The farmer sat down smoking his cigar, while the caretaker counted an egg at a time. The caretaker would bring an egg out of the barn, then take it back in. He did so repeatedly, as he counted and showed the farmer the egg each time.
The farmer was satisfied with the counts, and paid the caretaker handsomely. He then asked that the caretaker be taken across the river by boat by his two house-helps.
As the boat left, the farmer walked into his barn and to his surprise, only one egg was sitting in the middle of the barn. The farmer realized that he had been scammed by the caretaker. There had only been one egg in storage and the caretaker had been counting the same egg when he came to and fro!
The farmer raced towards the river yelling for his house-helps to turn the boat around, and bring the caretaker back to face judgment. At this point, they were at the middle of the river.
The deaf house-help, who was in control of the boat because he could see, could not hear the farmer's call. The blind house-help could hear the farmer's call, but could not communicate effectively for the deaf house-help to understand him.
The caretaker, on the other hand, was glib and an excellent con man. He was able to use hand gestures to deceive and keep the deaf house-help from paying attention to the blind house help.
The two house helps were thus, unable to rescue their master from his loss, and the caretaker went scat-free unto his misbegotten fortune. He went on to bigger scams, and the farmer was unable to prosecute him once he had crossed the river.
How did American justice fail Liberia? How did Charles Taylor escape from prison in Plymouth County, Massachusetts? Taylor remains the only person who has ever escaped successfully, without recapture from the Plymouth County jail. The failure of American justice, contributed to the catastrophe Taylor inflicted on Liberians and Sierra Leoneans.
Charles Taylor (or "super glue" - a name he earned for his "sticky fingers" when it came to money) progressed from embezzling nearly $1 million, to being arrested, to being a prison escapee, to becoming a mass murderer of hundreds of thousands of innocent Liberians, to siphoning Liberia's coffers and committing grave crimes against humanity and excessive breaches of the Geneva conventions in Liberia and Sierra Leone.
From where I sit….
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Solomon Myers hails from Buchanan, Liberia. He is a Political Scientist/Historian, currently based in Ottawa, Canada.
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