He paid for school through financial aid, which he easily qualified for, since his mother hadn’t held a job of any kind since he was a boy. With no discernable source of income for the family to report, aside from Jason’s monthly Social Security checks stemming from his father’s death, Jason was entitled to a state grant to cover tuition fees, and low-interest school loans to cover books and living expenses. It could have been a time of amazing independence for him. He even held down his first part-time job, working as a clerk for a mail order company, Starcrest Products, located in the nearby city of Perris. Mostly, he answered phones and took care of the mail, but he loved the extra time away from home. Yet at 17 years old, he was still a minor. So, despite his graduation from high school and his college enrollment, he was still bound to his mother’s home.
In the spring of 2000, Jane’s behavior once again seemed to stabilize. She still had no real friends to speak of. But there may have been times in her life when she longed for them.
Jane hadn’t spoken to her old friend and San Marcos neighbor Paula Beam Toedt since 1996, and they hadn’t really been close friends since the disastrous skiing trip in Big Bear that January. So it was a shock when Paula, arms heavy with groceries as she bounded up the steps to her home, saw Jane standing outside.
“Jane, what are you doing here?” a startled Paula said.
“I can’t use the phone anymore,” she said. “My telephone is bugged, so if I need to talk to anybody, I just have to go to their house.”
It was a typically cryptic Jane statement, so Paula rolled her eyes and let her former neighbor inside. She moved into the kitchen to unpack groceries, and Jane followed. Jane chatted about nothing particularly eventful at first, just catching her up on Jason’s graduation and college plans. Then she started.
“I have to talk to someone, but my house is bugged,” she said. Then, lowering her voice, she added, “I wouldn’t be surprised if your house was bugged, too. You better be careful.”
Paula just laughed uncomfortably at Jane. “She was just out of her mind, it was obvious,” Paula said.
“Well, I’m just trying to warn you. Someone is out to get me, you know,” she told Paula.
The visit was brief, but before she left, she turned to Paula, now carefully putting away her empty grocery bags.
“So, you really do this stuff, huh?”
“Do what, Jane?”
“You buy groceries and you cook?”
“Of course I do. Don’t you?” Paula asked.
“Oh never,” Jane told her, shaking her head. “I’d never do something like that.”
As she left, Paula called her husband. “Maybe it’s one of her new Arab boyfriends out to get her,” he joked, remembering Jane’s old habit of dating foreign men.
“No, I think she’s just finally lost whatever was left of her mind,” Paula answered.
12
Until now, life with Jane had been hard. She was unpredictable, temperamental, verbally abusive, and sometimes physically abusive. She kept her sons on edge with her stories of imaginary people out to get her, out to get Matt.
But all of that would be a cakewalk compared to the life they were about to endure.
In the summer of 2000, Jane’s insanity took another turn for the worse. A pattern began to set in, with Jane quieting down in the late spring to early summer. She was never normal, but she was calmer. Then, as fall approached, and particularly as the winter holidays neared, she seemed to lose her grip again. And each time her sickness flared, it grew more intense.
Even though years had passed, Jane still hung on to her belief that Duncan Sheik was out to get her. The idea reemerged so strongly that summer, she decided to call the police. An officer came to the door, and Jane tried to explain that her life was in danger.
“The man on this CD, this singer, he’s out to kill me,” she said. “I met him a long time ago and told him about my life. Then he used the things I said in his songs and now he wants me gone!”
The officer knew a 51/50 (the police radio code for a mentally ill person) when he saw one. He patiently listened to her rantings for a few minutes, then took the CD she shoved into his hand before he turned to leave. It was obvious the officer didn’t believe her tale, and Jane, even in her deluded state, could tell.
“You see that?” she told her boys. “Now even the police are against us!”
Days later, Jason and Matt discovered their mother in her room frantically packing.
“We have to get out of here,” she told them, her voice filled with fear. “They’re watching us, right now. The whole house is covered with cameras.”
