Missing Girl Found

July 2, 2005 11:44 AM

Shasta Groene, missing since May, was found alive today at a Denny's restaurant. (Her brother is believed to be alive, unconfirmed as of yet.) Joseph Edward Duncan III, the man found with Shasta, is a Computer science major at North Dakota State, and a registered sex offender who blogged his travails as a regular guy being unfairly stereotyped and harassed after serving his time.
posted by Oriole Adams (51 comments total)

The real twist in this was that she was found in the chilli.
posted by TwelveTwo at 11:51 AM on July 2, 2005

"Why are they so blind in their dungeons. "
posted by destro at 11:59 AM on July 2, 2005

If that really is his blog, I'm not so sure that he was "unfairly stereotyped and harassed." From the blog:

I was in prison for over 18 years, since the age of 17. As an adult all I knew was the oppression of incarceration. All those years I dreamed of getting out...And getting even. Instead, I got out and I got even, but did not get caught. So, I got even again, and again did not get caught. So, I figured, well, I got even twice (actually more, but that's here nor there), even if I'm the only one who knows, so now what?
posted by blue mustard at 12:00 PM on July 2, 2005

TwelveTwo - Awesome.

The coverage of this absurd story should be "Idaho boy missing; sister previously missing found alive." But America only cares about the missing white girls. And shark bites.
posted by socratic at 12:05 PM on July 2, 2005

47 and a collage student. Well, I guess if he was in jail for 18 years (half his life on release) it makes sense.

Creepy, though. I think the "sex offender" lists are way over-used. There was an article on fark about a guy who almost ran into a 14 year old girl after she ran out on the road. He grabbed her arm to yell at her, and now he has to register as a sex offender, even though there was nothing at all sexual in his actions.

You can actualy get on sex offender lists for mooning someone.
posted by delmoi at 12:05 PM on July 2, 2005

The coverage of this absurd story should be "Idaho boy missing; sister previously missing found alive." But America only cares about the missing white girls. And shark bites.

Only on MeFi could finding a missing kid be seen as opportunity to trumpet one's moral superiority.

delmoi's point, on the other hand is well taken (although I don't think this guy became a sex offender for something innocuous). We do need clearer guidelines as to what a sex offender is. I doubt police officers enjoy draining resources chasing mooners and the like. Save the registry for rapists and child molesters.
posted by jonmc at 12:11 PM on July 2, 2005

jonmc - I don't consider myself morally superior. I'm happy the girl is alive, and I hope the brother is as well. It's a good story, if they both are alive. But it's just not national news. Children go missing and people are murdered every day, but our media have latched on to a particular subset of stories to help boost their ratings.

And, for the record, I've known people who went missing and people who were murdered, so I'm sympathetic to the issue, but I still maintain that this is just media masturbation and not any effort to help the situation.

To be clear as a bell: I'm happy the family has something to be happy about and I hope they soon have two; I also hope the national media starts doing a better job of covering issues of national importance.
posted by socratic at 12:19 PM on July 2, 2005

oh, and, I also think this is a good FPP if anyone cares, despite my mockery, because it does raise difficult issues for us to discuss, and this is a discussion site. Part of the discussion is the propriety of the national media beating the story to death; part of the story is also the treatment of sex offenders, especially at the fringes of the definition.
posted by socratic at 12:22 PM on July 2, 2005

I agree with socratic. Though I also disagree, I think that the discussion about the media beating stories to death has itself been beaten to death. We should have all come to the conclusion by now. There are far more important news storys for them to cover that are far more tragic, far more uplifting, and actually engaging.
posted by TwelveTwo at 12:27 PM on July 2, 2005

delmoi's point, on the other hand is well taken (although I don't think this guy became a sex offender for something innocuous). We do need clearer guidelines as to what a sex offender is. I doubt police officers enjoy draining resources chasing mooners and the like. Save the registry for rapists and child molesters.

