FOR THE WANDERING JEW...

Please see below: I hope you will take a look at the story of this Jewish mother, innocently imprisoned for a crime committed and admitted to by someone else. The collage is the cover of a brochure I created for Elsa Newman, #921975, Maryland Correctional Institution at Jessup. The text is the material from the inside of the brochure.

As an additional note, I want you to know that I have learned that Newman suffers incredible harrassment for being a Jew...an attorney...white...and innocent. I have written to Gary Maynard, head of Maryland's Department of Public Safety and Corrections, and he has been able to reduce some of the harrassment--but not all of it...never all of it.

This is the story of Elsa Newman and her sons, a mother unjustly imprisoned in Maryland, while her two boys live in Tampa, Florida, with a father they have accused of incredible molestation and abuse.
In the early 2000's in Maryland, Newman and her then-estranged husband, Arlen Slobodow, were divorcing when her two small boys began disclosing that they were being molested by their father. Before visitation, the boys clung to furniture and begged their mother not to make them go.
On a night in January, a friend of the Newman family, Margery Landry, broke into the home of Arlen Slobodow while his two sons were visiting. She carried a gun containing two whole bullets--hardly the arsenal of a woman intending murder--possibly the arsenal of a woman afraid of Slobodow because he had assaulted her more than once.
Landry, having heard of the molestation and abuse by the children's father and seeing that neither children's protective services nor law enforcement nor the courts seemed able or willing to do anything about it, entered the home at night to see if she could find evidence of the molestation.
She found no evidence, but before she left, she decided to look in on the two little boys. However, when she reached the bedroom of the younger son she found his bed made and empty.
Landry turned toward the master bedroom and looked in. There she saw Arlen Slobodow, nude from the waist down, in bed with his younger son, who was completely nude.
Question: In January in Maryland, how would she have known about the nudity if the pair had been sleeping and thoroughly covered as one would expect in the NE at that time of year?
Question: Why did Landry testify at trial that she "tried to pull them apart" if they were doing nothing but sleeping?
A struggle followed the attempt. Slobodow forced Landry to the floor and tried to turn the gun on her. It went off. One bullet struck the wall and one struck Slobodow in the thigh. Although his pajama bottoms were covered with blood, there was no bullet hole in the pajamas, verifying the claim that he had, indeed, been half naked when discovered.
Landry broke free and fled. She would be arrested the next morning.
Slobodow called 911 and set up the case for the prosecution in the trial that was to follow: "My wife sent someone to try to kill me."
During this time, Elsa Newman was out of state. When she heard that the police wanted to talk to her, she returned voluntarily, with no idea that authorities would accuse her of involvement. She was arrested and charged with everything Landry had done, plus conspiracy and attempted murder.
Landry pled guilty to other charges, but refused to plead either to conspiracy or attempted murder. Conspiracy and attempted murder were both null prossed for Landry. She was sentenced to 20 years in prison. Offered a reduced sentence if she would implicate Newman, she refused to do so.
Newman was tried twice. In her first trial one of the witnesses against her was her own divorce attorney, who, some two days after he discovered that she was planning to file a complaint against him, suddenly remembered that she had sat in his office and plotted to kill her estranged husband.
Maryland’s highest court voided the verdict the first trial, saying that her attorney should never have been allowed to testify against her.
Newman was released. In the second trial, the divorce attorney's secretary testified against her. Although Landry had denied conspiracy or murder attempt, those charges were held against Newman, who was offered a reduced sentence if she would apologize. She refused to apologize for something she had not done, and is now in Maryland Correctional Institution for Women at Jessup.
Her two sons, now young teens, continue to live with their father in Tampa. Since molesters do not change, I assume they are still being molested.

I am not alone in my belief that the court system is failing

Scandal Illuminates Troubled Family Court System

By Byron Williams

The family court system has, in theory, operated on the question, "What is in the best interests of the child?"

But the findings articulated at a one-day workshop hosted by Alameda County Supervisor Gail Steele and the Center for Judicial Excellence suggest that question is more theory than practice.
If the statistics are accurate, the frequency with which children are allowed to have unsupervised contact with physically or sexually abusive parents after divorce in this country is alarming and worthy of the public's attention.

According to the Center for Judicial Excellence, "Not since the Catholic Church pedophile scandal has the United States seen this level of institutional collusion and corruption harming innocent children."

This may sound like hyperbole, but the comparison holds if, in fact, most family court professionals know the system is broken and are allowing the most vulnerable members of society to potentially suffer lifelong consequences.

It is indeed a broken system that allows 58,000 children each year to be placed in harm's way simply because the abusive parent also possesses the resources to hire a bevy of professionals who plead his/her case to judges, mediators and other family-law professionals.

Heavy caseloads, bad judges and unqualified mediators, who evaluate families sometimes based on no more than a one-hour meeting, can add up to decisions that permanentlyaffect families.

As one parent shared with me, "I wouldn't believe my own story if I didn't live through it. We trust the courts to do the right thing, but it's just not that simple."

