The vanishing of Hannah Graham from her Virginia university town in mid-September is the fifth such disappearance of a young female from that particular locale in as many years. And only one body has ever been found.
That's the bad news, considering the search for Graham -- or what remains of the 18-year-old -- has become more desperate by the hour.
The good news is that police now believe they finally have the serial killer in custody after DNA evidence linked Jesse Matthew, the prime suspect in Graham's disappearance, to a similar attempted abduction and sex assault in 2005 as well as to the rape and slaying of Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington four years later.
If their theory is correct, then the 32-year-old exceptional athlete with an exceptionally checkered past that includes a rape charge would also be an exceptional serial murderer too, since, by and large, such violent sadists are supposed to be young white males.
Lately, though, experts have been cautioning homicide investigators that the rule book on this class of deadly perpetrator contains some outdated and extremely faulty data; namely that black offenders just like Jesse Matthew are grossly underrepresented in it, and they and their victims wrongly falling under the radar as a result.
How, in the land of Rodney King, Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown could that happen?!
Because, as with most other types of criminal profiling, when law enforcement officials try to pinpoint who a likely serial killer may be, and who he likely could not be, they rely on age-old beliefs borne mainly out of bias: Maniacally murderous men who successfully evade detection and arrest are smart (really, really smart like Jack the Ripper was) and Caucasian males are obviously way smarter than African American males are. At the very least because they're better educated.
It's called racial stereotyping at its most perverse and reverse, but the myth of a deviously-brilliant white man butchering for sport and eluding capture for years or even decades might not only be bigoted to the core. It could in fact be the only reason why some serial killers are never caught.
After all, the crime experts appear to be dead right in their latest assessments -- a majority of the world's homicidal sociopaths did not turn out to be anywhere near the geniuses once thought, and a fair number of them have also been dark-skinned as well.
So too the perceived status of victims and their communities unjustly factor into the criminal justice equation, more often than not, determining the speed and depth to which certain investigations are conducted, if at all.
Thus, cases of affluent individuals who are missing or murdered in affluent areas typically garner greater public attention and resources than those of down-and-out vagabonds, prostitutes or drug addicts. Especially if the latter unfortunates fell victim to foul play in economically-depressed neighborhoods -- the exact environments where, studies show, serial killers of color almost exclusively prey.
That historically prejudicial treatment by police and the press explains why we know and care so much right now about still-missing college coed Hannah Graham and her unlucky lookalike predecessor Morgan Harrington. Yet the same killer's equally tragic victims who were themselves either black or lesser privileged ... not so much.
A societal slant which, to the opportunistic predators hiding among us, makes for fertile hunting grounds.
Eponymous Rox
*Look for more case updates in the comment section
Additionally, they are now examining a number of other unsolved homicides and missing person cases of young people throughout the Virginia areas that suspect Jesse L. Matthew was known to have either lived or worked in.
UPDATE: Authorities are offering a $100,000 reward for information which leads to the safe return of Graham. The University of Virginia sophomore’s been uncharacteristically missing since September 13th.
Additionally, they are now examining a number of other unsolved homicides and missing person cases of young people throughout the Virginia areas that suspect Jesse L. Matthew was known to have either lived or worked in.
For instance, in Campbell County police are searching for a link to the abduction, rape and murder of Cassandra Morton, whose body was dumped in woods near Lynchburg in late 2009.
Orange County police are also re-investigating the case of Samantha Ann Clarke, missing since September 13, 2010.
And in nearby Montgomery County, the sheriff's office is revisiting the 2009 double homicide of Virginia Tech students Heidi Childs and David Metzler. The two were in a long term relationship and sitting together in a parked vehicle the night they both were shot to death and then robbed. DNA evidence emerged in the case a few years later but their murders remain unsolved to date.
Having just tied Jesse Matthew to the rape and murder of 20-year-old Virginia Tech student Morgan Harrington in 2009, police investigating the similar disappearance in Virginia this month of Hannah Graham, 18, are expanding their probe to include the years that the 32-year-old suspect himself attended college.
ReplyDeleteThat means the inquiry now begins at Liberty University in Lynchburg VA, the university Matthew went to via a football scholarship before being expelled in 2002 on credible rape allegations. His sports scholarship was simultaneously revoked for the same reason, school officials claim, although the victim apparently declined to press formal charges against him and a rape kit with DNA samples was either never issued in the case, or else never processed.
In the latest development, school officials from yet another Virginia university -- at Newport -- are also cooperating in the now wide-sweeping investigation.
Records indicate Matthew was subsequently accepted there in 2003, but, in what school administrators say is highly unusual even for a new student, he suddenly dropped out after just one month of attendance.
Detectives are actively exploring the possibility that Jesse Matthew committed similar crimes dating as far back as when he was a college freshman or even earlier, and that the nature of those criminal acts intensified over the years, leading to multiple sex assaults and murders.
E.R.
I always look forward to reading your articles. I agree wholeheartedly with you on this one. Thank you for your blog and awareness.
ReplyDeleteMany thanks for dropping by again and for taking the time to post a comment too -- much appreciated!
DeleteRoughly three weeks into the search for missing UofV student Hannah Graham the hunt for her or her body continues in earnest today, with no sign whatsoever of the 18-year-old girl.
ReplyDeleteA lawyer for Jesse Matthew, the sole suspect in Graham's disappearance, claims Virginia police are withholding the forensic evidence they've asserted directly links his client to Graham's case and to at least one other rape in 2005 as well as the 2009 sex assault and murder of V Tech undergrad Morgan Harrington.
Harrington, 20, vanished after leaving a local concert arena and being denied reentry. A theory circulating at present is that the young woman may have then called for a cab to return her to campus -- Jesse Matthew was a taxi driver at that time. Morgan Harrington's badly decomposed remains where found several months later in a nearby cornfield. She had been raped and slain.
The evidence investigators are guarding closely, therefore, is likely to be prima facie -- a DNA cheek swab -- legally obtained from Matthew without a warrant once he was arrested, extradited and arraigned.
The hulking 32-year-old footballer and wrestler remains jailed whilst authorities also examine numerous unsolved rapes and murders throughout the region. However, he has yet to be charged for any other crime although a slew of new charges for these older offenses may be pending.
E.R.
Jack The Ripper may have been a Jill
ReplyDeleteYes, I've heard that compelling new theory too, Tennessee. However and statistically speaking, women rarely commit murder -- especially not serial killings -- and, when they do, almost never with knives.
ReplyDeleteThanks for coming to read my articles again, my friend --
E.R.
Jack The Ripper was Aaron Kosminski, DNA proved it. By the way E.R. I am glad you are back. When your blog went silent for months I was worried, and rightfully so. Anyway, I am glad you are ok!
ReplyDelete