The Tale of the Florida Cat Killer

by Pa Rock
True Crime Reporter

Eighteen-year-old Tyler Hayes Weinman was arrested last week for the killing and mutilation of a couple of dozen cats in and around the tonier neighborhoods of Dade County, Florida. Mr. Weinman, who had graduated from Palmetto Bay High School just a few scant weeks before his arrest, has spent the last several days being psychologically dissected and vilified in the press. Today he was released on bail.

This story bothers me on two levels. Basically the story made it into the national headlines because of class. It happened in two nice, white neighborhoods. The owners of the victim cats were horrified, which is understandable. They lit fires under the local police and the press - and they got action! But if those cats had belonged to families in East St. Louis, Illinois, or South Central Los Angeles, people residing more than five miles beyond the crime scenes would have never heard about this sadistic animal abuse - and the crimes would not have merited any police time for investigations. It is a variation of the Nancy Grace Syndrome in which terrible things that happen to white children are matters of the gravest public concern, while equally horrendous things that befall children of color are routinely ignored.

But, regardless of the class aspects, this story is important because it serves to warn us about the long-term dangers posed to society by people who torture animals. It is a sad story about a bunch of dead cats, but, more than that, it is a reminder of how cruelty can evolve from animal victims to humans.

Tyler Weinman was given a psychological evaluation prior to his release from jail. The judge wanted to have as much information as possible on his mental state before releasing this lad back into society.

Why?

The Massachusetts Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and Northeastern University recently published research indicating that animal abusers are five times more likely to commit violent crimes and four times more likely to commit property crimes than individuals without a history of animal abuse. Another study profiled 354 serial killers and found that 21% of them were known to have committed animal cruelty - and that percentage is almost certainly on the low side.

Animal abusers find power and fulfillment in torturing a victim that is incapable of defending itself. That same motivation is also at play for child and spouse abusers, rapists, and serial killers.

Jeffrey Dahmer, as a youth, impaled dogs' heads, frogs, and cats on stakes. Albert DeSalvo, the Boston Strangler, trapped dogs and cats in fruit crates and then shot arrows through the boxes. Ted Bundy and David Berkowitz (the Son of Sam) were also animal abusers in their youth. Steven Green, the U.S. Army private who raped a girl in Iraq and murdered her and her family, bragged about setting a puppy of fire and throwing it off of a roof when he was a child. (He also burned the body of his rape victim.)

Many of the school shooters practiced cruelty to animals. Kip Kinkel of Oregon, Luke Woodham of Mississippi, and Columbine shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold of Colorado all had a history of abusing animals.

So, if a child abuses animals, does it necessarily follow that he or she will become a deranged killer of humans? No, it does not. It is however, a nearly perfect indicator that something bad has happened in that child's life - physical or sexual abuse, or serious neglect. It is also a warning sign that this little person could become a big problem to society in the years to come.

If Tyler Hayes Weinman did kill all of those classy Florida cats, that's a legitimate news story - though not one that merits a national obsession. The real story, however, may come about a few years down the road.

The blog posts that I have read are decidedly vindictive, suggesting that he should be locked up for many years. (Unbelievably, Mr. Weinman faces a possible 158 years in prison for the cat murders!) But prison would be counterproductive. While Mr. Weinman was imprisoned and rubbing shoulders with other convicts, his urges toward cruelty and anti-social behaviors would be strengthened - and when he was ultimately released, society would face significantly more dangers than if he had been directed into a comprehensive treatment program at the outset.

Prisons are warehouses that reinforce anti-social behaviors and make bad people worse - but that is a whole other post.

Death by Gun

by Pa Rock
Citizen Journalist

I heard a statistic on the radio this evening: thirty-two people are killed with guns every day in the United States. That's it. Thirty-two. It's only a number, and not a very big one, unless, of course, one of those thirty-two is you or someone you love. Thirty-two people's lives come to a sudden end in America each day as bullets rip through their bodies. But generally they are other people's bullets and other people's bodies, and those shootings basically don't register on our collective consciousness.

So let's make it somewhat more personal. I want to talk about two murders by gun that occurred in a small town in Arizona last Wednesday evening. It was in the community of St. Johns, AZ, and the murdered men were Vincent Romero, 29, and his friend, Timothy Romans, 39. I don't know much about these guys, only what has been in the news. I know that Romero was a divorced man who had custody of his eight-year-old son. I also suspect that he probably wasn't a very good parent.

You see, Romero and Romans were murdered by the eight-year-old Romero boy, apparently with malice aforethought. Mr. Romero had a gun in the house, either unsecured or poorly secured, and the young boy, who possessed knowledge of how to fire it, took that gun and deliberately killed his father and his father's friend.

