Victims & Stolen M16s: It's Never All Black & White

A friend of ours recently questioned our referring to the two 17 year-old women involved in the Vina High School sex scandals as "victims." The word "victim" obviously has many connotations and certainly in legalese a victim might be one who intentionally made the wrong choices in order to promote an agenda but was deemed too young to be held responsible.

Do we personally call these two young women victims? We don't know their upbringing or in the case of Brian Keeton if any physical or chemical inducements were (allegedly) used. We're 99% sure from the details that have come to light so far that both these women need spankin' and the two coaches need divorcin'.

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Campbell's Madison Drug Bust

Now we come to a much more permanent type of  victim--a shooting/killing victim. For every victim who's murdered at random for money (think Mr. Elbert Farley in Tuscumbia), you have countless more who are murdered because of their choices and actions. That doesn't mean they should have been killed; it simply means if they had behaved in a rational, law abiding manner, they would not have been placed in a position to be murdered.

This latter group includes Thomas Grant Campbell. He's dead, so we don't know his side. We do know he willingly went to the Sheffield residence of Chris Martin. We do know that several local news agencies have pointed out that none of the three adults involved in the shooting have lived a completely law abiding life. Campbell's previous brushes with the law seems to have involved drugs and some (allegedly) stolen guns that precipitated his dishonorable discharge from the military.

This space is reserved for a sermon entitled "Life is Hard Enough without Drugs or Alcohol," but sadly such sermons never seem to reach their intended audience.



Shoalanda

Vina High Student Victims Were Best Friends

Gary Williams

When asked about the two current teacher sex scandals at Vina High School, Franklin County Superintendent Gary Williams replied, "I don't know how things like this happen." Perhaps that's part of the problem. We've had teacher friends who carefully chose every word spoken to students of the opposite sex; they felt such actions were needed in order to maintain a professional relationship that could never be questioned. It would seem familiarity doesn't always breed merely contempt.

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Williams has also reported to the press that the two 17 year-old girls (reported victims) were best friends. The superintendent stated that at the time of his arrest, Tibbs had been transferred to Vina Elementary School in August after a nine year stint at the high school. We're surmising someone knew something was not quite cricket.

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And just how old are these two teacher/coaches? The TimesDaily and some other news sources have stated Sonny Tibbs was 35. Arrest records, along with a college bio, list his birth date as 11/18/74, making him 39 in three days. Similarly, the age of Brian Keeton has been reported in the TD as 38. Official records list his birth date as 3/26/73, making him 40. Both more than old enough to know better.

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Sometimes reader e-mail is just too good not to pass along: I was thinking about the comment that "sex sells." It's nothing compared to death and dismemberment, but you may be able to throw that in too. The coachs' wives haven't finished with them yet.



Shoalanda

Teacher-Student Sex is More Than a Molehill

It would be very easy to start out with a joke, but as one reader pointed out, problems at Vina are far more serious than losing a few ball games. Yet another reader sent us a Facebook posting in which a Vina High supporter accused this blog of making a mountain out of an ant bed, or words to that effect.

Boys' basketball coach Brian Scott Keeton has denied the allegations of sex with a 17 year-old student. If the allegations are false, the student should be punished severely. If true, Keeton should never be allowed to teach anywhere again. If true, we have to ask again, just what was this 40 year-old man thinking?

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On a November 5th Facebook post, Brian Keeton's wife quoted from an article on how to "fireproof your marriage." On November 8th, the day Sonny Tibbs was arrested, she asked for special prayers. We hope everyone does pray for this lady and her child.

Let's also remember the family of the 17 year-old student. As a friend says, it's not always the parents' fault.

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Okay...just one small joke: Coach Tibbs was booked in an Alabama hoodie. It's nice to see Franklin County is giving Auburn equal time.



Shoalanda