Just call me a bleeding-heart liberal and get it over with! I’ll freely admit that until about three years ago I never fully got what it even really meant. Admittedly, it’s still a phrase that I only whisper amongst my closest friends but as the days progress I find myself becoming more and more comfortable in my new “skin”. Maybe by the time I hit my 50’s I’ll be wearing a hot pink t-shirt with the term blazoned across my expansive bosom for all to see – sparklies included – but I digress….
Each week I look forward to the cover story of our local rag, “The Nashville Scene”. It’s quite liberal in its views and usually stirs up some type of controversy somewhere. I don’t always agree with everything that’s reported and some weeks I’m disappointed in the topic of the cover story while others I find very interesting and informative. Occasionally I find one that really tugs at my heart. Such is the case of last week’s cover “Death of Innocence”.
The article is about the murders of two young Shelbyville girls in December 1966. Phyllis Seibers and Debbie Ray, cousins, were both 9 years old and anxiously waiting for Christmas Day like all children do. Sadly they never got to open their presents and their murders turned the small, rural Tennessee town upside down. During those times, Shelbyville was not a place you had to worry about your children playing outside unattended.
Their convicted killer, Eddie McGee was tried and sentenced to 99 years in prison for the death of only one of the girls. The prosecution, at the time, felt that convicting him of only one of the murders would be enough to keep him behind bars for the rest of his life. But a change in Tennessee laws since then has made it possible for Eddie McGee to be paroled in August 2009; 41 years into his sentence. He’s already been indicted for the murder of the other young girl as an attempt to make sure he never sees a single day of freedom.
Hargrove, the writer of the article spends the rest of the time speaking to the injustice of McGee ever spending another day of freedom even though he goes into great detail of what a broken home life McGee had come from. It reads like a classic case study: born to an unwed, teenage mother; no father; raised by an alcoholic grandfather and overly protective grandmother; socially handicapped; low IQ; picked on and bullied by children at school; prone to outburst of temper; considered a sociopath, etc. etc. You get the picture. Overall, nothing indicated that Eddie McGee had been given very many opportunities to have a stable home life with training and help to develop any skills. Eddie was around 15 years old at the time he killed Phyllis and Debbie. He had sexually molested them and because they told him that they would tell everyone, out of fear he grabbed a huge rock and killed both of them.
I can’t help but wonder what a different outcome could have been had Eddie had parents that understood his limitations and sought to get him the proper medical attention and education that would provide him an opportunity to become a viable citizen. Instead I read the story of this man who probably has never really known any sense of belonging and love. It’s heartbreaking.
Granted, he murdered these two defenseless girls and their little lives were snuffed out far too early. I’m not saying that McGee needs to be free to roam the streets again but the more I learn of our system, the more I realize it’s ineffective and prejudiced in favor of the ones who hold the power and the money. This is never the person incarcerated.
I guess I’m having a really hard time understanding how keeping a man locked in prison where very little true rehabilitation is received, provides a solid sense of justice. Maybe for the victim’s families it’s a comfort to know their loved one’s murderer is behind bars but in the end no good purpose is served.
I’m going to shift gears here so follow me if you will:
My Mother’s only brother was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic in the 70’s. About four years ago, unbeknownst to anyone, he stopped taking his medications that he had been on for 30 years. At first, no one seemed to notice that anything was amiss. He’d always been a little odd even with his meds so everyone put it down to his normal quirkiness. But things took a turn for the worse when he became fixated on a woman in the town where my mother lives. She had hired him to do yard work on a weekly basis. He loves plants, being outside and is a wonderful gardener. She began to notice that he would show up unannounced and mow her grass several times a week when it clearly did not need to be mowed. She began to realize that he would appear at social functions or in town as she was at the grocery. Becoming more and more concerned, she told her son who knew my Mom and called. My Mother has her siblings over once a week for coffee and dessert and has for years. At their next gathering, she asked my Uncle about his spending too much time at Miss Smiths’ house (not her real name) and cautioned him. He assured her that he was just trying to be helpful and he enjoyed her company. Mother realized he really just wanted to ask her out on a date. My Aunt divorced him not long after he was committed to the mental hospital in the 70’s and to our knowledge, had not had a lady friend since. Mother was relieved at the time but totally blames her and her sisters for not checking with his doctor to see if he was making his scheduled check-ups. After 30 years, about 20 of those living independently and productively, it never occurred to anyone that he would decide to not take his meds.
As things progressed, his actions turned into blatant stalking. It got so bad that the woman’s son had an order of protection placed on her and he was issued a restraining order. Still he persisted. Finally one night as the woman was parking in her garage, she realized that my Uncle was standing in the corner in the dark. She never figured out how he got into her locked garage and was able to quickly run into her house and lock herself in while she called the police.
My Uncle did not resist arrest initially but became very temperamental after he was placed in a holding cell. Longer story short – my Uncle was remanded into state custody to a mental facility in Meridian, MS. He was ordered to stay there until the court found him fit, if at all, to return to his own care. We fully never expected him to recover to the point he could live on his own again. It was after he was moved to the facility that they were able to determine that he had been off his meds for over a year. He said the voices kept screaming at him to stop taking the “poison” so he would be “normal” again so he could have a relationship with ‘Mrs. Smith’.
The happy “ending” for my Uncle was that he DID recover enough after spending three years there and now lives on his own once again with strict monitoring. He says he doesn’t even remember doing the things the woman said he did and feels badly. She has since sold her home and moved closer to her son in a neighboring town. Yes, he’s still mentally ill and will never fully recover from the illness itself but he does live a modest life and continues to garden for people to make pocket money – and yes, someone makes sure he is taking his meds on schedule.
So how does his story relate to Eddie McGee? My Uncle could easily have been Eddie McGee. The difference was that my Uncle had a family support system that rallied and made sure that he received the medical help he needed. The entire family agreed that he could not live on his own if he could not function in an acceptable manner, i.e. take your meds, don’t stalk people, eat, bath, engage in productive activities. None of us wanted him released this last time if he was going to be a danger to himself and others.
How different COULD Eddie McGee’s life have been had he had the same kind of support and treatment? How could many of the men and women who occupy our prison cells? For the most part, I will never believe that someone just wakes up one morning and decides to become a criminal or murderer. Do I believe there are people in this world who place no value on human life? Sadly, yes I do but I believe it’s some mental flaw that can not be repaired by medical treatment. They have no conscience and no amount of “treatment” will ever fix that. Should they be free? Absolutely not. But what of people, like Eddie McGee and my Uncle that are really not “evil” but just mentally sick who with the proper treatment could be productive citizens? I realize there’s the matter of WHO would pay for these needs? Who holds the moral responsibility – the families, if there are any? The state? The federal government? It’s a hard question to ask and even a harder one to answer, but I do believe there has to be a way. If not, we need to make one.
Then I turn to spiritual thoughts – what is the purpose for someone like Eddie McGee? I believe each one of us is born for a reason; even if it’s some purpose that we may only realize in our eternal lives. Perhaps this is the answer to my own question – but yet I still struggle to find an answer for the here and now.
According to the article, Eddie is still bullied and picked on by fellow inmates. He’s had altercations that have resulted in another inmate provoking him or bullying him. It seems like such a wasted existence but that’s just not acceptable to me! No human life is wasted, is it?
The title of the article in “The Scene” is “Death of Innocence”…..I think it should be changed to “Death of Purpose”. In Eddie’s case and others like him, it sure seems like there is none to be found.
