CBEB’s

I was going to post a review of the Criterion Collection’s Special Edition of Fritz Lang’s M, but while dicking around on the web I was reminded of the shocking true story of a child killer that hits close to home.

Back in September, 30 year-old Hannah Overton was convicted of the capital murder of her four year-old foster son, Andrew Burd, and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

This is an extremely condensed version of the Hannah Overton case: Andrew Burd died on October 3, 2006 after being forced to drink two cups full of water mixed with salt, pepper, chili powder and cajun seasoning. After Andrew threw up from drinking the mixture of water and spices, he stopped breathing. Hannah Overton did not call for an ambulance. Instead, she called her husband, Larry, who came home from work. The Overtons waited over an hour before taking their foster child to get any sort of help. By then, of course, it was too late.

The details of the case are complex; Andrew Burd was what would be considered a “special needs” child. He supposedly had ADHD, an eating disorder and some severe behavioral problems. For example, in the days before his death, Andrew slept on a bed made of plywood because he defecated in his bed and smeared it around on the sheets. Furthermore, there were some heavily disputed allegations of physical abuse made during the trial. Defense experts say that the bruises came from CPR and hypodermic needles while the child was being treated by doctors; prosecution witnesses said otherwise. There was also some head trauma involved, with the defense claiming it had occurred in an earlier traffic accident.

I’m by no means one of these people who immediately shuts off their brain and reacts on a purely emotional basis when it comes to children. Given more facts, I could probably agree that Hannah Overton’s sentence is a bit severe, but I’m not going to lose any sleep knowing that she’s going to spend the rest of her life in prison.

However, there are a bunch of people who disagree with me. I find it odd that the first group of people to fall back on the “won’t somebody think of the children?” argument are the very same people who want us to forget that a four year-old child died.

Yes, I’m talking about Christians.

I shouldn’t have to make this disclaimer, but I will: I’m not one of these atheists who think that parents who bring their children up religiously are guilty of child abuse. While I think some extreme forms of religious belief cross the line, I don’t in any way think that being a Christian automatically makes a person a bad parent.

Now that’s out of the way, I gotta say that some of the stuff I read about the Hannah Overton case sickens me to the point that I want to grab someone by their lapels and scream “ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MIND?”

Rod Carver, the pastor at Hannah’s church is on record at (where else?) Worldnet Daily as saying:

For all the Christians out there, understand this, Hannah’s simple faith was used against her as the prosecution incessantly sought to make her out to be a religious sociopath.

Mind you, he’s talking about the prosecutors in that hotbed of Christian persecution, Corpus Christi, Texas. This is a city that has seriously discussed building a giant statue of Jesus in Corpus Christi Bay. This is a city whose name is Latin for “Body of Christ”, for fuck’s sake.

The Worldnet Daily article puts some serious spin on the facts of the case:

Andrew had an eating disorder of some kind that left him hungry all the time – even immediately after a meal. If he didn’t get more food, he would become quite agitated. She was told by someone familiar with such symptoms to add something distasteful to the child’s food once he had clearly had enough. First she tried lemon juice, but Andrew liked it. Next she tried Zatarain’s Cajun Seasoning. But he liked that, too. She believes she may have administered in food and drink one-quarter of a teaspoon to Andrew prior to his attack.

One-quarter of a teaspoon? Here’s what Dr. Alexandre Rotta had to say during the trial:

Then Dr. Rotta spelled out the sodium levels for the jury that were found in Andrew’s body.

The normal range is 135 to 145. Andrew’s was 245 at Spohn South and 255 at Driscoll. He also said one would have to eat 23 teaspoons of Zatarain’s Creole Spice Mix , or six teaspoons of salt to get a level that high.

A lot of people have a hard time believing that a mother would force a four year-old child to drink a concoction of food seasonings… not me. In fact, there’s a precedent. When a Christian mother needs parenting advice, what better person to turn to than Lisa Whelchel, better known as “Blair” on the 80s sitcom, Facts of Life? Call me optimistic, but I’d like to think that I live in a world where no one gives a fuck about what a washed-up child actress has to say about parenting, but Whelchel has other “credentials” that apparently qualify her to dispense advice on how to raise abuse children. For starters, Lisa Whelchel has spit not one, but three, children out of her vagina. If that’s not enough, Lisa is a born-again Christian. To top things off, her book, Creative Correction bears the Focus on the Family seal of approval.

Whelchel’s book is proof positive that there is nothing, no matter how offensive or ridiculously insane, that people won’t swallow if it’s published under the rubric of Christianity. Creative Correction is nothing more than a how-to on child abuse. I’ll admit that I haven’t read the book, nor do I plan on ever reading it. Take a look at the customer reviews at Amazon and look at all the 5 star reviews that complain about Whelchel’s advice being “taken out of context” (where have we heard that before?). Now take a look at some quotes and page scans from the book.

You know, if someone published this shit under the title of “Creative Correction: An Atheist’s Guide to Parenting” there would be riots in the streets. But stamp the adjective “godly” on just about any affront to decency and it’s almost beyond reproach. In fairness I should say that there are plenty of confessed Christians on the Amazon customer review pages and message boards who see the book for sadistic obscenity that it is. It would, however, be nice if Focus on the Family would admit they made a huge mistake in publishing this garbage. We know that’s never going to happen, though.

I’ll never know exactly what happened in the Overton home on October 3, 2006, but one fact stands clear: Andrew Burd is dead because of Hannah Overton’s parenting methods. It doesn’t matter why she gave the kid Cajun seasoning nor does it matter how much. What matters is that Andrew Burd died at her hands. What matters to members of her church, however, is that… well, that Hannah and Larry Overton were members of their church.

The Calvary Chapel of the Coastlands has set up a “Free Hannah” website that makes the mind boggle. Particularly nauseating is the “Fact vs. Fiction” page, which refers to Andrew’s death as “the incident”. They actually claim that Andrew wanted the Cajun seasoning. Great Fucking Christ, if I ever experience cognitive dissonance on this level I hope someone shoots me.

The “Free Hannah” movement is spreading, too. Under the category of “Persecuted Christians” (can you believe this shit?), the Reformed Covenanter blog has this to say:

Our brother Rev. John Otis (Westminster RPCUS) has requested prayer for the homeschooling mother Hannah Overton - unjustly convicted of causing her child’s death - whose has a hearing this Monday concerning whether there should be a retrial or the case should be dismissed.

The name Andrew Burd is nowhere to be found in that article. No prayer requests for Andrew’s biological family. No prayer requests for the inevitable future victims of abuse under the guise of “godly parenting”. They want Christians to pray that a child killer goes free.

Fortunately for Hannah Overton’s surviving offspring, there is no god to answer those prayers.