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“The evidence appears, I represent, and my argument is that it seems to be fairly agreed upon that after the child was born, the focus of Mrs. Abernathy was her depression or the alleged rape by Mr. Abernathy in the bedroom back in July of 1983, which resulted in the conception of Chloe. This was something she dwelled on, she focused on, she obsessed on. She turned to drink. She ended up drinking for a period of two years.
“Can you imagine what that household was like for two years? You heard the evidence as to him working. He would come home from work. He would just about hit the door, when she’d say, “The rapist is home.” What type of atmosphere is that, do you think, for a child of three years of age, four years of age?”
While listening to Blakeley, Bea thought, Had I even mentioned any of these facts, I would have been found in contempt, fined, or reported to the Bar. “The rapist is home.” Brilliant. Bea had never gotten a fully satisfactory answer from Bill as to what Denise had said when she nagged him.
“You remember Carol Tracy. You can consider her bias, you can consider Carol Tracy’s attitude, you can consider Carol Tracy’s attitude when dealing with people. Is there passion there? Would you want Carol Tracy judging an issue involving you when she stands there on that witness stand and says I didn’t need it, I don’t care, I know what it was, I know what happened? Do you take notes? No, I don’t take notes, remember that? No, no, I don’t take notes.
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You don’t sit there and indicate you’re not interested in taking a video recording, perhaps, or an audio recording. The American Psychologist Association, they’re not a bunch of numbskulls. This is a group of people whom you can assume have some intelligence or knowledge, and the rules and regulations... couple that with her bias, which is dripping from her on the witness stand, and couple that with the obvious bias of the mother. There is no evidence, there is no evidence, there is no evidence.
“The mother, this woman who has focused and obsessed for ‘83, ‘84, ‘85, ‘86, ‘87, ‘88, ‘89 about being a rape victim. You heard her testimony on the stand as to the alleged rape that occurred. And then in 1989, in one of her group sessions, she discloses she has a concern.
“I asked Carol Tracy, Did the child say anything to you about being molested while she was in diapers? No. Do you deal with DSS? Do you know who DSS are? Do you understand the DSS? Yeah, I know 51A. 51B, I don’t know anything about. I don’t know what he’s reading from. I don’t know what that is.
“Well, if the indication is that the child complained to her mother her bottom was itchy and the father comes into the room and wakes her up and bothers her and, in fact, there was the pinching and the punching playfully, and the mother mentioned that in her group, and Carol Tracy interviewed the child for possible sexual abuse, it’s the mother, it’s Carol Tracy.
“Where is it coming from? What is this all about, about going into the bed and waking her up? Where is all the part about the indication that the child was penetrated, hitting, pinching, kicking, and sex while she’s wearing diapers and sleeping in her crib? And then the child is being in a position where she’s molested by her father, statements being made that he struck her with a baseball bat.
“What is this all about? And Carol Tracy says, No, she never disclosed anything in the group, never said anything about the crawling in and out of bed. Doesn’t know where that came from, doesn’t know what he’s reading from.”
Bea was laughing and crying at the same time. Blakeley had lucky breaks, and he’s making them into scrambled eggs. Maybe scrambled eggs is his style. If his pace was slower and if he had not exhausted the two women, Denise and Tracy....
“Carol Tracy indicates the child made a disclosure to her. You heard her testimony as to what the child said. Carol Tracy says I wrote that down, Carol Tracy says It’s in my report, and there’s nothing in there about that. Well, how about Carol Tracy’s indication in her report, also, that the child calls herself a ‘thing’?”
“The child calls herself a ‘thing.’ The child is reacting in a fashion that she is becoming, making statements. The child is living in that household, she is brought by the mother to see Carol Tracy, and Carol Tracy sits down with her and with the anatomical dolls and then starts using leading questions, and the child makes statements.