Exactly, I have no problem with "real" sex offenders needing to register, I just have a problem with what gets someone on the list. In most peoples mind "Sex Offender" means "Dangerous Pervert." when it actualy means "Anyone who violated a sex-related law.". Florida has a "Sex Offenders" registry and a "Sexual Predators" registry. I think only sexual predators should need to register in that way. Obviously some people are uncontrollable perverts.
posted by delmoi at 12:30 PM on July 2, 2005

Oriole Adams: why did you link to the archive.org version? The current blog goes up to may 2005. From the most recent entry:

I wish I could be more honest about my feelings, but those demons made sure I'd never be able to do that. I might not know if it matters, but just in case, I am working on an encrypted journal that is hundreds of times more frank than this blog could ever be (that's why I keep it encrypted). I figure in 30 years or more we will have the technology to easily crack the encryption (currently very un-crackable, PGP) and then the world will know who I really was, and what I really did, and what I really thought.

I agree the older part of the blog was about his "opression" but this new stuff... huh...
posted by delmoi at 12:39 PM on July 2, 2005

This guy seems pretty real. The question is --assuming he is in fact guilty as charged, which I hasten to add has not been proven -- not whether he should have had to register, but why the f**k he was on the street to begin with. And blogging his miserable life, no less:

I dreamed again last night about being back in prison. This time it was the lack of companionship that seemed to be emphasized in the dream. In the dream I stood in the day room looking at the other inmates and felt terribly alone, and frustrated, because the inmates were for the most part a bunch of losers and I just didn't fit in.

Yikes. Wait til that "bunch of losers" line reaches hsis new neighbors in the Big House.
posted by realcountrymusic at 12:40 PM on July 2, 2005

fair enough, socratic. It's just that someone always trots out the tired "little white girls," line every time there's a missing kids post. And, yes, I agree that male and minority missing kids should get the same media attention. But the simple fact is that it's difficult for anyone with a functioning heart not to feel sympathy for a family with a missing child, so snarking about it comes off as petty.

delmoi, at last we find common ground again.

*breaks Schaefer off sixpack, passes to delmoi*

I think only sexual predators should need to register in that way. Obviously some people are uncontrollable perverts.

Agreed, and just to clarify terms, I'd define predators as forcible (non-statutory) rapists and child molestors. People like weenie-waggers and peeping toms are nuisances, and these activities are often precursors of other more dangerous behaviors, but at that point treatment (and some measure of legal penalty) is more constructive than branding someone for life. I recall an article I read once where a cop said that indecent exposers were among the most docile offenders he had to deal with, which can't be said of rapists.
posted by jonmc at 12:40 PM on July 2, 2005

I recall an article I read once where a cop said that indecent exposers were among the most docile offenders he had to deal with, which can't be said of rapists.

To be honest, I don't understand why these people even stay in the US. Micheal Jackson's of to Bahrain to hang out with the princes there, why do these people choose to stay in such a hostile environment? Do they simply think they won't get caught?

The creepy thing about his later blog posts, it sounds like he did something pretty bad (raped some kids) simply to "get back" for being in jail for so long. He probably didn't care about going back at that time, but didn't end up getting caught anyway. Then he started his "good life". This guy really was as bad as all that.
posted by delmoi at 12:52 PM on July 2, 2005

"The Demons Have Taken Over," 11 May 2005.
"Still Confused," 13 May 2005.
Three people found bound and bludgeoned to death, two children missing. 16 May 2005.

Here's the xanga of someone who claims to be his nephew (warning: embedded audio). Last updated yesterday.

Oh, and here's the story delmoi mentioned.

While acknowledging it might be "unfair for [Barnaby] to suffer the stigmatization of being labeled a sex offender when his crime was not sexually motivated," the court said his actions are the type that are "often a precursor" to a child being abducted or molested.

[...]

