Clicking on banner ads enables JWR to constantly improve
Jewish World Review Oct. 6, 2000 / 7 Tishrei 5761

Bob Greene

Bob Greene
JWR's Pundits
World Editorial
Cartoon Showcase

Mallard Fillmore

Michael Barone
Mona Charen
Linda Chavez
Ann Coulter
Greg Crosby
Larry Elder
Don Feder
Suzanne Fields
James Glassman
Paul Greenberg
Bob Greene
Betsy Hart
Nat Hentoff
David Horowitz
Arianna Huffington
Marianne Jennings
Michael Kelly
Mort Kondracke
Ch. Krauthammer
Lawrence Kudlow
Dr. Laura
John Leo
David Limbaugh
Michelle Malkin
Jackie Mason
Chris Matthews
Michael Medved
MUGGER
Kathleen Parker
Debbie Schlussel
Sam Schulman
Amity Shlaes
Roger Simon
Tony Snow
Thomas Sowell
Cal Thomas
Jonathan S. Tobin
Ben Wattenberg
George Will
Bruce Williams
Walter Williams
Cathy Young
Mort Zuckerman

Consumer Reports


'Had they shot him in the head, he would have suffered less'


http://www.jewishworldreview.com -- COLUMBUS, Ohio | "We knew we had a 3-year-old with no heartbeat. They had him on a cot when they brought him in from the ambulance. The first I saw him . . . Oh, my G-d. . . ."

The man speaking those words -- Mike Cogdill -- was a paramedic assigned to the emergency room of Children's Hospital in Columbus on the day that P.J. Bourgeois, 3, was brought in by a Columbus Fire Department rescue squad.

"The bite marks, where those two had bitten into him," Cogdill said. "The furry stuff on his wrists and ankles, where they had taped his arms and legs together. . . ."

Cogdill was referring to the two people who killed P.J.: Patrick Bourgeois, P.J.'s father, and Tracy Lynn Bratton, Bourgeois' girlfriend.

Cogdill said that the pediatric emergency room staff looked down at the child, who weighed 34 pounds, and detected no signs of life. But they were going to hope against hope -- they were going to try.

"I tried to put an IV in," Cogdill said. "I took his arm -- his left arm -- and I saw one of the bite marks, where they had gone into him with their teeth.

"I was trying to do my job, but I was thinking: I want to see the people who did this.

"I knew he had been beaten. I knew he had been tortured. You couldn't have been in that emergency room and not have known that whoever had done this to him had tortured him to death."

The two adults who did this to the 3-year-old boy -- Bourgeois and Bratton -- are walking free now. As we have been reporting, they never had a trial -- they each pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter, and then were released early from prison by Franklin County Common Pleas Court Judge Nodine Miller before they were even eligible to ask to go before a parole board. Judge Miller let them out early because she felt that what they did when they killed P.J. "was fraught with ignorance, immaturity and inexperience, more than malevolence." No witnesses ever testified in court about what had been done to the child.

In the emergency room the day P.J. was brought in -- Feb. 28, 1996 -- Cogdill and what he estimates as between 10 and 15 medical personnel -- "physicians, nurses, residents, paramedics" -- tried to bring the boy back to life. But P.J. didn't have a chance.

"The doctors finally called it," Cogdill said. "He was dead. He had been down for a long time. One of the doctors said it: `Stop.'"

The frenzied effort to save the boy was over, and Cogdill said he could feel the emotion because everyone in the room was so silent: "[P.J.] was covered with a sheet up to his shoulders. We stood there, and no one was saying anything."

Now, with Bourgeois and Bratton out on the streets after their release from prison by Judge Miller, Cogdill is enraged: "Letting the people out of prison who killed the child in the way they killed him . . . letting them out is an atrocious thing to do. More than anything else, it is a slap in the face to P.J.

"What they did to him is the worst thing I have ever seen in my life. They took his life away in the most violent way you can imagine. Had they shot him in the head, he would have suffered less. They made sure that his death was slow and agonizing. I keep asking myself what he was thinking after they beat him and bit him and taped him up so he couldn't move, and left him to die. He must have been thinking: `Why am I going through this? Why are they doing this to me?'"

