Yesterday it was announced that pretty Debra LaFave had won her recent court battle, and all charges (in Marion County) had been dropped. As many of you know, I discussed her case in an earlier post, so I won't go over the details now.This is wonderful news for good ole Deb. Just look at that happy, relieved smile on her face! You might think she had just won an Olympic Gold Medal, if you didn't know any better. Oh! she added in afterthought, she did regret her previous actions. Just as if she was a Gold Medalist who'd been in the paper for partying too much. Looks bad, you know: Throw a sop to the puritans and admit it.
But Deb had a willing ally in her fight against justice which helped greatly: the victim's mother. Mom didn't want the publicity and so she fought against the court system, tooth and nail. Thanks to Mom, Deb won. Of course there were a couple other factors, as well. Deb is undeniably pretty, which made it hard for the public to take her role as a molestor seriously. Even the victim's mother expressed her surprise as to how pretty she was, and admits that she then immediately felt sorry for her.
Isn't it interesting how beauty can overcome so much resistance? As some of you know, I occasionally still model (my last gig was for a clothing company a year ago). I will admit that beauty sometimes unfairly opens doors. But my internal beliefs always demand that I still treat people honestly and ethically, no matter what.
Interestingly, studies show that beautiful people are usually viewed as more honest, reliable, and trustworthy. Of course most beautiful people take advantage of that, and use that mistaken belief to exploit situations (as Deb did, here). In my own personal experience, there are very, very few beautiful people who are of any value whatsoever. Most of them never had to develop any ethics, intelligence, or noteworthy skills, and so they didn't. Deb is no exception.
Happily, Deb still has to serve out her 3 years of house arrest (her charge was "Lewd and Lascivious Battery"), she remains a registered sex offender, and she can't profit from her crime for 7 years. But heck! It sure beats 20 years in the slammer, doesn't it?
So what can Deb teach the Modern Molestor?
1. Make sure you're pretty. If necessary, get plastic surgery. Try to get some sexy photos of yourself on a motorcycle.
2. Pick victims with parents who will dread the publicity. With any luck, you can get them on your side if you're ever caught.
3. It helps to be female, molesting a male child. So if you're a female molestor, you should be encouraged. That's when radio and TV talk show hosts start drooling all over themselves and talking about their adolescent fantasies (which they haven't outgrown yet). This will help sway public opinion immediately. Of course, see #1.
4. Pick a teenager so that it looks more like it might have been a blooming relationship instead of statutory rape. And make sure you've covered #2.
5. Talk about any mental illness you have, even if it isn't at all related to what you did. It helps if you can generate sympathy. Deb is bi-polar! So what if most bi-polar victims aren't child molesters? That doesn't matter! Just milk it for what it's worth and hope no one asks any real questions about your claim.
6. Be young, so that everyone (including the victim's parents) talks about youth, inexperience, and mistakes. If you're an old geezer, this won't make a good defense. But if you've covered the first 5 tips, you still may have a fighting chance.
33 comments:
As previously mentioned, the OH is a teacher. It is a struggle for todays teachers to make sure there is no opportunity for any student/teacher relationship to be misconstrued. This includes having NO private conversations with some students or even making certain some meetings recorded.
It is sad that teaching has devolved to this level of paranoia because of molesters like Deb. It is worse the parents let her get away with it.
isn't that disgusting. the mother shouldn't be allowed to have a say so. throw the book at her. we have to be able to trust teachers....what is the deal with this? It's almost a rite of passage to have an affair with a teacher nowadays.....I don't care how pretty you are...when you are scum you are scum.
I never could understand her. She is pretty enough to be able to elicite sex from just about any man who walked by and she chose a 14 year old boy.
With all the others in the news over the last several years, is it a growing trend or are they just now being caught?
Somehow I knew you were going to do a post about this, after I saw it on the news this morning.
What really galls me it that she used the guise of her *bi-polar* (choke, choke) disorder as an excuse for her indescretions. BS!
I don't believe it for a moment... it was a convenient excuse only.
She didn't just molest one boy, but two in two different counties, and her "disorder" is only that she can't decide if she wanted to be a teacher or a sex-kitten.
Losing her teaching status, and not being able to profit from a book deal is only a small price she has to pay. I wouldn't be surprised if she gets a call from Hefner to pose nude in Playboy... after all, it's the thing to do when your name gets splashed across the news and internet for being a *pretty* idiot. Look at Jessica Hahn and Darva Condor... and I rest my case.
THe whole thing is just disgusting. There is a real double standard here that is entirely unacceptable.
sickening.
KristieD, yes!
