Michele Catalano is back, published in Pajamas Media, discussing the case of Lori Drew, the 49-year-old mother of two whose MySpace prank resulted in the suicide of a 13-year-old girl.

Lori Drew, the mother of Megan’s former best friend, created “Josh Evans” for the sole purpose of interfering in her daughter’s social life. Drew claims she started the charade just to see if Megan was saying anything about her daughter on MySpace. Why it became mean, cruel, and vicious is something only she knows. She has made excuses for her actions, but none that excuse the abhorrent behavior that literally crushed Megan’s spirit and led to her suicide. A grown woman posted messages as a teenage boy, saying hurtful, horrible things to a 13-year-old girl that she knew was suffering from depression to begin with. How did she know? Because Megan went on vacations with that family. They knew she took medication. She was the best friend of their daughter. And yet this mother decided to interfere in her daughter’s life to the extent that she became a part of, and a cause of, so much teenage drama.

There were immediate cries for justice and punishment. Someone needed to be held responsible for Megan’s death and the public outcry indicated that they wanted Lori Drew’s head. But did she commit a crime? While her actions were certainly despicable and vile, were they criminal?

I met someone like Lori Drew..

When I was about 10, my mother's co-worker and friend, Eileen*, a psychiatric nurse, invited me over her house to play with her daughter, Anna**, another only child.

While we were sitting in the basement den, watching reruns of "The Munsters," and eating white powdered donuts, Anna casually mentioned that she had a crazy aunt living in her attic. According to Anna, this aunt, her mother's sister, had to be locked up in the room upstairs, hidden away, for many years because she was cannibal who ate children. Anna told me how scared she was of the crazy aunt in the attic. The whole story started her crying, and I felt awfully sorry for her, having to live in a house with a cannibal upstairs. I asked her what they fed her cannibal aunt. She held up a donut and looked through the middle of it.

Anna's tears stopped and she smiled. "These" she said. "Want to help me feed her?"

"No" I said, partly because I was scared, and partly because the cannibal aunt story was sounding more than a little cheesy. First of all, Anna stopped crying pretty fast. Also, I'd listened to Eileen and my mom talking a few times, and she never mentioned a sister. Eileen might have some really good reasons not to mention her, but then I remembered that they'd just moved into their house. Some of the moving tags were still on the furniture. The aunt couldn't have been locked in the same upstairs for years.

In fact, I remembered that Eileen's family moved fairly often. It would take a lot of work to set up an attic prison for a cannibal aunt. Even if they did have a mobile cannibal aunt prison, it just didn't sound like something they could have kept secret after all those moves.

Anna's response to my expressed doubts was to say "You're chicken".

I was, but the story still sounded like b.s.

Anna said, "I'll prove it to you." She took me upstairs, past her mother, who was working in her office. Eileen waved as we walked by. I carried the donuts. Anna carried a note pad.

We reached the attic door. The upstairs was brightly lit and freshly carpeted. The door to the attic was painted a sunny yellow. But there was, inexplicably, a small slot cut into the bottom of the door.

We sat crouched beside the door, arms wrapped around our legs. Anna slid a donut through the slot, then giggled into her skinned knees. I heard sniffing, then slurping behind the door.

Anna was nearly exploding with giggles by then, the kind that come from trying not to laugh. I smelled dog breath and figured out her dumb trick.

"You jerk, that's just a dog" I said, but then I heard the wicked cackles behind the door. That was no dog.

There really was someone behind the door. Anna didn't have any brothers or sisters who would be playing a trick on me - she didn't even know any other kids in town, because she just moved there. So who was that?

"See, I told you." Anna said. She scribbled a note asking her aunt if she was hungry. She slid the note through the slot. After a few demonic laughs the same piece of paper came back out, covered with what looked like drool. Anna read, nearly weeping with laughter. She said, "my aunt writes that she smells fresh meat". There was something written on the paper, but I was too busy running away to read it.

Terrified, I stumbled downstairs and bolted for the front door. Eileen, the mother and the nurse, was running behind me. She was laughing, just like Anna.

"We fooled you" they both laughed.

Anna said. "That was mom. She was just pretending"

Eileen, the 30+, respectable, employed adult, was apparently the mastermind of this plot. There was a fire escape that led from her office to the attic, and the previous owners had a pet door built in the door upstairs for a cat. She and her daughter came up with the cannibal aunt story and planned this all out before I arrived.

Their confession freaked me out more than the idea of a cannibal aunt. A mom plotting with her kid to scare the wits out of a 10 year old? My kid-brain couldn't process the idea that a mom would do something like that.

However, my brain could process the fact that Eileen was a psycho bitch, and there was no way I was spending another minute in that house.

My mother was upset that I walked home without telling her where I was, and she thought I over-reacted, but Eileen didn't come over much anymore. When she did, I'd leave the house. I didn't play with Anna anymore, but I did feel sorry for her, having a crazy mom.

So, yeah, shunning is the nicest thing we as a society can do for our Lori Drews.

* Not their real names