Fear of Our Father

by Stacey Kananen

  “Yes.”

  “During a family get-together at their home, you indicated to Chris that you needed some help in the backyard at Marilyn’s house in order to get him there so that you could confront him with this knife situation. During that conversation you offered to get Cheryl out of the home, that you could get her out of the house because you knew how to break her.”

  “No.”

  “When Daniel told you about problems he was having with his mother, you offered to take her out of the way for him.”

  “No.”

  She, like Robin, took him down the long path from September 11 through December 22, talking about the story he told everyone about Mom and the IRS, the money he took from the bank account, our interviews at the police station, and the eventual suicide attempt, oftentimes trying to trip him up into saying that he acted alone, but he was on his toes, on that account. He never missed a beat and continued to implicate me as his accomplice.

  She asked him about the suicide attempt, “You walked away from the storage unit. You were never unconscious for any period of time. You were not admitted to the hospital. In fact, you went from the hospital to jail later the same day, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “And then sometime later, you tell law enforcement that you and your mom got in an argument over her taking Cheryl’s kids. You told them that part of this argument was that your mother was worried that if Cheryl didn’t do the classes she would lose the kids.”

  “Correct.”

  “And then you told police, Mom started screaming, she’s going to take Cheryl’s kids, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “And then you told law enforcement that as you and your mother were having an escalating argument, you don’t really remember what else happens.”

  “Correct.”

  “And then you admit to killing your mother. At that point, you were arrested for first-degree murder. Now you are in the Orange County jail with a first-degree murder charge pending, you go on a hunger strike, you lose one hundred and eighty pounds, and you start talking about having hallucinations. What kind of hallucinations have you had?”

  Rickie testified that he heard our father’s angry voice, ever since he was a child, yelling at him. He admitted that he stopped taking care of himself in jail because he wanted to go to the state hospital. Diana asked, “You go so far at some point to put your own feces on your body?”

  That, he would not admit to. “No, I did not do that.”

  Although she was surprised by his denial, she pushed on. They discussed his being found incompetent, and that the voices stopped after he was put on medication. He testified that he was sent back to jail, and he tried again to fake symptoms so he would be sent back to the hospital, but this time it didn’t work.

  “And so finally in the early part of 2007, you got a court date coming up, and it doesn’t appear that there’s going to be anymore stalling this event. At that point, you were still facing first-degree murder which, if convicted, and you had admitted to killing your mother, you would receive a life in prison sentence without any possibility of parole. And you knew that your sister Stacey was a state witness against you and she had been listed as a state witness against you from way back in the early part of 2004?”

  “Correct.”

  “You knew that your sister Cheryl was listed as a state witness against you and she would come out and see you on occasion with your nephew, and you told your sister and nephew that Stacey killed your mother? And Cheryl encouraged you to take a plea, correct?”

  “I thought it was best for the family not to have a trial.”

  I wrote on my legal pad, “I guess he picked me because I never went to see him. How can I go see someone who buried a body in my backyard and involved me in all the stealing of money?”

  Diana continued, “But she encouraged you to do that, correct?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And when you accepted the thirty-year offer, you went in front of the court and there was a discussion, and a part of that discussion on the record is that you were going to talk to law enforcement that very day?”

  “There was no discussion about that.”

  “There was something on the record that said you were going to talk to law enforcement. Not until after the plea bargain was done?”

  “After the hearing.”

  “Within minutes after the hearing right there at the courthouse.”

  “Correct.”

  “And in it you told them for the first time that your sister had been involved in the killing of your mother.”

  “Correct.”

  “And when you took that deal, your charge went from a first-degree murder to second-degree murder, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “At some point, you had known that the State could ask for the death penalty. And you knew that wasn’t going to happen now?”

  “Correct.”

  Robin jumped up and objected, which led into a long series of questions and answers, with Robin trying to prove that Rickie didn’t make any sort of agreement to talk about me in exchange for a lesser sentence, and Diana implying, even though she had no proof of it, that there may have been some hints of some backdoor dealings. The rest of the afternoon was spent going over the same ground again and again, until finally both attorneys were satisfied that they had covered all the ground they needed to with my brother. Not a moment too soon, because I was emotionally exhausted and couldn’t take much more of this.

  Just before Diana finished with Rickie, she said, “Just a minute Your Honor,” turned to Toni, and asked, “Did I get them all?” and they started counting on their fingers. Toni said, “Yep, you got ’em all, you’re done with him.” And Diana said, “Your Honor, I’m finished questioning him.”

  I said to her, “I missed something. What was the counting for?” She laughed and said, “Oh, Toni catches things I don’t. After I gave my opening statement, she told me, ‘You said he changed his story five times. Robin’s going to come back, and there better be five different versions.’ She wanted to make sure the testimony matched my opening statement.”

