“Reena’s mother is just an amazing lady,” he would later say. “She was gracious through the whole thing, and she must have such a strong faith to survive in the way she does.”
Another mother behaved with less dignity. Surrounded by reporters who had figured out her identity, the red-haired lady scowled while her companion pushed a photographer suddenly. “My son never killed anybody,” Warren’s mother said. “I know him, and he doesn’t have it in him. There’s just no way that he killed that girl,” she said, and she left the courthouse to see if she could catch sight of her son through the dark glass of the sheriffs van.
After the Trial
SYREETA CONSIDERED what she should do with the box marked Warren G.
From a new and unmarked box, she retrieved her diary.
All her youthful years, she’d never kept a diary of any sort, and then, one day, in the midst of the sad days, Mrs. Smith gave her the gift.
After her time on the stand, she had written: “Being a witness is the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and I hope it stays that way.”
The newspapers on the day of the verdict were full of her face and her name. How could that be? she wondered. Those who had punched Reena and kicked her, those girls like Dusty and Josephine, were protected and sheltered, while everyone in the country was reading of her name. GIRLFRIEND TIPPED OFF POLICE, the headline said in the Times-Colonist, and a photo below showed Syreeta trying to shield her face from the photographer. On the day of Warren’s verdict, she’d skipped the articles, knowing her name would appear, followed by the words: “a bold liar, but not a sophisticated or clever one.” Would that have been better, she wondered, if she’d been a sophisticated liar? Skip it, she told herself. WARREN GLOWATSKI: GUILTY. Leave it be. She turned to the horoscopes, finding them near the cartoons. Once I was naive and once I was carefree. And everything just changed in an instant, for no reason at all.
Syreeta believed in her heart that she was the reason Warren was going to jail. Warren’s father agreed. When asked his opinion of the girl his son so loved, he would scoff before taking a drag from a Marlboro Red. “She pretty much hung him,” he’d say, bluntly.
Her horoscope meant so much to her on the day after the verdict. She cut it out and memorized every single word. April 25, the horoscope for Aquarius. “Whatever else you do or don’t do this week, you must not allow yourself to feel guilty for what happens to other people. You are not responsible for the world and its woes and those who say you have no right to be happy while others are suffering should be shown the door—as quickly as possible. The best way to make the world a better place is to demonstrate how easy it is to enjoy it.”
At school, Syreeta still found herself spending most of her time in Mrs. Smith’s office. The cancer in her mother’s body had subsided for now, after months of chemotherapy, but still her diagnosis was: terminal. (“April 9: She is so important to so many people, especially me. I can’t live without my mom. I hope I am as much help to her as she has been to me, always.”)
Mrs. Smith offered her the articles about Warren’s trial. Syreeta wished instead to thank Mrs. Smith for the new job at the Royal Colwood Golf Course. After two years, thanks to the efforts of Mrs. Smith, she was finally moving on from Brady’s.
“Thank you so much for getting me that job,” she said to her guidance counselor. “They said I could work at banquets.”
“Its a very fancy place,” Mrs. Smith remarked.
Syreeta wanted to ask Mrs. Smith if she thought Warren would be sent to a federal institution and put away for the rest of his life with cruel and crazy men. But Mrs. Smith would only tell her what the horoscope said: “You are not responsible for the world and its woes.”
Finally, she read the articles.
One entitled “A Moral Blind Spot” was written by a man named Chris Wood. Syreeta had never spoken a word to him.
He wrote: “Syreeta Hartley’s hair is glossy and dark, like the victim’s, but the 16 year old is also thin and model-pretty. According to prosecutors, her slender young boyfriend confessed to Hartley at least twice before his arrest a week after Reena Virk’s Friday night death. She never bothered to inform police. Call it a disconnect from reality. Call it alienation, marginalization, a moral blind spot. Hartley has shown an apparent indifference to Virks murder that has troubled and perplexed courtroom observers.”
Christie Blatchford, Canada’s most high-profile columnist, also wrote of Syreeta. Syreeta had not spoken with Christie Blatchford. She’d never even heard of the reporter from Toronto.
