NFT: Man mistakes porn DVD as woman's cries for help

[The Rick]

Man mistakes porn DVD as woman's cries for help
He faces charges after entering apartment with sword in tow
By DAVID DOEGE
ddoege@journalsentinel.com
Posted: Feb. 20, 2007

Oconomowoc - Instincts took over, James Van Iveren says, when he rushed out his door to the sound of a woman being raped in an apartment above.

"It was a woman screaming," he recalled Tuesday. "She was screaming for help."

Sword in hand, he bounded up the stairs, kicked in the door and confronted a man who turned out to be alone - watching a pornographic movie.

"Now I feel stupid," Van Iveren said.

Worse yet, police seized his sword - a family heirloom - carted him to jail and referred the case to a prosecutor who charged Van Iveren with three criminal counts.

"This really is nothing," Van Iveren insisted, "nothing but a mistake."

Van Iveren's "mistake" unfolded on the morning of Feb. 12 when Van Iveren, 39, of Oconomowoc, was listening to music in the apartment he shares with his mother behind Red & Bunny's Diner on S. Main St.

Suddenly, according to Van Iveren, the distinct cries of a woman pleading for help could be heard coming from the apartment above him. He tried putting them out of his mind at first, but when they persisted, Van Iveren decided something had to be done.

"I don't have a telephone," he said. "I couldn't call the police."

The cries seemed to be coming from the apartment of a tenant he barely knew, but that, Van Iveren said, didn't matter.

"It had nothing to do with him," he said. "I didn't even know if he was there. It was the woman. I thought there was a woman."

The woman, according to a criminal complaint, was on a DVD being watched by the neighbor, who later played part of the movie back for police to point out what he figured Van Iveren heard downstairs.

To Van Iveren, the neighbor's film sounded like a rape in progress.

"So I grabbed the cavalry sword and ran upstairs," he said. "I intended to hold it behind my back and knock.

"But I froze and instead, what happened happened."

According to the criminal complaint, the neighbor told police that Van Iveren pounded on the door and kicked it open without warning, damaging the frame and lock in the process.

"Where is she?" Van Iveren demanded, thrusting the 39-inch sword at the neighbor, according to the complaint. "Where is she?"

The neighbor told police that Van Iveren became increasingly aggressive as he repeated the question, insisting that he'd heard a woman being raped. With the sword pointed at him, the neighbor led Van Iveren throughout the apartment, opening closet doors to prove he was alone, according to the complaint.

Van Iveren said it wasn't nearly that dramatic.

"I walked in the front room and looked around," he said. "When I saw there was no woman, I left.

"I went downstairs and when I looked out the window, I saw the police had come, so I went out to tell them what happened."

Van Iveren insisted that he never threatened the neighbor with the sword.

"I had the sword extended," he said. "But that was all."

The neighbor wasn't home when a reporter visited the building Tuesday, and he could not be reached by telephone.

For his effort, Van Iveren was charged with criminal trespass while using a dangerous weapon, criminal damage to property while using a dangerous weapon and disorderly conduct while using a dangerous weapon, all criminal misdemeanors that carry a maximum total penalty of 33 months in jail.

"All of them are going to be dismissed," he predicted. "They have to.

"This was all just a big mistake."

The prosecutor who issued the charges could not be reached for comment Tuesday. Van Iveren, who was released on a signature bond when he was charged last week, is due to appear in court March 5.

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=568400

[Sully]

You guys make fun... but a kitten was legitimately saved by this brave man's act.

[el borracho]

Who phoned the police? The guy that was watching porn?

"911. What is your emergency?"
"Uh... hello, police"
"Yes, sir, what is your emergency?"
"Uh... I was minding my own business. You know- just beating off in my apartment when my crazy neighbor broke down my door!"
"......(sigh).... we'll have an officer respond in approximately 39 minutes."

[el borracho]

Seriously, why were the police necessary? Why didn't the guy that broke the door just apologize and make arrangements to pay for the damages?

