The Kyron Horman abduction at the 8-week mark

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—

I am feeling a great deal of empathy for the family of Kyron Horman, who spoke at a press conference today, eight weeks after their 7-year-old son was abducted.

Eight weeks after my four children disappeared from Oregon 14 years ago, my lawyer was able to obtain a PO Box number in Eden, Utah. It was our first clue to the general location of my children, somewhere in the mountains east of Ogden.

I later learned that mail was being received there, but not actually picked up by anyone, and that the letters I had been writing to my children's mother's last address were actually being forwarded to a woman in Hillsboro, a person named Evelyn Taylor.

By then, I had already learned that several people were involved in the kidnapping, that it had been in the works for months.

I learned even later that it is not illegal to receive mail intended for abducted children.

Later still, I learned that more than 200,000 US children are abducted by family members or persons known to the victims every year, and that the majority involve multiple perpetrators.

You learn these things one at a time when your children disappear.

A lot of numbness sets into your bones at the eight-week mark. The world feels completely empty.

And it stays that way.

Parental abduction wisdom, pt 9: When the police figure it out

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon--

The Multnomah County Sheriff’s Office announced yesterday, more than 50 days after Kyron Horman disappeared, that they were now convinced that a crime had taken place in the disappearance of Kyron Horman.

While it took law enforcement more than a month to decide that the disappearance of a 7-year-old child was a criminal matter, Kyron's family knew it right away.

When your child disappears, like mine did 14 years ago, you know right away that a crime has been and is being committed. Sometimes the police never figure it out….

Most of us who are parents knew by the end of the first day Kyron went missing that a crime had been committed, somewhere, somehow, by someone.

This child was not lost, had not wandered off on his own, this child had been taken, whether by a stranger or by a person known to the child, we did not know, but what we knew for certain was that a crime was being committed against this child and against this child’s family.

ALL of us who are parents of kidnapped children, parents of children who have vanished with or without a trace, we knew right away.

The police needed more than a month to come to that conclusion, in a case as obvious as Kyron Horman's.

They are MUCH slower when the issues aren't so clear-cut, like when the children have vanished along with a parent or family member.

The police will take reports of missing children and there’s a filing system for those reports, where they usually wind up.

But if a family member, if a parent is gone with the child(ren), then local law enforcement rarely forwards the report on to the Oregon State Police, which explains why so few abducted children are ever listed on the OSP website, which also explains why the Sheriff’s Office is unaware of any other children missing in Oregon “that meet the criteria.”

Many of those children are gone forever.

And that’s a crime, the same crime that began on the day each child disappeared, a continuing crime, crimes with beginnings but no end.

Try to tell them that when your child disappears, you'll see....

Parental abduction wisdom, pt 8: To murder the soul

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—

Former Portland police detective C.W. Jensen recently gave his opinion regarding the presumptive motive for the abduction of Kyron Horman:

“If you are really, really angry at someone, you can kill them, or you can kill their soul by taking their child away, and that’s what I’m afraid happened here.”

Every year, more than 200,000 US children are abducted by family members or persons known to the victims. The crime is horrific, but only a tiny percentage receive any attention by the media, the public or law enforcement.

In all of these cases, the abductors intend to murder the soul of the victim parent by causing their child to disappear, and are willing to murder the soul of the child victim as collateral damage.

High-conflict custody battles are common; parents use their children as weapons in far too many cases, but the abduction of a child is indeed tantamount to murder.

When my four children disappeared on February 12, 1996, 14 years ago, kidnapped by my former wife and a group of Mormon officials in three states, no one was interested. Four children vanished. Zero interest. Ho hum.

My former wife wanted to murder my soul, and was willing to put our children through hell to do so; the Mormons that Kory and Chris Wright organized to carry out the abduction wanted to re-engineer my children’s personalities, at a cost to my family that was irrelevant to them, and through a process that led to the death of my son Aaron Cruz.

