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Dr. Drew

Kidnapped, Enslaved Woman Escapes?

Aired May 22, 2014 - 21:00   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

DR. DREW PINSKY, HLN HOST (voice-over): Tonight, a girl kidnapped, missing for 10 years, reunited with her family. And Facebook may have set her free.

Plus, the father of three little girls who may have been murdered by their mother says the devil made her do it. Our behavior bureau thinks otherwise.

Let`s get started.

(MUSIC)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: I`m here with my co-host Samantha Schacher.

And coming up, here we go again. We have a teacher arrested for, guess what, having sex with an underage student and it`s a female teacher, a male, and, of course, Sam, they`re in love.

SAM SCHACHER, CO-HOST: Is she delusional? And how many of these cases do we have to report on?

PINSKY: First of all, how dare you? They could be in love. What makes you think they`re not?

SCHACHER: I know, right? It`s become an epidemic.

PINSKY: It`s something we`re talking an awful lot about on this program. But before we get onto that story, and again, it`s a male student and female teacher. I don`t want to hear any more of this guy is so lucky, because where is the teacher when I was 15? We`ll tell you why --

SCHACHER: Double standard.

PINSKY: We`ll tell you why that`s an insane position.

First, Facebook is the reason allegedly, an allegedly kidnapped woman gets free after a decade. The 25-year-old walked into a police station and said that this man abducted, drugged, brainwashed, and raped her 10 years ago. She had the courage to escape after finding her sister online. Take a look at this.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: When she was 15 years old, she was actually kidnapped by the boyfriend of her mother. She had a headache. He gave her some pills. When she woke up and tried to get out, she tried to open the door but he had backed a car up to the door.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: A 15-year-old girl that came to this country, doesn`t speak English. He tells her that her mother doesn`t care.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Investigators say they even had a child (AUDIO GAP).

UNIDENTIFED FEMALE: The victim and her alleged kidnapper and tormentor, along with their daughter seem like a normal family.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Garcia was finally arrested at this apartment here after the victim managed to find a family member found a family member on Facebook.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

PINSKY: Joining us, Anahita Sedaghatfar, defense attorney and from Anahitalaw.com, Alison Rosen, comedian, syndicated columnist, Alison Rosen, comedian, syndicated columnist, host of "Alison Rosen as New Best friend" podcast, co-host of the Adam Carolla podcast, and Alfonso Rachel, commentator for the PJTV and drummer for the band 20-Pound Sledge.

All right. Sam, how is it they managed to stay in hiding for as long as they did?

SCHACHER: Well, according to police, he moved her at least four different times. He gave her several different identities and also in 2007, he got documents from Mexico that gave her a new birth date, a new name so he could marry her.

PINSKY: Oh, were they married?

SCHACHER: Oh, yes. He forced her to marry him.

PINSKY: But, Anahita, it`s Facebook that comes to the rescue again. Is that a good thing or is there a potential downside here?

ANAHITA SEDAGHATFAR, DEFENSE ATTORNEY: Well, finally, Dr. Drew, we`re talking about social media being a good thing this case. I don`t care if it was Facebook, Instagram, Twitter. This girl did the right thing. It saved her. I do worry that people in situations like this, people in danger, that they are going to be running more and more to social media instead of calling the police, calling the authorities. People that know how to handle these situations.

And I get that here she was an immigrant. She probably didn`t speak the language very well. This man had brainwashed her into fearing the police, that if she called the police, she would be deported, her family would be deported.

I`m really, really concerned at it is going to create a dangerous slippery slope.

PINSKY: Well, let me be a little bit of a devil`s advocate and say - - and ask Alison, so what if this woman who`s unwilling to go to police for fear of deportation goes to social media? It`s incumbent upon the rest of us to become what I like to call citizens of social media where you learn to read and look for these things and respond of them.

ALISON ROSEN, COMEDIAN: Well, that`s what I was going to say. I mean, people more and more feel as if law enforcement doesn`t serve them so they`re finding ways around it to get what they need and how wonderful is that that she was -- you know, people bellyache over this world we live in where we`re constantly wired, we`re constantly connected and look at the way it`s destroying lives. Look at the way it saved this woman who was afraid to go to law enforcement.

PINSKY: Potentially. Alfonso, you agree?

ALFONSO RACHEL, PJTV: Let me say first, if there`s a silver ling to this, I`d like to offer this young lady a job. Obviously she can use Facebook effectively. I have 45,000 likes on my Facebook page but three people only see my posts when I make my posts. So, hey, young lady, I may want to give you a job.

But in terms of -- I heard the issue of deportation. Yes, this is sad that, you know, this was hung over her head.

And maybe the moral of the story is: look, don`t do things that are illegal. Those things come to haunt you. You may be put in a situation where somebody knows you did something illegal and will hang that over your head to have power over you.

PINSKY: That`s what I`m saying. And that is where social media can come in.

I want to bring in Adely Rios. She lived next door to the family where this handicap woman was until she escaped.

So, Adely, were you surprised that this young lady who you knew in your neighborhood was the wife of this man? Were you surprised to find out that she had been kidnapped by him?

