The RECORD

Editor's Note: This column was written in 2005, and refers to an incident that occurred in 2003.

A fourteen-year-old retarded girl was abducted from the Maine Mall and raped two years ago. Three Nigerian immigrants were arrested and charged with gross sexual assault. Newspaper and television coverage was widespread and, this being every parent's nightmare, a lot of people heard about it. Very few, however, know how it finally turned out. I didn't know myself until the girl's mother, Laurie Stanley from Bridgton, called me. She was crying with frustration and asked me to write about it.

The Nigerians got away with it, essentially, and this fact was all but ignored by local media. Charges against Kingsley Nwaturocha were dropped. Dan Eneagu and Okey Chukwurah pled guilty to misdemeanor assault. Eneagu got a suspended sentence and two years probation. Chukwurah got a $1000 fine. That's it. The Portland Press Herald ran a tiny news brief buried in the December 10, 2003 issue, saying: "A Nigerian man accused of raping a 14-year-old Gorham girl in Old Orchard Beach last year has pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault charges and has been released after his attorneys said the man would receive a death sentence if deported."

The York County District Attorney's office contacted Laurie Stanley the day before trial to tell her that Eneagu would be killed in Nigeria if he were deported. Is that what you want? A woman from the DA's office asked her over the phone. As mad as I was that they raped my daughter, she said, "I didn't want that." I didn't want them to die. I listened silently. What would you have done?

"If they raped my daughter," I said, "execution would be fine with me."

Semen found in the girl matched Eneagu's DNA. A rape conviction would have been a slam-dunk, yet the DA's office offered a plea bargain on the belief that the men would be deported and executed in Nigeria if convicted of felony rape. That seemed suspicious to me. Checking into it, I discovered that a rape conviction is extremely difficult under Islamic law and it would have been highly unlikely for those men charged with rape in Maine to be accountable there. I called Eneagu's attorney, Nicholas Mahoney, several times to ask where he got his information but he didn't return my calls.

Islamic law, or Sharia, considers a woman's testimony worth only half that of a man's. Robert Spencer, author of Islam Unveiled, wrote in his article Rape in Islam: Blaming the Victim that four Muslim male witnesses are required for a conviction and that without these witnesses and a confession from the accused rapist, the victim will stand condemned by her very accusation: she wasn't raped, so she must be guilty of zina. Zina, under Islamic Law, is sexual activity outside of marriage. In Nigeria, women found guilty of zina are sentenced to death by stoning.

York County Assistant District Attorney Jeffrey Moskowitz negotiated Eneagu's plea bargain and I asked him if he verified the defense attorney's execution claim. He told me he called the US Immigration and Naturalization Service, but they had no idea about it. Then, he consulted an immigration lawyer in Portland, who referred him to a Nigerian in Portland whose opinion was that there was a good chance Eneagu would be killed. When I related what I had learned about Islamic law, he said I was comparing apples to oranges because Eneagu would have been deported already convicted, and would not likely be re-tried in Nigeria. When I asked Moskowitz if he thought justice was done, he said he had no regrets about how he handled the case and would do the same thing again.

I called the immigration lawyer Moskowitz talked to, an attorney named George Hepner. He said he didn't have an opinion about Eneagu at the time and referred Moskowitz to Najim Animashaun of South Portland. Animashaun is Muslim, a practicing attorney in Maine. He has also practiced in the UK and in Nigeria. He told me he didn't specifically recall consulting with Moskowitz on the Eneagu case either, although he might have. He said he often discusses hypotheticals concerning certain legal cases and does remember talking to Eneagu's attorney, Nick Mahoney. He told me it was very unlikely Eneagu would have been executed. Eneagu is not a Muslim and Islamic law is only applied to Muslims. He said though Islamic law is practiced only in some parts of Nigeria and death sentences are often made, they're seldom carried out. When I asked why, he said Islamic officials are afraid of executing someone wrongly because they themselves would be accountable in the afterlife if they made a mistake.

