Supreme Being
07-23-2012, 16:18
To the People of Gettysburg (http://appalachiantrail.com/content/20120715/to-the-people-of-gettysburg/)A Letter to the People of Gettysburg, Pennsylvaniahttp://appalachiantrail.com/content/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/fence.jpg (http://appalachiantrail.com/content/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/fence.jpg)For 149 years, Gettysburg — the scene of the bloodiest battle of America’s Civil War — has been a type of Mecca where people go to remember those who were wounded and died when neighbors killed neighbors and families turned on one another … for year after bloody year.
To equate the recent assault on one lone traveler in your town would do injustice to the 35,000 Americans who were wounded or killed during the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863.
On Thursday, July 13, 2012, a weary Appalachian Trail hiker was confronted, hunted down, and set on fire by five people in a small blue car. His crime? Coming to town to resupply to continue his peaceful hike.
This early morning attack cannot be attributed to black people or white people … men or women. Rotten apples from each of these demographic barrels were involved in the heartless victimization of an Appalachian Trail hiker, possibly because those who tortured him thought he might be homeless. As if that were a sensible alibi for their monstrous cruelty.
Roughly 84 hours have passed and — to our knowledge — no one has been identified as suspects. Before publishing this story I phoned the Gettysburg Police Department. Sgt. Wilson is leading the investigation and will be available for an interview on Monday, July 16th.
All I can report to you now is that the hiker has healed sufficiently to leave Gettysburg. For his safety — until his attackers can be brought to justice – the victim’s location will not be revealed here.
The weather at my home is lovely today. My motorcycle beckons me to go for a ride in the nearby mountains. I do not work on Sundays. However, there is no prohibition to doing good on anyone’s Sabbath.
I am writing to the people of Gettysburg as a member of the Appalachian Trail community, not as a professional writer.
It is my firm opinion/belief that at least one of the five people who viciously set the straggler afire and left him to burn in an alley could be identified, if someone were willing to call the police.
The only way to mitigate this stunning act of cruelty is for one or more of those involved to come forward, confess to the crime, identify the others involved, go to trial and accept the punishment meted about by a jury of his or her peers.
No matter how long it is before the guilty parties are brought to justice, their consciences will haunt them. They will have no peace, no joy and no rest. Whatever enjoyment they perversely found — in dousing a man with gasoline or some other flammable liquid and tossing a match at him for the singular purpose of watching him burn — will torment themselves more than any pain or suffering inflicted upon a stranger in their town.
Knowing who did this … even suspecting a likely culprit … and not notifying the police, in my humble opinion, makes a person an accessory to this horrid crime.
How difficult can it be to identify the two black men, the one white man and the two white women who were in Gettysburg around 1 AM on Thursday morning … driving around town in a small blue car? How common can that be?
This is not as hard as finding a single indescribable person in Los Angeles or Tokyo. We’re talking about Gettysburg — a town with a population of just over 8,000 individuals in 2009. There are big-city high schools that are larger than that.
Someone in Gettysburg must know who did this. That blue car with its five occupants got gas a day or so before the attack. Unless the car is hidden in someone’s garage, it will need gas again. These people didn’t simply vanish. They have friends and families and neighbors and coworkers. Someone knows who they are … someone is not calling the police … someone is an accomplice to their crime against innocence.
Once again, Gettysburg symbolizes the battlefield of senseless violence and destruction.
Citizens of Gettysburg: We call upon you to help identify those in your community or those who passed through who disgraced Gettysburg and all of humanity by attacking a member of the Appalachian Trail community.
Join us in the fight to right this wrong. Don’t just sit on the fence between right and wrong.
Join us in seeking the guilty and protecting the innocent. Please. Help us bring these violent criminals to justice.
You would ask for nothing less if the victim were in your family, as this hiker is in ours.
Thank you,
Robert Sutherland
If you have information about the attackers, please call the police at (717) 334-1168.
Adams County Crime Stoppers is offering a reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those involved. Call Crime Stoppers at (717) 334-8057 (tel:(717)%20334-8057). Callers may remain confidential.
To equate the recent assault on one lone traveler in your town would do injustice to the 35,000 Americans who were wounded or killed during the Battle of Gettysburg in July 1863.
On Thursday, July 13, 2012, a weary Appalachian Trail hiker was confronted, hunted down, and set on fire by five people in a small blue car. His crime? Coming to town to resupply to continue his peaceful hike.
This early morning attack cannot be attributed to black people or white people … men or women. Rotten apples from each of these demographic barrels were involved in the heartless victimization of an Appalachian Trail hiker, possibly because those who tortured him thought he might be homeless. As if that were a sensible alibi for their monstrous cruelty.
Roughly 84 hours have passed and — to our knowledge — no one has been identified as suspects. Before publishing this story I phoned the Gettysburg Police Department. Sgt. Wilson is leading the investigation and will be available for an interview on Monday, July 16th.
All I can report to you now is that the hiker has healed sufficiently to leave Gettysburg. For his safety — until his attackers can be brought to justice – the victim’s location will not be revealed here.
The weather at my home is lovely today. My motorcycle beckons me to go for a ride in the nearby mountains. I do not work on Sundays. However, there is no prohibition to doing good on anyone’s Sabbath.
I am writing to the people of Gettysburg as a member of the Appalachian Trail community, not as a professional writer.
It is my firm opinion/belief that at least one of the five people who viciously set the straggler afire and left him to burn in an alley could be identified, if someone were willing to call the police.
The only way to mitigate this stunning act of cruelty is for one or more of those involved to come forward, confess to the crime, identify the others involved, go to trial and accept the punishment meted about by a jury of his or her peers.
No matter how long it is before the guilty parties are brought to justice, their consciences will haunt them. They will have no peace, no joy and no rest. Whatever enjoyment they perversely found — in dousing a man with gasoline or some other flammable liquid and tossing a match at him for the singular purpose of watching him burn — will torment themselves more than any pain or suffering inflicted upon a stranger in their town.
Knowing who did this … even suspecting a likely culprit … and not notifying the police, in my humble opinion, makes a person an accessory to this horrid crime.
How difficult can it be to identify the two black men, the one white man and the two white women who were in Gettysburg around 1 AM on Thursday morning … driving around town in a small blue car? How common can that be?
This is not as hard as finding a single indescribable person in Los Angeles or Tokyo. We’re talking about Gettysburg — a town with a population of just over 8,000 individuals in 2009. There are big-city high schools that are larger than that.
Someone in Gettysburg must know who did this. That blue car with its five occupants got gas a day or so before the attack. Unless the car is hidden in someone’s garage, it will need gas again. These people didn’t simply vanish. They have friends and families and neighbors and coworkers. Someone knows who they are … someone is not calling the police … someone is an accomplice to their crime against innocence.
Once again, Gettysburg symbolizes the battlefield of senseless violence and destruction.
Citizens of Gettysburg: We call upon you to help identify those in your community or those who passed through who disgraced Gettysburg and all of humanity by attacking a member of the Appalachian Trail community.
Join us in the fight to right this wrong. Don’t just sit on the fence between right and wrong.
Join us in seeking the guilty and protecting the innocent. Please. Help us bring these violent criminals to justice.
You would ask for nothing less if the victim were in your family, as this hiker is in ours.
Thank you,
Robert Sutherland
If you have information about the attackers, please call the police at (717) 334-1168.
Adams County Crime Stoppers is offering a reward for information that leads to the arrest and conviction of those involved. Call Crime Stoppers at (717) 334-8057 (tel:(717)%20334-8057). Callers may remain confidential.