The working theory that police have leaked to the media of the Annie Le murder is that there was no romantic involvement between the two and no sexual motive, but that it was “workplace violence” precipitated by a series emails in which suspect Raymond Clark complained that Le wasn’t following protocols for the treatment of lab mice:
Along with the defensive wounds and the flunked lie detector test, investigators looking into the murder of Yale student Annie Le focused on a lab technician named Raymond Clark because of e-mails about the care of laboratory mice.
In the e-mails, Clark is said to criticize Le for not adhering to the protocols for tending the mice kept in the basement as part of her lab’s ongoing experiments.
Le is said to have responded in a conciliatory tone, promising to keep to the protocols. Investigators wonder if Clark was not satisfied, if resentment suddenly flared to rage, if as crazy as it may seem this was a case of mice and murder.
The Annie Le murder had piqued my curiosity originally because I lived in the area for a while, in Middletown in fact where Ray Clark was living with his girlfriend. But this new development is even more curious because it coincides with something I have noticed on the Web, a dark anti-human undercurrent dressed up in the self-righteous sanctimony of environmentalism but which is in reality nihilism and misanthropy at it’s most basic. More and more I see animal rights activists voicing calls for violence against humans.
Just yesterday I was watching a commercial for the Barnes Varmint Grenade bullet uploaded on YouTube when I saw this comment:
I would shoot that moron who was shooting at those animals with that bullet.
An odd sentiment. Prairie dogs are rodents whose “towns” are responsible for the broken legs of many another animal. They are also fast breeding pests that need to be controlled or they will overwhelm an environment. The human instinct to hunt is nature’s way to control animals like prairie dogs, and is more a part of respecting the natural world than slapping a P.E.T.A bumper sticker on the Volvo your parents pay for. The cult of “animal rights” that P.E.T.A. represents, however, doesn’t respect nature or our place in it. The call for animals to have human rights is not a call to elevate our treatment of animals at all but an effort to dehumanize us and make us targets for their ultimate goal, human extinction.
The “animal rights” cult is anti-nature. These same people de-claw their cats, feed their dogs vegetarian foods and promote legislation that leads to both human and animal starvation. But more telling, these extremists kill thousands of animals themselves. P.E.T.A. in fact kills over 95% of the animals they take in every year, and uses the money they take in to supposedly care for these animals to fund domestic terror groups that have firebombed the home of scientists, threatened researchers with death and even killed ranched animals as a statement against our “cruelty.”
The animal rights movement is clearly disinterested in creating a “cruelty free” world, which even if it was possible would be antithetical to nature. What they are interested in is creating a world where morality is redefined to accept the nihilistic anti-humanism they have embraced as right. To the animal rights movement, people are not simply worth the same as animals, they are worth less. This is a powerful belief to adopt because it means that killing humans is not just acceptable to save animals, but it’s less reprehensible than any action you could take otherwise.
But this isn’t to say that Ray Clark was some rabid A.L.F. member. It is to show how pernicious this animal rights philosophy can become when we allow it to become mainstream. Understand that if the police theory is correct here, Ray Clark murdered a woman just days before her wedding day because she didn’t treat mice to his liking. Mice.
As a child I owned a cat who was quite sweet with me but was known to be vicious among my family (she was a scratcher). When the house next door to us burned down it became infested with field mice who sometime ventured into my family’s house. I think I was 6 or 7 the first time she brought me a mouse, laid on my pillow with it’s middle torn out. Soon she learned that we were throwing the carcasses out and we began finding mutilated mice hidden under throw rugs, in shoes and everywhere you wouldn’t want to find a mouse that looked like it was a hapless teen in a Friday the 13th movie.
I also had another cat who was a gentle and docile creature. He once broke a mouse’s back and began torturing the creature by “playing” with it. It was the only time this gentle giant of a cat ever did anything that could remotely considered mean by our standards. But it wasn’t cruel, and neither was my other cat slaughtering mice. It was simply nature, which is beyond human conception of morality. In nature mice were born to breed and die, often at the hands of predators including us. That we may kill them now in an attempt to cure cancer is irrelevant, we kill them all the time as nature intended. I learned that from owning cats.
Ray Clark, if the police theory of the crime is correct, learned that perceived mistreatment of these tiny rodents was sin enough to kill for. I would put forward he didn’t learn this from nature, and I would hate to see what he would have done to a cat he owned that joyously shredded some hapless mouse. Clark internalized the message we allow P.E.T.A. to mainstream into our schools and pop culture, that there is a moral equivalence between mistreating animals and killing a woman, that Annie Le’s life was no more valuable than the mice she was experiment on.
