Editor’s note: The following column is not appropriate reading
material for children. It is not for squeamish adults. It contains
graphic details of a heinous crime.
The case of 13-year-old Jesse Dirkhising continues to haunt me
since I first wrote about it weeks ago
— before anyone else in the national press.
The details of the crime in Prairie Grove, Ark., Sept. 26, were
chilling enough before I read more than I cared to read in the affidavit
filed the next day. This is not an easy story to write about nor read
about. Be warned.
Joshua Macave Brown and David Don Carpenter have pleaded innocent to
charges of capital murder and six counts of rape in Jesse’s torturous
death. The pair is charged with drugging the boy, raping him repeatedly
and killing him by asphyxiation.
If you have the stomach for it, here are the shocking details of what
the police investigation found.
About 5 a.m. on Sunday, Sept. 26, two patrolmen from the Rogers,
Ark., police department responded to a call to assist an ambulance crew
at the home of Brown and Carpenter. When they arrived, they encountered
Carpenter, who kept repeating: “He’s not breathing!” Brown stood in a
hallway, according to police, completely naked, holding a flashlight and
a telephone.
The officers observed a young, naked male subject, later identified
as Jesse Dirkhising, on the floor in the middle of the room, next to a
mattress. His genitals and abdomen were covered with feces. His mouth
was blue. He had a weak pulse, but did not appear to be breathing. One
of the officers noticed that his right hand was wrapped in duct tape.
When Brown was asked about the tape, he explained that they were just
playing a game.
An empty prescription bottle was on the mattress. Some pills and a
razor blade were spotted on a mirror at the front entrance. Paramedics
took Jesse to the emergency room where he was pronounced dead at 5:30
a.m.
During police questioning, Brown explained that he and Jesse
frequently tied each other up, though not for sexual purposes. But on
this one occasion, he said, he decided to sneak up on the boy, tie his
hands behind his back, shove underwear in his mouth and bind him with
duct tape. He then placed a T-shirt over the boy’s head, but checked to
ensure his nostrils were not blocked. After all, this was only a game.
He placed belts around Jesse’s knees and ankles to hold his legs
together. He then untied his wrists and secured them to opposite sides
of the mattress. He positioned Jesse on his stomach, placing pillows
under him before penetrating his anus with various items, including
three fingers of his hand, his penis, a cucumber, a sausage and a douche
bottle. Brown told police he also prepared and administered an enema for
the victim, using his own urine as a liquid.
Brown then positioned a cucumber so that it was slightly penetrating
Jesse’s anus and secured it with tape. He went to the kitchen where he
took a lunch break from his fun and games. When he returned to the
bedroom, he found Jesse was not breathing. Brown says he pulled the
T-shirt off Jesse’s head, cut the tape and a bandana used to secure his
gag and removed the underwear from his mouth.
Before calling 9-1-1, Carpenter says he attempted to administer CPR.
A search of the premises later turned up numerous small green pills,
various forms of prescription medicine, including the controlled
substance amitryptilene, a heavy sedative used to treat depression. Two
cucumbers, one covered in petroleum jelly, the other in feces were found
in the bedroom. A tube-shaped sausage, a crushed banana and a plastic
disposable douche bottle with applicator secured in place with duct tape
were found among numerous items used in bondage — belts, more duct
tape, strapping tape, handcuffs, nylon rope, a rubber jump rope and
electrical cord.
In the living room, detectives found a computer and related equipment
still running. When the monitor was turned on, a program entitled
“Medical Drug Reference 4.0” was running. A note written to “Baby” was
found. “Baby,” detectives learned, was a term of endearment Carpenter
used to refer to Brown, his live-in lover. The note listed three types
of prescription pills, advice on forcing someone to take them,
positioning pillows beneath a male subject in a certain way and a threat
to sexually assault someone for the next 14 hours. The note included a
diagram depicting a person on a bed, face down, bound in tape.
And this is where it really gets interesting. It appears Jesse
Dirkhising is not the only victim of these fiends.
Another letter describes seeing “Baby’s little 10-year-old blond
whore” at her bus stop in the morning. The note graphically describes
how “Davie” can envision “Baby” engaging in various sexual acts with
her. Another handwritten text describes a man giving a 9-year-old girl a
glass of milk with a drug mixed in and laughing out loud about it,
knowing that, in 20 minutes, the drug would render her helpless. It then
describes in detail the man having the girl masturbate and perform oral
sex on him.
Brown says when he had sex with Jesse, Carpenter stood in the doorway
naked and masturbated.
Just so you don’t think you’re safe from such monsters outside of
Arkansas, consider that the pair has lived in three other states in the
last two years and that Carpenter has lived in 26 different states and
has friends in all 50.
But, fear not. This is just a homosexual rape and murder — not a
“hate crime.” No. This was just fun and games that got a little out of
hand.
I’m pleased that since I first wrote about this case, it has garnered
a fair amount of national media attention. Maybe Jesse Dirkhising’s
death will not be in vain if it serves to wake America up to the moral
disaster it faces.
As I wrote last month about this case: “Remember how the nation stood
riveted to the details of a hideous murder that took place in Wyoming
when a homosexual was tortured to death? Never mind that the crime had
little or nothing to do with the victim’s sexual proclivities. Uh-uh.
That didn’t matter. This was a hate crime. New laws were needed. New
brainwashing programs must be introduced into the schools. New
sensitivity outreach projects were required by all media outlets. Bill
Clinton sounded off. Janet Reno chimed in.
“And then there was Jesse Dirkhising. There was no hand wringing, no
candlelight marches, no national news coverage for the 13-year-old
victim of homosexual rape and murder. No presidential proclamations —
even though the heinous crime took place in his home state.”
Jesse Dirkhising was brutally raped, tortured and murdered — for
fun, for thrills, for the hell of it, because it felt good, maybe even
because a certain politically protected lifestyle has been elevated to
virtual sainthood. Don’t expect to hear Bill Clinton or Janet Reno weigh
in on this one. It just wouldn’t be appropriate. It might offend their
core constituency. After all, 13-year-old boys don’t vote anyway. They
don’t contribute to political campaigns. They don’t march and demand
special rights. They are, politically speaking, expendable.
The end of Obama – thankfully
Jack Cashill