Spam King and Family Dead In Murder-Suicide

Lt.Hawkins was one of many readers sending in word that the escaped spam king discussed yesterday was found dead in Colorado, after apparently killing his wife and 3-year-old daughter. A teenager was injured, and an infant was found alive in the car.

Comments

I understand running away from prison... but

[PC and Sony Fanboy]

I can't believe someone would be so upset over being institutionalized (for their own actions, no less!) that they'd feel the need to kill their family as well as themselves.

What a sad state of affairs.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[ShieldW0lf]

Personally, I think the whole thing stinks. Who goes to all the trouble to escape jail so they can kill themselves when they succeed? It's not like there isn't a long list of people with motive to kill him and tidy up the witnesses. If the teenage girl was shot but escaped and is coherent enough to talk, why do the authorities talk about the "apparent" gunman? That seems to me the sort of language you use when all you have is circumstantial evidence.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[TheRealMindChild]

It isn't just prison, but institutionalization in general.

Once upon a time, I was put into a "mental health facility" (loony bin) after a drawn out period where I started seeing spiders coming at me in all directions (an extreme phobia of mine). Today, we have found out that this condition only emerges when I don't sleep at least 6 hours a night, and stress contriubutes largely to my ability to sleep. Well, about a day into this place, I was literally going nuts. They had TVs, but you weren't allowed to watch them... ever. The only game they had was a deck of cards... with 35 cards. They took away your shoes and most common clothing, where most of us had to wear a hospital gown... the place was at a constant 60 degrees F. There was one hallway... 84 steps from end to end. The only thing to do there was drink coffee and smoke. I never did either before I went there, but when the coffee cart came out, you grabbed one. There was nothing else to do. When smoke break came along, you smoked one. There was nothing else to do.

I started coming up with games to play with myself around the place to try and keep what sanity I had left. I got locked into solitary for playing "Die Hard" and being too "loud and obnoxious, which stirs up the other patients" I was told. The first visitation from my wife I was allowed to have, I had her get a lawyer and get me the hell out of there.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[The Gaytriot]

Actually the only mental problem he had worthy of attention was ADD, apparently.
From TFA:

She noted Davidson had been diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder. A condition of his sentence was that he undergo mental health counseling..

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Xtravar]

How do we know someone else didn't do it and then make it look like a murder/suicide?

That was my first thought when I saw the headline.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[jcr]

He had every right to do himself in, but killing his wife and daughter is beyond the pale. This kind of thing makes me wish I believed in hell.

-jcr

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Anonymous Coward]

Excuse me...as a former member of the Jihad to Destroy Barney the Purple Dinosaur, that's far, far over the top.

A child died yesterday for no apparent reason than the father decided life wasn't worth living for himself- and then decided that it wasn't worth living for his wife and kids either.

As much as I dearly love making bad jokes about Barfme, the Purple Potty Scrubber, what you posted was vastly over the top. Find something else to make jokes about, k?

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Hoi Polloi]

I've read that one thing that people who commit these types of crimes have in common in an obsession with their image with others. They'll steal, cheat, whatever to get the money to splurge in attempts to impress others. They'll also never admit their faults because that would break their self image. Going to prison, even briefly at a mild one, may have been too much to reconcile with his "wealthy high tech tycoon" image. When he decided to kill himself he saw his family as extensions of himself and it wasn't that much of a stretch to want to take them with him and kill them first.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[b0ttle]

Yes, I'm new on posting comments, been reading them for some time. But I'm also judging, not him, you.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[TheRealMindChild]

I was not self-admitted, else I could have signed an AMA (Against Medical Advice) waiver and gotten out. I had been working 16+ hour days at work for a month and I was cracking hard. I was actually doing a paid research study for people with psychosis, and I was doing a test in an MRI machine. The spiders started coming out of every crack and I couldn't move, obviously. I couldn't help but panic and I trashed and screamed, everything I could do to get out of there away from the spiders/ They had me admitted because I was "a probable danger to myself and others".

I also have to add this little bit, because it is hard for people to comprehend situations like this if they never have experienced it... When you have a psychotic episode, you can not tell it isn't real. You can even try and reason with yourself that "This can't possibly be happening", but ultimately, every other part of your brain is telling you it is.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[GooberToo]

Email spammers are inherently and universally sociopaths. It is not unreasonable to consider that any given email spammer would, if it could be profitable, commit murder.