Those who are not directly involved trust the system to work — but there was a consistent message at the workshop that it does not work, and children are paying the price.

Are these simply the musing of parents and attorneys who did not get their way? No, there is more than enough data to suggest there is a problem that warrants investigation. The primary charge finds that many judges, for reasons ranging from being overworked to becoming jaded by the system, have placed an inordinate reliance on court appointees such as mediators, evaluators, investigators, and minors' counsel, who may or may not act in the best interest of the children.

This has created a scenario whereby individuals who have no understanding of the law often sway the individual who is appointed to administer justice.

Steele also cites a level of dishonesty that she states is pervasive throughout the system. "It's not just mediators but social workers who are not telling the truth," she said.

The workshop featured experts in the field and parents sharing their gut-wrenching, first-hand testimony and offering solutions to the problem-plagued system in California.

State Sen. Mark Leno and other members of the Legislature are calling for an audit that will evaluate the magnitude of the concerns expressed over a number of years.

A number of participants also made it clear the problems they cite are not emblematic of the whole, maintaining there are indeed a number of good judges within the system. But there are enough bad ones who are not held accountable, causing the system dysfunction.

Steele should be commended for her willingness to bring attention to an issue that has flown under the radar for years. Investigation is long overdue.

Byron Williams has served as pastor of the Resurrection Community Church in Oakland since 2002. As the only pastor/syndicated columnist in the country, Williams writes a column which appears in 10 publications and several progressive web sites across the country.

22 DAYS AND COUNTING DOWN...

...to the FREE-ELSA-NEWMAN trip

The brochures are ready to be printed, as of this morning.

I set aside the flyer and used that material on the outside of the brochure. One less thing to keep track of as I travel.

The paper petition is ready to be printed for me to carry with me on the trip.

I have gathered information from The Innocence Project at Yeshiva University; The Innocence Project has meant exoneration for some 240 people--many on death row. My hope is that this will prove helpful to establish without argument that there actually are innocent people in US prisons.

I have bumper stickers that say "Free Elsa Newman," and they are all ready to go.

The signs are on the motor home. The signs on the metal stayed on well. However, I must make some replacement signs for some that came off the glass. I will put the replacement signs INSIDE the windows, rather than trying to drive in pouring rain with outside signs.

I am beginning to make some media contacts, despite the poor piece of writing I put out at first. I think I will now send copies of the brochure to media, rather than trying to write a "press release" at which it seems I am a dismal failure.

I have twenty-two days to go, leaving three weeks from tomorrow, God willing.

All that remains is to finish the printing...make four replacement signs and have them laminated...and get the MK ready to go. Hmmm. Maybe I'll leave early. The earlier I am on the road, the better my hopes for the weather between here and northern Idaho, which will be my first stop.

DOGGONE...I FIGURED IT OUT!

The two little boys who, according their own disclosures, have suffered for years at the hands of the father they said molested them

Re: Stephen Friedman-- I FIGURED IT OUT!

It’s easy to understand why Arlen Slobodow would lie. He had been accused by his sons of molesting them sexually as well as savaging them physically, mentally, emotionally and spiritually. The accusations never reached a courtroom in Maryland because Margery Landry's crime intervened. If Slobodow lied and his estranged wife went to prison, he was free and clear.

But why on earth would a woman’s former attorney lie about her in court—saying she had sat in his presence and plotted murder?

It’s easy to understand why Doug Gansler, then State’s Attorney for Montgomery Country and now Maryland’s Attorney General, might not care much about the truth of the matter. He was planning a run for state office. The Newman case was high profile. The media coverage was doubtless helpful. And all the more helpful if he could put the defendant away.

But Newman’s own divorce attorney?

It’s easy to understand why Slobodow’s attorney might not be interested in truth. She was being paid to defend him, not find out the truth.

But why would Stephen Friedman, Newman’s own attorney, perjure himself on the witness stand?

It’s easy to understand why the prosecuting attorney, Katherine Winfree, would not seek truth. Her emails show her disdain for Newman. In addition, she had a reputation to uphold; her boss, Doug Gansler, has said she is a better prosecutor than even he is.

But dammit…the one thing that I couldn’t figure out for the longest time was why a man like Stephen Friedman would lie about his own client.

And now? I’ve figured it out. At last.

Perhaps, after reading this brief account, you can draw your own conclusion as to why Stephen Friedman would have been motivated to bear false witness.

Friedman, you see, was not Newman’s attorney in any way that had anything to do with the criminal trial. Nope. He was her divorce attorney. And Newman was becoming sick and tired of his behavior as her divorce attorney. She began putting together a list of his misdeeds.

· He made appointments and then kept her waiting interminably with no apparent reason, once when she waited with her elderly mother, now 96 years old.

· He would talk to other clients on the phone while Newman sat in his office—and then he would bill her for the time he was using the phone.

