In I Saw The Devil's Face, I talk about the heartbreaking case of Lavail Calhoun, whose case was allowed to fail at the grand jury level.  Therefore her alleged attacker, Dondi Craig, will always remain officially innocent until proven guilty of the crimes against her.  Craig then went on to abduct, sexually torture, and murder two small girls as I discuss in the book.

Now we have another example of a similar situation.  A woman named Alicia Franklin has filed a lawsuit against the City of Memphis, because she says they failed to follow up on her complaints about a man she called Cleo attacking her back in 2021.  The same man now stands accused of abducting and murdering jogger Eliza Fletcher.

From the above link:

"Alicia Franklin sued the city of Memphis on Tuesday, accusing the Memphis Police Department of failing to follow up on leads in her case even though she completed a rape kit and provided the first name, phone number, social media information, and a description of the car driven by Cleotha Abston. Abston is accused of abducting Fletcher, a teacher, while she was on her morning run and killing her on Sept. 2."

It's exhausting to me, how it's always the same old thing.  The police just can't bring themselves to take it seriously when we complain about rape.  Then somebody gets murdered.  I'm fatigued with the apathy about the damage done to women's lives.  It didn't bother the city, whatever was done to Alicia Franklin's life last year when she reported it.  I'm tired of how obvious it is.

"Franklin is now seeking damages for the lack of justice in her own case as well as to bring to light how police failed other women by failing to arrest Abston sooner.

“I definitely believe she would still be alive today,” Franklin told Good Morning America on Wednesday."

I'm glad she's doing that.  I think that's really the only way you get America's attention, is by suing them and getting paid.  That's the only way anything changes.  I'm proud of her.

There's so much wrong with this story.  Let me just start here:

"Police charged [Todd] Walls with first- and third-degree rape, sodomy and unlawful transaction with a minor, according to the original arrest citation. The case was pleaded down to a single count of sexual misconduct. Walls was sentenced to 12-months probation and a $65 fine. "

This was regarding a 15-year-old girl that he met while on duty as a Louisville police officer.  So even though he was quite guilty of raping a teenager -- while a sworn law enforcement officer -- all he got was probation and a lower fine than you get for parking on the sidewalk in my town.  Granted this was all the way back in 1996.

So why are they firing him now, when his employer hasn't cared about it in all these intervening years?  Well, the state has forced their hand.

"Kentucky House Bill 206, signed into law earlier this year, was aimed to keep officers off the force that have been convicted of sex crimes. The law requires KLEC to decertify officers who have been convicted of misdemeanor sex crimes."  That led to Walls' law-enforcement certification finally being revoked, much to his boss' dismay.  I'm a little dismayed about "misdemeanor sex crimes," and actually all of this.

The above-linked article clarifies the finer points of expungement, including that it doesn't mean that legally "it never happened." It also clarifies that this case wasn't eligible for expungement for two reasons:  1. It's a sex offense, and 2. It involved a minor.  Expungement simply means the conviction -- this officer was convicted as I will clarify below -- is wiped off your record.  As the linked article states, "It is not clear why a judge said this case could be expunged."  I would suggest corruption and rape culture as two possible reasons.

But wait, isn't it all just he-said, she said?  Maybe the girl is lying.  Maybe she said she was 18.  You can't ruin a good man's life with false accusations.

"WDRB obtained a copy of the Crimes Against Children Unit report from a source and last month reported details of the 1996 case that included phone calls between Walls and the girl. "Was I good in bed for a 15-year-old?" the girl asked, according to a transcript of the phone call obtained by WDRB. "Heck Yeah," Walls responded."

Okay, so he did it, and he knew, and he DGAF. He pled guilty, got a wrist slap.  Then his record got expunged, and he got hired on as a deputy somewhere else.  So did his new employer, the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department, not know they were hiring a scumbag?

Jefferson County, You're Doomed

Citizens of Jefferson County, Kentucky, your sheriff had to be forced to remove this POS from its department.  It took a  firm arm-twist by the state, or they weren't going to do a damned thing to keep him away from your daughter.  They know exactly who he is.

"Col. Carl Yates, a sheriff's department spokesman, previously told WDRB that the office was aware of the sex crime conviction and had lawyers look into it.

"We asked legal counsel, and we were we were told that it means it never happened," Yates said. "When records are expunged it means it never happened."

Col. Carl Yates Is Not Worried About Your 15-Year-Old Daughter Getting Raped By A Deputy, Because Lawyers Told Him It Would Be Fine

"WDRB located the now-adult woman as part of efforts to authenticate the Crimes Against Children Unit file. She has never spoken publicly about the sexual encounters with Walls. WDRB is not identifying the woman, as she is a survivor of a sex crime. [Emphasis added]

She's the one who needs to hide it, not him.  Why is that?  Why does she end up hiding a dark secret on society's margin, while it takes 26 years to get him in actual trouble?

"I feel like my silence has allowed (Walls) to feel entitled to keep a position in law enforcement," she said in a recent interview. "I want to make the record very clear: He raped me. He took advantage of me. He committed a crime against a child."

People are paying the salaries of these decision-makers on their behalf.

Some middle-school boys in Rhode Island thought their teacher was a creep.   He would make up flirtatious nicknames for the girls, demand that they get up and dance for him in class, say that tomorrow would be swimsuit day.

The teacher was known to also be rude to the boys at times.  The kids had complained about the way their teacher creeped on the girls.  And just like back in my day, there was nothing to be done about it.  The teacher told them so himself.  He had tenure.  He had withstood years of parental complaints.  When the boys complained, they were ignored.

But these wonderful young men were uncomfortable with what they saw.  So in this internet age they decided to take action.  They understand how the world works now.  They began crowdsourcing, and documenting his behavior.

"During COVID, as they attended class online, they’d open the Discord channel on a split-screen and document the teacher’s comments in real time:
“You all love me so choose love.”
“You gotta stand up and dance now.”
Everyone “in bathing suits tomorrow.”
Once they were back in class in person, the boys jotted down notes to add to the channel later: Flirting with one girl. Teasing another. Calling the girls “sweetheart” and “sunshine.” Asking one girl to take off her shoes and try wiggling her toes without moving her pinkies.
“I felt bad for [the girls] because sometimes it just seems like it was a humiliating thing,” the boy told the Globe. “He’d play a song and he’d make one of them get up and dance.”

When one girl filed a restraining order against the teacher, he was finally placed on leave.  There is currently a criminal investigation into him and another employee, a coach who performed naked "fat tests" on several teens in his basement.

I'm so very proud of these boys who took the initiative to protect their classmates.  I'm glad that I lived long enough to see the world change in this way.