The Interview continued…
“Well, you made it through law school,” Blanchett said, “so I guess you picked yourself up after all that and made something else for yourself.”
“I had to do something, right? And having ties to Grand Forks made it an easy choice,” I replied, thinking about Tami. “That, and it was the cheapest university for me to attend,” I finished with a grin.
“Personally, I like the idea of having someone with some Marine Corps thinking around here,” Peter said with a touch of swagger. Then he looked to Bob and Patty and said, “I’m pretty well satisfied with his background. Are you?” he asked, referring to Bob and Patty.
“Yes,” Bob replied. “I don’t have more questions about that.”
“Oh, I’m satisfied” said Patty while looking at me with a slightly seductive smile.
“Okay, great,” Blanchett said. “Wes, this job comes with a tremendous amount of power and responsibility. You’ve heard me say it already, and you’ll hear it again all the time if you get the job: your job is to do the right thing. ‘To do Justice.’ Exercising good judgment is absolutely key to being a good prosecutor. With that in mind, I’d like to move on and go through a few more standard character questions that we’ve asked all of the candidates for the job. Fair enough?”
“Sure thing,” I replied. “Fire away.”
“We’ve got a few hypotheticals. Here goes,” Blanchett started. “What would you do if you found a bag of meth or even a bag of weed in one of your coworker’s desk drawers?”
“First, I would confront them about it directly,” I responded after a brief pause. “I would want to make sure it wasn’t misplaced evidence or something like that. But if it was that person’s stash and they’re using, I would strongly encourage that person to own up to it with you (referring to Peter), privately, and seek treatment or whatever help they need to get straightened out.”
“What if they didn’t, and just blew it off?” Bob asked.
“Then things would have to escalate, and I would take it the boss, the D.A. Quietly, if I could, but I wouldn’t just let it go,” I replied. “If someone’s doing hard drugs, or using at work, they need help right away, especially if it’s a job with big responsibilities, like in this office.”
They all seemed comfortable with my answer. We moved on.
“Wes, I have a good one I like to ask,” Patty stepped in with. “What are the top three qualities you look for in a close personal friend?”
“Honesty, integrity, and loyalty,” I said instantaneously in reply. “In no particular order.”
I could tell that they all liked my answer. I could almost hear Patty thinking “wow,” because that’s the look she had on her face.
“Okay,” Peter said. “Next question: what would you do if the D.A. told you to prosecute a case where you believed the defendant was innocent?”
“Well, that would probably be the last day I would be working here,” I said, again without any pause or hesitation. “Because there is no way in Hell that I would ever abuse my power and prosecute an innocent person.”
At my answer, Peter Blanchett, Coos County District Attorney, looked like he had just gotten kicked in the balls. His face turned beet-red in a flash, and he looked like the wind was knocked out of him. He abruptly straightened himself upright in his chair before speaking. Then the stammering started. For their parts, Bob was grinning broadly, and Patty was trying hard to stifle her laughter. I could tell they both loved my response.
“Oh, well, ah…that’s not exactly what I meant to say,” Blanchett said with some awkwardness, followed by assertiveness. “Of course, we’d never ask you to do anything like that. Like I said, this job is about doing justice. We don’t do frame jobs around here.”
“That’s good to know,” I said with a smile. He quite obviously had never heard an answer that honest and blunt in response to his question. I knew without any doubt that my answer either just got me the job or just got me eliminated from consideration. That’s exactly how I wanted it, too, after being asked that question – either these folks were for real, or I wanted no part of it.
“Yeah. Um…let me re-phrase that one somewhat,” Blanchett continued back peddling as the red color in his face started to subside. “What if the D.A. told you to prosecute a case where there was enough evidence for probable cause to prosecute but you personally weren’t convinced that the defendant was guilty? How would you handle that?”
“That’s a bit of a different story,” I said. “It’s an adversarial system for a reason. If there’s sufficient evidence that a defendant committed a crime and I wasn’t personally sure about it, I would do my job and present the best case I had with the facts and evidence available. It’s not my role as a prosecutor to usurp the job of the judge and jury; it would be my job to present my best evidence of guilt and then let the jury decide. I truly believe that when everybody does their jobs right and under the law, the system usually sorts it out to the best conclusion.”
