pattern of police abuse and brutality. Once the rumors and reports about the behavior surfaced, a series of complaints, investigations, and lawsuits followed. Burge was tried for police brutality in 1989 -- he was acquitted – and then tried again for civil rights violations. But he was never convicted of a felony, and after he was fired in 1993, he moved to Florida where he’s lived – unrepentant and free and collecting his police pension -- for 15 years. To date over 30 million dollars has been spent by the city and CPD in settlements and legal fees. Many believe Illinois’ stay on death row executions by former Governor George Ryan was prompted by Burge’s behavior.

Enter US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. On October 21 Fitzgerald finally arrested Burge in Florida and charged him -- not with torturing his victims-- but with lying. Fitzgerald, an aggressive, rising legal -- and probably one day political-- star is best known for his work on dramatic cases like the first World Trade Center bombing, the Valerie Plame scandal, and sending George Ryan to prison after the licenses for bribes scandal. (In Illinois you truly can be a hero one day, a felon the next. In fact, the story of Ryan’s career would make for great theater too… but I digress.)

Fitzgerald’s charges are themselves interesting. Because the statute of limitations on the actual torture ran out, the prosecutor used Burge’s denial of the torture in a 2003 federal civil rights case as fodder for charges of perjury and obstruction of justice. In his announcement, he compared Burge’s arrest to that of Al Capone who was arrested for tax evasion, rather than his mob and prohibition-related crimes.

It turns out Friend-of-the-Outfit (ours, not Capone’s) and best-selling author Jonathan Eig is writing a book about Capone and the man who nailed him (It wasn’t Elliot Ness). Eig says while the practice of using one crime to pay for another started with Capone, it wasn’t a slam dunk. Indeed, there was high drama there, as well.

They weren't crazy about the idea and they weren't sure it would work. Even the tax charge against AC was fairly weak. In the end, it worked, of course. My book will show that Capone actually got screwed during the trial. If he had a better lawyer he might have beaten the rap… It doesn't have to be tax evasion. Barry Bonds was indicted with the Capone method; instead of nailing him for steroids they (the IRS again) are after him for perjury. Countless terrorism suspects have been arrested for visa violations and locked up for long stretches on the assumption that they're probably dangerous. Burge fits the pattern perfectly.

When he's not pleading the 5th, Burge has – of course - said he's not guilty. The trial is set for May 1st and the judge is none other than US District court judge Joan Lefkow, whose husband and mother were tragically murdered three years ago by a disgruntled plaintiff. High drama there, too.

So, the pieces are in place. The characters’ back stories are fascinating; the issues are fraught with conflict, tragedy, and not at all pre-ordained. Stay tuned. This is going to be some show.

What about you? What corruption cases would make great theater in your neck of the wood?

Why do I let myself worry wondering what in the world did I do?

By Kevin Guilfoile


Jeanette Sliwinski, the lingerie model who killed three Chicago musicians, including my friend Doug Meis, was found mentally ill and guilty of reckless homicide instead of the three counts of first-degree murder sought by prosecutors. Rather than life in prison, Sliwinski faces a maximum of ten years in prison when she is sentenced later this month.

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

When Michael Mukasey, President Bush's nominee to succeed Alberto Gonzalez as Attorney General, faced Congress last week he was presented with a long list of questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee, and he was expected to respond in writing. The resulting document is well over 100 pages. Dick Durbin, the senior senator from Illinois, asked Mukasey specifically about the Cornbleet murder case, which has been reported on and discussed extensively at this site. Mukasey's responses are not edifying in any way, but the fact that the question was asked is significant and so, in the interest of completeness, here is the text of the exchange:

34. On October 24, 2006, Dr. David Cornbleet of Chicago was brutally murdered in his office by a former patient, Hans Peterson. Peterson is a U.S. Citizen who was born in the United States and lived in the United States up until the time of the murder. After the murder, Peterson fled to the French West Indies, turned himself in to the French authorities, and confessed to killing Dr. Cornbleet. Peterson's mother was a French citizen, and therefore Peterson is also considered a French citizen under French law. Because French law prohibits the extradition of French citizens to the United States, France is refusing to extradite Peterson to face trial for his crimes in Illinois. Media reports indicate the [sic] Peterson purposefully fled to French territory and turned himself in to French authorities because he knew that if he was convicted for murder under French law, he would face more lenient punishment than under American law.

a. If you are confirmed as Attorney General, will you work to see that justice is done in the matter of Dr. Cornbleet's murder?

