Watson Murder Case - Discussion

[Kern]

What's a "normal" person?

 

[bowlofpetunias]

And who gets to decide?

 

[Divedoggie]

Remember that until a few days ago in that article, we never knew a timeline regarding Gabe's anger over an alleged affair. All the articles and news reports said was that Gabe was angry over an alleged affair that Tina had and described some of his angry behaviour. For the first time a few days ago, we have read in the latest article that this alleged affair was apparently before Gabe's proposal to Tina.

Proposing after one believes their girlfriend has had an affair and plotting to kill her is a little strange, yes. Of course, you're assuming that the alleged plot hatched prior to the proposal, if that story is even correct. The plot could have hatched at any time prior to the honeymoon.

Is it normal to keep the engagement ring box in view and demand that your girlfriend not look at the ring for 6 months on threat of dissolution of the engagement? And continue to get married?

Is it normal to throw pizza at and verbally berate your fiancee at a restaurant? And still go on to marry her? BTW, I believe Tina's sister said this argument included the alleged affair. And yet they married each other. If Tina's sister's version is true, then Gabe was still angry during the engagement, prior to the wedding.

Gabe and Tina's relationship and engagement appeared to have been very tense and skewed and I'm not sure we can rule out any behaviour as being abnormal or normal in their reality.

Yes, they seemed to have had an abnormal view of normal.

Throwing pizza, dangling the engagement ring box, and a public argument are not indicators of premeditated murder. As a little more info continues to trickle out, we can paint a picture of immature a$$es. Plural, because it takes two to have a public argument and it illustrates that Tina should have walked away..run away, but no, she married him anyway.

Based on all the discussions and the newest information, take a leap in logic: Tina never understood the consequences of bad decisions. In both cases she chose a completely unreliable person to be her buddy in life and her buddy underwater.
Tina had multiple indicators to NOT get married..yet fooling around with the rest of her life..she got married anyway.
Tina had multiple indicators to NOT go diving..yet she fooled around with the rest of her life and went diving anyway.

For every argument that is raised concerning murder, there is reasonable doubt. Months of folly, poor decisions, incompetence, and immaturity culminated in the events that we've discussed concerning Tina's tragic death. A murder plot hatched before the wedding, before the honeymoon, just doesn't stand on it's own.

 

[Ayisha]

Throwing pizza, dangling the engagement ring box, and a public argument are not indicators of premeditated murder.

No, they're not and I don't think anyone has said that they are. Those examples were in response to a quote within my post that alluded that Gabe may not have had the patience to propose to Tina and follow through the sequence of events if he was angry enough to kill her. We also may not expect someone to do the things that Gabe is alleged to have done to Tina and still go on to marry her. Many women also would not go to see their former boyfriend during a relationship as Tina was alleged to have done and then go on to accept a marriage proposal. We don't know what their reality was.

 

[Dadvocate]

Ayisha wrote:

Is it normal to keep the engagement ring box in view and demand that your girlfriend not look at the ring for 6 months on threat of dissolution of the engagement? And continue to get married?

Is it normal to throw pizza at and verbally berate your fiancee at a restaurant? And still go on to marry her? BTW, I believe Tina's sister said this argument included the alleged affair. And yet they married each other. If Tina's sister's version is true, then Gabe was still angry during the engagement, prior to the wedding.

Gabe and Tina's relationship and engagement appeared to have been very tense and skewed and I'm not sure we can rule out any behaviour as being abnormal or normal in their reality.

Perhaps this is a bit unfair, but I read the words above imagining that they were part of the summation of the prosecution trying to convince me as a jury member that Gabe Watson is guilty of murder.

Mind you, our speculations about what is appropriate or “normal” behaviour in matters of love belie just how fickle this emotion is and how in all the annals of human history it creates “abnormal” behaviour in our species, for both male and female victims alike.

I would certainly take these examples of Gabe’s odd behaviour into consideration IF they came with some actual evidence that he had a plan in the first place. The entire case was brought to trial based on the assumption that Gabe had a plan before the couple left the States.

Of course the point might be moot if the prosecution can convince the jury of guilty behaviour in OZ, leaving them to give the prosecution the benefit of the doubt on the testy issue of motive and chronology before the fact. Kind of the legal version of bait and switch if you ask me. Dishonest but effective.

But I imagine that this could easily become a double-edged sword. If the jury is successfully convinced that the evidence in OZ is as the authorities in OZ found it to be (i.e. lacking), the added burden of providing a Stateside motive and plan in a substantive form might become a major sticking point that tips the scales in Watson’s favour. Establishing a reasonable motive (or the lack thereof) apparently played a significant role in the Anthoney case for a muber of jurors.

It is hard to say in this day and age with the current jury system we have in the US.

And if you’ll forgive a personal anecdotal reference to all things “normal” in the pitfalls of love between men and women, I’d like to tell a little story.

I have a group of friends I made while living in Austria some years back. We were a tight-knit group of Bohemian university students living the European dream.

We all had relationships of various kinds, some casual, some more serious, some straight out of a western chick flick and some of Slavic suffering and turmoil.

