Missouri Miracle: Aftermath

There are updates on the Missouri kidnapping case. The wheels of justice are doing their slow, fine grind with kidnapper Michael Devlin being returned to the scene of the crime in Washington County yesterday to answer the latest and final charges there in his crimes against young Shawn Hornbeck. He'd already answered charges in Franklin County for the kidnapping of Ben Ownby. These two cases are on track and should be rolling along fairly close together. His further prosecution for crimes against both boys in St. Louis County would follow after, and the Federal case involving the victimization of Shawn alone will go last.

My hope is that there will be a plea bargain, so that Ben doesn't have to go through two trials, and Shawn four. However, when you're dealing with a narcissistic sociopath defendant who wants to tell "his side of the story," you might not get anything so humane. It's not as if he's suddenly going to start taking his victims' feelings into consideration.

The happiest update is that the boys are enjoying life safe in their own homes, and are receiving therapy. Ben, held for four days, is back in school and took up his life where he left off. Shawn, held for over four years and all that time without schooling, is being tutored at home. There is currently a bill in the Missouri state senate to pay for tutoring for young crime victims such as Shawn, who were deprived of the education the state would have provided and who clearly cannot be dropped back into the public education system.

Remembering my teaching internship and the "nest" an English teacher had built in her office for a sexually abused boy going through a trial against his scout master to pass his school days, I know how hard it must be for a kid to concentrate on academics when he's going through so much personal turmoil. It seems amazing now that that was something a teacher had to take on herself.