“That’s very reassuring from the perspective of the Juvenile Department,” Bob Hartman, the Juvenile Department Director spoke up. “Since Measure 11 was passed, the entirety of the of State’s juvenile system is sort of scrambling to get properly organized and have the right resources where we need them. From our perspective, it’s very important to us that we charge whatever crimes fit the law and the facts of each case.”
“As it is on the D.A.’s side, too,” Blanchett chimed in, “From my perspective, I’d rather have to reel in my prosecutors for going too far rather than have them too scared to try a tough case.”
“Hear, hear!” Patty added. “We in the victims assistance unit like it when the bad guys go to jail for a long time. Kinda our ‘thing,’” she said as she smiled and winked.
“I appreciate hearing that, from all of you,” I said sincerely. “I can commit to doing the job you’re looking to get done. I’ll charge whatever crimes the evidence supports on every case. I’ve made plenty of tough decisions under pressure, so that’s nothing new for me. I’m sure there will be many more to come.”
—
(THE REST OF THIS NOVEL TAKES OFF FROM HERE - SUBSCRIBE NOW!)
—
Coquille, Oregon, November 2, 1995…
After saying goodbye to Keith, I had a cigarette in the parking lot separating the Juvenile Department from the District Attorney’s Office. The nightmare at Bandon Beach that I had that morning was still rattling around my head…it was so surreal and vivid. I had to try to put it aside as I finished my smoke and went into my office at the Juvenile Department, a few minutes before it opened.
On my desk stood a short stack of files – it was scheduled to be a light morning at court. None of the cases today were very serious and all of my plea deals had been negotiated. I moved on to the next day’s calendar for plea dates to start pulling files, and it practically slapped me in the face – the Freddy Nelson case was set for a plea the next morning. Freddy Nelson, as I call him, is the 15-year-old severely physically and developmentally disabled pedophile who was caught in the act of giving oral sex to a 5-year-old neighbor boy by that boy’s mother. It was the first police report I ever read on the day I got the job and drove to Coos Bay with Keith to find a place to live.
Nothing had happened with me on the case because it was charged by Kevin and Freddy was arraigned while I was away at my father’s funeral and then away for a week of training. The reason nothing had happened on it is that Kevin had charged this case as a sexual abuse 3 case, a class A misdemeanor. I didn’t understand why Kevin would do that since the perp was caught in the act committing sodomy 1, a class A person felony under Measure 11, and we had further confessions and substantiating testimony to go for as many as five separate counts. Further, Kevin’s recent admonition rang in my ears about double jeopardy preventing any felony charges if the defendant pleads guilty to misdemeanors based on the same facts and evidence. If I was going to do my job and do it right, as I had committed to doing, I had no choice but to dismiss the misdemeanor charges immediately before Freddy’s lawyer pled him out on chicken shit charges with a slap on the wrist as punishment.
It wasn’t right. No fucking way. Not on my watch.
We had a rock-solid case on the class A felonies. Indisputable facts. Clear law. This was the job I promised to do, no matter how hard or emotionally draining it would be.
Why did Kevin only charge it as a misdemeanor? Is there something I’m missing? He made a huge point of letting me know this was my case to handle…but I better talk to him before I drop the misdemeanor charges just to be sure...
Immediately following my morning court appearances, I went back to the D.A.’s side of the building to look for Kevin. He was behind closed doors doing his secret grand jury proceedings. “Secret” means I couldn’t go in or interrupt him. My only choice was to keep coming back.
On my first attempt to find Kevin to no avail, I found Chuck instead. Chuck’s trial for the day had pled out at the last minute, giving him a bit of time to chat. I went into his office and asked him for advice.
“Hey Chuck, I’ve been trying to get ahold of Kevin all morning but he’s in grand jury,” I started. “I’ve got a real bitch of a case here and I’m looking for some input.”