ADELY RIOS, NEIGHBOR (via telephone): Yes, I was very shocked. It`s still, like, a process for me to get this in because it doesn`t seem like she was actually restrained.

PINSKY: Did you -- that`s what we`re all sort of trying to get our head around. Do you think she had opportunity to escape before this or was she voluntarily with this guy?

RIOS: Well, I feel like she wanted to be with him already because she had her own car. She was able to come in and out of her apartment when she pleased. She had her job in the morning so it was fine to come in and out.

SCHACHER: Adely, where were they -- how did you observe their interaction? For instance, did she feel she`d need to check in with him in order to make decisions or did she seem like that she was like an independent free spirit?

RIOS: Well, she would be, like, oh I got to discuss this with my husband, but it didn`t seem like she had to have his authorization for everything she did.

PINSKY: She didn`t seem terrorized by him.

RIOS: No, she did not seem terrorized.

PINSKY: Adely, sit for a second.

I`m going to carry over to the behavior bureau which follows. Thank you, panel. We`ll hear from the woman at the center of the story.

But I just want to say that, you know, although we`ve talked about this young lady being here volitionally with her husband, I want you to remember, she was taken at 15. There`s no consenting at 15. That`s somebody, an adult using coercion, control, over a teenager and then brainwashing her, forcing her to create a life such that really it`s the most full-blown Stockholm syndrome you can possibly imagine.

So, to talk about this as volitional, it gets bizarre. That`s why I want my behavior bureau in here.

I`ll be right back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Like every other couple, they`d be happy, kissing, holding hands and she comes up with this now, why does she take so long to do it, you know?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police said you tried to escape.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I tried two times, but I can`t do it. All the time, I cry for her for them, more my mom, for my sisters.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: She had time to leave. The police station is around the corner.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: People are skeptical. We`re talking about the Facebook enabled escape of a young mom who allegedly had been captive for ten years.

Many of you all on Facebook are asking the same question, why didn`t she get out of there? The police station is around the corner.

Let`s bring in the behavior bureau: Leeann Tweeden, social commentator, host of "Tomboys" podcast on Blog Talk Radio, Kirsten Haglund, former Miss America, from the Kirsten Haglund Foundation, Wendy Walsh, psychologist, author of "The 30-Day Love Detox".

And if you`d like to be part of the story, tweet us right now. You guy are pretty lazy on the tweets tonight. So, tweet us right now on #behaviorbureau.

SCHACHER: Come on, guys.

PINSKY: I`m just saying. I`ve had enough of this. Let`s get in here. Get active on this.

Wendy, you were struck by the police reaction of this story, no?

WENDY WALSH, PSYCHOLOGIST: Yes. Her mother reported this abduction ten years ago and they barely reacted. And they just dismissed.

You know, here was a young girl who was new to the country. One of our newest immigrants and she didn`t speak English. She`d only been in the country six months. I don`t think the police even cared about her.

PINSKY: Well, I think Leeann, she was a new immigrant that wasn`t supposed to be here.

LEEANN TWEEDEN, SOCIAL COMMENTATOR: Right. She wasn`t supposed to be here. Her mother brought her in and she was illegal. She didn`t speak the language. Of course, she was vulnerable.

But let`s talk about the guy who abducted her, the mom`s boyfriend at that. He knew she was -- you know, she didn`t know anything. If he took her and brainwashed her like he did, what she was going to do? I mean, she was terrified for her life, she was separated from her family, she didn`t know where they were.

So, I mean, I can`t really blame the girl. I mean, of course, she`s going to say that was her only sort of semblance of life as bad as it was.

SCHACHER: Right. And he viciously beat her, the two times that she did try to escape.

TWEEDEN: Emotionally, he messed with her, too.

SCHACHER: Of course. In fact, I have a question for Wendy, actually. So they also have a child together. As we all know.

So, this poor toddler -- now, this toddler has to grow up learning the fact that their father who maybe they grew up to love, you know, within the two years --

PINSKY: They loved him. Their dad. It`s the child`s dad.

SCHACHER: Now, this child is dealing with the fact their father raped and kidnapped their mother. How will that affect them?

WALSH: Oh, in a huge way. It is dependent on what happens going forward. My recommendation is this girl, this young girl get parenting classes right away, because as she`s learning to give self-esteem to her child, she`ll be re-parenting herself. I don`t think she has a model of what is a healthy relationship?

Her own mother had to leave her and break the attachment when she was young. And then, she was -- you know, definitely she was attached to this guy.

PINSKY: Yes.

WALSH: Doesn`t mean she was in love and bonded in a healthy way.

PINSKY: All right.

WALSH: But she also was -- you know, that guy was her mom`s boyfriend then she was abused by somebody that she felt like was kind of a father figure. So that`s like doubly wrong.

PINSKY: Listen, I get --

WALASH: Can you say trust issues?

PINSKY: Yes, I get -- yes, I start to spin and get confused when I even try to understand this story. Can you just imagine what a 15-year- old, 16-year-old is going through with her mom`s boyfriend -- I don`t want to think about it.