· He would take a “break,” be gone for as much as half an hour or forty-five minutes, leaving her alone in his office—and then bill her for that time.

· He would often seem to fall asleep during time that should have been used for preparing the divorce case. Whether he was really asleep or not, he billed her for the time.

· He left to use the restroom—and billed her for the time.

· Friedman double billed—meaning he would go back and bill again for something he had already included in a bill. One month he billed Newman $40,000. Nor was this a month when he went to trial for her. There was nothing going on but office visits.

· Friedman billed Newman some $300,000 for a year’s work—although he stretched the work out for well over a year.

· According to Newman, Friedman wrote three- and four-page threatening letters.

As a result of these and other equally “obscene practices," Newman was preparing to accuse Friedman of malpractice. This she did not want to do during the divorce hearing. She intended to wait until divorce issues were settled.

Newman never got that chance. Margery Landry broke into Slobodow's house, and the rest is news I've written and rewritten.

Now you need to know that Newman has a habit of planning everything out on paper, and even before the divorce hearing, she made a list, some two or three pages long. At the time of Margery Landry’s crime, officials removed a computer and personal papers from Newman’s home, in search of evidence. Included in the papers was Newman’s list of complaints against Friedman.

Ah-oh! Guess who saw them!

Somehow, it seems, possibly with the assistance of Katherine Winfree in the State’s Attorney’s office, Friedman became aware of the paper and the charges Newman was planning to bring against him.

Two days after he saw the papers, he suddenly remembered that he had heard Elsa Newman sit in his office and plot to kill Arlen Slobodow, and rushed to two different judges to ask advice about what he should do with this horrible knowledge. Two days. And then he testified against her at trial.

Ladies and gentlemen…readers of this blog…I rest my case.

TO THE SONS OF ELSA NEWMAN:

One of my fondest hopes for you is that you will forever--no matter what anybody makes you say to the contrary--be proud of your mother!

I've ever known a mother more proud of her children, more pleased with them, more hopeful for their future; more frightened that the horrible abuses you disclosed might damage you and your bright future.

Of course her heart is broken over her separation from you, but she did nothing to deserve that. All she did was believe you when you disclosed the abuses your said your father was perpetrating on his two very young sons.

Did you know that your mother, when she was offered a reduction in her prison sentence if she would apologize for "conspiracy" and "attempted murder" held her head high and said simply, "I cannot apologize for what I did not do."

It did not matter what the jury said. It did not matter what the judge said. It did not matter what your father had said. The only thing that mattered is what she knows to be the truth. Your mother is a brilliant woman and a woman of integrity. It takes guts to do what she did--face a longer prison sentence, rather than deny that integrity.

Enough said for now.

THE FIRST LEG OF THE COAST-TO-COAST TRIP!

The first leg of the coast-to-coast and border-to-border trip on behalf of Elsa Newman has been completed. On Wednesday last the pugs and I climbed into the motor home, took our places and picked up Lois, a friend who had agreed to accompany me on this part of the journey.
Thanks to Lois, I have pictures for you. I will try not to write much, but just let you look at the pictures and captions.

We drove to Long Beach in Washington, where we picked up a small piece of driftwood, thanks to Lois, who found it. I was about ready to give up on the driftwood and just take a tiny container with a few grains of sand. The idea behind the driftwood is that as I travel I will pick up a small rock or other found item from each state I visit, carrying all of them with me as a symbol of my attempt to unite people in all the states behind Elsa Newman and her sons.

After Long Beach, we drove across the Astoria bridge and back to Vancouver, Washington--and then the pugs and I came home.

It was a good shakedown trip. I learned that I may not be able to drive that far every day. We found that some of the signs came off, so I will have to replace those. The ones on metal were fine. The ones on glass were a lost cause.

Now for the pictures:

The view from the passenger seat. We drove about two miles out of the way to take a look at this historic covered bridge.

Notice the signs. Please notice also my "prison blues,"

which I wore, but which had not yet

been stencilled with the words "PRISON BLUES...

in honor of Elsa Newman...#921975 MCIW...

innocent but imprisoned." I am right now in the process of

doing the stenciling

Me--with some of the pug herd, in their ex pen.

Somebody must have still been inside, because I seem to be informing someone that

it is time to disembark.

If you scrunch up your eyes just right, you can see some of the herd of elk we

saw on the way to the coast.

Plans Proceed Apace

Several things have happened over the last few days. All good, so far.

· The motor home is repaired and ready to travel. Ooops! That reminds me: I’d better start it up and let it run for a while.

· My stencil has arrived, so I can get my prison blues ready—thank you, Johnny Cash for the name. My blue shirts will say “PRISON BLUES…in honor of Elsa Newman…#921975 at MCIW…innocent but in prison.”

· I’m planning to purchase little blue shirts for all the pugs. I need to get fabric paint in tubes, so I can write on their shirts, things like “Free Elsa Newman”…”Elsa Newman-unjustly imprisoned”…and maybe even “Shame on Maryland!”