“Ms. Hartley, her exquisite, perfect oval of a face, perfectly blank, was in the courtroom at the same time that two young men were gunning down their former classmates at a Denver high school. The link between these soulless youngsters is not imaginary. Ms. Hartley likely would have no difficulty talking to the young men any more than she had trouble talking to Mr. Glowatski, after he had, allegedly, confessed to killing Reena Virk.”
Soulless. Indifference. Syreeta knew the meaning of these words no more than she knew the meaning of animosity. She tried to laugh it off. “Wow,” she said to Mrs. Smith. “I had no idea everyone thought so low of me.”
Under her pillow, she kept the diary. After the trial, she would write: “Today I got fired from the Royal Colwood Golf Club because they saw my name in the newspaper. They said that since they are a private club, they didn’t want all the whispering.”
• • •
“Violence is not a recreational activity,” Judge Macauley told Warren on the day of his sentencing. “The death of a young woman and the many shattered lives are a testament to that.” The judge said he had taken into account Warren’s “immaturity and physical demeanor and size” as well as the fact that he’d caused “no significant problem in the Youth Detention Centre” when considering whether Warren should stay in a youth detention center or serve his time in an adult prison.
“Warren Glowatski, please stand. You are sentenced to life imprisonment without eligibility for parole before November 21, 2004. I order that you serve the balance of your sentence within the federal penitentiary system.”
• • •
Soon after arriving at the (“dirty as hell”) medium-security prison, Warren was surrounded by his fellow prisoners. He knew what they were going to do. A few of them were “keeping six”—just watching out in case the guards strolled by.
Travis, this “overweight guy, around thirty-three, with a Caesar cut and long sideburns,” who was inside for “something petty,” offered to do it to Warren. He used a motor from a Walkman and needles stolen from the arts and crafts classroom. The black art wasn’t really an initiation, just more of a ritual way of killing time.
Travis placed the onion paper onto Warren’s back and began to tattoo. The words would be written in Olde English style; Warren was never sure where he got the idea for that style of writing, but probably from some picture of Tupac or some gangster. He wasn’t into that stuff anymore; he saw his former heroes as some scared kid’s fantasy. Travis pressed the onion paper into Warren’s skin; soon the letters came onto the skin of his back. Travis lifted the needles to pierce the skin, to engrave the two words Warren chose to have forever on his body: First Love.
Finishing the job, Travis rolled some Old Spice onto the tattoo, allowing the alcohol of the cologne to work as a de facto curative.
“Boy, did that hurt,” Warren would later recall.
The Village Idiot
JOSEPHINE, almost sixteen, sat in the room of the police station, curious, suspicious, intrigued. She was dressed in a gray sweatshirt and gray sweatpants, and she bore the resigned and malcontent attitude of one who’d been confined for many months. Why did the cops want to talk to her now? Six more months of jail time faced her. What could they want with her?
The cop who arrested her sat across the table from her in their private meeting room. “We went up there to talk to Josephine because the Crown asked us to. They were hoping she’d be a little mo
re forthcoming. We suspected that there was more involved in the planning of the murder by Kelly. We weren’t sure where her loyalties were.”
This meeting would be an attempt to shatter Josephine’s loyalty.
To Josephine (“She still had a lot of attitude, but she seemed more resigned. She was looking a little more mousy”), Sergeant Ross Poulton said: “Now, I understand that Kelly’s your best friend. She’s been a good friend for a long time.”
“Since I was eleven.”
The cop pointed at a tape deck. “Well, we wanted you to have a chance to hear this tape.”
“Fine, go ahead,” she said, shrugging her shoulders. “Play it.”
He pressed Play. Kelly said:
“Josephine’s got some psycho problems. She says weird, demented things all the time.”
“Oh, really, that’s nice,” Josephine said, crossing her arms over her chest.
“She says weird and demented things, all the time, all the time. She said, ’I want to kick the living crap out of Reena, that stupid bitch!’ She’s always saying stuff about burying people.”
