NASA Astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak to be Charged with Attempted Murder

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NASA Astronaut Lisa Marie Nowak to be Charged with Attempted Murder

by John Little on 6/02/2007

It looked like Lisa Nowak was going to be released on bail today but things have taken a turn for the worse:

A NASA astronaut charged with pepper-spraying and trying to kidnap a romantic rival was granted bail Tuesday, but her release was delayed after police announced they were filing an attempted murder charge against her, a corrections department spokesman said.

Navy Capt. Lisa Marie Nowak had already paid her bail on three other charges when she learned that she would not be released because Orlando police were planning to add attempted murder to the list, said Allen Moore, a spokesman for the Orange County Corrections Department.

Nowak will remain in protective custody until her first appearance on the new charge, which will likely come Wednesday morning, Moore said. The additional charge is likely to be filed Tuesday afternoon, Moore added.

The items in her possesion tend to support the charge:

Police found in Nowak’s bag a tan trench coat, a new steel mallet, a folding knife with a 4-inch blade, 3 to 4 feet of rubber tubing, large plastic garbage bags and about $600 in cash, the report said.

We can’t know what was going through her head but if someone came after me with all that gear I’d assume that they were planning on killing and quite possibly dismembering me. It’s a sad case but this woman needs to remain behind bars, or in a hospital, for quite some time.

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There are 2 comments in this article:

6/02/2007Dave Bennett says:

I am not sure why the media appears to be so surprised at Lisa M. Nowak’s behavior in response to her romantic crisis. I realize that everything in our media needs to be sensationalized for maximum profit potential and that this is not healthy behavior. A normal person when confronted with this situation should surrender, accept what has happened and let it go.

However, people who just let go and let things take their natural course are not good candidates for the space program at all. Astronauts are selected, in part, for their tenacity in solving problems and are trained to be prepared for any contingency and to apply their skills and abilities to attempt a more positive outcome while managing the risk of failure.

Unfortunately, Ms. Nowak admirably applied her skills as an astronaut to try and rectify her personal problem. Although this wasn’t a healthy decision for her or her rival, it is perfectly understandable given her training and background. As we all do, she was merely following her programming.

Here are a few of my observations:

1) Astronaut’s wear the equivalent of diapers during missions. Although this appears to be very unusual behavior, I would bet it’s not the first time that someone with her training has worn diapers on a long road trip.

2) Given the list of items she was carrying. She had obviously prepared for several contingencies and possible outcomes on her ‘mission’.

3) Using the mace first before employing the more dangerous weapons (tools) is perfectly logical. Someone with her training would employ the least damaging and risky solution first, thus minimizing the potential for disaster (her rivals death) while maximizing the possibility of success (winning back her lover) and causing the least amount of damage to the system (their lives).

4) Any criminologist will tell you; this is the wrong approach for someone who is trying to get away with murder. But then again, Lisa is not a murder. She’s an astronaut.

5) Although her attempt failed, no one died or was seriously injured. She followed her astronaut training perfectly.

This incident is no more unusual then Charles Whitman’s ‘Deadly Tower’ killing spree at the University of Texas. The sad truth unfortunately, he WAS trained as a killer. Just wait until our freshly trained and experienced killers come back from their tours in Iraq. Then they’ll be plenty of horrendous disasters for our media to sink their teeth into.

Me? I think I’ll just stay home and lock the doors. I’m trained in Internet Security.

–Dave Bennett
Kansas City
6/02/2007Robert Kuhn says:

Though she claims the diapers were to enable her to drive straight through, I saw mention of a motel stay in the police report. Given her disguise and latex gloves, a more likely motive for the diapers might be to minimize the chance of ending up on gas station security cameras. With diapers, she could just pump gas and be on her way.

When an embezzler attempted to lure me and my wife to what we know would have been a murder to conceal the embezzlement, people wanted to tell us it was simply to talk. As in Nowak’s case, none of the circumstances made any sense if talking was the goal, though I’m confused about the 4 foot section of rubber hose: she not only had it in her bag, but had written it on her list. Will she say it was it to go from the AstroNut’s mouth to Shipman’s ear so she could hear her talk more clearly?

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