Looks like Obama's father.
Hey! Obama been laudin' that "don't let a crisis go to waste thing." I'm just trying to help.
Posted on 03/24/2012 3:54:08 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Her name was written in the thick murder book.
Three decades later Snohomish County sheriff's detectives came knocking on her door. She knew why the two men were there. The moment finally had come to share the secret she'd been lugging around since she was 18 years old.
She could tell them who killed Susan Schwarz.
The words eventually tumbled out. She had been in the small Lynnwood-area home in 1979 when Gregory Johnson grabbed a pretty, young woman out of her shower, tied her up and put a bullet in her head.
Johnson, then 26, looked up to find his teenage girlfriend in the room. He shot the victim again.
"It's that easy. This is what happens to people who (expletive) with my life," the woman recalled Johnson saying, the gun still gripped in his hand.
The teen had already felt the rage of his fists. The threats he made against her family pounded any courage out of her. She would be to blame if they got hurt, he said. Fear bought her silence.
Then last year, two dogged detectives asked her to tell the truth and give a grieving family answers.
"I had this immense sense of relief," the woman told The Herald (http://is.gd/ic74Qc) last week.
The Herald is not naming the woman, now 50. She is considered a witness to a violent crime and prosecutors refer to her only by her initials in court papers.
A Snohomish County judge on Friday sentenced Johnson to a minimum of 24 years in prison for the death of Susan Schwarz. The Seattle ex-con, 58, pleaded guilty in January to second-degree murder, finally admitting that he was responsible for the slaying.
Because the murder happened two years before the state Sentencing Reform Act, Johnson's fate ultimately lies with the state's Indeterminate Sentencing Review Board. They will decide if he ever walks out of prison again.
Prosecutors believe that Johnson killed Schwarz out of revenge. He blamed her for meddling in his marriage.
Schwarz, 24, was a high school friend of Johnson's estranged wife. The woman had confided in Schwarz that her husband beat her. Schwarz helped her friend move into a shelter until the woman could leave the state with the couple's young son. The woman later returned to Washington and spent time with Schwarz in the weeks before the murder.
Back then detectives listed Johnson as a suspect. They took down the names of people in his circle, including his then-girlfriend. Over the years, Johnson was questioned at least twice about the homicide. The first time he told investigators he'd been fishing with his brother in Edmonds the day of the shooting. Police were unable to confirm his alibi. About seven years later, detectives questioned him again while he was in prison for robbery. He implicated his brother in the murder.
At the time, there wasn't enough evidence to prosecute either man, sheriff's cold case detective Patrick VanderWeyst said.
VanderWeyst joined the cold case squad in 2010. Teamed up with veteran detective Jim Scharf, the homicide cops are assigned to investigate dozens of unsolved murders and missing persons cases. A majority of the victims are featured on the county's deck of cold-case playing cards. Schwarz is on the queen of hearts. Her homicide was featured in The Herald's yearlong series on the unsolved cases.
In recent years, detectives pored over the old case files, noting what work had been done and where there were holes. They shipped off evidence to be tested using today's more advanced forensic technology.
A tip in March 2010 pushed the Schwarz case up the priority list. An inmate had seen the cold case card featuring the 1979 murder. He told detectives that Johnson had admitted to killing Schwarz. That kick-started the case, VanderWeyst said.
They began to take a hard look at Johnson and how his life intersected with the slain woman's. Inside the case file, they found the name of Johnson's then-
"He took from our family our sense of security, our belief in kindness in others, our belief in right and wrong, but most of all, he took Sue from us forever," Rau wrote in a letter to the judge.
The detectives didn't know that she would provide critical evidence to put the killer away -- the first conviction in the cases featured in the cold case cards.
The woman met Johnson when she was just 17. Her father had died about nine months earlier and her family was reeling from his death. With Johnson's encouragement, she became alienated from her mom. She moved in with the older man and the relationship quickly became violent, the woman said. He threatened to hurt her if she left. He allowed his friends to abuse her.
The day of the murder, he told the woman they were going to see his friend who owed him some money and drugs.
The woman didn't know the victim's name or even the address where the homicide happened.
She believed Johnson when he told her the cops would see her as a suspect. She wasn't sure what legal responsibility she'd bear, but she was certain that if the detectives came for her, she'd answer their questions. She also was convinced that Johnson would go after her family if she told the truth.
