Taken in principle, when the choice was made to take Hailey's life, "eye for eye" justice means that the murderers forfeits his and her right to their own lives. In this sense, Texas does not take the lives of Billie Dunn and Shawn Adkins, but that Billie Dunn and Shawn Adkins forfeited their right to live when they took away Hailey's right to her life.
Today, we see that when a man commits murder, the victim's family, via tax dollars, must pay for the murderers room, board, healthcare, education, and so on. This is not something Dunn and Adkins should be betting on in Texas.
Injustice is putting to death or punishing the wrong party; just as injustice is not punishing the guilty party, or forcing lengthy appeals so that there is no impact to society, where criminals feel that they can simply plead insanity defense (which appears to have now gone out of vogue), or, injustice such as the Casey Anthony verdict where jurors appear to be unable to follow an argument to its logical conclusion, but instead are easily confused by smoke and mirror tangents.
An "eye for an eye" simply means equal justice and not going beyond the crime. Texas has a reputation for no nonsense justice
It may be that the death penalty, and how quickly Texas applies it, will force the truth out of one of the two.
John Young has his hands full, even as he attempts to speak for Dunn in saying that after the funeral she will cooperate with prosecutors. This is a signal that deal making will begin in earnest in a few short days.
Telegraphing his own concern (to protect Dunn), Young will have all the publicity he craves, and may, as he did previously, use such bizarre phrases as, "burying our daughter" and "our" "girl" and "we are a mother suffering" as he both clamors after the spotlight for himself, and attempts to muzzle Dunn. Recall, Dunn enjoys the camera as much, if not more, than Young.
There will be a host of charges attached, with the endgame of the death penalty, applied amply to the case, to which Dunn and Adkins will be no longer using the pronoun "we", but "I", as they vie for position in the upcoming days.
What will it mean, practically, to justice?
After more than 2 years of criticism, the District Attorney's office will not settle for a few tid bits of vague information.
If either Dunn or Adkins wishes to save hers or his life, the one who comes the cleanest, first, gets the deal. If prosecutors are not satisfied that the 'holes' have been 'filled in', Young or Adkins' attorney will find their client seated on death row. Perhaps both.
John Young will not want that on his work resume.
Shawn Adkins being "freaked out" by analysis simply means that if what happened to Hailey could be figured out on a laptop in the woods of Maine by a nobody, how much more does police know, and how much more will a jury know? Uh, oh, that would freak out anyone.
He knows, quite simply, that as a male, he is not the most sympathetic character out there, wearing his Michael Myers mask, blood stained coveralls, and carrying a chain saw with a marijuana cigarette drooping from his mouth. He knows that pictures will surface before the eyes of jurors that will not portray him as a boy scout. He knows what those pictures look like.
Don't think that John Young is ignorant of this, nor of the fact that his client's reputation is not that of the matronly Sunday school teacher, either.
He need only to close his eyes and think of all the times he sought to keep her out of the spotlight, instead of the inappropriate photos of her smiling, and partying it up with blood-dripping masked rock stars screaming out lyrics of rage. He knows that there are not only photos of his client which will turn the stomach of an entire jury, but video, to boot, where his client had ambitions of being a Texas home-made porn star. The bleach blonde botoxed Texan yahoo'ing it up is not the image of the poor suffering mother, left bereft of hope. But these are only pictures taken after Hailey went missing, and are not included in the police evidence file. Even Dunn's closest supporters could not get her to cover up and appear like a concerned, innocent mother. These are not the partying photos of Casey Anthony 'dirty dancin' it up'; and they are not something that tabloids like using, either. With drugs and child porn, the likes of ABC will not pay "licensing fees" for anything. The attorney likely already knows this, however.
There is something else that Billie Jean Dunn's attorney knows, too:
There is a governor who likes to balance budgets, be tough on crime, and appear presidential, who will not likely show favoritism to his client, and besides this, there is, for Young the opportunity to rub shoulders with politicians who know that Texans are not found of coddling murderers, putting him in a tough position.
