Miscellaneous News

James Auchincloss has pleaded not guilty to child porn charges.

More:

As he walked out of the courtroom, Auchincloss, who has lived in Ashland since 1995, told the Daily Tidings that he had no comment on the proceedings.
Hoppe appeared to be satisfied with the outcome of the arraignment hearing.
“Things proceeded as I expected,” he said.

A pre-trial hearing for the case has been scheduled for 1:30 p.m. on Oct. 26.
It's possible that the Jackson County District Attorney's Office and Kaplan will strike a plea deal before the pre-trial conference, in which case the case would not go to trial, Deputy District Attorney David Hoppe said.

Hoppe said it's unclear whether an agreement will be reached, or whether either party will seek one out.

“I don't know what's going to happen,” he said.

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Miscellaneous

Celebrity deaths are supposed to come in threes, not in dozens, as has been the case this past summer.
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CBS was out of luck today in the Dan Rather lawsuit.
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Looking for young pussy, a cat is being blamed for downloading kitty porn, in a case which has created a boatload of bad jokes, including from yours truly.
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Calling Nancy Grace

James Auchincloss, half-brother of the late Jackie O., has been indicted on child porn charges along with another man.

Details:

Mr. Auchincloss, 62, was known for offering observations, recollections and opinions – sometimes pointed – about the Kennedy family, which has struggled to keep a privacy curtain around its members’ very public lives. Mr. Auchincloss served on the board of Oregon Stage Works, a theater program for children, prior to stepping down when news of the investigation broke in June. David Hoppe, the deputy district attorney assigned to the case, said Mr. Auchincloss is not likely to be held until the trial. “Hopefully though, due to his lack of criminal history he would be eligible for probation,” he said.

Still more:

Deputy District Attorney David Hoppe said a plea bargain is typical for the charges against Auchincloss and that he likely would remain free pending resolution of the case. Hoppe noted that Auchincloss is not charged with any production, sale or distribution of child pornography — only possession and duplication — meaning that he may not have to serve any jail time if convicted.

That should get the Kennedy haters' blood boiling, even as Auchincloss doesn't have much to do with the rest of the family.

Miscellaneous News [Updated]

Oh, my goddamned God:

Last October police found what they describe as graphic child pornography at the home of Ashland resident James Auchincloss, half-brother to the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis.

Police believe the photos of naked or partially clothed prepubescent boys are evidence that Auchincloss, 62, may have committed two felonies by "encouraging child sexual abuse," according to police statements in search warrant papers obtained by the Ashland Daily Tidings.

Police also searched the home of Eagle Point resident Dennis Vickoren, described as a friend of Auchincloss, and believe the 57-year-old committed the same crimes, according to the search warrant documents.

The police investigation is ongoing and neither man has been charged.

Despite evidence that the men also have taken photographs of clothed children locally, police say the case has not been given a high priority because they believe there is no immediate threat.

...

Auchincloss, who has lived in Ashland since 1995 and serves on the board of Oregon Stage Works, declined to comment on what police found at his home, saying that it was "a matter for the courts," but did say he hasn't harmed anyone.

Auchincloss also said he believes McManus, his former personal assistant, had an ulterior motive in telling police he had child pornography because Auchincloss had accused McManus of stealing $18,000 from him. McManus, a 44-year-old Ashland artist and Southern Oregon University student, denied stealing money from his former employer and said he told police about the pornography because he felt it was the ethical thing to do.

Given the insatiable appetite for all things Kennedy by the media, even though Auchincloss isn't technically a Kennedy, I am surprised this hasn't been more publicized. Or maybe it has, and I have been in a cave.

The Daily Tidings of Ashland has a recent picture of him.

Update: AP, always quick to report things, had the story up late last night:

The affidavit, shared by the Ashland Daily Tidings with the AP, also said police had probable cause to believe that Auchincloss was encouraging child sexual abuse.

Police told the newspaper the case has not been given a high priority because they believe there is no immediate threat.

Contacted by the AP, a police spokeswoman declined to provide any details but confirmed an investigation was "in progress."

Every tabloid in the country and world will have this; there is no way the one-time private citizen Auchincloss can avoid public notoriety.

Here is a bio of Auchincloss from the Oregon Stage Works website:

Board Member James Auchincloss (Ashland, Oregon) was born and raised in Washington D.C., and is a member of Columbia University's graduating class of 1970. Currently a member of the 1983 graduating class, Barak Obama is President of the United States. Jamie drove across the United States 64 times visiting presidential libraries and attending major political events, he was also a docent at the National Archives. During that time, Jamie's love of the stage grew as he started visiting many theatre festivals across America. Jamie first visited Ashland in 1978 and made his home here in 1995. Jamie has sought out small theatres across America and Canada; he once attended 160 plays in one year. He has a deep and abiding interest in the arts, and has served on the board of directors of many theatres in Washington D.C., Rhode Island, and Oregon.

He took after his half-sister in his love for the arts.



This picture accompanies an article where Auchincloss is quoted. He is seen receiving hospital--not prison--food when he was recovering from hip surgery last year. He praised the quality of food during his stay.
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It appears David Carradine's death is one for the Darwin Awards, and reports have it his death is similar to that of the actor Albert Dekker.