· The signs for the MH are due on Monday. I can hardly wait to get them on, so I hope the weather accommodates.

· The backup mirror for my MH arrived. I’ve got to get that installed. It helps a lot when I am driving. For example, I will be able to see if some ning-nong, invisible in the side mirrors, is tailgating.

· I even received the little rubber piece I needed for the vacuum cleaner, so I will be able to carry a Dirt Devil and vacuum the carpets, which needs to be done rather often, in view of the fact that statistics show that one pug sheds enough hair every day to make a whole new pug!

· Next week should bring the trip to the coast with a friend. Looking forward to it.

· I’m still working on the press release…finding it difficult to write about myself and mine in the third person.

· Found out I cannot use dried egg whites for my liver shunt puppies, so I will have to carry fresh eggs and/or make frequent stops for fresh eggs. Guess I’ll be eating lots of egg yolks or making lots of puddings—or something.

· Starting to receive word from folks who will welcome my dogs and me—and some even have suggestions for publicity in local news media. Yesssss!

· Received washable pads for the floors, to protect the carpet. Also have lots of homemade “rugs” that I use for the same purpose—mostly old towels sewn together.

Hey! This is really going to happen. I can hardly wait to get on the road.

Journal--day three

Elsa Newman and her sons

with friend of a canine persuasion

Wheee! Count down another day! Thirty-eight days until we leave; and sooooo much still to do!

The signs for the motor home have shipped—due here on the 19th of this month, but that is about all the news for the day.

We had a power outage this morning and into part of the afternoon, which put a crimp in some of my preparation plans. Preparation, of course, includes getting my home ready to leave behind, as well as getting the motor home and the dogs and myself ready for travel. Getting the house ready? Means putting covers over the screens on my screened back porch. Means getting all washing caught up. Means keeping up on dishes. Nothing very exciting.

Most of the preparation for the dogs means being sure I have the right foods with me. I have very young little girls with liver shunts. They have to have a special diet and special meds. They also need filtered water. Gotta be sure I have everything with me.

As to the rest of the herd? I’ve switched them all to Beneful—because I know I can get that anywhere. They are good to go.

Come November 20? We'll all be good to go.

Watch for us in your state or your city!

Journal--day two

Not much to record today on the preparations for the trip. I did begin writing a press release, after looking up a how-to and a guide on the net.

I have signs coming for the motor home. The first one has arrived: a banner which I can attach to the MK at stops. It says, “Elsa Newman and Sons—information here.”
The rest are supposed to arrive on the 19th. I hope the company keeps that commitment. I am looking forward to decking out the MK in her new clothing. Among the signs I am expecting are the following:
1. Coast to coast and border to border for Elsa Newman and sons
2. elsanewmanisinnocent.blogspot.com
3. Free ELSA NEWMAN –unjustly imprisoned in Maryland
4. Elsa Newman—Innocent but in prison
5. Time for justice—Elsa Newman—unjustly imprisoned
6. Time lost in prison is gone FOREVER—missing out while your children grow up—ALSO GONE FOREVER
7. Sign petition: thepetitionsite.com/1/Free-Elsa-Newman
8. Free Elsa Newman [with two pics of Elsa]
9. Plus a pug sign, since I’m a pug person, in which a pug bewails the fact that “Elsa Newman has been in prison sooooo long!” That one is for the driver’s- side door.

Looking forward to taking this message across the United States. Look for me in your state and your city. I’ll be the obnoxious little, old lady retired school teacher, traveling in a “Jubilee” motor home covered with signs, and accompanied by 11 ½ pugs, ½ Chihuahua, and one pug in a tuxedo—that’s Holly, the Boston Terrorist!

THE TIME HAS COME...

It is October 11, 2009—40 days to departure--and time to begin a journal of my coast-to-coast and border-to-border journey to publicize the plight of Elsa Newman and her sons.
In September, I made a shakedown run to LaGrande, Oregon, with the motor home. I took all 13 small dogs with me, using built-in crates that I had made myself. I have 11 ½ pugs, ½ Chihuahua, and another person who is either a pug in a tuxedo, a penguin, or some relative of the flying nun. We all learned a bit from that trip. I took notes on things I wanted to change or improve. And we headed home.

After that? Boy, howdy! Did things ever shake down! On the way home, as I passed some construction, I remember thinking, “Wow! That stuff is too close to the road.” And before I could even finish the thought, something hit my front awning arm, pulled it loose and created a tremendous racket.

When I finally got to a place where the road was wide enough to allow for pulling over, I clambered out to survey the damage. The awning arm hung loose. The door was scraped and looked pretty bad. Nor would it open. Fortunately, I try to plan for emergencies and had with me a length of clothesline, which I used to secure the battered arm.

After sitting a while in an attempt to calm down from the incident, I drove on home, nearing despair at the thought of what the cost of repairs would be.

When I checked online, it appeared that a new door would cost about $400 and the new arm for the awning would be something over $200. Ahh…then came David.

