Parent-Child Homicide-Suicides
Evita
depression last Sunday [Dec. 3, 2006] evening when she stepped over the
railing of an overpass onto Hwy. 401 with her 2-year-old son, Sulla
Genua, in her arms. They were struck by several cars. Johnson was
pronounced dead at the scene. The boy died later in hospital."
It did not occur to any writers that this may be yet another case of
the "Medea Syndrome". In a nutshell, the mother kills the child(ren) in
order to get even with the father. Occasionally the mother also commits
suicide, but that is almost unheard of. In this case, we do not know
why the parents separated.
Those who are not familiar with the syndrome may be interested to read
the following:
Medea fell in love with Jason and offered to help him to get the golden
fleece provided he married her.
She killed her brother, she tricked the daughters of Pelias, the king
of Iolcus, into killing their father. She tortured Jason for choosing
a younger mistress, burned the mistress to death. She killed her
children in order to give Jason further pain after he was made to marry
the daughter of Creon, the king of Corinth, where they had escaped
after the murder of Pelias. She killed Jason's bride with a poisoned
robe and crown which burned the flesh from her body.
Medea then married Aegeus, the old king of Athens, and bore him a son,
Medus. Aegeus had another son, Theseus. Medea tried to trick Aegus into
poisoning Thesus. He refused and Medea fled with Medus. Medus became
king of the country which was later called Media.
There is no dearth of examples of modern day Medeas. A few of them
very, very few, also kill themselves. There also is no shortage of
examples of fathers who kill themselves, but not their children,
because they cannot live without their children. Suicide is the leading
cause of death of men in their prime. Reseach shows that the only
constant in all these tragedies is divorce and the loss of the
children.
The media reaction to this latest mother-child murder-homicide was as
expected. According to the Globe and Mail, the knee jerk reaction was
to find plausible excuses for the female perpetrator. Though nothing
was known about the woman, not even her identity, Ontario Provincial
Police Sergeant Cam Woolley volunteered: "Some people get so desperate
that they take not only their life but that of a loved one". [Source:
"Woman throws tot off 401 overpass, then leaps to death" by Timothy
Appleby. -- The Globe and Mail, Dec. 4, 2006]
Two days after, once her identity was established, the spin was in
furious motion. There was no indication that she was abused and
impoverished.
Dr. Jodi Lofchy, an associate professor of psychiatry at the University
of Toronto and chair of psychiatric emergency services at the
University Health Network said that "Someone has to be very ill for
this to occur." She continued that in such cases, the woman tends to
believe she is "saving herself and the boy from a fate worse than
death." Things seem to be so bad that she sees no alternative but to
end it all, Lofchy said. Her colleague, Dr. Mark Berber, piped in:
"Very often, something may have happened recently in their personal
life to tip the balance," he said. "And the woman sees no future for
her or her child." Suicide "expert" Paul Links did not want to be
left behind: "That's a sign of a significant mental health problem."
[source for the above quotes: "Mother ignored pleas before plunge"
by Michele Henry. -- The Toronto Star, Dec. 5, 2006]
Where were these "experts" when on March 6, 2005, in a similar
incident, Alnoor Amarsi, a debt ridden and broken man, threw his little
daughter, Inara, from a bridge onto the highway and then jumped to his
own death? They were busily condemning the desperate father as an
inhuman monster.
On March 11(?), 2005, Heather Sokoloff of the National Post quoted
judge Marvin Zuker, best known for his feminist advocacy: "How can he
say to me on Feb. 15, 'I love my daughter,' and do this? ..."It
wasn't about the court or anything the court did. It was about revenge
or getting even. ... I'm telling you that, why, if two people are
separated, when this man has the whole of Toronto to move into, he
decides to move into the same building. I'm surprised he didn't move
next door. Come on ... the only reason is control, that's all control.
I mean, we weren't born yesterday."
These comments by his Honour would be enough to have him disrobed, and
maybe thrown behind bars, if the target of his hate was a mother.
These two themes are repeated each time when parents kill their
children. It is rare for a mother to take her own life as well, whereas
about half of the fathers who kill their children commit suicide.
On Aug. 11, 2000, Dr. Suzanne Killinger-Johnson, a wealthy professional
woman, jumped in front of a train with her infant son in her arms.
Hundreds of tearful tributes are still found on the Internet. Article
after article offers the same lame excuse: "postpartum depression".
Sally Armstrong wrote in Chatelaine's October 2001 issue "From
devotion to despair". According to some reports, she was distraught
because she was due to return to work and leave her son in someone
else's care though she had no financial pressure to do so.
A typical media response: "Suicidal parents who take their children
with them often do so for love, says the director of a national crisis
support group.
