“Murder does not come often to Chapel Hill” sums up what I’ve heard frequently today in the wake of Eve Carson’s tragic death.
The Mayor said it. WCHL’s Ron Stutts and Natasha Vukelic repeated the sentiment on my drive home. Chief Curran, at the 5:30 CHPD, said it was one reason Eve Carson remained unidentified for some time.
Murder, at least for now, does appear to come infrequently to Chapel Hill but it does come, and more often than our media and elected leadership admit. I’ve lived here for nearly two decades – been around Chapel Hill for nearly three – and no matter how much I want our community to be and to be seen as safe and secure, our brushes with serious crime are coming more frequently and often more violently.
In the last few weeks, two domestic disputes, one in Northside and one at Carrboro’s Carrboro Plaza ended in the murder of two of our local citizens.
Not to diminish the Carson’s terrible loss, but where was our community’s outrage, sorrow, grief and calls-to-action for the deaths of 51 year-old Marshall Ralph Brown (shot in the back by stepson 27-year-old William Albert Stroud) or 59 year-old James Imonti ( by his 65 year-old father-in-law)?
Was it because Eve Carson’s death was apparently random, not as mundane as long simmering family disputes? Was her death any more random or less tragic than those of the 2005’s murder of the Sapikowski’s, blasted by their son over an argument about his grades and a girlfriend? Brutal, terrible but so was that of 2006’s Kedrain Swann’s at the ill-fated Avalon night club.
Was it that she was young, accomplished and so full of promise and these folks seem to have made less of splash in our local community?
“Murder does not come often to Chapel Hill” comes from Sylvia Colwell’s analysis of the troubling media coverage of another Chapel Hill murder of young woman of great promise.
July 15, 1993, roughly 6am, Kristin Lodge-Miller, 26, a speech therapist with a promising future was gunned down on Estes by 18 year-old Anthony Georg Simpson. Simpson pumped 5 bullets into Kristin, the final a head shot as she lay dying on the side of Estes [B on MAP]. He didn’t care that morning commuters saw his callous act.
Random, brutal, senseless.
This happened a short distance from where my wife and I lived. The murder, the ensuing media circus and the trial stirred ire within our community. There were calls to regulate or ban handguns.
What lessons were to be learned?
In the years since, folks, as is natural, have forgotten Kristin. The informal memorial of flowers and mementos decorating the shoulder of Estes was removed. The remnants washed away. Her friends and few others seem to remember or care about that Chapel Hill murder anymore.
I still remember though.
Is there anything to learn from Eve’s death? Chancellor Moeser’s kind comments this afternoon [MP3] made clear there was plenty to learn from Eve’s devotion to the “Carolina Way”. But what of her death?
I know one lesson to take away from today’s commentary. Chapel Hill is changing.
Random acts of violence and simmering domestic disputes that chaotically flare into fatal confrontations are nearly impossible to prevent but complacency does a disservice to our community. As the story of Ms. Carson’s death unrolls, I hope what the world will see a realistic Chapel Hill.
Maintaining the pretense, especially in the face of so many near misses these last few years, is also disservice to folks like Eve, James, Marshall, Kedrain, Kristin.
Will, glad to see that you found your keyboard again!
Until we get more info, we don’t really know that this was a random acts of violence. The cases that we have experienced here usually involve parties that know each other.
The sad thing about this case and others like it is that while we wait for details, the spectulation seems to make things even more painful.
Quite true Fred. When I heard that the car was found on North St. I wondered if there would be some kind of connection between Carson and her killer.
The point is that murders that make residents feel insecure about their own safety don’t happen frequently in Chapel Hill. Murders that are the result of domestic violence rarely draw the death penalty – and they shouldn’t. They don’t threaten the public – I remain safe simply by avoiding any interaction with people who carry guns, who have violent tempers, who drink too much, who abuse their wives or children and by avoiding the places such people gather (generally, seedy bars and/or those with pool tables). What makes me feel insecure about the safety of my family and me are random acts of violence, which I can’t control.
