The shortest month of the year has always been hard on me. Well, not always. Just since 1982. Specifically... February 7, 1982.

The reason is simple. That's the date I can't help but associate with unfathomable loss, because that's the date I learned my sister Elena had been killed. And now I have the 7th to remind me of that brutal truth every year for the rest of my life.

For good measure, there's also the 16th, which was her birthday. Once a cause for celebration, now a bittersweet memorial of what might have been (or will never be, depending on how you look at it).

So, yes... these two little days in February stir up feelings in me which quite frankly, I don't necessarily want to feel anymore. And since they tend to linger all month long, I tend to be in a very bad mood for four very long weeks.

Now, it looks like there is another family out there who will also forever feel the pain that this month brings me. And I have to admit, this one hit a little too close to home for me... both in the literal and emotional sense.

"The BAC Street Lounge" is a total dive, located a few blocks from where I live; not the greatest bar in the world, but it's definitely got a certain charm. It's also the last place 28-year-old Cori Daye Desmond (pictured at right) was seen alive. She used to be a bartender there, and still had plenty of friends there. So as fate would have it, she went to meet them on a Saturday night in February.

Just like my sister Elena went to meet friends on a Saturday night in February.

The next morning, Cori's family knew something was wrong when she didn't show up for work.

Just like my family knew something was wrong when Elena didn't show up for work.

The more I researched this story, the more I noticed the striking similarities in their murders... and it wasn't long before those old wounds of mine started opening up. The curse of February was suddenly upon me with a vengeance.

The night she was killed, Cori had a remote chance at survival around 2:30 AM when she tried to use the bathroom at a locked establishment before she was attacked. Likewise, Elena unsuccessfully tried to flag down a passing car before she was attacked at about the same time.

Cori's body was discovered only because her leg was sticking out of the spot where she was dumped. Same with Elena.

They were both the oldest of four siblings. They both had infectious smiles. Both were extremely popular in their communities.

Then there were the news-reel images: the stark footage of their covered bodies being transported on gurneys; their orphaned vehicles parked at the curb; their personal photographs provided for the media by numb-struck family members.

All this and more can't begin to measure the impact this story has had on me over the past couple of weeks. My guess is that the Desmond family has already put a generic face to Cori's unknown killer. I know I did when Elena's was still roaming free (although the monster in my head looked nothing like the one who eventually confessed).

As of this writing, nothing is known about the person who killed Cori. But of one thing, I am almost certain:

Whoever killed Cori will have a history of criminal behavior. Maybe nothing as violent as murder, but there will definitely have been brushes with the law in their past. There will probably have been an early release, or an ill-advised parole, or an otherwise failed attempt at "rehabilitation." Then, if and when they are caught this time around, Lady Justice will spin her wheels once again, and turn yet another blind eye to the innocent victims who fall prey to the system's endless mercy for the guilty.

My best advice to Cori's younger brothers (one of whom is pictured here with his sister) is to prepare themselves for a long and exhausting bout with anger management. There will not be a woman you see who is being treated well enough by the men in her life. You will defend girls who are complete strangers, who might not even know you are defending them, and you will probably get in a lot of fights with guys who have no idea why you are so incredibly mad at them. But eventually, the realization will come that no matter how hard you try, you'll never be able to save the beloved sister whom you are subconsciously trying to save.

All you can really do is toughen up every January, forge as fast as you can through February, and know that March is thankfully less than thirty days away.

I never met Cori personally, but I do remember being at "BAC Street" a while ago with a group of friends on karaoke night. An enthusiastic girl stepped up to the mic and belted out a couple of songs, putting on a great show for the crowd. We all cheered wildly when she finished.

I can't say for sure, but seeing how her nickname was Cori-oke... I'd like to think it was her.

This heartfelt indie film was written and directed by Adrienne Shelly (pictured left), a 40-year-old actress who was quickly coming into her own as an important and talented new filmmaker.