ANSWER: I am not familiar with the specific facts of Dr. Cornbleet's murder.

b. If you are confirmed as Attorney General, will you work with other federal agencies to ensure that U.S. citizens who have dual citizenship with another country are not able to commit murder within the United States and then surrender to the authorities of the other country in order to avoid justice in the United States?

ANSWER: It is true that dual citizenship can raise complex issues. I would consider this type of question on a case-by-case basis and examine the facts and applicable law in each situation in which it arose.

On October 24, the first anniversary of Dr. Cornbleet's murder, Channel 5 in Chicago ran another update on the case. Much of this material will be used in the upcoming Dateline NBC feature.

The Cornbleet family is still asking people to contact the US State Department and urge them to continue to pressure the French to extradite Hans Peterson for the crime.

UPDATE: The story of Dr. Cornbleet's murder will air tonight (Monday, November 5) on CNN's Anderson Cooper 360 at 9:00 PM Central Time.

'Cause Sorrow Is Just All The Rage

By Kevin Guilfoile

"Justice will not be found through the legal system...Would taking some of their money even be justice? Their lives would go on, just with a little less money. Our lives will never be the same."

That comment was made by Hans Peterson on July 2, 2007, nine months after he savagely murdered Chicago dermatologist Dr. David Cornbleet. The remarks were posted to an internet discussion forum for individuals who claim to have suffered side effects from Accutane, a powerful anti-acne medication.


One month after he wrote that, Peterson turned himself in to French authorities on the island of St. Martin. According to reports, he told police that he murdered Dr. Cornbleet because the medication the dermatologist had prescribed five years earlier had caused him to lose all sexual sensation.

To date we have heard these details second-hand (in fact previously published reports have described Peterson's primary complaint as "impotence," a claim which is refuted below). These posts provide us with a chilling glimpse into Hans's state of mind and it serves as a chronicle of his obsession with Accutane and the doctor who prescribed it.

Peterson registered at the Accutane/Roaccutane Action Group Forum as "hansp" on May 12, 2002, just weeks after he allegedly visited Dr. Cornbleet's office for the first time. (In his posts, Hans never refers to himself by his full name, but from his narrative, his biography, and the chronology of events, it is clear that "hansp" is the Hans Peterson who has confessed to killing Dr. Cornbleet.) On June 16 of that year he posted his first comment.

"In late April, I went to see a dermatologist for my very mild, but persistent acne. He was an unethical old man who suggested accutane. He said that it was a very safe and popular drug with no serious side effects. I was never given a blood test. He never showed me the consent forms that he is required by law to make me sign. I was started on 80 mg per day. (I weigh around 190) He said that I could take the entire day's dose at once. When I picked up my prescription, the pharmacist conveniently forgot to give me the FDA required medication guide. When I picked up the medication, I was under the impression that accutane was an extremely safe drug.

"I took it for 2 days. Then I got a bad headache and read about the side effects. I stopped right away. I thought that I was safe having only taken a few pills. However, about 5 days later, I got really depressed and couldn't sleep. My ears started to ring around this time, and a lot of hair around my hairline began to fall out. (The roots of these follicles were black, normally they're white.) My appetite went away around this time as well. A couple of days after this, my libido vanished and I lost virtually all sexual sensation...It has been over a month and a half since my very brief experience with accutane and most of these effects have not improved at all. (I sleep a little better as I am starting to get used to the ear ringing, but that is about it.)

"Am I permanently affected from taking an acne medicine for 2 days?"