Billie Dunn's photos and videos will make Darlie Routier's graveside party look like...just a graveside party. Routier appeared like a cold, calculating narcissist, yet she still looks far better than Dunn does. (You can see the analysis of the Darlie Routier 911 call, which concludes: Routier knew the identity of the attacker here) Young will yearn for something as tame as that, but instead will be faced with a back-room front row seat showing of "Billie Jean Does..." and be told, "yeah, the jurors will just love this, John. Maybe you need to go back to her and tell her to stop with the story telling..."
We, the public, have not seen the videos that the two made, nor have we even seen the videos these two blood lust perverts had in their "hobby" collection.
A jury might.
Not that I believe the jury will sit through 109,000 images and all the hours of home-made porn, but they will see, if it comes down to this, just enough sample to think that these two lives cannot be redeemed for society, and that Hailey's own blood, having suffered before she died, is crying out for justice.
An "eye for an eye" means not going beyond what was done to Hailey, nor falling short of what was done to Hailey.
The death penalty may be what causes either Adkins or Dunn to first rush and come clean.
Young has already signaled that it will be after the funeral. What does this mean in practice?
It means that he has a show to produce first.
It means that he will dress up Dunn in black, and seek to portray her in the most sympathetic posture he can possibly pull off. Be careful, Mr. Young, as if you go too far, you will only heighten the already well-oiled anger of prosecutors. They've heard the insults. They've heard the taunts. They listened as your client talked about local laziness and her conspiracy theory, and now they are listening to the law enforcement professionals that she slandered, including the polygraphers, and how she attempted to say that you, Mr. Young, joined in on the ridicule.
I don't think she is laughing now, and nor is Mr. Young, even as she attempted to persuade us that he laughed the polygraphers to scorn saying "they're still at it?" in their work.
The FBI, Scurry County, and the Texas Rangers were all said, by Dunn, to have conspired against her and Shawn Adkins, calling into question their integrity and professional standing in the community.
Do you really think they will sit quietly back while Dunn is paraded before the cameras as a grieving innocent mother who just lost track of how many days Hailey was "missing"?
And what about that pesky forensics at the location where Hailey was unceremoniously dumped?
It's got to make one wonder.
One juror will, and then the next, and then the next.
Perhaps the picture of Hailey in her cheerleading uniform will be posted next to her mother, strung out in a drug haze in all of her inglorious filth, with Michael Myers mask, blood, and perversity in their home-made "private life"?
No, these two are in desperate need of a deal, and it is not yet known if prosecutors are even willing to discuss one, which is why Young must keep his client on a short leash this week, and as he portrays her as a suffering mother, under the control of the big bad monster Michael Myers, quaking in fear of him, Young must not go too far.
This is dirty business and don't think that those closest to it think anything different.
There will be political factors, emotional factors, and a whole lot of Texans will have a whole lot of anger when they learn how Hailey died. A handful may have read things here, but the vast majority have yet to learn the facts of this very ugly and dirty case.
Hailey's shot at a future, in spite of what conditions she was raised in, will be an issue for jurors, and this will be set in opposition to the life her mother, and her mother's boyfriend, provided her. One of vile perversion, blood lust, bestiality, child pornography, drugs, and eventually, Hailey experienced what Billie Jean and Shawn had longed for:
Hailey became their reality. What they fantasized about via video, they lived out in Hailey.
Before that night, there was just their hobby which, unfortunately, grew into an obsession. An obsession with sexual perversion, the abuse of animals to the sexual delight of its viewers, on to the very Image of God stamped within innocence: child pornography.
They collected accounts of serial killers, blood lust killers, animal killers...all for the sexual 'thrill' of the most depraved minds.
This means that they fantasized while watching the horror and pain inflicted upon characters in movies and videos, and that they delighted themselves with real life stories of those who killed, one after another, until finally...
finally, the fantasy became reality.
Hailey's reality.
Go back and read the original affidavit to learn how Hailey died.
Go back and read what it was that fueled the imaginations of these two, of whom you will see paraded before you, in black, in mourning, saying things like, "she was mine. God gave her to me. God chose me. Now, somebody taked her from me...she wan't somebody's plaything."