Those Mormons included Evelyn Taylor and Mormon Bishop David Holliday in Washington County, Mormon Bishop Donald Taylor in Clark County and Utah resident Steve Nielson, who would become my former wife’s fourth husband, who I would later learn slapped my children around throughout their marriage.

Retired Portland police commander Cliff Madison, interviewed today about the Kyron Horman case, made a comment that resonated with my experience, referring to the revelation that Terri Horman, Kyron’s stepmom, might be involved in the 7-year-old’s disappearance:

“They’ve just been hit with a big right hook, because all of a sudden the possibility of someone within the family being involved. It is a shock, because we all refuse to believe that until it is thrown in our faces.”

It is that refusal to believe, on the part of law enforcement, the media and the public, on the part of the courts, that refusal to believe that a family member would kidnap a beautiful child, that stands in the way of recovery and of achieving justice in many, many cases.

That refusal to believe that a family member would do such a thing causes the wheels to turn slowly, if at all.

In most cases, the family is entirely on its own. No cops, no detectives, no media, no public outcry…ho hum….

In the months and years that followed the disappearance of my children, I nearly died from shock, from grief, from bereavement, from depression and from suicide, when I had run out of hope and was overwhelmed by the pain.

My mother died four years after the abduction began, without seeing or hearing from her grandchildren again. That fact alone speaks to the character of the people involved in the abduction.

Remember that kidnappings are continuing crimes, crimes with a beginning but no end….

The abduction of Kyron Horman has thrown the fact in our faces, that a person in a trust relationship with a child, a family member, could inflict harm on this scale, and law enforcement, the public and even the media are getting involved.

There was a time when they could have expended just a little bit of energy and saved my family, could have saved Aaron’s life….

Now there is Aaron’s Law on the Oregon books, soon to be modeled in other states, and with it a drive to end parental and family abductions in this country.

I hope that they find some time to take an interest in that, too.

Parental abduction wisdom, pt 7: Complicated Grief and a Continuing Crime

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—

I began the Parental Abduction Wisdom series in 2009, but the subject was so painful that I had to step back after posting the sixth installment, “The Little Girl in the Blue Dress”, nearly a year ago.

Kidnappings are continuing crimes, however, and the damage to the Cruz family continues to mount with the passage of every minute of every day.

The present case involving the disappearance of 7-year-old Kyron Horman illustrates the concept of a continuing crime very clearly: the public generally understands that this child is just as kidnapped today as he was when he disappeared several weeks ago. The crime continues….

My experience, as the victim of a parental, family and Mormon kidnapping, has been entirely different. Few have understood the continuing nature of the crime, many have wondered at why I haven’t let the crime (and my children) go, and some have expressed frustration that I haven’t “moved on.”

I want to note here that each of my critics can pick up the phone and speak with their living children any time that they want to…and that none have experienced the disappearance of their child….

Before I saw the Oregonian article linked below, I had never heard of "complicated grief syndrome", but I realize that it attaches to cases of child abduction, like mine, which began with the abduction of my four children in a Mormon kidnapping.

Unlike deaths, time and aging bring no closure to kidnapping victims. There is no "coming to peace with it." Only the mending of the relationships can bring closure.

Kidnappings are "continuing crimes", meaning that the crime has a beginning but no end, not before the victims are reunited and the kidnappers see justice served.

I want Mormon kidnappers Kory and Chris Wright in particular to take notice of that last statement. The crime has no end. Justice…will…be…served!

So long as people believe that they will get away with abducting a child, they will do so. In the case of Mormon zealots like the Wrights, they will relish pulling off a child abduction, if the purpose is to absorb the child into their belief system.

More on this later.

I am reviving the Parental Abduction Wisdom series with this post. There is no end in sight.

Here is an excerpt from the Oregonian article on Complicated Grief Syndrome:

“We are built to love, biologically programmed to attach. To lose that relationship, as everyone does, is to meet sorrow.

“Early in grief, humans yearn for the one who died, until we recognize that search is futile. Psychiatrist M. Katherine Shear says this transformation occurs in the brain circuitry and we eventually come to peace. ‘Death is a part of life and we have the mechanisms to come to terms with it,’ says the Columbia University professor.