“Sure. What you got?” Chuck asked.
“It’s nasty…a 15-year-old developmentally disabled kid with multiple birth defects got caught sucking off a 5-year-old neighbor kid,” I said, “by that kid’s mom.”
“Oh shit, that is nasty!” Chuck bounced back at me. “Just how low is this guy’s IQ, anyway?”
“The school has him at an IQ of 72.”
“Damn,” Chuck said, “that’s like house-plant stupid.”
“I was thinking more like a retarded grasshopper, but yeah, you get the idea,” I said.
“Have you had him candled yet?” Chuck asked.
“Candled? What the fuck is that?” I asked in reply.
“You know when they hold an egg up to a candlelight to see if it’s been fertilized? Well, it’s the same thing, but using his head instead of the egg,” Chuck laughed as he made a hand gesture like holding an egg to the light. “It’s having him get a psych eval from the State.”
“No, nothing like that yet. It’s only been charged as misdemeanor sex abuse 3,” I explained.
“What!? You got Sodomy 1 cold with just the mom’s testimony alone. Why’d it get charged so low?” Chuck said in dismay.
“I don’t know. That’s why I’m looking for Kevin. The problem is this thing is set for a plea date tomorrow,” I said before Chuck cut me off.
“…and you need to drop that bitch so he doesn’t walk away on the misdo,” Chuck said, trying to sound cool. He was extremely sharp. “You got anything else in the file on this guy? Any reason why Kevin went with sex abuse charges?”
“Not much beyond the police reports,” I said. “The kid – the perp, I mean – Freddy…well, Freddy gave a full confession to the cop who interviewed him. Freddy even acknowledged that he knew what he did and that it was wrong. Altogether, I think we could bring five counts of Sodomy 1 against Freddy based on his confession and corroboration from the mom and victim.”
“All Measure 11, and you said Freddy’s 15, right? So all adult charges in adult court,” Chuck pondered.
“And all with adult jail time in adult prison,” I finished for him. “You think that’s why Kevin went with lower charges?”
“Shit, I don’t know. Maybe he already talked to opposing counsel and worked out a plea deal?” Chuck speculated.
“From an A felony to an A misdemeanor?” I replied skeptically. “That’s one hell of a leap.”
“Yeah, you’re right about that. There may be more to the case that would make him go for a plea deal,” Chuck offered.
“Like what?”
“There are all sorts of things that can wind up fucking you on a case,” Chuck said assertively. “I always prefer an agreed plea deal to rolling the dice with a jury. Any fucking day, my friend.”
His words shocked my sense of justice, of the Justice system. That’s not what they teach you in college or law school, or anywhere else, and my patriotic core was a bit offended. I challenged him.
“Isn’t that what the system is all about?” I asked. “To be judged before a jury of your peers?”
Chuck laughed. “That’s great! Next, you’re gonna tell me a trial is about finding the truth!” He laughed some more, then seeing the confused look on my face, he said, “Look, the fact is: juries are fucking stupid. They are usually made up of people too dumb to figure out how to stay off of them. If I can get a satisfactory result, satisfactory to me and to the victim, one that is guaranteed, like through a plea deal, I’ll take it every fucking time over relying on a jury to do the right thing.”
I was stunned again, but only because I was a rookie. I would learn the harsh truth of his comments soon enough - the hard, bitter way - but today I was still quite green and naïve. Still a believer.
Chuck was a great trial attorney, and he could read my confused look, so he went back to the reason I came to talk to him. “But it sounds like you have him dead to rights, no question. I say go for it! Let the jail figure out what to do with him. You do your job and let them figure out how to do theirs,” Chuck said confidently.
—
(HIT THAT ‘LIKE’ BUTTON, PLEASE! IT DOESN’T COST A THING!)
—
About an hour later, I was back on the D.A.’s side of the building looking again for Kevin. He was still unavailable while in grand jury. Instead of finding the assistant district attorney directly senior to Kevin, as I had with Chuck, I found the man directly junior to Kevin, I’ll call him Ted Williams.
