From the monthly archives: February 2011

Shawna Forde Sentenced to Death

By On February 23, 2011 · In Danse Macabre

In case you haven’t heard, Shawna Forde has been sentenced to death for the murders of Brisenia and Raul Junior Flores:

Ms. Thomas and fellow jurors were told during the trial that Ms. Forde and accomplices gained entry to the Flores home with the expectation of finding drugs there, which could be sold to finance Minutemen American Defense’s border-control operations. Finding no drugs, the intruders made away with inexpensive jewelry but, prosecutors said, not before fatally shooting young Brisenia and Mr. Flores. Both victims were American citizens born in the US.

“I see Shawna Forde as someone who would have liked to have been the face of a movement,” Thomas says.

Arriving at the death sentence was difficult, Thomas says, but it was aided by a picture of Brisenia presented during trial that was etched in her mind: “A little girl, with bright red fingernails; she’s wearing a white T-shirt and turquoise-colored pajama bottoms. She’s on a love seat. It’s a perfect, innocent picture until you realize that half of her face has been blown off.”

Read Terry Greene Sterling’s jailhouse interview with Forde (from last week) here:

I know in her mind,” Forde said of Gonzalez, “I am guilty and she hates me. I know her tragedy is extremely sad.” But on the other hand, she said “people shouldn’t deal drugs if they have kids.” (No drugs were found in the trailer.)

Forde told me she’d “lost a daughter” and she knows from experience Gonzalez will feel pain “the rest of her life” and her “tragedy is extremely sad.” “I wish I could say I was sorry it happened,” Forde said. “I am not sorry on my behalf because I didn’t do it.”

Monstrous. I don’t think anyone deserves the death penalty, but I am entirely unsurprised that the jury decided in favor of it.

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Shawna Forde: Guilty

By On February 14, 2011 · In Cremains

From the Arizona Daily Star:

A Pima County jury convicted Shawna Forde today of two counts of first-degree murder in the May 30, 2009 deaths of Arivaca residents Raul Junior Flores and his 9-year-old daughter, Brisenia.

The jury also convicted Forde of attempted first-degree murder in the shooting of Flores’ wife, Gina Gonzalez, as well as related aggravated assault and robbery counts.

Gonzlez started crying as soon as the first guilty verdict, the killing of her daughter, was read just before noon in a packed courtroom at Pima County Superior Court.

The jury deliberated for seven hours over two days. Jurors will now be asked if the death penalty ought to be considered.

Seven hour deliberation, with a verdict that took ten minutes to read. More info here.

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The strangest Facebook friend request thus far

By On February 14, 2011 · In Memento Mori, Vanitas

I was a Facebook “early adopter” inasmuch as I created a profile in late 2004 or early 2005 so that I could do recon on the undergrads I was supposed to be spotlighting in the marketing publications that I worked on at the time.* Back then, I could see pretty much anyone’s profile, provided they attended the university where I work. Mostly, I needed to make sure that none of their profile photos included gravity bongs** and that none of their personal information said anything to the effect of “HITLER WAS RIGHT” or “Embrace Jesus as your personal savior or suffer His wrath.” If they passed on both counts, they became a Maybe. If they had academic honors or a special scholarship, they became a Yes. And if they were “diverse” in addition to that, we basically dispatched a limo to go pick them up and bring them in for an interview. Because that’s how the world works.

My own profile was entirely blank, no photo, nothing. I would periodically get friend requests from old college friends, but I’d ignore them, because that’s not what I was there for. Now I’m on Facebook every day. I do not remain in contact with too many high school or college friends. (You needn’t wonder why.) I’ve blocked a lot of people. (Look: I’m not up to anything interesting. You’re not missing out, okay?)

Friday night, I came down with a 102° fever, lower GI nastiness, muscle aches, general malaise, etc. I lay on the couch, wrapped in the amazingly warm and strange blanket my in-laws gave us for Christmas, watching Tivo’d episodes of Tabatha’s Salon Takeover. (What.) At some point, I checked my email. Work stuff, sale at Rugs USA, and a Facebook Friend Request from my first unrequited high school crush.

I was momentarily startled, but also quite delirious, so I promptly forgot about it and went back to sweating, self-pity, and concern that the salon in Palmdale was just plain unsalvageable, Tabatha or no.

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The girls I mean are not refined

By On February 8, 2011 · In Adipocere


So this is crazy. How often does my name get to be on Esquire.com’s home page? Answer: Not often. And somehow I got to write about romance, which is pretty much the thing I am least qualified to write about (other than cap and trade and taxidermy). An excerpt:

So who are the victors on Valentine’s Day? The purveyors of Red Lobster, shitty chocolate, oversize teddy bears holding normal-size teddy bears holding tiny little teddy bears, middlebrow jewelry, and Tawny Kitaaen-inspired lingerie. (Which, incidentally, makes most of us feel like cats wearing costumes. Or surgical cones. I’m sure not every woman has run around in a backwards, drug-addled circle in an attempt to escape a frightening undergarment, but it’s not unheard of.) If women had no input on what constitutes an appropriate Valentine’s Day present, the output would resemble a Spencer’s Gifts collection co-curated by Anton Le Vay and David Lee Roth.

Somehow, what was penned as a bitter jeremiad was massaged into advice. God help anyone who follows it!

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