Our Children Won't Be Safe if the Courts Keep This Up

Not that long ago in the Des Moines library a man lured a small girl into a bathroom and sexually molested her. Library workers forced the restroom door open, removed the girl, then trapped him inside until police arrived. Now, due to a f**ed up technicality he will get a new trial.

According to the ruling:

During an interview with a police detective,
Effler requested a court-appointed lawyer “if I go to jail.”

The detective responded by saying, “Let me finish this and we’ll talk.”

The detective finished reading Effler his Miranda rights, and briefly left the room.
When he returned, he asked Effler if he remembered his rights.

Effler said, “I already know them” and later admitted the sexual abuse.

Now, being the logical person I am it sounds to me like he was read his rights and said he only wanted a lawyer if he went to jail. And then he was offered to hear his rights again. Sounds to me like he waived them. And then, before he was in jail he admitted to the abuse.

The appeals court rejected prosecution claims that Effler had waived his right
to an attorney until he actually had arrived in jail.

And if that isn't bad enough here's more fuel for my fire:

Effler’s lawyer argued at trial that, despite his detailed a highly graphic
videotaped confession, prosecutors failed to prove any sexual abuse. Doctors
found no significant trauma to the toddler’s body, and police technicians could
find no sign of Effler’s DNA in the restroom.

Now, I'm going to go off on a bit of a tangent here. This is a mighty personal topic for me as I was molested by not one but two adult male relatives when I was growing up. Neither one ever did anything to me that caused "significant" trauma. At least to my body. And no DNA would have ever been found (had it been available then). But what the molestation did to me mentally will never go away.

I was very young when it happened- probably between the ages of 4 and 9, to the best of my recollection- but the dreams and images that still come to my mind when I least expect it are very vivid. And nothing, no amount of therapy, has ever taken that away.

While I don't lay blame and I have forgiven and made my peace I cannot forget. The choices I made as a teen and young adult were heavily influenced by my childhood and skewed ideas of "love". What this toddler had happen to her will never go away. I only pray that, because it was once when she was so, so little, that she won't be haunted by it.

This filth admitted in a videotaped and graphic confession what he did. I'm pretty sure he did that while "in jail" so he would have had an attorney by then. (Or do cops carry concealed video cameras now?)

The waste of taxpayer money for a re-trial of a confessed child abuser is not only nonsensical it's a slap in the face to the taxpayers. Not to mention a terrible re-opening of a nasty wound for this family.

Oh, wait... did I mention that the guy had failed to register on the state's sex offender list? Oh, yeah, he's done it before!

Lock him up in a mental facility. He obviously wasn't helped by the touchy-feely "help" he received at my expense the first time.

This sickens me. I'm just sick...