An online friend of mine speaks often of angels—in various forms, canines, other animals, people. I wonder often if David is not one of mine.

David, you see, lives on my land in a fifth wheel. Why is he here? Well…it’s a long story, but to keep it short, he lives here to help me care for his mother, Alice, who lives in my travel trailer [not to be confused with my motor home; the travel trailer is more-or-less permanently in place, and I consider it an extension of my house]. David’s mother, you see has terminal cancer. Actually, she was not expected to be still living by this time in 2009; in January, the doctors gave her two to five months at best. She is now at the beginning of the tenth month since her diagnosis.

OK…so all that is sort of an aside where this journal thing is concerned, except to explain the presence of David, who is helping me prepare the motor home for the journey. David felt nothing like the despair I had felt. “You know,” he said, “I believe I can fix this.”

The first step was to persuade the door to open and close. Which he did. Then we applied a painted plywood panel to cover the worst of the scratches and hold the door straight.

That left only the front arm of the awning. I ordered parts and David—bless him again—replaced the damaged one. Just today we rolled it up and down and it works fine.

I don’t know exactly how much money this young man has saved me, but I can make a rough guess, starting with the $400 I did NOT have to spend for a replacement door. Plus labor for replacing the door. Plus labor for replacing the awning arm, even if I had bought the parts myself and taken them to a repair shop. I’m appropriately grateful. I rather need the money for the trip, instead of repairs to the vehicle.

So now the repaired motor home—which my friends call the “motor kennel” or “MK”—stands in the yard, waiting for final preparations.

I have signs ordered, which should arrive on the 19th of this month. After that? A trip to the Washington-Oregon coast, accompanied by a friend, so I can say literally and truthfully that I am travelling coast to coast for Elsa Newman.

More later. This will do for a start. I have planned this venture for a long time now. I do hope it will call attention to the unjust imprisonment of Elsa Newman—as well as the abuses her sons have said they live with at the hands of their father.

Quick test about those involved in putting Elsa Newman in prison--despite her innocence

1. What do you call it when a father molests his two sons sexually?
a. Incest
b. Sexual abuse
c. Child abuse
d. All of the above

2. What do you call it when a father is found in bed, nude from the waist down, with a small son who is completely nude?
a. A situation which would suggest child abuse.
b. A situation which would suggest child molestation.
c. A situation which is improper.
d. All of the above

3. What do you call it when a state’s attorney from Montgomery County, Maryland wants to convict a suspect so badly that he decides to retry her case after the state’s highest court has voided the verdict?
a. Political ambition
b. Fear of looking bad when a high-profile case went bad on him
c. Preparation to run for the office of Attorney General of Maryland
d. Deciding ahead of time who was at fault and then accepting only evidence which supports his theory.
e. All of the above.

4. What do you call it when Katherine Winfree, prosecuting attorney in the Newman case is
observed late one night, driving erratically; when stopped by police, she refused a breathalyzer test?
a. DUI
b. Illegal
c. A sign of an individual who cannot be totally trusted within the framework of the law.
d. All of the above

5. What do you call an attorney who lies on the stand about his own client, stating that he has heard said client, while sitting in his office, state that she wanted to kill her estranged husband?
a. An attorney who is testifying in defiance of attorney-client privilege.
b. A man who is willing to lie about a former client
c. A man who believes he will be believed by a jury when he claims that his former client--well-educated, an attorney in her own right and a woman of considerable wisdom--sat in his office and talked about a plan to murder her estranged husband, when her attorney knows she never did this.
d. All of the above.

6. What do you call an estranged husband who sets up the prosecution case against his wife for said prosecutors?
a. A sociopath
b. Someone able to make a good impression when he chooses to do so
c. Someone who has a darker side, which before the trial had taken the form of spousal abuse, physical and sexual abuse of his children, and who, although friendly and believable in public, became at home a surly, sullen man who seldom spoke unless to shout or demean.
d. All of the above.

7. What do you call a court psychologist who sets aside the results of psychological testing in favor of his own personal opinion of Elsa Newman and her estranged husband?
a. A liar
b. A man who will one day recommend that the Castillo children in Maryland be allowed unsupervised visits with their father.
c. A man who will be responsible for the fact that said father drowned all of his children in the bathtub during one of those unsupervised visits.
d. A man who has no integrity.
e. All of the above.

A BLOG FOR AS[S]...

Recognize the hands? Remember when I used them in one of my original blogs, not just on this site, but on several sites? Remember how quickly you removed your picture--which contained those hands--from your Facebook page? Why did you remove that picture? I can only suppose that you removed it in fear that someone who saw both pages might recognize the hands and know of whom I was writing.

That is certainly what I would have done, if I were a pedophile who was molesting my own sons and somebody cropped my hands from MY picture and put those hands on a blog site.

