Trial - Ross Harris #5

[katydid23]

The door was opened for awhile when other people had the opportunity to get a whiff of that car. When Ross got in it was totally closed up and hot as hell. There had to be at a minimum the distinct smells of toddler sweat and a wet diaper. I would think that would be strong inna tiny space but would have aired out quickly once Cooper was out of the car.

I agree. That wet diaper baked in the car with the sweat and the odor would have been strong, imo. And the car seat was inches away from the drivers seat. It's really hard for me to believe it did not smell in that hot car.

 

[Safeguard]

But most of those parents are looking at their phone to see sports scores or stock exchange data or their FB comments, or look at instagram etc.

How many of them are sexting minors or setting up appointments with prostitutes or afternoon hookups with strangers?

bbm
I bet you'd be surprised by that number. Plenty of people probably thought RH was "just looking at sports scores" (or what-have-you)...

I've seen rapid fire texting, more times than I can count.

Does the content they are being distracted by really matter?

 

[ScotAng]

Thanks! So maybe it was more than 6 after all. I don't know how those apps work - if a name is up on the screen does it mean a realtime message? I mean, as opposed to a chat room where a bunch of names are on the screen but not necessarily in active conversation.

Yes. If they're designated IM's (instant messages), as most were in the May to June screen captures. The 'conversations' are between him and individuals.

There are names from trial we know such as bamaxh, Jaymaydarling, magnolia blonde, epic bunnies, betsy81, sexyLo, etc. Others include lovelysecrets, juicebox, barnlady, ladynymph, bigtrucklady, the minors, (potential) real names, some are phone numbers only (apologies sp). Definitely more than six.

 

[TexMex]

Definitely bad behavior that is cause for alarm - and could lead to his child being removed from him. But that's not what led to Cooper's death.

I don't see where I said it caused Coopers death...

 

[TexMex]

RH said he wanted to divorce in a text with Meadows. He then said it would be hard for him to do so because he didn't want to HURT Cooper. This was sworn testimony

The last time Copper was alone with his father he was HURT. Whether through malice or neglect the fact is RH allowed, caused or planned Cooper to be HURT.

 

[TexMex]

Here is why I think it is disrespectful and dishonors his son, when he is sexting minors while his boy is laying next to him--

And I don't understand how it wouldn't dishonor their child. Dad is doing something that could send him to jail and/or get the child removed from the home. How does it not disrespect/dishonor the child to willfully do that, while laying right beside him in bed?

True.
I guess in the long run Cooper may have lived if he'd been removed from being in the same home as his father.

 

[Hope4More]

Here is why I think it is disrespectful and dishonors his son, when he is sexting minors while his boy is laying next to him----

You say that the boy does not know what his dad is doing. But that is not the point, imo. I think that a parent is supposed to be loving, caring, and connected with their toddler. The child only can relate by mutual nonverbal interactions. A child has complete trust in Daddy and wants to feel total emotional connection. So it is deceitful and twisted, in my opinion, to be laying next to your child, while sending pictures of your junk to a 14 yr old. That has to mess up the child because it will feel weird and phony, not sincere and genuine with the parent.

And I don't understand how it wouldn't dishonor their child. Dad is doing something that could send him to jail and/or get the child removed from the home. How does it not disrespect/dishonor the child to willfully do that, while laying right beside him in bed?

I think Cooper was asleep at the time?

I don't know about the rest, Katy. I really am thinking it through, but entirely in the context of how it does or doesn't connect to the specific charges against RH.

More generally, about parenting and parental styles and choices, and being judged for them. When I was (very) pregnant with my son, I returned from lunch to find an article on my chair a concerned colleague had left for me. The article was about the "dangers" of co-sleeping, a term I hadn't even heard of before, much less thought about one way or the other. The article concluded-don't do it! Your baby could die!

Well, I gave birth to my son, and breast fed (for a very long time-- oh my! the grief I got for that choice, including my doctor -fired on the spot- telling me I should look for other sources of "emotional satisfaction"). Co-sleeping felt like the most obvious and natural choice in the world. The thought of isolating him even in the same room seemed cruel and unnecessary.

I'll always cherish the sweet memories of those 2 years of having him sleep with us, his reaching up to touch my face in the middle of the night, the way as a baby baby he would curl his toes tight into my thigh, to keep as connected as he could possibly be.

Was I endangering him? Was co-sleeping a "selfish" choice? Not in a million years, but if you know anything about the "mommy wars" you know those choices are harshly judged and condemned by many moms.

What I'm trying to say is, I think like many other aspects of parenting, it is a subjective expectation that parents are supposed to be emotionally connected to their children at all times, and that it was necessarily "damaging" to Cooper for his father to be on his phone sexting as Cooper slept. Would it have been any different if RH had been on his phone absorbed with work research and emotionally detached from Cooper?

