Pledger was more animated by this time, as I could feel his thoughts becoming clearer about that incident forty-five years ago. “So many strange things. If she was the shooter and was standing in the doorway, how in the world did she get brain tissue and bone fragments in her hair? It’s just not possible under the laws of physics.” He was stating what I had been thinking ever since I’d read the police reports.
The retired officer continued to speak. “We measured how the bullet traveled and it had been held at hip distance from some feet away. There’s no way when you’re dealing with a rifle, well, you can’t just point and shoot somebody in the temple, unless your gun is right next to him, which would have left splattering on the gun. And there was no blood on that weapon. And if a person is inexperienced with firearms, they just can’t hold it up and . . . it was not logical that she fired the gun.” Listening to him was strangely hypnotic for me, perhaps because he was speaking so plainly and without any agenda.
I asked him where he thought Suzanne was at the time of the shooting and he said in the room, next to Vern. She had to have been, because of the brain tissue in her hair. Pledger had some theory about them doing sexual acts using lighted cigarettes and then David bursting in on them, thinking his mom was being abused. I don’t know if that’s true, but I wonder if she was that close to Vernie how David could have been certain his mother wouldn’t have gotten hurt, too. Then he talked more about Suzanne and David that night.
“When we got there, Suzanne was right there at the door. I tried to talk to David, but she kept holding her hands up to me like [a] ‘Don’t. Don’t. He’s going to explode’ kind of thing. She did her best to keep me from talking to him. Like she didn’t want me to get his story.”
I found this narrative fascinating. Having read the police report numerous times, I knew about her holding her hands up regarding David, but I had always thought she was protecting him. Here this man who’d been at the scene was telling me she was preventing the police from questioning David, by exaggerating his mental fragility. It was another case of Suzanne using illness as an excuse. Pledger went on, “I had my own thoughts about things. She apparently contacted the sheriff, in his home, before she called the ambulance.
“I thought there was some kind of a deal between her and the sheriff, because I knew they were at least casual friends, and that case did not proceed as it should have. In her interaction with the sheriff she said she pulled the trigger, but I never believed it. Not long after that, I heard she was on kind of a leave from prison and was let loose on weekends or something.”
Was there some kind of agreement between Sheriff Leslie and Suzanne? I really believe this brilliant Mensa woman, who loved to outsmart people, had to know someone had her back before she got involved in committing a murder. My cousin Donna is convinced Suzanne was having an affair with an important man, who would do anything to keep Suzanne quiet. Was that the sort of thing Pledger was hinting at?
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
From the Doctor and Psychiatrists
When I first got the court documents, I was very disappointed that there were no letters from the psychiatrists. How would I ever know what the diagnosis was, other than what was reported in the transcripts, which was chronic paranoid schizophrenia? Then I hoped maybe something would be in the police files, but I was told such information was “confidential.”
A few months later I went to Madison and looked through the microfiches myself. I stumbled upon three letters from court physicians, dated September through October 1970, which had been somewhere deep in those files. I copied them. Unfortunately, these were not all the letters, and I was especially wanting to read the one from the psychiatrist who did not believe Suzanne was insane, but that letter had disappeared. The family GP, Dr. Washburn, wrote:
On March 1, 1970, I was asked to go to Dane County Jail by Mr. Kenneth Orchard to examine Mrs. Suzanne Stordock. Several hours prior to my examination she had shot and killed her husband and was being confined in the jail pending further procedures.
When I first saw Mrs. Stordock I was impressed by the apathetic manner which she presented with almost complete loss of affect. She indicated at this time that she was psychologically numbed by the experience and kept repeating that when considering problems of concern, she would consider asking her husband, La Verne for help, but then would realize that he was dead and not available. I was somewhat taken aback by the inappropriate manner in which she approached the problem of this tragic incident and felt that she was mentally ill and in need of psychotherapeutic care immediately. It was at this time that I elected to call Doctor Leigh Roberts, of University Hospital’s Psychiatric Department, a man of extremely high competence and one in whom I have great confidence.
Examination of Mrs. Stordock at this time revealed a ½ cm circular burn over her right scapular area judged to be between a first and second degree burn in severity. It was not blistered or weeping. She indicated that prior to the shooting while trying to embrace her husband that he had purposely burned her back with a lighted cigarette. No treatment was rendered to this burn as it was felt that open air care would be of most benefit.