WALSH: Dr. Drew --

PINSKY: But she does talk about -- Wendy, what?

WALSH: You know how upset I get about the single mother thing dragging non-biologically related males in front of their young children.

PINSKY: There you go.

WALSH: It makes me insane.

PINSKY: Yet another example.

And the victim talks about why she thinks neighbors are doubtful of her story. Take a look.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: He works hard for me and my daughter, and he bought everything I want. But I want -- I need love of my family.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Kirsten, listen, it breaks your heart and yet I get a funny feeling when I hear her say that. Why I miss the love now after 10 years. Did something -- did he make her angry and now it`s time to get back to my family? What do you think?

KIRSTEN HAGLUND, FORMER MISS AMERICA: Well, we don`t know. That`s - - everyone who`s saying, well, you know, why -- and with all respect to the woman who was on the phone, why didn`t she leave earlier?

We have no idea what he was holding over her head. Potentially her life, her family`s life who her family is really the main point of this. You know, it`s the reason why he brainwashed her to believe her family didn`t care about her.

And as soon as she found her sister on Facebook, her family, she reached out. That`s when she found the courage.

So, we have no idea, potentially he was holding their lives over her head and people -- you know, we don`t know what they will do in that kind on situation.

PINSKY: That`s right.

HAGLUND: And when people are hopeless, they will do anything. Even things we might think make no rational sense.

PINSKY: That`s right.

HAGLUND: But she can be rehabilitated.

PINSKY: That`s right. Young people adapt.

But the fact that we questioned it, which I was just doing, Leeann, is that just victim blaming again?

TWEEDEN: I think so because I mean, let`s face it, 10 years, that`s a long time. She was so young. She was a child when she was taken. Let`s remember that. So, he`s been conditioning her for 10 years.

PINSKY: Of course.

TWEEDEN: He loved her. He provided for her. He became her husband. He became the father of her child. He provided everything.

He bought her everything that she needed. He was basically her world. That`s all she had.

PINSKY: He was her world. And he manipulate, played her like a Stradivarius. He manipulated this poor girl. She had to adapt. Children adapt. It doesn`t make sense to us as we sit outside --

WALSH: She had to survive.

PINSKY: She had to survive and survived by adapting then pretty soon has a child with this guy, a life with this guy. What`s she to do? She`s brainwashed at that point. Think about it that way.

Now, speaking of brainwashing, we`re going to go to a very different sort of story, but the devil becomes evoked in this story. When the father of three little girls who were murdered allegedly by their own mother, that father says she -- there he is -- he says she was possessed by the devil.

Back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: A naked mother with a knife arrested in the deaths of her three little children.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: A 3-year-old, a 2-year-old, and a little girl who was just 2 months old.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Just because she posted pictures on Facebook and hash tagging and thinks everything is OK, it`s not.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: You hear the three children were killed and you want to kind of just vilify the person.

PINSKY: Social media says she is guilty.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Lock her up, throw away the key. Better yet, do the same to her as she did those babies.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: If this was psychosis from post-partum depression, she really had no idea what she was doing.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Back with Sam, Leeann, Alfonso, and Wendy.

It is the most tweeted about story of the day and tonight it is the grieving dad who has everyone responding on our Dr. Drew HLN Facebook page.

According to "The L.A. Times", the dad told a relative that he, quote, "blames the demon inside of her," unquote, and is giving his wife, again, quote, "the benefit of the doubt."

Leeann, here`s my thing, Leeann. You`ve been difficult to convince about the mental illness in this woman. And somehow when people evoke the devil, people are more likely to go, oh, I understand, OK, the devil made her do it. I understand. It`s not her fault. It`s the devil.

TWEEDEN: OK, well, but let me say this. The dad`s not a doctor. I mean, they lived in a low-income area. He was trying to support a family with three young daughters under the age of 2 1/2.

PINSKY: What I`m saying -- Leeann, I`m going to interrupt you and say, what I`m saying is why is it different to say the devil or mental illness? Something comes over you and makes you unable to be volitionally thoughtful about what you`re doing and you do things you never do?

TWEEDEN: I`m trying to speak for the father because I -- not for the father, but in regards to the dad, I think this is somebody who`s not educated. He doesn`t know what post-partum depression means. He doesn`t have a clinical manual --

PINSKY: I`m defending him.

TWEEDEN: Right. Well, so am I, though. I`m saying that he says demons. Maybe she`s acting funny or whatever. I don`t think in his mind he`s thinking she`s going to murder her children.

PINSKY: Yes, he`s saying exactly that. Wendy, you`re sighing. Now, come on, now. Wendy, here`s my point, is that why do we get -- let`s not get mince -- let`s not get lost in the weeds of words. There`s something that makes her brain not work right. If everyone understands that, I think we`ve gotten somewhere.

WALSH: Yes, but, Dr. Drew, what this father is trying, this husband and father is trying to do is deal with, I`m going to use a big word, hang on, everybody, his own cognitive dissonance which means he has two conflicting feelings at the same time. He still loves his wife and he`s very angry and freaked out.