Alas, we will never see another movie from her.

That's because Adrienne Shelly was tragically killed on November 1, 2006, just a few months before Waitress was released to theaters.

At first, her death was ruled a suicide, since she was found hanging by a bedsheet from a shower rod. However, there were signs of foul play that were hard to ignore. Eventually, a 19-year-old Ecuadorian construction worker confessed to murdering Shelly, then staging her death to look like a suicide.

Watching the movie, you can’t help but feel saddened by the harsh reality of Shelly's death infringing on the fantasy world she created in Waitress. The writer-director had even cast herself in a supporting role, as well as her young daughter Sophie, with whom she was pregnant while writing the original script.

It doesn’t seem fair that this dreamer did not even get the chance to relish in her dream come true.

For that, we can all thank Diego Pillco.

He told authorities that he was in a "bad mood" when Shelly complained about the noise he was making while doing construction in her office building. The argument escalated until Pillco knocked Shelly unconscious, then egregiously finished her off in a desparate attempt to cover his tracks.

He wound up entering a guilty plea on charges of manslaughter as part of a deal with prosecutors that got him sentenced to twenty-five years or so.

By now, you might be asking yourself what differentiates this case from the countless other more interesting murders out there? It does all sound somewhat routine, I suppose.

Except for one all-too common twist these days:

You see, Diego Pillco was an illegal alien.

Technically, he never should have even been in the country, much less in that building. (He might have still been in the bad mood, I can't speculate on that.)

Stop.

Stop right there.

I know what you're thinking. You are expecting me to go on an anti-immigration tangent, but that's not where I'm headed. I'm just trying to understand what it is about this country that is so incredibly appealing to the dregs of foreign society?

There are of course the obvious reasons why normal law-abiding people would want to come to America, and I get those. Freedom and opportunity and all that. But what attracts those who can best be described as criminally intent? Or at the very least, criminally potential?

Diego Pillco was most likely the latter. He lived and worked in New York City as an illegal immigrant, which had been his only crime as far as we know. But then he went and graduated to murder because he was afraid of being deported.

Ironically, that probably wouldn't have even happened. Maybe Pillco didn't get the memo, but New York is one of more than thirty U.S. cities that consider themselves a literal sanctuary for illegal immigrants.

In other words... "don't ask, don't tell."

What that means is all too simple. Certain cities around the country have taken it upon themselves to mandate a moronic policy that prevents city employees from assisting U.S. immigration officers in locating illegal aliens on their streets.

Is it really surprising that such a policy might backfire every now and then?

On June 22 of this year, Anthony Bologna, 48, and his sons, Matthew, 16, and Michael, 20, were heading home from a family get-together in San Francisco when they were violently gunned down by a twice-convicted felon named Edwin Ramos, a 21-year-old illegal El Salvadorian.

Initially, the crime was thought to be a tragic case of road rage. But authorities later expressed their belief that it was actually a gang-related case of mistaken identity.

Either way, it could have easily been prevented. Ramos could have been handed over to federal authorities when he was a teenager and shipped back to El Salvador long before he ever even came across the Bologna family. And the real kicker is that it wasn’t some stupid clerical error, or even a crafty defense team that kept him in the country.

It was the city he illegally called home turning a blind eye.

It's funny (as in "funny sad" not "funny ha ha") how San Francisco's original ordinance didn’t even mention what to do with illegal aliens who were known threats to public safety. City officials had to actually adopt an exception that would allow for assistance to the feds when it came to adult felons on the loose.

Lucky for Ramos, he was a juvenile when he was convicted of his felonies.

Not so lucky for the Bologna family.

So when exactly does illegal become illegal in the eyes of pro-immigration advocates? Is it when an alien enters the country illegally? Or is it when they actually commit an illegal act?

It’s like a silly twist on the chicken or the egg theory. Would American citizens like Shelly and the Bolognas still be alive if illegals hadn’t killed them?

