94-Year-Old Woman Arrested

Theodora Garreau, 94, a resident of Westminster Commons, a nursing home located at 560 St. Charles Ave, NE Atlanta, Ga. was arrested by the police on the charge that she assaulted a fellow resident with a telephone. Her relatives say that not only was she arrested but she was taken to Grady Memorial Hospital where she was shackled to a bed.

Theodora’s daughter, Fran Daniel, said her mother, who suffers from dementia, was charged with assaulting her roommate. The police report states that Garreau threw a phone at her roommate, causing a small cut to the roommate’s lip. Jeff Andrews, the administrator for Wellington Healthcare which owns Wellington Commons Nursing Home, told WSB-TV Channel 2 that Garreau and the roommate were involved in a physical altercation and had to be separated by a nurse, adding that Garreau was the aggressor.

According to Fran Daniel, the nursing home reacted in an unprofessional manner and should have resolved the incident without having to call the police.

“She had meds to be sedated. They could have restrained her safely and taken care of the issue in-house,” said Daniel. “I really don’t understand how she can be charged with battery.”

Daniel said she isn’t happy that her mother was also allegedly shackled to a bed while she was under arrest at Grady and has hired an attorney, Robert Kaiden.

The nursing home claims they had no choice in the matter. They asked the roommate’s family if they wanted to press charges and that’s when police were called. The officers initially cited Garreau with disorderly conduct but later upgraded the charge to simple battery. The police have declined to make any comments on the case.

Attorney Robert Kaiden insisted Garreau, who weighs about 80 pounds and has arthritis, did not hurt the other woman. He plans to fight the charges and is considering a civil suit against the nursing home.

“They violated her patients’ bill of rights,” Kaiden said. “You’d think they would have some sort of standard operating procedure to handle this in a different way.”

“She didn’t throw a phone at anybody. She doesn’t recall throwing a phone at anybody,” he said, “calling the police was a drastic measure. I think it’s borderline abuse. I think they have abused this woman.”

Theodora Garreau was released on bond. She is no longer staying at Westminster Commons. Her family is searching for another nursing home.

The Fritzl Drama Continues

Josef Fritzl, 74, is in jail. He belongs there. He is the monster that kidnapped his own daughter, Elisabeth, imprisoned her for 24 years and raped her continuously resulting in 7 children — six of whom are still alive. The five part video documentary –  “The Josef Fritzl Story” – shines a light on the dark side of human nature and gives us a peek into the world of a truly evil person. For more about Josef Fritzl and family find all the posts here: The Josef Fritzl Page.

His trial date has been set for March 16, 2009 in St. Poelten, Austria where he is currently being held in jail. According to Franz Cutka, deputy head of Sankt Poelten criminal court, the initial proceedings will be open to the public and media but later access will depend on further developments in the case, he added. Fritzl has been charged with murder, rape, sequestration, incest, grievous assault and slavery. If convicted, he could face life in prison.

Previous problems in getting a jury together seem to have been overcome. According to Austrian law, the jury consists of eight members, with two substitutes. Thirty police officers and prison warders will be on duty to keep order in what is regarded as the most shocking crime in modern Austrian history. Over 250 media representatives have requested permission to attend the trial.

Meanwhile, Josef Fritzl has been making some news for himself. He has announced that he has converted to Buddhism. According to reports he spends most of the 23 hours a day in his cell studying the peaceful Far Eastern philosophy.

Speaking through his lawyer Rudolf Mayer, Fritzl said that he has found a lot of comfort in reading Buddhist literature and finds the religion “fascinating”. Fritzl first discovered Buddhism on a family holiday in Thailand but has only started studying the religion in depth while behind bars.