I recall one night when one of these couples (a tumultuous affair between an Austrian female friend and her Italian male lover) had one of the most ridiculous public fights in front of all of us.

I mean this fight was ugly! Food was thrown, dishes broken, vile things said (in tree languages to boot), tears shed, and I believe from some accounts serious makeup sex after the fact (read dormitory living and fill in the blanks).

Afterwards as each of us blissfully coupled individuals engaged in a spell of Schadenfreude, we lamented that “normal” couples understand that you have to practice respect and restraint in order to nurture a successful relationship… blah, blah, blah.

All of us (including my naïve self) were at the time in very successful “normal” relationships. We all hoped that our tumultuous friends would go their separate ways and find partners like we had so that they could be “happy”.

As it turns out some 15 years later, all of us normally coupled know-it-alls have made several mistakes in love, found and lost love (in some cases numerous times over), and had heartbreaks galore. While our “abnormal” friends went on to be blissfully married with three kids. And yes, two years ago when I visited them in Vienna, I noted immediately that they still fight and argue like crazy.

If I have learned anything from my two friends, it is to not keep anything in under the misguided notion that this somehow improves the line of communication or that it allows for a better life with your chosen partner. Perhaps they understood this early on, and maybe that is far more “normal” and honest than any of my BS ideas on relationships from the past.

Cheers!

 

[Ayisha]

Ayisha wrote:

Perhaps this is a bit unfair, but I read the words above imagining that they were part of the summation of the prosecution trying to convince me as a jury member that Gabe Watson is guilty of murder.

Nope, again, the examples I gave do not fit any less with the idea of proposing after being angry about an alleged affair. I could add what is described as the "bizarre" behaviour of sending a Christmas card with their wedding portrait to Tina's friend with suggestive remarks after Tina's death. Or repeatedly removing flowers off Tina's grave and when discovering eventually that he could not, to go to get bolt cutters and cut them off, caught on video. It's all a little different than one might expect.

None of that means anything in a court of law, but it tells you a little about the personalities involved.

Establishing a reasonable motive (or the lack thereof) apparently played a significant role in the Anthoney case for a muber of jurors.

I believe what played a significant role in the Casey Anthony case was that she had a fabulous defence team. Her attorney was able to introduce so much doubt into the credibility and motive of the witnesses and offered up a plausible explanation of events that discredited and pointed to another suspect (her father). It was a masterful case of creating doubt in the jurors to the extent that they could not prove murder beyond a reasonable doubt. When seeing interviews with some of the jury and stand-by jurors, it seems like they could be confusing "reasonable" doubt with "any" doubt when speaking of how there was a tiny doubt but they could not convict based on the law.

I'm sure that attorney's going rate went up a whole lot after that case and there's a new "dream team" around. If Watson has an attorney that can incite doubt to such an extent, he'll easily walk. His side of the story with his explanations have been coming out more than ever before, so the tactics seem to be different than the first time around.

 

[bowlofpetunias]

Too right DV. People get into relationships for all sorts of reasons that may be healthy or unhealthy but they "work" for the people involved. It may seem from what we have heard that Tina "needed" to be a bride and be married to avoid escape the "Old Maid" syndrome It may seem that Gabe needed someone to control

You see many relationships that last for life where people who "need" to be controlled (even bullied) team up with people who need to control (even bully). As long as neither has a change in what they need to get out of the relationship the relationship will last. From the outside with the filters of our own bias we all come to conclusions about how WE interpret these relationships but in many cases only a professionals can really work them out if it is indeed possible to do so!

IHMO we are too far removed from the reality of the people involved to come to accurate conclusions about the relationships involve. I would also like to point out that the relationships that impact this case go beyond Tina and Gabe but also include their relationships with friends and family who are now impacted by and impacting this case because of their personal biases!

 

[DandyDon]

So true, Petunias. I've been on some of those trips. :silly:

 

[Divedoggie]

IHMO we are too far removed from the reality of the people involved to come to accurate conclusions about the relationships involve. I would also like to point out that the relationships that impact this case go beyond Tina and Gabe but also include their relationships with friends and family who are now impacted by and impacting this case because of their personal biases!

Well said. It has been years and it has become an obsession for Tina's family..and for Scubaboard discussion as well.
When dealing with death, loved ones always look for a reason, a cause, an explanation that will give some clarity and eventual acceptance. Gabe afforded no consolation to Tina's relatives, so they began to suspect him. This suspicion was fueled by supposedly expert divers telling Tina's family that a Rescue Diver should have conducted himself differently...and rescued her.
His pride, incompetence, insensitvity, inability to grasp the reality of the tragedy, poor communication skills, and then anger toward her family for being blamed have added together to make him look guilty.

I have had a few friends who have just disappeared during mountaineering expeditions. A fall into a deep cravasse in New Zealand, or blown off a mountain top in Alaska, the end result was that they were never seen again. The parents were incredibly distraught and continue to search for explanation. It will never come. If they had a Gabe as a scapegoat, these very nice distressed parents, may have singled him out and accused him...