I guess you could argue that they might have been murdered by home-grown killers right here in America if given enough of a chance, but it just seems that supporters of immigration rights often have difficulty seeing the illegal forest for the citizenship trees.

What if an illegal alien kills an illegal alien? Who would they support then? Maybe they would have us believe that everybody has the equal right to get killed by anybody, whether they are an American citizen or not.

Now before I get bombarded with comments about how insensitive I am to the plight of honest hard-working immigrants across the nation, let me be very clear that this latest rant of mine isn’t even really about illegal immigration, per se.

This is more about illegal aliens committing illegal crimes and legally being protected by the very system that declared them both illegal in the first place!

Look, I have no numbers to back this claim up, but I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the likelihood of committing an illegal act increases exponentially the more comfortable a person becomes with maintaining an illegal status of citizenship.

The first time I told a lie and got away with it, I felt guilty as hell. The last time I told a lie and got away with it, I took a nap.

City sanctuary policies are just one of the many reasons criminals thrive in America. Notice I didn't even bother putting "illegal" in front of "criminals." Aren't they really just one in the same?

By the way, the second picture above is from a demonstration at San Francisco City Hall in the wake of the Bologna murders. Look for the pro-immigration sign in the background that states: “No one is illegal!”

Uh...actually, some very dangerous people are.

And their illegal actions speak louder than any words I can ever write.

Please visit The Adrienne Shelly Foundation.

Maybe you are, and maybe you aren’t.

If not, I would venture to say that it is probably because you can’t possibly imagine anything redeeming about a bunch of poorly animated children saying and doing things they shouldn’t be doing or saying.

Which is fine. Most of us would feel that way. I know I did at first.

However, if that really is the reason you don’t watch South Park, then I would also venture to say that you probably haven’t bothered to watch it all the way through to the end.

And that is where you have definitely missed out.

Because the truth is, if you can get past all the outlandish behavior and inappropriate dialogue, then there is always a thought-provoking lesson to be learned at the end of every single episode.

The children of South Park spend thirty minutes experiencing sheer insanity all around them, then bespeak wisdom beyond their years in dead-pan reaction to the idiocy they have witnessed.

The irony is that it is often the adults who should be listening the hardest.

Take this one particular plot summary, for example. On the surface, it sounds anything but funny:

A young white boy is charged with a federal hate crime for throwing a rock at a black schoolmate on the playground. His lawyers argue that the crime was not racially motivated, while the prosecution plays the race card at every turn in an attempt to distract the jury from the truth.

The white boy’s friends (including the black boy he attacked) decide to lobby their Governor in an effort to demonstrate that hate crime laws are, in their words, “a savage hypocrisy.” As presented, their argument is compelling to say the least:

Okay, first thing's first. I am totally unimportant in the field of true crime.

The only reason I was even invited to this site in the first place was at the request of my mother Harriett (pictured here). I was simply there to help introduce her to the unfamiliar world of blogging, but she was the real star of the show.

She was the Lone Ranger to my Tonto, the Batman to my Robin... the Hall to my Oates for those who like obscure eighties music references.

Our official introduction to the masses was back in June, 2007 ("The Missing Peace"), when we gave readers a little bit of a background on our family. For those who don't know, my oldest sister Elena was murdered in February of 1982 by a relatively unknown serial killer named Coral Eugene Watts. This mass murderer’s history of eluding police and slipping through the cracks of the criminal justice system had long defied any logical explanation.

I was only twelve years old at the time this monster entered our lives, and I remember an overwhelming sense of confusion upon hearing the news that my sister was gone. The inevitable anger would come much later, followed by a strange sense of resignation that nothing could be done to bring Elena back, so why bother?

Thankfully, my mother never surrendered to this latter emotion (although she was very familiar with the former ones). And due to her amazing resolve over the years, many unjust laws were amended so that victimized lives could heal.

