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Home > Blogs > West Chester News and Issues > Archives > 2008 > June > 25 > Entry
Thoughts on the Terrence Candidate trial
Yesterday was certainly interesting.
While awaiting the verdict in Terrance Candidate’s trial for kidnapping, robbery and assault, I got a front-row seat for the defendant’s attempted escape.
Thanks to the Butler County Sheriff’s Deputies and the area police officers waiting in the lobby to testify, the incident was resolved lightning fast and with much less drama than it might have had.
The incident, coming at the end of a sobering trial, has me thinking about a bigger issue…
Though it wasn’t the thrust of the prosecution’s case, this was very much a domestic violence crime.
Two of the people Candidate held captive testified multiple times that he said he was there to murder his former girlfriend, her mother they said he called the “mastermind” of their breakup, and the girlfriend’s sister, who they said he “just didn’t like.”
All because she broke up with him, he told the victims.
What kind of screwed-up mindset does it take to justify murder over a break-up?
This was the second domestic violence-related report involving the Candidate and his ex to come through West Chester Police in the past year; what kept these two people in a relationship that broken, that dangerous?
If you have kids, please talk to them. Not just about the birds and the bees, not just about how boys aren’t supposed to hit girls, but about all the other complications that come with raging hormones and the sticky realities of love.
Talk to them about the messages they hear: the songs full of codependent, “I need you, I can’t live without you” love themes, film and TV characters who fall madly in love overnight with Mr. right and live happily ever after in a world where nothing goes wrong and it’s always sunny. Plenty of people absorb these messages without turning violent, but other people come away with skewed perceptions of what a relationship is and should be.
Relationships aren’t easy. They take work. People argue in a healthy relationship, but there’s a difference between respectful disagreement and derisive, vindictive attacks or worse, settling disputes with your fists.
Kids need to know these truths about relationships, and I say it’s a message they should hear before they start dating. I doubt it’s an easy subject to broach, but nobody said parenthood would be easy, either.
But, all my parents in the audience, what’s worse: an awkward conversation with a balky preteen, or seeing your child on the witness stand, telling the judge with a straight face she thought she was dead when her ex kicked in the front door?
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