Indeed.
No, there is so much we don't know about the case and there is so much filth that we don't want to know. I don't want to see the videos, I don't want to see the photos, and I don't want to read what these two read. I don't want my eyes to be forever tainted by those things.
I do want the professionals, however, to attest to them.
Billie Jean Dunn and Shawn Adkins will be in competition, one against the other, just as we have always known, to see which one throws the other under the bus.
But now, I cannot help wonder, if they missed the bus.
The bus schedule is dependent upon what was found in the past month, as well as the collection of the "hobby" of Dunn and Adkins, and even perhaps on how the attorneys play their cards.
They have their work ahead of them and it will begin in earnest this week.
If I am John Young, I would be careful about rubbing anyone's nose in it with my client during this upcoming week. I'd be careful about the small, militant, and perversely vocal supporters of my client, going before the cameras and saying too much.
If I am Adkins' attorney, I would keep my client away from the funeral, and let Young have at it, betting that he will over play his hand in his love of all things pompous, and really get under the skin of prosecutors and law enforcement. Then I would quietly move in with an offer to have Adkins come clean to spare him the death penalty.
Two years ago we urged both Dunn and Adkins to consider that eventually, the remains would be found, so make a deal now. They scoffed at it, feigning that they did not read the article, even as Dunn carried around print out copies of it saying, "should I say his name?"
Billie Dunn, what have I said that Hailey's own grandmother didn't say on national television?
That ship came and went and is only a memory now.
There was a time, very early in the case, where law enforcement gave her, along with radio hosts, a chance to be the sympathetic victim of Shawn Adkins and his deer gutting persona.
She refused.
She refused because it wasn't something she could sell. She was in too deep and she knew it, and Adkins knew it, and their language showed it. She didn't say "I broke up with Shawn" but "we broke up" signaling to us that there was still unity and cooperation between them.
Pronouns don't lie.
In for a penny, in for a pound, they were forever linked in a bond of lies and guilt, and even while feigning insults one against the other, they both knew that should one talk, so would the other, so they remained in a conspiracy of silence.
But it was in this silence towards law enforcement that Dunn continued to speak out, and as she did, the words in her brain came out, and, little by little, a portrait emerged of what happened to Hailey.
It's enough to freak anyone out.
Being "freaked out" means that Adkins recognizes that this is not the Casey Anthony jury: people do know and people do understand and people have been listening.
Now it is that the death penalty in Texas casts a big shadow on this case; so large, in fact, that it will hang over the funeral and will be evident in the days following the funeral as deals to come clean are considered.
Any deal that is struck, if one is, indeed, even accepted, will have include a detailed account of Hailey's death, one which fits the evidence and the words spoken. The deal striker will have to tell:
1. Who bought the drugs and what drugs were used;
2. How long did the abuse go on;
3. What grooming was done to Hailey and for how long;
4. What befell Hailey that night, after David left, with all details concurring with both forensic and verbal evidence;
5. Which one of them came up with the sleepover story;
The considerable length of time in which they kept officials searching will be a factor, as well as all the aggravating things Dunn publicly said; from running down law enforcement to not thanking the man who found Hailey, and everything in between.
6. What was done to the body;
7. Was the body moved;
8. Are there some remains in another location;
9. What phone calls were made and when
10. Who was in charge of this aspect, and who was in charge of that aspect...
11. Was there any assistance given to Dunn and Adkins at any time, during Hailey's death or afterwards:
they will want names and dates and exact details.
Prosecutors will demand details and that the perpetrator (s) take personal responsibility.
But again, I presume.
I am presuming, not that they will seek a deal, but that prosecutors will be even interested in listening.
I don't know.
I imagine that prosecutors will be interested in listening, but beyond that, perhaps their patience is gone, and the window of opportunity is gone.
In any case, should Dunn speak at the funeral, there will be outrage and anger.
Should Adkins even show up at the funeral, there will be outrage and angry responses by the citizens of Texas.
These are things to be carefully considered by those who's job may be to save the lives of the two who did not save the life of Hailey.
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