“But in the 1990s, Shear and other researchers realized that about 15 percent of the bereaved suffer ‘complicated grief,’ stuck in a loop of despair. Their longing for the loved one overcomes all other desires. They either avoid any mention of the dead or become totally preoccupied. They daydream about being together and have suicidal thoughts. Brain imaging shows their reactions differ from people who progress through the grieving process. Researchers want complicated-grief disorder and its treatment included in the 2012 American Psychiatric Association diagnostic manual.

“No one tracks how losing a young, healthy child in war can push parents and other survivors to suicide. Yet, complicated grief almost exclusively occurs after the loss of a person's closest, most rewarding relationships. Losing a beloved child is one of the most obvious risks, and losing an only child, greater still.

"’Debra wanted to be with Michael,’ George says, ‘Wherever he was.’"

The complete article is titled: " Measures of Sacrifice: Answering the call to military binds a patriotic Oregon family", here:


http://www.oregonlive.com/health/index.ssf/2010/07/measures_of_sacrifice_answerin.html

Father's Day 2010, child abduction and Aaron's Law

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon--

I last had a reason to celebrate Father’s Day 14 years ago, other than honoring my own father and grandfather, not since my four children disappeared into concealment in Mormon Utah in February, 1996.

Abducted children are never permitted to celebrate any memory honoring a left-behind parent, much less a holiday, and the day becomes radioactive for all its victims. No cards, letters, gifts or phone calls will get through in either direction.

Abducted children suffer the devastating loss of a parent, but are never permitted to mourn. My children were compelled to celebrate Father’s Day with a succession of three stepdads in three states, no trace memories of me or my family allowed.

The abducting parent, family members and other criminal associates involved in an abduction will work hard to destroy every emotional connection the child(ren) have to the left-behind parent, and with it any possibility of a normal childhood, of a normal life.

A kidnapping is a continuing crime, with lifelong consequences, and for many victims, like my son Aaron, life-ending consequences.

I have learned that I have a grandchild, name unknown, being raised in concealment in a Mormon enclave.

My son Aaron would have made someone a fine father, with his big heart and irrepressible good humor, had he been given the chance to live a normal life, to become a father himself.

I am working my way out of a five-year period of mourning the death of my son, and have begun preliminary work on the introduction of Aaron’s Law into the California State Assembly, gathering allies, planning, looking at legislative concepts that would increase the effectiveness of the law.

I have connected with the Polly Klaas Foundation and spoken with Marc Klaas,
Polly’s father and Founder of the KlaasKids Foundation. Both organizations are national leaders on the issue of child abduction. See for yourself here, and become aware of the issues at stake:


http://www.klaaskids.org/

http://www.pollyklaas.org/

May 25 is National Missing Children Awareness Day

Statistics from the U.S. Department of Justice help shed light on the problem.

Missing children

•An estimated 797,500 children were reported missing each year.1
•More than than 2,000 children are reported missing every day, but thankfully the vast majority of them are recovered quickly.
Non-family abductions

•An estimated 58,200 children were taken in one year by someone outside the family2
•An estimated 115 children experienced a stereotypical kidnapping, the rarest type of abduction potentially posing great risk of serious harm.3
Family abductions

•An estimated 203,900 children were victims of family abduction, where the child was taken by a noncustodial parent.4
•24 percent of these abductions lasted one week to less than one month.5

US State Department notes "epidemic" of child snatching

"Parental kidnapping is one of the worst forms of child abuse." --US State Department

The U.S. State Department has recognized that parental and family abductions in the USA are occuring at epidemic rates and provides information (see excerpts) through the web link below:

"Sixty percent of all children in the United States now spend some time in a single parent home. In these single parent families (354,000 cases reported in 1988), one parent has taken unilateral action to deprive the other parent of contact with the couple’s child, in half of these cases (163,200), according to one study, the intent of the abducting parent was to alter permanently custodial access by concealing the child or taking the child out of the state or out of the country."