There is absolutely, absolutely indication of manipulation, indication as to the source of this virus. Virus, where do you think a virus comes from? A microbiologist, the mother, she tests, deals with blood and things like that. Says the penis and the vagina. This child was four or five years old. Penis? Vagina? Remember Carol Tracy saying, ‘Oh, open up the doll,’ and ‘Oh, it’s got a penis’?”
Is that enough to deal with the “yucky” statement? Will the jury buy it?
“And then what does Carol Tracy do? Positive reinforcement, you know, positive reinforcement.
Thanks her for telling the truth. Does she talk to anyone? Does she do anything? Does she investigate? No. Just Thank you for telling the truth. How many times do you think over these years the child has been thanked for telling the truth? And during that period of time, you can see from the evidence as to the reinforcement, the circumstances surrounding the visitations. These are not rules— These are Denise’s rules. The no-whispering rule. The no-touching rule. Can you see how it’s kind of like tightening the circle there?
“The time goes by. Time goes by. Now, you have supervised visitation rights, and during that period of time, he continues to see his daughter. While he continues to see his daughter, he can’t hug her, he can’t touch her, and God forbid if she should touch him, because Denise doesn’t think she should be able to touch him, either. The indication is nobody knows where that came from until it was brought out in the records.
“Then she comes in here and tells you people he just, you know, saw her a couple of times in court, no big deal. Well, didn’t you write a letter a year later and recommend something to the court? Might have, yeah. Didn’t you recommend visitation rights be revoked, and he shouldn’t even visit with the child a year later?
“And then what did she react to, do you remember that? She looked at me like I had three heads. I didn’t do that. And then I showed her her letter. Again, it’s in the records, it’s there. I recommend visitation rights be revoked. How dare she? How dare she?
“And then I asked her, based on what? Is it based on the faint memory she has of something the mother said? What was the evidence, Ms. Tracy? Talked to the mother a couple of times. Just like when Denise was on the witness stand and indicated she had a faint memory of bringing this five-year-old child to her classes, a faint memory of this child being in the groups, the sex offenders’ groups, the sex addicts and their families’ groups.
“And then I ask, Did the child indicate to you other kids were molested by their daddies, too? No, no. Once again, it’s in the records. Well, do you recall this? Did you say that? Do you see this? Read it. You said that. This child talked to kids who had been allegedly molested by their fathers, there have been groups, they have been read to.
“This is like in North Korea when you have somebody in a concentration camp and you read out of the little red book there, remember? And you read to people and you talk about being a victim, and you’re a victim, and then one year turns into two years, you’re a victim. Thank you, you’re telling the truth, you’re a good little girl. Daddy’s no good, we hate Daddy, I hate Daddy, Daddy can’t touch me, Daddy can’t see me, I can’t even brush the hair out of Daddy’s eyes.
“And it just goes on and on and on, 1992, ‘93, ‘94, ‘95, ‘96, ‘97. How many times has this child— Ten... ten social workers, psychologists, therapists, using the term loosely. Well, you wouldn’t pay for the therapy. And what’s his indication? No, I wouldn’t pay for the therapy after I had an indication as to what the therapy was. The therapy was nothing more than the commonwealth preparing her to testify.
“You’ve got a man who comes before you and describes his interaction with his daughter. He described his feelings with his daughter. He has attempted to maintain contact with her against incredible odds.
“The documents, the records, the evidence referenced in this trial, Heather Bruce’s notes, all of the circumstances involving the visitations, the mother again denying that she would punish the child until she saw the record, twenty minutes in her room on one occasion because she felt the child was manipulating and she felt the child was trying to lure her father into the kitchen.
“The documents that indicate Denise: Denise calls, Denise wants, Denise says, Denise thinks, Denise wants and demands. Denise, when she’s confronted, didn’t like one of the people, one of the facilitators, because the individual confronted her and said, Don’t you listen? You have an avoidance tendency. And then she talked to a social worker about the visitation and has no memory, of course, of sitting with the child in her lap for twenty minutes and refusing to talk to this individual. Where did this come from?
