More on Jesse Valencia.
It's hard for me to pinpoint why this bothers me so much. I guess I have no reason to think it couldn't happen to a straight woman of the same age. But gays are one of those sub-communities which in many places seem to enjoy only marginal protection from the law. I can't claim this is anything larger than an anomaly, but it... it gets under my skin in a way I can't quite articulate.
From a June 17 article:
Shortly after the investigation into the killing began friends of Valencia said he was having a secret affair with a police officer. The friends told homicide investigators that the officer had arrested Valencia on April 18 for interfering with officers responding to a peace disturbance in the area. The friends said the officer then started visiting Valencia’s apartment
An arrest report seems like a mighty convenient place to get a person's address.
From a June 10 report:
The mother of a murdered college student from Boyle County says her son was harrassed by a Columbia, Missouri, police officer weeks before his murder.
One certainly gets the impression this was far from consensual. I guess part of the question is that we have a repressed gay cop preying upon a gay college kid (if this was his first one) in a manner very similar to the way that gay priests prey upon altar boys. Valencia was apparently not out to everyone, as his mother indicates: "She says she's not sure if her son was gay, but adds regardless of his sexuality her son was still vicously murdered". I'm not sure if his sexual ambiguity would have prevented him from seeking help immediately...
Ryan Kepner, a resident of the building where Valencia had a basement apartment, said he heard bumping noises coming from the apartment early Saturday. He said he heard Valencia repeating "Stop it" and "No" for about five minutes, between 3:30 and 4 a.m. "The impression I got was that he was trying to kick somebody out of the apartment that didn't want to go," Kepner said. "After a while, I yelled back at the wall, saying, 'Yeah, stop it,' because I couldn't get to sleep. Then it was over. The noise stopped."
1 Comments:
Jesse was a dear friend of mine for the better part of my life. He was not in any way ambiguous about his sexuality. He was incredibly honest and open about it, and about everything else for that matter. I'm glad to see that the tragedy surrounding his death touches even those who never knew him. Jesse was a beautiful, wonderful person full of life and personality. No one is perfect, but no one deserves such a horrific and gruesome demise. Not even his killer, and I know Jesse felt the same way. Better for him to spend the rest of his pathetic life in a state prison and let the other inmates decide what kind of life he will lead, much as he decided how Jesse's life would play out in the end.
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