"The rise in international child abduction can be attributed to the increase in marriages and divorces between bi-national couples. These marriages, by their nature, come with cultural, ethnic, and religious differences. The ease of international travel and the fact that many dual national children possess two passports facilitate abductions."

"When non-custodial parents resort to kidnapping, they believe they are acting in the best interests of their children. Although a minority of parenta1 kidnappers may actually save their children by taking them out of the reach of the other parent, the motives of most parents who steal their children are not at all altruistic. Parents find a myriad of reasons or self-justification for stealing a child from another parent Some abductors will find fault with the other parent for nonsensical transgressions; others will steal a child for revenge."

"Although most parents who steal their children attempt to justify their actions as the only way to ensure the best interests of the child, the child’s best interests are usually not considered. In fact, the best interest of the child mandates that parents ask themselves what the consequences of the abduction will be on the child. If parents had the foresight and emotional empathy of the impact of lying to a child across time and deriding the custodial parent, then they would not do it."

"Parental abductors have several common characteristics: the abductors are likely to dismiss the value of the other parent to the child. They believe that they know, more than anyone else, including a judge, what is best for their child. Second, the children abducted are likely to be very young (2-3 years old), since they are easy to transport and cannot verbally protest or tell others of their history. If older, such children, often manipulated, have colluded with the abducting parent. Finally, the abductors work with an extensive social network of other persons for practical assistance and to keep their whereabouts hidden."

US State Department: Parental child snatching "one of the worst forms of child abuse."

I hurried to my son's gravesite

By Sean Cruz


I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

Today was—would have been—was, and now forever will always be was, nevermore is, his birthday, and I would mark it with a vigil until sunset, with a vigil and a song, with a song and a lament, and with these words:



I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him flowers, a glass vase, music and incense, an orange

I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him photographs, dried fruit and nuts, and my blind Airedale Rex

I hurried to my son’s gravesite as the sun was coming up

I brought him a painted stone, and sips of tequila to share on his birthday

The sun was coming up



My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill



In the late afternoon came a grieving father

To a grave nearby came a grieving father

A son forever four lay beneath a marble racecourse

An oval with his fifty favorite cars embedded forever

Selected personally by the grieving father

Maintained personally by the grieving father

He worked in silence with his brushes and oils

The headstone cut racecar shape, a heart broken forever

In the late afternoon came the grieving father

Father of a four years forever child



Like a sailor who lies buried where he washed ashore

On this lonely knoll far from any semblance of home

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill

My son lies near the top of the hill

Among strangers he lies near the top of the hill


----------------

The vigil took place on March 21, 2010, Aaron’s birthday, at a cemetery in El Dorado Hills, California. The four-year-old’s father was one of the few persons to visit the cemetery that day, and no one came to remember my son but me.

I wrote this piece on April 20, 2010.

It was five years ago today, on April 20, 2005 that I received a phone call from the police in Payson, Utah, who told me that my son was found comatose and unresponsive there in his mother’s vacant former home. Aaron had a serious seizure disorder aggravated by years of medical neglect, emotional abuse and abandonment inflicted during his kidnapped years in Utah.

He was pronounced dead on April 25, 2005, and buried near Sacramento on May 3, 2005, a location convenient for his mother and her fifth husband, Aaron’s 3rd stepdad, a man who never knew my son.

There is no closure on a kidnapped child. The death of the child does not create closure.

The death of a kidnapped child only adds another dimension to the tragedy, to the trauma.

A kidnapping is a continuing crime, and so are its consequences.

Aaron’s grave lies no more than twenty miles from Sacramento, from the state Capitol, and it is there that I will seek the introduction of legislation making California the second state in the nation to adopt Aaron’s Law.

Watch me work!

Ancestors, Penance, California and Aaron's Law

By Sean Cruz

Portland, Oregon—

I arrived in Fairfield California on Monday planning first to visit my parents’ and grandparents’ gravesites and then look up some old friends, but my itinerary changed as soon as I arrived at the cemetery and saw the condition of the graves.

