At least, that's how the petite (5'1") woman assigned to guard former linebacker and martial artist Brian Nichols was described.

Which brings to mind Dennis's last post about bullshit.

Why does bullshit seem to always get smeared across the headlines?

I can think of many characterizations which might manage to find their way into a headline about triple quadruple murderer Brian Nichols, but "good person"?

That's what stared me in the face in today's Inquirer as I simultaneously read Dennis's post:

Views differ on accused Atlanta killer

Family members call him a "good person," but others saw him having a knack for trouble.

"We're trying to understand this whole thing," Nichols' sister-in-law, Felisza Nichols, said from her home in the Fort Lauderdale, Fla., suburb of Plantation. "Why did this happen? His character is completely opposite to what is going on."

Nick Pergine, who played football with Nichols at Kutztown, said Nichols' massive physical presence and martial-arts skills earned him a reputation as someone to be careful around.

"He was a bad dude," Pergine said. "You didn't mess with him."

Jake Williams, who coached Nichols at Kutztown, compared Nichols' physique with that of NFL star John Mobley, who also played at the university.

"He was a physical specimen like you wouldn't believe," Williams said.

Nichols was arrested at least three times during his short stay at the university.

In 1990, he was charged with terroristic threats, simple assault, disorderly conduct and harassment, stemming from an incident in a university dining hall, according to court documents. He pleaded guilty to the two lesser charges and the others were dropped.

The next year, Nichols was arrested twice in a month for criminal trespassing, misdemeanor criminal mischief and disorderly conduct. The charges were later dropped.

After dropping out of school, Nichols moved to Georgia in 1995. He lived in an apartment complex in Atlanta; his last known job was working as a computer technician for a subsidiary of Atlanta-based shipping giant UPS. Company spokesman Norm Black says Nichols joined the unit in March 2004 and left in September 2004, which was when he was arrested in the rape case.

But "good person" makes the headline.

Let's return to the tale of the tiny grandmother, and how she fared at the hands of this "good" man:

Until Friday morning, Nichols, a 6'1" 210 pound former college football line backer and computer consultant, was in jail and standing trial for his alleged kidnapping and vicious assault on his former girlfriend. When returning Nichols to his jail cell from court on Thursday, jailers searched his shoes and found that he had smuggled two "shanks" or knife-like weapons from his jail cell into the courtroom. When advised of this, presiding Judge Rowland Barnes ordered additional security for Nichols' court appearance on Friday, however, he was nonetheless allowed to be alone that day with 5'1", 51-year old sheriff's deputy Cynthia Hall.

Nichols overpowered Deputy Hall, grabbed her Beretta .40 cal. semi-automatic pistol, ammo magazines and police radio, and beat and shot the deputy. But instead of quickly fleeing the courthouse in furtherance of his escape, Nichols intentionally walked two or more minutes in the opposite direction and was somehow able to enter Judge Barnes' chambers. He captured another deputy and seized a second gun, and then entered the courtroom where he shot and killed Judge Barnes and court reporter Julie Brandau, noting that the principal witness against Nichols (his former girlfriend), and prosecutor Gayle Abramson had yet to enter the room. He then ran from the court house, stopping long enough to shoot and kill deputy sheriff Hoyt Teasley who had pursued him from the building, car-jacked a number of vehicles while demanding that at least one car-jack victim stay in the car with him, but she instead ran screaming from her car. He next pistol whipped another vehicle owner who refused to accompany him, and then calmly walked down the street to the nearby rail station and rode the train to the northern part of town. Later that evening this "human Tsunami," one that cut a path of murder and mayhem across Atlanta, attempted to rob and then pistol whipped another victim, confronted and murdered off duty federal agent David Wilhelm, and finally took a local woman hostage in her own home. She was eventually able to talk her way out of her apartment and called the police who quickly surrounded Nichols and took him into custody.

Now, the grandmother's family is justifiably upset that no one was there to protect Mrs. Hall:

A sister and a family friend of Fulton County Deputy Cynthia Hall say they are concerned about the fact that she was the only one guarding Brian Nichols before he allegedly attacked her.

"If they had been on a heightened security alert on this individual, why weren't additional security measures taken?" asked Jean Hall, 46, of St. Albans, W.Va. "If it meant hiring an additional guard or two for the day — that's just common sense."

Sheriff's Deputy Cynthia Hall may soon leave intensive care, her doctor says.

Hall received severe head injuries in the Friday attack and remained in critical condition in Grady Memorial Hospital on Sunday night.

Family friend Daphne Robinson, who grew up with Cynthia Hall in West Virginia, also said Hall should not have been the only guard on Nichols.

"It should have been two or three," said Robinson, 43, who lives in Winston-Salem, N.C. "They should have had more guards on him. He should have been shackled."