Ted was tall and lean, standing a thin 6’2’, with an affable but professional disposition. He came off as a bit bookish but approachable. He lacked any condescending attitude toward junior attorneys, I guess, because he was relatively new on the job, too. I could tell when I first met him that he was smart and dedicated, a strictly by the book kind of guy. He had some time, so I briefed him on my case and crisis.
“You sure pulled a tough one,” Ted said as he started to laugh. “Good luck!”
“Gee, thanks,” I smirked back at him. “Any idea why Kevin would charge this as just a misdemeanor?”
Ted sat back with his arms over his head as he thought about it. “It could be all the problems that are going to come from Freddy’s low IQ,” Ted opined. “The way I see it, you got two potential issues that the defense could create problems with. The first is: does Freddy have the mental capacity to be able to assist in his own defense? If not, your case is sunk right there.”
“Yeah, I know it’s a possibility. But we have some good evidence of capacity with his confession,” I countered.
“Yup, you got something to work with there. The other problem is whether Freddy has the mental capacity to be held criminally liable,” Ted said. “They’re not the same issue.”
“Mens rea (that’s the mental capacity necessary to be held criminally liable) . Yeah…but those questions both have the same answer – Freddy said he knew what he did was wrong.”
Ted sat up straight and brought his arms down to his desk. “You said Freddy had multiple birth defects…”
“Police report claims he’s had four heart surgeries and is on eleven different medications,” I interrupted him with.
“Well, that’s going to be an issue at the jail. That, and keeping him from being tossed around as a sex tool by the other inmates,” Ted chuckled again. “Man, you sure do have the luck!”
“Gee, thanks,” I smiled and shook my head. “So, what do you think? Should I go for it?”
“You got a solid case…and the jail’s gonna have to figure what to do with Measure 11 kids anyway, so yeah. I’d go for it!” Ted said with an encouraging smile.
—
(CONSENSUS HERE IS A MIRAGE OF THE MOMENT - SUBSCRIBE NOW AND SEE HOW IT UNFOLDS! AND PLEASE SHARE EVERYWHERE!)
—
About an hour later, I was back in the D.A.’s offices looking for Kevin when I found our Chief Deputy, Steve Keutzer, who was the functional boss of the office. He got stuff done, managing all of the attorneys and their trial schedules, as well as his managing his own top-level felony workload. Steve bore a resemblance to the actor Dean Norris and carried himself in a similar fun-loving but professional manner as Norris’ character “Hank” on the hit TV show Breaking Bad. Steve was extremely likeable and one of the best trial attorneys in Oregon. His advice really mattered to me.
Steve had just gotten back from the then felony-handling Circuit Court (now they’re all circuits courts) hearings he had that day. He had a good morning and was chipper as usual.
“Hey Wes. What can I do you for?” Steve asked with a smile when he saw me at his door.
“Hi. I’ve been trying to talk to Kevin all morning but he’s been jammed up in grand jury,” I began again. “I need his input on a really tough case. It’s this 15-year-old developmentally disabled kid – who also has some significant physical birth defects – who got caught blowing a 5-year-old. By the 5-year-old’s mom.”
“Oh fuck,” he said with an exaggerated look of shock for comic effect. “What’s the problem?”
“Well, there’re a few. Kevin charged it before I came on as one misdemeanor, sex abuse 3,” I informed him. “The perp, Freddy, also confessed to perping the little boy at least four other times, and that’s backed up by what the victim verified.”
“Okay, so just drop the misdemeanor and take it to grand jury for the Measure 11 case,” Steve said.
“It’s a bit more complicated. The perp has an IQ of around 72, according to his school,” I said.
“Shit, that’s as dumb a housefly,” Steve quipped with a mock serious face. He was in a good mood and having fun. Nothing shocked him. Steve was the most accomplished murder prosecutor in the State of Oregon and had been to every single crime scene of those cases. The man had seen it all and managed to keep his sense of humor, off color though it was.
