NO APOLOGY!

    Well, the commenters say I do not need to apologize to DA Craig Stedman and after some thought, I think they are correct.  I wrote the piece, “UNACCEPTABLE” that is reprinted below, before we knew about the Involuntary Deviate Sexual Intercourse charges that were filed against Troy Stewart and Lauren Reed, who partied with Scott Mcquilkin on the night of his death.  Maybe the DA was correct in keeping those details hush until after the autopsy and the arrests. 

    But keeping a community scared and in the dark was not acceptable.  Release enough information so people feel safe in their homes, for crying out loud! 

    And while the IDSI may be the cause for his sealing the search warrant, I still believe that Heather Martin and her mother were protected by law enforcement – and the Lancaster Newspapers – who barely named Martin and certainly did not publish her connection to the most powerful person in West Cocalico Township. 

    LIP News will stay on this story.

UNACCEPTABLE!

 This comment in early this afternoon:

      Heather Martin is Norma Enck’s daughter who runs West Cocalico Twp.  Hmm is that why it was so low on details?

    Yes, Heather Martin, who leases the apartment at 200 Creamery Road where Scott McQuilkin’s body was found early Saturday afternoon, is the daughter of Norma Enck, the Manager, Secretary and Treasurer of West Cocalico Township.

    It would appear this is why Lancaster County District Attorney Craig Stedman sealed the search documents, was very slow in releasing names and made absurd statements like this one to the Lancaster Newspapers with no further explanation:

    “Based upon the information we have at this time, Scott McQuilkin was familiar to Heather Martin, although they may not have ever met,” Stedman said.

    The East Cocalico Police who investigated the death also released no information.

    A 32-year-old man was found dead on Saturday afternoon and the word “homicide” was repeatedly used and yet the DA and the police still have not released any details, including the name of Martin’s friend who apparently came with McQuilkin to the apartment, left him there and returned to find him dead.  It is also assumed she is the one who called the police.

    The only basic pieces in this puzzle were provided by Jenni Joyce of CBS-21 (see this morning’s story immediately below).

    This is simply unacceptable.  Neighbors were concerned and scared and no information was released.  Stedman needs to provide valid reasons for sealing public documents and allowing the public to speculate and live in fear for four days. 

     He also needs to release all of the details, including the friend’s name, as soon as possible.  I don’t care who Heather Martin’s mother is and those immediately affected and those scared and touched by this death don’t either.  They want answers.  They deserve answers.  They deserved answers days ago.

    The response by law enforcement on this case is unacceptable on all levels. 

I SEE DEAD PEOPLE …

FOR $1.99 A MONTH

     Now comes word from the Poynter Institute’s Bill Mitchell that Journalim Online’s system has been released into the wild; its first adopter is LancasterOnline, which serves a swath of south-central Pennsylvania.

    What will be metered? Obituaries!  Insert newspaper-audience-dying-off jokes here.

David Brauer, “I see dead people…” (click here).

     Well, it looks like LNP is going boldly where no newspaper has gone before in an attempt to bring money into their coffers.  But by the next day, the author has learned this (click here):

    After my skeptical post yesterday about Journalism Online’s new Press + paywall at the Lancaster (Pa.) Online site, a source let me know how easy it was to beat the meter.

    Make sure to check out Online Editor Ernie Schreiber’s quotes!  What a hoot!  Good luck with that, Ernie!  What a loser!

THEY DON’T LIKE EACH OTHER?

    Well, the cosmos came together yesterday with two very odd circumstances that still have me shaking my head:

1.  Someone in my neighborhood is learning to play the drums!  Yes, I listened - as did the entire block - to them practice for over an hour yesterday evening before…

2.  My Facebook college buddy Bob sent me this chat:

    Every time I go to your little LIP page I thank goodness I’m down here in quiet Florida…. What a bunch of wackos you got up there…!!!!

    To which I responded:

    lol! Reinholds is a cross roads town of a couple hundred people!  Lord have mercy!

    And he said:

    Apparently they don’t like each other much…. Can’t wait for tomorrow’s “Breaking News”!

    And then the lights and the internet went out – seriously – for over an hour!

    Things that make you go hmmm…

Please check back later today.

FIRE THE IDIOTS!

     Frances, the very nice woman who answers the phone at the Pennsylvania Game Commission, informed me that Executive Director Carl Roe was “on leave today.”  Maybe he was really fired?  Apparently, we aren’t that lucky.  She said he’s expected in on Tuesday.

    Michael Smith, the Deputy Director of Communications for Governor Rendell, also had the day off today.  I was told that he frequently works with the Game Commission and he is expected in on Tuesday as well.

    The Spokesman for the PGC, Jerry Feaser, did not return my call again today.

    I will be calling all of them on Tuesday.  This is simply unbelievable.  The PGC works for us.  We pay them.  There is a huge public outcry over a tiny bird – and rightfully so.  The Lancaster County D.A. has called on them to make this situation right and return the finch.  The Lancaster Newspapers advised the public to “keep up the pressure” on the PGC. 