This is a great point:
“Not to diminish the Carson’s terrible loss, but where was our community’s outrage, sorrow, grief and calls-to-action for the deaths of 51 year-old Marshall Ralph Brown (shot in the back by stepson 27-year-old William Albert Stroud) or 59 year-old James Imonti ( by his 65 year-old father-in-law)?”
I also remember a few years ago, a woman was shot by her husband in one of the UNC commuter parking lots. I think all of these murders are tragic, regardless of the person’s education, social standing, race, etc. While Carson’s death is tragic, all of these murders are equally tragic to someone.
I just want to say that I mourn for Eve Carson and her family. I know what her family is feeling. I can vouch for what YankeeInNc said that all murders are tragic to someone.
My sister Keara Hart was murdered in Chapel Hill in 2006. She was killed by her boyfriend. I disagree with Alumni who says that Murder that is the result of domestic violence should not carry the death penalty. Murder is murder and until you have experienced the loss of a loved one in this way you have no idea the impact it has. Why should these murderers be treated any different from someone who commits a random act of violence? In some ways, it is even worse because they are killing a person who they profess to love and who loves them. What kind of person can do that? I also disagree that people who commit domestic violence are not a threat to the public. The person that murdered my sister had a long criminal record which included violent crimes not limited to domestic ones.
I also thought I was safe by avoiding the types of situations and places mentioned, but when this person murdered my sister, he also killed part of me, her children , my mother, other sister, brother and numerous other friends and family.
I just want to say that I mourn for Eve Carson and her family. I know what her family is feeling. I can vouch for what YankeeInNc said that all murders are tragic to someone.
My sister Keara Hart was murdered in Chapel Hill in 2006. She was killed by her boyfriend. I disagree with Alumni who says that Murder that is the result of domestic violence should not carry the death penalty. Murder is murder and until you have experienced the loss of a loved one in this way you have no idea the impact it has. Why should these murderers be treated any different from someone who commits a random act of violence? In some ways, it is even worse because they are killing a person who they profess to love and who loves them. What kind of person can do that? I also disagree that people who commit domestic violence are not a threat to the public. The person that murdered my sister had a long criminal record which included violent crimes not limited to domestic ones.
I also thought I was safe by avoiding the types of situations and places mentioned, but when this person murdered my sister, he also killed part of me, her children , my mother, other sister, brother and numerous other friends and family.
I just want to say that I mourn for Eve Carson and her family. I know what her family is feeling. I can vouch for what YankeeInNc said that all murders are tragic to someone.
My sister Keara Hart was murdered in Chapel Hill in 2006. She was killed by her boyfriend. I disagree with Alumni who says that Murder that is the result of domestic violence should not carry the death penalty. Murder is murder and until you have experienced the loss of a loved one in this way you have no idea the impact it has. Why should these murderers be treated any different from someone who commits a random act of violence? In some ways, it is even worse because they are killing a person who they profess to love and who loves them. What kind of person can do that? I also disagree that people who commit domestic violence are not a threat to the public. The person that murdered my sister had a long criminal record which included violent crimes not limited to domestic ones.
I also thought I was safe by avoiding the types of situations and places mentioned, but when this person murdered my sister, he also killed part of me, her children , my mother, other sister, brother and numerous other friends and family.
The murder was Ms. Hart was certainly a tragedy for her family and friends, and while she clearly did not in any way deserve to be murdered by her boyfriend, the unfortunate truth is that the security of the public in general is not threatened by someone who focuses their anger solely on members of their own household. That does not in any way mean that abusers should not be punished to the full extent of the law – they should be. And it is important that we provide safe places for abused families to go. But combatting domestic violence is more about figuring out why a person chooses to be in the company of an abusive person; that is a much more complicated question that needs to be answered before domestic abuse can be stopped. But random violence remains the greatest threat to society in general and to my family.
