Please Note: I've had this post held here in draft form for quite some time and did not want to post it for fear that family members might view it. Now that the Fifth Estate will be broadcasting a segment on March 11th 2011, I've decided to post this item. My regrets to the family and despite the content and tenor of this post, my continued hope that I am wrong.
Owen Rooney, Eric Wilson ... so what's changed since 1978?
The award-winning documentary Just Another Missing Kid, which was first broadcast on the Fifth Estate on CBC-TV on April 7, 1981, is an indictment of the apathy and bureaucracy of the legal system on both sides of the border. So what are the differences between the late seventies and the present day? Have law enforcement agencies changed their practices? Will they ever change?
Eric Wilson was 19. Owen Rooney was 24.
Eric Wilson was a Canadian citizen. Owen Rooney was on a working holiday in Canada.
Eric Wilson was last seen in the United States. Owen Rooney was last seen somewhat near the border of the United States and Canada.
Eric Wilson was last known to be in good health. Owen Rooney was last known to have suffered a serious neurological injury and to have been misdiagnosed and poorly treated.
Eric Wilson involved the legal system in Canada but primarily in the United States.
Owen Rooney involved the legal system in the United States but primarily in Canada.
There are some differences between the two disappearances but lots of similarities.
After considerable time was wasted by a variety of police agencies giving them the runaround, the Eric Wilson family had the good fortune to encounter a cop who told them "I'm not going to waste my time and your money running around all over the place looking for an amnesia victim: Either your son is a no-good louse who stole your car and is off somewhere doing drugs or he was a good kid who has been murdered. Which is it?" Yes, he said exactly that. Tactful ain't it! He was really and truly subtle in his approach to a very delicate issue at a time of a family's greatest need for tact wasn't he? There is one advantage however: he didn't bankrupt the family and let the case grow cold by wasting time looking all over the place for a non-existent victim of amnesia. Instead he started the ball rolling on a homicide investigation and he was the one who actually solved the case despite the "best efforts" of several police agencies and the FBI who all said "runaway kid" or "joined a cult".
The Owen Rooney family had the misfortune to have dealt with the RCMP who were only too perfectly happy to rubber-stamp the file as "Missing Person" and to leave it like that as the family ran all over Canada looking for an amnesia victim selling trinkets door-to-door. The loss of such deeply coded information as one's name is extremely rare. The loss of it for an extended period of time is even more rare. The loss of one's name while wearing a hospital bracelet is absurd beyond contemplation. The RCMP know this, yet they allow the Owen Rooney family to grasp at straws. It is so much easier on the RCMP to have the family scattered all over Canada tracking down dubious sightings than to have the family in Grand Forks breathing down the RCMP's neck and demanding action.
Sometimes you have to call a spade a spade. Sometimes its the right thing to do!
Try to do it tactfully if you can, but call a spade a spade! You ain't sparing the family from grief by holding out false hope. You are only prolonging their ordeal. And what is worse, you are only aiding the perpetrators to evade capture. One would think the RCMP would know this. They had not learned that lesson when The Fifth Estate did the Eric Wilson documentary in 1980, let us see if the RCMP has learned that lesson now.
Missing persons posters, newspaper features, TV "news" puff pieces can continue indefinitely. What has been the result so far? A "sighting" on Vancouver Island as one of three door-to-door salesmen when neighbors report there were no salesmen of any description at all during that time. A "sighting" in Alberta of a person so paranoid he could not have been hired for any job at all much less hired as a truck driver for some employer too foolish to ever ask to see a driver's license. What sort of investigative leads are these? Is it any wonder the Horsemen reach for a drink rather than for the reins of their steeds and go galloping off into the sunset?
Perhaps its time for the well respected Fifth Estate to prepare another award-winning documentary. This time, perhaps they will focus on informing the Canadian people that their RCMP is not there to tactfully hold hands and talk nonsense about amnesia just because there are heartbroken parents involved. No matter how attractive the RCMP finds Owen's sisters to be, its not the job of the RCMP to plant false hopes in the breasts they are staring at. What are the Horsemen going to do? Ride off in search of the criminals a year later because they were too busy sitting on their duffs while jotting down a series of endless vague sightings of utterly no merit whatsoever? There are people who couldn't tell an Australian accent from an Austrian accent but let them see a flyer or read a human interest piece in a weekly newspaper and suddenly they are experts at Australian accents as well as recalling descriptions of persons they saw weeks before even though they can't recall what they had for breakfast that very morning.