Cogdill recalled leaving work that night, with the sight of P.J. on the emergency room cot still in his mind. "I live in London, Ohio, about a 30 minute drive southwest from Columbus," he said. "On the drive home, I just started crying. I couldn't help myself. I was driving and I was crying, and I was alone in the car. . . ."

He found himself wanting to know: What exactly had the boy gone through? What had caused the 3-year-old to die?

Someone else was about to find the answer to those questions. He was another person who has never had the opportunity to testify in court about the child's death: Dr. Patrick M. Fardal, forensic pathologist with the Franklin County Coroner's Office, who was assigned to perform the autopsy. On Tuesday, we will report what Dr. Fardal learned.



JWR contributor Bob Greene is a novelist and columnist. Send your comments to him by clicking here.

Up

10/05/00: 'I remember the moment that I first saw the human bite marks'
10/04/00: They killed a 3-year-old boy -- and they are free
09/29/00: This just in, sort of: How the news can make you calm
09/27/00: Like being with old friends in places you don't remember
09/21/00: If the Olympics banished television . . .
09/19/00: As summer ends, have the executives learned any lessons?
09/14/00: The new stardom that doesn't require paying any dues
09/12/00: Leave a light on for us children of the pioneers
09/09/00: River banks? How to turn water into an endless cash flow
09/06/00:Oh, give me a home, where the megabytes roam . . .
09/01/00: If this works, it can literally change young lives
08/30/00: From inside all those screen porches, one more cheer
08/24/00: Who will make your life better by August of 2004?
08/24/00: Four men running -- Why do we have to throw out two?
08/16/00:The certain way to measure the Lieberman factor
08/10/00: Can a library be a library without books?
08/08/00: Can't they spare eight nights every four years?
08/04/00: Cheney, Abe Lincoln and Ricky Martin -- do they add up?
08/02/00: Convention aside, you might want to tune in
07/27/00: How to make a killing
07/25/00: 'If we didn't do it, no one else would'
07/24/00: The executioners who walk among us
07/20/00: On Main Street, signs of the times tell two stories
07/18/00: Have the choices changed, or have we?
07/14/00: Gable, Hepburn, Zanuck--you wouldn't find them at HOJO's
07/13/00: The Great Lie about political conventions
07/06/00: If this is victory, what would defeat feel like?
06/29/00: A bright moon and a missing person on Orange Ave.
06/26/00: They're not singing our song
06/22/00: The name game
06/07/00: It's like knocking on a revolving door
06/06/00: Steven who? A close encounter of mistaken identity
06/02/00: Of summer days, summer nights and pebbles in a jar
05/31/00: The best laughter, the truest voices, will never fade
05/25/00: Of distant visions, close views, and Bobby Knight
05/24/00: 'The luckiest thing that ever happened to me'
05/23/00: 'It's funny how you remember the little things'
05/22/00: 'The whisper of a generation saying goodbye to its children'
05/19/00: The place to find life is not a keyboard
05/18/00: A problem of suds but no duds
05/17/00: Are those lazy, hazy dot-com days fading?
05/16/00: The truest things in life require not a single word
05/15/00: 'Evidently he didn't like the way she dusted the house'
05/12/00: Why news executives are hoping this 'woman' is a hit
05/11/00: Ted Koppel, Hitler, Mellencamp . . . and words of love
05/10/00: Maybe it's time for the right people to hear our cheers
05/09/00: The lesson that they always learn late
05/05/00: 'Excuse me, but there seems to be something in my water'
05/05/00: When your first dream turns out to be your best dream
05/04/00: Even baseball couldn't make light of this superstition
05/03/00: The ringmaster who looks back from your mirror
05/02/00: There they go, just a-yappin' down the street . . .
05/01/00: You must remember this (Unless you don't)
04/24/00: Now that casino ads are allowed to tell the truth . . .
04/13/00: The man in the seat across the airplane aisle
04/11/00: A star is born, but do you know where it's @?
04/06/00: Through the eyes of Norman Rockwell
03/21/00: 10 good reasons to avoid making this list
03/21/00: 'I tell myself that they've gone on vacation'
03/21/00: Monday Night Football memories
03/02/00: This report card deserves an 'A' in every subject
02/29/00: What really happened on New Year's eve
