Tomorrow, the city of Philadelphia is burying a police officer killed in the line of duty.
Last Tuesday, Highway Patrol Officer Patrick McDonald was shot to death after a routine traffic stop in a bad neighborhood. The city is furious, and rightfully so—the killer, Daniel Giddings, had an extensive and violent criminal history. He was convicted of robbery and aggravated assault in 2000 for carjacking and kneecapping the victim in the process. Yet Giddings was paroled from a maximum-security prison to a halfway house on August 18, 2008, which he promptly fled.
On August 27, Philadelphia police pulled Giddings over for a traffic violation in a car that was later discovered to be stolen. He fled on foot and ducked into a house. Giddings struggled with police, injured two cops, and escaped. A warrant was issued for his arrest.
Gidddings’ mother said the criminal vowed he was never going back to prison.
So when the car Giddings was riding in was pulled over for a broken tail light on September 23, he bolted again. Officer Patrick McDonald radioed for backup and pursued him on foot. The officer caught up with the criminal, and Philadelphia Homicide Capt. James Clark described what happened next:
“Mr. Giddings pulled out a .45-caliber semiautomatic, shooting the officer, striking him several times,” Clark said. “The officer went down, and then he stood over him and executed him, shooting him several more times.”
Giddings seized a bicycle and rode up the street, where he was confronted by three motorcycle cops. Giddings threw the bike at one cop, and started shooting at another, Officer Richard Bowes. Bowes returned fire. When it was over, Bowes was wounded and Giddings was dead.
Violent behavior started young
Daniel Giddings’ first conviction was for beating and robbing a mentally disabled man in 1991. Giddings, at the time, was 10 years old.
Articles in the Philadelphia Inquirer recount Giddings’ continuing life of violence:
- Gidding spent his youth in and out of juvenile institutions. He was charged several times with assaulting staff, sending some of them to the hospital.
- He told the court in 2000 that he sold drugs on the corner, raised pit bulls for fighting, and gambled.
- While in prison for the robbery and assault charges, Giddings was charged with disciplinary problems 27 times and spent 537 days in solitary confinement. He had been moved from medium-security prisons to a maximum-security prison.
- Giddings was found guilty of 13 misconduct charges between 2001 and 2006, including stealing from cellmates, assault, passing sharpened metal objects to another inmate and other offenses.
- Before going to prison at age 17, he fathered three children.
- Psychiatric evaluations described him as highly self-centered and manipulative. He was not, however, impulsive. His violence was planned and deliberate.
Shaping up to get out
So how did this guy get out? Twice, Giddings cleaned up his act long enough for authorities to think he had changed.
The first time came in 2000, during his trial for carjacking and kneecapping the victim. Giddings faced a potential sentence of 22½ years to 45 years in prison. During the sentencing, Assistant District Attorney Joseph Coolican told Common Pleas Court Judge Lynn B. Hamilton there was no reason to believe it would ever be safe to release Giddings.
“From what I have seen in the four years of prosecuting violent crime, I have never seen an individual who presents a higher risk of re-offending,” Coolican said.
Although the judge was alarmed at Gidding’s criminal history, she was impressed by his grades in finishing his high school diploma while in custody. She gave Giddings the minimum mandatory sentence—six to 12 years.
For the first six years in prison, Giddings racked up all those disciplinary charges. But after 2006, he entered drug and alcohol counseling, participated in group counseling, took courses in anger management, citizenship, violence prevention, victim awareness and parenting.
The Philadelphia Inquirer interviewed Susan McNaughton, a spokeswoman for the Pennsylvania Department of Corrections. “You have to look at his overall situation,” she said. “The fact that he was misconduct-free for the last couple of years was good, and he had completed a lot of programs.”
War on judges
The mayor of Philadelphia is outraged that Giddings was paroled. The governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell, has ordered a review of the parole board’s decision. And the city’s Fraternal Order of Police has declared war on “L” judges, as in liberal, lenient or light-sentence.
The FOP is demanding a comprehensive review of sentencing practices of Philadelphia judges. But although the cops are justifiably angry, they’re fighting the wrong battle. What is really needed is a comprehensive education program for the judges and parole board members to teach them about psychopaths.
The behaviors exhibited by Daniel Giddings are the behaviors of a psychopath.
Psychopaths do not change.
It’s that simple.
For more information on this case, see the following articles in the Philadelphia Inquirer:
Patrick McDonald shot to death; 2nd cop wounded; gunman slain
Phila. Officer’s killer “just evil,” commander says
From age 10, a life of violence
Rendell wants review of Giddings’ parole
Are you an “L” judge? The FOP wants war
LIG, the more you “cave in” to their abuse the more they despise you for weakness. Yea, they “want” you to be nice to them, but when you are, they despise you for being so gullible. It is a catch 22, if you are nice they despise you, if you are nasty, they hate you.