She was in such a state of panic, neither boy knew what to do. So they helped her pack. She rented a moving van and loaded it up with every piece of furniture in the house. Neither boy knew where, exactly, they were headed. But Jane didn’t seem in the mood to answer questions. The goal was to get out of the Menifee house immediately. She’d figure out what to do next when they were on the road.
Jane never spoke to her neighbors as she pulled out. Dan Cormier never even got a chance to say goodbye to his athletic protege. She simply left, on the run from the latest set of enemies living in her head.
Before deciding where to settle down, Jane made a stop at Sun City Mini Storage, just a short drive from the Menifee house. She dumped most of the furniture there, then spent several weeks at a Best Western hotel in Beaumont, California. Jason lost his job at Starcrest over the abrupt move. Ever the survivor, he applied for a clerking job at the hotel and got it. However, he’d only be there two months before Jane decided it was time to move again. She spent considerable time scouting out towns before finding one that just might be safe.
This time, Jane made her way to the tiny town of Wildomar, California, with an average population of just over 14,000. It was just about ten miles south of Menifee, but Jane decided it was secure. For now. Just in case, she kept most of the family’s belongings in storage. She wanted to be free to run on a moment’s notice, if necessary.
Oddly, she did take on an obligation that seemed out of character for a woman on the run. One day, she decided she wanted a pet. So Matt and Jason drove to the local pound and picked up a puppy. The dog would become the one object in her life that Jane would shower with love and attention. She took the dog everywhere with her, and treated it like a member of the family. For that, Jason hated the puppy. It’s obvious what must have been running through his mind as he watched his mom, the one who could be so hateful, so angry with him all of the time, lavish time, love, and attention on a pet. How could she be so kind and loving to a mutt from the pound, and yet so cold and cruel to her own child?
On August 25, 2000, Jason turned 18 years old. Technically, there was nothing stopping him now from packing his bags and leaving Jane’s life for good. But he didn’t. Only three months after leaving the Best Western, he started working at the front desk at the Country Inn in Corona, bringing in a few hundred dollars extra a month. Though at 18 he no longer got the monthly Social Security benefits from his father’s death, he was doing well, and certainly could have made it financially on his own—or at least with the help of a roommate. Unlike most areas of California, where the rent on even the smallest one-bedrooms can run $1,000 a month or more, apartments around California State University-San Bernardino ran about $800 monthly for a two-bedroom.
But Jason didn’t pick up even one of the countless flyers littering the school campus, all in search of a roommate. Instead, he remained home. If only he’d known what a profound mistake he was making.
Shortly after Jason turned 18, the family bought a second car. It was a big deal for Jason—with his own car came added freedom. It was a matter of practicality, really, that prompted Jane’s generosity. With Jason’s part-time work and full-time school schedule, sharing a car was too impractical. So Jane relented and bought a brand-new 2000 gray Oldsmobile Intrigue. Well, actually, Jane and Jason bought the car together. Since Jane had no job and no work histo
ry, she couldn’t qualify for a car loan without a co-signer. That came from her son, who at least was employed and had student loan income. The new car was a giant step up from the family’s old car, a late eighties model blue Honda Accord that had definitely seen better days. One of the back windows was even missing, making it hard to use for travel on rainy days.
Jason thought that, as a co-signer on the car, and with his school and work money helping to pay bills, he would get to share the shiny new car with his mother.
“No way,” she told him. “You take the Accord. That’s your car now.”
The news infuriated him. He resented having to drive the ugly car all the time, especially since his money was going to a share of the payments on the Intrigue. But with little choice, he picked up the Honda’s keys and shoved them in his pocket.
13
Living in Wildomar didn’t satisfy Jane for long. Jason saw the signs coming. Only four months passed before, once again, some neighbor—the man just across the street—had become part of the conspiracy against her. He watched their house, watched her come and go, she said.
“He must be on their payroll,” she told her boys. “I can’t believe it. They’re getting to everyone! We’ve got to get out of here.”
