Note: please note! I beg you to note! This photgraph comes to you, compliments of Arlen Slobodow, the man in the photograph.
Why?
Well...I have just discovered that the comment below, from the person calling herself (himself?) Ashan is a complete fake! When Elsa Newman was 8 years old, her mother was recovering from the loss of her son in an accident. The family did not invite anyone over, not ever. None of Elsa's acquaintances had parents who were friends of her parents.
Elsa Newman lived in Philadelphia until she was ten and then her family moved out of the city. Why didn't "Ashan" know that?
By 1979, when "Ashan" says she (he?) met Elsa and others for dinner, Elsa was married (her first marriage; the ill-fated one with Arlen Slobodow would come later) and living in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
My best guess here is that Arlen Slobodow himself penned that comment--or some member of his family who equally despises Elsa.
And what do I think of that possibility? The vindictiveness and lack of detail is typical of other things I have received that I believe to have been written by Slobodow.
Since he has apparently chosen to insert himself into my blog, I have responded by inserting a picture of Slobodow himself at the beginning of this note.
Petty!...Petty!...Petty! A cheap shot, Mr. Slobodow. A very cheap shot indeed. It begins to look like my research is hitting close to home! Which means that Elsa Newman really is innocent. And you, sir, are among the most vile of creatures, a man who sexually savages his own sons.
Because I would rather have everything out in the open than have readers miss it, I am posting the following comment as part of my blog today.
Please note that the name this person uses refers to "smoke" or "city of smoke." Thus my question in the title as to whether this writer might be trying to "blow smoke" on my writing about the Elsa Newman case. Please read these arguments--in which the writer gives vent to a serious dislike for Elsa and calls her names, but does not venture into the area of fact or detail, apparently expecting us to accept her words at face value, with no documentation whatsoever. This writer also notes that her most recent contact with Elsa Newman was in 1979. Whatever the realities of this individual's claims about Elsa--from so very long ago--I have to stop and take a look at the time that separates this person's claims from the Elsa Newman I know now. This person's last contact with Elsa was nearly 30 years ago. And on this basis, she claims that Elsa "should pay for everything, and that would not be enough for what she put them through," although she offers no details as to what "everything" is and likewise no detail about "what she put them through" entails.
Please read Ashan's fact-free, name-calling diatribe. And then please read my response. Thank you.
Ashan said...
I just felt compelled to write this even though I don't want to get involved in this sordid affair.From what I see here, you actually never met Elsa Newman. Well, I knew Elsa for many years - from the time we were about 8 years old. The last time I saw her was around 1979, in our late 20s.Elsa was a thoroughly manipulative, egocentric, jealous, psychotic, vindictive, vengeful, conniving and compulsive child and young adult. Her parents and mine were friends over the years, which unfortunately threw us together far too many times. I used to dread having to tolerate her fits of rage, verbal abuse and general nastiness. I used to beg my mother to leave me at home alone rather than have to put up with her for hours. My final contact with her in 1979 was as horrendous an experience as any when I was younger. She tried very hard to demean me in front of others (who she also verbally abused). I kept my dignity, as did the others around the dining table.Everything the psychologists said about her in the wake of her crime was right on the mark. I completely sympathize with Elsa's ex-husband. Those poor children were exposed to a true mother-from-hell, if you could call her a "mother". I firmly believe that she should pay for everything, and that would not be enough for what she put them through.It's a pity that you believe that lies can be proven to be the truth. Elsa Newman's two boys are in the excellent, caring hands of their father.
July 31, 2008 1:07 AM
Rather than dwell on your fact-free, name-calling diatribe against a woman whom state you despise, despite—according to your own statement—not having had any contact with her in nearly 30 years, let me present you with some current facts about the Elsa Newman I know and about her case:
FACT: The question of justice has nothing to do with whether or not you find Elsa Newman likeable.
FACT: Elsa Newman is in prison based on charges that are impossible—by the very definition of the word, you cannot have a conspiracy of one, and yet no one else was charged with conspiracy.
FACT: Elsa Newman was charged with attempted murder. Margery Landry was not.
FACT: As I understand events on the evening of the crime, Margery Landry found Arlen Slobodow, nude from the waist down, in bed in the master bedroom with his younger son, Lars, who was completely nude.
FACT: At trial, Prosecutor Katherine Winfree showed a series of slides of the crime scene. One of those slides showed a pair of shoes—little boy’s shoes—beside the bed, with a pair of socks, shoes and socks bearing silent witness to what had happened to that little boy in that bed.