“Or fresh Jello,” I offered. He laughed and I joined him for a chuckle.
“So, you got competency to stand trial and mens rea issues,” Steve concluded for me.
“Yup. But wait, there’s more,” I promised with a smirk. “Freddy the 15-year-old perp was so severely physically messed up at birth that he has undergone four heart surgeries to this point in his young life.”
“Fuck,” Steve said more seriously this time. “The Sheriff ain’t gonna want to babysit a sick kid, I can tell you that.”
“Hasn’t the jail figured out what to do with juveniles charged as adults?” I asked.
“Not under Measure 11, they haven’t. Normally, the juveniles are kept in juvenile detention, regardless of the charges,” Steve explained. Then he perked up, almost congratulatory when he said, “Hey, I think this will be the first one for them under Measure 11!”
“Great,” I said sardonically. “I’m good at firsts.”
“Don’t worry, they’ll figure it out,” Steve reassured me. “You got mom walking in on the act, right? You got him dead-to-rights! Shouldn’t even be a long trial, at least not as far as proving your case.”
“So you think I should go for it?” I asked bluntly.
“Hell yes! If I were you, I’d dismiss the misdemeanor case before the afternoon court session gets called – just in case his public defender is smart enough to go in and cop to the lower charges while they still can,” Steve finished.
“Okay. Great! Thanks for your help,” I said as I left his office…
—
(PAYWALL WILL GO UP AFTER ABOUT 1000 WORDS STARTING CHAPTER 14)
—
…and bumped into the boss himself, Peter Blanchett, Coos County District Attorney. I was trying hard to not get myself into trouble with this case, but I also wanted to do the right thing. Best talk to The Man.
“Hey Wes,” Peter said.
“Hi Peter. Hey, do you have a few minutes?” I asked. “I’ve got a doozy of a case I wanted to ask you about.”
“Yeah, sure. Come into my office,” Peter replied. I followed him a few feet next door to his corner office and sat opposite him across his desk. “What’s the case all about?” he asked.
I had run down the essential details three times already that morning, allowing me some practice in how I presented it. As I briefed him, Blanchett sat stone faced while listening attentively.
“Okay. I’ve got a 15-year-old sex offender who has major birth defects leaving him with an IQ of around 72. This perp – Freddy - was caught in the act of giving oral sex to a neighboring 5-year-old, by the 5-year-old’s mother. It’s a dead-to-rights sodomy 1 case, right? But it gets worse – Freddy admitted to the cops that he understood what he was doing to the little boy and that it was wrong. Freddy went on to admit to multiple occasions that are corroborated by the victim and the mother, in terms of access to the little boy and timing of the other offenses. So it’s a clear Measure 11 case, requiring that Freddy be charged and tried as an adult in the adult system. But here’s another ugly wrinkle – Freddy was so messed up from birth that he has had four heart surgeries to this point in his life and he’s on at least eleven different medications for all his medical maladies…so he might be a bit of a problem for the jail, too.
“My immediate problem is that Kevin had previously charged it as a sex abuse 3 misdemeanor case, and the plea date is tomorrow. I’ve been trying to talk to him all morning to find out why, but he’s been tied up in grand jury. I’ve talked to Keutzer, Chuck, and Ted about it, and they all think I should go for the Measure 11 case. So that’s what I’m going to do as soon as I leave your office,” I said. “I just wanted to run it by you first and see what you think.”
Peter Blanchett paused for about five seconds while looking directly at me as he thought about it. Then he said in a total deadpan, “Son, you are going to either get elected Governor, or your ass is going to be ridden out of town on a rail.”
I smiled awkwardly and made a small chuckle while suppressing the cold knot in my stomach.
“It’s your case,” Blanchett continued. “You’re the juvenile prosecutor and it sounds like a solid Measure 11.”
“I definitely have a lock on at least one count,” I replied.
“So what if it’s the first one for juveniles?” Blanchett said assertively. “The voter’s decided they wanted this when they passed Measure 11. It’s our job to follow the law and prosecute crimes according to the facts and evidence we have.” He paused for a second before nodding at me and saying, “Do it.”
