Brian Mitchell and Wanda Barzee charged in Elizabeth Smart abduction...

Drudge ^

[Maedhros]

Brian Mitchell and Wanda Barzee charged with kidnapping, sexual assault and burglary in Elizabeth Smart abduction...

[TheDon]

"The charging documents allege Mitchell entered the Smart home after using a knife to cut a window screen."

Remember the infamous screen? I watched a interview of one of the detectives who was amazed anyone could get in through that window, but now admits, that's exactly what happened.

[Utah Girl]

Sadly, I agree with you.

[Az Joe]

Utah is the only state providing the Firing Squad as a means of execution. The last person executed was William Andrews on 30th July 1992 by Lethal Injection.


How courteous, a choice!

[ewing]

Good lord, that is horrible.

[Utah Girl]

The details are awful. And the Smarts are trying to keep the worst of them out.

[uncitizen]

She'll crack within a week.

[ewing]

I will admit I was wrong on this one and eat crow.

This was no runaway case on Elizabeth's part ..

[MineralMan]

There's already a very long thread over in the Smoky Backroom where these people are jumping on the Smarts because people are trying to sell them on the idea of a TV movie or a book.

The Smarts haven't accepted any offer, but they're being damned because other people are _making_ such offers to them.

This will never end, I'm sure. I've grown very disgusted with the behavior of a group of Freepers with regard to the Smart kidnapping. I have a list of those who condemned Elizabeth hanging on my wall. I will certainly ignore any statements they make on any subject, since they have shown such stupidity on this subject.

[justshutupandtakeit]

The yammering yesterday by his mouthpiece sounded like a threat to her as well. Since when are lawyers allowed to issue threats from their clients?

"Little lady if you get away I will come back for you. And your sister will be next. Didn't I come in the middle of the night and take you from your own bed in the middle of your family? No one can protect you. I have allies who will get you it I don't."

[Catspaw]

This is what the Smarts are trying to avoid:

Article Last Updated: Tuesday, March 18, 2003 - 8:29:07 AM EST

 

Giordano hears tapes
By LINDA CONNER LAMBECK

BRIDGEPORT - Former Waterbury Mayor Philip A. Giordano was at his son's Tee Ball game when his cell phone rang on July 9, 2001.

"Who you got?" he asked in a phone conversation that was tapped by the FBI and played in federal court on Monday.

The woman he was speaking to, a convicted prostitute, gave him a child's name, then said: "Today's her birthday you know she turned 9 years old today."

"Wow, that's cool," said Giordano, followed quickly by, "Make sure you're there."

After logging more than a hundred calls between Giordano and the prostitute, Special Agent William S. Reiner Jr. of the FBI said he learned from that call that the "little ones" Giordano had referred to for months in his conversations weren't other prostitutes but really little girls.

On Monday, a jury of 12 men and two women

including two alternates

spent most of the day listening to 126 tapped phone conversations, most of them between Giordano and the prostitute who allegedly supplied him with two young girls for oral sex in exchange for money. One of the girls is the woman's daughter, the other her niece.

Giordano, 39, has pleaded innocent to 18 federal charges that he violated the civil rights of the girls, then ages 8 and 10, by sexually abusing them, conspiring with a prostitute to abuse the girls and using a cell phone

an interstate device

to set up sexual liaisons with them.

Reiner told the jury the calls were intercepted from November 2000 to July 2001 as the FBI investigated an unrelated illegal matter. He said the calls were monitored in an attempt to establish how a mayor on an $80,000 salary, with a wife and three children, was spending so much cash.

Reiner indicated there were other known prostitutes who called the mayor and that at first no special attention was paid to calls made for months by the woman who called July 9. He said agents never saw Giordano with the woman or girls because they were not following the mayor around.

As the tapes were played, Dawn Giordano, the former mayor's wife, sat two rows back in the courtroom. She spent part of her time Monday flipping through a pocket calendar of 2001 as taped calls were being played.

The prostitute has pleaded guilty to state and federal charges and is cooperating with prosecutors. In many of the calls, Giordano specifically asked the woman to bring "the girls" or "the little ones."

"Who you gonna be with?" Giordano asked the prostitute in a Feb. 23, 2001, phone conversation. The woman told him the girl's name. "Make sure, cause if it's the other one I'll leave," Giordano told her.

On June 6, 2001, Giordano asked: "Do you got the girls?" "Of course. Definitely," the prostitute replied.

Other times, the pair made quick calls trying to arrange meetings at his former law office when no one was there. On June 4, 2001, Giordano phoned the prostitute to tell her not to stop at the law office, because Angela Juliani, his former partner, was still there.

He called Juliani to establish she was working late, then the prostitute to say they couldn't go there. "She knows you and she's gonna wonder what you're doing there."

