When Being A Good Person Costs You Your Life

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MrsSpringsteen

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Should people still be good and help others when this is what they get for it? I like to believe the answer is still yes.


(CNN) -- A Texas woman was allegedly robbed and killed by three hurricane evacuees she befriended after meeting them at her church, according to Pasadena, Texas, police.

Betty Blair, 77, was strangled to death inside her Pasadena home Friday and her bound body was discovered by her daughter Friday evening, said Pasadena Police spokesman Vance Mitchell.

Three suspects -- all described as hurricane evacuees -- were arrested Friday evening after police located the dead woman's missing car through its OnStar electronic tracking system, Mitchell said.

The three had been hired by Blair to do odds jobs around her home, including cutting her grass, Mitchell said.

"Unfortunately, it looks like her good will cost her her life," Mitchell said.

Two of the suspects are teenagers who evacuated from Beaumont, Texas, in the wake of Hurricane Rita, Mitchell said. They were identified as Jimmy Hoang Le, 18, and Stephanie Jacobo, 18.

The third suspect, 43-year-old Roosevelt Smith Jr., apparently was a Hurricane Katrina evacuee from New Orleans, Mitchell said.

They met Blair when they sought help from St. Pius V Catholic Church in Pasadena, where she volunteered in the church's food pantry.

When police realized Blair's 2000 Buick, which was missing, was equipped with OnStar, they quickly tracked it and it was stopped at a Beltway toll booth in the Dallas area, Mitchell said.

The suspects were arrested without a confrontation, he said. Jacobo's 10-month-old son, who was also in the car, has been handed over to relatives, he said.

Blair was described as a highly respected woman whose husband, a former Pasadena school board president, died several months ago.
 
Attempting to help someone who may potentially want to harm me is living.

This act of kindness cost the woman her life.

People suffer to some degree every day when trying to be a good person.
 
nbcrusader said:

People suffer to some degree every day when trying to be a good person.


Yes, that is so true. When you try to be a good person some people will take advantage of you, disregard your feelings, treat you like a doormat. Sometimes it really can make you believe that the only way to get ahead in life is to not be a good person, sometimes it seems like those people get all the breaks in life.

Maybe it all comes down to being able to live w/ yourself though, in spite of how tough it can get

She died for trying to help others (albeit "people" who didn't deserve the kindness of someone like her), maybe that is a noble cause worth dying for , it's morally right at least. It is just so incredibly unjust and hard to fathom though.
 
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LarryMullen's_POPAngel said:
I realize it's wrong to think this way, but how can you not be more defensive and less likely to help others when something like this may happen? :slant:

Call it the cynic coming out in me, but I'd rather live than attempt to help someone who may potentially want to harm me.

yeah..I agree and its too bad isn't it:( Just this morning I saw a person either broken down or out of gas on the side of the road...it makes my heart ache to go by them but I did...it was 6am and it was a man withen a mile of town...but you just never know:|
 
How about the Katrina victems spending there money here in MA on strippers. We have had plenty of that going on here.

Nice use of tax money.
 
Well, when all people do is scream "you aren't acting fast enough," you end up with money going to places where it really isn't needed.

FEMA's reaction to the press criticism will costs us $$$$.
 
nbcrusader said:
Well, when all people do is scream "you aren't acting fast enough," you end up with money going to places where it really isn't needed.

FEMA's reaction to the press criticism will costs us $$$$.



perhaps if FEMA had, i don't know, not waited a weeek to get their asses on the ground they wouldn't be trying to make up for their justifiably ruined reputation by tossing money at the problem.

or perhaps this is another example of the Republican's utter inteptitute when it comes to governing?
 
I think it's simply another example of man's inhumanity to man..it has nothing to do w/ FEMA or the hurricane really

What is the likelihood that those people would have murdered someone in some other situation? Maybe the hurricane just gave them opportunity, I don't know

It's disgusting and discouraging, this world that we live in. Luckily there are still people who will help others in spite of the risks they face on a daily basis for doing so. When you really stop to think about how heroic that is..
 
