<p>soozievt - you always say it better than others. I do feel bad for others, but it hits home more when it’s a young college woman (I have 2 young daughters).</p>
<p>I felt compelled to follow this story for the reason you describe, soozievt.
It is not that I feel less compassion for any other victim of a violent crime, but I have the tendancy to put myself in the position of being the parent of someone who suffers at the hands of such a person , who commits this type of crime.
It is one of the "fears you don’t say out loud "
Everything is going great for my child, what if that was my child ?
The horror is unimaginable</p>
<p>Yep, I have a daughter in graduate school myself (and have two daughters ages 20 and 23). I was just at my D’s grad school. She works very very late into the night in her graduate studio and practically lives in it. I was surrounded by all these graduate students the other night. I was mentioning to my D about the missing girl (at the time) at Yale. There is a feeling of relating here. That is not to say that I don’t care about ALL victims of horrific crimes.</p>
<p>
Sorry, but now I’m annoyed. That’s certainly not what I was doing in noting the loss that the murder of this woman represents. I don’t “shrug” at all when I hear about the deaths of “average” women, nor do I need to be reminded that women have value even if they aren’t Yale students. I think you’re packing a lot of personal biases into that statement.
Who in the world said that? Besides you, I mean.</p>
<p>The thread’s about a Yale student, a young woman of, yes, great promise, who was cruelly murdered before she had the opportunity to contribute the full value of her life to our society. This thread is not the place to snark at us for recognizing Annie Le’s gifts.</p>
<p>It has now been confirmed that the remains are Annie’s:</p>
<p>[Medical</a> examiners: Body found in building is missing Yale student’s - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/09/14/missing.yale.student/index.html]Medical”>Yale student's killing 'completely senseless,' roommate says - CNN.com)</p>
<p>It’s hard to imagine what the motive for this horrible crime could have been. Clearly, the perpetrator is a seriously disturbed person.</p>
<p>Well, this is college confidential forum, and what most of us have in common - especially after retiring to the Parent Cafe - is children at college. We send our kids off to college and hope for the best. To me this is about a child who went off to college and met a tragic end. It’s not about Yale or even that the victim is a woman, at least to me.</p>
<p>D worked in that lab building last summer, in the basement.</p>
<p>Needless to say, she is slightly freaked out.</p>
<p>ilovetoquilt</p>
<p>We think about our own children at Yale.
We think about children not at Yale, at other universities, and those living away from home accomplishing other things.
We think about students everywhere, who just started the school year, full of excitement, hopes, plans, and ideals.
We think about how we worry about their communities, their friends, their safety, their well-being, their health in a world of H1N1, STDs, mono, and anything else we can’t protect them from.
We think about when we were students, how we felt, how busy we were.
We think about a serious student, running a work errand in the middle of the day in a building she knows well, with people she knows well.</p>
<p>We think about parents planning a wedding.
We think about our daughter being “Mrs. …”
We think about our son marrying a lovely, brilliant girl, and our hopes and dreams for a young couple’s happiness.
We think about our own excitement leading up to marriages and hopes for careers.
We think about working closely with co-workers, whom we think we know, with whom we discuss our personal lives and never think they could be planning an evil deed involving us.