 

[LyndyLoo]

That's going to be a non-issue IMO because several witnesses on the scene didn't smell anything either.

The door was opened for awhile when other people had the opportunity to get a whiff of that car. When Ross got in it was totally closed up and hot as hell. There had to be at a minimum the distinct smells of toddler sweat and a wet diaper. I would think that would be strong inna tiny space but would have aired out quickly once Cooper was out of the car.

I agree. That wet diaper baked in the car with the sweat and the odor would have been strong, imo. And the car seat was inches away from the drivers seat. It's really hard for me to believe it did not smell in that hot car.

AS someone who is well acquainted with the actual smell of death..MOST are not! The mere fact anyone mentioned some odours at all..indicates there was some who did notice it. The mere fact anybody dies in a HOT CAR ..within a closed space coupled with high temps ( actually increases the rate of decomposition of dead tissues) would indicate..on entering that car coffin of Cooper, Ross would have smelled it immediately!!

I know he claims to be deaf in one ear, does he also claim he has "Olfactory Deficits"? If anyone got in their car with a bad smell, wouldn't any normal personal try and figure out WHERE IT WAS COMING FROM"??? Course Ross is not normal, but he knew exactly where the smell was coming from and chose to expose it in a highly populated area to commence his "ACTING" all panicking and claim his forgot scenario!

Ross can claim all he wants..but his poor acting with his interviews with Detectives plus impressions he gave to responding officers led to a rather high level of suspicions! No one knew anything about his sexting back then..that got revealed later.

One does not have to have experience of odour of death to recognize a smell that isn't normal. Never heard the term bad body odour .. so must have been obvious to some to identify Death smell, urine smell, excrement smell..and none of them where sitting inside the car except the one who helped Ross get Cooper out of that car!

Does anyone remember how many times, murders taking place and the living space was found to be cooled unusually?? That's because the murderer lowered temp ( air Conditioning) to slow down decomposition that would alter Time of Death"..versus..HIGH temperatures that increase decomposition>> There's a reason the temperature is always considered when TOD is considered!

 

[Safeguard]

Here is why I think it is disrespectful and dishonors his son, when he is sexting minors while his boy is laying next to him----

You say that the boy does not know what his dad is doing. But that is not the point, imo. I think that a parent is supposed to be loving, caring, and connected with their toddler. The child only can relate by mutual nonverbal interactions. A child has complete trust in Daddy and wants to feel total emotional connection. So it is deceitful and twisted, in my opinion, to be laying next to your child, while sending pictures of your junk to a 14 yr old. That has to mess up the child because it will feel weird and phony, not sincere and genuine with the parent.

And I don't understand how it wouldn't dishonor their child. Dad is doing something that could send him to jail and/or get the child removed from the home. How does it not disrespect/dishonor the child to willfully do that, while laying right beside him in bed?

Totally agree! It is disrespectful, and shows disregard for his family. Anyone who does shady chit, has no respect/regard for their family. You do something like that, it doesn't just reflect badly on you, but your bad Karma is coming to their house!

 

[MsMarple]

Ugh, I'm still trying to get "couch kooties" out of my head - thanks so much RANCH! :yuck:

 

[TexMex]

I think Cooper was asleep at the time?

I don't know about the rest, Katy. I really am thinking it through, but entirely in the context of how it does or doesn't connect to the specific charges against RH.

More generally, about parenting and parental styles and choices, and being judged for them. When I was (very) pregnant with my son, I returned from lunch to find an article on my chair a concerned colleague had left for me. The article was about the "dangers" of co-sleeping, a term I hadn't even heard of before, much less thought about one way or the other. The article concluded-don't do it! Your baby could die!

Well, I gave birth to my son, and breast fed (for a very long time-- oh my! the grief I got for that choice, including my doctor -fired on the spot- telling me I should look for other sources of "emotional satisfaction"). Co-sleeping felt like the most obvious and natural choice in the world. The thought of isolating him even in the same room seemed cruel and unnecessary. I'll always cherish the sweet memories of those 2 years of having him sleep with us, his reaching up to touch my face in the middle of the night, the way as a baby baby he would curl his toes tight into my thigh, to keep as connected as he could possibly be.

Was I endangering him? Was co-sleeping a "selfish" choice? Not in a million years, but if you know anything about the "mommy wars" you know those choices are harshly judged and condemned by many moms.

What I'm trying to say is, I think it's a subjective expectation that parents are supposed to be emotionally connected to their children at all times, and that it was necessarily "damaging" to Cooper for his father to be on his phone as Cooper slept. Would it have been any different if RH had been on his phone absorbed with work research and emotionally detached from Cooper?

Hope. You shared your Zero Tolerance policy re cheating here. Question....don't answer if you don't want to..