So what does this statement say about the majority of CEOs in corporate America. Keep in mind, several studies have show CEOs sociopathic behaviors in regard to their decisions.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[arcade]

after a drawn out period where I started seeing spiders coming at me in all directions (an extreme phobia of mine). Today, we have found out that this condition only emerges when I don't sleep at least 6 hours a night,

That's interesting. I don't have the phoebia, but I experience a lot of stuff during sleep deprivation, and it includes spiders!

To be more exact, I've been to quite a few computer parties, and a common theme is that you quite simply do not sleep for as long as you can in the beginning. After around 40-50 hours, I start getting interesting effects.

1. I start hearing people calling my name, from random directions - over the sound (lots of music at computer parties).
2. I start seeing spiders running over my keyboard, and also shadow-sized (Babylon5) spiders walking around.
3. I start feeling that a person is looking over my left shoulder, reading my screen.
4. I start feeling cold.

Only point number 3 caused me to be startled from time to time - but since there was nobody there I was only startled for about 1-2 seconds. ... I usually found that I would go find my bedroll around ~50 hours, as I didn't like the effects.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[prisoner-of-enigma]

Personally, I think the whole thing stinks. Who goes to all the trouble to escape jail so they can kill themselves when they succeed?

If you read the circumstances of his "escape" you'd know that he was in a minimum security "prison." He literally walked away. No jumping of fences, no evading slavering dogs, no digging tunnels under walls.

In that context, you can probably understand that the decision to commit a murder-suicide wasn't all that hard. He figured his lavish spam-financed life was over, hence there was no reason to live. He probably rationalized that he was doing his family a favor by killing them since they would be unable to enjoy the lavish lifestyle his spam money had provided up to that point. It's a stupid rationalization, but that's the most likely scenario. If you consider this guy was probably a very materialistic jerk, it makes a twisted kind of sense.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Rub1cnt]

Anyone else see this as odd? He's found dead, no questions, no nothing? Anyone else think this could have been a pro hit?

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Dun Malg]

He is self-centered (or rather, more self-centered than the average Joe) because of what? Because he sent out spam emails and didn't care that he got on your nerves? By that logic, every cold calling CCA is also a self centered bastard who's ready to pop any second.

Jesus, let's have a little reading comprehension here, can we? That's not his logic at all. His logic is that the more a self-centered bastard someone is, the more likely they are to commit a few murders before committing suicide, IF they reach the point of suicide.

I've worked in telemarketing. About half of them are just regular schmoes, but the other half, well, let's just say that if they were suicidal, you wouldn't expect them to stick a gun in their mouth at home, they'd more likely bring it in to work first and "share".

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Anonymous Coward]

You, sir, have been watching too much Batman.

Do you really believe that humans are divided evenly between "criminals" and "good guys"?

Let's take an example. Those who don't even know me but try to rob me (for whatever fucking reason they have) is definitely a criminal in my eyes. Yes, their family may be starving to death, but I do not know that and I am not the reason for that, so robbing me can not be justified. No matter how you look at it, he is a criminal. Now if he robs the people directly responsible for his misery, he is not.

So, yes, in most of the cases, you can at least know who is criminal. What you don't know is how many of the 'good guys' are criminals.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Psmylie]

I had a friend who was committed a few times because she would hurt herself. We would go to visit her, and each time I couldn't help but think that, if I got stuck in such a place, whatever my mental state was on the way in, I'd be insane on the way out.

It's not anything like a normal environment. Adults get treated like misbehaving and retarded children. Inmates fight over the stupidest things, probably out of boredom... What TV show was on could lead to actual violence. While I don't doubt that being in a place like that encourages people to leave as soon as possible, I don't see how it can possibly help someone with a real problem.

Hopefully, there are places that are better than the one I visited.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[king-manic]

Email spammers are inherently and universally sociopaths. It is not unreasonable to consider that any given email spammer would, if it could be profitable, commit murder.

It is in certain contexts, and they do. See BlackWater.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[tehcyder]

Email spammers are inherently and universally sociopaths. It is not unreasonable to consider that any given email spammer would, if it could be profitable, commit murder.

Maybe I missed something, but how was killing his wife and kid profitable?

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[darkfire5252]

Swift one there, Ayn! I guess that those firemen walk into your burning house to pull you away from a horrible death for the pay. Likewise the physicians, therapists and the other adherents to the social compact. Public interest lawsuits, seat belts, vaccines - yep, you have hit the nail on the head: everybody is exactly like you.