The relief I felt made me want to hug him. Instead, I smiled and said, “Thanks for your input,” as I left his office to go back to the Juvenile Department. I then instructed the office secretary to print out a “Dismissal Without Prejudice” form for the Freddy Nelson case, which I promptly marched up to the Juvenile Court and filed just before the office clerk’s office closed for their lunch break.
—
(IF YOU LIKE MY WORK, PLEASE SHARE IT AND HIT THAT ‘LIKE’ BUTTON!)
—
After coming back to my office from my own lunch, I got to work on the next steps required on Freddy’s case. The first thing I had to do was set up an interview with the mother. I needed to have her give me all of her testimony before I could take her into a grand jury room. I had to have the full story so I could prepare to file all the charges we could allege. I also needed to test her credibility and find out how her 5-year-old son was doing. I didn’t know yet if the child would be capable of testifying, so I needed to meet him at some point as well.
I reached her on my first attempt to call. After I explained who I was, Wendy (I’ll call her) was very happy I called. She was shocked that the case had only been charged as a misdemeanor. She was also angry that she had been seeing Freddy around the neighborhood like nothing had happened. “You’ve gotta get that kid out of here,” she said sternly. “There’s a lot more going on that you need to know about,” Wendy finished. I had no doubt she was right. I promised to hear her out completely and do everything I could to help her and her son. We made arrangements to meet the following week in preparation for grand jury.
—
—
As the afternoon started to wind down, I went back over to the D.A.’s side of the building to look for Kevin again. This time I found him at his desk after he apparently just got through with grand jury. He was reading something and he looked tired, like he had had a really long day, but as soon as I said “Hey Kevin,” he look up at me with fire in his eyes.
“What did you do?” he snapped at me.
“What?” I responded.
“What in the living fuck did you do?” he said again with a raised voice. “Why did you dismiss the Freddy Nelson case? Do you have any idea what you’re doing?”
I didn’t expect this kind of reaction. I was taken aback and tried to be polite in how I responded. “I’ve been looking for you all morning to talk to you about…”
He cut me off, as was his habit, saying, “dismissing the sex abuse 3 and going Measure 11 on this. Are you fucking kidding me?” Apparently, someone told him about the dismissal. He went on, “I charged that case! Who are you to decide what to do with it?”
“You said it was my case the first day I met you,” I replied.
“Yeah, maybe so. But do you even know what you’re doing? The kid – Freddy – is only 15, and he’s mentally retarded! Not to mention the fact that he’s on a dozen different meds for a heart problem and god-knows-what other birth defects!”
“Yeah, I know all that,” I said calmly.
“And you want to throw him in adult prison! It’ll fucking kill him!” Kevin screamed at me. “Do you know how long the sentence is for each count of sodomy 1? It’s 100 months, automatic, at minimum and per count! IN ADULT PRISON! You’re not just punishing him, you’d be giving this kid a fucking life sentence! You could even think of it as a death sentence!”
“You don’t know that. And that’s the law – Freddy got caught in the act committing sodomy 1…” I said before getting cut off again.
“Sex abuse 3 gets us all we need in prosecuting Freddy,” Kevin demanded. “He’ll be on probation and have to register as a sex offender, so we’ll have an eye on him.”
“But that’s not what Freddy did,” I countered. “Sex abuse 3 is just the touching of another’s sexual parts for the purpose of arousal or sexual satisfaction. That’s a statute aimed at unwanted gropers, and that’s why it’s only a misdemeanor. What Freddy did was far more serious and fits exactly the crime of sodomy 1, sexual contact between the sex organs of one person with the mouth or anus of another. That law was passed for exactly this type of offense, and it’s aimed right at child pedophiles. So that’s what I’m doing with…” I said before Kevin cut me off again.
“Oh, what a bunch of…” Kevin said as he got out of his chair and started toward Peter’s office. I got up to follow but Peter was already coming our way. The whole office could hear Kevin going off on me. They were all paying close attention, too.