TSB, exactly!
Ellen, you're right. Of course, everyone's assuming she'll pose for Playboy. I don't see why she wouldn't, she's already shown us she has no shame or morality. And there's no telling how much psychological damage she's done not only to the boy but also to his friend who drove them around in a van while she was molesting his friend.
Ed, it's not your fault, but you've unwittingly fallen into a similar trap: it's not that she could have any man she wanted, it's that she chose to molest a child, instead. It wasn't that she couldn't find someone else; it's that she's sick. Now, it's true that we can think, rationally, WTF? But she's your typical molester, wrapped in a pretty package.
SRG, You're right. Scum is scum is scum.
Mallory, yes, I have a professor in my family, who never meets with students behind closed doors. You have to be careful.
It's a mess. My second husband had an affair with his mother's best friend when he was a teen. She took advantage of him in every way possible and would set him up for jealous rages, call him to come in the middle of the night, etc, just to watch him jump when she said to.
He was totally controlled by her and it took years to get free, because he "loved" her.
It's abuse of trust, if not abuse of the body, to misuse a teen of either sex.
Bi-Polar my ass! When you think it can't be more disgusting it does! Couey will be claiming some mental disease that caused him to torture, rape and bury alive little Jessica. Who gives a RATS ASS! She is a predator and so is he. If that were my son or grandson, I am afraid I would have to be restrained from seriously harming her. At the very least, wiping that smile off her face. Wow this has really struck a nerve with me!
Ok, I am leaving now to pull myself together.
I totally agree with everything you have posted. You know if she were ugly that the ending results (most likely) would have been different.
Did you like how she said she suffers from being Bi-polar and that was a factor in the whole thing!! Ugh, paaaaaleeeeeease!
The Bi-Polar Scam: Enough of you have pointed out this bogus excuse that I just added it. Thanks for mentioning it. Ridiculous, isn't it???
LeeAnn, 'zactly!
Kathleen, I know! If it were my son, publicity be damned!!!
Valerie, exactly! What a perfect illustration (although I'm sorry to hear of what he went through). Thank you for the contribution.
It is very true that she is getting away with something a man never would have.
But despite all that, and my logical science brain saying she should be held to the same laws (this is what I want).
I cant help thinking how I would have loved to be molested by her. Im not trying to be cute or anything!
Shweeew....when you said, "Deb", I thought you meant me....until I read the 'pretty part' ...hehe!
Ummm... Now honestly, yes this is a horrible thing.
However...
However...
I can't. help. but. think...
Why didn't this happen to me????????????????????????
Sorry. That's my imature idiotic other personality coming out.
I'll shut up now. But wow. She is hot.
BAD teacher...
Alex & Deb, kudos for your honesty! But the thing is... if it had happened to you in your formulative years, it might have shaped you into someone that you aren't now. And I'm not talking 'for the better', either. I know it's a fantasy that many people have. And yes, she's very pretty (and she knows it). But what she did could cause all kinds of conflict for him later on (as you probably know). And that's why all child molesters are dangerous to their victims.
sure does seem like a case where the kid should be protected from the stupidity of his parents.
Sad to say, I've known several girls who "threw" themselves at new, young male teachers.
3D, you're right. It does happen. Your comment reminded me of the song by The Police: Don't Stand So Close to Me.
The fact that she will serve no jail time is really a bad thing. It sends a message to other would-be molesters that they can get away with it. Your tips are right on the money.
Beauty is highly valued in our society. That's the way it is. I've noticed that people who think they are beautiful often talk about themselves a lot and focus on "me" and are usually shallow people. They are usually not as gorgeous as they think they are.
I agree with you that the truly "beautiful" rely on their beauty and rarely have inner beauty or develop life skills that are needed. When they get older, they can no longer rely on their beauty because it starts fading.
Debra is a very pretty lady, but sadly she is a mess, and the fact that she referred this whole thing as a "bump in the road" really made me shake my head in disgust. If I were that boy's mother, Debra would be heading to jail.
Well, no pretty (or ugly) teacher ever tried to seduce me, but I know that I -- like most teenage boys -- would probably have jumped at the opportunity and would certainly have regreted the experience later (if not sooner).
Jeffery Hodges
* * *
Chilling. It's disturbing to think she's not getting more. This will not help the situations of teachers everywhere, in a day and age where it is costumary to file suit at a whim.
Horace has a point though: I knew a lot of teenage boys back in the day who had crushes on young and pretty teachers. It doesn't excuse her since she shouldn't have indulged anyway. But let's keep in mind he may not be entirely innocent in this whole mess.
