Several years ago, way back when the list was hosted by a major university, we had a conversation about our personal brushes with death or encounters with killers or somesuch. At that time I related 2 stories about my encounters with people who had or would soon murder others. The unrelated story was about how I was almost "procured" for a famous serial killer.
The other story was about how I blustered and chased off a pair of guys who were threatening to beat the crap out of my younger brother in our frontyard. One of those fellows was one Max Soffar. I believe I also posted some link to the Department of Corrections webpage concerning him and his Deathrow status. To refresh, a few months after my encounter with Soffar, he robbed a bowling alley and shot all 4 people inside execution style, killing 3 with one person fortunately surviving. Sidebar: Last year I was working with a pair of fellows, they happened to be best friends since Jr High, and the subject came up. I related this story to them, they both looked at each other with a "should we tell him" look and informed me that Gregory Garner, the lone survivor of the robbery was at that time one of their best friends. It is indeed a small world after all Mr Disney. So What?: Max Soffar was given a new trial and was again found guilty. Punishment phase is ongoing at this time and it appears very possible that Soffar will once again sit on deathrow. http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/front/3676421.html I've told this story a few times over the last decade and a half. Giving consideration to Soffars possible innocence was frightening. It meant that the actual killers would likely still be at large. That would be tragic. Soffar being imprisoned unjustly for 25 or so years was only a minor consideration for me. He was a bad bad apple. He beat his mother with a bicycle chain (a highlight of his juvie criminal career). The juvenile courts ordered him to live in a tin shack behind his parents home (a nice home in a nice neighborhood he was court ordered not to enter), balancing the parents requirement to care for him and the need to keep him separated from them. In this part of the world a good bit of the news is devoted to people released from prison when DNA evidence proved their innocence or at least disproved the evidence that provided for a conviction. How many criminals are roaming free because someone was unlucky enough to provide for an easier conviction? In a town where our police crime lab was so inept (with regards to DNA evidence certainly and there is some question that convictions were "made") that every conviction over a number of years is questionable, one has to seriously question the results of every trial. It is a real mess. To be sure, Soffars original conviction predates the use of DNA evidence, and his guilt was judged on other factors that are generally considered to be generally reliable. But there is always an uncertainty factor for the purveyor of news and when the quality of criminal justice is called to question, uncertainty increases. I do not doubt Soffars guilt. My brother knew the guy, and he was a well know thug amongst the young people in Friendswood. My own encounter with him was enough to tell me he was dangerous. (Well......I thought it laughable that he and his obviously doped-up friend wanted to fight 2 guys much bigger than they were, and that, plus a lie about the imminent arrival of the police, it still took 5 or 10 minutes of heated jawjacking to convince him to leave......put a gun in his hands I doubt it would have been so easy) Some pictures: http://ccadp.org/maxsoffar.htm http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/statistics/deathrow/drowlist/soffar.jpg He looks just like I remember him. xponent Many Hits Maru rob _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