“Do you know what he just did?” Kevin asked Blanchett with some heat.
“Yeah, he told me about the case,” Blanchett said plainly.
“Do you know the perp is mentally and physically handicapped? Severely?” Kevin continued. Peter and Kevin walked back to Kevin’s office as they talked. I sat back down across the desk from Kevin as he sat behind his desk. Peter stood in the doorway and continued.
“Yes, and he wouldn’t be the first disabled defendant we’ve ever…” Peter said as Kevin cut him off.
“But he’d be the first 15-year-old retarded and disabled kid we threw into adult jail!” Kevin screamed. “He’ll never make it out of there with all that’s wrong with him. Not to mention that fact that he’ll be tossed around by the other inmates like a fucking sex doll!”
“Look, the jail has to figure this out sometime, and…” Peter started.
“But do we want this kid’s blood on our hands?” Kevin interrupted again. “You know this is learned behavior, right? It’s being ‘bitten by the vampire’! You know this kid learned it from somewhere. You know he was a victim, too, right?”
“Of course,” Peter replied. “So are most criminals.” Peter was referring to the basic fact I had recently learned - that around 85% of all crimes are what law enforcement considered “A v. A,” meaning “Asshole versus Asshole,” otherwise known as crimes amongst and upon other criminals. Those tended to have less priority for some reason. Gee, I wonder why?
Kevin cooled down a notch at Peter’s point, easing into more of an attempt at persuasion while he carried on with his rant. “Yeah, but this is significantly different than just a regular criminal background. Kids don’t think up behaviors like this, it’s learned from someone. Especially a mentally deficient kid like Freddy. He’s a victim who got bitten by the vampire and turned into one himself. A child getting perped by a pedophile is just like someone being bitten by a vampire – they don’t all turn, only a few do. It’s only about one in a hundred, or so. Hell, maybe it’s only one in every two hundred victims of child sex abuse who turn, but the point is that it’s not all of them. And this kid is retarded, for Christ’s sake! So tell me,” Kevin said directed at me, “knowing all that, what do you do with someone who’s been bitten by the vampire?”
I looked Kevin in the eye, embraced his metaphor, and said with complete sincerity, “If someone has been bitten by the vampire, and they turn, you drive a stake through their heart and cut off their fucking head so they can never do it to anyone else. It’s got to end somewhere.”
Several seconds of stunned silence was followed by Kevin pointing at me and looking at Peter. “See? You see that? That’s what we’re dealing with…” Kevin started ranting again before I cut him off.
“Now just wait a damn minute here,” I cut in. “I’ve been listening to you yelling at me, now it’s my turn to speak. Of course, it’s learned behavior. We all know that. But where do you think he learned it from?” I asked sharply. “Home, or from someone close to it. So please tell me how it does him, Freddy, any good to send him back home to be further abused, AND letting him roam the neighborhood looking for other kids to perp! Where the hell is the honor in that? If he stays out on the street, he’s getting raped at home and he’s a threat to the community. Do you want that?”
“Oh, come on, he’ll still be a registered sex offender and be on probation with the sex abuse 3 count,” Kevin shot back.
“Yeah, how many pedophiles does that actually stop from committing further crimes?” I asked. “You and I both know that won’t do shit to stop Freddy from perping some other kid, or kids, as long as he’s walking around free in the community. How many more lives does this victim, Freddy, get to destroy in his process of becoming a vampire? How many more vampires are we going to let him create? How is that in any way ‘doing justice?’”
“He has a good point,” Blanchett spoke up. “Our priority should be protecting the community from further harm. We all know Freddy’s learned it from somewhere…”
“And that’s another issue I have,” I interjected. “Why the hell aren’t we trying to work up the chain to the master vampire? Sort of like working drug cases up the chain by putting pressure on lower-level dealers to turn on their suppliers or face hard time, why the fuck aren’t we trying to find the person or people who perped Freddy? We know they’re out there, probably very close by. How are we going to ever go after the really bad guys, the master vampires, if we’re afraid to pursue their vampire creations?”