Bea wondered, too. This time the mirage is Michael’s.
“These are things that you have to grapple with because when you consider what has gone on in this case over these years, you know, everybody starts out with their hopes and their dreams and, you know, you’re going to have a wonderful life, and things happen in life, and this family has been tortured, this family has gone through so much.
“A jury cannot make it all go away, cannot make it better. Your job is to consider whether or not the government has presented evidence that proves to you beyond a reasonable doubt, beyond a reasonable doubt.”
His closing was a magician’s sleight of hand. Bea was not sure Blakeley even realized what he was doing. Tortured language. Conveyed passion. And masterfully, he ended the closing with an emotional crescendo.
When her adrenaline rush stopped, she wondered whether if the jury acquitted Bill, Blakeley would have won it as much as the prosecution lost it.
Necessary to Consider the End
On April 16, 1997, after two days and two hours of trial, during which Chloe, Denise, and Carol Tracy testified on behalf of the prosecution, and Bill, his auburn-haired colleague (Jennifer Ouelette), his sloe-eyed Kate, and his supervisor at Hanksville Community Health Center testified on behalf of the defense, a jury of five men and seven women deliberated for under two hours, including lunch, and found Bill Abernathy not guilty after almost eight years of Hell.
Two or three jurors later told Jennifer it was cut and dried.
Rachel Gidseg, Detective Charles Cooper, Norma Fellows, Heather Bruce, Roberta Leavitt, Maryellen Murphy, and many unnamed others were not called to testify. They had already done their part in ruining the relationship between a loving father and a loving daughter.
Chloe turned thirteen years old the day after the jury’s decision.
And Kate became a June bride.
Pitbull
The Appeals Court notified Judge McGill’s court that they upheld McGill’s decision, which had called for two different sums to be paid by Bea to no one in particular and by no particular date, and that the Supreme Judicial Court upheld theirs.
But Pitbull lied his way into an unretractable position: he had said the defendant companies no longer existed. Although Bea had evidence to show the opposite was true, Pitbull could not change his position.
Then to whom would the execution issue?
Not being able to answer this question, no execution, which would have ordered the sheriffs to collect on behalf of the allegedly defunct defendant companies, issued.
The possible successor corporations weren’t interested in the small amount of money; they were still fighting the issue of liability in the third and remaining employment discrimination case: Rita Petrillo’s.
When Petitioner Pitbull sought a writ of execution against Bea for the fines for being held in contempt, the clerk of McGill’s court gave Pitbull an execution for a little more than eight hundred dollars against Bea, but the execution called for Bea to pay the money to the Commonwealth, not to Pitbull, his law firm, or his defendants. Pitbull was not an Attorney General, so he couldn’t use the execution and returned it unsatisfied to the court. The amount had always been unimportant. Bea had fought it on principle.
Had there been a real order, Bea could’ve lost her license to practice law. She didn’t. In fact, she had sought from the Bar Counsel an amicus curiae brief to support Leslie Calhoun and had been refused.
If she fought them, the whole disgusting unjust matter would have reached the public through the press. At that time, the code of silence ruled.
Bea and Leslie Calhoun waited for the Appeals Court to notify the lower court of the appellate panel’s and the SJC decisions. That never happened. Bea surmised the decision about the award of appellate fees to Pitbull’s allegedly defunct corporate clients had been deep-sixed somewhere between the 14th and 15th floors of the Suffolk County Courthouse.
Bea wondered which of the Supreme Judicial Court justices caused that to happen.
She had not seen Hugh after he’d gone out the door.
EPILOGUE . . . . . What’s past is prologue ~ Shakespeare
Bea was fussing around with flower pots on the upper deck. She nipped off the dead blooms of the narcissus and braided the leaves. The yarrow was a riot of coronation gold surrounded by an assortment of white blooms short and tall, delicate and bold. Here and there, she had some mint, thyme, basil, and even dahlia and columbine. She wanted to experiment with some old-fashioned plants rediscovered by an old friend, Jo Ann Gardner, and shared in The Heirloom Garden.