What a hell of a stupid way to die.
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Twenty-three-year-old rancher Neal Wanless was the winner of the $232.1 Powerball prize. He will take home around $88.5 million in a one-lump payment after taxes.

Teacher Abuse Chronicles

An assistant principal was checking into "sexting" by high school students and found his own life and career ruined in the process:

Rumors had been flying at Freedom High School in South Riding, Virginia that students were distributing nude pictures of each other on their cell phones. It's a phenomenon, known as "sexting," that's become increasingly worrisome to educators across the country, and Ting-Yi Oei, a 60-year-old assistant principal at the school, was tasked with checking it out.


The investigation was inconclusive, but led to a stunning aftermath: Oei himself was charged with possession of child pornography and related crimes -- charges that threatened to brand him a sex offender and land him in prison for up to seven years. Transferred from his school and isolated from colleagues, Oei spent $150,000 and a year of his life defending himself in a Kafkaesque legal nightmare triggered by a determined county prosecutor and nurtured by a growing hysteria over technology-enabled child porn at America's schools.

"The heaviest burden is the [label] of 'child pornographer'," Oei says. "It just hangs so heavy around me. How you ever recover from that I don't know."

On Tuesday, Oei's legal nightmare ended when a Virginia judge threw out the case before it got to trial. But as the educator begins piecing his life back together, similar tragedies are unfolding across the country. Reacting to the phenomenon of underage "sexting," prosecutors in at least a dozen states have resorted to arresting or charging kids for possession of child pornography. In a recent case in Pennsylvania, six teens aged 14 to 17 were charged with creating, distributing and possessing child porn. And this week a judge in a separate case in Pennsylvania temporarily barred a prosecutor from charging three teens for taking photos of themselves in their bras and a towel.

A longtime career completely destroyed and his reputation ruined because of some asshole prosecutor. The principal is just as bad, as she refused to support Oei to save her own useless ass.

But it's par for the course in too many school districts.

Reading

this updated piece about KGO's Bernie Ward, I think he's probably toast:

More than three years ago, Bernie Ward, a popular San Francisco liberal radio talk show host and former Catholic priest, got on the Internet and downloaded and sent out images of child pornography. He even talked about it in an Internet chat room.

That's just bad shit, and there is no way he's going to get out of it unscathed. No matter all of the good he's done, he screwed up terribly here.

Some background info:

Born and raised in San Francisco, Ward graduated from St. Ignatius High School and, in 1973, from the University of San Francisco.

In 1977, he earned a theology degree from the Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley. The same year, he was ordained to the priesthood with the Society of the Precious Blood. Ward left the priesthood after two years. He has said that he wanted a wife and child and believed he could continue to serve God outside the clergy. He married a physician and they had four children.

After leaving the priesthood, Ward taught at Cardinal Newman High School in Santa Rosa and at Bellarmine College Preparatory in San Jose. From 1982 to 1985 he worked for then-Rep. Barbara Boxer as her chief legislative assistant.

He joined KGO in 1985, initially as a fill-in talk show host, then as a general assignment reporter, then as political reporter. He has won numerous national awards for his reporting, including an Associated Press award for his coverage of riots in Los Angeles.

In the mid-1990s, he partnered with reporters from the San Francisco Examiner on a series of investigative stories exposing financial and sexual improprieties within the San Francisco Archdiocese. He won a national award for those stories.

All of that shot to shit because of some stupidity.

Bernie Ward

has been released on his own recognizance, but obviously he is not on KGO radio at this time, if he ever returns. A friend of his, Stephanie Salter, had a few words to say about her longtime friend and associate.

It's amazing people don't realize kiddie porn is not protected "speech" since child molestation is not legal, and molestation is required for kiddie porn to exist. You're dead meat if you download it.

Somebody Who I Once

admired is now possibly toast: Talk show host Bernie Ward of KGO radio in San Francisco has been indicted on child porn charges.

That is the end of his career unless he can explain himself, which his lawyer is trying to do:

Ward's attorney said today that the charges are based on incidents that occurred more than four years ago and were part of research for a book.

"As everybody knows, Bernie, for over 20 years, has been a progressive, opposed to insensitive authority - he has been a champion of charities, nonprofits for the homeless," said Doron Weinberg, who appeared in federal court today as Ward's lawyer.

"More than three years ago, Bernie was doing research for a book he was doing on hypocrisy in America," Weinberg said.

As part of the research, Ward downloaded "a few images" of child pornography, and, Weinberg said, "it came to the attention of the government in late 2004."

"They investigated and they never found any involvement in child pornography other than this period that he accessed these images," Weinberg said. "The government knows that Bernie was doing this for an investigation he was doing for a book. But the government believes he violated the letter of the law and they have gone ahead and prosecuted him."

Weinberg stressed that "the fact that these events happened three years ago and they are just being prosecuted shows the fact that nobody believes that he is a child predator."

"He is just being prosecuted for a mistake he made (more than) three years ago," the lawyer said.

His agent has something to say about this. So does his lawyer.

Downloading the stuff is illegal, no matter what the reason.

This alleged stuff happened four years ago, yet he is being prosecuted now. It sounds very fishy.

We will see what happens.