He hopes to be reincarnated as a decent person in his next life if he can help stop other weirdos copying his crimes. As if to reinforce that notion, Fritzl has invited criminal psychologists to study his warped mind. He wants experts to quiz him to work out the root of his evil. Fritzl told his lawyer: “They should look at what makes me tick and learn from it to stop anything like this happening again. “

Fritzl said: “I realize now that I am not normal, and I see that somebody who did what I did cannot be regarded as normal.  With the help of therapists I want to know what the real reasons are for why I behaved like I did and I want to get treatment, I want to be healthy again at some point.”

‘I am aware I will spend a very long time in prison. I would like to be examined by as many profilers, psychologists and psychiatrists as possible, preferably the most renowned in the world. They should look into the deepest depths of my soul and learn from it for future cases.’

Professor Reinhardt Haller, an Austrian forensic psychiatrist mentioned by Fritzl, said:

‘It would be in the service of science to examine this unique case as thoroughly as possible. From the point of view of both medicine and criminology his personality is most certainly worth examining.’

Teen Attacks Parents over Cellphone Use

This is one of those stories that makes you stop and think. Some parents really have no control over their kids. Discipline seems to be a concept of a bygone era. Some children have lost all respect for parental authority. The following story may not be typical of the problems most parents face but at the same time it is not as uncommon as you might believe.

The following appeared in the news journal Delawareonline.com written by Ira Porter dated Jan.26, 2009:

A 16-year-old Laurel girl threatened her parents with two large kitchen knives early Sunday after her father confiscated her cell phone.

The frightened parents retreated into their bedroom and locked the door, then called police. It took officers about 10 minutes to calm the girl and persuade her to put down the knives, Delaware State Police said.

“I can’t comment on the state of mind of the juvenile, but this is one extreme example of a teenager having something as little as her phone taken away from her and how it affected her emotionally,” said Cpl. Bruce Harris.

State police said they were called to the home in the 11000 block of Sandy Ridge Drive at about 3 a.m.

Police said the girl’s father heard her talking on the phone in her bedroom, and knew that there were no minutes left on her phone.

He said he suspected the girl had stolen money from her mother’s purse earlier in the day to purchase minutes on a prepaid card, Harris said.

After the father took the phone from the girl, she became angry, grabbed two large kitchen knives and threatened her parents, police said.

The parents locked themselves in a bedroom and called police. Police said the teen violently attacked the door.

Police responded and talked the girl into putting the knives down after 10 minutes of negotiating. She was charged with possession of a deadly weapon during the commission of a felony, two counts of aggravated menacing, terroristic threatening, disorderly conduct, theft, criminal mischief and possession of a deadly weapon by a person prohibited.

She was committed to Stevenson House after failing to pay $14,000 secured bond.

The William Marion Stevenson House Detention Center is a lock-secure facility staffed for 55 pre-adjudicated male and female youth under the age of 18 years old, located in Milford, Delaware.

Several types of programs are available: HIV prevention, pregnancy prevention, aggression resistance, and drug education. Certified providers offer medical, dental, and psychological services. Religious services of various faiths are regularly scheduled or can be provided upon request.

Academic education is provided by public education teachers. Credits received in these facilities can be transferred towards a high school diploma or GED.

Throughout the resident’s stay, staff maintain contact with the family to assist in adjusting the youth’s behavior towards becoming a better citizen. Services are available to assist them in providing guidance to help their child to meet this goal.

They also have a strict policy with regards to telephone use:

Once a youth is admitted, they are given the opportunity to make two phone calls; after those calls, all phone calls are collect. Each resident will be given a PIN number and only allowed to make outgoing calls to the phone numbers on their phone sheet. Residents may receive phone calls from court workers, social workers, attorneys, DFS workers, and Aftercare/Probation workers at any time. Resident may telephone their attorney at any reasonable time if the attorney agrees to accept the call or the charges. Residents may call parents, legal guardians, foster parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and siblings as indicated on their phone sheet.

At least here there seems to be strict discipline. I am sure the teen who thought is was OK to pull a knife on her parents will have a long time to think about actions and consequences. She will in all likelihood end up with a criminal record which might follow her for the rest of her life. Did things really have to go this far??