A pile of green glass shards, the remains of a broken vase left by one of her friends, lay beside my grandmother’s tombstone, needed immediate attention, and as I reached down to collect the pieces one of them bit me hard on the end of the finger, cut me so deeply it was still bleeding the next day.

“Ow!” I said. “Lo siento mucho, grandma. I am sorry.” Thus began a daylong conversation with my ancestors.

“Where have you been, mijo? What took you so long?” she said, silently but directly, pointedly.

“I am sorry, grandma. I love you.”

I know she was glad I had come, had returned home.

The Cruz family plots are located on a hillside in the old section of the cemetery, where the dense, irregular clusters of upright monuments and above ground tombs make upkeep difficult and more time consuming for the maintenance crews. There’s an Old California feel to the place, many of the names Spanish first and last, and there are many old shade trees scattered throughout and houses in the surrounding neighborhoods with red terra cotta tile roofs.

Blood on my clothes, on the side of the car, gushing out of my finger, sopping up the blood with paper towels, I cleared the graves where my grandparents lay side by side, where my parents lay side by side, where my beloved uncle Victor lay, he of the movie star good looks, idolized by all of us children, whose tire caught a patch of gravel in the valley one summer night in 1960, spun him out of control to an early death at the age of 26.

I had returned to Fairfield only twice in the last ten years.

Ten years ago we laid my mom to rest here beside my dad, who had preceded her by twenty-five years.

I came here for a funeral visit five years ago also, the day after we buried my son Aaron in El Dorado Hills, north of Sacramento. At the time of his death, I had refused to argue with my former wife over where Aaron would be buried, and she had chosen a place convenient for her and stepdad number three, who had never known my son, a story for another day.

This is an ancestor story, an elders story, a generations story, a story of gratitude, of paying respect, not the story of a young man lying alone on a hillside among strangers, a son as abducted in death as he was kidnapped in life.

I will get to that story in a few days.

The headstones all faced east into the warm morning sun. The ground was baked hard, the crab grass tough and difficult to dig out. I worked with the one tool that I happened to have with me, a folding shovel with a 12-inch handle.

I was aware that I could call any one of several friends and borrow landscaping tools, and a maintenance truck festooned with real shovels and other equipment was parked no more than fifty feet away, but I elected to work with what I had brought with me.

My ill-preparation was part of my conversation with my folks, particularly with my Dad.

“If you had thought this through, son, there wouldn’t be a problem with the tools.”

“Yes. You’re right, Dad. Next time, I will come prepared.”

The ground was so hard that the shovel was mostly useless as a digging tool. I adjusted the handle to use it as a hoe to chop at the edges, and I thought about that, too.

A hoe with the short handle. El cortito. The short one. Short hoes similar to this one had ruined the backs of countless millions of mostly-Mexican farmworkers before Cesar Chavez organized the effort that resulted in its ban, and I was reminded of how hard that labor was, down on my hands and knees as the sun rose on my back.

A couple of hours into the work, the hard ground separated the blade from the handle and I finished edging the sites chopping with the blade only, held between my two hands.

Tools hung in racks on the maintenance truck nearby, and friends were only a phone call away, but there was a certain amount of penance to be paid this day, and devices that would ease the work or shorten the time would interfere with the process and intrude on my silent conversations.

I broke for lunch, drove to meet old, old family friend Chuck Johnson for cheeseburgers and reminiscence. I had brought with me a Christmas card that his parents had sent to mine decades ago, with it a photograph of the Johnson family on it, and I had wanted to return it to them, this too in the spirit of paying respect to our elders.

I returned to the cemetery with bags of topsoil and live flowers to plant in the ground.

I had brought glass vases from Portland and fresh flowers cut from my friend Michael Iverson’s Sacramento yard for the graves, and I had brought a rock from the Columbia River, a chunk of basalt with my son’s name and yellow flowers painted on it to place with my parents, the grandson whose name now references Oregon’s Aaron’s Law, the only law in the nation whereby persons who abduct children can be held accountable for the damage they cause in the lives of innocents.