FACT: Arlen Slobodow said his little son came and climbed into bed with him, either because of a bad dream or because he could not sleep (depending on which journalist you are reading.) The boy's bed had not been slept in. Therefore I am required to believe that Lars woke...got out of bed...made his bed...took off his pajamas...put on his shoes and socks...walked, naked, to his father's room...removed his shoes and socks...left them by the bed...and crawled, naked, into a bed where his father slept, nearly naked. Ptoooie!
FACT: There was no attempted murder. The gun went off while Landry and Slobodow struggled over it. One bullet struck Arlen Slobodow in the thigh.
FACT: When Arlen Slobodow called 9-1-1, he told the operator that his estranged wife had sent someone to kill him. The reality is that—even if it were true—there is absolutely no way Slobodow could have known it.
FACT: Another of Winfree’s slides showed a small bag of what appeared to be “sex toys” in the room.
FACT: Elsa Newman and Margery Landry are in agreement that Elsa had nothing to do with and no prior knowledge of the break-in at Arlen Slobodow’s house. Landry was repeatedly offered a reduction in her own sentence if she would testify against Elsa. This she refused to do, saying she would not lie, even to make her own sentence less severe.
FACT: Landry stated on record that she wished she could blame someone else for the crime, because it had ruined her life. She added, however, that she alone was responsible.
FACT: Maryland’s highest courted tossed out the conviction from the original trial, saying they could find no evidence to link Elsa to the crime.
FACT: When Elsa was rearrested and retried, the trial was moved to Frederick, for fear that she could not be justly tried in Montgomery county.
FACT: At least some of the prosecutors and detectives actually thought chances for conviction were better in Frederick.
FACT: Some of the jurors in Frederick expressed prior opinions of Elsa's guilt. This was reported. On of those who reported it was a deputy sheriff. The report was ignored. The trial continued.
FACT: One tactic which investigators often use when a woman tries to prove a father’s sexual abuse that has disclosed by a child or children is to call the mother “crazy.”
FACT: Prosecutor Kathleen Winfree wrote an email to Susan Mercer, one of the investigators working on the case, and in that email she said of Newman, “She is so nuts.”
FACT: Winfree was herself probably not completely sure of Newman’s guilt, since she wrote in another email to Susan Mercer, “…Rob Grims was giving us only a 30% chance of conviction. When I told him we were going to Frederick, he upped it to 50!! And he is supposed to be on our side!!
FACT: Again, by email to Susan Mercer, Winfree stated, “I think Frederick will be fine—it is just a bit inconvenient and I am hoping Judge Donohue does not gut our case before we even get to the jury!! I don’t think the Fredneck rednecks will think much of Elsa’s Birkenstock 60’s look…”
FACT: During the second trial, Prosecutor Katherine Winfree did not show the slides with the “sex toys” and the little shoes and socks beside the bed. She showed, instead, slides of Arlen Slobodow in his hospital bed. [Not fact, but suspicion—I suspect that she had realized the implications of the slides she had previously shown, found them too telling, and switched to the slides of the hospital scene.]
FACT: According to the decision of Maryland’s highest court, Stephen Friedman should never have been allowed to testify against Elsa Newman in any court—by virtue of attorney-client privilege.
FACT: Elsa Newman is herself an attorney. She is obviously highly intelligent. It would require incredible stupidity—a virtue that Elsa clearly lacks—to sit and plot a murder in front of any attorney.
FACT: On Thursday, December 28, 2000, Sandra Ashley, as an employee of Stephen Friedman, met with Elsa Newman. As Friedman’s employee and representative, her interactions with Elsa should have been covered by the same attorney-client privilege as any interaction between Elsa and Friedman himself. This meeting occurred some 13 months before Landry’s break-in at the Slobodow house.
FACT: On Thursday, December 28, 2000, Ashley sent the following email to her employer, Stephen Friedman, and I quote the email in its entirety: “The children have been w/father for past several days and w/be returning tomorrow evening, Fri. She wants to have them examined and was in search of a pediatrician who ‘will tell it like it is.’” Strangely, there was no mention of any sort of threat against Arlen Slobodow.
FACT: Four years after she sent that email, Sandra Ashley testified in court that at the time of that meeting, Elsa had threatened to murder Slobodow or have him murdered.
MY OPINION? MUCH THE SAME AS THIS PHYSICIAN'S OPINION:
“In thirty-five years [of studying/reviewing child abuse cases] I have never seen a pushback like this….I’ve seen the disfavor professional mothers are held in, but never this….The disrespect shown Elsa and her children must be seen to be believed.”
Source: Pediatrician; Head of Child Abuse Unit at his hospital; Professor, Harvard Medical School; served on Presidential Commission on Child Safety. Name withheld as a matter of courtesy--although I'm sure that if you choose to research this statement, you will be able to discover the name of its source.
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