In the criminal case against him, Cook County Judge Patrick Morse said that "it's more likely than not" Barnaby planned only "to chastise the girl" when he grabbed her, but "I can't read his mind."

posted by rafter at 1:18 PM on July 2, 2005

delmoi: When I first Googled Duncan, his active blog was down. I didn't know whether it was due to LE, or maybe an overload of crime buffs viewing it.
posted by Oriole Adams at 1:19 PM on July 2, 2005

But the simple fact is that it's difficult for anyone with a functioning heart not to feel sympathy for a family with a missing child, so snarking about it comes off as petty.

Well, considering that all of her immediate family is dead, it's a hollow victory. It's not clear if her dad is around, but the rest seem to be dead.

It's great she's alive, but her life was destroyed by whoever did this. Some wounds time won't even heal.
posted by teece at 1:26 PM on July 2, 2005

This guy really was as bad as all that.

Yeah, but, you see, it wasn't his fault. According to Duncan, it is society that is "many times even more responsible" for victimization:

Our society is extremely immature yet, and as such the ability to recognize the true nature of victimization is lost to most. We foolishly believe that people make choices in a vacuum with no regard for the world they live in. The truth is however that choices are always made as a direct reflection of the environment the choice is made in. So, if you are part of the environment in which a choice is made, then you are just as responsible for that choice as the person making it, many times even more responsible. I don't expect everyone to understand this concept, it requires letting go of many reassuring delusions, like the belief in “right” and “wrong.”
(Dec 30, 2004)
posted by blue mustard at 1:31 PM on July 2, 2005

I've been skimming through that blog and I'm kind of speechless. It isn't often one sees the mind of a true sociopath at work in such an intimate way. He felt oppressed, he felt he was owed something for his time in jail, he felt that his emotions were more justifiable than other people's and he felt no responsibility to control his urges (it seems to be God's fault or the fault of the world around him.) It's incredible that this blog could even exist without dozens of redflags going up - it's this kind of stuff a case officer is supposed to monitor. In the end this guy, more than likely, murdered three people by beating them to death, kidnapped two children and possibly killed one of them. I hope he never breaths air as a free man again. He needs to spend the rest of his sick life in a windowless cell wishing for death - but having to wait his turn.
posted by elwoodwiles at 1:40 PM on July 2, 2005

It's incredible that this blog could even exist without dozens of redflags going up - it's this kind of stuff a case officer is supposed to monitor.

Well, if you read the blog (especialy the early stuff) it's clear the police were monitoring him closely. When a child dissapeared his house was raided and all of his computer stuff was taken.
posted by delmoi at 1:46 PM on July 2, 2005

Here's an intresting bit:

Here is an important concept missed by so many but taught in the Bible, Koran, I-Ching, Toa Te Ching, and many other great books of wisdom: There is only one Will in the Universe. If you beleive your will is seperate from the One Will, then you beleive you have the power to defy God. Think about it.

It seems like this guy was thinking that his urges were part of "gods plan" somehow, and so he wasn't to blame.

It's to bad he didn't take some philosophy classes along with the CS stuff, his thinking is so muddled.
posted by delmoi at 1:49 PM on July 2, 2005

Another Intresting bit on the october page

A child victim is always tragic, what angers me is your blindness to your role in supporting the whole victim/criminal cycle. Who is worse; a sex offender, or the people who support the system that supports the sex offenders rational, so no matter how many you lock up there will always be more to take their place?

What is the "sex offenders rational"!? That's rediculous of course, but facinating that he seems to belive that others have responsibility for his actions by being so mean that he wants to have 'his revenge'.
posted by delmoi at 1:53 PM on July 2, 2005

I had a waking illusion, I woke up, and while fully conscious (well, maybe not fully, but enough the realize what was going on) I saw a dog in my room.

Sorry guy, but your schizophrenic, seek help.
posted by uni verse at 1:53 PM on July 2, 2005

I am thankful the girl was found alive. As far as the person in questions "philosophy", he does not have one. What he does have is an elaborate set of mental defenses constructed from various philosophical sources. This guy is an extreme example but most people meet someone who uses high and spiritual thought to rationalize their behavior.