Sergeant Poulton stopped the tape, and looked to see how Josephine reacted to the words of her former best friend.
“She was scared,” Josephine said rapidly. “She just said those things because she was scared. I can hear that was scared. Was she crying?”
“Nope, I was right there. She was talking to me. There were no tears.”
“None?”
“None at all.”
“Well, she was scared. I could tell.”
“She was scared of getting caught for something she knew she’d done, and she was trying to load it on to you!”
“Well, it’s a pathetic lie, if you ask me. I have alibis. The chick at Seven Oaks signed me and Dusty in at 11:03, so I’m really not too worried about what Kelly has to say.”
Josephine was silent for several moments, and then, as if forsaken, she inquired of her captor: “When did she give that statement?”
“The night she was arrested.”
“Are you serious?!”
“Absolutely.”
“The night she was arrested? Are you sure you’re serious?”
“Of course, I am. Listen, that statement is going to cause some problems for you. The problem you have right now is Kelly’s trying to say the responsibility for the murder lies with you.” Hearing this, Josephine gasped aloud.
“How can she possibly do that?”
“Well, she can say that she did it because you persuaded or coerced her.”
“Kelly has her own opinions.”
“Well, why don’t you tell us about the discussion between you and Kelly with regard to killing Reena. We know about that phone call, Josephine,” Poulton said, alluding to the sworn statement in which Elaine Bell had detailed the chilling phone call she’d overheard.
“I don’t remember any conversation about killing Reena. I had a lot of telephone conversations with Kelly, but I don’t sit there and tell her who should die.”
“Do you recall ever saying that Reena should be buried alive?”
“No, I never said that she should be buried alive.”
“Well, you know what happened the day after the murder.”
Josephine sighed and looked at her bare and boring nails. The restrictions on cosmetics sickened her immensely. How was makeup hurting anyone? She yawned, perhaps enjoying the position of power she was clever enough to realize she now occupied.
“The morning after?” She smiled sweetly at Sergeant Poulton. “I probably did my makeup in the morning. I probably had a cigarette. I usually have a coffee.” She squinted her eyes, looked to the ceiling, gazed at the cop through her dark eyelashes, and smiled once more. “What else did I do? I probably went downtown.”
“Well, Dusty says you found Reena’s shoes and threw them in a garbage can.”
“I don’t remember that. Maybe Dusty has a better memory than I do.”
“Personally, I find it unfortunate that you’d want to cover for people.”
“Who says I’m covering for anybody? I saw Kelly that Saturday. We talked about parties. We talked about cigarettes. We had stupid conversations. She said, ‘You should smoke Players. Du Mauriers are gross.’ See, we don’t talk about murders and stuff. We just talk about cigarettes and makeup. We don’t talk about violence.”
She smiled once more, rubbed a finger over her dry lips.
“When did you find Reena’s shoes?”
“Can you charge me if I tell you?”
“No, I can promise you that.”
“Can you charge me with accessory to murder?”
“No. You haven’t had any charters or warnings or any lawyers. Nothing you tell us is going to incriminate you.”
“That’s good.”
Then suddenly she stopped toying with the cop. “Reena’s shoes were black. We saw them at the schoolhouse. Somebody said, ‘Get rid of them.’ I put them in my Guess bag. I think Kelly’s mom paged her, and she’s like, Oh, I’ve got to get home for dinner.’ So me and Dusty took the shoes and ditched them downtown.” She rolled her eyes, as if to say, What is the big deal? Of the cop, she inquired: “How is any of this useful?”
“Well, we don’t want anyone to point fingers at you.”
“I don’t care, though. You guys could give me a hundred years, and I’d tell you to go to hell. See, jail’s done me a lot of good, huh? Look at the positive outlook I have on life now. Every single day, every time something pisses me off, or I get locked down, or I get yelled at, I just go, ‘Fuck. I hate the fucking cops. I hate the judge. I hate everybody who put me here. Everybody.’ Because I know that I don’t really deserve to be here. I’m not downplaying my role. I know what I did was wrong, okay? I know that I shouldn’t have done it and I’m not going to do anything like that ever again. I didn’t even like violence. I’ve never been a violent person. Never. I’ve seen too much of violence. Normally, I wouldn’t have touched her because that’s not my style. But I was just like, ‘Hey. I have to do something because people are going to be talking about me and saying I didn’t do anything about Reena fucking with me.’ It wasn’t peer pressure. I chose to do it. It was my fault, but I had to.”