The Houston Astros hat that Eve Carson’s killer was wearing does have a gang affiliation. The “H†logo pays homage to Larry Hoover who was in various incarnations of the Black Gangster Disciples, which he founded. Throughout the 60’s Hoover created alliances and “nations†of gangs in the Chicago area. Lemaricus Davidson, the lead “accused” black slayer of Channon Christian and Chris Newsome was also a BGD– and we know what THAT means–the murder of Eve Carson could not POSSIBLY have been racially motivated–lol.
VIDEO ABOUT Eve Carson-
http://podblanc.com/?q=node/14742
VIDEO about her white-ribboned “memorial”-
http://podblanc.com/?q=node/14842
VIDEO-BLACK GANG DISCIPLES-
http://podblanc.com/index.php?q=node/1769
MORE EVE CARSON VIDEOS-
http://podblanc.com/index.php?q=node/14654
To be quite honest, what shook me about Eve’s death that didn’t about other recent murders was that I knew Eve personally. I imagine there is a bit of what you speak of in why we as a community reacted to Eve’s death and not the others, but I also wouldn’t downplay the importance of the fact that she really did have personal relationships with hundreds if not thousands of people in this community. Any murder is tragic. I hope we as a town/university/state/… focus our anger and confusion and sadness towards making positive strides to protect others in the future rather than only dwelling in the past for a while before moving on with more of the same.
Jason, I had two brief conversations with Eve last Fall but that was enough to know she was quite a special person – full of energy with a direction to forge. The outpouring from UNC and local folks is incredible – recognizing not only what Eve accomplished but mourning what amazing potential was lost.
As you know, I’ve pushed for various safeguards – including the off-campus call boxes that Eve supported – for some time. Four years ago I said we needed to improve our gang intel and prepare (something we’re doing a bit better though, considering the Avalon, Apple Chill and Visions events – not enough).
Alumni, the more this story unfolds the more I’m convinced it isn’t “random” – but not in the sense that Eve was a particular target. I don’t want “random” to end up meaning we can’t do a better job of securing our neighborhoods.
From my read of the events, someone involved either knows Chapel Hill fairly well or their behaviour is highly coincidental.
I haven’t seen any confirmation on where Eve was picked up but if she was abducted from her Friendly home – which is fairly centrally located and adjacent to some dense development – the perpetrators were either fairly knowledgeable of her situation – roommates gone, access routes, etc. or strangely lucky.
Parking her car close to her home indicates to me that they either lived somewhere nearby, knew someone with transport nearby or had another vehicle nearby (though why they would tool around in her car if they already had one doesn’t make sense).
I’m pretty sure I know which ATM and which store has been identified by the CHPD – both of which are fairly central to the whole nexus of the crime.
And finally, killing and dumping her at Hillcrest, which is a “easy on and off” from Franklin St. My wife rents a small garage studio in that area – given the location I’d say it indicates some knowledge of town. It might even indicate some knowledge and use of the back way out of Roosevelt to University Mall.
Again, this might just be a series of coincidental choices made by out-of-towners but, to me, it just doesn’t have that feel.
Lauren, I remember Ms. Harts murder. It seems like after some early trouble she was on the right track – a terrible tragedy. As you might know, I pushed for doubling our town’s human service grants program which, this year will be funded at about half the cost as the fancy fountain for the Lot #5 project (priorities?) in order to better maintain and expand our domestic violence reduction efforts. More on Keara here (WRAL) and at the N&O
and a memorial site Memories of Keara Lynne Hart.
Mr. Cobb, you pose a difficult problem for me.
On checking out the site you link to, podblanc, I discovered it is some kind of freakish white power/white supremacy outlet.
On doing a bit of ‘googling’ I found out you’re the neo-Nazi that posted Federal Judge Lefkow’s address. Turns out your bile is well-documented.
