One of the challenges of my job is keeping my feelings out of my work. I’ve been doing this work on and off since I graduated Cal State Long Beach in 1989. I’ve been covering Seal Beach (starting as a freelancer) since 2005. I know I’ve failed at least a few times.
I’ll let you know if I ever get the hang of it.
• One day in the early 2000s, I was covering a lecture by Laura Hillman, author of “I Will Plant You a Lilac Tree.” She was a Holocaust survivor who was saved by Oskar Schindler. She died in 2020.
There came a moment during her account when my eyes started to get misty. But I was working and forced down my feelings enough to keep from crying. One must be practical. It’s hard to take good notes with tears in your eyes.
• Years later, I was reading a press release about the prosecution of a stalker who had targeted Sandra Bullock, then a Sunset Beach resident.
I’ve never been stalked—thank God—but I have been the object of a mentally ill relative’s obsessive devotion. She phoned me 365 days a year to say things like, “I worship the ground you walk on,” “you are the center of my universe” and so-on.
No, that isn’t stalking. By California law, stalking is a pattern of behavior that would make a reasonable person fear for their safety. My “fan” lacked both the physical strength and the transportation required to be a threat to my safety. By the threat standard, an obsessed person can make your life miserable without committing a felony.
Should I have added that observation to the press release? I could make a good argument for either side of that debate. Nowadays, I lean toward “just include the definition of stalking”.
• 2009: A 23-month-old child died in Seal Beach at her mother’s hands. The victim’s name was Millicent Wilborn. Mom was not prosecuted for murder. She was prosecuted for “inflicting corporal punishment on a child likely to result in serious injury or death.” The penalty: 25 years to life. (The Army court martialed Millicent’s father for negligent homicide for failing to protect his children. He got a demotion and 90 days in custody. I was revolted at the short incarceration period but reminded myself that the civilian authorities didn’t prosecute him at all.)
I lost count of how many people said, “Oh, that poor woman must be mentally ill.”
Ahem. My mother was diagnosed with schizophrenia. My father often claimed to be a werewolf. (Either he was joking or he had PTSD from the Battle of the Bulge.) Yet my parents made darn sure I always had food, clothing, medical care, shelter, and they didn’t physically abuse me. I had zero sympathy for Millicent’s mother. Or her father. Or the social worker who didn’t recommend removing the children from the house. Millicent’s mother and father were convicted in 2012.
After Millicent’s mother was tried, convicted, and sentenced, I felt free to write the opinion that I was glad she got 25 to life. I never told anyone this, but I was disappointed in the entire City Council for not givng Millicent Wilborn a moment of silence.
• Circling back to 2005 or 2006. A reporting person left their car unlocked and unattended for two hours. When he returned, the car was still there. His gun, however, had been stolen.
I wrote a paragraph or two for that week’s crime log without expressing my fury at the gun owner for leaving a deadly weapon in an unlocked car. I’ll state for the record that I’m anti-bullet wound.
Fortunately, only a minority of stories touch me. But I know the challenge will exist as long as I have the job.
Charles M Kelly is associate editor of the Sun. His opinions are his own.