Then Watts died in prison on September 23, 2007, and my mother decided to close that chapter of her life at long last, amicably resigning from "In Cold Blog."

Consequently, my name was left sitting up there alone, without any real reason for being lumped with all the true crime professionals listed at the top of the page.

I assumed my blogging career would soon be over.

Corey Mitchell didn't see it that way, though. He graciously asked me to continue being a contributor to "In Cold Blog" and offer my insight into the world of true crime... which immediately raised three glaring questions:

1) Who exactly is John Semander? 2) What in the world is he doing here? and 3) Why would anyone care what he has to say about true crime?

All valid questions, I have to admit. Truth be told, I had been asking them myself from the get-go.

So here's what I've come up with:

The "who" is easy to answer. I’m nobody. If you asked two million random people on the planet who I was, over a million would have absolutely no idea.

(Of course, the same could be said for just about anybody).

My point is that I’m just a regular guy who happened to fall into the ever-growing percentile of people who have lost a loved one to violent crime. So hopefully that answers the who.

Which brings us to the second question: what in the world am I doing here?

Well, I am here because of my sister Elena, plain and simple. Writing on this blog has provided the rare opportunity for me to give Elena a voice again. Sure, my own opinion is going to sneak in there more often than not, but trust me when I say my views on life have all been directly influenced by Elena's death. Therefore, I will always let my memories of her serve as a guide for the words that I write.

Nevertheless... why would anyone care what I have to say about true crime?

On the surface, my family's involvement with a site like this looks a little strange. My mother and I often fielded questions regarding our association with "In Cold Blog," and we eventually came to realize why it is important for victims' families to be represented here.

When the "In Cold Blog" group was first getting assembled, I was constantly biting my tongue (fingers) to keep from voicing (typing) my opinion on certain subject matters because I wasn't sure if my thoughts would exactly fit in with the rest of the group mentality.

I remember the first comment I ever made was on the topic of true crime itself, and the inherent perils of upsetting family members who might not like what has been written about their loved ones. The reason I felt compelled to give my two cents on the topic was because I happen to walk both sides of the "personal tragedy as entertainment" fence.

On the one side of that fence, I had to admit that I have written all sorts of sordid stories, mostly in screenplay form, and I would be lying if I said I hadn't made a few bucks off of them. I would really be lying if I said I had made as much as I hoped off of them.

But it was the other side of the fence I wanted to discuss.

My family has long cooperated with media outlets to bring Elena's story to light. We have never received monetary compensation, nor did we actively seek out the attention. We simply tolerated the intrusion on our personal lives in order to seek out a sense of justice that we felt was badly needed, and to hopefully help other families cope with tragedy as we had.

When I was younger, I never understood why my mother would grant interviews at our house, and I hated the reporters for not leaving us alone and just letting us get on with our lives.

What I didn't realize at the time was that my mother was fighting a bigger battle, one that she felt was worth her personal sacrifice of emotional pain. Of course, where were the cameras two hours after the interview concluded, when her shell-shocked kids were sitting around an empty dinner table while she was still sobbing uncontrollably in her bedroom?

After posting this rather abrasive comment of mine, I told my mother to get ready for the boot, seeing that most of our fellow bloggers were members of the profession I was so blatantly calling out.

Instead, Corey told me, "Good job."

He explained that this was exactly why he had gathered the various personalities for the group, so that we could get different viewpoints from all sorts of angles.

More importantly, he made me feel comfortable enough to write whatever I felt like writing.

Which is what I plan on doing from here on out.

"In Cold Blog" has become a popular website for true crime fans of all types, and there are many out there who revel in this form of entertainment for all the wrong reasons. There is an underlying insensitivity in them because they simply can't quite grasp the intense emotional pain that violent crime brings.

The physical part is easy to imagine... we've all been injured at some point in our lives. The irony is that we all don't truly know how real pain feels.

These are the readers I hope to reach.

And that would be the why...

We just wish Elena's name didn't have to be on it.