More than 60 posts from Hans follow over the next five years. They show a man becoming increasingly obsessed with the drug Accutane and the effects he believed it was having on his body and his mind. He attributes a series of ailments, including depression, to the medication but the two that he claims most haunt him are a constant ringing in his ears and a loss of sexual sensation.

On November 15, 2002 Hans wrote:

"Since taking a relatively high dose of accutane for a very short period of time 7 months ago, I have been experiencing persistent sexual problems. I would describe it as a loss of libido and sexual sensation. I have lost virtually all interest in sex. When I do engage in sex or masturbation, the act is no longer pleasurable. I can get an erection and otherwise function normally. The pleasurable sensation is just gone."

On April 30, 2004, in a thread specifically about "Erectile Dysfunction," Hans wrote:

"How am I coping with it? Not particularly well. You take a drug in order to increase your chances of getting laid, and end up not being able to enjoy getting laid. (Getting an erection isn't that big of a problem - it's the near complete loss of sensation.) I guess you could try to enjoy pleasing the other person, and all that crap. But, still, this side effect is horrible..."

As the years pass, Hans tries to become more familiar with both the science and the unsubstantiated claims made about Accutane. He consults with other doctors, who are not able to prove a link between his ailments and the drug he took briefly years before.

On February 6, 2003, he wrote:

"I have just begun law school, and tasks like paying attention or concentrating are not as easy as they were before I took Accutane. Perhaps I can use whatever legal knowledge I gain to take my revenge... I have nothing else to live for."

(The list of side-effects that members of this forum attribute to Accutane is so long that it would be difficult to find a response from drugmaker Roche for every single one. In the past Roche has denied a connection between Accutane and the most serious conditions alleged. "It's our conclusion, along with the outside experts and the FDA, that there is no scientific basis that links Accutane with depression or suicide," a spokesperson told Reuters in 2002.)

In a few of these posts, Hans seems to be formulating his rationalization for murder. According to Hans, Dr. Cornbleet is a villain who "deceived" him by knowingly prescribing a dangerous drug without providing any warning of the harmful effects associated with it. Hans also suggests a possible motive for this: Greed. On October 9, 2002 Hans speculated that Dr. Cornbleet was "desperate for patients, and, if I were to go on accutane, I would have to see him every two weeks for a check up."

These two claims would seem to be inconsistent, however. Presumably Dr. Cornbleet did not tell Hans that Accutane was an "extremely safe" and "popular drug with no serious side effects" that nevertheless required an intense schedule of bi-monthly monitoring visits.

And yet, especially compared to the standards of internet discussion forums, Peterson's writing is frequently clear and concise. At times he even grows impatient with his fellow posters, chastising them for throwing out statistics and claims without citations:

"Is there anyone that can tell me where this information is actually published? I admire the effort of the people that run this site, but you should really provide some adequate form of citation, so we know that these figures aren't just pulled out of the air...I don't doubt the truth of these statements, but in order for this website to be taken seriously, there needs to be some way of verifying the claims that are made on it."

After a period of frequent activity in the spring and summer of 2004, Hans disappears from the forum for two years, returning on September 20, 2006, just four weeks before he would travel from New York to Chicago to murder Dr. Cornbleet. On that day he posts two links--one to a depression study reported on the BBC web site and another to a video on YouTube. On October 10, he posts the complete text of an article about Dopamine.

The next post is February 7, 2007, more than three months after the murder:

"I was deceived by my doctor almost 5 years ago into taking this drug (no consent form, no med guide, no warnings whatsoever). I took a rather high dose for two days. TWO DAYS!!! (albeit an 80 mg undivided dose) Life altering, presumably neurological, problems which I never experienced before have plagued me ever since.

"I will never know again what it is like to pleasure a woman because I no longer have any sexual sensation - I will never again experience what silence is due to the constant ringing in my ears - I will never know who I would have become because of what this motherf**king drug has done to my mind. A drug which I should have never been prescribed...In at least some cases, such as mine, this drug just does its damage when its taken, or shortly thereafter, and that's it. No real hope of recovery, doctors are useless, the damage is done.

