Newsletter for July 2005

Inside this issue:

Kids Safety: Background Checks for School Construction Workers
Airport Security Still Riddled With Bugs
New Anti-Terror Cargo Standards Adopted Worldwide
Inside The Mind of the BTK Killer
Skyscraper Safety Recommendations Released
Replace Vests With Zylon
Sorry Columbo: Ejected Shell Casings Can’t Place a Shooter
U.S. Raises Estimate for Terror Attacks
Read Our Lips – The Police are Not Responsible for Your Safety– The Police are Not Responsible for Y

"Evil is easy and has infinite forms."

Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

Kids Safety: Background Checks for School Construction Workers

Tennessee Sen. Jamie Hagood has announced plans to introduce a bill mandating that background checks be performed on subcontractors and employees working on school construction projects in the state. The legislation would apply to construction projects at existing schools. Hagood was inspired to create the legislation after a local schoolgirl was kidnapped and murdered by a construction worker who had been working on a construction project at her school. The worker had previously been convicted of a sexual offense.

Airport Security Still Riddled With Bugs
 

A new study by the Homeland Security Department has found that screening methods employed by airport security are ineffective and often not standardized. As a result, security breaches occur and travelers are subjected to new rules from airport to airport. But efforts are underway to bridge the gaps in airport security. Among the steps being considered are to replace federal screeners with private screeners at some airports; implement pilot programs that use fingerprint and iris-scanning technology to screen out potential terrorists; employ new bomb sniffers and video surveillance; and install Israeli-technology-based security systems that track airport workers and make luggage and cargo loading areas more secure.

Ironically, there was a huge cry to replace the private screeners with federal screeners after 9-11.   Now, we are hearing that we are going to do another 180, bringing us back full circle.  It is also important to remember that technology does not equal security.

New Anti-Terror Cargo Standards Adopted Worldwide

More than 50 nations that are members of the World Customs Organization are drastically changing the way goods are tracked as they move around the globe in an effort to fight terrorists.

Now cargo containers will be inspected by customs officials as they leave a port, instead of at their destination. In addition, private importers will get preferred customs handling in return for tightening security to prevent terrorists from using their containers to transport banned weapons.

The 50 countries that made immediate commitments to honor the standards handle about 98% of all cargo movements and include the United States, Mexico, Canada, Japan, China and Brazil.

Governments worldwide will require advanced electronic notice of goods leaving or headed to their shores, as well as of their origin, route of travel and destination. Customs officials from the importing country, and perhaps the exporting nations, will analyze the information. If a container is designated high risk, the importing nation can ask the originating country to inspect the container with a radiation detector and an X-ray-like scanning device.

Inside The Mind of the BTK Killer

You’ve probably asked yourself, how can someone be so sick as to murder people?  But you don’t know the depths of depravity in which a serial killer’s mind can plumb.

The so-called “BTK” (for “Bind, Torture, Kill”) suspect Dennis Rader has pleaded guilty to 10 counts of first-degree murder, admitting to a series of slayings that terrorized Wichita, Kansas since the 1970s.

In his admissions, he revealed just how completely psycho and scary he is:

• He said he was motivated by sexual fantasies to torture and kill his victims.
• He referred to his victims as "projects".
• He would "troll" for victims on his off-time, then stalk them and kill them.
• "I had never strangled anyone before, so I really didn't know how much pressure you had to put on a person or how long it would take," he said in describing his first killings in 1974 which was a couple and two of their children.
• In describing those murders on Jan. 15, 1974, when he killed Joseph Otero, 38, and his 34-year-old wife, Julie, and their children Josephine, 11, and Joseph II, 9, Rader said, "The whole family just panicked on me. I worked pretty quick. I strangled Mrs. Otero. She passed out. I thought she was dead. I strangled Josephine. She passed out. I thought she was dead. Then I went over and put a bag on Junior's head.  Then he “went back and strangled her [Mrs. Otero] again."
• Rader has not been accused of sexually assaulting his victims, but he admitted masturbating over some of them.
• His next three known victims were young women found strangled in their homes: Kathryn Bright, 21, in April 1974; Shirley Vian, 24, in March 1977; and Nancy Fox, 25, in December 1977.
• He would take personal items from his victims to keep as “trophies”.
• He also killed Marine Hedge, 53, who was abducted from her Park City home on April 27, 1985, and found dead along a dirt road eight days later, and Dolores Davis, 62, who was abducted from her Park City home Jan. 19, 1991. Those deaths were not linked to BTK until Rader's arrest.
• He matter-of-factly described to the court how he chose his victims.  "If you've read much about serial killers, they go through what they call different phases. In the trolling stage, basically, you're looking for a victim at that time. You can be trolling for months or years, but once you lock in on a certain person, you become a stalker. That might be several of them but you really hone in on one person. They basically become the ... that's the victim. Or at least that's what you want it to be."
• He said he told Nancy Fox he had "sexual problems," forced her to strip, then handcuffed her and strangled her with a belt. After she was dead, he said, he removed the handcuffs from her body and masturbated over her.