He can`t actually blame his wife and maybe he is a man of faith who believes in the forces of good and evil and maybe believes that some force of evil just took over her body and that`s a way for him to make sense of what happened.

PINSKY: All right.

SCHACHER: OK. A lot of people were blaming the father and I`m sorry I don`t --

TWEEDEN: That`s not fair.

SCHACHER: OK, exactly. I agree with you, Leeann. I don`t think we can blame this father. How was he supposed to be aware of these signs of mental illness if he can`t call it for what it is after the fact? He believes she was possessed by a demon.

WALSH: However --

SCHACHER: So, I think all the blame should fall on the lack of education. Lack of education.

PINSKY: So, what does Facebook say?

SCHACHER: OK. So Facebook`s upset. They say that, you know, they`re mad that the dad did not prevent the tragedy, for example, one -- yes, one viewer commented, quote, "Too bad he didn`t see the demons and do something before this happened."

PINSKY: It is too bad.

SCHACHER: I agree. Absolutely. And then there is some rare sympathetic comments out there, for example, one person commented, quote, "I have to imagine he`s in shock right now. But he`s not the one who killed them. Why are we judging him?"

PINSKY: Alfonso, what do you say? I haven`t heard from you yet.

RACHEL: One thing I want to say, is I hope -- I pray for the blessings of peace and comfort to come over this family quickly. But how - - I don`t know what his household is like. I don`t know what he saw in his wife to make him think that, hey, maybe there`s something going on with her.

Maybe this came on so quickly and so out of her character that what else, what other rationale is there, hey, maybe she`s possessed by a demon. You know, maybe a few days before, maybe he didn`t see her spitting up green pea soup or her head spinning around or something like that. Maybe he`s seeing those things. But it came over quickly, maybe it`s outside of her character.

And just like my friends said, he loves her. He`s trying to rationalize this experience. He doesn`t want to hate her. He wants to forgive her.

And maybe, you know, this is part of the rationalization process. You know, what else is supposed to do?

PINSKY: "The L.A. Times" reports that children who were deceased were 2 years old, 16 months old, 2 months old and according to the father- in-law, quote, "She was trying to go back to the school, take care of the kids, do all that at the same time."

Three kids -- and, Wendy, three kids, in natural sequence. Unnaturally rapid sequence, I suggest.

WALSH: There`s the magic word, unnaturally.

Listen, in our hunter-gatherer past, babies were naturally spaced three to five years apart because breast-feeding function was a natural contraceptive. Now, we give the baby formula, we make the body think, let`s drop eggs, the baby is old enough now. And so, this is not healthy for the human species.

And the other piece, we put families in isolation. We need a village to raise children, especially the stress of three little ones under the age of 3. I couldn`t imagine that amount of stress.

PINSKY: A hundred percent agree with Wendy.

Let`s finish up. There`s something called post-partum depression that I think most people are aware of which are different than the baby blues. It`s a severe depressive episode within 12 months after a delivery. There`s also post-partum psychosis.

When you hear about horrible stories of murder, it`s usually the psychosis and can come on rapidly, it could be very bizarre. The women often think they are saving their children by killing them and they wonder where their children are the next day. They`re bewildered when the children actually aren`t there. And trust me -- this woman will have a shattering reality to deal with when her post-partum psychosis clears which it will.

I agree with Alfonso, we need to say prayers for this man and this woman. It`s what`s left of their family. They`ll have to live with this the rest of their lives.

Next up, two little boys maybe spike a teacher`s drink with rat poison. Cops say that`s exactly what they did. We`ll be back to discuss after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Police say two fourth grade boys tried to poison their 62-year-old teacher with rat poison. One is the 9 years old, the other 12.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Little children in school spike their teacher`s water with deadly rat poison?

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The boys were arrested and charged as juveniles.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Somehow they got hold of her water bottle and put what they believe to be rat poison in the water bottle.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The victim went to police after two other students told their parents they saw the boys spike their teacher`s drink.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Back with Sam.

That 62-year-old teacher got medical treatment soon after drinking that water. She is fine and recovering now.

Back with us, our panel, Anahita, Alison, and Kirsten.

All right, Alison, how do you think fourth graders get this kind of an idea? I, by the way -- I Googled how to kill your teacher. What do you think I got?

SEDAGHATFAR: Rat poison.

ROSEN: Did you really get rat poison? Because I Googled how much rat poison does it kill to take a person and apparently it takes tons. Like much more than you could put in a water bottle.

PINSKY: Yes, it does.

ROSEN: Obviously, I`m not defending their behavior. I find this really disturbing, and well, I`m wondering is, did they intend to kill her in which case they`re sociopaths or was this some kind of misguided prank?

PINSKY: All right. Stop there.

ROSEN: And where are the parents?

PINSKY: Stop it right there. OK. Stop it right there. Let`s answer that question. Kirsten, you`re up first. Did they intend to kill her or not?

KIRSTEN HAGLUND: No. I don`t think that they intend to kill them. I think, this was a let`s see what happens if, but the danger here is that, what if they`d given that to another student, you know, to a little kid?

PINSKY: Yeah. All that.

