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CHARLOTTE OBSERVER (N Carolina) 25 May 10 Two Raleigh men accused of beheading turtles - Shocked kids looked on (Thomasi Mcdonald)
Raleigh: After Jennifer Jeffries caught a foot-long turtle in her front yard Sunday afternoon, she and her three young children set out to drop it off in a South Raleigh fishing hole. Jeffries, 24, figured on a serene trip, where the children also could feed the ducks.
But when the family arrived at the fishing hole, they saw a scene out of a horror movie. A shotgun was propped against a car and a machete lay in the grass. When Jeffries got ready to release the turtle, a man sitting in a metal folding chair warned her that if she dropped the reptile in the water, he would kill it, she told police.
Then, the man lifted the machete and slashed the head off another turtle caught on his fishing line, according to police reports.
"We've been killing a lot of them," Jeffries recalled the man saying. "We've been shooting them because they keep biting my fishing line."
Raleigh police charged the man, Ralph Benjamin Marshall, 55, of Raleigh, with one felony count of animal cruelty and one count of going armed to the terror of the public, according to records filed Sunday at the City County Bureau of Identification.
Police also charged Marshall's fishing buddy, Kenny Davis, 38, of Raleigh, with one misdemeanor count of instigating cruelty to animals and one count of going armed to the terror of the public, court records show.
Jeffries, who lives in the 1000 block of Suffolk Boulevard, told police that Marshall scooped up another headless turtle "with its little legs dangling" and showed it to her children, ages 7, 3 and 1 month. The kids were stunned and horrified, their mother said.
"You don't tell children that," she said.
After Jeffries went home and called police, officers arrived at the fishing hole at 2911 S. Wilmington St. just before 5:30 p.m., said Jim Sughrue, a Raleigh police spokesman.
Investigators say the men chopped and shot the heads off turtles because the reptiles kept getting caught on Marshall's fishing line.
In arrest warrants made public Monday, police said Marshall decapitated a turtle while Davis watched and did nothing. Police also accused both men of arming themselves and threatening to shoot more turtles living in the pond. Sughrue said Marshall was charged with a felony because "he was more at fault."
Police took Marshall and Davis to the Wake County jail. Davis was still behind bars Monday afternoon in lieu of $750 bail, a jail spokeswoman said.
Someone posted a $5,500 bond for Marshall before he made his first court appearance in an orange and white jail jumpsuit Monday afternoon.
North Carolina doesn't take violence against turtles lightly. In 2003, former Gov. Mike Easley signed into law a Senate bill that authorized the state's Wildlife Resources Commission to protect certain species of turtles and terrapins.
The Turtle Law
The bill, which became known as "The Turtle Law," states that a person can kill only four of the protected turtles over the course of the person's lifetime. So, if someone killed three turtles in one day and two the next, a law officer could charge the offender with animal cruelty.
It's not clear whether investigators found more than one or two dead turtles when they arrested Marshall and Davis. Based on the charges, police apparently think Marshall was responsible for multiple turtle decapitations.
Also unclear is whether the fishing buddies would have been charged if they had been killing the turtles to eat.
Turtle soup is considered a delicacy. Phyllis Rhodes, a CCBI technician, said that before cooking a turtle, the reptile must be soaked for at least a week in water to get rid of the "gamey taste."
"It tastes just like chicken or barbecue," Rhodes said.
Two Raleigh men accused of beheading turtles - Shocked kids looked on

Stupid is as stupid does.

Is it stupidity, meanness, or ignorance? That is the question.

I'd vote for ignorance. The obviously blatant manifestation of just not knowing any better. In my opinion, ignorance knows no sociological or ethnic preference. Just as likely in one group as in another.

More obvious in those with less where-with-all and means...those at the lower echelon of the socio-economic ladder. Those with fewer life experiences, fewer fungible assets, less education, less opportunity. Ignorant behavior more obvious with these folks. It's not their fault. They just don't know any better.

However, there is one very insidious manifestation of ignorance not often recognized. That is the ignorance displayed by those that are financially well to do, well educated, and upwardly mobile. Those with all the advantages and opportunity society has to offer.

That is, the ignorance of those that should know better, but for whatever reason, think they know what's best for the world and so choose to dictate their simplistic idioms to the masses; forever tone deaf to reality as they judge and criticize others with their measure of privilege as a baseline.

jsc
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"As hard as I've tried, just can't NOT do this"
John Crickmer