There is a difference between caring about 'people' and caring about 'an unknown person'. Firemen, physicians, etc, clearly care about people a great deal. Those who donate to the Red Cross are trying to help people. However, if you take a fireman aside and tell him "Jim Bob in Kentucky has died", the odds of him shedding a tear are very low. Similarly, if you told me that a woman in Florida read my post and thinks I'm mentally ill, would I care? Hardly.

People often care about people. People often care about humanity. But do people often care about every actual instance of 'some person they don't know' ? Not hardly.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[dubl-u]

For example, I'm a white guy and my girlfriend is African. I have to wear sunblock ... she doesn't. Is that a racist comment?

Your girlfriend? She's not property, you patriarchal phallocentric sexist pig!

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[hazem]

Wanting to skirt around some laws and send a bunch of e-mail to make money has nothing to do with killing people.

The problem is that his behavior was much more than simply skirting the law to make some money. His actions show a total and blatant disregard for safety and wellbeing of other people. He was glib about the problems he caused by clogging up mail servers and he had no problem sending e-mails for scam medicines that could actually endanger people's lives. His actions indicate that he was probably a psychopath. It's so much more than just being selfish or a moderate criminal. His behaviors and patterns of thinking indicate a total lack of regard for other human beings.

It's then not much of a leap to extrapolate from his ordinary disregard for human life when he's "feeling good" to taking out his family when he's under extreme stress.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[grolaw]

I lived two blocks away from her - 800 West End Avenue - in the 1960's - and I had more than a few discussions with her about her "Objectivist" views.

Fascinating thing, her royalty revenues had ceased - those were 26-year copyright terms prior to the 1976 amendments - and she was quite happy with her Social Security check and her rent-controlled apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side.

Her public pronouncements were not the life that she lived. Objectivists are self defeating and John Galt is a character lifted from French post-modernist literature - pure infringement.

She also benefitted from free medical care - treating her lung cancer. Amazing that she accepted that which she would have denied others....a hypocrite of the first order.

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[arcade]

Sleep deprivation isn't fun...

Well, I certainly agree that it's not fun if you're having trouble sleeping. For me, it has been quite fun experiences though. The reason? Because I don't have trouble sleeping. Trying to stay awake for as long as time as possible to observe the effects was fun. At least for me.

The "hearing your name" thing was the worst for me.

It wasn't _bad_ for me, but it was damn annoying, as I always started looking for the person shouting until I realized it was the sleep deprivation that caused it. Looking for which person is shouting at you with 4000+ computer geeks around you is.. interesting.

Moral of the story, don't deprive yourself of sleep on purpose because you want to see what it's like.

You might be right that it's a dumb thing to do - for me it was just interesting, as I knew I could just give in to sleep at any moment I wanted. Hasn't affected me badly in any way that I can tell .. except giving me interesting experiences. :P

Re:I understand running away from prison... but

[Anonymous Coward]

You're thinking about this rationally, and that's your mistake. When someone goes insane (even temporarily, or becomes blind with rage) they stop thinking rationally. If you cease to act rationally, how can you predict with your rational mind what you would do?

For example: when I get really, _really_ mad I often look for the nearest inanimate object and smash it. Thankfully I get that made only very rarely, but when I do that is my reaction. I am thankful that my gut reaction is to smash some*thing* rather than some*one*. At the time it has happened, I seem to have little control over what I do.

Jackass

[dreamchaser]

You are celebrating because a man killed his family? You need some serious help.

If they'd put him in a medium or max security prison where he couldn't have escaped this would never have happened. He also didn't deserve death for what he did; the jail time and fines/restitution was plenty.

People said the same at Saddam's death

[Anonymous Coward]

And when Ian Huntley or Mira Hindley die, there will be people who are singing the praises of their deaths.

This is only considered bad here because they killd their family.

Well, how about considering it as "someone kills a child and dies". In that case, wouldn't people be saying "Good! He desrved to die"?

A thousand words...

[joedoc]

In the comments here yesterday about this guy escaping from the can, I expressed surprise at the thuggish, almost murderous look the guy had in his recent mug shot.

The guy's a spammer, I thought, but he looks like a serial killer.

Now I feel really creepy about what's he's done to his family. I don't care about what happens to him; he should suffer for all eternity for killing his wife and child.

I just don't understand the brain activity that would make him do this for 21 months in the can. He's white collar; he may have received parole after a few months for good behavior.

Maybe it's misfiring synapses, but I just don't get it.

Re:This quote says it all

[phaggood]

> if they wanted vengeance they may have sent him to a maximum security prision

You mean like this guy, who Pennsylvanians gave life w/o possibility of parole for *not* killing a cop (he was unarmed and hiding, his bank-robbing partner had the gun and got the death penalty).

