Reason First: The Monster Behind Sylvia Likens’ Murder

The notions of sex and death pervade the culuture. The corruption of and the force associated with both seem to be conceptually entwined in some crime stories. With the case of Gertrude Baniszewski, the inversion of sex and the presence of death at her hands led her to torture and eventually murder of 16-year-old Sylvia Likens in Indianapolis, Indiana in 1965.

The trauma, including forcing Sylvia to ingest her own eliminations, is part of the reason why the Sylvia perished. With the assistance of her twelve-year-old son, daughters, her daughter’s boyfriend, and unnamed classmates, this witch felt the need to encourage them all to beat Sylvia.

Just because she was allegedly saved by Jesus after the crines, Baniszewski felt that she had been saved from the clutches of the law.

But she also motivated her own brood including her son to terrorize Sylvia with body blows. Baniszewski poured scalding hot water on the teenage girl.

But the defining offense remained an injury to the girl’s torso made by a hot needle showing: “I’m a prostitute and proud of it.”

Baniszewski reigned terror but soon would see the inside of the prison walls related to a 1966 conviction of murder in the first degree without the chance for parole.

Twenty years after the murder, Baniszewski tasted freedom once again. But it may’ve been bitter. She wouldn’t survive long as her conscience tore away at her soul. As she changed her name to reflect her middle and maiden names, respectively (Nadine van Fossan), she wanted to chart a new life. Five years later she died from lung cancer in Iowa. Did her past misdeeds contribute to her demise?

The way that she treated Sylvia’s sister Jenny had been just as vicious. Jenny said that she needed to be taken from her place of misery and then she would explain all of the horrors that she witnessed. In one instance, Sylvia experienced torture when Baniszewski forced a glass soda bottle into Sylvia’s genitals.

The results of the autopsy showed that Sylvia had sustained severe brain swelling, brain hemorrhaging and shock to her largest organ, her skin. All of these terrible acts led to her death.

Because of the mercy involved rather than the justice, Baniszewski’s freedom became official. But why? She even said that she took full responsibility for the wickedness surrounding the death of Sylvia Marie Likens. Did Jesus turn all of this around?

That’s the power of bad philosophy. Philosophy, if it is good and proper can be just as or even more potent. But appeals to the unknown and unknowable permitted Baniszewski to walk in liberty. Justice would have said that she should have rotted for the rest of her life behind bars. Mercy said oh, no, you have been forgiven and you must put your trust in ghosts.

Baniszewski represented the sickness in the carceral system. It is an illness that is difficult to detect and even tougher to fight. It is the twisted sense of how mercy and justice struggle to become equal. When someone views the case and how this woman treated the girl, then she should have been given either life in prison with hundreds of years served back to back, or the electric chair.

No. Most people wish to see people bathed in the blood of the “holy” and saved and born again. Anything and everything that a person did can be forgiven says these folks. How is it that someone can commit heinous crimes but not be conpletelty punished in this life, on this earth?

The monstrous actions of this woman should have been enough for her to be put in a life or death situation. Objectively, she could have suffered at least perpetual bondage for her evil. Sadly, the justice system is replete with gaps and crevices that allow for these horrible people to experience freedom again. Maybe one day, the scales of justice will only tip in the favor of the victim(s) and his or her families. One can only rationally hope.