She also believed her life was now being taped and broadcast on Mexican television stations. “I know, because all the Mexicans know me. They always look at me and laugh,” she said.
It was time to pack up and run. This time at night, so the neighbor couldn’t see them. With fewer belongings, they packed in a matter of minutes. She stuffed everything she could into the family cars, and left behind anything that wouldn’t fit. Then she drove furiously, a few miles into the city of Hemet, where she booked the family into another hotel. Of course, her beloved dog came along, too. In the morning, she would find a temporary kennel for it.
After that close call, she would take no more chances lugging belongings. Even though most of the family’s furniture was in the Sun City storage unit, she still had mattresses, Jason’s computer, and the family TV to worry about—much too much to move when you’re running for your life. So she opened a second unit at West Florida Self Storage in Hemet and dumped everything but an armload of clothes for each of them, stored in the car trunk.
Life for the boys got dramatically worse after leaving Wildomar. For more than a year, Jane refused to find another place to live. Instead, the family checked in and out of motels all over eastern California. She never stayed in one place too long, certainly never more than a week or so. That would give the bad guys time to find her, Jane reasoned. So, the family constantly moved.
Worst of all for the boys were the nights when Jane skipped renting a room altogether and forced her family to sleep in their cars—Jane and Matt in the Oldsmobile, Jason in his Honda.
Periodically, Jane picked up her beloved dog from the Moreno Valley kennel where she kept him most of the time, and he slept in the car, too. But what the boys hated most of all was the lack of everyday amenities—they couldn’t shower, they had no bathroom, they had no television. They were homeless, and it was humiliating.
Jason begged Jane to get another apartment. He despised living this way—getting ready for work and school from the trunk of his car, searching for a bathroom where he could brush his teeth and wash up. It’s why he liked working as a desk clerk at the hotels. It gave him access to showers and washrooms. But that wasn’t good enough. Jason wanted to go home each night after school, like every other kid his age.
Jason would later call this time the worst of his life. “It was so horrible,” he said after his mother’s death. “We were homeless for a year and a half. I couldn’t even sign any leases because she didn’t trust anyone. Everybody was always out to get us. It was horrible. My life was so miserable. I wanted to kill myself. I contemplated suicide so many times, you don’t even know.”
Faced with the prospect of sleeping in a car each night, the boys could only look forward to the times when they had a hotel room for a night or two. At least then they’d have a hot shower, cable, maybe even access to a swimming pool and hot tub. But at times, Jane chose motels that were simply dirty, and attracted the worst of society. Prostitutes, drug addicts, and the mentally ill often hung in the halls of such places, some with vouchers from the state to cover rooming expenses, because they had recently been released from institutions and had nowhere else to go. Some nights, the smells and noise would be so bad, a decent night’s sleep was impossible.
Their wandering became so erratic, Matthew simply could not attend high school five days a week. By this time, Jane was too concerned over his safety to let him go to classes anyway. Just because they were on the run, however, didn’t mean Matt would grow up uneducated, she decided.
That was the funny thing about Jane—through all of her madness, she was not a stupid woman. She still showed signs of being an educated lady from a well-to-do family. She was articulate and could still reason well, as long as the topic had nothing to do with the big conspiracy. Ultimately, Jane decided no one could teach her son better than she could. So, in the winter of 2000, she enrolled Matthew in a home-school program through the Redlands Unified School District, a small area in San Bernardino County. Under the program, Matt checked in with a supervising teacher every several weeks. The teacher issued him his books, lesson plans, and tests, and gave out his final grades. But Jane oversaw his day-today classwork. It was the perfect situation for Jane, leaving her son without restrictions to roam at his mother’s bidding.