"I can't say I did it right, but I did the best I could," the woman said. "I was sorry Sue was dead. I'd have done anything in my power possible at the time to stop it if I could have. She wasn't coming back though. I knew my mother would be a victim. I had to protect my mom."
The woman split up with Johnson. She tried to put the past behind her, breaking off ties with high school friends. She stopped going by her childhood nickname. She became a nurse and a mom. She never stopped looking over her shoulder.
Even as time went on, her fear didn't go away.
Johnson called her mother's house after he got out of prison for robbery. The woman was visiting her mom and spoke with him. He reminded her that he was still around and knew how to reach her family.
"It drags on you," she said.
She thought of the slain woman and her family.
"She didn't deserve that. She was only standing up against abuse," the woman said. "Her family deserved to have answers long ago."
Gary Schwarz had learned to live without knowing who took his big sister's life. He had no choice. He carried some small hope that the killer would be caught. He worried that the person would hurt others.
On Friday, he and his younger sister, Valerie Rau, finally got to face the man who robbed them of their sister.
"The desire to help her friend should not have cost Sue her life," Gary Schwarz said.
The defendant's motivation to kill her was as senseless as the man's existence, he said.
"He took from our family our sense of security, our belief in kindness in others, our belief in right and wrong, but most of all, he took Sue from us forever," Rau wrote in a letter to the judge.
Gary Schwarz asked the judge to protect the woman who helped the detectives and Snohomish County deputy prosecutor Lisa Paul put Johnson behind bars. He said he feared for the woman's safety if the convicted killer was released any time soon.
Gary Schwarz met the woman in January after the defendant pleaded guilty. The woman felt she owed the family an explanation and an apology.
"I feel like I didn't do enough" she said.
The guy was abusing a teenage girl and was angry that another woman had helped his wife escape his abuse. I guess he wanted to abuse two women at the same time. I certainly hope he gets his just reward in prison.
Rope.
Then I hope that they make sure that he never breathes another breath of free air.
Looks like Obama's father.
Hey! Obama been laudin' that "don't let a crisis go to waste thing." I'm just trying to help.
Some people need killing. This guy looks like a prime candidate.
Jail is too good for him.
Nice courage. She ought to be put in prison with him! Pathetic!
It’s not a story because the murdered party is white? Saying victim may be considered racist.. hmmm, that would add to the crisis though. And Obama been laudin’ that “don’t let a crisis go to waste thing.” Okay the poor white girl was a victim. As were others threatened by the murderer.
No... but if Obama had a father he’d look like that. :-)
So where can we see a picture of the victim?
I would be curious to know the statistics for murder, assault and domestic violence between white girls/women who date African American men or if such statistics are even kept.
Uuuuuh . . . you could click on the link that’ at the top of the posting. Then veiw the pictures by clicking next above the picture of the perp.
Wanting to be with black men is every liberal females' wet dream. I am sorry to say it but she set herself up for this.
Rape in the United States I often wondered about this.
"The U.S. Department of Justice compiles statistics on crime by race, but only between and among people categorized as black or white. In 2005 there were 111,490 white and 36,620 black victims of rape or sexual assault. In 2005, out of the 111,490 cases involving white victims, 44.5% had white offenders and 33.6% had black offenders, while the 36,620 black victims had a figure of 100% black offenders, numbers of white offenders were estimated to be negligible (extrapolated from a sample size of fewer than 10 instances)."
Though wiki is sometimes wiki graffiti it appears that the above is documented unless I misread this DoJ document that apparently the Obama/Holder Dept. of Just Us has not yet erased See Percent distribution of single-offender victimizations, based on race of victims, by type of crime and perceived race of offender.
“If you have a snake for a pet and he bites you, you cannot blame the snake for doing what is in his nature.”
Black men are not necessarily snakes. I don’t have the .gif to post, but, that really is racist.
Uuuuuuh, I did. The article is nothing but text.
Either the photo was removed from the site or the link is incorrect or there was never any photo there to begin with.
Also (Family members)
google, Susan Schwarz Gary Schwarz
In this situation, the snake happened to be a black man and the victim a white woman, he could easily have been white. My point was that many women make very poor choices for men in their life and end up battered or dead as a result. I can see how it can be misconstrued as racist but then again anything can. it depends on your point of view.
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