Hypothetical:
If your spouse were laying in bed with your sweet son those two years he slept with y'all...and was texting someone things of a sexual nature and sharing sexual pictures as well....would you find that disrespectful? to you? To the family? Is this a zero tolerance situation?

To me it's not just that RH was detached...like he's checking his fantasy football team. It's that...as he said himself: it became a sickness...his word was "addiction". He even stated it was a "double life". IMO this guy was a really sick pup by May and June

 

[Hope4More]

I say it is obsessive because he sexted until 3 am, then began sexting again at 5:30 am. That seems out of control, imo. That gave him less than 3 hours of sleep. I would say that was a hobby that turned into an obsession.

As others have pointed out, we have no way of knowing what else RH was doing that night. He seemed quite adept at juggling work & sexting. For all we know he was up late trying to catch up on a work project and switching back and forth between screens to sext.

What I'm sure of is that the State has provided only cherrypicked, impressionistic glimpses into RH's online and phone activities, not context, and that the majority of what they've presented has been highly misleading, at best.

 

[Hope4More]

Hope. You shared your Zero Tolerance policy re cheating here. Question....don't answer if you don't want to..

If your spouse were laying in bed with your sweet son those two years he slept with y'all...and was texting someone things of a sexual nature and sharing sexual pictures as well....would you find that disrespectful? to you? To the family? Is this a zero tolerance situation?

To me it's not just that RH was detached...like he's checking his fantasy football team. It's that...as he said himself: it became a sickness...his word was "addiction". He even stated it was a "double life". IMO this guy was a really sick pup by May and June

Disrespectful to me? Oh heck yes, and oh heck no, would i have any tolerance for it. Notice the distinction between disrespectful to ME (and to "family") and disrespectful to our son.

I make that distinction in the specific context of this case, and whether or not RH sexting with his son sleeping next to him has any relevance at all to what happened to Cooper a year later.

 

[minor4th]

The door was opened for awhile when other people had the opportunity to get a whiff of that car. When Ross got in it was totally closed up and hot as hell. There had to be at a minimum the distinct smells of toddler sweat and a wet diaper. I would think that would be strong inna tiny space but would have aired out quickly once Cooper was out of the car.

One of the first detectives on the scene who actually went in the car did not smell anything

 

[SuperTmo]

bbm
I bet you'd be surprised by that number. Plenty of people probably thought RH was "just looking at sports scores" (or what-have-you)...

I've seen rapid fire texting, more times than I can count.

Does the content they are being distracted by really matter?

I believe that yes, the content matters in this case because a child died during the course of that activity. You can't really compare it to any other parents manic texting unless their kids all suddenly died during it too.

 

[minor4th]

I say it is obsessive because he sexted until 3 am, then began sexting again at 5:30 am. That seems out of control, imo. That gave him less than 3 hours of sleep. I would say that was a hobby that turned into an obsession.

There was testimony that he was doing other things in his computer in the early morning - like researching cruise info. The texting could have been incidental.

And we don't know how many texts he sent at 3:00 a.m. Or at 5:30 a.m. Do we? That is not enough IMO to determine that he was obsessive about it. But I'd like to know if there is more info about it that I'm not aware of or missed during the states case.

 

[Hope4More]

For any part of the day? If like to see what's available so I can make some sort of timeline.

I'll try to find it for you. There were many posts here about the testimony elicited on direct relating to texts between LH and RH (some SS's) on the 17th (plus not SSed later testimony of texts between them on the 18th), and RH searches in the AM of the 18th.

I don't remember any SS's of sexts during work on the 18th, but a (very) partial chronology is possible if one does a timeline based on the times provided for some of those texts

 

[Hope4More]

One of the first detectives on the scene who actually went in the car did not smell anything

No mention of death odor in SW's obtained on the 18th.

 

[just the facts pls]

But when someone is grumbling about needing an escape, and 2 minutes later, they conveniently 'forget' to drop off their little joker, that grumbling does look a little more sinister. JMO

Thank you. It's not just that it looks sinister, though. It's because you cannot forget someone you are talking about. I think people are missing this point - lack of sleep or no lack of sleep, distractions or no distractions, if you are talking about someone you are not in a mental state to forget them because they are immediately in your mind.

 

[SuperTmo]

No mention of death odor in SW's obtained on the 18th.

I don't think the smell was relevant to the SW. Everyone knew he was dead. I don't think the car smelled, I think Cooper smelled. Once he was not in the car and the door was standing open, why would it stink in there? Whether it stunk or not is not an issue for me because RH would have absolutely seen Cooper when he got in his car and put his stuff on the passenger side. There is no way he wouldn't have seen him.

I actually have a Chicco infant seat in my garage and I drive a Honda CRV. I'm only 4'10.5" so my view would be different but I'm tempted to go install it and see what I see.