I’ll have more to say about that, too. With this trip to Sacramento, I began the work to see Aaron’s Law take effect in California. I brought several Columbia River rocks with Aaron Cruz’s name painted on them, and I place the rocks where I plant the seed of the Law.

As I molded the new soil with my hands, planted and watered the new flowers, completed my conversations with the folks, with grandma and grandpa and Uncle Victor, I was aware that this day marked a new beginning for me.

I will be back. Soon. Often. There is a foundation to build on here.

Family. Generations. Ancestors. Past…and the future.

My parent's headstone reads: "Sunshine, fresh flowers, green grass. Together at last."

That California sun spoke to me. I drove on those California roads and highways with the windows rolled down, just like in the old days, just like home.

Not Guilty!

by Sean Cruz

A Vancouver jury returned a verdict of Not Guilty yesterday on charges of assault and harassment stemming from my confrontation with my children’s kidnapper in the lobby of the Hilton Hotel last October (Happy Valentine’s Day!).

The outcome became a dicey proposition during pre-trial motions, when the prosecution successfully moved to prohibit any discussion or mention of my children’s kidnapping or Kory Wright’s participation in the abduction during trial.

The prosecution’s motions also disallowed any references to Aaron’s Law, or to the contents of the envelope (which contained a copy of Aaron’s Law), or of my motives for the encounter other than the embarrassment factor, or of what exactly was said during the event. Consequently, the jury only heard that there were “some papers” or “an envelope” involved, and never heard what was actually said or exchanged between my children’s abductor and myself.

Also during pretrial, the prosecution moved successfully to bar my blog writings or any mention thereof while the jury was present.

I’m telling you, it was really difficult to answer some of the questions posed when I was on the witness stand without crossing into forbidden territory. At several points, I was concerned that it might appear that I was avoiding answering some questions, when I was trying to figure out how to answer truthfully with the handicap that answering the question fully was not going to be allowed. I’m sure that worked to my disadvantage.

The jury never learned that my children had been abducted, which was the whole point of the encounter in the first place, to force Kory Wright into a courtroom where he would have to testify under oath to events that he had previously lied about.

The outcome I was looking for all along was a perjury charge against Kory Wright.

Ironically, the prosecution relied on statements I had written on Blogolitical Sean as their basis for pressing charges without ever telling the jury where the statements came from, since the blog writings were disallowed at their own insistence.

The language I had used to describe the incident was intentionally insulting and inflammatory, but was largely rhetorical. It was never intended to be a literal account of the confrontation.

I had written that I had both slapped my children’s abductor with the envelope containing Aaron’s Law and had thrown it at him, bouncing it off his face, but had actually done neither, although I had flipped it in his direction.

This was bait.

I was aware at the time that security cameras in the Hilton would capture the incident and thus I could describe the sequence of events with great latitude.

When Kory Wright filed his complaint against me using the identical language from my blog, “slapped” and “bounced”, I was extremely pleased. The language I had used rhetorically was being taken as a literal description, even an admission of guilt, which could easily be disproved.

After posting my description of the confrontation, I had felt compelled to call or email a number of friends to clarify that the slap was rhetorical, not actual, but otherwise let the writing stand unaltered as a continuing insult, just as an abduction is a continuing crime.

My next focus was to get the earliest possible trial date, to get Kory Wright into a courtroom as soon as the law would allow, and as I navigated through the process of hearings and conferences, representing myself, I never stated to anyone in the court system or to law enforcement that the language was rhetorical. I let it stand. I wanted to be taken seriously.

I was focused on my day in court like a laser beam, and very frustrated at the length of time it took to get there.

An unexpected complication arose when just before trial I finally saw the Hilton security video, taken from two perspectives in the lobby, neither ideal, and taken as a series of stills rather than as a running documentation of the confrontation.