HAGLUND: We don`t know. You know, if neither there are just so many questions here, so many things went wrong. They didn`t inform the parents that this happened Monday. They didn`t inform them until Wednesday. Apparently, there have been complaints brought to the principal before who has ignored them. Another teacher at the school thought that she was maybe being poisoned, you know, her drink got spiked, too. There are some serious problems at this school.

SAMANTHA SCHACHER, DR. DREW ON CALL CO-HOST: Kirsten, that`s what I`m concerned about. I`m concerned about these two kids because I feel like that this is pretty bold to start out by poisoning your teacher. So, I feel like that there may have been some other incidents, maybe on animals before they finally advanced to testing this out on the teacher. My mom`s a fourth grade teacher. This was a fourth grade teacher. I can`t imagine if one of her students did this to her, but one of the kids was 12. That`s a lot -- that`s way too old to be a fourth grader. So, that kid was obviously held back for not one or two, but three years, maybe behavioral issues.

PINSKY: Anahita, I think he was possessed.

ANAHITA SEDAGHATFAR: I`m sorry, Dr. Drew.

PINSKY: I think he was possessed. I think the devil got him.

SEDAGHATFAR: No, I don`t think they were possessed.

PINSKY: Really?

SEDAGHATFAR: I don`t think that`s what it was, Dr. Drew. Maybe they`re troubled. And I have so many problems with this story, too.

PINSKY: Anahita is taking this very seriously. No, no, I don`t think they were possessed.

SEDAGHATFAR: I didn`t hear you the first time.

PINSKY: Listen, I think -- they`re trying to kill their teacher. I don`t know how you can excuse that, Anahita.

SEDAGHATFAR: I`m not excusing that. I`m saying, I actually have a huge problem with that, but I blame the parents, because how in the world -- A, do two little fourth graders even get access to rat poison, B, where did they come up with this idea?

PINSKY: The hardware store.

SEDAGHATFAR: I don`t think they went online. I think this is learned behaviour, they -- God only knows what kind of households they grew up in. But having said that, I`m glad that they`re only being tried as juveniles and not going through the adult system, because they are 9 and 12. This isn`t like some 16 and 17-year-old. So, I think they need counselling more than anything.

PINSKY: Let me go back to Allison. Maybe it`s counselling, maybe it`s family problems, but maybe it`s sociopathy. That will not respond very well to counselling, will it?

ROSEN: Both of them together, Dr. Drew.

PINSKY: There`s a lot of that out there. I`m sorry to tell you.

ROSEN: But that`s what scares me. I mean, if 9 and 12 -- if that 9 and 12, they`re already sociopaths, what can be done? I mean, should they just be put down?

PINSKY: Allison, you have been around animal cruelty way too much, way too much.

ROSEN: I actually -- obviously I don`t think that. I think the most wonderful thing would be if they could be rehabilitated.

PINSKY: Yeah.

ROSEN: I`m just saying, you know.

PINSKY: Early intervention. That`s everything. So, I`ll go back to, Anahita, and say, yes, some sort of intervention can be helpful, most likely could be helpful. We don`t know that they`re sociopaths, we really don`t. They`re behaving in a way that suggest they might be -- look at the world they live in. We`re going to go back to talk about the problematic or the dangers of social media and the internet. They can go online. I went online and found 101 ways to kill your teacher. That was tongue in cheek, but if I was the 9 came from a problematic background, or I was having emotional issues, maybe I wouldn`t think it was funny -- I wouldn`t know it was funny, but we have to be aware, early intervention is helpful even for kids that may be seriously in trouble. Early interventions are our only possibility of getting this under control.

Next up, another teacher is accused of, well, not being killed by her students, but having sex with an underage student. Yes, another teacher story. I know, Sam, loves this because her mom is a teacher, and bad teacher stories are really in the news lately. Back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Kelly Thompson who taught English is in trouble with the law.

UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: From what I heard, they`re like, she likes younger kids.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Charged with having an inappropriate relationship with a 16-year-old boy. Thompson and the boy engaged in sexual intercourse inside her vehicle while it was parked outside of his residence. One of Thompson`s friends, a co-worker, reported the affair after Thompson brought the boy over to the woman`s house. Thompson pleaded with the witness to deny knowledge of the relationship.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Back with Sam. And that 26-year-old English teacher apparently confided in some of her friends that she and this young guy were -- they were in love, don`t you know. And she, of course, has since been fired. Lets me bring in my panel, Leeann, Kirsten, and Anahita, they`re all back. And Sam, you`ve got some feelings on this one.

SCHACHER: Yeah. I mean, how many of these cases do we have to report? I mean, it has become some sort of an epidemic. Are these schools not screening the teachers properly? Are they not monitoring them? Are they overlooking red flags? And what are the adults doing? Are they not thinking about the consequences of their actions? They are just acting on impulse? It`s ridiculous.

PINSKY: Anahita, what do you think? You had a strange, like you almost looked -- what are you thinking? Tell me.