The phone rang. Bea picked it up and pulled out the antenna. “Good afternoon,” she chimed.
It was Bill. “The day after the verdict,” he said, “I called Chloe for her birthday. I told her I didn’t blame her and that I’m safe now.”
Chloe was his weakness. Over the next few minutes, Bea learned he continued to call the child weekly, even when he was away on his honeymoon. Chloe was cool, he said. He wondered aloud, “Where is she? It’s like she’s been in a cult for eight years. She needs therapy away from Denise’s influence.”
Then one day Chloe called him. Kate’s voice was on the answering machine.
“When I called her back, she asked whether the woman on the machine was my girlfriend and was I going to marry her. I told her, ‘Yes, I am, next week.’ I also told her I had lots of other things to tell her, but I hadn’t been able to tell her anything because of the situation. She wanted to know, first, if Kate had kids.”
Bea could hear his smile. “Did you invite her to the wedding?”
“Yes.”
“And?”
“She hesitated but finally said No.”
“Was Denise listening in?”
“No. No, I don’t think so.”
“Well, I suppose she’d still have to tell her mother where she was going.”
“I suppose, but I was disappointed anyway. After the wedding, though, I asked her ‘Do you have any questions for me?’ So she asked me when I proposed.” He laughed. He was obviously excited by the child’s interest.
“I also asked her whether she wanted to see me.”
“Did she?”
“No... she said No.” He sounded disappointed but not surprised. “Well, at some point, I asked her if she’d like to meet Kate. I told her she could bring a friend with her and choose a restaurant they’d like to go to.”
“Good idea.”
“Above all, don’t waste anymore money on someone like Cavanaugh. Just ask Chloe again directly from time to time. Let her be the one to decide if she wants to see a psychologist. Let her take the lead. At least you can talk to her privately, without Denise listening.
The steam should be out of Joe Aguilar by now. Just remember, though, the court still controls matters to do with the child, so when Chloe agrees to see you, ask for normal visitation rights.... No hurdles are left except Chloe herself.”
“One more thing. This you’ll find funny,” Bill said and then chuckled.
“What’s that?”
“Heather Bruce moved into the condominium neighboring Kate’s,” he laughed. “I don’t think she recognized me.”
He laughed again.
“That’s because you sound like another man. Your voice is an octave or two lower.”
“I know. A few people said I look twenty years younger now.”
“Oh, did you meet with Blakeley yet, for a post-trial briefing?”
“Not yet. I wrote him a Thank You letter and he answered. He said people had remarked how nervous he was. He said it was difficult defending a client who is 100 percent innocent in these child sex-abuse cases. It’s so unpredictable.”
Bea heard Bill’s beeper. “Oh, yes, I’ve got a new beeper,” he said. “When you connect, just punch in your number.” Bill gave her his new number.
“Go ahead. Call that one back. And call me to say you and Kate are pregnant.”
“I will.”
The phone call invaded the flowers’ space. Bea pushed the antenna back down and went inside. She grabbed a giant mug of coffee and headed for her recliner.
Cortland A. Mathers had retired from the bench when he reached seventy years of age in 1996.
After retiring, he became a mediator of civil cases in a court-sponsored alternate dispute resolution group. He offered his services as a mediator for Maggie Rudolph’s employment discrimination case, which Bea was prosecuting. Bea laughed.
Bill never called to tell Bea whether he and Kate were pregnant. Bea received, instead, a notice that Bill filed for bankruptcy to get rid of Bea’s last bill. Red Luther had warned her.
He said when one of his male clients in a family-court action got a girlfriend in the middle of the case, he’d tell the guy to get rid of the girlfriend or he’d withdraw from the case.
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