Gay Mayor Refuses to Resign

Mayor Sam Adams, 45, publicly apologized for lying early in his campaign about the relationship with an 18-year-old man, Beau Breedlove, in 2005. The openly gay Portland, OR. mayor is also accused of asking the teen to lie for him as well. This has prompted many to call for the mayor to resign. He has refused to do so.

The mayor met privately with the four city commissioners to discuss his political future just three weeks after being sworn in. The next day Sam Adams informed City Commissioner Randy Leonard and the other commissioners that he had decided not to resign.

In a statement posted on his website the mayor said he believed that he still had positive contributions to make, drawing on his 20 years of public service to the city. He thanked his supporters and his critics and promised: “I will work harder than I have ever worked before to make sure Portland meets our challenges.”

Although the Mayor has his supporters calls for him to resign have come from a number of organizations and individuals. The Oregonian of Portland in an editorial has called for the mayor to resign as have other smaller Portland newspapers and the police union.

The gay-oriented publication Just Out, is also calling for his resignation. Its publisher, Marty Davis says: “I feel at this point, his character has a deep flaw” :

“By his own admission, by committing the act of lying to the citizens of Portland, Adams has failed to show the principled character that this publication feels is a basic requirement for an elected official,” the editorial said.

Mayor Sam Adams sat down with the editorial board of the Oregonian and gave a videotaped interview. Afterward the newspaper, in an editorial, said:

Nobody — not even the mayor — knows if his sense of right and wrong will fail him again, but he is asking us to give him another chance. In his Tuesday news conference Adams responded to one question this way: “If it’s no longer in the city’s best interest for me to stay on, I will resign.”

He’s already said he doesn’t plan to quit, but we submit that it is not in the city’s interest to have a mayor who cannot vouch for his own character under fire.

He should resign.

Adams was elected easily last year, 2008, making Portland the largest U.S. city to elect an openly gay mayor. He was sworn in Jan. 1.

Rumors of the relationship had surfaced when the then-city commissioner was getting ready to run for mayor in 2007, but he and the teen, Beau Breedlove, both denied it at the time. Adams said he lied then because the rumors claimed the teen was underage. He said the relationship did not begin until after the teen turned 18 in June 2005. That is the legal age of consent in Oregon. He admitted he asked the teen initially to deny the relationship. “I am deeply sorry that I asked him to lie for me,” he said.

Beau Breedlove also gave an interview to the Oregonian to explain in his own words what really happened between himself and the Mayor. While agreeing with the Mayor that the two of them did not have sex until two weeks after his 18th birthday in June 2005, Breedlove said that the Mayor had kissed him twice “on the lips” when he was still 17 years old. He also says he welcomed Adams’ kisses and romantic interest, even though he was underage.

Beau Breedlove, now 21, told The Oregonian that Adams kissed him on the lips on two occasions before he turned 18 — once in Adams’ car and the other in the second-floor men’s room in City Hall after a party that Adams, then a city commissioner, had in his office.

“I do not see any relationship that I ever had with Sam as me being taken advantage of,” Breedlove said. “I do not feel like I was ever a victim. I may have been 17, but I was an adult, and I knew what I was doing.”

Adams said he didn’t recall kissing Breedlove. But Adams said that even if he did, his earlier denials stand.

“I said that there was no sexual contact before he was 18,” Adams said. Asked again whether he kissed Breedlove, Adams replied: “I don’t remember, but if I did, it was not sexual contact.”

Sam Adams’  attorney, Robert Weaver, said that even if Adams kissed a 17-year-old Breedlove, Adams broke no laws.

“There is nothing that (Breedlove) has said that is inconsistent with what the mayor has said,” Weaver said. “The mayor has said there was no sexual activity. Kissing is not sexual activity.”

Oregon State law says third-degree sexual abuse, which is a misdemeanor, can occur when someone subjects another person to “sexual contact” when the person either does not consent to the advance or is younger than 18. The law defines sexual contact as “any touching of the sexual or other intimate parts of a person … for the purpose of arousing or gratifying the sexual desire of either party.”