After spending two years and more researching your situation and the case of your ex-wife, Elsa Newman, I have a pretty good idea about some other things I would do if I were a pedophile, abusing my own sons, and some obnoxious little old lady from the state of Washington began exposing me on a blog site. Oh, yes! How about some of this:

1. I would be sure that CPS never interviewed my sons except in my presence.

2. I would lie to my sons about their mother. I would say things like, “Your mom is nothing but a failed lawyer.” It’s balderdash; Elsa Newman was quite a successful lawyer. But that’s what I would tell me sons if I were a pedophile and I were molesting them.

3. I would tell other lies about their mother. I would tell them she is “crazy,” despite the fact that Elsa Newman’s psychological testing showed her well within the framework of what is considered normal.

4. I would lie about my own psychological testing. I would never let my sons know that I was the one whose tests showed more-than-questionable tendencies toward mental problems.

5. If I were a child molester, and if I were molesting my own children, I would be delighted at the opportunity to put my sons’ mother in prison. Said mother, after all, is their primary line of defense. I would lie, if I had to, in order to make her look guilty.

6. Hell…I’d even pay other people to lie. I would do most anything to keep my obscene secret a secret.

7. If my children disclosed the truth, I would beat them and/or use any other possible form of intimidation to force them to take back their words of accusation.

8. If I were a child molester who specialized in molesting his own children, and my children disclosed the truth, I would take what those children said and tell authorities that it couldn’t have happened: Nobody could stuff a whole transformer toy into a little boy’s rectum. Ridiculous. Of course the fact would remain that I hadn’t stuffed the whole toy in there--it just felt that way to the kid. But I would make the kid look foolish and unbelievable.

9. If I were a child molester, abusing my own children, I would persuade my children that those things never happened. I would use mental, emotional, physical, spiritual and any other kind of force I could think of to assure that my sons lost track of reality--and wouldn’t even remember the things I had done to them.

10. If I were a child molester, and my own children were the primary objects of my attentions, I would do everything in my power to keep my children from their mother. She’s in prison, after all. She must have done SOMETHING to deserve to be there. And I would lie about my ex-wife until my sons believe me.

How am I doing, AS[S]?

And there’s so much more I would do, isn’t there? But that’s enough for now. Maybe you will write a response to me and continue with further thoughts about the actions of a pedophile who abuses his own children?

The coast-to-coast/border-to-border campaign begins

Finally I have thought of something to do to publicize the case of Elsa Newman and her sons.

On the 20th of November, I will begin a cross-country trip in my recently-purchased motor home. I will travel with my 13 pugs, who now have cages built into the motor home so they can travel safely.

The motor home will bear signs such as "Free Elsa Newman;" "Elsa Newman, Innocent and in prison," "#92197, Maryland Correctional Institution at Jessup," "8 years behind bars--but innocent," "Elsa Newman, separated from her sons by Maryland's injustice system."

The motor home will travel through as many states as possible, en route to Maryland. Also posted on the MH will be the website for this blog, as well as the website for the online petition. In addition, I plan to carry a paper petition and find as many signatures as possible to add to that. There will be handouts: a flyer for those who want a quick summary; a brochure for those who want more.

If you read this, please wish me blessing and peace for this journey. And please pray that my audacity will stir interest all across the United States, but especially in Maryland, where Governor McNalley has the power to step into this case and actually DO something, whereas all I can do is make a fool of myself on a cross-country tour.

And if you have not yet signed the online petition, please do so at this site: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Free-Elsa-Newman

Thank you, friends. And feel free to check around you for others in Newman's situation. Estimates range as high as 1 in 7 prisoners who may be innocent of the crime for which they are imprisoned. A despicable failure in the so-called American justice system.

Peace...blessings...love and light...

Aine

Not Your Usual Elsa Newman Story!!!!

But a story of a whole other kind...and one I cannot resist sharing.



Today I met a man, a grizzled, softhearted and kindly man, a Viet Nam veteran whose eyes and heart still fill with tears when he thinks, reads or writes about things that happened to him as the Viet Nam War was drawing to a close.

May I call him “Bill”? That’s not his real name, but although he gave me permission to write this and to share the story of one particular experience that left him haunted and hurting, he wants to remain anonymous.

Bill was among the last servicemen sworn in at the time of the Viet Nam War. Unable to see himself struggling through steaming jungles, he enlisted in the Navy. The Navy promised him that if he would take and pass certain classes, he could serve as an electrician. He took them. He passed. And he was on his way to the far east, aboard ship.

One thing you should know before you read further: Bill wishes there might be some way men--and now women, too--might learn even a little about what to expect in war--even when that war has ended. He was, he says, totally unprepared for the things he saw.

This is the haunting story that he wrote as he was trying to recover from the horrors of one of his last days in the Navy

As the fall of South Vietnam was taking place in late April, 1975, I was proud to be a crew member aboard the USS Blue Ridge (LCC19) [photo above] and be called upon to take part in “Operation Freedom Wind,” the evacuation of the last Americans and of loyal South Vietnamese civilians. I was in the Navy, on a ship and mostly safe. I was not out in the jungles fighting the Viet Cong, dodging bombs and gunfire, but I nevertheless had experiences that still, to this day, haunt and trouble me greatly.