Families are under extreme emotions at times such as these and are not always able to properly assess their various options. The RCMP are supposed to be professionals. A bruise or contusion to an ear lobe is one thing, but bleeding from the ear canal is a sign of a serious neurological incident involving leakage of cerebral spinal fluid and impaired cognitive functioning. Suggesting a trip to a first aid station to obtain a band-aid is simply an absurd response of a police officer who views bilateral bleeding from the ear canals. A statement that people are trying to kill him is not necessarily paranoid behavior. The whole world may not be trying to kill him, only a limited few. The RCMP should have been aware that those limited few would-be murderers know how to get to that first aid station also. And if those malevolent few should happen to arrive when the only person who can give evidence against them is outside at a picnic table, there is no reason for them to hesitate to get done what has to be done and which they came fully prepared to do. Mental impairment simply made their job easier for them.
Now just to continue with the parallels between the Eric Wilson case, let me point out that Eric Wilson was keeping in touch with his parents via roadside payphones. That was the manner in which things were done back in the pre-historic era before cell phones, twitter and facebook. No one is more capable than the family to know how many times Owen would routinely keep in touch with his friends and relatives. The family has a general impression of his cell phone use but the RCMP has raw data available to it. Surely the RCMP doesn't really think a person with electronics training walks away from a non-functioning cell phone. Surely the RCMP knows in this day and age that young people rarely venture away from the internet these days. Surely the RCMP should have the wisdom to know that this is not and never has been a missing persons case. Surely the RCMP should have the courage to admit that to themselves and to act accordingly. So which is it that the RCMP lacks: common sense or courage?
NOTE: Additional information recently released about the messages to a girl friend show Owen Rooney to have been severely confused as to time and place. He not only thought someone who was two provinces away was in his immediate vicinity but that for some reason he thought she was in one particular house according to the two men who severely beat him.
The Fifth Estate: The well-respected Canadian news magazine will be airing a short segment on Owen Rooney and the search for further information about him. March 11, 2011.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Thursday, February 17, 2011
Kick them when they are down.
Ryan Ferguson's Habeas Corpus petition was filed recently and in addition to assertions about invalid testimony there were direct accusations that co-worker Boyd was in fact guilty of the crime.
This has resulted in such comments as: But to now drag Michael Boyd into the tarnishing, destructive spotlight of suspicion in a slaying more than five years after the fact smacks of desperation and flailing, tossing anything against the wall that might stick.
It should be known however that he was the last person known to have seen the victim. He is a big strong man and much more likely to attack the hulking victim than a slightly built youth of seventeen. He is likely to be more able to attack without warning since the victim would not be on guard and might well have his back turned to his assailant. Boyd lied several times about the vehicle he was using that night and where he parked it. He also appears to have altered the paperwork on the vehicle after the crime and to have subsequently disposed of the vehicle.
Although the injuries were alleged by the prosecution to be the result of a tire iron the petition suggests the cranial injuries were not the result of an implement being wielded against the victim but were instead the result of the victim's head being repeated struck against the wheel hub of the co-worker's car.
48Hours will be airing an updated story in March.
This has resulted in such comments as: But to now drag Michael Boyd into the tarnishing, destructive spotlight of suspicion in a slaying more than five years after the fact smacks of desperation and flailing, tossing anything against the wall that might stick.
It should be known however that he was the last person known to have seen the victim. He is a big strong man and much more likely to attack the hulking victim than a slightly built youth of seventeen. He is likely to be more able to attack without warning since the victim would not be on guard and might well have his back turned to his assailant. Boyd lied several times about the vehicle he was using that night and where he parked it. He also appears to have altered the paperwork on the vehicle after the crime and to have subsequently disposed of the vehicle.
Although the injuries were alleged by the prosecution to be the result of a tire iron the petition suggests the cranial injuries were not the result of an implement being wielded against the victim but were instead the result of the victim's head being repeated struck against the wheel hub of the co-worker's car.