[The Rick]

Here's a follow article today regarding this story...

Swordsman's claim disputed
Prosecutor says sounds on neighbor's DVD were consensual sex, not rape
By DAVID DOEGE and AMY RINARD
ddoege@journalsentinel.com
Posted: Feb. 21, 2007

Waukesha - The pornographic DVD that was being played in an Oconomowoc apartment doesn't square with a man's claim that he thought he heard a rape in progress before storming into the residence with a sword, a prosecutor said Wednesday.

"Does hearing the sounds of consensual sex under these kinds of circumstances indicate that a crime may have been occurring? Obviously, the Oconomowoc police thought not," Waukesha County Assistant District Attorney Kevin Osborne said.

As for kicking in the door while armed with a sword, Osborne said, "Was that a reasonable response? It's reported that he pounded on the door and kicked it in before the man had a chance to open it. That doesn't appear to have been a reasonable reaction to me."

Osborne said the decision to file the charges against James W. Van Iveren over the Feb. 11 incident primarily boiled down to his reported beliefs and actions being unreasonable.

"If he disagrees, we can take it to trial," Osborne said. "That's why we have trials."

Van Iveren's neighbor, Bret Stieghorst, said Wednesday that he believed Van Iveren was doing what he thought was the right thing in kicking in the door to his apartment and didn't care about the charges that were filed, except damage to property.

"He did kick in my door, so he should get charged with that," said Stieghorst, 33, who works full time and is a student at Waukesha County Technical College. "But he really didn't do anything except what he thought was right. I don't know what I would have done in that situation."

But if Van Iveren was attempting to rescue what he thought was a woman in danger he was "obnoxiously late," said Stieghorst, who said he watched the movie between 1 and 2:30 a.m., but Van Iveren did not burst into his apartment until about 11:30 a.m.

When he told Van Iveren that he was going to call the police, Van Iveren ran out the door of the apartment and down the stairs, and Stieghorst said he followed him. It was only when they got to the bottom of the stairs, and Van Iveren ducked into the door of another apartment, that he realized Van Iveren was his neighbor, he said.

Stieghorst, who said he has lived in his small downtown apartment for five years, said he was watching an adult DVD in Spanish called "Casa de Culo." He said the movie has no screaming that would suggest to someone a woman was in danger.

"It's all in Spanish, and I don't understand a word of it," he said. "I only bought it for the hot chicks."

Van Iveren, 39, of Oconomowoc, was charged by Osborne last week with one count each of criminal trespass while using a dangerous weapon, criminal damage to property while using a dangerous weapon and disorderly conduct while using a dangerous weapon.

Van Iveren told a reporter Tuesday that he distinctly heard a woman screaming while he was listening to music in his first floor apartment on the morning of Feb. 11. When the screams persisted over an extended period, he concluded that a rape was taking place in the apartment above his, so he decided to intervene, according to Van Iveren.

Van Iveren said he grabbed an heirloom sword, raced up a staircase to the apartment above him and kicked in the door, expecting to find a woman being raped. He said he left after the neighbor showed him that he was alone in the apartment.

Osborne said Wednesday that the case was unusual.

"I guess I'd call it a unique set of circumstances," he said.

Osborne said, though, that it would be a mistake to let Van Iveren off the hook merely because he says he was mistaken.

"You can't just make up an excuse for your behavior and expect to avoid consequences," he said.

Stieghorst said the incident will not change his movie-viewing habits.

"No, way; I'm a man and I'm a normal person," he said. "But I think I will get some good headphones, maybe some wireless ones."

http://www.jsonline.com/story/index.aspx?id=569088

[chagrin]

WTF is Oconomowoc?

I think that Van Iveren dude is a satanist. I have never seen a "spanish" porno, but I bet the chicks would be pretty hot, who's got a link of some. LAZ???

[The Rick]

Here's a picture of Zorro himself...

[88TG88]

I have go to see this "Casa De Culo"