Laurie Stanley called me originally, not just because the men were never convicted of rape, but also because she read another tiny news brief in the Portland Press Herald that day last September about Kingsley Nwaturocha against whom the rape charge was dropped. He was granted $95,000 because he claimed to have been beaten by corrections officers at the York County Jail while awaiting trial. I was trying to get my daughter into a residential school to protect her because it was getting to point that I couldn't handle her, Stanley said. I was afraid she might go off with someone like she did at the Maine Mall, but the school wouldn't pay for it and the state wouldn't either. And now he gets all that money. My daughter was raped, bitten, and burned with a cigarette. They gave her herpes. She had to be tested for AIDS. She was robbed of her innocence, and he gets $95,000!

Stanley found an attorney willing to file suit against Nwaturocha, but he discovered that the Nigerian had gotten his payoff three months earlier and moved to Maryland. Believing the money to be gone by then and because it would be difficult to file suit in a state so far away, the attorney dropped the case. Stanley's frustration became unbearable and she wanted the story told. After seeing how everything turned out, she wishes now the men were executed.

My inquiries into this sad case produced as many questions as answers. Why didn't the York County DA's office scrutinize the defense's execution claims more closely? Why didn't they just enforce Maine law instead of worrying about Nigerian law? Why would the local media virtually ignore the plea bargain? Were they afraid of public outrage? Was it overzealous opposition to the death penalty? Why delay reporting the $95,000 settlement for three months? Was it sympathy for immigrants? Whatever it was, two of those men are still here, free to walk among us, and they don't have to register as sex offenders because they were never convicted of rape.

Tom McLaughlin is a teacher and columnist living in Lovell, Maine. Hundreds of his columns have been published in Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts newspapers as well as online at familysecuritymatters.com, realclearpolitics.com, freerepublic.com and many other venues. He can be reached on his blog at http://tommclaughlin.blogspot.com/

A bill that has Christian people ready to take out their pitchforks and head for Augusta is still bottled up in Committee. The Labor Committee held a very poorly attended public hearing on the bill on February 28, 2007. The hearing featured a carefully orchestrated 90 minutes of testimony presented by the most radical homosexual rights group in Maine. "Equality Maine" openly admits that this bill is the next best thing to same sex marriage. In their press release declaring support for the measure they write, "The ultimate, fairest, and simplest solution will be for same sex couples and their families to have ... marriage." Nobody testified in opposition.

League Executive Director Michael Heath submitted written testimony on Wednesday, March 7, 2007. The bill is not yet scheduled for a work session. It is still in Committee.

Heath opened his written testimony acknowledging, "I did not attend the public hearing." He continued. "Given the majority party's obvious disdain for the will of the people on matters related to sexual orientation, I was of two minds about appearing at the hearing on Wednesday, February 28, 2007. I'm certain that nobody in the Legislature would interpret my failure to speak as support for this measure. It may, however, have been interpreted by some to be a lack of resolve."

Some people have suggested the bill deserves support because nobody is opposed. Heath observed, "Additionally, I understand that some people may be using my absence as reason to support this bill. This is shameful. The bill is bad no matter what the League, or I, say about it. Legislators have a duty to make up their own minds according to their lights, just as I have a duty to accurately convey the mind of the League."

Heath wrote with emphasis, "I wish to reassure you regarding my views. If you interpreted by absence as lack of resolve, you are mistaken."

While only a few couples and individuals testified in support of the bill at the hearing, 68 people have used the League's Citizen Action Center to email decision makers on the bill. They have sent a total of 1,049 emails to members of the Labor Committee, the Governor, groups that are supporting the bill, and their own House and Senate members.

Equality Maine has declared that this bill is their highest priority this session. The Roman Catholic Diocese is supporting the bill as written, even though the definition of "domestic partnership" clearly includes "same sex couples." The Chancery put out a statement in which they offered a "point of information." They said that they do not support having the phrase "domestic partners" refer to "same sex couples."