The entire encounter, from start to finish lasted only 42 seconds, long enough to get through my brief talking points, serve Kory Wright with a copy of Aaron’s Law, and leave for my intended interview with a reporter from the Vancouver Columbian.

The stills, however, showed me with the envelope in my hand and then cut to where it was lying at Kory Wright’s feet.

I did not anticipate this at all. The stills showed an obvious heated exchange of words, me pointing my finger at my children’s abductor, but did not clarify whether contact occurred.

This caused me great concern at trial, as the prosecution sought to convict me with my own words, “slapped” and “bounced”, which I had stated to just about everyone, including a Vancouver police officer, who testified to that effect.

The fact is that I had indeed used those words to describe the incident… which was backfiring on me in an unexpected way…somewhere in here there is a lesson for me….

Kory Wright testified that I had reached out with the envelope in my hand and slapped him in the face with it. A bitch-slap encounter.

His witness testified that I had thrown the envelope and that he thought it had struck my children’s abductor somewhere in the chest. He was largely confused.

You really can’t have it both ways, although the prosecutor tried to prove that I had done both.

The bottom line is that the prosecution had to prove that an assault took place and that there was intent on my part to assault my children’s kidnapper. Same for the harassment charge.

My attorney, Mr. Blake Doré of Vancouver Defenders did a remarkable job. It gave me great comfort to watch him work. This man has a bright future.

The judge was tough but fair, and had an immensely likeable personality (ideal characteristics for the bench); nonetheless, I promised the Honorable Verne Schreiber afterwards that he wouldn’t see me before him again!

As for the prosecution, your narrow focus did nothing to advance the cause of justice. Every witness swears “to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth”, but you did your best to see that the truth did not get into the record or before the jury, and in that lies your only success. Choke on it.

POINT OF CLARIFICATION: The foregoing statement regarding choking is
meant rhetorically, not literally.

There’s a difference.

Lastly, the one point of satisfaction for me, apart from the acquittal, was to cause my children’s abductor to at last suffer a consequence for his criminal acts, even if it is only some embarrassment and time taken off from work to appear in court.

If he doesn’t like what I have to say, then he’s free to sue me.

I’m waiting for you, motherfucker.

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth…that’s my defense.

Count on it.

Max Cleland, depression, the cosmological constant and me

By Sean Cruz

Portland--Former U.S. Senator Max Cleland recently stated that his episodes with depression were more painful than when both of his legs and an arm were blown off during the U.S-Viet Nam war.

Quoted in his new book, he said: “…I go into a massive, deep, dark depression and I get to where I don’t want to live…When your brain is compromised, and your body is riding high with massive anxiety and you can’t shake it, it’s a terrible feeling. And you cannot concentrate. You cannot read.”

I know this part well.

By the time ten months had passed after my four children had disappeared into theocratic Utah, my depression had become so severe that I lost the ability to read.

Reading was my lifelong escape, my place to go in good times and bad and in every other spare moment, but the depression took that away. No escaping from this!

Reading (and writing) was also how I made my living at the time, working as a newspaper editor, and the depression took that away, too, by the end of 1996, ten months into this long nightmare.

The reading didn’t come back for more than a year, gradually, short pieces only, maybe a paragraph or two and then the heartache would take over again.

Loss of concentration, waves of stomach pain…hopelessness….

For any person, the loss of four children is a question of survival.

I had the honor of meeting Max Cleland in 2008, a quiet moment at Portland State University, where he was appearing in support of soon-to-be U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley.

I told him about my two sons, Aaron and Tyler, who I’d seen off to the war in Iraq, and how neither had come home, and he hugged me with his one arm….

The best part of many days has been escaping into sleep at night, even more important when reading is not an option.

But sleeping has its dangers, too…dreams of my missing children…they remain young forever…can’t quite find them…frantic, looking for them…heart pounding, high anxiety…starting to wake up…fighting that, I want to keep looking, keep looking…keep looking…try to rescue them…heart….