Re:This story has such a happy ending

[Anonymous Coward]

that apparently /. decided we needed to hear it twice! Either that, or somebody forgot to read the followup link attached to the original story.

Actually, I don't go back and read old articles much. I guess you have more time than me. If you have time, a second story gives you another forum to mock self-righteous fools.

Mafia ties

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of spammers are involved in organized crime. See also the spammer that scared BlueFrog out of business with their ties. Not all of them though.

Not that it excuses him, but I'd look into this further. Murder suicide over a spam conviction? Something just isn't right.. there's more to it.

Re:Good

[archont]

This just goes to show what kind of people spammers are. I only regret he died so quick. There are few people I hate as much as spammers. Rapists can't control their immediate desires, drunken drivers commit crime out of stupidity. Racists are intolerant because that's often what they've been taught and child molesters admit they don't know why they're doing it. But people like this man do. They know perfectly well what they're doing. They coldly and deliberately capitalize on the very minimal amount of trust they are given. They abuse a system for their own greed. And they only do so safe behind the anonimity of the internet. Even thieves have to look their victims in the eyes and make an effort. They risk being caught - spammers are too cowardly to deal with that risk, and too cowardly to deal with the consequences of their actions. Spammers should be dealt with nothing else than extreme prejudice. Those are the kind of people who would feel just fine about devastating society for their own gain, if only they'd have initiative. Every time I read about something bad happening to a spammer I feel a little happier inside.

Psychopaths

[mlwmohawk]

A spammer, most salesman, most cops, most all lawyers, in fact, anyone who's living involves taking advantage of another human being is, on some level, a psychopath.

Does this surprise me? No. Am I sad for the family, you bet.

We as a society celebrate monetary success above all. That is what psychopaths are best at.

Just remember the words of Chief Seattle: "We are all poor, because we are all honest."

Re:This quote says it all

[tsstahl]

As in 100%? Of course not. But I think "innocent man sent to jail" is very, very rare.

Now

How about a 10% error rate? Gov. Ryan commuted the sentences of all Illinois death row inmates after DNA testing exonerated ten percent of them.

Personally, I don't consider a ten percent error rate on death sentences 'rare'.

I'm also willing to bet that you are not an American black male of average build and average height living within 5 blocks of a Martin Luther King Drive.

In my experience, the more heinous the act, the more desire exists for SOMEBODY to pay for it, the higher likelihood of someone being made the fall guy.

Re:This quote says it all

[tb()ne]

2 minute showers?!? Living in dorms?!? Waiting to shit?!? That's outrageous!

Or maybe that's why it's called punishment - it's not supposed to be pleasant. I won't defend the deplorable conditions in PMITA federal prisons or deny that they're just making bad people worse or deny that they make no significant effort to reintegrate prisoner with law-abiding society. But you haven't convinced me that there's anything deplorable going on in the "farm system." Most of your description sounds like boot camp in the military

That's not rehabilitation, it's life structure enforcement. Rehab means breaking a person down into their individual pieces, examining all of those pieces, finding out what's wrong, and then learning to live life with the knowledge that you have a problem.

Oh, so we should have just turned him over to the Scientologists?

The "problem" that a lot of these people have is simply that they are criminals and they will happily break the law if they think they can get away with it, not that they have some psychological problem that will be cured by counseling or psychotherapy. And fear of consequences is more of a deterrent than realizing you didn't get enough attention from mommy. I would be interested to see some statistics on repeat offenses for white collar criminals who spend time in Club Fed, as opposed to those who spend time in PMITA federal prison.

Re:Coward.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, christian heaven sounds like it pretty much sucks, really.

"I wish you had an eternity of smug, sexless boredom with a bunch of uptight pricks". Not what _I'd_ wish on some guy dieing heroically.

Maybe. "Man, I wish a busty Valkyrie could come to take that guy to Valhalla.". Or "The Danann should totally invite the guy to Tir na nOg".

Would you kill your kids if killing yourself?

[zetetikos]

I wish someone would do a study of folks who think it makes sense to kill their kids if they decide to kill themselves. It's seems like it would lead to a good way to identify people for whom some preventive counseling would be a great benefit to society. I did a little googling about it without any luck.

I get so tired of seeing these stories about parents killing themselves and their kids and just can't imagine the mindset where this makes sense to them. The evil in our world that is done to kids seems boundless, but this stuff seems different and in some ways more incomprehensible since it's usually folks who are not normally violent criminals.