Kelsey Smith (1989-2007) was a very pretty, young girl, who sadly enough was cheated out of her life after being abducted, raped and killed by a stranger in 2007. That means that her death was one of many with a well-known scenario: Horny guy sees beautiful/non-beautiful girl-child/woman and falls for the temptation of turning his sexual fantasies into realities at the cost of her life. The same story have been reenacted over and over: Different guy and different girl-child/woman, various means of murder, but all the victims abused and dead. The girls/women would say "I died for nothing", but the rapist-murderers would feel that what they did somehow was sanctioned by what they themselves felt as a strong, natural urge. Something which some of them would even be proud of, like e.g. Henry VIII who boasted about his three nightly ejaculations as if that would prove the masculinity that lied so very close to his heart.
The abduction happened from the parking lot at a Target store and there are good video takes both of the lot and of the movements of both Kelsey and Edwin Hall from inside the store. It's very obvious that she takes no interest whatsoever in him, but that he follows right on her trails, most likely in the futile hope that she would shift her attention from the anniversary gift for her boyfriend of six months she was looking for and direct it towards him. Something that never happened: She was simply blind to this percistent, but discreet stalker, who most likely had planned his crime in beforehand. Actually, it's like an animal predator out for a kill without the targeted victim seeing or hearing anything.
Some days after this fatal shopping trip the body of Kelsey was found, and the hunt for her murderer got intense. Edwin Hall was seen on the surveillance videos, and he was targeted as the prime suspect. One of the most interesting aspects about this case is the technology that led to the arrest of him on August 1. First there was the footage of Kelsey being chased in the store by Edwin Hall, but discreetly and at a distance: Where she goes he follows, but all the time at a distance, and it's obvious that even if she saw him, she didn't notice him as anything but a fellow shopper. Then there is a video take from the parking lot showing her being forced into her car and driven away by a man. Later on this particular video made the neighbour of that man recognize him as the 26 years old Edwin Hall, who was living with his wife and their very young son.
What led to the finding of her body and his life sentence was the video takes and telephone technology which I find quite impressive. Now the same tools are much more advanced than it was at that time, and I bet we are in for something even more "to the point" if that's what we chose. I for one like it, as I want criminals to be found and arrested, but it can't be denied that it's a key to the deepest layers of privacy there are, and when that is lost, it will be something forever, as that kind of anonymity will never be regained.
As to Edwin Hall he lost his life, but in another way than his victim. Some people will say that he had lost it even before it started: He was adopted at 7, but was returned to State custody at 15 after threatening the adopted family's daughter at knife's point. Also, he assaulted another boy with a baseball bat. With time, he may have become a violent criminal because those traits were already present in him. However, his sentence wasn't the death penalty that some had wanted, but life in prison without parole: Two lives were ruined which is sad, no matter what.
Wikipedia
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