The 51-year-old deputy is about 5 feet tall. Nichols, 33, is 6-foot-1 and weighs 200 pounds.

She should not have been there. I know this is politically incorrect, but what happened violates the most elementary common sense.

Would we expect a Chihuahua to successfully protect us against a rabid Rottweiler? (I'm afraid calling the Rottweiler a "nice doggie" wouldn't be enough either.)

We come to the issue of whether Hall was armed or whether she should have been armed. I've been reading repeated accounts like this -- which make it appear that Nichols wrestled the gun away from Hall -- implying that she shouldn't have been armed.

ATLANTA — On Wednesday, when Brian Nichols returned to jail from his rape trial, sheriff’s deputies found a pair of crude weapons in his socks.

On Thursday, a judge, prosecutors and his attorney sought additional security for Nichols’ trial.

Still, on Friday, the former football linebacker ended up alone — his handcuffs removed — in a room with a diminutive deputy almost 20 years his senior.

Nichols, 33, overpowered the deputy, seized her handgun, and went on a shooting spree at the Fulton County Courthouse, authorities said. And the Sheriff’s Department faced difficult questions about how it performs one of its core jobs: protecting the county’s halls of justice.

Many details about the episode remained unclear late Friday. Fulton County Sheriff Myron Freeman and other authorities declined to discuss whether officials had told the deputy assigned to guard Nichols, 51-year-old Cynthia Ann Hall, about the increased security concerns.

They also would not describe Hall’s training or answer questions about why she carried a handgun into a locked room with an allegedly violent defendant.

Not according to a video captured by hidden cameras installed in the holding area:

At 8:48 a.m. on Friday, Hall took a handcuffed Nichols from the detention area at the bottom of the downtown Justice Center Tower and put him in an elevator to take him to an eighth-floor holding area. There, Nichols was to change into his civilian clothes and resume a rape retrial before Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes.

The holding room, which has two cells, is supposed to be a secure area between courtrooms in the modern Justice Center Tower.

A video camera, which is supposed to be monitored by two guards in a command post, shows the two arriving in the holding area between two courtrooms, according to a law enforcement official who viewed the tape.

The video shows Hall guiding Nichols, whose hands are still handcuffed behind his back, face-first into one of two open cells.

Hall releases one cuff and turns Nichols around to unhook the remaining cuff, which is dangling from his wrist. She uncuffs him so he can change from a jail jumpsuit into street clothes.

The muscular, 33-year-old Nichols then lunges at Hall, knocking the petite, 51-year-old woman backward into another cell. Both disappear from camera view because having a camera inside the actual holding cells is prohibited for privacy reasons. Two to three minutes later, Nichols emerges from the cell, holding Hall's gun belt and police radio. He picks up her keys from the floor and locks her inside the cell. Nichols then enters the empty cell.

A couple of minutes later, he emerges dressed in civilian clothes. He locks the door behind him and saunters calmly out of the holding area, carrying the gun belt, according to the law enforcement official who viewed the tape. Nichols appears to know which key to use to unlock the holding area door and enters a vacant courtroom on the eighth floor.

Nichols told Atlanta police that on the way out he retrieved the deputy's gun from a security lockbox where Hall had placed the weapon. He was able to get the weapon because he had Hall's keys.

This whole, bumbling fiasco would almost be comical if it weren't for the tragic loss of life involved. Unthinking bureaucrats wrote the rules which placed the tiny grandmother (and everyone who died) at risk. Now they'll rewrite the rules again. I am sure they'll refer things to a committee. Maybe even a committee to study the results of the committee. And then a Commission! Maybe even a "Blue Ribbon Commission." (Dennis, please shut up about bullshit!)

Of one thing you can be sure: common sense will not be considered.

I'll therefore conclude with a few questions for the Commission as they ponder the "bad choices" which "led to tragedy" for a tiny grandmother and a "good person":

Stay tuned.

(I don't know if I can stand to stay tuned, as I'm reminded of the many hours I spent sitting on committees . . . )

MORE: Reading the most recent account I can find, it's still not being made clear whether or not Nichols wrestled a gun from Hall, later unlocking the cabinet and stealing another gun belonging to her, or whether she was unarmed, and he stole her only gun. From what I am reading, it appears that Hall was unarmed while in the holding area -- but that might be wrong. (I haven't seen the video, but if Nichols already had the gun, why bother to unlock the cabinet for a gun?)

AND MORE: Yet another report does little to shed light on the status of Hall's gun:

"Common sense says you lock up the gun in the lockbox, but policy and common sense aren't always the same thing,"said another deputy with long experience in courthouse security.

The camera did not show whether Hall had locked her gun. In a confession Sunday, Nichols said he retrieved Hall's gun from a lockbox.

The key to the lockbox is typically on the same chain with keys that unlock handcuffs and the holding cell door.

I'd say they're becoming antonyms. . .