BROADCASTS.com

Ten year-old Judith Barsi was a bona fide, in-demand child actor in the 1980s.\xa0 Between her fifth and tenth birthdays she appeared in 72 commercials and dozens of television movies and series.\xa0 And her acting abilities and professional demeanor, even at such a young age, made it clear to everyone who worked with her that young Judith was destined for even greater things as she grew up.\xa0\xa0Sadly, Judith\u2019s life ended not even one month past her tenth birthday.\xa0 And the circumstances were nothing short of tragic.\xa0\xa0The only child of Maria and Joseph \u2013 immigrant parents who came to the United States from Hungary \u2013 Judith\u2019s talents were noticed by Maria early on.\xa0 Joseph, who worked as a plumbing contractor, never encouraged Judith\u2019s career the way Maria did, even though by 1988 it had been Judith\u2019s income that had enabled the family to purchase \u2013 for cash \u2013 a lovely home in the San Fernando Valley suburbs of Los Angeles.\xa0\xa0And by that time Joseph\u2019s non-support had turned dark.\xa0 He was now drinking heavily, and had begun verbally and emotionally abusing Maria and Judith.\xa0 The more successful Judith became, it seemed, the more twisted and verbally violent her father became.\xa0\xa0It all ended on July 25, 1988 when Joseph became one of a tragically long line of family annihilators \u2013 shooting young Judith in the head as she slept, then Maria as she rushed in to see what was going on.\xa0 He then lit the house on fire, walked into the garage, where he shot and killed himself.\xa0\xa0And all of that is awful enough \u2013 but what really fueled Melissa\u2019s ire about this case is what happened 29 years after Joseph Barsi\u2019s murder/suicide rampage: A 2017 article in, of all places, a home design magazine.\xa0\xa0Listen in as Melissa details the short lives and crushing deaths of two beautiful souls \u2013 a mother and daughter who did not deserve their fate \u2013 and the strange era in which we live that somehow diminishes everything to the level of kitsch.