Delano Massey reports in today's Lexington Herald-Leader that three of the four "men" convicted of assaulting a librarian and stealing rare books from Transylvania University three years ago have been interviewed for a December Vanity Fair article, "Majoring in Crime." That article isn't available online, but Massey provides a summary and some very noteworthy outside comments.
Eric Borsuk, Warren Lipka and Spencer Reinhard, all serving seven-year sentences at the Federal Correctional Institution in Ashland, KY agreed to be interviewed; Charles Allen did not. A lawyer for Borsuk said he had advised his client not to talk to reporters, at least until after a scheduled appeal before the 6th Circuit (the men are trying to get their sentences reduced). Fred Peters told Massey "if he [Borsuk] did grant them an interview, it would be against my objection. He shouldn't do anything until the appeal is over. A judge could see the story and make a different ruling." He added that he "can't imagine it helping" Borsuk's case.
But the interviews were granted, and I hope the judge reads the resulting article: Massey reports that the thugs "express no regret for the crime, except for harming [B.J.] Gooch, the librarian." Gooch was stunned, blindfolded and "hogtied" while the thieves snatched rare books, including volumes of Audubon's Birds of America. A spokesperson for the university said she was interested to read the article, and that she is "concerned about inaccuracies and embellishments."
The scheme, which Massey describes as "hatched in a haze of marijuana smoke, with inspiration from popular heist flicks" was motivated by "a desire to escape the 'mundane, nickel-and-dime existence' of suburbia," according to one of the felons. Borsuk tells Falk if they'd pulled it off [a ludicrous idea, really], "they would have lived a 'crazy life thinking we were Ocean's 11 types.'" Lipka adds "In a few years we'll be released. We'll all be ... still young. We will be stronger, better, wiser for going through this together, the three of us. Before, in college, growing up, we were being funneled into this mundane, nickel-and-dime existence. Now we can't ever go back there. Even if we wanted to, they won't let us."
These guys are doing their level best to glamorize their story and make themselves into some kind of counter-cultural super-thieves. How long do you think it'll be before the movie deal's announced? Ridiculous. Here it is, simply put: these are four small-time suburbanite potheads who violently assaulted a librarian and stole major cultural treasures. That's nothing to be proud of. I do hope the judges who hear their appeal read both Massey's and Falk's articles, because it's clear to me that these twerps need every minute of jail time they can get.