    The Pennsylvania Game Commission needs to step up now and do the right thing or all of these idiots should be fired.  Why would taxpayers want to pay idiots who have no common sense or decency?  We don’t.

    Have a great Friday and please check back tomorrow.  You know, when I get to “A STORM’S A COMING - 10!” - I’m going to start getting a little angry! 

AN INCREDIBLE NIGHT!

    While we wait for the courthouse to open today and obtain the full Post Sentence Motion filed yesterday by defense attorney Chris Patterson in the Joy O’Shea Woomer trial, I thought I would post this amazing clipping from the original Lancaster Independent Press sent to my Facebook page several days ago by Carl Cooper!  Thank you, Carl!  Hey, Jeff and Israel!

    This is from November 1978.  I was inside that room pretending I was a member of the “mainstream” media covering Duke for LIP.  I will never forget that night.  And it was inside that room that I would meet a Klan member who would ultimately lead me to the suspects I photographed in the Lancaster Lynching story.

    Carl, Jeff and Israel know all about the story.  They helped me to investigate all those years ago while I stayed with Carl and Jeff’s mom, Ruth Cooper.  I miss you, Ruth.

    Please note that I am not very active, to say the least, on Facebook.  Direct emails reach me much faster.  Thanks again, Carl, and there will be much more on the Lancaster Lynching story involving  Detective Joseph P. Geesey coming.  

   Please check back later today for the Post Sentence Motion and more on ADA Randall Miller.

HE JUST NEEDED A JOB!

Detective Joseph P. Geesey after the verdict in Joy O’Shea

 Woomer’s trial.

    Joseph P. Geesey was 22 and unemployed, with a wife and family to support, when he first walked into the Lancaster city police station looking for work.

    There was no message from God, I just needed a job, he said. Plain and simple.”

    The police hired him, trained him and put him in uniform.

    But police work soon became more than just a job to Geesey.

    It turned into a career in law enforcement and criminal investigation that he said still fascinates, excites and challenges him today - 50 years after he was sworn in on July 1, 1958.

The opening paragraphs from Janet Kelley’s July 5, 2008 New Era article, “Case Closed?  Not for this Guy,” available in the newspaper archives.

    The day the New Era printed this story - I published and it was true – that I received an email from my webhost that morning reminding me that my domain name, LancasterLynching.com, was due to expire.  I renewed it and the site remains up.

    I chuckle every time I read this.  I wonder what would have happened if a black man had walked into the police department looking for work in 1958?  I know what happened to a black man, Robert L. Henderson, Jr., in 1981 after he took Detective Geesey into Federal Court for violation of his civil rights.  I know Detective Geesey tried to have him killed in a most horrific way.

    I know the Lancaster Detectives never solved his attempted murder nor another one several months later committed by the same three men.

    I know that Detective Geesey has been the lead detective on two infamous, long ago unsolved murders of two young women, Lindy Sue Biechler and Christy Mirack.

    Someone recently sent a comment to this site saying I had “cooked-up” the story of the Lancaster Lynching and Detective Geesey.  Not quite.  As a 27-year-old journalist I stumbled onto this story and took a photograph.  A photograph that has haunted me ever since.

    I tried everything I knew for almost two years to get someone to act on the story, until fear and friends made me put it away.  I put it in a box.  I stopped writing.

    I found the box – and opened it – when I went looking for old letters from a boyfriend relating to the incest story. 

    In September of 2001, I published a special eight page paper edition of the Lancaster Independent Press entirely about the Lancaster Lynching story.  I distributed it in Lancaster two days before 9/11.  It was the second story to go on this site, after the incest story, in the fall of 2004.  I gave the story its own website in September of 2007.  This story is far from over.

    Whenever I see Detective Geesey’s name involved with a case, I sense trouble, deception and lies.  And so it is with the prosecution of Joy O’Shea Woomer six years after Brent Weaver’s death.

    He told me in person outside the courtroom as the closing arguments were about to begin, “They want me in there.”  And so 74 year-old Detective Joseph Geesey, looking like a kindly grandfather, sat by the prosecution’s table.

Please check back tomorrow…

JOY, ROSEBORO, BIGMAC

THREATS & MORE!

    Nearly 600 Fans!!! I talked to Joy today. She was so grateful for all of your support and love. She sends her thanks. Keep spreading the word. We want to have 1000 fans by the end of next week. I would ask all Nurses to share our cause with their colleagues.

From JusticeForJoy.org (click here and click on the Facebook link.)

    Actually, she had 622 fans the last time I checked this morning but it literally is growing by the minute.

    I called the Court Reporter’s office in Lancaster last week and they told me Judge David Ashworth has requested a transcript of Joy O’Shea Woomer’s trial.  The woman who answered the phone also stated copies are $.90 a page and she estimated the total cost at about $1,500.  That’s right – and you can not pick and choose portions/pages.  If anyone gets a copy, please let me know and we can share and copy it much cheaper.  My local Staples wants $.08 per page!

TRASHBACK GALA!