  CHAPTER 32

  The Worst of It

  The next day, Robin called Michael Vincent, the crime scene investigator who dug up Mom’s body. He was so graphic that there was no doubt in my mind exactly what the scene looked like. “The victim was wrapped in two heavy-duty plastic trash bags with duct tape around the center. The one trash bag went from the head to the feet, and the second trash bag went from the feet to the head and it was duct-taped in the middle. She was facedown, with her head east and her feet west, with her legs bent at the knees, facing upward.”

  I knew the judge wanted no outbursts, but I just started bawling. That was my mom they were talking about. But at least I stayed quiet. I had to sit there and watch while Robin started displaying photos of the dig and he narrated, showing Mom’s body wrapped in the bags, as it was unearthed.

  Then Robin showed the jury Mom’s actual jean jacket with the embroidered Disney characters on the back, encased in plastic for display. Susan and I had the same jackets. The three of us bought them the opening day of Animal Kingdom at Disney. The whole story of what fun we had that day, buying the jackets and going out to lunch, poured through my head.

  The jacket was horribly stained, obviously soaked with body fluids, and there are no words to describe what it felt like to see it in person, other than every nerve in my body screamed out in protest against Robin’s inhumane behavior. She deliberately left it sitting in front of me, leaning against the evidence table, just so I could sit there and stew in its horror. Diana whispered to me, “That’s the reaction she wants. She wants you to get mad.”

  Robin asked, “Mr. Vincent, for what purpose was it packaged in this way?” and he replied, “It was packaged in this way in order to keep the smell contained. If I was to take it out of the plastic bag, I think we would have to clear the courtroom because it still has a bad smell to
it. It’s really saturated in there. I had dried this in the scalding hot sun but because of the decomposition liquid it just never goes away.”

  Robin entered the actual duct tape from around Mom’s face, hands, and legs and Mom’s stained shirt into evidence. It was all I could do to not vomit, as she and Mr. Vincent just tossed the items around casually, as if there was no meaning there. He kept talking about the smell, that he had to wrap the duct tape in plastic because of it. He seemed to be deliberately bringing it up, again and again and again. I could feel myself becoming numb. It had become too much, and I couldn’t allow myself to feel anymore. Thank God his testimony was fairly short and Diana didn’t ask him too many questions. After all, they didn’t say anything about me being involved, and there was nothing for her to rebut.

  Considering that Mom was wearing that jacket, and shorts and a T-shirt, when she died, I think she was either getting up in the morning and put the jacket on to go out with the cat, or came home from work and changed. She slept in shorts and a top. She didn’t have pajamas, unless it was the middle of winter and she was in flannels. She was obviously not going to the movies if she was wearing those clothes. She would never go to a movie without jeans on. She didn’t go anywhere without jeans on unless she was running to the grocery store across the street. Never. Unfortunately, there was no way of proving that.

  Judge Lubet knew, before the medical examiner testified next, that he needed to say something to everyone in the courtroom. “All right, ladies and gentlemen, the next witness is going to take the stand in a few minutes. There are going to be photographs that might be disturbing. If you do not wish to see the photographs I suggest you leave the courtroom. The jury, of course, has no choice. I don’t want any outbursts or disturbances, while this is going on.”

  Diana had warned me that this was going to be rough, and I had to be strong.

  Robin called Dr. Sarah Irrgang to the stand, and she testified that Mom was asphyxiated. Her body was partially mummified and weighed only seventy-nine pounds when they found her. The mouth and nose area was covered by duct tape, which was wrapped around her head, and her wrists and ankles were bound. There was a Taser dart in the back of her jacket. The details began to get so gory that I had to stop listening and revert back to old coping mechanisms—I started counting the syllables of the words I was hearing. Robin asked about horrible things, like bugs and body fluids—things that were completely unnecessary to discuss, except to horrify me and the jury.

  Robin asked, “How long would it take if someone was to cut off the air coming in through the mouth and the nose for someone to go unconscious?” and Dr. Irrgang replied, “If you put your hand over someone’s mouth and nose, they will begin within a matter of a couple of minutes to have a shortage of oxygen and become light-headed and then faint.”

  I was devastated by the thought of Mom suffering for so long. I can’t even fathom what that feels like. Somebody put a bullet in my father’s head. He got off easy, and he was a vicious bastard. What did she do so bad that Rickie had to make her suffer? I don’t understand the person he became.

  Once the first photos were coming up, Toni grabbed one arm, and Diana grabbed the other, and both had Kleenex ready. I asked them, “How bad is it if I don’t look?” and they both told me, “You don’t have to. You just have to sit here and you can’t be really loud.” I kept my head down, for the most part, but it was hard not to look. It’s just human nature. Even if you don’t look up entirely, you do glance. You want to see what they’re talking about, even if you desperately don’t want to know. I was quietly hysterical. Diana patted my arm and said, “It will be okay. It will end soon. It’ll be okay.”

  The photos were exceptionally graphic, pictures of her face, her scalp peeled back to expose her skull, and even her brain. Then they showed her laid out on the slab in the autopsy room. They showed the full body. I don’t think I picked my head up the rest of the afternoon. I just cried the whole time. Previous days, when we broke and we’d stand up, I’d look at the jury. That day, I stood up, but I was still shaking and crying.