“You’re not here because you hit Reena. You’re here because they murdered her.”
• • •
Again, Sergeant Poulton pressed Play
Kelly: “Josephine is so demented. She worships Satan….”
Hearing this, Josephine laughed, and then, tilting her little chin upward, she laughed in a rather dismissive way. “I’m not a big Satan worshipper, so I don’t know what she’s talking about there.”
“No pentagrams tattooed on you anywhere?”
“No, I do have a tattoo, but it’s nothing to do with Satan. It’s a flower, okay, a fucking flower!”
“We don’t think you’re as callous as the impression you give sometimes, Josephine. Even your mom said you sounded so tough and callous when she talked to you on the phone about Reena. But we don’t believe that’s the case.”
“I acted a little,” Josephine conceded.
“Exactly. It’s a tough situation. You’re under a lot of stress, and it was clear to us you were probably surprised and upset.”
“You guys all wanted to see me cry so I wouldn’t cry. I wouldn’t let you see that. And I don’t consider myself part of the murder. I don’t.”
“We don’t consider you part of it either,” Sergeant Poulton reassured her.
“Sometimes it feels like everybody does,” she said, softening.
Observing the shift in her demeanor, Poulton seized the opportunity, and encouraged the girl to reflect upon her own morality. “How do you feel about what happened?” he asked her, compassionately.
“I think I was a fucking moron, and yeah, I feel bad. I thought she’d just go home and have a black eye, and I thought I would apologize to her if she was in the hospital and maybe I’d bring her flowers. I probably wouldn’t have gone
that far, but you know, I didn’t think she was hurt that bad because I saw her get up and walk away.”
“So you must have been absolutely freaked out when you found out she was dead.”
“You think? I kind of lost it.”
“What did Kelly tell you?”
Josephine shook her head, realizing she’d fallen into a trap. She paused, but then returned to her denial. “I don’t know.”
“You do know. You just don’t want to tell us.”
“Even though Kelly fucked me around, I just don’t want to fuck her around.”
“Even though the reason you’re doing a year is because of Kelly’s stupidity?”
“Maybe it’s meant to be that I’m supposed to be in jail right now.”
“A noble thought, but it’s all Kelly. It’s not karma.”
“I guess so.”
“Doesn’t it bother you that she’s implicating you?”
Josephine was silent for a while. She reflected and considered, and her thoughts turned back to Kelly’s moment of betrayal. “Can I ask you a question?” she asked Sergeant Poulton. He nodded. A certain camaraderie had developed between the two. She was no longer toying with him, no longer trying to appear invincible. She looked, for a moment, very sad.
She asked, “Did Kelly have to be interviewed by you, or did she choose to be interviewed?”
“At no time did she have to be interviewed. We told her that. At any time she could have stopped talking, but you know, she seemed to want to tell us that you’re the one who’s somehow responsible.” He mimicked Kelly’s insistent, girlish, bratty voice: “Oh, it’s not me. It’s Josephine.
“That’s something else to hear that,” Josephine admitted, and once again, she seemed to change and become more reflective, more open to conversation, even confession.
“It’s funny because she never blamed it on me when we were together after we got arrested. I saw her before we went to jail, and she was just like, ’Are you in as much trouble as I am?’ I told her I wasn’t in half as much trouble as she was. I told her they’d dropped the murder charge on me and everybody but her and Warren. And she just said, ‘Oh.’ That was all she said to me! And then, the last thing she said to me, before we left the cop station, was, ‘Don’t write any statements on me. I won’t write statements on you.’ She told me she didn’t even bring my name up in her statements.”
Under the Bridge Page 28