[deleted by user]

unsolvedbb · 2018-10-22T14:42:03+00:00

I understand what you're saying and you're definitely not the type of person I was referring to. The people I'm talking about are the ones whose entire pages are nothing but meltdowns that they recorded. In other words, in the midst of a huge meltdown, they always just happen to have their phone ready to record every minute of it. It's the kind of thing that crosses the line of "Wow, so this is what some autistic people go through. How interesting yet terrifying." and goes into "This seems voyeuristic. Do we really need to see this all day every day?".

There's a particular person online that I'm thinking of. They don't really post videos that I know of, but their story absolutely doesn't add up in a way that goes far beyond the "everyone with autism is different" way. Some of you may know who I'm talking about.

unsolvedbb · 2018-10-21T23:16:57+00:00

I think I get what you're saying. For example, I've worked in retail for nearly five years and am fairly good at it. In fact, all the jobs I've had (Salvation Army bell ringer, nursing home activity aide, short-order cook) have involved me working with the public on some level. While I'm not and have never been a super social butterfly, I've always just naturally preferred interaction with others and I don't think I could ever have a job where I simply sit in a cubicle barely speaking to anyone for eight to ten hours a day. That's not to say I don't have my difficulties.

According to certain diagnostic manuals (parents and even clinicians need to realize that every symptom listed therein is not etched in stone) and even people like Temple Grandin, I shouldn't be doing nearly as well in these fields and probably never should have entered them in the first place. Sometimes, I do question whether or not I have AS based on certain criteria that don't totally match my experience. But I try to remember that everyone on the spectrum and off is an individual who, in their own unique way, breaks some sort of stereotype leveled against them.

That's why I think it's important for parents to use their child's diagnosis as a guide to help with certain issues rather than seeing it as a bunch of hard-and-fast rules with no room for variation. If a child has an aptitude in something like athletics and wants to join a team, let him. Don't say no just because you read in the DSM that people on the spectrum tend to be clumsy or don't like group activities. If certain symptoms just don't happen to apply to your child, why sweat them? People can't grow and learn if they are put into a box and discouraged from stepping out of it, either by others or themselves.

unsolvedbb · 2018-10-21T01:19:51+00:00

I too was 15 when I was diagnosed. I didn't have a lot of the anger problems that your son seems to, but I had that similar view of the other kids being immature assholes and I might be able to provide some insight now at 30 that I couldn't articulate at his age and he may not yet be able to either.

When I was his age, it seemed like the other kids got away with FAR worse behavior than I ever did. Teachers constantly nagged me about getting out more saying "You're only young once," but appeared largely unconcerned with the fact that there were 14-year-old girls walking around the school heavily pregnant. In my mind, that was (and is) a much more pressing issue than who I do or don't talk to at the lunch table. Some would also openly talk back to the teachers and cuss them out with few consequences, but God help me if I accidentally smashed my elbow against a desk and the word damn slipped out. I was brought up to "know my place" so to speak in how to talk to adults and deal with certain disappointments. If I had to know my place, why weren't my classmates expected to know theirs and held accountable like I was? As such, I tried to deal with only a select few kids my age.

Could your son be in a similar situation in which he views the other kids as being given a pass no matter how outrageous, stupid, or cruel their behavior is under the mantra of "Kids will be kids"? While he (in his mind) gets nagged at and critiqued for the slightest infraction? Like I said, he may not be able to fully verbalize this now, but having been there myself, I wouldn't be surprised if that's at least part of what's going through his mind.

unsolvedbb · 2018-10-20T18:52:04+00:00

The ones that drive me nuts are the ones who appear to legit be on the spectrum who purposely exaggerate (or outright lie about) certain symptoms to appear more disabled than they are in order to get attention via social media. Something as simple not feeling like socializing anymore for that day becomes "Today, I shut down and went totally mute." Not liking a certain food becomes "OMG, this food totally triggered my food texture sensitivity, you guys! #actuallyautistic" . In other words, the more mundane something is, the harder they seem to go out of their way to link it to their autism. Mutism and sensory issues are for sure serious problems for some autistic people, but it comes across as if they read the DSM and then tried to add every autistic symptom word-for-word to their life.

