It's a word I've just heard about. Victimology is the study of the victim of a crime and what might have transpired to contribute to the victim becoming a victim.
I talked with someone in law enforcement who tells me that any decent detective working a case will always consider a victimology report, especially in a death case. Of course, it was not done in Natalie's case because she was not considered the victim of a crime. She was considered a woman who got drunk and accidentally fell off her yacht.
Had a victimology report been completed in Natalie's case it of course would have included all of the circumstances surrounding her death, and how her death affected those involved.
Definition of VICTIMOLOGY
1: the study of the ways in which the behavior of crime victims may have led to or contributed to their victimization
2: the claim that the problems of a person or group are the result of victimization
The first known use of VICTIMOLOGY was in 1950
The term "crime victim" generally refers to any person, group, or entity who has suffered injury or loss of life due to illegal activity. The harm can be physical, psychological, or economic. The legal definition of "victim" typically includes the following:
A person who has suffered direct, or threatened, physical, emotional or pecuniary harm. Besides "primary crime victims", there are also "secondary crime victims" who experience the harm second hand, such as intimate partners or significant others of rape victims or children of a battered woman, and/or witnesses of crime. There are also what are called "tertiary crime victims" who experience the harm vicariously, such as through media accounts.
Victimology is a complete study of a case and ALL of the people involved in it. I'd like to think that's what I accomplished with GNGS. After all, the detectives did not even consider the possibility that a bruised dead woman's body could be a victim, and that's because of the celebrity factor involved in Natalie Wood's death.
The THEORY of victimology:
"Victim defenses" have recently emerged in cases of parricide (killing one's parents) and homicide of batterers by abused spouses. Advocates for battered women were among the first to recognize the issue, and promote the "battered woman syndrome" to defend women who killed or seriously injured a spouse or partner after enduring years of physical, emotional and/or sexual abuse. Attorneys have also drawn upon theories of Post-traumatic Stress Disorder to defend their client's behavior. From time to time, media attention to these defenses becomes intense, and certain "high profile" cases tend to influence public opinion and spread confusion over who is the "victim" and who is the "victimizer." One of the goals of victimology as a science is to help end this state of societal confusion.
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I guess Natalie got all of her bruises bumping into all of those little fishies floating around.
ReplyDeleteSeriously, someone had to be paid off to get those detectives to look the other way. A witness who wasn't interviewed, a husband who wasn't interrogated, and, just to add insult to injury, multiple bruises on the deceased that were disregarded.
Am I missing something when I say that Natalie's death was not investigated? Am I that stupid for thinking foul play was involved in ending her life?
Natalie became a victim when she married that bozo.
No, Kev, you're wrong. It wasn't the little fishies...it was the sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their heads.
ReplyDeleteSorry...Austin Powers joke...hopefully, if Wagner or his cronies visit here, they'll get it.
Kevin, it's the power of celebrity. Don't know if you've been watching the miniseries about the Kennedy family this week, but it had to be bid out because the original network to air it caved after warnings from Caroline Kennedy, who did not want the miniseries to air. (Katie Holmes is doing a wonderful job playing Jackie Kennedy and Greg Kinnear is awesome as Jack Kennedy!)
ReplyDeleteCaroline Kennedy has been on a book tour all week long, appearing on many shows, and not ONE reporter or interviewer asked her about the miniseries or why she objected to the "The Kenndys" airing. SHe set the rules for her interview, just as Wagner was allowed his own little versionof lies about how his wife died when he toured his book. No, you're not stupid. Neither am I, nor many others here. Were in an elite group that can see each individual tree that comprises the forest. People can call me whatever they want. I thank GOD for my capabilities. True journalism is in a disgraced state of being. I may stand apart, but I stand apart with pride.
HSP, I get it. :-)
What I have trouble understanding in Natalie's case is that there was evidence that her death was murder and not manslaughter.
ReplyDeleteI know how the studios paid off the police and other officials to look the other way when some star was involved with the law. I was under the impression that those things were usually the results of accidents (DWI's)or fights that got out of hand. In Natalie's death, it appears to be deliberate. Roger Smith was suspicious from the beginning.
However, it is clear that the detectives intentionally avoided a proper investigation into Natalie's death.
It boggles my mind. Even if we reach resolution, it will ALWAYS boggle my mind why in the process of truth, these authorities and media looked the other way. It is a disgrace beyond my comprehension.
ReplyDeleteGood info on victimology.
ReplyDeleteNatalie's case wasn't helped by Sinatra's intervention.
You don't think Sinatra did his bit out of revenge for his heart aching for Natalie. I heard talk that since Kings Go Forth up until her death, Sinatra had a huge crush on Natalie (what guy wouldn't?)?
ReplyDeleteFunny how an author (Lambert) can color his
ReplyDeletewriting to give the impression that Natalie was responsible ("Natalie's demons") for her own death.
Natalie seemed very normal in the way she was adjusting to middle age...just like millions of other people do.
Here was a woman who had been one of the top two female stars in the world of cinema. She had the good sense to realize that having a family was important to her, so she stopped making movies every year and raised a family.