48Hours will be airing an updated story in March.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
AF 447 Air France flight lost over the Atlantic
I just learned that NOVA will have a special tonight on the AF 447 flight. There are so many interesting aspects to this puzzle. Primary amongst them is the Airbus concept of a computer flying the aircraft and over-riding pilot input in certain modes. Also involved are sensor design issues, conflicting data resolution issues, pilot attention issues, international cooperation issues, search operations issues and use of maintenance data as an alternative to the unrecovered Black Boxes.
I'm uncertain if the plane deviated for severe weather or not. I think the primary problem was overspeed resulting in a deep stall at high altitude resulting in a near vertical descent with little forward speed. It would be a problem of how to evaluate fluctuating data from multiple sensors.
The flight into a severe thunderstorm may well have taken place although the pilots may have believed they were above the storm. In most stalls the rule is simple: lower the nose immediately and add power immediately. This simple rule usually results in greater air flow over the wings to generate lift. Wings are usually designed to stall from the inboard area first so that the pilot has time to react before the stall reaches the outboard areas of the wing and the control surfaces become stalled. In a deep stall, moving the control surfaces has no effect because there is no airflow over the control surfaces. Adding power may be a problem if there was a sudden and unexpected ingestion of super-cooled rainwater into the engines. If it was not just pitot tube icing but an engine flame-out, no power may have been available to the pilots even if in their information overload state of mind they realized they desperately needed to add power.
Analysis of the flight from the ACARS maintenance data transmissions is not ideal. The information is designed to give maintenance crews an indication of what systems will need to be tested when the plane lands and what tools and parts should be on hand for the task. Such maintenance data is not an alternative to a Flight Data Recorder. There are also problems since the ACARS messages are held in a one minute suspense window and are grouped by item and priority. Certain message evaluation rules are clearly compromises. A fault detected by a system is considered more serious if it relates to a separate system than if it is a self-detected internal fault. A fault is deemed to be hard if it persists for thirty seconds whereas a fault is deemed soft if it is detected for less than thirty seconds. Such rules do make sense in most circumstances.
The loss of satellite uplink carrier signal during a critical time is one argument against replacing physical black boxes with constant electronic transmission of the FDR and CVR data. The cost of such transmissions is a major problem also.
I'm sure it will be an interesting program and I look forward to viewing it. I hope all my many readers (LOL) will enjoy it.
By the way, the most relevant incident to compare AF447 with is the Gimli Glider incident. That plane ran out of fuel half way through its flight and all the design errors, pilot errors and ATC errors were countered by one thing alone, pilot expertise. The pilot had a hobby of flying gliders, so when he suddenly found himself flying a huge ungainly glider full of passengers, he still knew what to do and how to do it. He had flown gliders before. He knew to make his S turns toward his objective and not lose sight of it. He knew how to do skids. He was flying the airplane rather than monitoring computers but everything turned out okay because he was used to actually flying the airplane rather than monitoring computers. That is a rare skill nowadays.
With AF447 when things turned so bad that the computer entered Alternate Law mode the computer would no longer override disapproved pilot inputs and would allow the pilots to fly the aircraft as they saw fit. Unfortunately, the pilots were not very experienced at actually flying the aircraft and were not able to do it in situations of high informational overload, high insecurity as to the reliability of their instruments and unusual attitudes. When Fly-By-Wire ended and Alternate Law started, the situation was already critical and the pilots desperately needed a learning curve. Unfortunately, there is no learning curve during such an event. If you've entered even the fringes of a supercell at night and are experiencing electrical overloads, have circuit breakers popping all over the place, are losing some instruments and have utterly lost faith in all your instruments, the situation is hopeless for a pilot who really doesn't know how to fly an airplane without a computer.
Every flight using a computer to change altitude saves on fuel costs over a heavy handed pilot trying to manipulate the throttles, but every such flight deprives the pilot of real flying experience. Just as the Gimli Glider incident involved a sudden transition the AF447 undoubtedly involved a sudden transition even though we don't know the cause. Initial lightning seems insufficient. Iced-up pitot sensors can have any number of causes. Auto Pilot and Auto Thrust are different systems and some confusion may have existed as to speed selection and the rapidity of speed adjustment attempts that were required.