How many Clarks are out there even now, thinking that hunters, fishermen, trappers and scientists deserve to die for their “cruelty”? More importantly, when will we stop allowing the “animal rights” cult to create them?
Rob Taylor,
Murder in the name of animal rights? I would love to see what PETA has to say about this? I knew that one day, the animal rights slash eco terrorist mentality would lead to the loss of human life. Either by accident or by acts of murder. Well Annie Le was apparently murdered by Raymond Clark, for mistreating mice.
I wonder if PETA will rush to his defense.
I remember that story you posted on animal rights Terrorists trying burn a family alive. How much longer until a fishermen, a cattle rancher or a scientist who experiments on lab rats, is gunned down in the name of animal rights?
I should add, the “legal” team of the Communist Party USA known as the National Lawyers Guild has been involved in helping these “animal rights activists” and those eco-terrorists already in prison. Kind of running the entire environment movement as an eco-mafia.
mah29001,
I wonder why
Wow… last I heard they thought she had done a runner to avoid the wedding. My husband came to me asking what I thought about the fact that the $10K reward offered for info about her whereabouts was far less than the reward offered ($1 Mil.) for some Andy Warhol paintings that had been stolen.
What is wrong with people? I had no problem putting mouse traps in my garage last autumn when I noticed droppings in my son’s stroller that we kept there between uses (ew… and actually, I don’t have the stomach for the removal, but thankfully my mother-in-law does.) We used the snap traps because they’re more humane than glue traps, but either way they end up dead.
I’m all for protecting endangered species and all, but mice are far from endangered… I suspect they’re right up there with cockroaches. If we suffered a nuclear attack, it’d be cockroaches, mice, and rats left. x^p
Cats torture mice in order to get their blood pumping harder and faster. It makes them taste better when they finally tear into them. At least that’s what I’ve heard. Your cat was actually trying to share her food with you. She didn’t know any better. I had a cat once a long time ago that I made let go of a field mouse, because I was afraid it might have been poisoned, so I gave her something else to compensate. The next day she brought me a piece of hot dog she found from a garbage can and laid it at my feet.
I dont think this case had anything to do with his sentiments towards animal cruelty. He was after this woman, and any communication he had with her was with that in mind. The mice was an excuse. He had a hangup about Asian women. When he was in high school, he even joined an Asian American club that was meant to promote Asian American dialogue and understanding, or something like that.
He probably raped her too, the cops are just trying to be sensitive to the feelings of the fiancee, which is commendable on the face of it.
He probably resented her upcoming marriage. I think there is a chance she was using him, leading him on in exchange for help in her research work. Or he might have just thought she was doing that.
The fact that he had an interest in Asians, and committed this act on the day of the woman’s nuptials, seems to point in obvious directions. There’s an old saying, when you hear the sound of galloping hoofs, think horses, not zebras. In other words, the obvious answer is usually the correct answer at least nine times out of ten.
PatrickKelley,
Its bad enough if he murdered her. Let’s not even think about rape, until some evidence of rape shows up.
Hey Rob Taylor, I don’t want to spend too much time leaving this so I will get to the point. This article is moronic. You must be the type of person that no one really likes too much and that’s why you write this lame excuse for a blog… leave this to people who have an once of skill like DRUDGE. terrible
So odd. She died like a lab animal, young, striving against all odds, and trying to survive.
I think that it is interesting that you are basing your argument on comparing yourself to a cat, but you cannot compare humans to mice. To say that it is ok to kill mice because it is in a cats nature, is not a correct argument to deduce that it is a human’s nature. What separates humans from many other species is the ability to have morals and ethics. I am not in any way saying that what Mr. Clark did was justifiable–I am simply stating that your argument is illogical. In addition, not all of those who support animal rights support human torture. It’s easy to focus on the negative aspects of a group like PETA when they make themselves extremists in order to get media attention–but there has been a lot of good that has come from their campaigns as well–such as awareness. Finally, to say that mice are less important than humans is egocentric and incorrect. We all have a place in this world-we are inter-dependant. I’m sure that with all of our “superior” brains, as I’m sure you would think by the tone in your message, we could focus our research on figuring out an alternative to animal testing so that no one would have to suffer. In fact, there are alternatives…do the research.
Damien-
I don’t sugar coat things. If he raped her, it was in part because he was sexually dysfunctional and that is the only way he can achieve orgasm. If he didn’t rape her, it was, again, because he was sexually dysfunctional and his violent rage was the only outlet he could produce. The fact that he was attracted to her is obvious to me, and the further fact that he committed this crime on the day of her wedding speaks volumes. Why that day of all days?