That drew a few seconds of silence before Kevin piped up, “So who’s going to try this case, him? (Gesturing to me) It sure as hell won’t be me!” Kevin asserted loudly. Then while looking to Blanchett and pointing to me, Kevin yelled, “He can’t do it – he hasn’t even had a goddamn jury trial yet!”
“I’ll have had a few by then, but if that’s what it takes…” I began before Kevin cut me off again.
“You have NO idea what you’re getting into,” Kevin raged on. “Remember the trial I told you about just before you got here? The ex-police chief?”
“Yeah,” I responded.
Kevin was talking about a trial he had finished shortly before I was hired. It was a horrendous sexual abuse case that started when the mentally disabled teenage stepdaughter of the then-current police chief of one of the small towns in Coos County made some sort of disclosure of abuse. As required by Oregon law, it got investigated. Evidence was found and it turned into a major molestation case against the chief. The disgusting two-faced monster had cut a hole in the attic floor/ceiling above the stepdaughter’s bed. He then set up a video camera and recorded in graphic detail various sex acts demanded by him or with him. Investigators found a pile of videos as evidence. Kevin had to watch them all in order to prosecute the case. Beyond the absolutely disgusting nature of the crimes themselves, having had formerly worked with this chief as a trusted member of the legal profession made it particularly hard for Kevin. The chief went down for the equivalent of a life sentence for it, too.
“You have no fucking clue what you’re stepping into, the kind of toll it takes on you,” he said intensely. “But you do this one, you’ll find out!”
“Well, it’s his case,” Peter chimed in, “and we’ll back him up wherever he needs.”
God, I loved Peter Blanchett in that moment. In that instant I believed I had found an honorable man to work for, giving me a big glimmer of hope for the longer term.
“Oh, bullshit,” Kevin chimed in with even more heat. “Whatever. You’re pretty good about telling us we have the authority to handle our cases as we see fit, and then pull crap like…”
Peter cut him off. “It’s his case. What’s your problem?”
“You make all sorts of promises you don’t ever keep,” Kevin retorted back to Peter.
At this point, I realized I had stepped into a much bigger fight between them, perhaps an ongoing fight, that I was not privy to – but getting caught in the middle, I was being punished for it. They had a brief, maybe five minutes, intense argument over the top of me about issues between them from the past. It was all pretty vague as Kevin had no desire to clue me in and Blanchett didn’t want to embarrass himself or drag out an old office fight.
“You’ll see soon enough, man” Kevin said to me as he put on his sports jacket to leave. “Stay here long enough, you’ll know exactly what I’m bitching about. I’m outta here,” Kevin said as he left the office and the building for the night.
I stood up as Kevin gathered himself to leave, following Peter a few feet toward his office. Blanchett’s cheeks were still a little flushed when I looked at him and said, “Thanks.”
The office was dead silent even though it was fully occupied. Everybody heard everything and nobody was saying anything.
“Have a good night,” Peter said calmly before retreating to his office.
I left the D.A.’s office in total silence but feeling the heat of eyeballs burning into my back.
I walked the one block east and one block south from the courthouse to my new mostly unfurnished two-bedroom duplex home. The place I moved into the night before to accommodate Tami’s arrival. It was about 5:30 by then, and as soon as I walked in the door, the phone rang. I picked up.
“Happy Anniversary!” Tami exclaimed on the other end.
It had been ten full years since our first official date. I was slightly surprised that she remembered or felt the need to acknowledge it considering that we had been apart for about half of those years. It shouldn’t have, though, since from the start, her overblown sentimentality required me to adhere to the strict observance of “month-a-versaries.” Yeah, she made that a thing between us.
“Happy anniversary, baby,” I said in reply. “You wouldn’t believe how glad I am to hear your voice after the day I’ve had…”
I spent the next half-hour explaining what I could about the case to her, then the office fallout as a result. The good news from her was that she was on her last week of work and everything was set for her to move on schedule as planned the following week.
Despite the ugliness of the day, it ended for me with hope.