If there was a deep stall, I just wonder what attitude is required for it. Note: A Deep Stall is one wherein no manipulation of power or control surfaces will have sufficient effect. A pilot in the deep stalled plane is as utterly helpless as a pilot on the ground who might be observing the incident. The pilot on the ground will push a non existent throttle lever, the pilot in the plane will push an actual throttle lever however the effect will be the same. A pilot on the ground will push an imaginary steering yoke, a pilot in the plane will push a real steering yoke yet the results will be the same. No effect whatsoever. A deep stall with or without a flat spin would mean a high speed vertical descent with little forward momentum.
NOTE: On Feb 28 2011, the Alucia arrived, fresh from a Seattle overhaul, at the Pacific waiting area for transiting the Panama Canal to begin its three phase search for the Black Boxes using remote controlled submersibles.
NOTE: This Phase 4 search continues. IF there is a Phase 5, Recovery Phase, a different ship and different equipment will be used. So far, no debris field has been discovered much less the "black boxes". (April 2nd, 2011).
Debris Field found. Learmount of Flight International being quoted on theory of crew fatigue induced fixation on minor problem while plane was in an unnoticed gentle descent resulting in a collision of an intact and controllable plane with the sea. He does not believe there was any deep stall. Merely pilots having lost so many instruments that they did not believe what few instruments remained.
I'm uncertain if the plane deviated for severe weather or not. I think the primary problem was overspeed resulting in a deep stall at high altitude resulting in a near vertical descent with little forward speed. It would be a problem of how to evaluate fluctuating data from multiple sensors.
The flight into a severe thunderstorm may well have taken place although the pilots may have believed they were above the storm. In most stalls the rule is simple: lower the nose immediately and add power immediately. This simple rule usually results in greater air flow over the wings to generate lift. Wings are usually designed to stall from the inboard area first so that the pilot has time to react before the stall reaches the outboard areas of the wing and the control surfaces become stalled. In a deep stall, moving the control surfaces has no effect because there is no airflow over the control surfaces. Adding power may be a problem if there was a sudden and unexpected ingestion of super-cooled rainwater into the engines. If it was not just pitot tube icing but an engine flame-out, no power may have been available to the pilots even if in their information overload state of mind they realized they desperately needed to add power.
Analysis of the flight from the ACARS maintenance data transmissions is not ideal. The information is designed to give maintenance crews an indication of what systems will need to be tested when the plane lands and what tools and parts should be on hand for the task. Such maintenance data is not an alternative to a Flight Data Recorder. There are also problems since the ACARS messages are held in a one minute suspense window and are grouped by item and priority. Certain message evaluation rules are clearly compromises. A fault detected by a system is considered more serious if it relates to a separate system than if it is a self-detected internal fault. A fault is deemed to be hard if it persists for thirty seconds whereas a fault is deemed soft if it is detected for less than thirty seconds. Such rules do make sense in most circumstances.
The loss of satellite uplink carrier signal during a critical time is one argument against replacing physical black boxes with constant electronic transmission of the FDR and CVR data. The cost of such transmissions is a major problem also.
I'm sure it will be an interesting program and I look forward to viewing it. I hope all my many readers (LOL) will enjoy it.
By the way, the most relevant incident to compare AF447 with is the Gimli Glider incident. That plane ran out of fuel half way through its flight and all the design errors, pilot errors and ATC errors were countered by one thing alone, pilot expertise. The pilot had a hobby of flying gliders, so when he suddenly found himself flying a huge ungainly glider full of passengers, he still knew what to do and how to do it. He had flown gliders before. He knew to make his S turns toward his objective and not lose sight of it. He knew how to do skids. He was flying the airplane rather than monitoring computers but everything turned out okay because he was used to actually flying the airplane rather than monitoring computers. That is a rare skill nowadays.
With AF447 when things turned so bad that the computer entered Alternate Law mode the computer would no longer override disapproved pilot inputs and would allow the pilots to fly the aircraft as they saw fit. Unfortunately, the pilots were not very experienced at actually flying the aircraft and were not able to do it in situations of high informational overload, high insecurity as to the reliability of their instruments and unusual attitudes. When Fly-By-Wire ended and Alternate Law started, the situation was already critical and the pilots desperately needed a learning curve. Unfortunately, there is no learning curve during such an event. If you've entered even the fringes of a supercell at night and are experiencing electrical overloads, have circuit breakers popping all over the place, are losing some instruments and have utterly lost faith in all your instruments, the situation is hopeless for a pilot who really doesn't know how to fly an airplane without a computer.