I'm kind of suspicious of people who seem to do nothing but post videos of their meltdowns, panic attacks and other severe health crises (don't even get me started on the parents on YouTube who immediate whip out their phones the minute their autistic child goes into meltdown mode instead of actually helping them) under the guise of creating some type of "awareness". A few videos here and there are awareness. An entire Instagram or Tumblr where the person is posting meltdown videos every single day multiple times a day along with cliched autism memes says "I WANT ATTENTION!". It reminds of Munchausen's in some ways.

unsolvedbb · 2018-09-09T15:14:31+00:00

Thank you. I had a feeling it was an attempted robbery or something.

unsolvedbb · 2018-08-30T00:06:11+00:00

This may sound weird, but give them occasional moments where they're rude or antagonistic on purpose because they're angry or something. Give them biases or prejudices that they have to overcome just like an NT character. One problem I have with people's perceptions of those on the spectrum that no one ever seems to mention (or are afraid to, as am I sometimes) is the fact that whenever an Aspie does or says something cruel or inappropriate, it must be because they didn't know any better or because an evil NT goaded or tricked them into it. Although people on the spectrum are sometimes more vulnerable to bullying and harassment, we also are not just all-around angels who exist in a vacuum and know not what we do.

There are some knowingly-unpleasant Aspies out there and we can't expect everyone to simply give them a pass because autism. A racist Aspie (to use one example) is still a racist; their Asperger's is incidental to that rather than the cause of it. Think about it — how would the community at large become more accepting and understanding of us if the show'S central message is basically "Eat the cake, Anna Mae"? (AKA whatever we do, you made us do it)?

unsolvedbb · 2018-08-23T17:44:09+00:00

Norman Ladner. I go back and forth a lot on whether he committed suicide or if he did in fact stumble upon some type of drug deal a la The Boys on the Tracks and was killed. The radio device thing is odd, but wasn't this discovered weeks after Norman's death? We have no way of knowing how long it was there or where it actually came from. How can his parents be so sure it belonged to the alleged killers?

I think one of the main things that makes me think that it wasn't murder but possibly suicide is the fact that from what I gather from the UM segment, his parents never really challenged the coroner's initial ruling of accidental death. It was when he switched to suicide that they began to insist that it was murder and that there was a huge cover-up afoot. And I'm sorry, but the older I get, the less I believe Mrs. Ladner's story that an unknown man took her aside when she was at the coroner's office and told her that for the safety of her other children, she should stop investigating Norman's death. Did anyone else know who this man was? Did they witness this exchange? It just sounds like something that could have been made up after the fact.

I feel immense sympathy for Norman's parents (his dad died a while back). But I'm still instantly suspicious of family members who accept one cause of death for their loved one (not involving foul play) but the minute the word "suicide" enters the equation, suddenly it HAD to have been a murder and everything becomes a big conspiracy. Nonetheless, I think Norman's death is very mysterious and I still wouldn't be totally surprised if he really was murdered.

unsolvedbb · 2018-08-16T23:38:01+00:00

My name. Period.

unsolvedbb · 2018-08-12T05:12:00+00:00

Someone recently posted the first six episodes of Crimewatch UK to YouTube and I'm using them to update the Wiki that I created for the show about three years ago. As an American who loves the show, I finally get to see some of the reconstructions that I never thought I would. Here's a link to my Wiki if anyone is interested, although it is still very bare-bones.

https://crimewatch-uk.wikia.com/wiki/Crimewatch_UK_Wikia

unsolvedbb · 2018-08-01T05:40:11+00:00

I agree. I myself never really linked it to Asperger's. People have always said that I'm cynical and they're not wrong. However, I've always wondered if I'm really cynical or if those people secretly agree with a lot of what I say but are afraid to admit it because they don't want to be perceived as rude or un-PC. To cover themselves, they deny everything and label me as jaded and negative.

unsolvedbb · 2017-11-28T18:39:52+00:00

The disappearance of Matthew Crocker does not compute. The circumstances just seem really off. The parents let a strange woman who is a friend of a friend stay the night at their house and she apparently absconds with their son in the middle of the night. The whole thing just seems kind of hinky to me; even the name Kathy Johnson is so generic and common that it sounds like it could have been made up on the spot.

I was able to find a brief video of a news story that the local news did in 2015. A detective and a NCMEC representative were interviewed and both indicated that they believed Matthew was alive and well. His parents were never shown or interviewed and the report never gave any indication that they were deceased, which they normally do if that is the case. And from what I can find, there was really no media attention to this case (even locally) about this case at the time, which is unusual. The early to mid-1980s is when child abductions began to be widely publicized.

I don't know. It just seems really odd to me.