Sam Adams is under criminal investigation by the Oregon attorney general’s office.

Double Stabbing at Moonshine Wake

Dennis Jerome Foust, 33, of 9587 Walsh, Montague, MI seems to be trying to set some kind of record. He has already been convicted of: Breaking and Entering, Home Invasion, Furnishing Contraband to a prisoner, Criminal Sexual Conduct, and Disarming a Peace Officer. If the prosecutors get their way Foust, who has been on parole since June 2008, can add: Two counts of felonious assault and a misdemeanor count of domestic violence to his resume.

Foust is accused of stabbing two men who tried to intervene when he got into a fight with his wife. The incident happened at a funeral wake for Shawn Davila, 39, who died on New Year’s Day from methanol alcohol poisioning. Davila died four days after drinking from a batch of homemade moonshine. Two other men were sickened, but survived.

During the wake on Jan. 9th – where many people were drinking alcohol – a fight broke out between Foust and his wife. According to the police, Foust allegedly assaulted his wife during the altercation. Two men intervened on the woman’s behalf, instigating another fight in which both men were stabbed by Foust. The two victims were taken to a local hospital where they were treated and released.

In addition to being charged with assault and domestic violence, Foust was also charged as a habitual offender. This could result in him being sentenced to a longer prison term, if convicted on the current charges. The assault charges carry maximum four-year prison sentences, and the domestic violence charge carries a 93-day jail sentence.

Judge Kevin Drake ruled there was enough evidence presented for Dennis Jerome Foust to face trial. Drake ruled after hearing testimony from victims James Riggs, 32, and Riggs’ brother-in-law Steven Davis, 40. Drake also heard from Davis’ wife, Kathy, and a sheriff’s deputy.

Davis said he was stabbed in the side of the head, the neck, shoulder and lower back. Riggs said he was stabbed below the left shoulder. They all admitted to consuming alcohol. Foust is scheduled for arraignment in 27th Circuit Court Monday, Jan. 26, before Judge Terrence Thomas.

Killer of Homeless Man Caught

Benjamin Mathew Martin, 30, was arrested at about 11:45 am on Jan. 22 2009 for setting a homeless man ablaze, killing him while he slept. The homeless man was later identified as John Robert McGraham, 55. The killing of John McGraham, which occurred on Oct 9 2008, garnered significant media attention both because of the brutal nature of the attack and because the attack occurred without any provocation. Read the full story here.

John McGraham was also featured on the TV program America’s Most Wanted which painted a melancholy picture of John’s life, who grew up with an abusive father, had an ill-fated love affair and suffered from depression which ultimately led to his homelessness.

The gruesome slaying of John Robert McGraham, 55, as he sat on his usual corner at 3rd and Berendo streets in the Mid-Wilshire area of Los Angeles on  Oct. 9, galvanized the multi-ethnic, largely working-class neighborhood. Martin is Latino, as are the neighborhood people who regularly gave McGraham — who was white — food and clothes. LAPD Deputy Chief Charlie Beck said the alleged motivation for the killing appears to be “straight-up personal dislike.” The crime provoked widespread introspection about the dangers faced by homeless people in the state. Hundreds gathered for vigils at the corner that McGraham called home.

“The attack occurred without any apparent provocation. The victim was totally helpless,” said LAPD Chief William J. Bratton. “The suspect intentionally set the victim on fire and then ran from the scene, leaving a red plastic gasoline container.”

Benjamin Martin was described as a former barber in the Mid-Wilshire neighborhood with a grudge against the homeless. He has a previous criminal record for a drug offense. It was with the help of eyewitnesses and by matching his DNA on file, with evidence found at the crime scene, that the police were able to identify and eventually capture Martin. He was taken into custody in Rancho Mirage – 120 miles away from the scene of the murder.