Joan Wright of the Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention: "It's
often done as an act of love, not any sort of revenge ... When someone
does complete a suicide, they feel there's no other way to end their
pain. You can't understand how powerful that is." [Source: Alan Findlay
-- Sun News Aug. 12, 2000]
In stark contrast, almost exactly one year before, on Aug. 25, 1999,
Rosie Dimanno of the Toronto Star wrote in her article called
"Pitying parents who kill is final indignity to child": "There
can be nothing but revulsion for a man who takes his young son's life
as well as his own. No way to mitigate that wickedness, by exploring
the state of Jeyabalan Balasingam's mind when he clutched 3-year-old
Sajanthan to his chest and dropped in front of an oncoming train at the
Victoria Park subway station." This man, unlike Suzanne
Killinger-Johnson who seemingly had it all, also was a penniless and
desperate immigrant, with little hope for the future.
After Andrea Labbé, a woman whose husband had provided her a secure
and comfortable lifestyle, committed suicide on Dec. 1, 2004, having
first fatally wounded her husband, killed one of her children and
stabbed another several times all over her body, Margaret Philp wrote:
"They had seen exhaustion on Andrea's face, but didn't think it
anything out of the ordinary. They didn't know that a parenting worker
at a drop-in centre at the local school had recognized signs of
depression, and had urged her to get help." [Source: "Hazel eyes,
brown locks, and deep scars" by Margaret Philp. - The Globe and
Mail, Dec. 13, 2004]
Quite a contrast to the standard media report which was expressed by
Noreen Stuckless, a research scientist at Women's College Hospital and
the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health when Bill Luft, a man who
was under incredible stresses, did the same unthinkable. She said:
"Every year, two or three men do what Bill Luft did". [Source:
Canoe (Sun Media) Aug.1, 2000]
If, indeed, filicide, at times followed by a suicide, is viewed as an
altruistic act of mercy when mothers commit it, the explanation is as,
or maybe more, valid when fathers are pushed beyond the brink. It is
rare for a mother to commit suicide after she has killed her
child/children, whereas about half of the perpetrator fathers also take
their own lives.
Surely there is more at stake than depression (in case of women) and
revenge (in case of men). Case law documents that the roles, in fact,
are reversed. Mothers usually kill their children because they find
them a nuisance, or because they want to get at their husbands (the
Medea syndrome). When fathers do the unthinkable, it is usually a
result of having been deprived of their children, often because of
false allegations of abuse.
Conclusion: in order to prevent some of these tragedies, though there
will always be some, we need to take a hard look at how our politically
correct, but morally and factually wrong, prejudices contribute to
them. Above all, justice will have to replace gender based judgements
in our family courts.
Darla
As you know, I have my own website regarding child abuse, child
murders, etc.
I have been reading about this last MURDER of a young child by the
mother. Nothing infuriates me more, than when I read Headlines such as
those written by CTV.
"Toronto police identify two overpass victims." Updated Tue. Dec. 5
2006 7:33 AM ET toronto.ctv.ca
Victims?
As I have said umpteen dozens of times, "victim" ends when they take
another life other than their own. Especially when the life is that of
a child's.
Women have confronted me on my website saying I have a hate on for
people of my own gender.
NO.
I only despise those that try to scream victim in order to avoid being
accountable, or taking responsibility for their own actions. Some
women,, (generally feminists FANATICS) seem to think only women can be
victims.
Everything becomes a women's issue, even if the only TRUE victim is a
child.
There needs to be accountability on all levels. Government seems to be
getting a little more intelligent, and are removing funding from a lot
of women's programs. Some women have become the greedy, gold-digging,
self-centred, vindictive people that the saying "ell hath no fury like
a woman scorned" was created for.
I recently read an article, "Mothers who kill 'are just like you and
me' Toronto case caps series of murders " Kelly Patrick National Post
Tuesday, December 05, 2006
(http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=3a7bb619-21d3-4b16-95b3-9c04fd5c6408&k=61545)
It states:
"Although nearly as many women as men murder their children, the sexes
differ greatly in why and how they kill. Men tend to employ different
methods. They bludgeon, stab or shoot. Women, on the other hand, lean
towards less violent options of suffocating, drowning or poisoning --
making the Toronto woman's choice of throwing herself and her son off
an overpass unusually violent.
"Women are almost more gentle," says Rosemary Gartner, a professor at
the University of Toronto's Centre of Criminology."
Who cares HOW they do it. Why waste time on describing how, and face
the fact that some men and some women BOTH murder their children.
A lot of women are monopolizing the corner on abuse, and violence,
while it is children that are dying at a faster rate than most
canadians know.
I know.
The list of victims and perpetrators is growing phenominally on my
site. Almost monthly.
And lately, most have been women.
They call a man a monster, a pervert, evil, abusive, violent, yet a
woman they will say "the poor thing, she had depression. We need so
many more women's programs"
All while the surviving parent kneels next to the lifeless body of
their beloved child, completely ignored by the media.