Cowardly Craigslist Killing, Stay Strong Justice System By Mike Coughlin

Many will wish he’ll die for what he did.

He lured the daughter of a pastor to his home, baiting her with the hope of a nanny job, and murdered her. Police have arrested a 19-year-old man in association with the Minnesota murder, but have not released his name.

On top of the fact that he killed someone (assuming the police have the right guy) I feel additional contempt for the man because of the way he did it.


I fear it will be Terri Schiavo or O.J. Simpson all over again. And that’s the part that bothers me.Of all things to use as bait, he used an ad for a nanny job. His ad could have been about sex or drugs: lure the sinners. But no, he killed a woman who simply wanted to take care of children. Why didn’t he just invite a nun over?

Furthermore, he used Craigslist for this. He now has the advantage of being the first person to use Craigslist.com as a murder aid -- the advantage being that his World Wide Weapon just gave him front-page, high profile status. Cue the entourage of defense attorneys, media and human rights activists who’ll drag out justice until long after it should have been served.

I fear it will be Terri Schiavo or O.J. Simpson all over again. And that’s the part that bothers me.

I don’t really care if he gets the death sentence. I don’t really care if he gets life imprisonment. I just want to see him sentenced. I want to see some kind of justice.

Cases that get appeal after appeal are absurd. Everyone passes the buck until the case eventually makes its way to the Supreme Court just because it’s under the scrutiny of the media. It is absurd.

I’m not saying that it will for sure happen in this case. I’m not saying all appeals cases are because of media attention. But some? Humor me and postulate it.

The men and women of our justice system should have more integrity in themselves than to quickly wash their hands of a tricky case and pass it off to the next guy. Is our justice system as spineless as the vermin it claims to convict?

We’ve all thought about how easy it would be if some vigilante like the Boondock Saints came in and took care of our problems for us. But some crimes are too monstrous not to take a stand, not to sit by idly as evil men go free.

It is an imperfect system comprised of imperfect people. But those people must at least be strong. There should only be one coward in a courtroom. And it shouldn’t be the one in the black robe.

Photo credit: Katherine Ann Olson, 24; ABC News [http://www.abcnews.go.com/TheLaw/story?id=3789765&page=1]