Meanwhile, Jason’s grade point average fell so dramatically, the university put him on academic probation, meaning he’d have to pull up his grades by the next quarter or he’d end up suspended. But as life on the run continued, Jason couldn’t get his grades together, and he was barred from campus. It’s not clear if Jason told Jane about the expulsion, but he didn’t need her rantings to feel devastated by the blow. For a kid who’d always seen himself as an academic achiever, the expulsion cut deep into his self-esteem. He took solace by blaming his crazy home life. And he was determined not to let it interrupt his education. Jason enrolled at San Jacinto Community College in Menifee, attending for a semester until he pulled his grades up enough to re-enroll at the San Bernardino college.
Each day, as Jason went on his way to work or school, Jane would have to decide if she’d be in a motel or not by the time he returned. If not, she would give him a meeting place to find her, usually the parking lot of a fast food restaurant. Because Jane didn’t allow cell phones, Jason couldn’t call her and find out where they’d be. He’d simply have to cruise the designated parking lot in search of her car. It was hard for Jason to tell exactly what Jane did with his little brother, and sometimes the family dog, all day long—especially during those times when they had no room. Likely, they simply drove around for hours. Sometimes, when Jane was having a good day, they’d go to the movies or maybe even a ballgame. Sometimes they’d walk the malls or settle into a library so Matthew could do some homework. It was a crazy, fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants kind of life, with no end in sight.
As his family hopped from motel to motel, Jason continued taking on front desk jobs. After working for Best Western in Beaumont for two months, then clerking at the Country Inn in Corona for fourteen months, he landed a job at the Holiday Inn in Ontario by February 2001.
Holiday Inn General Manager Dan Huffer was impressed with Jason right away. As Dan remembers, Jason was “respectable, polite, always stood up straight, and said, ‘Yes sir,’ ‘No sir’ so much, you’d think he had a military upbringing.” His goodie-two-shoes manner easily won him the respect of his boss. “If you wanted a really good person on the front desk, he was your guy.”
Over time, Jason regularly won “employee of the month” awards, some even at the encouragement of customers impressed by his helpful and overwhelmingly friendly attitude.
But interestingly, co-workers at the Holiday Inn remember a very different side of Jason. While he was always res
pectful to superiors, he was rude to his equals. True, he had a reputation for being a smart guy and a capable employee. But personally, he was a “smart-aleck,” according to one employee, and hard to get along with. Certainly, the stress of a vagabond life was enough to push anyone into a perpetual bad mood. Likely, he was so unhappy at home, it was hard to switch gears and remain cheerful at work. But it was frustrating for co-workers to see him so cheerful to bosses, and so unpleasant to them. Plus, he rarely talked about his home life. He never told a soul about his year of homelessness and living in motels. He was too proud for that. So co-workers had no idea. They just thought Jason was, best case scenario, weird; worst case, an ass.
“He always thought he knew more than other people,” one co-worker said. “And a lot of times, he did. I have to give it to him, he was a smart guy. He always liked to use big words and was real formal, even to his co-workers. But most people just thought he was kind of weird.”
Casey Kritzer, a bartender at the hotel, was one of the few to develop a friendship with Jason. She was married, so there never was a chance for anything but friendship between him and the young woman. But they were close enough that they often hung out together after work. It was one of the few friendships Jason had had over his lifetime.
Despite his kindness toward Casey, Jason was so abrupt and patronizing toward other co-workers, he quickly earned a reputation as being difficult to work with. He was bossy and critical, convinced no one could do the front desk job better than he could, including his managers. One female employee said she thought Jason was particularly condescending to the females on the job. She may have been right. It’s possible that Jason, unable to lash out at Jane, badgered his female co-workers instead. At any rate, her run-ins with him became so frequent, she complained to front office manager Priscilla Ramos and hotel manager Crystal Cantu, telling them, “Either he goes, or I do.” Instead, Crystal, a very no-nonsense businesswoman who had run the hotel for seven years, warned Jason about his behavior and put him on probation. She was suspicious of his two-faced behavior and told him so.
Such Good Boys: The True Story of a Mother, Two Sons and a Horrifying Murder Page 9