Torture

The third murder trial of a man twice convicted of killing a 12-year-old Huntington Beach girl is underway. Rodney James Alcala, 66, was twice convicted for the kidnapping and murder of Robin Samsoe, but both convictions were thrown out on appeal. Alcala now is standing trial for a third time as the alleged suspect in the girl’s slaying and killings of four Los Angeles women. He is charged with a series of murder and kidnapping charges with enhancements for rape, intent to inflict torture, intent to kill during burglary and kidnapping from the late 1970s, according to court documents.

Michael B. Mukasey, the nominee for attorney general, has been criticized for his views on interrogation techniques, specifically his comments on waterboarding. But Mukasey has said he would enforce a law banning waterboarding if Congress approved it. Do you think if he is confirmed as the next attorney general Congress should move swiftly to approve a law banning waterboarding, and would you vote for such a law?   Waterboarding in and of itself is not torture.

TALKING ABOUT CONTROVERSY UC Berkeley law professor John Yoo, who helped draft the so-called "torture memo," a Justice Department document that argued Al Qaeda and Taliban prisoners are not subject to the full protection of the Geneva Conventions while in U.S. custody, will appear in a panel discussion today at UC Irvine. UC Irvine professors Mark Le Vine and Cecelia Lynch will join the panel with attorney Stephen Rohde, former president of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California.

COSTA MESA — A 24-year-old man was allegedly caught on video attempting to kill his 2-month-old son by shaking, punching and swinging him by the neck with a blanket, authorities said. Joshua Allen Robey, who was living in a Costa Mesa motel, was charged with felony attempted murder, torture and child abuse with a sentencing enhancement for causing great bodily injury to a child younger than 5 If convicted on all charges, he faces a maximum sentence of 15 years to life in state prison.

We have many things to be proud of here in this part of the county. But we can be especially proud of the tributes given to our fighting men and women by our local schools celebrating Veterans Day. One such tribute was mentioned in this paper this week — Medal of Honor recipient Walter D. Ehlers came to Mariners Christian School in Costa Mesa to speak and be honored with the rest of the veterans. Another school-sponsored Veterans Day event that I attended was at St. John’s the Baptist Catholic School.

In emails addressed to his wife, the UC Irvine professor accused of setting fires and plotting mass murder at his son's high school said he was "eaten away by sadness" after the teenager's suicide. In a pair of emails filed in court late Tuesday by Orange County prosecutors, Rainer Reinscheid  depicts graphic plans  to use machine guns to kill 200 students at Irvine's University High School and administrators, sexually torture and assault two female staff members, and then kill himself at a nearby park where his 14-year-old son, Claas Stubbe, committed suicide in March.

Two adults were kidnapped in Newport Beach earlier this month and later discovered bound and beaten in Kern County, according to court documents reviewed by the Daily Pilot and follow-up interviews with police. Newport Beach Police arrested Kyle Shirakawa Handley Oct. 6 in connection with the crime, Lt. Jon Lewis confirmed Friday, but two other suspects remain at large. Handley, 33, of Fountain Valley, is being held at Orange County Jail and faces charges of kidnapping for ransom, torture, aggravated mayhem and burglary with sentencing enhancements for inflicting great bodily injury.

Additional details emerged this week about a Newport Beach kidnapping that left two adult victims bound in the Mojave Desert, court documents show. A Balboa Peninsula resident spotted the three presumed kidnappers unload a ladder from a truck and lean it against the victim's home in the 100 block of 25th Street before the kidnapping occurred, according to public records the Newport Beach Police Department filed. The suspects extended the ladder to the home's third-story deck and appeared to prepare for work, records show.

A forum is for the purpose of open discussion of public matters, not for misinformation and airing of personal dislikes. A letter in the Forum, signed by a person who is neither a resident of Costa Mesa nor a member of the Costa Mesa Senior Center, made an untrue accusation and called for the firing of two of the center’s hard-working employees and people whom I know to be dedicated to the welfare of our seniors. Every question raised by Councilwoman [Wendy] Leece has been answered promptly and thoroughly.

I cringed when I read Steve Smith's column about "Bullying no, teasing go ahead." Smith reminisced about the "good ol' days" when he was in school and bragged how he survived the jeers of his peers. As an educator for 20 years, I would like to inform Smith that times have changed. Now we have violent video games that simulate the destruction of the "enemy." When Smith was growing up, he and others could imagine in their head many revenge scenarios to get back at your taunter.