I find it admirable that Natalie accepted the fact that she wasn't in demand anymore, and she looked for work where she could find it. Is that such a hard thing to understand --considering she had been in the business since the age of five? She was a creative personality and she loved acting.
Wagner seemed to be the one who was having mental issues with aging. According to Ginger Blymer, Natalie was bothered by Wagner's increasing and constant drinking. Drinking does not seem to have been a chronic problem for Natalie, the way it was for Wagner.
Lambert makes a point to say that Natalie--while filming "Barainstorm"--had changed her habit of drinking only one glass of wine after a day of shooting. He explains that it had been Natalie's habit of never having more than one glass a day while shooting a movie, so she looked her best.
The last time Lambert worked with Natalie was when she was around 26. The woman had experienced quite a bit of living since then. She was 43 years old at the time of "Brainstorm." Is it that hard to understand that she would take an extra glass of wine? Lambert could not understand that maybe Natalie (at 43) wasn't so concerned about looking perfect? He could not understand how a woman with two children and the pressures of being in the Hollywood spotlight--not to mention being married to Wagner--might take an extra glass or two?
All of that would have been what a Victimology assessment would have studied and determined, Kevin. They would have come at the entire tragedy from all angles, including Natalie's habits and lifestyle. I think we would have had a much different view of things than the way Lambert presented Natalie to us. Dennis would have been asked so many meaningful questions had this type of study been conducted. Dennis did not just work for Natalie.... he was her sidekick on most ALL boat outings (which were plentiful for a good two-thirds of every year for seven years). Dennis knew Natalie, the PERSON.... that's what was NOT presented to the public...Natalie, the PERSON. Dennis has ALWAYS said, even in Natalie's personal life, he has never met a woman who conducted herself more professionally. Sure, she let her hair down occasionally, but NEVER did she lose control of her better senses. She NEVER once gave Dennis any reason to believe the lies told in Lambert's book. Many of Natalie's friends have remained quiet about the truth of what they witnessed in Natalie's marriage, and that's because Wagner is still alive. Wagner was a "silent danger" and maybe no one recognized it along the way but could it have been any more obvious after the morning of Nov. 29, 1981?
ReplyDeleteThank goodness, Lambert's book failed. Many of Natalie's long time, die hard fans saw it for what it was which was an attempt to give Robert Wagner a bath after Finstad's book. The best way to clean off Wagner was to attempt to dirty Natalie. It was said that Natalie's kids would share memories of their mother in Lambert's book. Those memories were few in number and all negative but RJ came out smelling like a rose as was the intention with the book and it's reason for being.
ReplyDeleteAs for her drinking, her autopsy report showed a woman who took very good care of herself, did not abuse her body with drugs and alcohol. She liked to have a good time, she liked her white wine but there was no sign of abuse in her autopsy.
You can see it in all of her interviews on YouTube, Marti--Natalie is herself in every one of them. I don't see any phony attitude or airs or problems. She is articulate, funny, humble and so poised. Those interviews are her character witnesses (since her friends refuse to speak up).
ReplyDeleteGood point, Roz. Her autopsy showed a woman in very good shape for her age...and with a very healthy and normal liver.
ReplyDeleteForgot that Lambert had access to Natalie's autopsy when he wrote that a person she visited thought her liver had been compromised...I think that is how he put it. What BS!
Lambert would have known that Natalie's liver was perfectly normal, when he wrote that.
To say such a thing shows how desperate Lambert AND Wagner were. That's an outright lie. The autopsy report states that she had a healthy liver. Why would people who "loved" her want to perpetuate such garbage?
ReplyDeleteI remember how much it bothered me when I first read Natalie's autopsy. Natalie was in great shape for 43, and she probably would have lived to a nice ripe old age.
ReplyDeleteIt made me angry to read just what good shape she was in when she was lying on the coroner's steel table.
I looked at her autopsy. A person can get bruised in water, but not the way she was bruised! She was a very healthy person. Lambert's book is an insult to this icon! It is very frustrating to care about Natalie because the people you want to care aren't there for her, but I will never stop caring.
ReplyDeleteI agree that a person can become badly bruised in water, but not the way Natalie was bruised. Human hands bruised Natalie, for the most part.
ReplyDeleteKevin, I agree, Natalie kept herself in excellent shape, but forty-three is really quite young! All the more sad that Natalie, a young mother, was taken from life in the prime of her life!
I didn't mean Natalie's external body was in great shape (although it was). I was referring to Natalie's thoracic and abdominal organs. An autopsy will reveal the exact condition of those organs (liver, lungs, heart, pancreas, spleen ...)that keep us alive. Natalie's were in excellent shape.
ReplyDeleteNatalie had no heart disease (the only mention was some thickening of the walls of the arteries, I think), but that was normal for her age. Her lungs were clear and normal (she had been a smoker). By 43, a coroner would have been able to see things that would have been a problem for Natalie's future health, but he didn't.
Natalie--most likely--would have lived a long life. That is what made me angry.