2009-05-06T22:35:00.000-07:00

NEW YORK – For sale soon: a variety of torture devices from the 16th century, including shame masks to enforce silence, a 14-foot table-like rack to stretch the victim's body, and a tongue tearer to punish blasphemers and heretics. Even an executioner's sword.

New York's Guernsey's auction house plans to auction the privately owned collection, with proceeds to go to Amnesty International and other organizations committed to preventing torture in today's world, said Guernsey's president, Arlan Ettinger. "That is clearly the seller's intent," he said.

Ettinger described the items Wednesday as possibly the world's most extensive collection of historical torture devices — some 252 items — plus rare books, documents and other related artifacts.

He declined to identify the owner, beyond saying it is a family living in the northeastern U.S., within three hours of New York. No date has been set for the auction.

Of German origin and acquired in the late 19th century by England's earl of Shrewsbury, the torture collection has been in private American hands since last publicly shown in 1893 in New York and at the Chicago World's Fair. Its owner for many years after that was Arne Coward, a Norwegian-born survivor of the Holocaust. His descendants are the present owners, Ettinger said.

On Nov. 26, 1893, an article in The New York Times described what was then a 1,300-item collection, noting that "thousands of people have gazed upon these terrible relics of a semi-barbarous age," all of which "have been in actual use."

As if to underscore the relevance of the exhibit to modern times, Ettinger said, the lead story on the front page of Wednesday's New York Times was headlined: "Torture Memos: Inquiry Suggests No Prosecutions."

The 252 devices include iron masks, boots, thumbscrews, foot squeezers, ropes, leg irons, chains, rings, manacles and "witch-catchers."

Notably absent is what the Times in 1893 called the "justly-celebrated iron maiden," a coffin-like case with deadly spikes on the inside. Ettinger said the fate of the iron maiden and other items is unknown, but they may have been lost in a fire that destroyed many buildings at the end of the Chicago world's fair.

The diabolical devices are a unique, but not unlikely, offering by the Manhattan-based auctioneer, noted for its sales of the offbeat.

Guernsey's auctioned off Mark McGwire's 70th home run ball in 1998 for a record $3 million, and it plans what Ettinger says will be the world's first "tennis auction" at this year's U.S. Open in New York, selling an array of sport-related items from antique rackets to trophies and historic contracts. "So it's not all painful," he said.

Ettinger said there was no way to tell what the torture collection is worth or how much it may fetch at auction. In the 1970s, he said, an obscure magazine "read only by historians" estimated its value at $3 million — about the same as Mark McGwire's home run ball.

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MO Mom Could Face A 3-Year Sentence

2009-05-06T22:25:00.000-07:00

LOS ANGELES – A Missouri mother should serve three years in prison for her role in a MySpace hoax on a 13-year-old neighbor who committed suicide, federal prosecutors said in court documents filed Wednesday.

Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Krause outlined the government's position while requesting the maximum sentence for Lori Drew. Probation officials have recommended Drew receive a year of probation and a $5,000 fine.

Krause argued that Drew "coldly conceived of a scheme to humiliate" Megan Meier, a neighbor in a St. Louis suburb, by helping create a fictitious teenage boy on the social networking site and sending flirtatious messages in his name to the girl.

The fake boy then dumped Megan in a message saying the world would be better without her. She hanged herself a short time later.

Drew used her then-13-year-old daughter and a business assistant in the scheme, which played on Megan's insecurities, Krause said.

"Both the callousness of defendant's criminal conduct and the extraordinary harm it caused mandate a sentence of more than probation," Krause wrote.

Drew was convicted in November of three counts of accessing computers without authorization. Besides up to three years in prison, she could face a $300,000 fine at sentencing set for May 18.

Drew's attorney, Dean Steward, has asked U.S. District Court Judge George Wu to throw out the verdicts.

Steward said his client couldn't afford the $5,000 fine recommended by probation officials because she no longer draws income from the coupon book business she had for nine years.

During the trial, prosecutors argued that Drew violated MySpace rules by setting up the phony profile for a boy named "Josh Evans." Jurors decided Drew was not guilty of the more serious felonies of intentionally causing emotional harm while accessing computers without authorization.

The jury could not reach an unanimous verdict on a felony conspiracy charge.

Drew was not directly charged with causing Megan's death.

Some legal experts believe prosecutors are still smarting over the conviction on lesser crimes. In his filing, Krause continued to argue there is convincing evidence that shows Drew set out to inflict emotional harm to Megan.

"They are just totally gung-ho on this case," Matt Levine, a New York-based defense attorney and former federal prosecutor, said about prosecutors. "On one hand, what Lori Drew did was egregious and she should be brought to justice, but they have used the wrong legal theory here."

Levine said it would have been more appropriate for Missouri authorities to charge Drew with harassment. Police there, however, have said they didn't file any charges against Drew in part because there was no applicable state law.

The trial was held in Los Angeles because the servers of the social networking site are in the area.

Original Post Found HERE

Myspace Hoax Leads To Death

MO Mom Could Face A 3-Year Sentence