MONDAY, NOVEMBER 8 Our week of criminal sex, viral assault, and icky, icky love begins today in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where today Tammy Imre--the 29-year-old Stratford woman accused of having a sexual relationship with an 8-year-old boy--was ordered held on a $250,000 bond following charges of first-degree sexual assault, fourth-degree sexual assault, and risk of injury to a minor. Details come from the Associated Press: A part-time receptionist and divorced mother of one, Imre met her alleged victim through her 7-year-old daughter, with whom the unnamed boy rode bikes, played board games, and shared school-bus rides, reportedly visiting the Imres' house nearly every day for the past year. But all that changed after the boy's older brother found a letter from Imre to his 8-year-old sibling: Police reports quote Imre's letter telling the boy that she doesn't "want anyone but you. Now tomorrow it's supposed to rain, you can come over we can (you know what). Love ya! I want you!" It gets worse: When confronted by police, Imre, described as "thin" and "blond," acknowledged the sexual relationship, telling investigators she considers the 8-year-old her boyfriend and plans to marry him someday. As for the littlest groom, the boy initially denied all sexual contact but subsequently described intercourse with Imre, with the alleged activity unfortunately confirmed by accidental eyewitness Imre's daughter. Speaking of troubled mother-daughter relationships: The suspect's mother, Evelyn Imre, told reporters that her daughter had "a little mental problem," offering this maternally optimistic incantation: "I love her. She didn't do anything wrong." The mother of the alleged victim mom was less ruminative: "She ruined my child." As for Tammy Imre, she's due back in court on November 30. If convicted, she faces more than 20 years in prison.
-- Speaking of sex-crime convictions: Today a Thurston County Superior Court judge declared 32-year-old Anthony E. Whitfield guilty of 17 counts of first-degree assault with sexual motivation following charges that he deliberately exposed 17 women to HIV--five of whom have since tested positive for the virus. Described by his own defense attorney as a methamphetamine-addicted "sex machine," Whitfield now faces a minimum sentence of 137 years in prison.
TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 9 Speaking of crazy fucks: Today brought an end to the klutzily distinguished life of Curtis, Washington's Alfred Hamilton, best known for his eye-catching "Uncle Sam" message board that's hovered above Interstate 5 since 1971. For those unfamiliar with Hamilton's work, his sign is a standard two-sided billboard adorned with religious/political messages in marquee letters beneath a humongous paint-on-plywood folk-art approximation of Uncle Sam, who's positioned as if delivering each of Hamilton's far-right rants, which over the years have denounced such life-threatening evils as homosexuality, communism, gun control, and the United Nations. But as today's (Centralia) Chronicle reveals, Uncle Sam is the last person Alfred Hamilton should have claimed to represent: After attending a one-room school in Chehalis, Hamilton moved on to what is now Washington State University, but strategically left prior to commencement day. "If he graduated, he would have been drafted [into WWII]," said daughter Sherryl Zurek to the Chronicle. "He quit early so he could get a deferment." Having rejected the battle against the iffy enemy of Nazism, Hamilton commenced his billboard battle against the real enemies: commies, gays, and the U.N. After 33 years of laughable yet admirably driven Uncle Sam ventriloquism, today Alfred Hamilton died from a Parkinson's-with-cancer combo platter at age 84.
WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 10 If you're not already doing so, please sit down, for today brings an alleged teacher-sleeping-with-her-student scenario that makes Monday's alleged intergenerational tryst seem like Casablanca. Unsurprisingly, the story comes from the miraculous website the Smoking Gun, which reported the full saga of Chicago's Senorita Walker, the 33-year-old high-school teacher facing three counts of aggravated criminal sexual assault for allegedly plying three teenage boys with pot and booze, then paying them for sex. Described in court papers as "at least 12, under 17, and at least five years younger than Ms. Walker," the three teenagers (one of whom is a student at the school where Walker taught) allegedly met Walker a number of times between May and August 2004, with single-mother Walker allegedly paying the pot-and-booze-laced trio an estimated $5,000 for their services. Even worse, court papers allege that the boys' "services" amounted to little more than getting high and kicking back, with Walker allegedly "placing her mouth on the penis" of three different minors--whose ages have since been confirmed as 15, 16, and 16. For now, Senorita Walker remains suspended with pay from her post as a special-education teacher at Chicago's Robeson High School. In the meantime, if anyone can name something more depressing than a single-mom special-ed teacher paying to suck horny teenagers' dicks, please share.
THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 11 Today brought a conclusion to the six days of Weekend at Bernie's-in-Palestine shenanigans that preceded today's official announcement of the death of Yasser Arafat, who ended a weeklong coma and four decades of Palestinian leadership by dying this morning at a Paris hospital.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 12 After a mere seven hours of deliberation, today a California jury found Scott Peterson guilty of the first-degree murder of his wife, Laci, and the second-degree murder of the couple's soon-to-be-son Connor. Unfortunately for Peterson, the jury followed their ridiculously-circumstantial-but-emotionally-rewarding verdict by declaring the killing of Connor during the murder of Laci a "special circumstance" deserving of the death penalty. The six-man/six-woman jury will begin deliberating Peterson's earthly fate on November 30. Meanwhile in King County: 20-year-old Nicholas Burham entered a modified guilty plea in the death of his 20-year-old fiancée, Emily Jacobson, who was fatally strangled in the couple's Kirkland apartment last March. Conceding that a jury would probably find his client guilty, Burham's attorney admitted Burham "clearly and intentionally" assaulted Jacobson, wrapping his hands around her neck in the heat of an argument, but never, ever meant to kill her. This tragic-accident theory is supported by police reports, shared by the Seattle Post-Intelligencer: After the slaying, Burham cut his wrists, smashed his car into a freeway divider, and stabbed himself in the stomach; en route to the hospital, Burham told ambulance workers that he'd choked his girlfriend. Which brings us to Deputy Prosecutor Hugh Barber's most damning insight: "It is not a simple task to strangle someone to death. It takes time, and it takes commitment." Nicholas Burham faces up to 16 years in prison.
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 13 Nothing happened today (unless you count the living, breathing 6-year-old girl found sealed inside a piñata at the Tecate Port of Entry.)
SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 14 Nothing happened today.
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