A History of Violence

From the Other McCain we have a story of what happens when soft-on-crime policies become accepted in the Criminal Justice System, so called. ‘An Extensive Criminal History’

In September of 2014 he escaped from jail in South Carolina when he and another inmate overpowered two officers, beating one.

Jaremy Alexander Smith was recaptured in a couple of hours with the aid of K9 team.

Between 2014 and 2024 he amassed “an extensive criminal history in South Carolina.” Despite that he was one the street.

Friday morning, Marion County authorities issued a missing persons alert for Phonesia Machado-Fore, a paramedic who worked in neighboring Florence County. Machado-Fore had last been seen at her home on Tuesday and, the alert noted, she drove a white BMW.

Not coincidentally, at 5 a.m. Friday morning, about 1,500 miles west of Marion County, South Carolina, New Mexico State Police Officer Justin Hare “was dispatched to Interstate 40, near milepost 318, to assist a motorist in a white BMW who had a flat tire and was attempting to wave down other motorists.”

Cut to the chase. Jaremy Alexander Smith killed Ms. Machado-Fore and stole her car. When Officer Justin Hare offered to help a stranded motorist, Mr. Smith shot him, dumped his body, and then abandoned his car a few miles down the road.

That “extensive criminal history in South Carolina” includes...

taking hostages and rioting in jail; breaking and entering; armed robbery; resisting or evading police officers; auto theft; and shooting at or from a motor vehicle.

So given all that, The Other McCain has a question of for the South Carolina Criminal Justice System, so called.

WHAT THE HELL, SOUTH CAROLINA? Given his “extensive criminal history,” why wasn’t Jaremy Smith behind bars? Here you’ve got two people dead — a paramedic in South Carolina and a state trooper in New Mexico, because some judge or district attorney missed a chance to put this murderous lowlife away for 20 or 30 years?

There is more. Click thru.

For those of you who don't get the reference, A History of Violence is the name of a movie staring Viggo Mortensen - who you probably know as Aragorn from Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings trilogy. It was critically acclaimed, but it didn't do too well at the box office. I thought it was good.