Albuquerque's Growing Murder Mystery: 11 Bodies and Counting

[tekisui]

Source: ABC News

The more they dig, the more bodies they find.

Albuquerque, N.M., police are preparing for what they say could be the biggest homicide investigation in the city's history as investigators look into who buried bodies -- 11 so far, including a first trimester fetus -- in the ground in a wide expanse of desert mesa.

"There are several people of interest … that the department is looking at," Albuquerque Police Officer Nadine Hamby told ABCNews.com today.

So far, only three of the bodies have been identified, the most recent being 22-year-old Michelle Valdez and her fetus. Remains of the 11th body were found Tuesday.

Valdez's father, Daniel Valdez, told ABC's Albuquerque affiliate KOAT that he reported his daughter missing in February 2005 and that as information about the rising body count hit the news, he feared his daughter would be among them.

http://www.abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=6965497&page=1

[bmbmd]

1. ABC News-brilliant as usual.

"University of Mexico (?) associate professor Dirk Gibson, who has written two books about serial killers and is working on a third, has taken an interest in the case."

Repeat after me, ABC. Mexico is a country. New Mexico is a state.

[tekisui]

2. And, how about counting a first trimester fetus in the 11 bodies?

I would have reported it as 10 bodies, one of them a pregnant woman in her first trimester.

[ColesCountyDem]

4. From the standpoint of forensic pathology, a body's a body.

As Jack Webb used to say, "Just the facts, ma'am".

:shrug:

[tekisui]

6. Would you call this a body, coming in at about half an inch?

[ColesCountyDem]

7. I'm not a forensic pathologist.

It's a term of their art/science, as THEY define it, so MY opinion is of no consequence on the subject.

[tekisui]

8. It isn't clear that the fetus was labeled a body by the forensic

scientists or the reporter. I suspect the latter. The former likely called it what it is, a pregnant woman, not 2 bodies.

[ColesCountyDem]

9. Neither of us actually knows, do we?

"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar".

--Sigmund Freud

Not every news story has to have political implications.

[tekisui]

10. Police count her fetus among the 11 victims.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29402299/

It is the police who count the fetus as a victim/body.

[ColesCountyDem]

11. No doubt relying on what the M.E. told them.

I used to be a deputy sheriff, and the Albuquerque police I.O. wouldn't use the term 'body' if the M.E. hadn't used the term 'body' in his/her report on the remains found.

On a side note, I'm not a pro-lifer-- I think 98% of them are batsh*t crazy, FWIW-- I just don't think that every news item necessarily needs to be microscopically analyzed for 'political' implications. OK?

:hi:

[ogneopasno]

12. I'm guessing the fetus was cut out of the pregnant woman, and "body" is the easiest way to refer to

it.

[ColesCountyDem]

13. Most likely. n/t

[Lost in CT]

5. I will always love the story about the Atlanta Olympics where Wade Miller tried to buy tickets.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9F0DEFDB1E39F932A15754C0A960958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2

It is just a joke, of course, inspired by one fan's experience with the Olympic ticket office. In February, Wade Miller, a computer systems analyst from Santa Fe, called the Atlanta Committee for the Olympic Games to order tickets.

The operator told him that she could not sell tickets to those who live outside the United States. Mr. Miller tried to explain that New Mexico is a part of the United States. It has been for 84 years.

He was passed on to a supervisor, who informed him that while she understood that New Mexico was a "territory," she still could not send any tickets outside the United States. Then she offered to give him the phone number for the Puerto Rican Olympic Committee.

[Political Tiger]

3. Has DICK Cheney spent much time in Albuquerque lately? n/t