"Doubt my problems and their connection to Accutane all you want - I know I wouldn't believe a word of it if I had never taken the drug and someone told me the story I have told above. The truth is, I'm a rational non-hypochondriac who still can't believe how his life has been changed by this drug."

He posted four more times before he turned himself in to St. Martin police in August. On July 2, his second-to-last post he wrote:

"Justice will not be found through the legal system. There is no way to objectively verify Accutane-induced permanent neurological problems. Even if there were, it would be near impossible to legally prove causation. Even then, statutes of limitation would have run... If and when the **** ever does hit the fan they will just point out how strenuously they claimed their ignorance about permanent problems.

"Would legal justice even be justice, anyway? The people who have profitted from Roche's deception won't be personally brought to justice -- they will be shielded from personal liability... Roche's stock might drop, that's about it, it still would have been rational for those ***holes to deceive regarding Accutane in the first place: its profits over the years have been more than enough. The corrupt FDA, as a gov't institution, can't be held liable....

"There is no foreseeable retributive action in the legal system which would make their fraud regarding Accutane a mistake. Their decisions were economically rational and they know it. Would taking some of their money even be justice? Their lives would go on, just with a little less money. Our lives will never be the same.

"If you seek real justice, it will not come through the legal system -- they know this, that's why they continue to deceive and play ignorant. It is the financially rational thing to do..."

And The Victim, Well He Won't Come Back

By Kevin Guilfoile

Perhaps you amateur detectives would like to know what really happened.

That's from a mysterious comment to my last post on the Cornbleet murder case. If you can excuse me on a lazy holiday weekend, I'm going to revisit the story.

Someone calling himself "Accutane Peterson" weighed in several times to defend confessed killer Hans Peterson (left in a high school photo) with some vehemence. In our thread this person identified himself as an anonymous member of the Peterson family, but Accutane Peterson has left similar comments in other news groups where he identifies himself as Hans Peterson's father. His long and sometimes rambling replies nevertheless give you the outlines of what will undoubtedly be Hans's defense if he ever goes to trial.

I also wrote about the story over at Radosh.net where I revealed some of what I've learned about Hans from various people close to the case. The discussion there has also been informative. If you would like clarification of some of the extradition issues that have been in the news, I encourage you to read through them.

And finally I'd like to point everyone once again to the online petition to have Peterson extradited back to the US. It's looking more and more like a futile effort, however, and, bizarre as it may seem, it appears Hans, who does not even speak French, will be tried as a French citizen in a French Caribbean court for a brutal murder he committed in the US against another American.

C'est la something or other.

Update: Jocelyn Cornbleet, Dr. Cornbleet's daughter, is scheduled to appear on Greta Van Susteren's Fox News program On the Record this Monday night at 9 PM Central.

One Of These Days I'll Chase You Down

By Kevin Guilfoile

The first thing that hit me sideways was the phrase "professional internet gambler."

If you're a crime buff there are few things that can become more obsessive than a real-life mystery in progress and we have one in Chicago right now. This week there was a huge break in a well-known local murder investigation and although details are sketchy and weird at this point, those few details don't add up at all. And I suspect that when the truth is known the story is going to get weirder. And more interesting.

Last October the body of 64-year-old dermatologist Dr. David Cornbleet was discovered by his daughter in his 12th-story Michigan Avenue office, just across the street from Millennium Park. Cornbleet had been bound, gagged, and stabbed over twenty times. Surveillance video showed what appeared to be a young man entering the building just before the killing and leaving just after. In both instances he seemed to be hiding his face. A witness who rode the elevator with the suspect back down to the street reported that he had injured his nose and had blood on his sweatshirt, as if he had been in some sort of struggle.

The video ran for several days on Chicago television. Promising leads turned cold. The victim's family raised money for a reward and Dr. Cornbleet's son, Jon, created a MySpace page for soliciting tips from younger people--perhaps the killer's peers--who might not follow the mainstream media.