As the evacuation was going on--escaping and frightened civilians--as they were swimming and floating on almost anything that could float, I had to watch helpless from the deck of the ship, as multitudes of them drowned. There were old people, young people, women with their babies and their other children--all of them fighting to get close to the ship, get to safety.

It was horrible for me that I could do nothing to help them. I know that I was not responsible for them. But the guilt and shame that I have carried for the last 32-plus years have been unbearable.

The ship quickly became filled to capacity with the people we could safely bring on board. Even the helicopters bringing out evacuees had to find alternate landing places--and then the helicopters were ditched, to make room for these fleeing swarms of human beings.

As more and more people were able to climb on board, we were busy throwing overboard weapons, supplies--anything we could find to get rid of--just to make room for more people.

We were about a mile from shore, and as people weakened and fell away from their flotation devices, I had to watch them drown. They were just too exhausted to hang on anymore. There were literally hundreds of people just out of my reach--out of our reach.

This event will stay with me for the rest of my life. I cannot escape it. Sometimes when I hear a helicopter--or even a spinning washing machine--it is like I am right back there on the ship, watching people who desperately needed help, people who were reaching out to us. But they were not within range of help, not by me…not by anyone else.

On that same occasion, one helicopter brought aboard a wounded Marine. He was pretty banged up, and I assisted the team to get him to sick bay. I never knew if he turned out OK, if he died or not. I just knew that I had seen another man in pain. And I realize that watching this guy, all bloody and screaming, created in me the same feelings of watching all those helpless people drown.

After the war I began abusing alcohol, just so I would be able to get to sleep without nightmares--the faces and the screams of those people, both the hundreds in the water and the single Marine I helped to sick bay.

After treatment for alcohol abuse, at the VA in Seattle, I no longer drink. But drinking was the only way I could cope back then.

CHILDHOOD LOST...

Please add your signature to the online petition for Elsa Newman and her sons:

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Free-Elsa-Newman
[the website above is not clickable; please copy and paste]

TRANSCRIBED: material from flyer

It seems that the material on the flyer I posted previously may be difficult for some of you to read. Here then is a transcription of the material to help you:

"This was a beautiful, loving family. Then mom expected the courts to protect her children from abuse. Everything went topsy-turvy. Now mom is in prison for a crime she did not commit, and the children are stuck with the very person who abused them.

Please sign our petition and ask friends to sign. Your signatures help not only this family but thousands of others whose cries for help--along with the expectations of their concerned mothers--were silenced.

Speak up. Judge righteously. Proverbs 31:9

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Free-Elsa-Newman

http://www.thepetitionsite.com/2/free-elsa-newman--save-her-kids-from-abuse

The best way to reach these to sites is probably to copy and past the addess into your browser.

Elsa Newman is innocent--please sign the petition

The problem with this petition has been that signatures don't seem to be showing up on the original petition. Over 100 people have told Friends of Elsa Newman that they have signed the petition...yet the number of signatures remains steadfast at 277.

I have written to the petition site. As yet I have heard nothing from the managers of the site.

My suggestion? Sign both of these. The original petition is in black below...the new version is in blue. [An apt color scheme, I suspect, for a woman and children who have been battered, abused and bruised by the Maryland "justice" system, by the prison system, and by the abusive father of the two boys.]

If you wish to sign only one petition, perhaps the new version would be preferable, since it still seems to be accepting signatures. I'll be back with news about why signatures are not posting on the other one.

ORIGINAL: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/1/Free-Elsa-Newman

NEW VERSION: http://www.thepetitionsite.com/2/free-elsa-newman--save-her-kids-from-abuse

A LETTER TO ELSA NEWMAN'S SONS...

Dear young men who have asked me not to use your names any longer,

Please notice that I respect your wishes, even though I must continue to write about the abomination your father has made of your lives, and the hell on earth he has created for your mother.

Her hell has more than one part, you know: one part, of course, is the imprisonment itself, unjust as it is, and the way she is treated in prison. Another part is her separation from you. And still another is her knowledge of the disclosures you made when you were much younger; your mother has to live every day of her life with the belief that your father abuses and molests you in every way he can think of.

And one more part of your mother's hell on earth is the certain knowledge that your father lies to you about her. Yes. He lies.

LIE: Your father told you that your mother planned to kill her older son, in order to save the younger one. LIE!

LIE: Your father told you that your mother pushed you down the stairs. LIE! In reality, your father pushed your mother down the stairs while she was holding a baby...the older of the two of you.

LIE: Your father told you that Margery Landry tried to kill him. LIE! If she was even remotely thinking of murder, why did she have only two bullets in the gun?

LIE: Your father told you that it was crazy for you to call Margery Landry "Aunt Margie." LIE! Lots of kids call their mom's best friend aunt...or other friends of the family aunt or uncle. It is actually quite common in the very finest of families.