The bill not only covers same sex couples, it forces businesses to honor intentionally fatherless (or motherless) parenting. The bill states that employers MUST provide leave from work to an employee at the birth of the lesbian partner's child, and when children under the age of 16 are placed in the home of transgendered men. The Maine Chamber of Commerce supports this bill.

Gary L. Morella, a research assistant at Penn State asks, "What kind of lunacy permeates the Maine Chancery to support a bill like this?"

Morella continues, "Where a clear voice is called for on the part of a Catholic witness to the Truth, Who is Christ, instead we get obfuscation playing right into the hands of the devil's disciples."

One supporter of the League sent a letter to 43 of her friends urging them to contact their Legislator on this bill. She quoted League director Mike Heath, "The real reason for this bill is to create a successful court case in the future for homosexuality. Same-sex marriage is the pot full of gold at the end of their rainbow. This bill will continue to lay the foundation for equality of sexual practices if it becomes law."

Maine's Catholic Chancery confirmed on its website today that it supports a bill that is the top priority of Maine's most radical homosexual rights group, Equality Maine. Hundreds of emails have been directed at the Chancery spokesman, Marc Mutty, in the past few days. While Mutty has ignored emails from the League for comment, the Chancery published a clarification of its position in support of "LD 375, An Act to Amend the Family Medical Leave Act."

The Chancery's written clarification repeats their view that Equality Maine's support is "incidental" to the purpose of the bill. The statement goes on to allow, "As a point of information, the diocese does not endorse the use of the term 'domestic partners' to refer to 'same sex couples.'"

League Executive Director Michael S. Heath observed, "The problem with Mr. Mutty's point of information is that the bill does exactly what he says they don't support. Unless the Chancery wants to propose an amendment immediately the League calls on them to withdraw their support of LD 375 by sending a letter to the members of the Labor Committee outlining the detail of their amendment."

The Chancery supported "gay rights" in 2005. Had the Chancery accepted the League's invitation to join the "Coalition for Marriage" that year Maine would not now be vulnerable to court action forcing same sex marriage or civil unions.

"What person in his right mind doesn't believe that there isn't some liberal judge in Maine that is going to connect all these legal dots at some point here and force same sex marriage." Said Heath. "It is tragic, really awful, what the Chancery is doing ... very disappointing. All they are doing is confusing people. Shame on them."

By Mike Hein

Heath proclaims "major victory" for decent Mainers

Article 11, a proposed ordinance seeking to effectively decriminalize marijuana-related offenses, was soundly voted down this past weekend at the annual West Paris Town Meeting. The vote itself has been officially reported by the Town Moderator, Vern Maxfield, at zero votes in favor of the article offered by the fledgling Maine Marijuana Policy Initiative. Others in attendance report that as many as a dozen town residents voted for the article, but there is a consensus that approximately 80 votes were recorded in opposition to the measure.

The news of this lopsided defeat was greeted gleefully by both the League and by West Paris-area pastors. League Executive Director Mike Heath proclaimed, "This is a major victory for decent, law-abiding Mainers. The League has fought vice like this for 110 years, and although this stunning vote is heartening, we must remain vigilant in our temperance efforts." Heath nostalgically concluded, "I am confident that somewhere in Heaven, Ben Bubar is smiling his famous smile [about this]." Ben Bubar, Jr. was the League's leader for over three decades until 1984, and was a prominent national and local leader in the drug and alcohol temperance movement.

Local pastors echoed Heath's sentiments. Pastor Bruce Tyner leads the First Baptist Church in neighboring Rumford and attended the town meeting as a resident of West Paris. "I was really happy that our town refused to give [the initiative's leader] a platform for notoriety. The vote in opposition to his speaking was as one-sided as the final vote," said Pastor Tyner the day of the meeting. "It's good to be a citizen of West Paris today." Pastor Dallas Henry, who leads Hosanna New Testament Church in neighboring Oxford, said, "The purpose behind this initiative was to do the same thing that the homosexual movement has done [in Maine] in the past, which is to normalize immoral behavior, in this case, marijuana smoking. The West Paris voters were not fooled by this effort by out-of-towners. It is encouraging to see people stand up for what is good, right, and proper."

