Disturbing New Details Released in Case of Teen Who Was Torched by Classmates

October 19, 2009

Authorities in Deerfield Beach, Fla, have released new details in the case of a Michael Brewer, a 15-year-old who was recently set ablaze by a group of teens, leaving him hospitalized with burns over 80 percent of his body.

"Please, please, please,'' Michael is heard screaming on a 911 recording."Please help me."

It was those agonizing screams that alerted several residents of Lime Tree Village apartments that something terrible had happened on the afternoon of Oct. 12. When they ran outside to investigate, they were shocked to find Michael, with much of his body engulfed in flames. Acting on impulse, one neighbor ran for a fire extinguisher, while another dashed to the boy's aide. Once the flames were extinguished, Michael ripped off his shirt and jumped into the complex's swimming pool. Unfortunately, much of the damage had already been done. According to eyewitnesses, the top layer of Michael's skin was literally falling off his body.

"He's screaming; he's alert," an unidentified caller told a Deerfield 911 dispatcher.

When the caller asked the boy what had happened, he responded by saying, "Somebody poured stuff on me.''

**Warning Graphic Content**Listen to the 911 call

Once the paramedics arrived on the scene and transported the injured teen to the hospital, investigators with the Broward County Sheriff's Office secured the scene and began interviewing witnesses in an attempt to determine what had happened to Michael. It was during this questioning that an unidentified resident of the complex allegedly told an investigator that he or she had witnessed a group of teens surround Michael, and that one of them threw an unknown substance on him moments before flames engulfed his body.

Through the course of their investigation, authorities were able to identify the teens as Matthew Bent, 15; Denver Colorado Jarvis, 15; his brother, Jeremy Jarvis, 13; Steven Shelton, 15; and Jesus Mendez, 15.

According to police, Mendez was the only member of the group to confess to his involvement in the assault. He allegedly told a Broward County Sheriff's Office deputy that he made "a bad decision."

In speaking with the media about the case, Broward County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Steve Feeley said that the assault stemmed from a series of earlier incidents. Michael had allegedly failed to pay Bent $40 that he owed him for a video game. In retaliation, Bent allegedly attempted to get even by stealing a custom-made bicycle that was owned by Michael's father. However, the theft went south when Bent was caught in the act, and arrested.

The following day, neither Michael nor Bent went to school. Bent stayed home after his brief stay in a juvenile facility and Michael, according to his parents, did not attend because he was afraid of retaliation.

Later that day, Michael went to visit a friend at the Deerfield Beach apartment complex at 429 SE 13th Ct. Police say that Bent was also at the complex and, upon seeing Michael, he and the other teens hatched their plan.

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John Forehand Arrested for Allegedly Propositioning Daughter for Sex via Facebook

October 12, 2009

Authorities in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania arrested 39-year-old John Christopher Forehand last week for allegedly using the social networking Web site Facebook to locate and sexually proposition his estranged 13-year-old biological daughter.

According to the criminal complaint, Forehand, using the name "Bad Daddy," recently contacted his daughter and told her that he had been having "inappropriate" dreams about her. He graphically described a variety of sexual acts and proposed meeting her for sex, allegedly telling her, "Not many other fathers and daughters are this brave, so not many of them are so lucky to experience all these pleasures."

Police say the girl did not fully understand everything Forehand was saying to her and that it was not until she looked up the meaning of some of the words that he used that she realized what he was asking; at that point, she reported the situation to her mother, who, in turn, contacted the Ephrata Borough Police Department.

On Oct. 6, an agent with the state Child Predator Unit took over the girl's email account, during which time Forehand allegedly sent multiple messages, urging his daughter to meet him for a sexual liaison. Posing as the girl, the agent agreed to a meeting with Forehand.

"I'll take very good care of my little girl," Forehand wrote, according to the affidavit.

The following day, agents from the Child Predator Unit and Ephrata Police arrested Forehand when he arrived at a predetermined meeting place. During a search of Forehand's vehicle, authorities seized a camera, tripod and box of condoms. A second search, conducted at his home Lititz, resulted in the seizure of several additional items, including a digital camera, a camcorder and computers. Those items are currently being analyzed by the Attorney General's Computer Forensics Unit.

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Controversial Cadaver Sex Show

September 17, 2009

It could be coming to a neighborhood near you!

Since 1995, German anatomist Gunther von Hagens has managed to generate both curiosity and controversy with his traveling Body Worlds exhibition, which showcases preserved human bodies and body parts. Now von Hagens is attempting to up the ante by posing the corpses in sexual positions, a move that is being protested in some countries.

Born in Skalmierzyce in 1945, von Hagens spent much of his youth in East Germany and later moved to Greiz, where he remained until his late teens. Von Hagens enrolled at the University of Jena in 1965. Following a brush with the law, von Hagens continued his medical studies in Lubeck, and in 1975, he received a doctorate from the University of Heidelberg.

In 1977, von Hagens invented a plastination technique used to preserve specimens for medical study. Von Hagen's Web site, bodyworlds.com, describes the process:

"In order to make a specimen permanent, decomposition must be halted.… By removing water and fats from the tissue and replacing these with polymers, the Plastination process deprives bacteria of what they need to survive. Bodily fluids cannot, however, be replaced directly with polymers, because the two are chemically incompatible.… Water in the tissues (which comprises approximately 70% of the human body) and fatty tissues are replaced with acetone, a solvent that readily evaporates. In the second step, the acetone is replaced with a polymer solution.… A specimen is placed in a vacuum chamber and the pressure is reduced to the point where the solvent boils. The acetone is suctioned out of the tissue at the moment it vaporizes, and the resulting vacuum in the specimen causes the polymer solution to permeate the tissue. This exchange process is allowed to continue until all of the tissue has been completely saturated."

Von Hagens initially used the plastination process to preserve small specimens; however, in the early 1990s, he began to plastinate whole bodies. Later, during the mid-1990s, Von Hagens developed the Body Worlds exhibit. Since that time, his specimens have been displayed at dozens of museums throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. The exhibits generally include about 25 whole-body plastinates, both human and animal, in various positions.

"We want to present to the public a comprehensive, multidisciplinary view of the various systems of the body," von Hagens is quoted as saying on the bodyworlds.com Web site.

The exhibits have been an obvious success, drawing nearly 30 million visitors to date; however, they have also caused a lot of controversy, resulting in laws being passed in the UK, Czech Republic, France and United States. Most of the laws control the transportation, sale, display and documentation of the human remains.

According to von Hagens, the bodies that he plastinated were donated, with each individual giving an informed consent. Despite these claims, in Jan. 2004, the German news magazine Der Spiegel reported that von Hagens had acquired corpses of executed prisoners from China. Von Hagens denied the allegations, and in 2004, he obtained an injunction against the magazine.

"I have never plastinated the bodies of executed persons, for, based on my ethical convictions, I disapprove of using such bodies for anatomical purposes," Dr. von Hagens said in a press release.

In addition to von Hagens' statements, an independent review of his practices that was launched by the California Science Center found that von Hagens was committed to ethical practices.

The center's report stated, "In March – April 2004, Dr. [Hans-Martin] Sass traveled to the Body Worlds' offices in Germany (Institut fuer Plastination [IfP] in Heidelberg) where he had extensive conferences with principal IfP staff, and reviewed body donor consent documentation. In addition he visited the Body Worlds exhibition in Frankfurt, Germany. On behalf of the Science Center, Dr. Sass reviewed all deceased body donor consent forms (206), matched the donor forms with death certificates, verified that the body specimens were properly donated for the purpose of public exhibition, and verified that the donor forms met established informed consent standards."

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