  I know Robin was just doing her job, but I cannot conceive of deliberately torturing another human being like this. Innocent until proven guilty, my ass! All because a rookie detective wanted to prove himself as a hotshot homicide investigator in 2003, I was subjected to this torment.

  I felt absolutely scraped raw. Over the course of my life, I’d been tortured by my father, beaten and sexually violated, and my own brother and sister conspired to have me arrested for murdering my beloved mom. And now I had been symbolically gagged, ordered to sit passively and watch as photos of my mother’s decomposed face and body were tossed around like playing cards. Seriously, what else could I possibly be asked to endure? What other fresh hell could life possibly dish out?

  We finished court at 6:00; I finished bawling at 6:30. I couldn’t eat that night. Diana and Toni tried to encourage me, saying, “Come on, you have to participate. You have to look like you give a shit.” I said, “I can’t. I just don’t care anymore. I just don’t care. My sister thinks I could be that inhumane. It doesn’t matter.”

  Toni and I went for a long walk that evening, and she said that was the hardest part of the trial, and now it would all be downhill. I said, “There’s nothing downhill about those pictures. They’re in my head for the rest of my life.”

  She said, “Yes, but the shock effect goes, the pain goes away, and you just go on.”

  I replied, “I don’t know if the shock of those photos will ever go away. They show autopsies on TV and I turn my head, and that was my mother. I’ve been through a lot of things in my life; those pictures of that body are things I wish I didn’t have in my head. There used to be a way I could pack things up in a little box and lock them up in my head, but that doesn’t seem to work anymore.”

  Diana told me that just because it’s obvious that Mom was murdered, it doesn’t mean that the prosecution doesn’t have a right to prove it. They didn’t do anything out-of-bounds of what they have a right to do. What they wanted to do was horrify and gross out and affect the jury emotionally. They wanted to show awful pictures and freak me out. She said, “This is in every single murder case I’ve ever been a part of. Yes, that’s what they do. To be honest, I know it felt like a lot to you, but in comparison it was a pretty lean presentation.”

  Then I got the good old “get your shit together” talk from Diana. She said, “Are you guilty?” I said no, and she said, “Then snap the fuck out of it.” And then I finally realized, you know what? I’m fighting for my fucking life here. Hello, wake up!

  CHAPTER 33

  Homicide Hussey

  There is a romance novelist in Florida who has a blog that features the writings of a certain Detective Mark Hussey, who works as a deputy sheriff in Orlando. He writes under the moniker “Homicide Hussey,” and here is an example of the kinds of things he writes:

  I’ve found that each year I spend as a cop I get a little more cynical and a little less tolerant of stupidity … For some reason, cops consider themselves after a number of years to be a little better than anybody else. It’s not a dig, it’s just that we are required to keep our personal and professional lives free of problems … So after years of handling other people’s problems it gets difficult to be objective and becomes more and more necessary to belittle the common man and sometimes add to an already bad situation.2

  I have no way of knowing if that’s the same Detective Mark Hussey who went out of his way to belittle me and add to my already bad situation, but it’s certainly obvious that the Homicide Hussey who came after me felt like he was better than me and found it difficult to be objective.

  Hussey took the stand the next day—wearing a dark gray suit, an American flag tie, his sheriff’s badge on a loop around his neck, and a miniature decorative gold sheriff’s star badge on his lapel. He testified that he started as a homicide detective the month after Mom was killed, and took on this case in November 2003. He was assi
gned to the case as busywork. He told Robin that this was the case that he was spending all of his time on.

  When Robin asked him, “From your first involvement in November, up until Marilyn Kananen was found, did you speak to Cheryl Bracken?” Hussey’s face lit up. He chuckled and said fondly, “Almost daily.”

  “Were there some days when you talked to her more than once?” Robin asked.

  “Yes, ma’am,” Homicide Hussey responded, smiling.

  “And would you describe Cheryl Bracken as fairly persistent?”

  He nodded and laughed out loud, and replied, knowingly, “Yes, ma’am, I would.”

  “During that same time, going up to December 22, 2003, how many phone calls did you get from Stacey Kananen?”

  Hussey’s eyes shifted back and forth, and he said, curtly, “None.”

  “How many phone calls did you get from Richard Kananen?”

  “None.” I wrote on my legal pad, “I had spoken to Cheryl weekly. Richard was telling me that he was speaking to police and IRS and SS frequently.”

  Robin continued, “Did you at one point make a phone call to Richard Kananen, to get him to come in and talk to you?”

  “Yes, I did,” Hussey said.

  Hussey testified that he had sought out E-PASS3 information from my mom’s car “… to determine if there was any pattern for the use of the E-PASS and when that pattern came to an end.” Robin entered that E-PASS record into evidence and displayed it on the wall behind the witness stand with the overhead projector. She asked Hussey, “Were you able to determine the last time that Marilyn’s car would have used its E-PASS?”

  Hussey turned around and looked at the screen behind him. “September 10, 2003, at 17:53 hours and 55 seconds.”