West Paris resident Sandra Poland stated succinctly the thoughts of the community at the town meeting, "This is wrong for our children and wrong for the town."

The first-of-its-kind pro-pot idea was met with significant local mainstream media attention when first announced late last year. As recently as two days before the town meeting was held, Cape Elizabeth columnist and erstwhile pundit Jim Brunelle was arguing in favor of the legalization of marijuana in Maine and this ordinance. Brunelle wrote on March 1, This ordinance' passage could send a small message to Augusta that there is grassroots sentiment in Maine for pot law reform and that the issue needs to be discussed seriously at the state level.

"It seems that the good people of West Paris have clearly spoken," maintained Heath, "and they have strongly voted on the side of law enforcement and the Biblical principle of temperance. It seems also that they have rejected the elite leftist arguments of people like Brunelle for the legalization of harmful drugs like marijuana. This small town in Maine has sent a message alright, but not the message that the dope peddlers and their apologists wanted."

The MMPI has stated publicly that it is targeting Maine towns to push local ordinances that make marijuana criminal offenses the "lowest law enforcement priority in town." The towns of Sumner, Paris, and Farmington are their current focus regarding the effective decriminalization of these drug offenses. Sumner is scheduled to have a public hearing on March 27 regarding a proposed ordinance of this nature, followed by a possible town vote on the proposed ordinance this June.

1. What are "domestic partnerships?"

The more accurate phrase is homosexual partnerships. The phrase "domestic partner" is a legal fiction created by homosexuals and non-married people who think they are entitled to the same benefits and recognition from society that marriage receives.

2. Are the ten weeks of leave provided in LD 375 paid or unpaid?

While the ten weeks of leave are unpaid, it is forced on the employer by the government as an unfunded mandate. The employer must provide the ten weeks, and the employer must hire the employee back after the leave.

Maine's economic system is built on FREE enterprise. We honor our businesses here by not babysitting them. Justice does not require government's intervention in this matter. While the leave is unpaid, it is not without cost. The employer has to do something during those ten weeks. While it MAY BE legitimate for government and business to honor an employee's spouse and children with this benefit, it is not right for our institutions to honor sodomy in this way. The practice of unhealthy lifestyles should not qualify anyone for societal benefits.

3. How are these special rights instead of equal rights?

Anytime a law like this fails to distinguish between civilization-forming sexual practices and civilization-destroying sexual perversions, then "special rights" are being created. Aristotle said, "Injustice arises when equals are treated unequally, and when unequals are treated equally." There is nothing "equal" about pretending that something evil is good, or vice versa. There is, however, something very "special" (in the negative sense of that word) about these particular "rights."

4. What is the real reason for this bill?

It is designed to create a successful court case in the future for homosexuality. Same-sex marriage is the pot full of gold at the end of their rainbow. This bill will continue to lay the foundation for equality of sexual practices if it becomes law. Moral sex must be equal to immoral sex for the public to accept same-sex marriage. That is what this bill is about: giving immoral sex the same support as moral sex in the law. If this were not the case, then a prohibition of immoral sexual practices would be included in the definition of "domestic partner." It is not. Therefore, this bill is unjust ... and certainly not Christian.

5. Does the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Portland (ME) support "domestic partnerships"?

Yes.

6. This bill allows elderly sisters to get benefits, therefore it will be a proper law if passed, correct?

A square stop sign painted pink instead of red is still a stop sign. It is not, however, a lawful stop sign simply because the sign features the word "Stop." A lawful stop sign is a red hexagon, by law. If businesses and the state want to honor elderly celibate sisters with 10 weeks of unpaid leave then they should say that this is what they want to do. That isn't what they are saying. They are saying that immoral and unhealthy sexual practices are irrelevant to the definition of "partner" and couple.

