She’s suddenly become kind of obsessed with getting hold of tubes of toothpaste and sucking down as much of the minty goo as she can before someone snatches it away from her.
I guess she’s worried that she might be developing bad breath as a result of all the dogfood & bath water she consumes every chance she gets ….
(Yep, we know eating a bunch of toothpaste can really be bad for a baby, and it’s all now locked up tighter than Al Gore’s lockbox.)
As I’ve said before, Joan Berry is my hero, and my inspiration.
Joan and Johnia Berry
Mike and Joan Berry’s beautiful daughter Johnia (pronounced “Jah-nah”) was brutally murdered in her Knoxville apartment in 2004. It took several years for the case to be resolved (ambiguously, as it happened to turn out), and during that time Joan and her husband Mike became vocal advocates for Johnia’s case, even when it seemed the criminal justice system had given up.
When 18 months after Johnia’s murder, Joan realized that no progress at all was being made in her daughter’s case, she and Mike were willing to openly question the work of the Knox County Sheriff’s Office, something that brought them public criticism from many inside the Knox County power structure. They organized public events to try to get Knox County District Attorney Randy Nichols to enlist available outside resources to fully investigate Johnia’s murder – something he was refusing to do.
(FYI- If you’ve followed my son Henry’s case at all, the specifics of the way Johnia’s case was handled, and the way Joan and Mike were treated by KCSO will seem disturbingly familiar.)
And they refused to shut up or go away like KCSO and the DA obviously wanted them – and their supporters - to do.
No, Joan Berry never, ever, ever gave up, even as others seemingly forgot about what had happened to her child. Three years after Johnia’s murder, answers came in the way of a lucky break that led to a DNA match to the suspect who was charged with the crime.
Today, Joan Berry is an advocate for victims’ families – she founded HOPE for Victims – and together with Mike, she also oversees various charitable initiatives in her daughter’s memory. Joan Berry is also THE reason that Tennessee and multiple other states now have laws in place that require suspects in violent crimes to give a DNA sample.
Yes, Joan Berry is my hero, and I am also proud to call her my friend.
And tonight – Sunday, January 29, 2012 – Johnia’s case and how it was mishandled will finally get the national attention it’s long deserved. Paula Zahn will investigate and profile the Johnia Berry murder case on her show, “On the Case with Paula Zahn.”
“Left in the Dark: Johnia’s Story” will air at 10 pm EST on the ID Investigation Discovery Channel.
I will be watching, and I hope many of my blog readers will be as well.
Note: If you are a Direct TV subscriber in East Tennessee, the Investigation Discovery network is found on channel 284.
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Did you follow Johnia’s case after her murder? What lingering questions do you still have about the case and how it was handled? Share your thoughts on Johnia’s case, as well as on Joan and Mike Berry’s tireless advocacy in the comments below.
This week, two of my favorite mombloggers (who are also my friends) made the mainstream media in a big way, and I want to give both of them a shout out.
First up, Joanne Bamberger of PunditMom (her blog and mine are like slightly off kilter anagrams…) was featured in the Washington Post talking about the political evolution of moms-who-blog.
Joanne Bamberger of PunditMom
And then, Meagan Francis of The Happiest Mom was one of the featured commentators in a New York Times “Room for Debate” smackdown this week on whether the “consumer model” for schools is a good idea or a bad one.
Meagan Francis of The Happiest Mom
Go check out what these two supersmart women have to say.
Back when I was in high school, I was active in the Interact Club, which is a terrific service organization for kids that works under the umbrella of Rotary International.
So I was really happy to hear that E’s own middle school was starting its first Interact group this year, headed up by one of my favorite teachers of all time, Laurie Coburn. E immediately wanted to participate in the new club, and he has really enjoyed being part of Interact so far.
And now, guess what Laurie’s first-year, start-up group has done? Well, the video they produced on the topic of how kids can help eradicate polio worldwide just won Rotary’s international Change 4 Change video competition, competing against schools from the U.S. and 10 other countries!
Yahoo!
To me, the really neat thing about this video is that the kids truly did it themselves, including shooting and editing it in iMovie, creating artwork, scoring it, and narrating it. And speaking of narrating, the proud mama in me requires that I let y’all know that if you watch the video, you will hear two different narrators – a boy in the first half and a girl in the second half. The boy is my boy, and his grandfather Hank Allison would be so proud, because he clearly inherited Hank’s broadcast news chops 
Anyway, huge congrats to Episcopal School of Knoxville teachers Laurie Coburn and Susan Lancaster, and to the crew of awesome middle schoolers who have won this big award, and who are bringing awareness to such an important cause.
Dateline photographer’s gear today at the site KCSO insists is where much of the April 25, 2010 assault against Henry took place.
If you’ve noticed less blogging from me in the past week, the photo above explains why.
NBC’s Dateline has arrived in town (!!!) to begin their work investigating Henry’s case, and today I took time off from my job to help their folks locate several spots around Knoxville they want to to have their photographer shoot early on in the production process.
Getting emotionally and logistically ready for this big thing kicking off today has occupied me a whole lot this week, plus I am INSANELY busy at work with several fast track projects I’m involved in.
Plus, there have been a couple of new pieces of info to emerge in Henry’s case just since my return from Utah on Sunday night, and I’ve put some time into trying to fully understand those developments.
Last, I will be a guest on WBIR’s Inside Tennessee this Sunday morning, and we taped the show last night. (the topic was social media and political campaigns)
Basically, after 5 days of travel followed by a super intense week with work and Dateline and everything, I’ve just not been able to put fingers to keyboard at Mamapundit in the past few days as much as I usually do.
But I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth! (Not yet anyway…)
Hope that all of you are having a slightly less frazzled week.
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