There are so many levels of psychology going on here. Gabe and Tina's disfunctional/functional relationship. The failure to act/react to Tina's distress on the fateful dive. Gabe's inability to communicate well with interviewers and Tina's parents. Gabe's reaction to being blamed for her death(ripping the flowers from the grave and suggestive language on a card to Tina's friend.) Tina's families obsession that it was premeditated and inability to accept that it was an accident. Everyone's lives being publicly dragged through the muck...for years.

When I first saw the TV special, and then read about the case, I suspected Gabe. But further reading and further thought have changed my mind. The case is interesting and the discussion here on SB is provacative and interesting. I'm also drawn to this thread and to following the case, because I speculate that the root cause of the accident is poor dive training.
Tina should never have been certified if she was prone to panic attacks underwater. Gabe definitely didn't respond the way a "Rescue Diver" should have. They were both inexperienced, uncomfortable, chose not to do the checkout dive, and were essentially reckless. It is a fine line between a near miss and a fatal accident. The divers who survive a near miss will hopefully learn from the experience and go on to gain more experience and better training. The divers who had a big problem underwater and who didn't have an attentive buddy or DM get to have a conversation with Mr.Darwin.

 

[Dadvocate]

Nope, again, the examples I gave do not fit any less with the idea of proposing after being angry about an alleged affair. I could add what is described as the "bizarre" behaviour of sending a Christmas card with their wedding portrait to Tina's friend with suggestive remarks after Tina's death. Or repeatedly removing flowers off Tina's grave and when discovering eventually that he could not, to go to get bolt cutters and cut them off, caught on video. It's all a little different than one might expect.

Firstly, I was merely providing a thought experiment on what the prosecution might proffer in summation if indeed they are forced to try and establish a motive that played out in the US prior to Gabe and Tina going to OZ.

I assumed for argument sake that this could have a significant impact on the case IF the defense is able to establish the same weaknesses that were apparently obvious when the prosecution viewed the evidence the first time around in OZ.

I did not mean to imply that you thought these examples constituted sufficient evidence, as you have stated clearly enough that this is not the case on more than one occasion.

I could add that though these actions are indeed compatible with an angry person who found out about an affair, wanting to lash out in bizarre ways is also quite “understandable” when infidelity and other types of cheating enter the mix.

Is it “bizarre” for a woman to cut out the crotch section of her husband’s slacks after finding out about an affair?

Would it be “bizaare” for her to paint “cheater” on his new Mercedes Bens or to send something like a card to his workplace to embarrass the hell out of him?

What if the husband added hair remover to his cheating wife’s shampoo?

The actions could take any number of forms when this kind of betrayal takes place and cheating could produce deep-ceded emotions and insecurities.

Wanting to wrest control back into the relationship could also be an explanation for why Gabe Watson wanted to carry on with the wedding. I know of at least two other friends who have made similar decisions after a cheating incident as a way to “move on”. I think this is crazy personally, but it seems to work for some. Doing so doesn’t necessarily mean a murder plot is in the make.

For the sake of argument, let us assume that Gabe is innocent of killing Tina but was still angry at her for this alleged affair at the relevant times you cited. Could he still be lashing out while also feeling guilty for having failed her, pressuring her to dive, etc?

I’d say it is well within the realm of possibility. In my estimation, based largely on his inarticulate interview and other instances when he has had to act on his own without guidance from lawyers, Gabe Watson is immature and unsophisticated on several fronts. This too makes him a good candidate (in my humble opinion) for acting out in ways that others might find “bizarre” because he lacks the cognitive tools to act in other, healthier ways.

Whether or not “anger” can be established is kind of moot anyway, because any lawyer can easily establish that these feelings are quite normal under the context you and others have provided. That he proposed anyway and went on to marry her could have any number of psychological explanations that I am sure others more qualified than me could explain.

I really don’t see the relevancy UNLESS viewed in light of more substantial evidence.

The question I have is what else do the prosecutors have to add to the mix to show that this anger was the catalyst for a master plan to kill his wife half the world away? If the evidence for this is as flimsy as the suggestion that he was angry in the first place, well then the prosecution could be in serious trouble.

None of that means anything in a court of law, but it tells you a little about the personalities involved.

More accurately, it establishes that your explanation is plausible, right along with the rest of many other explanations. Whether or not it sheds any actual light on the real personalities involved remains to be seen.

I believe what played a significant role in the Casey Anthony case was that she had a fabulous defence team. Her attorney was able to introduce so much doubt into the credibility and motive of the witnesses and offered up a plausible explanation of events that discredited and pointed to another suspect (her father).

I’d say her defense was competent because her lawyer did what he was supposed to do; he tore apart obvious gaps in the prosecution’s case and he held the jury’s attention on this while also adding a possible alternative example.

I haven’t read all of what transpired in the case, but I have read accounts that the “daddy did it” explanation was only effective in light of the woeful gaps in the prosecution’s case. Reasonable doubt was established well before the alternative chronology and key players were introduced (so say some).

I agree that the potential for the same outcome is possible in this case also, and I would also say that justice would be best served for everyone if Gabe Watson had just as competent a defense team that Anthony did.

We’ll see.

Cheers!