The goal here is same-sex marriage. Make no mistake. This is like the state saying that the color and shape of a stop sign are irrelevant to the effectiveness of a stop sign. It is like allowing the road department to put up square pink stop signs as well as normal stop signs. This is redefining and making a wreck out of family and marriage in Maine.

7. Why didn't the League testify at the Legislative public hearing?

There is no law compelling the League to appear at any committee's public hearing. Mainers know that these hearings, especially on matters related to common sense sexual matters, are a waste of time. The forces of our culture that wish to paganize our laws control the process. People have figured that out. That is why only one person submitted testimony in opposition to this bill at the hearing.

Is it possible for any sane person to believe that this bill would be a good law simply because the homosexuals organized an impressive sounding 90 minutes of testimony in front of a closed-minded legislative committee? This is the same committee and legislature (mostly) that endorsed a completely unqualified lobbyist to serve as Labor Commissioner. Laura Fortman's only qualification was years of lobbying for abortion rights as head of the ultra-leftist Maine Women's Lobby.

The League is smart enough to know that the only hope of change rests with the people of Maine. If they choose to remain silent, no amount of back-slapping and testifying under the Capitol Dome is going to bring about a course correction.

8. Why does this bill sound so good in my local newspaper and on the television news?

Because the media is liberal. In Maine, it is ultra-liberal. The media is no different than any other group: like begets like. For decades the media has been populating itself with people who are politically liberal. New England is the most liberal region in the nation. This is not a conspiracy, it is human nature.

The media is no more about balance and objectivity than the idea of same-sex marriage is about marriage. The herd instinct is powerful. Maine's media is herding anyone who listens to it toward a hellish oblivion where marriage means men who have sex with each other can raise children to never know a mother. If that makes sense to you, then you need to become a journalist, or a politician.

9. I thought I elected a representative who would think for himself. Why is the media so powerful?

Many politicians often think about the next election. Many are hoping to be elected to higher office. As America has moved away from common sense on matters related to family, marriage and human sexuality -- and as we have decided to create a much more permissive culture -- those among us who wish to be powerful learn quickly that they must accept drinking, drugging, gambling and pansexuality.

It is not necessary for a culture to be permissive and promiscuous in order to be free. Politicians need the media (and vice versa) in order to hold onto their power. Those who are involved tend to be less interested in positive change than they are interested in power. This is human nature. We are all fallen creatures. We long for the peace of Eden, but we aren't going to have it in this world -- especially if we take a public stand against sin.

The Christian who can accept political martyrdom is the Christian who will help bring about change for the better in Maine. There weren't a whole lot of Davids when Goliath was taunting Saul's army. There was only one. And he didn't cut a deal, remain silent, or form a private club.

10. What about the Christian Church? Shouldn't the Church be helping people?

The Church has been sent to the back of the bus by science. Consequently, it has developed a slave mentality in this culture. In some ways, it has lost its capacity to stand up as an institution and declare the righteousness of God. This prophetic role falls all too often to individual Christians who care for their neighbor. They don't care only about their neighbor's salvation, they also care about their welfare. This elite group wants to speak publicly on issues in the name of Jesus, and in reference to the Bible. They understand that God's laws will not be mocked, and that God is the Ultimate Lawgiver and Judge. These are likely the truly artistic, scientific, political and decent among us. They are everywhere, but perhaps in fewer numbers where power and money matter.

It should also be noted that the Church IS helping people. The idea that conservative Christians are not helping people is another fiction created by hostile forces within the Church and the culture. The League's own Executive Director devoted the first four years of his career to living without pay among mentally ill and recovering people. He has said many times that he would welcome the opportunity to do so again, should God create the opportunity. Liberals tend, in our experience, to be the one's who are most vocal about getting the big paychecks (especially so they can help poor people), and avoiding what they call unfair sacrifices.