In June, apparently in part from leads developed on the internet, a 29-year-old New York resident and "professional internet gambler" named Hans Peterson (left in high school photo) became a "person of interest." DNA in Peterson's New York apartment was compared to DNA left behind at the crime scene. Two months after the murder, Peterson apparently had fled to the island of St. Martin where he applied for and received French citizenship. Last week, he turned himself in to St. Martin authorities, claiming that he committed the murder because five years ago Dr. Cornbleet had prescribed some acne medication that Peterson believed had made him impotent.

Because the French will not extradite their citizens in capital cases, bringing Peterson to Chicago for trial has suddenly become complicated.

Obviously there are many holes in this story which will be filled in the coming weeks and months. And I suspect that some of the "facts" as we currently know them will turn out to be untrue. But the bones of this story--New York internet gambler seeks acne treatment in Chicago, has bad reaction, then five years later returns to savagely murder the doctor who wrote the prescription--just won't stand up on their own, especially when you compare the complete irrationality of the act to the cold calculation of applying for foreign citizenship in order to avoid prosecution in the United States.

The local TV stations have been all over this story. The Tribune put news of the confession on Page 3 of Metro, probably because they know so little about Peterson and what they know is somewhat dubious. The Sun-Times seems to be giving it a little more wood with no more information. There are skilled reporters working the beat, however, and my gut tells me this story is going to blow up into front page weirdness in the coming days.

And although I will almost always put my money on professional reporters having the edge over internet gossips, this story might turn out to be an exception. Hans Peterson has friends. Some of his friends must know his story. Some of those friends no doubt have blogs.

I'm not making any predictions, but this could be the kind of halfway-under-the-radar tale the internet was born for.

Don't Touch Me I'm A Real Live Wire

By Kevin Guilfoile

It was absurd and chilling. The kind of scene that, as a writer, you wished you'd made up yourself.

Joseph "The Shark" Lopez, defense attorney for accused mobster Frank Calabrese, Sr., was cross-examining Frank Calabrese, Jr., his client's son and the star government witness in Chicago's ongoing Family Secrets trial. Lopez was dressed the part of a mob lawyer in a black suit with pink tie and socks. Frank Jr. was in the middle of a grueling week of testimony in which he had confessed to taking part in more than a dozen murders.

"Are you a serial killer?" Lopez asked him.

"No," Frank, Jr. replied. "I'm just a killer."

If I had to propose a universal theory of suspense novels, a single theme common to almost all mysteries and thrillers (some cozies excepted, perhaps) it would be something like what is suggested between the lines of that exchange. Suspense novels explore, again and again, not just the reasons human beings kill each other but, just as significantly, the reasons human beings don't kill each other more often than we do. Almost all suspense fiction is set at the horizon of decency where we've drawn the line representing mankind's ultimate and universal prohibition against taking another person's life. These stories are frequently about the people who seek to cross that line, the individuals assigned to keep them from doing it, and the people who are terrorized and victimized when that ethical wall is breached. The point of it, if I can avoid making it sound too self-important, is to understand what it means to be human. That's the point of all fiction, of course, but suspense novelists have staked out this particular territory on the edge.

And sometimes, it seems, so have the federal courts.

Lopez's half-serious but still provocative question--Are you a serial killer?--was obviously meant to shock both jury and witness (if it's possible to shock a person with so many notches on his holster). And it's easy to see why readers and writers are attracted to and repulsed by the psychology of serial killers. Our fascination with mobsters might even be more complicated. Men like Frank Sr. and Frank Jr don't seem to be mentally ill. I'm not qualified to say whether any of the men accused in the Family Secrets trial is a sociopath. But what becomes clear in the trial testimony is the way killing is not just a method for mob members to eliminate enemies or remove obstacles in their way. For them, murder is a tool of business the same way retailers have QuickBooks and White Sales. If there were a Malcolm Gladwell for mobsters he might be writing THE WHACKING POINT.