SEDAGHATFAR: I just -- I just think it`s crazy. I don`t know if it`s just happening more frequently or we`re hearing more about it more often, Dr. Drew. And like, Sam, said, I think soon we`re going to be reporting on female teachers who are not sexually abusing their kids because that will be the rarity. And again, when we talk about these cases we talk about the double standard and it happened again in this case when I was reading some of the comments on social media. Everyone`s like, oh, yay, where were these teachers when I was in school? What a lucky guy, and I`m hot for teacher. And it`s like it`s no different when the perpetrator is a woman, Dr. Drew. That boy is going to be just as damaged as if this was a man molesting a 16-year-old girl.

PINSKY: It has -- it plays out a little differently. The young male sometimes does feel lucky when it`s happening to him and doesn`t understand the consequences. And then if it`s so coercive that he becomes emotionally invested, Kirsten, that`s where this gets really damaging. They believe they`re in love with this old woman.

HAGLUND: Absolutely, because young men at that age.

SCHACHER: She`s 26.

PINSKY: But to him, it`s an old woman. For him it`s an old woman.

SEDAGHATFAR: 26. Dr. Drew, I`m offended.

PINSKY: Relax, ladies. It`s for him, his perspective, not for ours.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: Wow.

SEDAGHATFAR: You`re excused.

PINSKY: Speaking of mob behavior, my goodness. Go ahead, Kirsten. Have at it.

HAGLUND: No, young men at this age are, like, completely controlled by their hormones. I mean, so anyone, you know, tries to engage them, in any - - or tells them they`re in love with them or anything like that, they`re going to respond and you`re right, it`s manipulation. It`s actually, even that much more predatory because they`re so responsive to those hormones. But what is this teacher thinking? Like, where is the self-control?

SCHACHER: Exactly.

HAGLUND: It just feels like the lines between teenagers and, you know, she`s 26. Someone in her young 20s, are blurred. It`s like, you know, teachers want it be cool and be their students` friends and all that. Once those lines start to blur, you can cross them pretty easily.

PINSKY: Yes.

HAGLUND: And there, you know, doesn`t seem like, oh, it`s that big of a deal. It`s a huge deal.

PINSKY: Leeann, let me get your ire going by saying, well, she`s sick, which she is.

LEEANN TWEEDEN: Come on, Dr. Drew. Come on, you know I just want to wring your neck when you say that. We`re talking about a woman who says she`s in love with a 16-year-old, just like we have that story last night about the older man taking away a 14-year-old. I don`t understand what it is about adults thinking that a child, whether it`s a boy or a girl, is somebody they can be in love with, somebody they can have a relationship with. I mean, where is she mentally? Obviously, this woman is smart enough. She has a college degree and she is a teacher, but that doesn`t mean she`s smart. That just means she`s book smart. Obviously, she`s delusional. She thinks she`s in love with this boy. She`s having sex with him in front of the parents` house. If that was me, and I came out and saw that teacher, I`d drag her out by her hair and probably give her a beating in the street.

SEDAGHATFAR: Do they just like the danger? All I mean, what is that danger with a 16-year-old? I mean, maybe is like she`s.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: It`s just common often times -- let me tell you what often times, Kirsten, do you want to address it? I`ll let you say something.

HAGLUND: It`s a taboo. Well, I think it`s a taboo.

PINSKY: No, it ends up being more commonly that these women, themselves, have been sexually abused and have some issues with boundaries in which they`re attracted to the.

SCHACHER: She still should know better. She`s in authority.

PINSKY: This is what I keep saying over and over again. Anybody having impulses that they -- she knows they`re wrong, impulses like that. You must get help before you hurt somebody else. Then as a woman, particularly, those sexual abuse experiences can bleed into love addiction. So, they start, you know, not understanding those intense feelings they`re having for somebody that`s completely inappropriate. It`s wrong. It`s sick.

TWEEDEN: Dr. Drew, you actually said something pretty poignant right there. You said before they hurt somebody. You know what, in her mind, having sex with him is not hurting him.

PINSKY: I know.

TWEEDEN: You know it`s not like beating him or killing him. So, in their mind, they don`t think they`re actually hurting him.

SCHACHER: What will happen to the kid?

PINSKY: They know. What could happen to the children, the young males end up with more difficulty with sexual compulsions and hyper sexuality of themselves. They can have higher incense of drug addiction. We were talking in the last segment about psychopathy. They have higher incidents of personality disorder. So, the consequences in them, although in the moment they`re not shattered by it, the actuality is that the consequences across their life span and development are profound. So, you do hurt these kids. Stop it already. Stop it, everybody. You know it`s wrong. Listen to the instinct in your head. The voice that says it`s wrong. There`s a reason you have these impulses. Go look into it before you hurt somebody else and yourself, for goodness sakes. Then, Leeann, will take you out in the parking lot and trash you.

TWEEDEN: Right.

PINSKY: Next up, speaking of foolish behavior, a crash caused by a selfie, then the Youtube video that goes viral.