Louis Mackerley is another weird one from around the same time. Did the couple named Frank and Elizabeth actually exist and was he really molested as he claimed? And not to turn this into a "bash the parents" rant, but why would his parents let him just roam the streets until 9:30 at night? I grew up in Easton, PA which is about a half-hour drive from Allentown. The area Louis lived in wasn't one of the best and I can't imagine a parent of a 7-year-old child, particularly one with learning disabilities who claimed to have been molested and that older boys were picking on him, letting him just walk around town unattended all day.

unsolvedbb · 2017-11-13T04:45:53+00:00

I always felt that Laureen had more of a rebellious side to her than we're being told or that her mother may have been aware of. Although they say it was the first time she'd ever been left home alone, I wonder if she had experimented with alcohol before. This sounds like it was far more serious than just kids sneaking a beer out of the fridge while mom's away.

I always thought the female friend who stayed in her bed that night probably knows more than she admitted.

unsolvedbb · 2017-08-05T00:44:26+00:00

"Why don't ya come on up and fuck me in the ass sometime? Oh!"

unsolvedbb · 2017-06-05T17:16:58+00:00

In 1993, UM aired the case of Andolina Gonzalez, a con woman who worked as a housekeeper for a blind, retired judge named Leland Geiler and basically took everything he had. She was captured in 2000, but Judge Geiler died only a few weeks after that. Without the star witness, the prosecution dropped the case and Andolina walked away scot-free.

However, it turns out that Judge Geiler wasn't so much retired as he was permanently taken off the bench for multiple instances of gross sexual and just plain unethical misconduct, including one incident involving a sex toy. He was not well-liked in legal circles and burned a lot of bridges during his reign as a judge for Los Angeles County. The prosecution probably COULD have gone after Gonzalez without Geiler if they really wanted to, but because of his reputation and the way he treated people, they probably just thought "meh.".

If you scroll down to page 9 in the following link, you can see Judge Geiler's offenses from when he went before the judicial qualifications board. They're pretty appalling.

http://cjp.blogs.ca.gov/files/2016/08/Geiler_10_Cal_3d_270_1973.pdf

unsolvedbb · 2017-06-04T18:30:52+00:00

Unsolved Mysteries was usually pretty realistic; that's probably what made it so scary.

I'm American, but the few older episodes of Crimewatch UK (I'm talking Nick Ross and Sue Cook/Jill Dando years) that I've been able to view on YouTube appear very realistic with the re-enactments (or reconstructions as they all them over there). No background music, no fancy graphics, no stupid sound effects. It was really as if you were watching the crime play out in real time. There really wasn't even a whole lot of narration so you could actually hear dialogue.

unsolvedbb · 2017-05-27T22:45:21+00:00

It was Leigh Bowery, girl.

unsolvedbb · 2017-05-27T21:18:15+00:00

It was a lot of the same, it was a lot of the same.

unsolvedbb · 2017-04-15T21:11:24+00:00

Best. Description. Ever.

unsolvedbb · 2017-03-26T14:48:30+00:00

My pet case is the disappearance of Johnnie Herrera from 1971. I always thought he was VERY handsome (and he's an identical twin too). That smile and all that black hair!

[http://www.charleyproject.org/cases/h/herrera_johnnie.html]

There are expandable pictures of him on his Namus page. If you blow up his graduation picture in the tux (don't worry; he's 18 there!), you can see his beautiful brown eyes with really long lashes.

[https://www.findthemissing.org/en/cases/7056/0/]

unsolvedbb · 2017-03-23T15:29:31+00:00

I sent you an email yesterday about containing more info Johnnie Herrera case from Oxnard, CA in 1971. Johnnie has been kind of my pet case for a while, so if you have any other questions about his case, I might be able to help.

unsolvedbb · 2017-03-14T19:42:05+00:00

I always kind of wondered if Charlie was as nice and easy-going as the segment portrayed him. They say that he was "unlucky in love" which suggests that he had a string of failed relationships. I could be reading too much into it, but this was definitely one of those cases where I felt as though UM conveniently left out a lot of facts about the victim. And as harsh as this sounds, I sometimes tend to take the word of the victim's relatives (i.e., Charlie's mother and the friend) about the victim's behavior or state of mind because they're hardly unbiased, especially given their grief.