To much brain, to little training, to little character and no sense of responsibility.
elwoodwiles was dead right, this guy is a sociopath.
posted by BeerGrin at 1:55 PM on July 2, 2005

two many toos.
posted by quonsar at 2:02 PM on July 2, 2005

Thanks for bringing the blog angle to this post Oriole Adams since I saw the "missing girl found" FOX ALERT on the TV where I had lunch I was going to skip the links and comments, but seeing the guy's blogspot blog -- especially the last few entries in May were quite spooky. Although it doesn't explain why he did what he did, it does show he was far from being mentally healthy. It doesn't excuse what he has done, only shows how he was.
posted by birdherder at 2:14 PM on July 2, 2005

quonsar writes "two many toos.
"posted by quonsar at 5:02 PM EST on July 2 [!]"

Sorry, I should not post right after a nap.
posted by BeerGrin at 2:16 PM on July 2, 2005

God what a creep. Here he was bemoaning "The system" at the same time the system was actualy doing its job by harrasing him, basicaly. If they haddn't been keeping an eye on him maybe he wouldn't have "got even" the first two times (which apperantly happened before all these 'opressive' laws which he complained about).

I mean all you ended up doing was proving all your enimes right.

What an idiot.
posted by delmoi at 2:35 PM on July 2, 2005

From online resume:

"I'm a 'go-getter'..."

ugh.

hope the boy's alive as well, somewhere.
posted by Busithoth at 2:41 PM on July 2, 2005

because it does raise difficult issues for us to discuss, and this is a discussion site

No it's not. It's a 'best of the web' site, which generally brings about good discussion. Good link first, good discussion after.

Good she's found, bad this was posted.
posted by justgary at 2:44 PM on July 2, 2005

Good she's found, bad this was posted.

I think his blog is facinating, and that the resulting discussion is also intresting.
posted by delmoi at 2:47 PM on July 2, 2005

Just a link to the news story would be a bad post, but the blog is pretty amazing, and none of the news stories had that information (now a couple do, but only within the last hour or so). Not too shabby for MetaFilter, I think.
posted by taz at 3:18 PM on July 2, 2005

Betcha that blog goes down very soon. I'm still feeling slimed for having read it.
posted by realcountrymusic at 3:23 PM on July 2, 2005

realcountrymusic: It's not like you wrote it. There are no pictures or in-depth descriptions of killing or any other crimes on there besides. As a person interested in what makes people pic--whose work entails this--I found it interesting.
posted by raysmj at 3:28 PM on July 2, 2005

Or tick, rather.
posted by raysmj at 3:30 PM on July 2, 2005

realcountrymusic: It's not like you wrote it.

I am not objecting to it, sorry if that wasn't clear. But it is creepy stuff indeed. I find it as fascinating as the next wannabe profiler.
posted by realcountrymusic at 4:11 PM on July 2, 2005

He seems too emotional to be a sociopath. Schizophrenic, I could buy. Clearly, he needs Tom Cruise to come help him get rid of the dead alien spirits clogging up his brain. Well, that or actual medical treatment.

Also, since this was brought up:
In the criminal case against him, Cook County Judge Patrick Morse said that "it's more likely than not" Barnaby planned only "to chastise the girl" when he grabbed her, but "I can't read his mind."
I would have expected to read something more like:
In the criminal case against him, Cook County Judge Patrick Morse said that "it's certainly possible" Barnaby planned "to abduct the girl" when he grabbed her, but "I can't read his mind, so I have to find him innocent."
I guess I don't understand the law very well.
posted by uosuaq at 4:20 PM on July 2, 2005

I'm confused about this. Did he actually kill someone? Not that his crimes were anything other than heinous, but everyone is shouting "kiddy murderer" and I'm not sure that he's actually been convicted of killing anybody.
I'm always blown away by people's responses to child molesters. From his blog comments:

Good thing the cops have you cause I'd cut you in half with a rusty saw. Burn in hell bitch!
# posted by Anonymous : 1:23 PM