The popular notion of some mobster code in which members of the Mafia limit violence to their own kind is rooted partially in this seemingly business-like approach to murder. The serial killer murders for pleasure or to quench some pathological thirst. The mobster always claims to have a commercially viable reason.

But on another day of the trial we got a glimpse at just how frightening and arbitrary those reasons can sometimes be. After someone broke into the home of mob boss Tony Accardo in 1978, burglars all over town began disappearing. Bobby "The Beak" Siegel had nothing to do with the Accardo break in but he was getting the distinct feeling that he might be next. His fears were confirmed in a conversation with mobster Gerald Scarpelli, who told Bobby that The Outfit couldn't be sure exactly who had been involved and so they had decided to go after any and all small time burglars in an effort to send a message. "They were trying to make it one guy of every nationality," Siegel said he was told by Scarpelli of the hit list. "He said, 'You just happened to be the Jew.'"

Crime on a national scale

by Michael Dymmoch

The Outfit prides itself on crime commentary, and mostly we confine our remarks to local or fictional violence and organized crime. But here’s a national crime that’s almost as stomach churning as Abu Ghraib:

Since 2001, according to a report by Bob Woodruff on ABC World News (July 12, 2007), 22,000 soldiers have been separated from the US military with a ‘Separation because of personality disorder’ discharge. The military defines personality disorder as a “deeply ingrained, maladaptive pattern of behavior." Because personality disorder is considered a pre-existing condition, soldiers so separated are ineligible for disability pay and benefits. EVEN SOME WHO SERVED TOURS IN COMBAT ZONES AND WERE TREATED BY THE MILITARY FOR POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER! Some of these folks were encouraged to reenlist before discharge, and were billed for return of their reenlistment bonuses when their disabilities prevented them from serving out second hitches. They will be branded for the rest of their lives with a resume that insures they’ll be discriminated against when applying for jobs and insurance.

This is how we support our troops!

If these soldiers really had previously existing personality disorders, the military had no business accepting them for service in the first place. If in fact they served without incident before suffering in combat, THEY DESERVE DISCHARGES THAT ENABLE THEM TO LIVE DECENTLY AFTERWARD. And they deserve veterans’ benefits.

And the geniuses who decided that abandoning veterans is a good way to trim the military’s bottom line, belong in the brig.

That’s my take. What’s yours?

Love Won't Be Calling At Your Address

By Kevin Guilfoile

One thing I remember about growing up was that my dad was really excellent at not murdering us. He had a look that made us believe he might kill us even when, it turns out, murder was never really an option.

Not killing your kids is a lost parenting art, apparently.

Experts (whoever they are) claim that the number of incidents of familicide are still quite rare and have remained fairly consistent over the years. They say that when parents murder their children it's always a sensational case and the overreporting in this modern era of media saturation makes it seem like such events are more common now than they actually are. I'll take their word for that, although last month surely represented an unprecedented spike in frequency.

In Chicago the papers are fixated on the case of Christopher Vaughn, who is accused of shooting his wife and three children on a June 14 daytrip to a downstate water park. The local papers ask how a man could commit such an unthinkable crime. It was a "coldly planned execution at dawn," Eric Zorn wrote yesterday. "A betrayal of love, trust, decency and biological imperative so complete it redefines the standard of everyday evil."

Similar columns are being written in San Francisco, but Christopher Vaughn isn't on their radar. Out there the name they're putting on everyday evil is Kevin Morrissey, who on June 18 similarly pulled his car over to the side of the road and murdered his wife and their two children before killing himself.

In Montclair, New Jersey it's Thomas Reilly, who drowned his two daughters on June 21 and then hanged himself, just hours after their mother had dropped the girls off for a visit.

In Delavan, Wisconsin the name is Ambrosio Analco, accused of killing his twin infant sons on June 9, along with his ex-girlfriend and two other people before killing himself.

In Griffith, Indiana it's Mickey Gordon who on June 10 killed his teenage stepdaughter before, of course, killing himself.