I wake up and the nightmare is real.

Every day, nearly 14 years now.

Sometimes the insomnia takes away the sleep and sometimes reading is difficult.

The only constant is the heartache, that never dims, infuses the universe like the cosmological constant….

My children remain out of reach….

Sleep beckons….

Cruz kidnapper confrontation earns commendation from judge!

See you next year, judge rules!
By Sean Cruz


It took 14 years to get Kory Wright, the organizer of my children’s kidnapping, into a courtroom, and that drama played out today.

The courtroom opportunity took place as a result of my confrontation with this criminal in the lobby of the Vancouver Hilton Hotel, where I slapped him with a copy of Aaron’s Law, Oregon’s anti-kidnapping statute…

…bounced it right off of his face…, telling him: “Oregon’s Aaron’s Law was written for people like you, motherfucker. You are served!”

Kory Wright was asking for a permanent Order For Protection From Unlawful Civil Harassment, which would restrain me from entering or being within 250 feet of his home or of Columbia Ultimate, his place of employment.

The judge heard me out…you lose track of time in there…she listened to me explain the Order for Joint Custody that had protected my children for four years…

She listened to me describe how Kory Wright, motivated by his rabid Mormon zealotry, had violated that order and criminal statutes in three states, but there had been no investigation and the statute of limitations had run on those crimes….

The judge saw documentation detailing Kory Wright’s criminal conduct…there was no question about whether he violated the law or not, that was easy to show….

The judge heard me describe my history of work on the issue of parental and family abductions:

My testimony on Kory Wright’s criminal conduct before the Oregon Senate Judiciary Committee and the Joint Ways and Means Public Safety Committee in 2003….

My testimony on Kory Wright’s criminal conduct before the Senate President’s Interim Task Force on Parental and Family Abductions in 2004….

My assignment, as Senator Avel Gordly’s Chief of Staff, to lead her workgroup on Senate Bill 1041 in the 2005 legislative session….

My 2005 testimony on Kory Wright’s criminal conduct before the Oregon Senate Judiciary Committee, the Senate Rules Committee and the House State and Federal Affairs Committee….

The 2005 passage of Senate Bill 1041 on a unanimous House vote…the bill became known as Aaron’s Law after the death of my son….

I showed the judge a photograph of my family—my children and I—taken before the abduction, and a photograph of Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski signing the bill into law with Aaron’s picture on his desk….

The judge asked me questions…What does Aaron’s Law do?...I described the law…explained that it provides an alternative to traditional criminal and family law procedures….

I described how both the criminal and family law systems had failed in response to the abduction of my children, and how common the problem is….

The judge asked me if there were any other legal avenues available regarding my quest for justice against Kory Wright (and the other criminals)….

I explained that custodial interference statutes have a 3-year statute of limitations, even if the children remain kidnapped, and that fact plus the inaction of law enforcement had allowed Kory Wright and the other criminals to escape justice.

I said that I had hoped that she would find Kory Wright’s conduct offensive and that she might order him jailed today on a perjury charge….

We discussed the fact that my “service” of Aaron’s Law on Kory Wright was an intentionally symbolic act, and not a legal process. I had not gone to the Hilton in order to get into a scuffle but to serve a document…there was a larger public purpose at stake.

I described my ongoing efforts to raise public awareness of the crime of abduction by persons known to the child or to members of the child’s family….

We talked about the Hilton confrontation. If he hadn’t smiled, I wouldn’t have thrown the envelope at him, I explained. He smiled, I threw it at his face….

After some deliberation, the judge handed down her order:

“Mr. Cruz, I see that you are an intelligent man, and I commend you for your work on these issues….”

She then ordered the Protective Order into effect until October 27, 2010.

Kory Wright protested…he was asking for a permanent order….

“You will have to file again next year”, the judge said.

Next case.

Looks like I will be seeing my children’s kidnapper again, this time next year….

See you again, motherfucker…!

I wonder how soon/often he is planning to set foot in Oregon…home of Aaron’s Law…?