McGraham’s sister, Susanne McGraham-Paisley, was very grateful to the police and the community for their support in capturing her brother’s killer. After hearing the news she called her brother David McGraham, who lives in Washington state. She started to cry soon after he picked up the phone.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her.

“No, David, it’s OK,” she said between sobs. “They got him.”

He grew tearful as he recalled the phone call. “I thought, ‘My God, I can’t believe it. They got him.’ ”

Psychologist Gets 7 Years for Child Porn

Dr. Joseph Belanger, 61, of Jamestown, ND, a former mental hospital psychologist who said he became interested in child pornography while treating sex offenders was sentenced to seven years in prison. He plead guilty in court to two charges of receiving materials involving the sexual exploitation of minors. When asked by U.S. District Court Judge Ralph Erickson if the allegations against him were true, he looked up at the judge and in a quiet deep voice replied: “Yes, Your Honor”. With those three words Belanger became a convicted child sex offender. Read the full story here.

His sentencing originally scheduled for Dec. 11, 2008 had been delayed until Jan. 23, 2009. He had faced a maximum sentence of 30 years in prison and a mandatory minimum term of five years. In sentencing Belanger to 7 years behind bars, Judge Ralph Erickson said he should have taken advantage of his experience and background to seek treatment for himself.

“He, of all people, should have known there was help available,” Erickson said.

Dr. Belanger, a former psychologist at North Dakota State Hospital, worked for 20 years examining sex offenders and testifying in court as an expert witness in hundreds of cases. He was targeted by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in an investigation code named Operation Flicker. He was accused of subscribing to and paying for downloading child pornography from various websites.

Defense attorney Steven Light said a psychologist’s report showed his client was a good candidate for rehabilitation. Belanger cooperated with authorities and had no previous criminal history. “He’s not a hands-on offender,” Light said.

During the hearing, Assistant U.S. Attorney Jennifer Klemetsrud Puhl read a victim impact statement from a 17-year-old girl who had been sexually molested by her father when she was 10 or 11. Images of the girl were posted on porn sites accessed by Belanger.

Victims in such cases “are traumatized in a way that never really ends,” Judge Ralph Erickson said.

Boy Lives with Dead Mom for 10 Days

8-Year-Old Trinity Tipado could not figure out what was wrong with his Mom. Everyday for 10 days he tried to wake her up but she would not respond. Trinity’s mother, Gaynell Tipado, 41, was dead.

Gaynell Tipado apparently died Jan. 9 in their apartment in the Detroit suburb of Romulus. Tipado, a Louisiana native, was a survivor of the hurricane Katrina in 2005 and had moved with her son to Romulus about three and a half years ago. An autopsy into her death is pending but the police do not suspect any foul play was involved.

According to authorities, 8-year-old Trinity Tipado survived in the apartment with his dead mother by eating dried rice, butter and flour. When supplies ran out he would make trips to Romulus Liquor Store, about a block away, where he and his mother had been shopping regularly for about a year and a half. He would buy milk, chips, candy and bread and pay for them with cash.

Layth Saco, who co-owns the store with his brother Sam, said the boy made four trips in a week to buy supplies. He said he was curious why the boy came in by himself and asked about his mother. On his fourth trip to the store, Trinity did not have any cash and presented his mother’s driver’s license and an expired credit card to pay for $34.80 worth of grocery items — including nacho cheese dip, a package each of processed ham and turkey, hamburger buns, milk, doughnuts, soda and candy. This peaked Layth’s curiosity even more.

He asked the boy if he could speak to his mother. “Is she alive?” Saco asked the boy.

“She’s in a better place,” the boy replied. He also said, “I tried to wake her up every day. I wanted to talk to her.”

“I sat him down, gave him chocolate milk. Then I called Romulus PD,” Saco said.

Police arrived and took the boy home. They called Saco about 10 minutes later to tell him the boy’s mother was dead. They questioned the boy and found out he was home-schooled, had no siblings and his father had died several years ago.