If you have been following this case, you’ll remember how “normal” this guy was supposed to be.  He has lived in the Wichita area almost his entire life, earning a criminal justice degree at a local university. He worked in suburban Park City as a compliance officer, handling code violations and stray dogs. He has been married for 34 years and has two grown children.

Moral of the story?  Stay aware of who might be watching you and don’t let your guard down for anybody.

Skyscraper Safety Recommendations Released

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has completed its three-year study of the World Trade Center collapse and developed a set of recommendations to improve the evacuations of skyscrapers, improve structural stability, and reduce fire vulnerability. Stairwells would be increased in width, allowing people to evacuate and firemen to enter the building; elevator shafts would be "hardened" with one set aside for use by emergency responders. There are 30 recommendations overall in the report. Engineers working on the NIST study noted that their main concern was increasing safety, which included the reduction of sway in tall buildings in strong winds and earthquakes, improvements in fireproofing, and better systems to track emergency personnel. Additionally, the report would require fire doors to divide up skyscrapers to limit the air feeding a fire.

Shannon's Maxim:  The adversaries know and understand the security systems, strategies, and hardware being used.

Replace Vests With Zylon

Second Chance Body Armor Inc., the nation's top supplier of bullet-resistant police vests is urging its customers to replace vests containing the synthetic fiber Zylon, saying they may not be safe.

The company has said that tests suggested the vests "may fail to perform and result in serious injury or death." The company sent warnings to police agencies nationwide.

The company previously recalled more than 130,000 vests made entirely with Zylon. The latest warning covers vests with filling blends containing any amount of the fiber, including about 58,000 Tri-Flex vests and an additional 40,000 Ultima and Ultimax vests with Performance Pacs. The vests are used by police officers and some government officials but not by the military.

Sorry Columbo: Ejected Shell Casings Can’t Place a Shooter

TV detectives and even some prosecutors have perpetuated the myth that the location and pattern of ejected empty shell casings from a handgun can pinpoint the location of whoever was firing.

The Force Science Research Center has determined that “The single greatest influence on where spent shell casings land when ejected from a semiautomatic handgun is how the pistol is physically manipulated by the shooter, not any rigid, intrinsic mechanical factor.”

The center’s benchmark research show that the ejection spread can vary up to 24 feet with the same gun, fired by the same shooter, depending on how the weapon is gripped and moved, a significant finding in shootings where the person shooting is accused of lying about where they were positioned during a confrontation, based on where their ejected shell casings were found.

An additional new study by Los Angeles County, monitored by the FSRC, is the most extensive ever undertaken of ejection patterns and involved 48 LASD deputies firing a total of 7,920 rounds over a 2 week period.

The deputies completed 72 tests, each consisting of firing 110 rounds through a particular gun. The guns used were common law enforcement handguns -- 9mm Berettas and Glocks, .40-cal. Sig-Sauers and .45-cal. H&Ks. The deputies held the pistols in 11 different hand grips and angles, including the barrel pointed slightly down, pointed slightly up, parallel to the ground and canted at various angles up to 90-degrees off-center.  The officers also moved the gun as they were shooting in some of the tests.

The bottom line of the Center’s findings: "This study proves beyond doubt that the most significant factor determining where spent shell casings land is how the gun is held and moved by the officer when firing. There is no mechanical element associated with ejection that can have that radical an effect."

U.S. Raises Estimate for Terror Attacks

There were 3,192 terrorist attacks in 2004, with 28,433 people killed, wounded, or kidnapped, according to an estimate from the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). The numbers represent a revision to numbers released by the U.S. government in April showing 651 "significant" attacks occurring during 2004, killing 1,907 people. The NCTC defines terrorism as the use of violence against noncombatants or civilians to make a political point.

Read Our Lips – The Police are Not Responsible for Your Safety– The Police are Not Responsible for Your Safety

The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled again that the police do not have a constitutional duty to protect a person from harm.

The Supreme Court’s 7-2 decision overturned a ruling by a federal appeals court. That lower court had permitted a lawsuit against Castle Rock, Colo., for the failure of the police to respond to a woman's pleas for help after her estranged husband violated a protective order.  The Supreme Court ruled that the woman did not have the right to sue the city or the police department.

To develop the proper survival mindset you must forge an attitude of self-reliance.  Those who claim that the “police are there to protect you” are whistling past the grave yard.  Individual police officers are some of the most heroic people you will meet, but you cannot rely on them to protect you.

You also cannot rely on an order of protection to save you.

It’s up to you to get the information and training you need to protect yourself and your family.  Then, it’s incumbent on YOU to act decisively to implement your plan.

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Train like your life depends on it.  Someday it might.
 

Brad Parker