It’s disgusting that Eve’s death is just so much fodder for your kind of hateful crap.
The twisting of this story to meet some kind of hate agenda is disgusting. Publishing Eve’s story under the headline “The racial murder and rape of White women in America” is reprehensible.
So what to do with your comment? Ignore it? Delete it? Prepare for chicanery with my site no matter what I do?
I’m going to leave your solitary comment up to remind folks that we still have a long way to go in our country and to underline why the loss of someone like Eve Carson, who sought to better our world, is even more tragic.
It’s not like my ‘blog attracts a lot of legitimate comments. Other than male enhancement and lonely women SPAMs I’ve never had to edit or delete a comment from a “real” reader based on content.
Today that changes as someone from the podblanc site continued with their racist spew:
Eve Carson appears to have been killed by one or more young males – one, at least, that is black. To use this tragedy to further your hateful and ignorant agenda is quite despicable.
While I’m struggling with the decision to excise your and Cobb’s comments since they’re quite demonstrative of how far we’ve yet to go improving our country, I have no problem excising any further racist commentary as it’s offensive and off-topic.
2006’s FBI murder statistics demonstrate that while African-Americans makeup roughly %12.5 of the US 2007 population, they account for %50 of murder victims ( 7421 of 14,990 in 2006).
and, to further highlight how the facts don’t support your spew, that those white women you seem to worry so much about are 6 times more likely to be killed by white males than African-Americans. African-American males do account for the majority of murders against African-Americans.
After looking at your site I pretty much can tell that these statistics aren’t important and that your only interest in Eve is in twisting her death to your nasty ends.
Take your vile agenda elsewhere.
Will, you are very emotional, almost like a woman. You also repeat all the code words – “vile agenda”, “nasty ends”. Just like a parrot. My favorite, of course, is “ignorant”, although a tad too old. Time to plug in to kike central and download the pre-approved tags.
Now, about who is twisting statistics: why did you leave out the number of crimes blacks *commit*? This is the important number, not the number of black victims. They kill each-other all the time. And who cares? About the only relevant info you posted is the 12%.
You should be thankful for our putting your two-bit blog in the sunlight anyway. You see, PC orthodoxy is getting stale – and yours is staler than most, lacking even a trace of originality.
I took time from my schedule to try appealing to the sense of honor of someone I perceived to be a White man. After I saw your mugshot and those lovely curls though, I just have to ask.
Will, are you jewish? What’s *your” agenda? Ta ta.
WillR, you are a coward and a liar. Look at the 2006 DOJ stats on rape and you will find that almost 40,000 White women a year are raped by blacks and ZERO (10 or less) Black females are raped by White Men.
Go ahead and call me a hater but you are a coward who hasn’t the nerve to face reality.
Tell us, WillR, do you live in an area that is majority black or majority White? Would you allow your daughter to marry a black man? Do you hate your grandparents because they were racist and evil? Are you man enough to think for yourself or does your love of [DELETED] (go ahead and change that word to “DELETED” since you are such a coward) cloud your ability to think?
——-
From WillR: This isn’t getting us anywhere. Before I shut down this thread, a few facts about sexual assault in our country – none of which support your contention.
In 2006, there were 92,455 forcible reported rapes. In 2007, while %80 of reported rape victims were white there’s no statistic that supports your claim.
African-American women have a lifetime rate of rape/attempted rape about %1 higher than white women (%18.8 vs. %17.7). Roughly %76 of reported rapes are by perpetrators known to the victim. While what statistics are available are skewed due the under-reporting of sexual assault, the bulk of rapes appear to happen within ones local community and socio-economic status. A fairly comprehensive study done in the mid-’90’s demonstrated that the vast majority of assaults occur between people of similar racial makeup.
It’s beyond repugnant that you want to trundle out this rape myth as bait in inciting further invective.
If you knew anything about my Southern community or my readership you would know that your kind of crap will fertilize nothing, take your manure and spread it elsewhere….