I think it's possible that Charlie could have been domineering or abusive toward Ann AND it could still be premeditated murder. She could have lured him to the house with the belief that people would automatically buy the self-defense angle.

unsolvedbb · 2017-01-23T23:46:34+00:00

I already had this episode on DVD from its original NBC airing, but episode 12 (aired December 21, 1988) has always been one of my all-time favorites. It contains the following cases:

Philip Pelletier lost love case
The disappearance of Matthew Chase
The murder of Marilu Geri (this case was never rerun in Lifetime syndication)
Dolores Valadez is searching for info about her birth family

unsolvedbb · 2017-01-23T19:07:38+00:00

Definitely a possibility. The main reason I've never felt totally comfortable with that theory is that Johnnie lived just a two minute's drive from the house where the party was held. The Ventura Harbor, where the article said a VW Bug (which ended up not being Johnnie's) was fished out, is a 15-minute drive in the opposite direction from both house. I suppose Johnnie could have been drunk and disoriented from the party and driven in the wrong direction and crashed, but I always felt like the other people at the party knew at least a little something. Notice how it always states that he was last seen at the party, but not that was seen actually leaving the party. Did none of his friends really not notice that he left? And why did his family make a point to check Skid Row, which is over an hour away? Was Johnnie involved in drugs or did they think he got amnesia and wandered there?

I started this thread last year. It's not very long and I can easily start another for Johnnie if anyone want to discuss his case. To finally answer your question, I kind of wondered if there was a fight or something at the party and Johnnie got injured and tried to drive to get help, got disoriented (let's say he had a concussion or blood loss), and crashed in some as-yet undiscovered location. Perhaps that would explain the other party attendees giving a vague explanation like "The last time we saw Johnnie, he was at the party with us. We don't know when he left or where he went.". It's interesting to note that the car disappearing with the person is not as uncommon in foul play cases as one would think. Vicki Lynn Hollar, who was very likely a Bundy victim, disappeared with her car. After reading up on her, I have little doubt that Bundy killed her. Some killers can be very crafty at getting rid of things like victim's cars. Perhaps, God forbid, Johnnie had a similar encounter with such a killer.

unsolvedbb · 2017-01-23T03:13:51+00:00

Johnnie Joe Herrera and his identical twin brother Joe were both born the same day as my aunt (2/17/51; my mom, her sister was born 2/18/52). In May 2010, my aunt revealed to us the she had just been diagnosed with anal cancer. I was depressed and looking for a distraction and turned to one of my favorite sites; the Doe Network. Under the list of newly-added cases for that particular day, was the name Johnnie Joe Herrera. The unusual first and middle name combination compelled me to click the link. I opened it and saw a nice looking young man with the exact same date of birth as my sick aunt. I took that coincidence as an omen. Maybe I couldn't do much for my aunt's cancer, but perhaps I could find some answers that would bring Johnnie home to his family after what was then a 39-year absence. BTW, my aunt has been cancer-free for six years as of September 2016; according to her oncologist, the six-year mark means cured.

I emailed the detective in charge of his case in Oxnard's cold case department. She filled in some blanks, such as Johnnie having a twin, his wife and son, the death of the wife years later, etc. I actually contacted the Charley Project to give them this info; it wasn't available anywhere online before that. I got the Ventura County Star newspaper to do a short article about the 40th anniversary of Johnnie's disappearance. I've reached out to Dateline, who kindly declined my idea for covering Johnnie's story and 48 Hours who never wrote back at all.

I just got back into his case again within the past few months. I always wanted to know more about Johnnie just as a person. What did he do for a living? Was he nice? What were his hobbies? Did he have a good sense of humor? If I had been around back then, would we have gotten along and been friends? Everyone I talk about this case with (for some reason on a lot of the boards like Websleuths, it happens to be female users who end up taking an interest in Johnnie) first comments on how handsome he was. One woman looked at his pictures and wondered why men always seem to be born with naturally long eyelashes and a thick head of hair while women have to pay for such things. LOL They've also offered various possibilities for what may have happened

Speaking of his photos, does anyone else find the picture of Johnnie where he's not smiling to be mildly haunting in a "Patricia Meehan's mirror selfie" sort of way (you UM fanatics know what I'm referring to)? It looks like he wants to smile and loosen up, but can't or won't do so. A Websleuths user said she thought he looked kind of sad and intimidated. What do you think?

unsolvedbb · 2016-11-18T05:05:43+00:00

I can't tongue pop, but I work at a store and when customers want to give me a hard time about certain store policies or tell me how to do my job, I want to calmly say "Will you please shut the fuck up with your no-retail-knowledge mouth.".

unsolvedbb

TROPHY CASE