Once, Giordano had his infant son with him while allegedly keeping an appointment with the woman and the girls. Another time, as Giordano allegedly set up a meeting with the prostitute, his older two sons can be heard arguing in the back of a car. Giordano threatened to stop the car and throw them both out if they didn't settle down while he was on the phone.

Reiner testified it was July 12 when he reviewed the July 9 tape that he realized the "girls" Giordano was referring to were minors.

He had an undercover agent call and threaten Giordano to leave the girls alone. The message was left on Giordano's voice mail. Giordano listened to the message eight times.

The next day, Giordano allegedly called the prostitute. They discussed who could be leaving the message. The prostitute swore the girls were keeping quiet.

"Well, someone said something to someone because this dude knew," Giordano said on the phone.

"The people that give me a ride up there they don't know what's going on," the woman is heard saying. "Nobody knows about them Nobody."

She added she had the girls scared to the point where they were afraid if they said something, they would get in trouble.

On July 21, 2001, the woman called Giordano to tell him "we're in trouble." She said the state Department of Children and Families had taken the girls from their homes that morning. Giordano was at a Waterbury country club with his wife and children.

"You know what. You better not mention my name, eh. You know nothing about it," Giordano is heard telling her.

The woman said she wouldn't but also said someone was blackmailing her for $200. She wanted to come to the country club to get the money. Giordano said absolutely not. "Are you out of your mind? I'm at a private country club," he said.

Instead, he told her, "If my name gets [expletive] mentioned, OK, you might as well just put a [expletive] knife to your throat and kill yourself." Giordano also told the woman to stop calling. "My wife's gonna get suspicious," he is heard saying.

Giordano faces life in prison if convicted. He also faces state charges of sexual assault, risk of injury to a minor and conspiracy to commit sexual assault.

[truthkeeper]

I am very much disturbed by the great majority of FReepers who slandered and smeared this poor girl and her family. Be honorable men and women, and write retractions.

I agree...but don't hold your breath. Did you ever read any of the Van Damme threads?

[UnsinkableMollyBrown]

Very brave and honorable. I respect you!

[MineralMan]

"I will admit I was wrong on this one and eat crow."

Good for you. Now, perhaps you'll think long and hard before jumping on similar situations before you have all the facts in hand. I certainly hope so.

[Catspaw]

I don't know. I've a feeling it's going to take a lot longer for Barzee to get from underneath his thrall. Frankly, she hasn't been in jail long enough for it to sink in yet and even after she's appointed an attorney--who'll be doing his damndest to keep the cops away from his client--will have to work out a plea bargain with the prosecutor and that's going to take a while--not days, but probably weeks or, more likely, months. If Barzee and Mitchell are legally married, depending on how the marital privilege laws in Utah are written, Mitchell could block Barzee from testifying against him by invoking privilege.

[stlnative]

Aggravated sexual assault is a first-degree felony, with a minimum prison sentence of six years and a maximum of life.

That is per count, right? We do not know how many times this happened to her over the 9 month period. This creep will go to prison for life... I hope!

[Palladin]

I hear ya, Hildy. Iwo Jima was the worst of the worst.

I think the people who blamed and slandered this beautiful child should be exiled from FR forever.

[Illbay]

Sheesh. "Hey, my son might have kidnapped, raped and sodomized this little girl making her life a pure hell on Earth for nine months, but at least he brought her back alive.

"Well, okay, he didn't bring her back voluntarily, he was caught with her, and she didn't admit who she was so traumatized by my son's brutal treatment of her.

"But he could have killed her at any time and he didn't, that's what counts.

"He ought to get credit for that."

The apple did NOT fall far from the tree in this family!!

[Doc Savage]

"...and say to those that want to make ES the guilty party here:"

Must be nice to sit on the right hand of God and have such an inflated sense of self-importance.

It has been obvious from the outset that she was abducted. Mitchell is obviously the perpetrator and will be dealt with accordingly.

That having been said, the Smart's are clearly guilty of more than just "poor judgment" in exposing their children to itinerant criminal grifters who eventually preyed upon the family. This was a clear case of child endangerment in which Ed and Lois Smart placed the welfare and safety of their minor children at extreme risk.

I can agree with YOU that she was abducted, she was sexually abused and that Mitchell is the culprit. I am quite sure, however, that you will never accept the fact that the parents are guilty of child endangerment.

[Catspaw]

After conviction, it also depends on whether the judge runs the sentences concurrent (at the same time) or consecutive (one after the other). I truly doubt if the judge is going to be sympathetic to either one of them.

[dalebert]

Sexual assault charges also refute the fact that she went willingly. Elizabeth will have to live with this the rest of her life.