Now there is the case of professional wrestler Chris Benoit, who apparently strangled his wife on June 23, his seven-year-old son on June 24, and then, after placing a Bible next to each of their bodies, hanged himself with a weight machine pulley.

And I don't need to tell anyone about Bobby Cutts, Jr. who on June 14 allegedly killed his ex-girlfriend and their unborn child right in front of their three-year-old son.

For those of us who are parents there is something especially repellent and fascinating about a father killing his children. But it's different than fear. There are an almost infinite number of things that I worry might harm my children but obviously I don't worry at all that my boys will be murdered by me.

Maybe that's why there seem to be so few fictional villains whose target is their own family. We might have a visceral reaction to these cases--we might be appalled--but we never think our own family might be in similar jeopardy. The prototypical villain of fiction is the murderer who chooses randomly. The killer who picks his victim because he or she is in the wrong place at the wrong time. That is somebody we can all fear.

(There are exceptions of course and I'd love to hear examples if you have them. The Stepfather is an underrated horror film in which the new head of the household is a serial killer. Terry O'Quinn's performance in that film is so good that 20 years later, when his character does something on Lost and I miss it, my wife still recaps it by saying something like, "The Stepfather just opened the hatch.")

Writers also like to have a motive for the crime and when a father kills his family we are frequently left with no explanation at all. According to forensic pyschiatrist Dr. Louis Kraus, when a woman kills her family it's frequently the result of a mental illness. The mother is depressed or she thinks the children are in some imagined jeopardy and using the logic of insanity decides that the only way to save them is to kill them.

When fathers kill their children, Kraus says, they are less likely to be insane and more likely to be narcissists and sociopaths for whom fatherhood has become inconvenient.

It's the new mid-life crisis. Murdering your kids is the new sports car.

When the killers take their own lives we rarely get any hint at motive. Benoit allegedly sent disturbing text messages to his friends while he was in the middle of his household killing spree. Perhaps that evidence will explain something.

On Memorial Day, 1998*, Daniel LaMere of Gurnee, Illinois sat down at his computer just moments before he would take a shotgun and kill his wife, his two stepchildren, and then himself. He typed:

"I guess your (sic) wondering why I did it. I have stayed as long as I can, but time has run out."

[Note: The original post of this article misstated the year in which this event occurred.]

Movies With Guns

by Marcus Sakey

I love movies. I especially love crime movies. I don't mean gangster films, or at least not specifically those; I mean movies that explore the seamier side of life, that are unabashed about having a plot and yet also handle character with grace and explore a larger issue.

Here's the problem. There aren't enough of 'em. And a lot of great ones slip through the cracks.

Ever see Spy Game? Odds are you didn't. It was badly trailered, promoted as a sort of pretty-boy actionfest. In truth, there's not much of what you'd call action. But it's a masterful film about loyalty, about country, about the things we can convince ourselves to do for a cause we believe is larger than ourselves--and what happens when we're wrong.

Plus it's damned entertaining.

How about The Peacemaker? George Clooney and Nicole Kidman chasing a load of stolen nuclear weapons. Not new in its own right, but handled with sophistication and subtlety, and every character, good and bad, is smart, motivated, and believable. The subject matter, timely when it came out, now plays as damn-near prescient. And it's even fairly accurate about nuclear weapons, something you just never see.

Obviously, no one needs me to recommend The Usual Suspects, or Goodfellas, or Silence of the Lambs. But did you ever see Manhunter, the first movie to introduce Hannibal Lector, chillingly played by Brian Cox? Okay, the soundtrack is a little eighties, but the film is otherwise fantastic, in many ways the equal to its Academy Award winning sequel.

Miller's Crossing may be the smartest (and oddest) gangster movie ever made. Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels is a perfect film, without a wasted scene or throwaway moment. Bound is so painfully tense it's hard to sit through. I watched Layer Cake three times in two days, and I could fire it up again right now.

So those are some of my favorites. What are some of yours, and why? Help a brother out--otherwise I'll just end watching Training Day for the fifteenth time.