Every flight using a computer to change altitude saves on fuel costs over a heavy handed pilot trying to manipulate the throttles, but every such flight deprives the pilot of real flying experience. Just as the Gimli Glider incident involved a sudden transition the AF447 undoubtedly involved a sudden transition even though we don't know the cause. Initial lightning seems insufficient. Iced-up pitot sensors can have any number of causes. Auto Pilot and Auto Thrust are different systems and some confusion may have existed as to speed selection and the rapidity of speed adjustment attempts that were required.
If there was a deep stall, I just wonder what attitude is required for it. Note: A Deep Stall is one wherein no manipulation of power or control surfaces will have sufficient effect. A pilot in the deep stalled plane is as utterly helpless as a pilot on the ground who might be observing the incident. The pilot on the ground will push a non existent throttle lever, the pilot in the plane will push an actual throttle lever however the effect will be the same. A pilot on the ground will push an imaginary steering yoke, a pilot in the plane will push a real steering yoke yet the results will be the same. No effect whatsoever. A deep stall with or without a flat spin would mean a high speed vertical descent with little forward momentum.
NOTE: On Feb 28 2011, the Alucia arrived, fresh from a Seattle overhaul, at the Pacific waiting area for transiting the Panama Canal to begin its three phase search for the Black Boxes using remote controlled submersibles.
NOTE: This Phase 4 search continues. IF there is a Phase 5, Recovery Phase, a different ship and different equipment will be used. So far, no debris field has been discovered much less the "black boxes". (April 2nd, 2011).
Debris Field found. Learmount of Flight International being quoted on theory of crew fatigue induced fixation on minor problem while plane was in an unnoticed gentle descent resulting in a collision of an intact and controllable plane with the sea. He does not believe there was any deep stall. Merely pilots having lost so many instruments that they did not believe what few instruments remained.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
The More Things Change ...
A Chinese civil servant returned to work recently thus ending his eight years of receiving a salary but never showing up. Although there is much commentary in China about this let us not forget that the outrage is mainly fueled by envy. The Chinese civil service has been rife with corruption throughout all of recorded history. The great ambition to be a civil servant in China is and always has been founded on a desire to feed at the trough of entrenched corruption. The French are famous for the saying "The more things change, the more they stay the same" but the Chinese are famous for being one of the best examples of that.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Exculpatory evidence? Non-Evidence?
In a motion that is sure to fail, the public defender is seeking dismissal of the murder indictment against security guard, Packer, in the murder of Brock and Davina Husted of the Farina Beach gated community near Santa Barbara.
I have every confidence in this being a spur-of-the-moment burglary committed by Packer while he was alone and unaided. However, an unknown fingerprint was found on the helmet visor left at the scene of the crime.
I do not consider this to be exculpatory evidence since it could easily be some salesman's fingerprint from years before. It does not even suggest the presence of an accomplice in the burglary or murders.
However, I would not consider it to be "Non-Evidence" as the prosecutor alleges. I'm sure the house has fingerprints in it that are not identified. I do think it should have been disclosed and disclosed far more promptly.
NOTE: As expected, security guard Packer will go to trial on April Fool's Day.
Packer's attorney requested the charges be dropped, alleging prosecutorial misconduct in withholding a crime scene fingerprint was lifted from a motorcycle helmet. The print did not match Packer or the victims.
I have every confidence in this being a spur-of-the-moment burglary committed by Packer while he was alone and unaided. However, an unknown fingerprint was found on the helmet visor left at the scene of the crime.
I do not consider this to be exculpatory evidence since it could easily be some salesman's fingerprint from years before. It does not even suggest the presence of an accomplice in the burglary or murders.
However, I would not consider it to be "Non-Evidence" as the prosecutor alleges. I'm sure the house has fingerprints in it that are not identified. I do think it should have been disclosed and disclosed far more promptly.
NOTE: As expected, security guard Packer will go to trial on April Fool's Day.
Packer's attorney requested the charges be dropped, alleging prosecutorial misconduct in withholding a crime scene fingerprint was lifted from a motorcycle helmet. The print did not match Packer or the victims.
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