Alleged victim testifies in sexual assault trial

by **Et in Arcadia ego** » Thu Jun 22, 2006 1:29 am

[Holy Moly..] <a href="http://cf.themonitor.com/SiteProcessor.cfm?Template=/GlobalTemplates/Details.cfm&StoryID=13762&Section=Valley">cf.themonitor.com/SitePro...ion=Valley</a> June 17,2006 Brittney Booth Monitor Staff Writer EDINBURG — A young girl featured in a controversial television ad during the 2000 presidential campaign testified this week that the man who developed the commercial molested her for years and forced her to watch pornography and use sex toys. The girl, now 15, told jurors Carey Lee Cramer — a 44-year-old political consultant who gained national notoriety when he released an anti-Al Gore ad showing a young girl picking daisy petals and ending in a nuclear blast — began molesting her in the third grade, when she lived in Mercedes with him, his then-wife and her younger brother. The ad in which she and another girl were featured was a remake of one Democratic President Lyndon B. Johnson’s campaign used against Republican Barry Goldwater in 1964. The girl took the stand Thursday in Cramer’s aggravated child sexual assault trial, which began June 7 in Hidalgo County before Visiting Judge Homer Salinas’ Auxiliary Court A. She continued testifying Friday. Cramer’s defense attorney, Charles Banker, argues the allegations are false and stem from a custody battle over the son Cramer shares with his ex-wife, Samara Whittaker. The girl shared graphic testimony. At times, she appeared to fight back tears and her voice quivered as she gave detailed accounts. She told jurors Cramer began by taking her into his home office and showing her pornography when she was 8. He would touch her sexually, remove her clothing and perform deviant sexual acts on her. The incidents occurred weekly, when the girl was home alone with Cramer. By the time she was in the fifth grade, Cramer began to force her to perform acts he would share with her from pornographic Web sites, including oral sex, she said. He also tried to make the girl use a vibrator and other sex toys, she continued. And Cramer forced her to have sex with him three times, she testified. She said Cramer continued to molest her after they moved from Mercedes to McAllen and Tucson, Ariz., until she finally reported the abuse in 2004. In response to the defense’s claim she was lying to help Whittaker in her custody battle, she denied it. "I haven’t lied for her and I won’t," she said. "I told you everything that happened that he did to me." She said she initially denied the abuse to Child Protective Services because Cramer threatened to keep her away from her family if she told. Jurors have also heard testimony from the girl’s therapist, a doctor who examined her and police officers who investigated the case. Earlier in the week, another 15-year-old testified that Cramer touched her under her underwear one time when she was visiting the family in Mercedes. Cramer’s alleged victims are relatives. The ad for which Cramer gained national attention was produced to accuse the Clinton-Gore Administration of giving nuclear technology to China in return for campaign contributions. At the time, he refused to identify who financed the commercial. __________________________

by **Et in Arcadia ego** » Thu Jun 22, 2006 1:41 am

<a href="http://huffcrimeblog.com/?p=637">huffcrimeblog.com/?p=637</a> excerpt: "In every news story I could find about Carey Cramer, he was referenced as being “of” or “from” the (Machiavellian) Meridian Group and as a spokesman for Aretino. In hindsight, this was a subtle handling of language on Cramer’s part, and worthy of his alleged kind. Al Gore’s people did manage to determine that Meridian and Aretino shared an address in Texas, telling enough, in and of itself. The media at the time had other fish to fry, and the story faded by election day. A net-savvy scholar would have seen right through what Mr. Cramer surely considered some extremely clever, subtle, but pointed nomenclature. The Aretino Industries website was no longer available when I researched this weekend, except through the always-wondrous Internet Wayback Machine, at www.archive.org. visit to both The Aretino Industries site at (archived) www.aretinoindustries.com, and www.themeridiangroup.net was my first clue. The first thing I realized was that the sites had likely been designed by the same hand, using the same programs. But that was more of a gut feeling, one I could only support by saying that I could tell that in spite of different color schemes, images, etc., both websites seemed to bear the signature of a single web-surfing aesthetic. The name, “Aretino,” bothered me. I don’t know if some old, mostly-forgotten scholarship of my own triggered the research, or just the painting on the left (click for full-size image). I know I thought it was an odd name for a Texas-based “group” to use. And somehow, Aretino reminded me of Machiavelli. There was a good reason for that. The preceding link has embedded in it a Google searche for the names “Niccolò Machiavelli” and “Pietro Aretino.” Nearly 10,000 hits on sites containing both names. Right or wrong, the modern interpretation of Niccolò Machiavelli’s political philosophy has been reduced to the phrase, “The ends justify the means.” The term “Machiavellianism” is used to describe a predilection for deception, for manipulation in the name of benefitting the one doing the deceiving. Pietro Aretino was younger than Machiavelli, but only by two decades or so. Machiavelli seems to the modern eye an exponent of a cold-blooded and ruthless approach to acquiring and wielding power, bu Aretino was a predecessor of William Randolph Hearst. Aretino was a satirist and a gadfly, and he managed to wield considerable power in various city-states on the Italian peninsula through both flattery and blackmail. Aretino provided background information and satirical writing for publications that were basically akin to modern newspapers, and in doing this he anticipated some trends that are now full-blown in modern journalism. If you find all that rather dry, then maybe all you need to remember is that some scholars also consider Aretino the founder of European pornography." [WAY more on that link..] Another excerpt: "Blogs on the left side of the political spectrum have gone after this sordid story (Google search link) with relish, and that is understandable. In doing this, they are missing what may be the key, underlying evil inherent in it. Not only that, at least one Democrat paid Carey Cramer Sr. of Tucson, AZ $13,038 during that Dem’s run for Congress in 2001/2002. Before the next passionately liberal blogger crows about Republican Activist Carey Cramer, perhaps it would be a good idea to ask Democrat Chuck Kalogianis of Florida (if he’s still around) just what Carey Cramer did for Kalogianis’s campaign that was worth $13,038." Sheesh..has this been covered here yet? It's the first I've heard of this guy, but I kinda remember hearing about the commercial..

Alleged victim testifies in sexual assault trial

Alleged victim testifies in sexual assault trial

Re: Alleged victim testifies in sexual assault trial

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