Another possibility that no one has considered to my knowledge is that they were actually having consensual sex, of the kind that involves consensual strangulation. It’s a dangerous act, and many times it results in an accidental death.
If this happened, it might well be he freaked out and hid her out of fear of prosecution.
Love-
I have not yet known of a single animal rights group, with the exception possibly of the ASPCA, who are not on balance more negative than positive. I once watched a debate between the then head of PETA and a conservative pundit. The PETA guy refused to concede that it was acceptable to kill rats-or head lice.
Galt-
Drudge? I might be wrong, I’ve only been on his blog a couple of times, but when I was, I didn’t see one word he wrote, it was all links pointing to other articles in other blogs or websites. I don’t agree with Rob on everything, but I do enjoy his blog, and his writing. Soooo, I guess that just means you’re full of shit, huh?
Love- People ARE animals, no better or worse than an other. That was the one argument Anton LaVey got right. To deny human predatory instinct is to deny the essential connection with both our True Nature and Nature as a whole. I’m not equating cats and humans on an intellectual or even moral level; I’m using cats (the quintessential urban pet) as an example of nature’s cruelty. I love cats, but cats are killers. That doesn’t mean we should be cats, it means we should understand the nature of cats, and ourselves.
PETA has euthanized 98% of the animals it has taken in. How can you defend that practice?
As for your egocentric comment. This is exactly my point. Are you so cut off from the natural world that you don’t understand that rodents and humans must compete to survive? Have you never seen a house infested with mice? Have you never seen a baby covered in rat bites?
You’re view of nature is essentially to stand apart from it while assigning equal weight to all creatures. That kind of view makes it possible for you to write criticisms of this post with throw away lines about the death Annie Le being sad but…
You don’t care about Anne Le. You see her death as the same as the death of a mouse. That is nihilism and misanthropy at it’s most basic. That’s was my point.
Patrick-The police say there was no sexual assault so I’m taking them at their word. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar and not every guy that kills a woman is masturbating afterward.
I also don’t believe in accidental strangulation. It takes far too long to kill someone that way for it to be an accident and you have to keep strangling the person after they pass out to kill them.
I agree with you that there are underlying problems with him, but even if the mice were pre-text that says something about what we have started to accept as rational. Even if that exchange only ended in an argument that would be a complete over reaction. But here there are commenters like Sam claiming she died like a lab animal. That’s my point. I can write a post about Annie Le mentioning PETA and someone will come here and claim moral equivalence between her and a mouse.
I really don’t know enough about the case to comment on that specifically. I do hate extreme animal rights groups with a passion though. My husband works in IT for a lab animal unit at a hospital. Sometimes they get threats from these extremists not just against the lab workers but also claiming that they will try to take out systems in the hospital with computer viruses, etc.
They haven’t succeeded yet and maybe they’re nut jobs who just make threats like that. But the point is that you’re right about them having little value for human life. If they were to succeed, they could harm patients who have nothing to do with animal testing, and they don’t seem to give a damn.
It has hardly been established that this was his motive. I find animal rights fanatics annoying as well, but this blogger is an idiot. Of all the forces standing in the way of making this a better world and country, animal rights freaks are a speck on a speck.
These Chickenshit teabaggers are always terrified of whoever their leaders hold up as bogeymen ex: PETA ACORN etc.
So since you have no argument to make you spout off some insults. Surprising.
And that use of the term “teabaggers” as opposed to tea party movement-so original and witty. Your towering intellect and poetic use of the language has converted me to your side of the aisle.
Do you steal all your material from Olbermann or only the stuff you rub out when in a hurry to get back to your bong and/or child pornography?
Rob-Of coruse I agree that every time a man kills a woman-even a beautiful one-it doesn’t have to have a sexual component. I am just struck by the seeming coincidence of this being the day of her impending marriage, and the fact that he had a strong attraction to Orientals and Oriental culture.
I would also remind you that very many times, the police don’t tell everything they know pertaining to an investigation. They might not outright lie, but on the other hand, they will twist the facts to keep from giving out too much information. For example, if his semen was discovered, that is not necessarily “proof beyond a reasonable doubt” that they had an affair, or that he raped her. At least, not until it is proven to be his semen, which I’m pretty sure takes more than a day or two to conduct the appropriate DNA tests. Until such time as this is demonstrated, then they can honestly say there is “no sexual component” (that they know of for a fact) to the crime.