YTea, they want you to cave, but yet they don’t respect your niceness, they laugh at you behind your back because they put one over on you and you fell for it.
Yea, some of them will move on when you stand up to them, but the really hard core ones will beat you or kill you if you stand up to them. My P bio father and my P son are pretty hard core, they despise nice as “weak” and definance they CRUSH if they can. My P XBF, he was a vengeful sneaky bastard, he got even but didn’t have the back bone to do it to your face, just behind your back.
None of them think you have any rights.
Ox: Wow. I’m glad after I discovered the lies and everything, I threw it in my ex’s face. I was mean. Never caved. I went right for the jugular and took back my car. Totally exposed his game. Each time he tells me a lie, I respond, “you are a liar.” I resulted to blackmail to get my deed back and told him I’ll call his girlfriend and get her involved if he doesn’t give it back. I threatened the prosecutor. I told him I don’t have to be nice because he and T** were not nice to me…they both didn’t give 2 sh**ts about me. Well, he texted me today and send he is sending out my deed papers tomorrow. I know this story is getting old but I do believe it will happen. He’s run out of gas with me with 0% possibility of ever weaseling his way back in my life.
The last thing he said to me was, “I hope you find someone who loves you the way you want to be loved.” I didn’t respond. His way of showing “love” is cutting you off from friends and family, verbal abuse, cheating, lying, manipulating, free-loading, controlling and dominating.
He did the same crap to the woman before me and called it “love.”
He’s been gone 4 1/2 months and I feel fine. (I’ll bet the GF doesn’t feel fine.)
I am glad you are doing well wonder-girl. I hope that deed shows up.. and I’m glad you stuck up for yourself. Some of them you can, some of them you just have to cover your head and hope they get tired of waiting to blow it off.
Kat: Thanks. 4 1/2 mos ago I got the car but I was a little wishy-washy about the deed to the condo at first. I was like asking nice, begging, telling him he needed to do the right thing…then I got tired of that crap. All I had to do was think of all the mean things he did and it gave me the strength I needed..that and some help from God up above helping me along. What he doesn’t want to do is lose his current GF/Meal Ticket / Roof Over His Head so that was good ammo.
I remember the time he spit in my face and then grabbed me by the neck and was staring me down. I stared right back and said “do you feel like a real man now?” I know now that I should have not retaliated because he could have hurt me bad. He let go and later said he really didn’t grab it that hard. How demeaning. He left the house (to the GF’s of course.)
I think the GF is more submissive..which is what he is looking for. He always said that I was too tough for him. Perhaps because I always stood up. I always told him what he was doing was trying to control me and that is not love. Oh boy, is she in for a ride and a half.
You know why he grabbed me by the throat? I asked him if he would stop by the cleaners and drop some clothes off. He got angry and said why don’t you do it? You stop there by yourself anyway! See, I was not allowed to stop anywhere on the way home from work or I was accused of talking to men in stores. It was impossible for me to get to the dry cleaners before they closed. My life revolved around his schedule because he had to go everywhere with me to keep an eye on me. I no longer had my own life. It sucked. It’s great to be free again.
Dear Wonderwoman!
I hope to heck you get the deed papers! Keep us updated and we will throw a cyber PARTY when you get them in your hands!
Iwonder
It really does feel great to be free again. Sometimes it will hit me and then I will tell myself “I really am free again!” and that’s when I stop and smell the roses and enjoy the bright Sunshine!!! Yes, it feels GREAT to be FREE again!!!
Dear Wonderwoman. I have a very effective recipe against being staired down. I got it as a secret from one of my patients when we were discussing about coping with power-play and being “too nice”. She told me that when she realizes that someone is trying to stare her down she looks in the opponent’s “third eye” i.e. the space inbetween the eyes at the beginning of the nose. You just look relaxed at them but they can’t stare in YOUR eyes. I tried it with my boss who used to stare me down as well, and it was just amazing. Have you all a nice evening!
Hey, Libelle,
That is a GREAT IDEA!!!! It is so amazing what all we learn on this blog! That’s a great technique.
There are others too, that you can use to make them “uncomfortable” without them even realizing why they are uncomfortable.
The book “Body Language”–a pretty old book from the 60s or early 70s describes alot about personal space, what is yours and what is theirs.
The Ps are masters at this it seems just instinctively, but when you are consciously aware of a great deal of the aspects of it, you can use it right back at them. It can also help you to NOT unconsciously violate someone else’s space by your body language.
90% of our communication is NON verbal anyway, so it is really a “language” lesson that is quite valuable. AT the time I read it in 1970 I had no idea about such a thing as “body language” so it was a real eye opener for me. I go back and reread it sometimes. Never hurts to refersh myself on it. It also just gives you great clues to how the power trippers are working on you without saying a word.