MrsSpringsteen said:
I think it's simply another example of man's inhumanity to man..it has nothing to do w/ FEMA or the hurricane really

come on,
don't you get it by now


this is all code
we can attack the victims of katrina for deeds done by a few


(we really don't like them, those people, there shiftless and lazy)
 
deep said:


come on,
don't you get it by now


this is all code
we can attack the victims of katrina for deeds done by a few


(we really don't like them, those people, there shiftless and lazy)



and they all look the same anyway.
 
:hug: MrsSpringsteen.

What a sad story :(. That poor woman.

For what it's worth, though, I still say people should do what they can to help others-this situation turned out tragically, but I'd also like to think that that sort of thing is highly uncommon and that most people will appreciate one's help. I just think we really need more acts of kindness in this world.

Angela
 
Absolutely terrible. I can't believe how cruel and heartless some people can be at times. Especially since this poor old woman was just trying to help these people. :sad:
 
My life's goal from this day forward is to think of a SINGLE thread I could start that could possibly not degenerate into irrelevant agendas and irrelevant side topics, and I have to agree w/ nbc about the agenda issue. It sure seems to me to be using any possible subject to do so. It almost seems like it's picking on mine because I'm insane enough to keep banging my head against the wall in a futile attempt to discuss some different subjects around here..is that the deal?

If people don't want to discuss the subject at hand for whatever reason can't they just avoid the thread? Sorry, I am just struggling here to understand..

I should have just stayed away
 
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nbcrusader said:


Try and understand MrsSpringsteen's point instead of resorting to 2nd grade "he started it" arguments.



i've done both.

you did the derailing, the rest of us just followed you.

i think we all agree that this is a terrible situation. but Deep's point that it is wrong to paint all victims of Katrina with the same brush is germaine to the topic.
 
MrsSpringsteen said:
My life's goal from this day forward is to think of a SINGLE thread I could start that could possibly not degenerate into irrelevant agendas and irrelevant side topics, and I have to agree w/ nbc about the agenda issue.

What about an "FYM Favorite Color" thread?


Though, I think even that would degenerate into heated arguments over if red or blue is the best. :wink:
 
ack ... just wrote what i felt, but then deleted it.

i'm sorry the thread went off topic. i accept responsiblity not for derailing it, but for following others.

i should not have done that and i apologize to you Mrs. S.
 
Irvine511 said:

i should not have done that and i apologize to you Mrs. S.

It's ok and I appreciate your apology, cutie :wink:

I sent you an e-mail before I read what you just said, just so you know. Not that it's nasty or anything like that :wink:
 
Poor Mrs. S.:hug: Someday. Someday. We'll open up a bottle of champagne for the first thread that doesn't derail.:D Good champagne.
 
:shrug: We've had a Katrina evacuee family staying in our home for about 6 weeks now, and there's been nary a homicidal impulse nor carnal indulgence on either side. Disaster scatters the base as well as the righteous, that's just the way it is.

I was also involved through our synagogue in coordinating the evacuee placement program in our area, and yes we did work with government and law enforcement officials to screen all the evacuees first. Taking complete strangers into your home without benefit of a paper trail, or reliable firsthand testimony regarding their backgrounds, is always a bad idea. Especially when you're an elderly woman living alone.

But to suggest she was murdered 'because' she did the right thing is misguided. To paraphrase Faulkner, people are hateful to others not 'because,' but rather 'in spite of.' If this sickening crime turned an act of charity into martyrdom, then the cost of that turn rests on their heads, not hers.
 
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MrsSpringsteen said:
Could a mod please delete this thread? Thanks

I guess you may have changed your mind about having this thread locked since it seems to have got somewhat back on track. If, however, it gets off-topic again, and particularly if the childish "you started it" comments continue, I'll happily close it. Hope that's okay with you, Mrs S. :)

*Fizz.
 
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