We think how safe we feel in a secure building, insulated from the outside world, an environment of swipe-cards, access doors, security cameras, with people we work with for years.</p>
<p>I hope I’ve helped make you understand. It’s not that anyone is “shrugging about an average woman killed by her husband”. That is also tragic.</p>
<p>It is that this young lady could be our daughter. Or our son’s future bride. Or it could been any of us.</p>
<p>How could this have been avoided? How do we know?</p>
<p>I will be honest. I told my youngest child last night that before she goes off to college next year she will take thorough training in self-defense. It might not have saved Annie Le, but what else can worried parents do?</p>
<p>3pm press conference today. NBC’s saying it was a lab tech with scratches on his chest but authorities aren’t confirming it.</p>
<p>I too read that it was a lab tech, who was secretely in love with her, and killed her because she was getting married. This is so ridiculous!</p>
<p>In a previous post, I mentionned better security at Yale, and was dismissed. Funny that Today I read that when Yale lab open again, it will be with more security. So, there is room to improve security. Because a crime occurs, Yale is “reacting”. Noone seems to be “proactive” anymore.</p>
<p>How could any amount of security have prevented this, if the circumstances are what has been suggested?</p>
<p>What sort of proactive solutions would you suggest? Do we need to have security cameras in every room of every lab with someone monitoring them 24/7? I’m not sure even that could prevent a crime, though it probably ensure that the crime would be solved more quickly.</p>
<p>Knowing the nature of lab work, my dh used to go to the lab alone at all sorts of hours to “pass cells” and the like.</p>
<p>Its hard to know how the investigation would have unfolded, but it seems that having the cameras was a help in focusing the search. One wonders whether the questioning of the lab employees would have been delayed, and possibly less aggressive, without the indication from the cameras that she never left the building. </p>
<p>Further, if there had been more delay, the scratches on the presumed perpetrator might have healed up, and its not impossible that he would have had some ability to retrieve the body and dispose of it effectively.</p>
<p>I am assuming that this is going to be classified as a crime of passion/obsession…but if the guy turns out to have had a history, any mental illness, etc, that will not be a good thing for the university. </p>
<p>Truly sad</p>
<p>Last night I had nightmares about this, especially after reading the poignant NY Times interview with the hair stylist who was supposed to do the wedding party’s hair on Sunday. I just cannot fathom the pain of those two families.</p>
<p>It’s weird that two big recent stories have involved Placerville. The Garridos are in jail there, and now this, the murder of a young woman who attended high school there.</p>
<p>I honestly do not know what sort of proactive solutions are worth considering… but, I have often thought that a call center, 1-800-A$$HOLE was needed…perhaps with different options, press #1 if reporting a spouse…press #2 if calling about a boy/girl friend (current or ex), press #3 if this call is about a relative, press #4 if calling about a co-worker, press #5 if calling about a neighbor, and finally, press #6 if calling about a stranger…</p>
<p>sometimes we just need objective listeners to help guide us in our judgements… if this young woman had an “admirer” who was unrelenting in their ardor, she could have called and gotten some advice… ie never go meet them alone… or perhaps an even more urgent don’t go anywhere alone. </p>
<p>someone else here, on one of these threads, spoke about their time in their lab… and the long and often late hours while waiting on results etc… their words help convey a very visual sense of the vulnerability inherent in those doing research. Having worked for too many years in the computer field, the description of research resonated… because I too have spent long hours in a computer room waiting for software updates to finish… gone back into performance labs late at night to get results… gone to my car late also and have felt that sense of unease. I don’t remember ever really being in danger, but, the fear of danger was real. </p>
<p>There have been many online comments after the news stories about how vibrant Anne Le was in her short life… I hope her legacy is her vibrancy… that she will serve as an inspiration to at least one person to pursue excellence as she did.</p>
<p>By proactive, I mean looking at a problem from ALL angles. Obviously, those in charge to plan security of the building made it almost impossible for outsiders to enter the building. However, in their planning, they did not look at the worse case scenario: What if the perp is in the building. Believe me, it is not just this university.</p>
<p>Of course, Yale has stepped up security. Everyone is freaked out and it’s a way to help people feel safer and more secure and it would be a huge blunder not to step up security. I honestly doubt that anything Yale is doing now could have prevented this crime had they been doing it last week. They have no choice but to try to create a sense of safety. But if this crime shows anything, it is that, to some extent, a sense of safety is ultimately an illusion and that there is only so much anyone can anticipate. Based on the article Annie wrote, she was as savvy as any young woman about her personal safety. It seems to me that if she had felt this person was a threat, she would have stayed away. Of course, we don’t have all the details yet.</p>
<p>For me, this crime is deeply upsetting for a number of reasons. I worried about my daughter’s safety when she was at Yale because there is a higher crime level than at some other schools. But I never would have thought to have worried had she been working in one of the most secure, safest spots to be found in the area. For a young woman, to take all the necessary precautions while walking in the streets, etc. and then to be murdered by someone she knew in a secure location is an event that makes me realize that there is just only so much we can do to keep our children safe and to keep ourselves safe. Life can be brutal and horribly unfair, and an event like this punctures the personal fables that we often hold about being able to stay safe.</p>
<p>“… only so much we can do to keep our children safe…” That’s true, because of the information available to us. When I was researching colleges for my daughter, the thought never occured to me to ask how many registered sex offenders presently work on campus. So you are right, I did as best as I could to safeguard my child, except for this question that I should have asked.</p>
<p>The reality is that most women who are stalked, abused, attacked, or murdered, know the perpetrator. THAT is what is most frightening, in my opinion. How to protect our daughters, sisters, friends and ourselves from that scenario is often extremely difficult. Why so many men, of all ages, become violent in their personal relationships is an issue that is not addressed nearly enough, unfortunately.</p>