Oh Saur. You say it so well. Are those her lawyers behind her looking so smug that they won???? Yeah. They do good work..maybe they paid for her tanning and teeth whitening.
Maybe they are smiling because their kids go to a private school out of harms way. Makes me sick.
I hope the kid takes up a civil case when he turns 18.
In response to Mr. Fabulous....
she is not allowed to put out a book and make a porfit on it as part of her condition for not going to jail. Small solace for being scum, but at least they put that in place. Chances are she will still get that call from Hef though..... I don't doubt that for a second.
Just another sign of the incredible depravity of our society, when teachers can get away with crimes like this with just a slap on the hand. It's unconscionable and scary, really.
You're right, it didn't hurt a bit that she is pretty. Have we become so shallow, so plastic in our society that just because one has looks they are entitled to get away with rape?
Yes, I would say we have sunk that low. And what's more, there have been lots of instances where looks were not involved in the equation at all and the perpetrator still got away with rape.
The Genie is out of the bottle though, and I don't think it's going back in.
The folks who were instrumental in getting the charges dropped should have to face the possibility of this kind of thing happening to their own children. It could happen! And then it wouldn't matter HOW pretty she is.
Oh, sorry, now I remember the kid's mom... there is no limit to humans behaving like sheep.
Jeesh! I'm an old geezer, so I would never get away with it anyway, but I can't even IMAGINE going for a guy under, say, 30. They seem like little kids below that. They are!
Saur,
This is the kinda thing that makes me think twice about dating a hot married woman. This is just weird.
Well we do have to think about the issue of rape with men and women here...
In the mind of many, and even the law I suspect, rape is harder for a woman to commit. There is some logic to this: it is hard to have sex with a guy who doesnt want it (or to find that guy).
But like in Disclosure (good book), sexual harrasment can be about power. Not just physical rape, but also a person in power getting sex from a person not willing or able to say no.
Beaver, I have to strongly disagree. A child of 14 is not responsible. He is the victim. A teacher who holds the responsibility for protecting children and holds their trust preyed on him. His life will never be the same. His perception of women and sexuality have been changed forever.
I don't think she looks so pretty...she has crazy all over face in that picture!
She is crazy...
But you know for men there really is this attraction: if she is so sexually needy that she has to go for a child, she would be wild as a lover. I mean suddenly there is this woman with the sexual appetite of a young man. She is humping legs, molesting children...
That may not really be true hower. Who knows what her brain is doing.
I noticed her fiance's countenance never seemed to change even when she looked up at him in the news conference.
What an outrageous case. I would kill her with my own hands if she touched one of my sons! I would think there would be procedures in place to protect the boy so the case could proceed. The judge was obviously just as disgusted, but unfortunately his hands were tied.
What's up with her fiance? He must also be a little crazy to want to be in the "victory" picture with his child-molester girlfriend.
Imagine how much money she would make for playboy...
Saur,
I apologize in advance for this, but I feel I may have to clarify my earlier statement about the boy's involvement.
Kathleen,
You stated that "a child of 14 is not responsible. He is the victim."
I hate to correct you but some 14 year-olds have been convicted of crimes before. Though one may be irresponsible at 14, it's definitely old enough to know that having sex with your teacher is wrong. Did he say no? Did he try to leave? Please tell me (as you may not know, info sources are not readily available where I am).
Statutory rape, by the way, is about AGE, not about CONSENT. So her conviction is no indication of his involvement.
Though a teen is a minor, a teen is (as they underline it regularly themselves) not exactly a child anymore. Unless you tell me he was coherced into sex, I can't help but wonder... It's a biological fact that a man can't be PHYSICALLY raped. I do agree with the comments about control, and it may be what it was about. Then again, maybe she's just F**** up, and frankly, I don't really care.
Now, as I said before, I totally agree with your statement that as a teacher, What's-her-name should never have had sex with him. Heck, as an ADULT she should not have had sex with him. THE WHOLE THING IS SICK.
As a trained attorney, I need to add this: the small itsy-bitsy wonder I just shared has nothing to do with reasonnable doubt. If I'd been on the bench, I would have convicted her despite it. It is a social comment more then anything else.
Chocolate, cookies and peaceful thoughts,
Beav'
The photo clearly shows how hoodwinked some become when their 15 minutes of fame is knocking at the door. She no doubt prepared for the camera by ensuring that her makeup and dress were in top public-appearance order. One might think she took a tip or two from my beauty site. How is this a win for anybody? Instead of looking embarrassed or at least relieved, she seems to embrace with open arms all the attention. 15 minutes is almost up!
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