Letters
I have followed with keen interest your coverage of events leading to and the trial of Andrew Serrano for his attacks on Lesa Koloff, her fiancé Willy Turner and friends. Lesa is my niece.
It is difficult to fully express my consternation and outrage at the jury finding of “not guilty by reason of insanity” following their verdict of guilt to most of the charges against him.
Without reportage of specifics of the sanity phase of the trial or a polling of the jurors there is no way to understand the jurors’ reasoning behind their verdict found after only two hours’ deliberation.
Could they have simply figured there were two testifiers for insanity and just one for sanity?
It seems that both the defendant attorney and the prosecutor were somewhat surprised at the outcome – was the district attorney blindsided and tepid in his presentation of sanity arguments?
Some things are clear. The victims and their families, far from finding closure in justice served, must try to move forward with burden of fear and apprehension of further danger and savagery.
I should think other Lake County citizens might likewise be concerned.
Rodger D. Elliott lives in Bellingham, Wash.
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- Written by: Rodger D. Elliott
I have some thoughts for Lake County's marijuana growers.
Nearly all of us live our lives based on trust.
We trust that money we put in the bank today will be there for us tomorrow.
We trust that the pound of hamburger meat we buy is 16 ounces, not less.
We trust that a car behind us won't slam into us at a light. We trust that we get back the right change at stores.
We trust ... well, you get the idea, and we rarely give any of it a second thought.
Because of our compassion for those of you in pain, we agreed to protect you from criminal prosecution for growing a few marijuana plants to ease your suffering.
We trusted you to act sensibly. We trusted you to act in the spirit of the agreement you led us to believe you would honor.
Your response was to take advantage of us far beyond any reasonable expectation.
You saw our compassion for you as open season on us.
You violate our trust with impunity, you put the safety of our children at risk, you drive down property values, you make a mockery of county government, you depress the economy by making visitors and vacationers think twice about coming here, you're a reason businesses don't locate here.
In sum, what you do threatens the peace and safety of us all.
And now you expect us to believe that even more of what you do is good for Lake County.
You want us to believe that a drug-based economy – one with more marijuana in more yards in more neighborhoods – is the “sensible” solution. And you tell us that you'll do it responsibly.
After all you put us through – including your superbly misleading petition drive to “support children's hospitals” – you tell us to trust you.
We don't want your marijuana grows next door or 10 doors away, we don't want them next to our churches, we don't want them next to our children's playgrounds and nursery schools.
We remain unalterably opposed to your marijuana grows in any of our residential neighborhoods. We trusted you once with that, and then you played us!
That's why so many of us are voting no on measures P and O in November!
Visit www.SaveMeasureN.info for details.
Tom Guthrie lives in Lakeport, Calif.
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- Written by: Tom Guthrie
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