02/23/00: Of paste pots, Denver sandwiches and finding Dr. Sam
02/17/00: What would you like to stay exactly the same?
02/04/00: Politics: When did the stagehands step onto the stage?
02/01/00: An awesome idea to make you sound better
01/26/00: Y3K already? We haven't yet recovered from Y2K
01/21/00: Watching the pot that always boils
01/19/00:The story behind the men on the museum steps
01/13/00: Here's to the students who never hear a cheer
01/11/00: The oh-so-sweet sound of modems in the morning
01/04/00: The person in your mirror just got wiser
12/31/99: A lesson -- and a memory -- to last a millennium
12/29/99: Racing the clock, even when it's running backwards
12/13/99: The right to bear coffee
12/08/99: From teen idol to ink-stained wretch: Can you Dig it?
12/02/99: Human 'search engines'
11/30/99: Here's looking at you -- now hand over the cash
11/23/99: Who'll say 'I'm sorry' to the other Decatur students?
11/18/99: "From bad things, good can come"
11/16/99: The man who didn't know the meaning of 'whatever'
11/12/99: Is this progress? We have made the weekend obsolete
11/09/99: Today he would probably be called Kyle Kramden
11/04/99: And you thought the IRS was heartless
11/02/99: When it's free, what will the real price be?
10/29/99: The tissue-thin decisions that define who we are
10/26/99: One way to cut road rage down to size
10/22/99: Asking all the right questions takes a special pitch
10/18/99: The signs are talking to you; Are you listening?
10/12/99: Even Capone would be disgusted
10/08/99: Don't ever look your neighborhood bear in the eye
10/06/99: Land of the free and marketplace of the brave
10/04/99: German warplanes in American skies
09/30/99: While you fret, something is sneaking up on you
09/28/99: In these busy times, why not bring back a certain buzz?
09/24/99: The storms whose paths no one can track
09/21/99: Who's minding the store? Oh . . . never mind
09/17/99:Here's another place where you can't smoke
09/14/99: As certainly as `lovely Rita' follows `when I'm 64' . . .
09/09/99: Why is patience no longer a virtue?
09/07/99: Once upon a time, in an airport close to you . . .
09/03/99: The answers? They are right in front of us
09/01/99: Up the creek with a paddle--and cussing up a storm
08/30/99: $1 Million Question: How'd we get to be so stup-d?
08/27/99: Fun and games at Camp Umbilical Cord
08/25/99: How life has been changed by the woodpecker effect
08/23/99: If you don't like this story, blame the robot who wrote it
08/20/99: A four-letter word that has helped both Bob and Rhonda
08/18/99: They have picked the wrong country
08/16/99: From paperboy to stalker--how the news has changed
08/12/99: Why wasn't anyone watching his brothers?
08/10/99: Come to think of it, stars seldom are the retiring type
08/05/99: The national gaper's block is always jammed
07/29/99: 'Can you imagine the gift you gave me?'
07/27/99: A view to a kill -- but is this really necessary?
07/23/99: Some cream and sugar with your turbulence?
07/21/99: When your name is JFK jr., how do you choose to use it?
07/19/99: The real world is declared not real enough
07/15/99: The real victims of cruel and unusual punishment
07/13/99: A 21st Century idea for schools: log off and learn
07/09/99: Are life's sweetest mysteries still around the bend?
07/07/99: Of great minds, cream cheese and Freddy Cannon
07/02/99: The perfect spokesman for the American way
06/30/99: 'He's 9 years old . . . he trusts people'
06/28/99: A $581 million jackpot in the courthouse casino
06/25/99: A nighttime walk to a House that feels like a cage
06/23/99: At least give men credit for being more morose
06/18/99: On Father's Day, a few words about mothers
06/16/99: If work is a dance, how's your partner doing?
06/14/99: Should a dictionary ever tell you to keep quiet?
06/10/99: A story of Sex, the SuperBowl and your wife
06/07/99: Take a guess where "California Sun" is from
06/03/99: Of summer days, summer nights and pebbles in a jar
06/01/99: Putting your money where their mouths are
05/27/99: Pressed between wooden covers, the summer of her life
05/25/99:The lingering song of a certain summer
05/24/99:We could all use a return to the Buddy system
05/20/99: Now, this is enough to make James Bond double-0 depressed 05/17/99: It's midnight -- do you know where your parents are?
05/13/99: And now even saying "thank you" creates a problem
05/11/99: The answer was standing at the front door

©1999, Tribune Media Services