And a reminder, you can find us any time on Instagram @drdrewhln. We`re back after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: I`m back with, Sam, and we are calling this one the selfie fail. Watch this video that is posted to Youtube. It`s insane. Both girls were taken to the hospital after learning their video -- take a look. There it is.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

(GIRLS TAKING A SELFIE)

(END VIDEO CLIP)

PINSKY: Listen. They -- it`s unbelievable. They get in a car accident because they are -- her hand is not on the wheel. She`s doing a selfie. She`s leaning into the camera and gets in a car accident. The video went viral. They posted another selfie to let everyone know they`re safe. They`re in the hospital. Look at this. This is what happened to them as a result of this. Let`s bring back in our panel. I`ve got, Leeann, and Kirsten, and joining us, one of the newest members of our HLN family. He`s now a correspondent, Ali Nejad. Ali, thanks for joining us. What`s your reaction to this?

ALI NEJAD: You know, I`ve got to be honest, the initial reaction was let`s condemn these girls and then I stopped and thought about myself as an adolescent, and in my teen years in driving. And I was fully distracted, it`s just we didn`t have Youtube. And we didn`t have common place texting and cell phone technology.

PINSKY: Hands off the wheel.

NEJAD: And so -- Yeah. I mean, look, ask yourselves, all of you, did you use to drive responsibly when you were an adolescent?

PINSKY: Ali, you`re making a case.

TWEEDEN: Oh, come on, Ali.

PINSKY: Ali is making the case for -- of rising the age in which we give someone a driver`s license, which some people are doing.

NEJAD: Let`s not judge them because we all probably did really stupid things and got away with them when we were that age but didn`t have a camera on.

SCHACHER: I agree with you tenfold, Ali. Again, when I first watched this, oh my god, what are they doing? Her hand`s not on the wheel. But then I think about 16-year-old, Sam. I hate saying this and admitting it, but I probably would have done the same thing. Why don`t we deactivate the phones when you begin driving.

(CROSSTALK)

TWEEDEN: How about we do the selfie when we`re pulled over on the side of the road.

SCHACHER: OK. Leeann, I need to finish my point. I agree with you, but people are also texting. People are also on their phone. There are a lot of distracted drivers out there. I know it`s against the law, but people are doing it.

PINSKY: So, we`re finding out is that, Leeann and Kristen, were perfect. They never did anything like that, right, Leeann?

TWEEDEN: I`m not saying I don`t text, but when I text when I`m in my car, I usually do it at the red light. I don`t actually do selfies and take my hands off the wheel while driving. I`m not that stupid, and I don`t think kids are that stupid. They know it`s wrong, and she still did it anyway. I mean, it was kind of funny -- I`m glad they didn`t get hurt, but what if they killed somebody else?

PINSKY: Yeah, right. Kirsten?

HAGLUND: Well, no, that`s very true. And of course, we want to say -- we want to put an image out there that says you shouldn`t be distracted when you`re driving and that we should, you know, condemn this and say it`s not good to videotape yourself -- videotape yourself while driving because this is what happens. These are the consequences you face. You know, but I think they tried to take it in stride, you know, they posted videos. They are doing OK. Thank goodness, you know, but we should see this as a cautionary tale of like you better watch out, you got to be careful and, you know, this has always happened. It`s just that these girls got it on videotape.

TWEEDEN: And the sad thing is, Dr. Drew, they`re vain, and they`re fully done up in hair and makeup and they knew that they were being videotaped. So, they loved the attention, and I think the problem is I bet they`re not going to learn from this. And I guarantee you they`re.

(CROSSTALK)

PINSKY: If their parents -- Ali, don`t you think the parents might help them learn a little something?

NEJAD: Well, being an Iranian-American myself, I can tell you right now, after the first few wrecks that I had, there were very long no driving periods that were associated with these mistakes.

PINSKY: First few wrecks?

NEJAD: Yeah. That`s what I`m saying. I wrecked a car in more than one occasion.

TWEEDEN: Doing selfies?

NEJAD: No. It wasn`t selfies, but selfies are the distraction (inaudible). Back when we were younger it was something else. You know if it was an eight track way, way back, if it`s a cd player, or if it`s your root beer float without a cup holder you`re trying to balance. There`s always been destructions, it just so happens now it`s social media driven and there`s a camera involved.

PINSKY: Well, and the video has 1.3 million views and it`s going up fast. Kirsten, does that say something about us that we`re all sort of, we`re in a way supporting this?

HAGLUND: Oh, absolutely. I mean, it`s like how much can you push the boundary in order to get attention? It`s like the most sensational thing is the thing that is going to get the most views. I mean, what are people going to do now? You know, I mean, they got in a car crash. What`s next, you know? But the selfie -- the whole selfie culture really points to our narcissism and desire for approval. You know, we put an image of ourselves out there, and try to get as much love and attention from other people as we possibly can. But it never satisfies.

PINSKY: No.

HAGLUND: All those selfies, they never give you the self-esteem.

PINSKY: And interestingly if you look at our Instagram tonight see, Sam, Ali, me, and Leeann doing a big selfie. Thanks, Kirsten, for bringing that up. We were not driving.

But we were indulging our narcissism which indeed we were, and we`re goofing out a bit. Check that out at our Instagram site, but thank you guys.

