Suspect’s blog showed malicious thoughts
Alleged Idaho kidnapper spoke of ‘demons’ that led him to commit
crimes

Updated: 3:36 p.m. ET July 7, 2005

BOISE, Idaho - Convicted sex offender Joseph Edward Duncan III
spent months on the Internet documenting his internal struggle over
right vs. wrong. Then, four days before two Idaho children he is accused
of kidnapping disappeared, he wrote: "The demons have taken over."

It was one of the last entries in Duncan's Weblog before the 42-year-
old North Dakota man was arrested and charged this week with two
kidnapping counts. Authorities believe he took 9-year-old Dylan Groene
and 8-year-old Shasta Groene from their Idaho home shortly before their
13-year-old brother, mother and her boyfriend were bludgeoned to death
May 15. Police say Duncan also is a suspect in the killings.

"God has shown me the right choice, but my demons have me tied to a
spit and the fire has already been lit," Duncan wrote April 24, after he had
jumped bail in Minnesota on charges of molesting a 6-year-old boy on a
playground.

His last blog entry was May 13, two days before Dylan and Shasta were
taken from their home and their family members killed.

Losing grip on right vs. wrong"As far as 'taking people with me,' well, I
don't know if that is right or wrong," he wrote. "In fact, I don't know
much any more what right and wrong even is."

Duncan was arrested Saturday at a Denny's restaurant in Coeur d'Alene
when a waitress recognized the girl with him as Shasta and called police.
A body believed to be that of Dylan has been found in Montana and awaits
positive identification.

Richard Forno, a computer crimes expert in Washington, D.C., said
prosecutors will likely use Duncan's blog as they prepare the case against
him.

"This type of information in his blogs, where he's telegraphing things and
revealing some of his other issues, certainly that is relevant in a case like
this," said Forno.

Duncan's began his "Blogging the Fifth Nail" online journal — the title is an
allegorical reference to a fifth nail intended to end Christ's suffering on the
cross — in January last year.

Police concluded that Duncan was the author of the journal based on
interviews of people who knew him and on the Internet Protocol address —
an identifying number specific to a computer — that was used to establish
the blog. The entries each include the tag line, "Posted by: Joe."

In sporadic entries usually posted in the middle of the night, Duncan used
the digital soapbox to vent his anger over the social stigma of being a
convicted sex offender.

"I have decided to give up on trying to convince people that I am a real
person, with honest and good intentions, not some evil monster they
should be afraid of," he wrote last year.

The entries include excerpts from a book he said he was writing based
on his conviction at age 16 in Tacoma, Wash., of sexually assaulting a
14-year-old boy at gunpoint. He documents his nightmares, his anger
over serving 20 days past his 20-year prison sentence, his difficulty
making friends and dating, and diatribes against police checking on his
whereabouts and confiscating his computer and digital camera to check
for child pornography images.

"Of course I am clean, they might find some pictures of me naked, non-
sexual mode photos I used once to make a birthday card for a girlfriend
once, but that's about it," he wrote in an entry last August titled "Home
Invasion."

Angered over sex offender stigma His irritation with registering as a
convicted sex offender and having that information publicized on a Web
site maintained by the police department in his home of Fargo, N.D.,
was a frequent topic. He submitted anonymous questions about law
enforcement's efforts to monitor sex offenders to Fargo Police Chief
Chris Magnus periodically through The Forum newspaper's online
"Chat with the Chief" feature and then posted the responses to his blog.

"I think it's pretty amazing you believe that as a registered sex offender
your situation is comparable to being a Jew or member of another minority
group persecuted by the Nazis," the police chief wrote in a May 2004 reply
to Duncan's comparison of the Fargo police policy to visit the homes of high-
risk sex offenders to the 1935 Nuremberg Laws that stripped Jewish people
of their German citizenship.

Magnus said this week his officers first learned of Duncan's blog when
they questioned friends and neighbors after he failed to check in with his
probation officer in May.

"Whatever questions he submitted were submitted anonymously, and I
certainly had no idea I was corresponding with him," Magnus said. "In
retrospect now, it is a little creepy, especially after I went on his blog to
read how he has this vendetta against anyone who he felt was responsible
for his situation."

© 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/8500603/

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http://fifthnail.blogspot.com/
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Only those who have actually wrestled with demons would understand
what it is like to fight with them. Satan can be formidable, and is a toxic
and poisonous energy. It doesn't change what is however. I am less
hostile with this man - one victim of Satan - than I was yesterday. I
read over some of his website quietly. He listened. There are those
who do have understanding. It doesn't change what is . Justice will
be dealt all the way around. Satan has been warned - that his time is
indeed short, and He has made his decision. He says that he makes
"No exceptions" - that has been heard.