    This email in:

    You should check out the TB thread in the “Off-Beat” section where the TB’ers are planning their next get-together.  Mac is going to Vegas for 5 days.  The same woman who is on medical assistance and has no job.
    Pardon me if I’m a bit peeved, since I can’t afford a trip to Vegas, have to work for a living and pay for my medical care.  And I surely can’t afford to go out gambling and drinking every week to boot.  I wonder if she’s made the connection that her major dental woes may be the result of all

her boozing.

    What a hoot!  Yes, BigMac is planning the grand Trashback gala to be held this coming weekend!  Ain’t life grand!  I’ll be taking cup cheese!

ROSEBORO STORY NOT OVER!

    Speaking about the Trashback forum, this was posted by “Chance” a/k/a Deb Fitzkee under an article about the Roseboro Funeral Home being sold:

    Purg did you and hyprocisy get tired of just posting on another website. Like the I’ve heard touch. Guys in jail where he belongs. End of story.
    Following from Purg in a PM
    Hey buckaroo,,you have too much time on your hands.

    What is wrong with this woman that she is so worried about my site?  I think another Trashbacker had a good response and posted this:

    Chance, WTF does this post have to do with the Roseboro case? Keep your silly little childish forum games to yourself and PM.  Maybe you should break away from the PC every now and then.

    Oh, and Deb, it is not the “end of the story.”  In case you haven’t heard, Roseboro filed an appeal and Judge James Cullen is coming to his time deadline in ruling on that appeal.  Oh, and once again, 48 Hours is doing a segment and M. William Phelps is writing a book, “Love Her To Death” on the crime.

OUR OWN BERNIE MADOFF

    On an icy morning last week, Sensenig’s home on Valley View Road in East Earl Township was quiet; no one appeared to be home. At the southern edge of the property, large dogs sat in wire cages. Plans by Sensenig’s son to expand a kennel on the property drew protests in 2005 and 2006.
Associate Sunday News Editor Gil Smart in his front page story today, “MISPLACED FAITH?” (click here).
     Did you even knock on his door, Gil, to see if he was home?  What a joke of a story.  It is unreadable!  This is the Associate Editor of the Sunday News and he can’t write!  How is that possible?

    This big “investigative story” has six pictures and illustrations along with it and a sidebar story by Smart.  And yet it says almost nothing.  If Sensenig is the Bernie Madoff of the Wenger Mennonites, then say so!  Jesus, this is bad!

DON’T THREATEN ME!

    And speaking of investigative stories, two commenters to this site have crossed the line on the Lancaster Lynching story and their comments will no longer be posted.  When you get several people this upset and angry, you know you have hit the truth.

    There will be much more tomorrow on the background of the Lancaster Lynching story.

WHEN YOU HAVE NOTHING ELSE!

Becky, why do you keep going after Det. Geesey?
He didn’t do what daddy did to you did he?

A comment in to this site which was not approved.

Please check back later today…

DETECTIVE GEESEY SUED

HENDERSON’S ASSAILANTS

RHOADS’ ASSAILANTS

LANCASTER LYNCHING

    This email in:

Becky,

     I have been reading and commenting here and there on your site. My question is what is your relationship with the Woomers and why not write for the Weavers. Your site is on the justice for joy site and is mentioned on her son’s site.

     I just don’t understand why you write about Woomer’s side and not Weavers. I’m sure there are stories from their side and I’m sure they feel some sort of pain as well.

     Also, where did you get your information about the detective? I read the news article and really am not convinced he did anything. If you had an interview with someone, who was it (no need to name, just how you found this person).

    I am going to answer the question about the detective – specifically Lancaster County Detective Joseph Geesey - today and the other questions tomorrow.

    I moved to Philadelphia in the very early ‘80’s after being the editor of the paper edition of the Lancaster Independent Press.  I was freelancing as a reporter for the Philadelphia Tribune, America’s oldest Black newspaper and a twice weekly.

    In May of 1981, I went to a newsstand to buy the latest edition and saw a headline, “Man critical after Lancaster lynching try.”

    I thought it had to be a mistake of some kind – there could not be a lynching in my Lancaster!  I didn’t own a car so I took a train the same day.  I went straight to the crime scenes and realized immediately that at least one of the three men who committed this horrendous crime had to be familiar with the area and thus had to live or work nearby. 

   To make a very long story short, I became very suspicious of one man who worked very close to the crime scenes.  The vehicle used to abduct Robert Henderson was also parked right in the lot.

    On May 21, I took a train to Lancaster.  I walked to the Coe Camera Shop and purchased a Polaroid Instamatic camera.  I walked to Hazel Street and the crime scene.  I said to a neighbor I had spoken to several times before, “I’m going in there to take a picture.  If I’m not out in five minutes, please call the police.”

    I walked into Brookshire Printing and saw the man I wanted sitting around a table with two other men.  I raised the camera and took a picture of all three.  The one who recognized me is on the right and he put his head down.  The other two had no idea who I was and almost smiled for me.

    The next day the Lancaster Newspapers ran police sketches of the three assailants.  I had taken a picture of all three of them, sitting around a table at Brookshire Printing, less than half a block from where the two assaults occurred.

    The police never “solved” this attempted murder or one five months later committed by the same men.  There will be much more this weekend.