Next up, videotape of a beating this time goes viral and made its way into the hands of police, and so, this one has an interesting story attached to it. We`ll get into that after this.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

PINSKY: Back with Sam, Leeann, Kirsten, Ali. A fight filmed and posted on Facebook, but users of a completely different social media site see it and than try to help. So, here`s the video taken a few days ago in Chicago`s McKinley Park. You can see a man getting beaten by a group of people, including one guy with a baseball bat. That video was then pasted -- posted on Facebook and, Sam, what else can you tell me?

SCHACHER: Well, it actually got lot of its traction from Reddit. So, Reddit is a huge social networking site where its users cannot only upload content, but they can vote on content, they can create little communities and help one another kind of have calls to act in campaigns with certain, like this, for example. So, the person that saw this video posted it on to Reddit, asked all the people if their community to please help them get this to the cops, get these people arrested. People immediately started reposting it and it went viral.

PINSKY: Ali, my producers accuse me of being obsessed with Reddit.

SCHACHER: Are you?

PINSKY: Well, I like it. My kids introduced me to it. They`re obsessed with it for sure, but I`m not surprised by users of Reddit engage in this kind of activity, that they`d be engaged.

NEJAD: Yeah. Well, this is an example of a much more redemptive element of social media as opposed to the vanity narcissism motif where people glamorize violence in this way. You`ve got a global community, global watchdog almost. I remember a long time ago there was a video of a man throwing puppies into a river somewhere in Eastern Europe, and what happened was I think it was the fortune (ph) group. They got together, and went, you are not going to have this, and they found a guy, a random person in Eastern Europe and busted this guy for that. This is another example of this on a much more micro level and this is what social media should be used for something much more positive to catch people doing stuff like this.

PINSKY: Yeah, Kirsten, not just narcissism like, Leeann, Ali, me and Sam.

HAGLUND: Well, yes. In social, you know, it can be used for good and it can be used for bad in this case which is for good. But actually, what`s really neat, too, is that authorities are increasingly using sites like Facebook to find, like, they`ll post, you know, wanted, a suspect, and people will report them, turn them in. And in fact, there have been cases where people will -- an undercover cop will inbox message a criminal that they`re looking for and tell them to meet them somewhere and the criminal actually goes and meets them and they get arrested. So, I mean, it`s like -- there are amazing ways for both authorities and regular civilians to use this in order to bring people to justice.

PINSKY: One juvenile and two adults. Three were arrested for mob action. They face misdemeanor charges as you saw in that graphic there. Leeann, apparently the victim wouldn`t talk for fear of retribution. That`s the sort of weird part of this story.

TWEEDEN: What I found interesting when I watched that video is that you see the mob attacking this guy with a bat. So, the first thing you`re going to think of, oh, the guy came with a bat. So, he should get his butt beat, right? Well, I don`t know. They take the bat and are beating him. We don`t know the backstory to this. We don`t know if that kid is been bullied and he showed up to the park with a bat because they always beat him up. We don`t know that. So, we need to find out more of the story. Obviously, he`s not talking because he`s probably afraid. So, hopefully the cops will interview him and interview everybody involved and get to the bottom of it. But I do say that social media is being used for good in this case.

PINSKY: As I think, Reddit, for people who don`t know about Reddit. Check out Reddit it`s a hard thing to navigate. You may not get the hang of it right away, but there`s a ton of information. It`s a very active site, and it`s a very interesting view into many different disciplines, the world over, in fact.

SCHACHER: Yeah, and dependent on the votes actually raises the power of the story. So, if one story, what somebody`s trying to get out, maybe it`s a call to action campaign, and they get a lot of votes, then that`s going to be immediately being on the front of Reddit`s page, as far as like instead of being on the bottom.

PINSKY: Speaking of call to action tonight. We had a ton of retweets about the story with the woman that had the postpartum psychosis. I was reading through this just now. Yeah. I know, it`s a very sad story, the woman that killed her children. Several people suggested that perhaps hospitals -- this is something social media might be able to accomplish, that the hospitals teach, educate as people leave the hospital with their new baby. I think it`s a great idea and then somebody from Appleton, Wisconsin, said that`s exactly what happened at our hospital. So, people are doing it. But here`s another sort of possibility that just through retweeting, maybe people will get the idea to do this regularly.

HAGLUND: Interesting.

PINSKY: Thank you. It really is. Thank you, guys.

Now, I`ve got a reminder for everyone. You need to join Robin Meade for a special Memorial Day salute to the troops. It is stories of courage, posts from the home front. It airs Monday at 7:00 P.M. on HLN. We`ve got coming up, of course, Forensic Files and a reminder that if you DVR us right now, you can watch us any time. Be sure to go ahead and DVR us. It helps us out quite a bit. Sam, we have a few last minutes. Anything on your tweet feed?

SCHACHER: I have a lot of different tweets. Here`s one coming in in regards to what we just talked about, WITH the beating. He says, takes real guts to swing a bat while three of your buddies hold the guy. Brutal beating, that`s what it is. We don`t know the backstory, but we know three people ganging up.

PINSKY: There we go. Forensic Files, right now.

END