LIE: Your father tells you that your mother is crazy. LIE! Your mother is a woman unjustly imprisoned. She is a mother who loves her children far beyond what anyone who has not had children can understand. She is a mother who suffers the tortures of the damned as guards, officers and other inmates turn their anti-Semitism on her. She suffers abuse at the hands of guards, officers and other inmates who resent her because she is educated...because she is an attorney...because she is gentle and kind...perhaps even because some of them actually believe in her innocence.

LIE: Your father tells you that your mother tested as borderline--or some such psychological drivvel--when she was tested by a court-appointed psychologist. LIE! Actually, your mother tests well within the normal range; any statement to the contrary is based on a whim...just something the psychologist felt like saying. [Incidentally, do you know that this is the same psychologist who said that Mr. Castillo, the father who drowned his children in a bathtub, was normal and sent the children off to him on unsupervised visits--and to their death?]

LIE: Your father tells people--and perhaps you as well--that he has your welfare at heart. Pardon my Spanish, but nierde! nierde! nierde! LIE!

LIE: Your father tells you that HE is the one who tests normal. LIE!

LIE: Your father tells you that your mother and Margery Landry had an unhealthy relationship, in which Landry was manipulated by your mother to do your mother's dirty work. LIE! Your father is the one who manipulates others to do HIS dirty work.
Just like he got you to write all that horrible stuff online about your mother.

LIE: Your father tells you that there were other things abnormal about the relationship between your mother and Landry. LIE! Margery Landry was a friend of your family. She was also a long-time friend of your mother; the two, as I understand it, were like sisters.

So what am I saying here? Bluntly, I am saying that your father is an immense liar...a mammoth, continuous liar...a remorseless liar. And that is in addition to the fact that you and I and your brother and your mother all know: he is a living lie, because he is a pedophile.

Time to end. I could say a lot more. I will refrain for now.

QUESTION: WHAT KIND OF PARENT...

...allows his children to "ramble" around the back of a Jeep Cherokee and without seat belts...in heavy traffic...or on the highway...and all the time?

ANSWERS:

• A parent who virtually always neglects to watch for his children's safety.
• A parent who watches them closely otherwise--every word...every gesture...every thought they share with their unjustly imprisoned mother.
• A father who molests, beats, exploits and otherwise debases his children, in order to satisfy his dark urges.
• A father who is not "raising" his children but using them.
• A "man" who lied on the witness stand to take these children's mother away from them.
• A father who has been heard to say, "I don't give a damn if the kids grow up fucked up."

This is the kind of parent who lets his children ride without seat belts...who abuses their mother...and who abuses those children in every way he can think of.

ATTENTION TAMPA AND THE MAN WITH THE INITIALS A.S.

She's back! You know who I'm talking about: the little, old lady from Amboy, Washington who thinks you're a pervert of the grow-your-own-victims persuasion. That is to say, a so-called "father" who molests his sons.

Yes...that little, old lady would be me.

And I have a few questions for you:

1. You took your sons to visit their mother--Elsa Newman, #921975, Maryland Correctional Institute for Women at Jessup--in prison just over a week ago, did you not?
2. Why is their mother in prison? All she did was try to protect her sons from you, the perpetrator they accused of all kinds of abuse--including sexual, physical, mental, emotional and anything else you could think of.
3. Could it be that you lied on the witness stand?
4. Could it be that other witnesses also lied?
5. Why do you cut visits short? Your kids are supposed to see their mother for two hours each time you take them to the prison. Yet you cut the visits to an hour and a half--or sometimes just an hour and a few minutes. I'm sure you understand the importance of every second to a mother who sees her children only once a year. I'm sure you understand that. Cutting the visits short...insisting that the boys leave at your whim, when they are hanging back, trying to get another word or two with their mother...sounds to me like sheer vindictiveness. Well, duh...what else would I expect from a man who molests his own sons?
   
6. Why do your sons look so tired when you take them there? Your elder son has bags under his eyes from weariness. And the bags under his eyes were worse on the second day.
   
7. Why do the boys behave differently on the second day of visits? Do you coach them overnight? Do you threaten? Do you abuse again? What is it that you do to break them in preparation for the second day of visitation?
   
8. Your younger son was far more solemn and careful on the second day. What did you do to change his aspect that way?
9. Surely you do something to keep them from drawing closer to their mom. I wonder what horrors would thus change children overnight.
10. And what about the older boy's taking your side against his little brother? That's what seems to be going on. Is the older boy trying to curry favor with his father? Is he trying to earn points for himself, so that he is less frequently and less viciously abused? What is going on here?

Someday, the truth will out. And what will you do then, AS? Whatever will you do then, when all the people you have abused, threatened, humiliated, cheated, intimidated and used let the world know what you are? And I include, of course, your own sons, who know better than any of the rest of us that the first four letters of your last name describe you to perfection.

Take careful note, Mr. S--THE TRUTH WILL OUT!