What to Look for in a Sex Offender

By Lynn A. Granata

             Sex Offenders throughout history have been stereotyped as fat, bald, dirty old men who hang around in parks looking for unsuspecting innocent children to bait.

             Truth be told, it's difficult to determine who's a sex offender from who isn't. Sex offenders can blend in with the rest of society quite suavely. There are 3 levels of sex offenders. Level 1 sex offenders are the least dangerous. They are usually hypothetically an 18 year old boy who dates his 15 year old next door neighbor. It only takes one date before he becomes aroused and she reports him for sexual assault. He gets charged with statutory rape. A lot of statutory rape cases are never reported, just to keep that in mind.

              Level 2 offenders are more daring and don't always stay within their own demographics. They are the stalkers who when you tell him you don't want to see him anymore, he doesn't take no for an answer. Level 2 sex offenders don't bother strangers, but they may target members of their own family. Usually second degree relatives for example they'll sexually molest a stepchild or a niece or nephew.

              Finally the most dangerous of all the level 3 sex offender is the one who will charm random strangers. They are the ones who are most likely to get involved in online dating sites. They use their charm to lure in vulnerable victims.

             What causes a sex predator to act out you may wonder? If they see say a small child at a playground and that child is alone, then they feel that it’s an opportune time to act, but keep in mind that they kindly lure their unsuspecting victims. Rather than just “grab” them and whisk them away.  It’s always best to make sure that your child is never alone and is either always accompanied by you or with an older responsible person. Sexual offenders tend to gravitate toward vulnerable people, especially those who are less likely to be reported missing.

            Please use this information as a guide only. It is not intended to give out legal advice. Nor is it designed to provoke anxiety. It is used solely for entertainment purposes only.  If you ever feel your life is endangered; please call your local police and emergency services by dialing 911 immediately.

50 Years Since the Brutal Torture Murder of Sylvia Likens

Fifty Years Since the True Torture Murder of Sylvia Likens

By Lynn A. Granata

    Back in the summer of 1965, a pretty 16 year old girl and her 15 year old sister were invited to stay with Indiana's infamous Gertrude Baniszewski.

      On approximately July 3, 1965,  the two young ladies had just met two of Gertrude's small daughters. The girls were invited by Marie Baniszewski and Shirley Baniszewski to go to their house in Indianapolis and meet their older sister, Paula. Sylvia Likens and Jenny Likens originally met the Baniszewski's in church. And rode the church bus home on this particular day.

        After they went to their house, the two girls then decided to stay because their carnie parents had no place to leave them for the summer, while they were touring with the carnival. Mr. Likens agreed to pay Gertrude $20 a week to board his two daughters at the Baniszewski's.

       In the beginning of this arrangement, Paula Baniszewski was friendly with Sylvia and Jenny. A few week's later, Gertrude's check didn't arrive in the mail. When the 2 girls got home from school that day, Gertrude forced the two girls to go downstairs to the basement. The two girls were both whipped with a belt, Gertrude was angry because her $20 check was late.

       As time went by, the scapegoated violence toward Sylvia escalated. Her sister Jenny was spared because she coercively agreed with the Baniszewski family to take part in Sylvia's abuse. Sylvia its been speculated took this abuse for both herself and her younger sister who was also afflicted with polio.

        If you're wondering why this all happened in the first place, there's more than one answer.  The answers of course are unjustified, but to the Baniszewski's however, they were. No matter how wrong it was.

       Sylvia it's believed was spreading gossip around the high school that the children attended. It was speculated that she told everyone in her class that Paula and Stephanie Baniszewski were sluts.

      Sylvia was beaten and battered with a vast array of housing items. She was constantly beaten with broom sticks and burned by cigarettes, branded with a hot poker, starved,and sexually molested with a coke bottle.

    The suspects were Gertrude and her 7 children and their friends. Since this is such a long story, to make it short Sylvia was put in the basement, starved, was given scalding baths, she was forced to eat her own vomit.

   She eventually succumbed to such brutal trauma that was inflicted on her and then died a painful death from her injuries in October 1965.

        The Baniszewski family was charged with murder. The children plea bargained and most of them served out their time in juvenile detention centers or were placed into foster care.

       Gertrude was sentenced to prison for life, but then because of good behavior her sentence was reduced to 20 years in prison. She was released from Indiana State Prison in 1985 and she served the rest of her time on parole. She moved to Iowa, changed her name, and she died in the summer of 1990 at the age of 62. She developed lung cancer from years of excessive chain smoking.

    It was a cruel shocking crime, and it was true! To see the whole story, watch  An American Crime. It stars Katherine Keener as Gertrude and Ellen Page as Sylvia.

Clayton D. Lockett

Bad Seed or Bad Start?

By Lynn A. Granata

     Whenever a death penalty execution by our criminal justice system occurs the media goes on an immediate frenzy.

        On April 29, 2014 an angry young man, Clayton D. Lockett was executed by a botched lethal injection in an Oklahoma penitentiary.

        He started his life on the wrong foot. His mother abandoned him when he was three years old, and his father forced him into a life of crime and violence.

         In fact, both of his parents were drug addicted degenerates. At some point in his young life, his drug afflicted father, with which whom he lived with as a child remarried.

      Lockett never had any say in the matter just like with every other malevolent eventful turn of unfortunate circumstances. A wicked stepmother, so what difference does it make? Lockett may have been born bad, but what other way else can you say or rephrase this fact? You can also say he was born into a life where he never had a chance.

     Okay, but that's no excuse for the brutal rape, robbery, torture and murder of Stephanie Neiman, he committed back in 1999.

     What motivated him to do such evil? He was angry because Neiman represented everything in life that Lockett wanted, felt he should have had and hated her because of it. He was consumed by anger and malevolent jealously, a bad combination.

     Why was he ever born in the first place? He was unwanted. What was his biological mother thinking? She abused him and threw him away.

      What chance does anybody have in life when the cards are clearly stacked against you? No one around to teach this "boy" right from wrong.

     Maybe we ought to set more laws for parents. Parents who are unfit should not be allowed to bear children. But that would be a moot point to ponder. His mother was given free will. There's no reproduction law, aside from legalized abortion, that states that you can't have children.

      Again, free will is what God has given us. If his mother didn't understand the meaning of free will, she would never be able to teach the concept of it to her son.

      You can say anything you want about Clayton D. Lockett. He was evil, he was a monster, he got what he deserved, etc. Let the truth be told he just never had a chance, period.