Police said that with his father dead, along with his grandparents and now his mother, he worried that he would have to go out and live by himself.

“In his little 8-year-old mind, that’s what he came up with — that’s what he was afraid of,” said Romulus Police Lt. John Leacher. “Your heart just breaks for this little boy.”

“It’s sad. It’s very hard. It’s very unfortunate for him,” said Layth Saco, 36, a father of three young children. “I just feel bad. What he had to see for 11 days.

“The things he went through,” said Sam Saco. “I’m shaken. I’m almost about to cry. I’ve been thinking all night about the kid.” Sam said he felt guilty he had not called the police earlier.

Trinity was placed in foster care, but fortunately the police were able to find his aunt and uncle. Tipado’s sister, Verna Lemieux and her sister’s husband came up from Louisiana after police notified them of her death. When reached by The Detroit News, Lemieux’s husband said they were still making arrangements for Gaynell Tipado’s burial as well as measures for caring for Trinity. The family has requested privacy, for now, despite an outpouring of support from people wishing to make contributions.

Calls continue to flood the Romulus Police station from people concerned about Trinity. The boy is currently in foster care.

“I’ve had calls from all over the country from people who want to adopt him on the spot, sight unseen,” Leacher said. “I told them there was a lot of officer support but right now they just want to get some time to grieve their losses.”

Saco said he already turned away hundreds of dollars from customers because he hoped to set up a fund for Trinity at a local bank. He said he called at least half a dozen, but none was willing to help.

“Nobody wants to do it, because we’re not a family member,” Saco said. “A lot of people are giving me (money). I keep turning these people back. I would have had $200 for the poor kid by now.”

Saco, having no success at finding a sponsor, finally relented and put a donation box in his store.

“I’m going to do whatever I can,” he said. “I don’t want to bother them (Trinity’s family). They are probably miserable.”

Parents of Adolf Hitler to be Evicted

When Heath and Deborah Campbell complained that their local ShopRite supermarket refused to decorate a birthday cake with their son’s name, little did they know how much publicity they would receive.

They could not understand why the supermarket would not put their son’s name – Adolf  Hitler – on his birthday cake. They could not understand why naming all three of their children after Nazi names was such a big deal. They could also not understand why everyone thought they were racists just because they had swastikas all over their house. They really did not understand all the negative publicity they received. And one more thing – they don’t know why New Jersey’s Division of Youth and Family Services (DYFS) came and removed all three children from their home.

To be fair to the Campbells DYFS has not given a reason for removing the kids from the household. DYFS cited privacy concerns and has refused to provide any information about the case. DYFS did however say that they would not remove children from their parents just because of their names. A recently scheduled court appearance has been postponed, reportedly at the request of the parents, to give them time to find a lawyer.

In the meantime Heath Campbell is hospitalized due to stress and his wife Deborah gave the following interview:

Mr. Campbell had at least two of the children’s names legally changed in recent months. He dropped his son’s original first name, Antonio (Adolf and Hitler had been the middle names), so he is now Adolf Hitler Campbell, and fixed his daughter’s birth certificate to correct the spelling of “Aryan.”

The Campbells’ neighbors described a family living on the fringe, financially and socially. Mr. Campbell, 35, and his wife, Deborah, 25, do not work and receive disability payments for emphysema and neck pain, respectively. Their landlord, Larry Lippincott, who shares the two-family home, said the family is often up all night.

“I hear the kids playing at 2:30 in the morning and the TV on,” Mr. Lippincott said. “He told me he was a night person and didn’t like to do anything during the day.”

Mr. Lippincott said he had decided — before the cake incident — not to renew the Campbells’ lease when it expired in November because, he said, a relative they frequently argue with threatened to “firebomb the house.” He expects to begin eviction proceedings soon.