I wish someone would take you out back and shoot you like the dog you are...
# posted by Anonymous : 1:50 PM

I hope you die a horrible death
# posted by Anonymous : 12:40 PM

I hope you rot in hell!
# posted by Anonymous : 11:21 AM

Visit http://www.tuckermax.com/
Read my stories!
# posted by Tucker Max : 5:46 PM


There is quite a bit of interesting research out there concerning the gut-level response most Americans have toward child molesters. It's incredible - a profound hatred that overshadows just about every other committable crime imaginable. Men who rape pregnant women are given five year sentences while "sex-offenders" are simply killed in prison.
I understand the fear that parents have over something like this happening to their children, it is unthinkable. We seek to protect our young at a very biological level.
Child molesters need to be imprisoned and kept apart from the rest of society, potentially forever.
However - it is always interesting to hear someone rail against the death penalty until they are blue in the face, but as soon as they have an opportunity to single out a "child rapist" their visceral response is, "burn in hell you sick fuck."
posted by Baby_Balrog at 4:20 PM on July 2, 2005

I agree, it is creepy, albeit in a very Blair Witch Project kind of way. You see this character profile through his soliloquy-of-a-blog, you see (or infer) the end result, and your mind rather fills in the rest. It doesn't have to be a graphical description of the actual events to invoke that feeling. On the contrary, I think the lack of that makes it get under my skin all the more.

It's also the act of peeking into the mind of a man who seem beyond reform and defensively rationalizing all of his actions. It reminds me of Raskalnikov from Crime and Punishment, only...real. Of course, in that book the protagonist was testing the limits; this man seems far beyond that point.
posted by Sethamin at 4:21 PM on July 2, 2005

However - it is always interesting to hear someone rail against the death penalty until they are blue in the face, but as soon as they have an opportunity to single out a "child rapist" their visceral response is, "burn in hell you sick fuck."

Being against the death penalty and being disgusted by heinous crimes are not mutually exclusive positions.
posted by jonmc at 5:53 PM on July 2, 2005

..."find a job in a state where I am not required to register..."
Yikes.
posted by buzzman at 5:57 PM on July 2, 2005

So instead of giving the guy a jury trial the judge should act according to the wisdom of Metafilter. Perhaps Metafilter should also be required reading in philosophy, psychology and jurisprudence courses.

Butt two, I can't belive your unabel to speal, and that nobody's called the accused a meat-cleaving lickspittle.
posted by davy at 7:04 PM on July 2, 2005

If you name your child after sub-premium soda pop, Denny's is going to figure big in her life one way or another.
posted by Mayor Curley at 7:11 PM on July 2, 2005

So instead of giving the guy a jury trial the judge should act according to the wisdom of Metafilter.

who said the guy shouldn't be tried, davy? We're just trading opinions over the virtual water cooler is all.
posted by jonmc at 7:15 PM on July 2, 2005

On a given day in 1994 there were approximately 234,000 offenders convicted of rape or sexual assault under the care, custody, or control of corrections agencies; nearly 60% of these sex offenders are under conditional supervision in the community. The median age of the victims of imprisoned sexual assaulters was less than 13 years old;
posted by nickyskye at 8:03 PM on July 2, 2005

His nephew posted an entry saying "I know what you did". And the nephew,who is 18, has his OWN blog entitled "Knowing nothing, is Better..."
(Courtesy of my amigo damion via hintmag)
posted by postmodernmillie at 9:44 PM on July 2, 2005

If you name your child after sub-premium soda pop, Denny's is going to figure big in her life one way or another.

Mean. Anyway, the soda is named after a mountain in Northern California (South Weed, my favorite address in the US). Read about where the mountain got its name here.

Most likely the reference since the family seem to be very of the mountain west. A lot of kids are given names drawn from western geography in places like Couer d'Alene. I'll bet there are a lot of Shastas around the place.

