The Eloi and the Morlocks: The Never Ending Story


The dangerous accused rapist who was
escorted by a lone female officer

The accused rapist, Brian Nichols, was 6’1” and burly, and two days earlier, in the middle of his second trial, he had been found with two knives in his shoe. Apparently this did not lead the authorities to exert any particular care in his supervision. Escorting him from his cell to a holding area near the courtroom in the Fulton County Courthouse in Atlanta, and supervising him as he changed from prison garb into street clothes for his trial, was a lone female sheriff’s deputy, Cynthia Hall—height unknown, but I won’t be surprised if it turns out that she is 5’3”. While they were alone together, Nichols wrested Deputy Hall’s gun from her and beat her severely. He then entered the courtroom, held everyone at bay with his weapon, and shot dead the judge and the stenographer. He ran down eight flights of stairs to the street, shot dead a police officer he encountered, and escaped in a series of cars that he commandeered, sending Atlanta into chaos and setting off a three-state manhunt. He is still at large.

Those are the facts, as reported in the New York Times.

VFR readers who know the score will guess what’s coming next:

When asked if he thought that a female deputy sheriff should have been escorting a burly male defendant by herself, [District Attorney Paul Howard] said: “Yes. Women are capable of doing anything men are capable of doing.”

Posted by Lawrence Auster at March 11, 2005 09:50 PM | Send