“They’re not destroying anything, the house is clean and they pay their rent on time,” he said. But, he added, “There comes a point when you say, ‘Enough is enough.’ ”

Encouraged by Crowd Teen Commits Suicide

Shaun Dykes, 17, from Kilburn, Derbyshire in Britain was a troubled, gay teen who had just recently broken up with his boyfriend, 18-year-old David Challands with whom he was living. His life ended on Saturday, 27 September 2008. He commited suicide by jumping 60 ft to his death from the top of a multi-story car park at the Westfield Shopping Center in Derby city. See a TV report of the incident here.

Police negotiators, who spent over two hours trying to dissuade 17-year-old Shaun Dykes from jumping from the roof said their work was made much more difficult by heckling from the crowd which had gathered on London Road below. According to witnesses, as the negotiators were trying to convince Shaun to come away from the edge of the roof, people in the crowd below were taunting the teen with shouts of: “How far can you bounce?”, “Go on, jump”, “Get on with it” , “Stop wasting time” and “You’re wasting tax-payers’ money.”

At the inquest, on Thursday, January 15, 2009, Louise Pinder, deputy assistant coroner for Derby Coroner’s Court, said she thought it was a “great shame” the people goading Shaun had not been identified and brought to justice.

“I find it incomprehensible that while two police negotiators were talking with such sensitivity and taking such care with Shaun that those members of the public below were acting so insensitively and with no apparent concern for a fellow human being.”

She returned a verdict that Shaun Dykes, of Elm Tree Avenue, took his own life, saying it was “abundantly clear” there were a number of factors leading to his death. The coroner said: “Those individuals who taunted Shaun are responsible, at least in part, for his death.”

Inspector Barry Thacker, one of the negotiators gave this account of what was happening just moments before Shaun jumped to his death:

“Hand on heart, I felt we made some progress towards the end. He asked us to stop talking because we were giving him too many options, and I could see in his eyes that he was weighing up the positive things in his life. I took that as a positive sign.

“But when he heard the shouts he would disengage from us, look at the people on London Road, close his eyes and start counting down from 10 – obviously a sign he was preparing to jump. That happened on three or four occasions, but we managed to get him back.”

Seconds before he died he reached for Insp Thacker’s hand to help him down, but was distracted by shouts of: “You’re wasting tax-payers’ money.” The inspector said he then turned again, closed his eyes and jumped.

After Shaun Dykes jumped to his death, in what can only be described as gruesome and sickening, some of the spectators in the crowd who had been goading the disturbed young man to jump, broke through the police cordon to take pictures of the dead teen, using their cellphones.

Commenting on the behavior of the crowd, Superintendent Andy Hough, of Derbyshire police, said he was disturbed and disappointed by what had happened:

People were at the police cordon shouting for the man to jump,’ Superintendent Hough said. ‘I find it a disturbing and shocking reflection on society when people feel inclined to do that. Negotiators were working with the man threatening to jump and it was their job to talk to him in the hope of changing his mind. We really need the public to work with us, not against us. It was a very disappointing situation.’

Just days before his suicide, Shaun had broken up with his boyfriend, David Challands, 18, of Avis Avenue, Marlpool. Shaun was suffering from depression and had twice before tried to take his own life. David said of his former boyfriend:

“I knew he was unstable half-way through our relationship. He would tell me about feeling depressed, he thought nobody cared about him. Daily, I had to reassure him that everyone was there for him. He said if I left him he would kill himself, and I knew that he would, so I felt like I had to stay with him.” He added that he ended the relationship as he “really just couldn’t do it anymore”.

Shaun was a student at Heanor Gate Science College in Heanor, Derbyshire. Earlier Shaun’s mother Tina told the inquest her son felt under pressure because his GCSEs were approaching. His headteacher Rob Howard said: “One or two students were standing near people goading him to jump.

“One student told me he could not believe people place such little value on life. It’s almost like they are in a television show. The sad thing is that a couple of the students, if they could have got close enough, felt that they could have made a difference.”

Lindsey Reid, 17, Shaun’s best friend since he was four, said: “He was the joker, always smiling. He’s not the sort of person you’d expect to do this.”