She looks like a sweet kid, but the backstory here is a rather brutal life I think. I am *not* at all of the school that blames something like this on a kid's family, but the few details in the press make her childhood sound poor and hard, and her brother's, of course, in a way that's rather specific to western state rural communities. Now her family is dead, and who knows what hell she's been through. You know, in exchange for the entertainment value (let's face it) of a FPP about this story, we might as MeFites use our superb google-fu and look for a way to get a few bucks to people who will take care of her and make *that* a FPP as well. I'll work on it.
posted by realcountrymusic at 11:36 PM on July 2, 2005

There was an article on fark about a guy who almost ran into a 14 year old girl after she ran out on the road. He grabbed her arm to yell at her, and now he has to register as a sex offender, even though there was nothing at all sexual in his actions.

And then he'll be listed in the Google Maps hack that shows all the sex offenders in your neighbourhood. And then maybe a vigilante will torch his home. And in all likelyhood, he'll be driven from his neighbourhoods by his neighbours.

But it's all okay, because it shows we're thinking of the children.
posted by five fresh fish at 1:14 AM on July 3, 2005

Well, considering that all of her immediate family is dead, it's a hollow victory. It's not clear if her dad is around, but the rest seem to be dead.

Her father Steve Groene and older brother Vance are living and spent the day at the hospital with her.

The premise of Duncan's organization, The Fifth Rail, was that released sex offenders are hounded to the point that they cannot reassimilate back into society, giving them nothing to lose and thus making them more likely to commit new offenses.

Considering the kind of support he was receiving in college, where he excelled in computer science and even mentioned supporters who knew about his criminal past, there's two ways to look at this outcome: Police were rightfully dogging his tracks since his release, or his premise, that he wouldn't have reoffended if he could have made a fresh start.

My read of his weblog, with all of its self-pity, anger, and lack of empathy, suggests it was only a matter of time before he hurt someone again.

Though it's tragic that his weblog could not have led to more scrutiny before these crimes, he's left a case study of the thought process of a sex offender in the archives of that site.
posted by rcade at 6:41 AM on July 3, 2005

From the article:

Duncan's arrest record goes back to a 1980 rape conviction in Pierce County, Washington, when he was 16.
[...]
According to the Detroit Lakes, Minnesota, Police Department, Duncan was charged in early March with molesting a 7-year-old boy near a middle school in Becker County in July 2004.
[...]
In his 1980 conviction in Washington, Duncan pleaded guilty to abducting and raping a 14-year-old boy at gunpoint, burning the victim with a cigarette and firing the gun -- on empty chambers -- causing him to believe he would be killed, according to a description from the North Dakota sex offender registry.

And from his blog, in an obviously autobiographical fictionalized excerpt from a book he says he's writing:

It seemed to Jan as though the real intent of this hearing was to establish the innocence of society, by placing the burden of guilt completely on the shoulders of a fifteen year old boy. If Jan is evil, then society is pure and innocent, the proverbial victim, and order is restored. This young man has no excuse for his heinous behavior. Spit the prosecutor. There was that word again. Jan had looked it up in a tattered old dictionary the night before in his jail cell. It meant, "Grossly wicked or reprehensible; abominable." He had to look up the words, grossly, reprehensible, and abominable too. More words for drawing lines, separating Jan from the good people. The prosecutor continued his contempt of Jan, "Your honor, the people are afraid. We are afraid for our children, and we are afraid for our own safety".

Hell yeah, we are.
posted by jokeefe at 10:55 AM on July 3, 2005

Remains Identified as Idaho Boy
Officials Confirm That Sister Is Only Survivor of Attacks

Authorities have said they think he alone is responsible for the attack at the children's home in May. Kootenai County Sheriff Rocky Watson has said that the family appeared to have been chosen at random, but that the attack was carefully planned and that the motive may have been to acquire the children for sex.

Jeeebus. How terribly terribly sad. Dunno why the randomness makes it sadder for me but it does. Poor family.
posted by uncanny hengeman at 9:09 PM on July 12, 2005