You make a good point but how can I resist attacking people like “love” above with this story? I’m only human!
Your thesis is ludicrous. If Clark believed in “animal rights” he would not have had a job dependent upon animal testing; It is just that simple. He may have had a control issue re: “his” mice – that remains to be seen – but he was most certainly no believer in animal rights.
From the NotMIlk website:
There was a recent murder which captured the
interest, compassion, and then mourning spirits
of Americans. A young girl about to be married
was murdered in her Yale University animal research
laboratory by a lab technician who had previously
been angered by her inability to follow research
protocols.
That much has been released by the media.
What exactly were those protocols which the
young woman refused to follow? Will we ever
be told?
Annie Le was experimenting on mice. What
exactly was she doing? Was she training them
to turn right or left in a maze or press a Skinner
Box lever while being rewarded with a food pellet?
Or was she treating her research mice with one
drug or another, then killing them and cutting
their bodies open to learn the effects of her
experimental “protocol?” I want to know.
Does it make a difference? Not really. Annie died
a horrible death in pain and terror. Many laboratory
animals experience similar emotions during the final
moments of their own lives. To these gentle creatures,
Annie Le was the one wearing the butcher’s apron.
(snip)
There are millions upon millions
of scientists performing research, and none of
them will cure cancer in my lifetime. Since Nixon
declared war on cancer 38 years ago, billions of
laboratory animals have suffered needlessly
because scientists do not observe professional
protocols. These scientists are not heroic. When
they die from any one of society’s horrific crimes,
attempts to make them something which they are
not become pathetic deceptions.
Robert Cohen
http://www.notmilk.com
“To these gentle creatures,
Annie Le was the one wearing the butcher’s apron.”
Apparently to you “animal rights activists” it seems to be quite fine to also threaten the lives of researchers whom are trying to find cures for cancer and other horrible diseases.
mah29001,
Like I asked earlier, “How much longer until a fishermen, a cattle rancher or a scientist who experiments on lab rats, is gunned down in the name of animal rights?”
“Like I asked earlier, “How much longer until a fishermen, a cattle rancher or a scientist who experiments on lab rats, is gunned down in the name of animal rights?—
No wonder the same eco-Left has also been responsible in creating a modern Grapes of Wraith scenario in California over the complaint of protecting those endangered fish. Gee, with all the money Al Gore makes and other wealthy eco-Left propagandists, you think the simpliest solution would allow to have both sides claim victory?
Gore has so much money, why can’t HE come in and save the day in building a santuracy for the endangered fish, and giving the water back to the farmers?
I get sick at how people justify animal cruelty as “nature,” but claim that it doesn’t carry over to humans so it’s ok.
Asian culture is often cruel to animals, and it’s likely that Anni Le was cruel to animals accordingly, and that Clark tried to tell her to stop, and it escalated into something he didn’t intend. Americans often are braishwashed into assuming that all other cultures share our values of human and animal rights, but this is a mistake since most cultures have neither.
I’m commenting late, but can’t resist.
“Asian culture is often cruel to animals”
Wow, that’s quite a statement to make.
This appears tinged with AR’s “White Man’s Burden” and “Manifest Destiny” to me. Just the other day I read an editorial by Paul Watson (a professional in extremism and promoting intolerance and bigotry towards other cultures) where he opined that it was the duty of white countries to stand up and enforce their sense of morality on the heathen barbaric foreigners.
People like you would probably applaud such a sentiment.
On the other hand, we ourselves have a long history of using the brutal slaughter of animals for our entertainment. Dog fights, cock fights are illegal yet still quite popular and rampant in the US. Spain is quite happy with bullfighting; and many Westerners see no issue with it.
But get some Japanese on tv eating abundant non-endangered Minke whales. Or Koreans and Chinese eating dogs… and all hell breaks loose.
Nevermind that Sweden uses the carcasses of dead bunnies to heat their homes, or Bullfighting, or slaughtering millions of Kangaroos and Camels in the outback because the Aussies need more land to breed more horses to sell to Europeans as a delicacy etc., etc., etc.
I’m not even going to address the fact that you automatically label somebody with a non-white last name to be “Asian” and not “American”.
That alone speaks volumes as to your character and demeanor.
One of the stupidest things I’ve ever read.
If anything, this scum Raymond Clark was someone who apparently took some delight in hurting animals, much like hunters.
Get your facts straight before you grind any more axes as dull as your brain, moron.
Try reading a post before criticizing douchebag. Oh wait, then you’d have to argue real facts and not play in that adolescent fantasy land you’ve constructed for yourself after multiple viewings of Avatar.