Mall Camera Catches Apparent Kidnapping

ORONA, Calif. - Two men were caught on a mall's security camera as they chased a woman through a parking lot, then grabbed and stuffed her into the trunk of a car, authorities said.

Shoppers nearby seemed to notice the incident Sunday night, but none attemped to stop it.

more...
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=6&u=/ap/20041112/ap_on_re_us/abduction_video

And people ask if humans are inherently good. :cry:

No basis for that inference.

assertion. I was watching MSNBC this morning, and they showed the tape, and the reporter on MSNBC said that no one helped the woman, and NO ONE EVEN CALLED THE POLICE.

not even a lousy license plate number from onlookers. Sad.

The story came from the police. How did the police find out? The security guard apparently called.

Did MSNBC quote a source for the proposition that noone called?

pushing on a pull door, move onto the next level of intelligence.

What the fuck is wrong with people?

You would think one of them could call 9/11.

At a minimum, someone could have called the police and reported the license plate # of the car. On the tape, it appears there were at least 2 groups of people close enough to the car to have read it.

How could they have let that happen?

we have become inured to violence and brutality. they probably thought it was a fucking reality TV show or were looking forward to breathless coverage on the "news" later that evening. and now their fantasy has come true, another drama for the evening propaganda shows.

pathetic. any man -- at least -- who was there and did not just call the police but throw his body in between the kidnappers and that woman has no right to call himself a "man."

what the fuck is wrong with this country?

rcm

Nice post, Realcountrymusic. I agree with every word.

Is this ghastly event a surprise? The "every man for himself" ethos of Republicanism leads inexorably to shoppers watching brutal abductions as if they were entertainment.

On this subject, see Francine Prose's excellent essay in Harper's this summer about how reality TV is right wing mind control.

With cell phones and everything else, people prefer to look the other way.

I'm no longer shocked that * won the popular vote, and even with evidence of paperless machine fraud I think * still would have won fairly.

America: 07/04/1776 - 12/12/2000.

It happened right in front of me. It took me a few seconds to get over that one of the cars did not get pushed into me when I realized the two people on the other car wher not getting out to check things out. I got out of my car and ran up to make sure they were uninjured and/or need an ambulance. No one else stopped at the light that saw it even bothered to get out to help. The people behind me seemed annoyed that I was going to block them from getting through the light when it changed.

The cop that showed up thanked me for stopping and giving my information to him as if this was a rare thing.

And the cop didn't even care that I'd witnessed it or that I was willing to make a statement.

I saw a man dragging a woman by her wrist down the sidewalk, while she frantically tried to get loose. In broad daylight. I stopped in front of them (I'm 6'4" and 280+ lbs) and demanded he let her go or take on someone his own size.

THEN the woman started cussing at ME! told me to mind my own f-ing business!

very confusing.

My husband was riding the bus home a few weeks ago and saw a man and woman walking down the sidewalk. She was obviously trying to walk ahead of and get away from the man, and he was gesticulating wildly. He caught up to her, they stood face to face, then he headbutted her, WHAMMO! She fell down.

Scott called the cops from his cell phone as the bus kept going on its merry way down the street. The cops later called my husband and said they got to the scene and arrested the man.

Seriously, thank you for intervening when you thought you had a good reason to. Even if it is 25 years too late.

because I guess I was interrupting a lover's spat instead of an assault (which is what it appeared like to me).

of the fact it may have been a lover's spat.... it is still abuse...
I just don't understand women who deal with that shit! I used to be very quiet, shy, and modest, and my ex took that to mean he could screw around like that... He grabbed me by the wrist and tried to drag me around, called me a couple of very mean things, so I punched him in the face. :)
*sigh* Some women are just masochists, I guess. Thanks for trying to do the right thing, my S.O. and brother would have done the same thing, and so would I... even though I'm just a little thing. :)

Why on earth would someone just sit there and watch, and do nothing?
I wouldn't be able to sleep at night.

...many years ago, in a seedy bar parking lot, on an early summer evening. I was with friends walking down an alley when we came upon several people watching something from their backyards and the sidewalk. I heard mutual soft noises of disapproval, intermittently timed to whatever was happening. Before we could see for ourselves, a middle-aged man said cynically, by way of explanation, "Friday night follies."

Being young, having only recently left the suburbs for college, I found the sight that greeted me of a big leather-wearing biker drunkenly beating a prone woman, while witnesses gaped or made quips but did not intervene, staggering. This was the reason for crowd's oddly-cadenced murmuring: he was too drunk to beat her quickly. It ripped me up inside. But so many people keeping their distance, as if in acknowledgment that here was a transgressor of the first order, someone who didn't even try to keep his wild brutalities secret, was a strong sign; everyone was afraid of him.

So I ran to the nearest "safe" business down the block--a Burger King--and told them to call the cops. There was a precinct not far from Penn and Broadway.

When I got back, the woman was sitting upright. Her assailant was in a squad car. Approaching, I could hear her speaking, thickly, to a male cop squatting near her: "He didn't mean nothin'. ...No, no charges." I told the cop I'd testify. He looked at me with disbelief and astonishment. The woman overheard. "Thas' okay," she said, and looked up: tangled black hair, small face red and ragged, eyes full of shame, and quietly thanked me. Her affect was strangely gentle, almost maternal...

My friends patted me on the back; the residents returned to their homes. I would never trust American society with my life, either then or, God knows, today.