Before I get to speculating too freely, you need to understand something about Arizona. This state is gun crazy. The citizens of Arizona have been gun crazy since the days when the Clantons and the Earps went at it in Tombstone. These people love their firearms. They flaunt them, they conceal them, and they use them as props in their lovemaking and masturbatory rituals.

I'm not a fan of guns - never owned one and never will. As far as I'm concerned, the lack of guns in my home makes me somewhat safer than those who maintain personal arsenals. If someone breaks into my house, they had better be after books. Chances are when those guys break in, we'll all sit down and have a literary discussion. A house full of guns, on the other hand, attracts criminals. If some old codger of a homeowner pulls a gun on home intruders, he needs to be ready and capable of using it. More often than not, that isn't the case.

The elderly and guns are a bad combination, and an even worse pairing is kids and guns. I write to several people in prison. One of my correspondents gained notoriety as a "school shooter" more than a decade ago. This young man was fourteen when he went to school one morning and killed several of his fellow high school students. He is now in his mid-twenties and has lived in a cage every day since his awful crime. He is a man rotting in prison over a crime committed by a boy. He had easy access to guns in his upper-middle class home, and he made a fateful decision that ruined the lives of several families, including his own, and made an emotional imprint on hundreds of his friends and classmates that will be with them for life.

The little Romero boy is currently in jail. He probably won't face a life in prison, but his crime will be with him for the remainder of his life. Even with sustained therapy, it will have a significant impact who he becomes and how he lives. His crime will be with him to some degree until the day of his death. A crime committed by an eight-year-old will cast a shadow across his lifetime and the lifetimes of those who knew and loved his victims.

We will learn more over the next few months about the things that drove this little boy to kill his father and another man. He was troubled, of that we can be certain. Kids aren't born troubled, they become that way through their experiences in life - and some of his experiences were obviously very bad ones.

Bad experiences and easy access to guns can be a recipe for death, regardless of age. And yes, you Arizona macaroons, guns do kill people!

Nuckin' Futz!

by Pa Rock

The school board of the Harrold Independent School District of Texas has voted unanimously to allow teachers to carry guns to school. Yep. You can't make up crap this weird! The good people around Harrold want their teachers to pack heat in case some deranged shooter gets into the school. With lead flying from every doorway, up and down halls crowded with screaming students, somebody would be bound to hit that evil Arab bastard!

Well, so be it. You just can't beat the problem solving skills of a Texas school board. And it may be a decent idea. A teacher plagued by discipline problems might just get a little more respect in the classroom when she plunks a .44 Magnum down on her desk. And Friday Night Lights might evoke even more excitement when some pissed off coach begins shooting them out after a referee makes a particularly heinous call.

But why stop with teachers? What about bus drivers? A terrorist could jump aboard a school bus with relative ease and take everyone hostage. If the driver in the front of the bus and the bus monitor in the back were armed though, they could catch that sucker in the crossfire and...problem solved!

And I've always worried about church shooters (so much so that I quit attending!). Shouldn't pastors be allowed to pack at the pulpit? Sunday school teachers, too. And what about Wal-Mart? Wouldn't we all feel safer knowing that Wal-Mart's non-unionized, underpaid, part-time workforce was carrying loaded weapons to protect us from retail shooters? I know I would.

In fact, let's get rid of all gun laws so everyone can carry - everywhere. Then, by God, we really would be safe! Why, the help that gun-totting citizens could provide to law enforcement would be amazing! Joe Bob could stand on the overpass and enforce the speed limit, you bet your ass he could!

Thank you, Harrold, Texas, for heralding the future! You're an inspiration to every Christian, Republican, straight, red-white-and-blue-blooded, testosterone-oozing, white American. You good old boys done real damned good!

Pen, Paper, and Pistol

This past Friday a piece of legislation was introduced into the Arizona legislature that begs to question the sanity of its sponsors. State Senator Karen Johnson and Senate Majority Leader Thayer Verschoor are co-sponsoring legislation that would make it legal for persons with concealed weapons permits to take their guns to school. Any school: elementary, junior high, high school, college, public or private schools. Anyone with a permit: parent, teacher, coach, bus driver, janitor, even students. (Don’t criticize the lunch, the cook may be packing!)

Senators Johnson and Verschool, both Republicans, justify their wacko bill on the grounds of safety. Supposedly a potential school shooter would be forced to think twice, knowing that his or her targets might shoot back. The reality is, of course, that many school shooters are suicidal to begin with, and, almost certainly not acting in a rational manner. Any ensuing shootout would be much more likely to injure and kill more people than a lone shooter would, and when responding police are added to the mix, not knowing for sure which shooters are on which team, the carnage could grow exponentially.

Teachers need to be free to teach and students need to have the freedom to learn without worrying that some unintended provocation might unleash World War III in a classroom or crowded hallway. Guns aren’t about protection, they’re about machismo. They won’t cure bullying, they will simply reinforce it.