Post by Gregg Olsen

Like a toilet in need of a plunger, James Tait has floated to the surface and is back in the news.

Who is that? Saddle up and recall the man-on-horse sex case that made the news in 2005.

The former Seattle area man was convicted of trespassing at an farm where an aerospace engineer was fatally injured while having sex with a horse has just been accused of having sex with animals on a Tennessee farm.

That’s right. The most disgusting perv of all time…is baaaaack in the news. Doing what he apparently loves to do.

Here’s a snip from the AP:

James Tait, 58, was arrested and charged Thursday with three counts of felony animal cruelty in Maury County, Tenn. Kenny Thomason, 44, who lives with Tait, was charged with two counts of felony animal cruelty.

“They’ve been having sex with full-grown horses,” Maury County Detective Terry Chandler said Monday. “He [Tait] has been here for four years and it looks like it has been going on for some time.”

This story makes me sick. I have a feeling Mr. Ed would be turning over in his grave (to make sure he can get as far away from Tait and his ilk as possible).

Post by M. William Phelps

“We did this for a show,” Balloon Boy said during an interview only hours after the world watched and waited on pins and needles as the starship enterprise floated for two hours on live television.

Balloon Boy was in the garage attic the entire time, not in some field, spattered on the ground like road kill. He was scared, he said. Dad was pissed at him and the boy was, apparently, running from a good old-fashioned reaming.

The AP describes the situation fairly well:

Richard Heene and his family have never been afraid of the spotlight as they made a name for themselves chasing down storms, starring in a reality TV show and experimenting with a series of unusual inventions including hovercraft, a weather-gathering flying saucer and a rocket launcher.

They found themselves at the center of yet another strange saga Thursday when 6-year-old Falcon Heene vanished around the time that a homemade helium balloon floated away from their home, setting off a national panic as authorities scoured the plains of northern Colorado for the youngster. As it turns out, he was hiding in the rafters of the family’s garage the whole time.

The disappearance and sudden discovery of the boy have raised questions about whether it was all an elaborate attention-getting stunt orchestrated by the Heenes or simply a bizarre case of a child who ran away and hid after getting spooked by a scolding from his father.

Look, I get the whole “kids will be kids” thing; and I certainly understand that for Reality TV Families, it’s truly hard to match the hubris and ridiculousness of Jon and Kate these days.

That said, I am appalled at the notion that our culture revolves around the concept that you are worthless unless you’re a celebrity—and that if your star is not shining bright enough, you need to pull some sort of publicity stunt/hoax in order to draw attention to yourself. It used to be that celebs simply came out of the closet or checked into rehab to reignite a failing career. Now we have a new breed—the reality TV star whose 15-minutes, washed up career is in need of a pop culture injection to get them back in the game.

What’s frightening is, this child, just six years old, mind you, comprehends this dynamic!

We did this for a show…

I saw one interview with a Swap Mom who had participated in the wife swap show with the Balloon Boy’s family. She said Balloon Boy liked to drop the F bomb and curse around the house. She said he was fearless. That he and his family lapped up attention like Paris Hilton. That they all understood—clearly—that thrill seeking and a love for the unknown is what makes them a commodity in the reality television market.

Part of this is our own fault. We all watched at some point while that saucer-shaped apparatus floated aimlessly, and believed there was a child inside who was probably going to end up being killed on live television. Isn’t the idea that the boy’s safety was in jeopardy one of the motivating factors behind airing such an event in its entirety?

I purposely took note of how many commercial breaks Headline News, CNN, MSNBC, FOX and all the others aired during the balloon event. It was amazing to me to listen to these anchors cut from the chase to a commercial, using the question of the boy’s safety as a teaser to stop viewers from clicking back to “As the World Turns” or “General Hospital,” those midday soap operas that used curb the hunger for afternoon drama.

Crime Rant guest post by Steve Jackson

Author Steve Jackson's Latest

NOT LOST FOREVER is the story of Carmina Salcido, the heroine of the book and my co-author. I think it’s a truly remarkable story of survival and healing following the 1989 murderous rampage by her father, Ramon Salcido in the wine country of Sonoma Valley, California. Left for dead at three years old in the county dump—her throat brutally slashed—Carmina miraculously survived what is widely considered one of California’s most notorious crimes: the savage murder of seven innocent lives, including Carmina’s entire family.

However, Carmina’s troubles didn’t end there as she was kept in virtual seclusion in the rural Midwest by her adoptive family who belonged to an ultra-conservative Catholic sect, which she eventually escaped only by joining a Carmelite nunnery. Her road takes her to a work camp for troubled girls and finally back to Sonoma looking for the truth about what happened to her family and to confront the man who took away everything she loved. Her story is one of perseverance, courage and hope.

The book is something of a hybrid as far as writing styles. We wanted to capture Carmina’s voice–she has a remarkable recall of the horrible events that forever changed the rest of her life, as well as a unique perspective on what happened before and since. So much of the book is in first-person, or “through the eyes of.” However, the crimes occurred when she was three and hardly aware of what was going on around her in the search for and apprehension of her father, as well as his trial and sentencing to San Quentin’s Death Row (where he remains). So there are times when the book dives into dramatic narrative and “as told to.”

Carmina will be the subject of an hour-long ABC 20/20 program on Friday, Oct. 16 (check your local listings). I’ll be talking about the book on True Crime Radio (outlawcrime.com will take you to the link to listen via internet) Saturday, Oct. 17, 2 p.m. Pacific Time.

[Crime Rant Note: You can read more about Steve and his books by visiting his web site.]