I have been Mrs. Stordock’s physician for approximately ten years during which time she has been seen several times for emotional difficulties. My partner, Dr. Edward Kolner, cared for her in August of 1966, at which time she attempted suicide which was almost successful following the ingestion of six to eight hundred milligrams of Seconal. She was also seen at this time by Dr. Stanley Miezio, who treated her following discharge from Madison General Hospital for a psychoneurotic depressive reaction.
Dr. Washburn, who evidently had no psychiatric training, felt competent to determine what “loss of affect” means. And remember her alleged suicide attempt in August 1966 was shortly before the court hearing when Vernie asked to end child support. During those months Suzanne also announced to everyone that Vernie would not get sex unless he did what she wanted.
* * *
Next we have more information from one of the court-appointed psychiatrists:
The period of her hospitalization was March 23, 1970 to June 13, 1970. Because of the history of previous serious depressive reaction with suicide attempt—August 1966—the recent death of her husband, the presence of anorexia and insomnia and the findings of marked emotional liability and depression poorly defended by intellectualization and hypomanic intensity of affective behavior, hospitalization seemed indeed appropriate and essential.
I met with her daily for a supportive and reality oriented psychotherapy. Throughout the larger period of her somewhat lengthy hospitalization, a process of mourning the loss of her husband was prominent. She spent much time ruminatively preoccupied with the events surrounding her husband’s death; partial amnesia was present initially but many memories returned as time passed, occasionally with abreactive emotional tone.
The use of psychotropic medication—Sinaquen 25 mg i.d.—seemed useful to mediate her insomnia and anorexia. Ultimately her depression was controlled and her sense of self-esteem and hope for the future bolstered sufficiently to permit discharge to out-patient care.
Mrs. Stordock’s reactive depression has seemed to be a product of decompensation of a longstanding character and neurological reaction to the events surrounding her husband’s death. Signs of gross thought disorder or regressive thought and behavior of a schizophrenic nature were not seen [emphasis mine] during her stay at Madison General Hospital. Occasionally unusual suspiciousness was present and her associations were replete with suggestions of feelings of inadequacy and inferiority, but with these exceptions, paranoia was not seen.
In my judgment she suffers from a mixture of neurotic and characterological problems; her level of ego strength permits a generally adequate level of social function but allows little room for regression so that under unusually stressful circumstances mental disease of psychotic proportions may result. I believe that Mrs. Stordock suffered such a transient psychotic state the evening
of February 28, 1970 and thus lacked substantial capacity either to appreciate the wrongfulness of her conduct or conform her conduct to the requirement of the law.
Anorexia and insomnia? Could that be from the drug use her mother indicated in the police reports? This reminded me again of all the drugs they found in the attaché case in the bedroom the night of the murder, after the execution of a search warrant. Though my uncle worked for the medical examiner’s board and did drug tests, why did he bring the case home and have it out in plain sight? Inventory of the leather attaché case showed Demerol, pot pipes, a roach clip, syringes, amphetamines, codeine, marijuana and morning glory seeds, cocaine, heroin, spoon, one surgical hose, hashish, one bottle white powder, one can of nutmeg (four teaspoons gives hallucinations), phenobarbital, LSD, and lots of capsules and pills, plus one vial of something that was redacted. There was also one bottle of 144 red and black capsules. (Could those be the infamous Black Beauty uppers and Red Devil Seconal downers?) Where was Suzanne getting drugs to be so intoxicated that she slurred her words and did not recognize her mother’s voice on the phone? Was it from the stash in the attaché case? And reading in the letter how he described her condition and her psychological state, I cannot see how Dr. Gerald L. Clinton, one of the psychiatrists assigned to the case, arrived at the conclusion she had a psychotic breakdown. But then, I’m not a psychiatrist.
* * *
Finally we have a report from a psychiatrist that gives more detail about Suzanne’s background and family (italics are my choice):
Mrs. Suzanne Stordock has been seen extensively for psychiatric evaluation above March 1, 1970. She was hospitalized on the University of Wisconsin Hospitals Psychiatric Inpatient Services on March 1, 1970, the date of an alleged gunshot killing of her husband and remained on that service until March 6. I subsequently saw her on multiple occasions during the next month on the Psychiatric Service at Madison General Hospital. The record of family psychiatric interviews at University Hospitals Psychiatry Clinic in 1967 was reviewed as well as an interview conducted with her daughter, Louisa Briggs, on March 4, 1970. She was also referred for psychological testing to Dr. David Rice, a Clinical Psychologist on the University of Wisconsin faculty, whose findings are contained within my report.
Mrs. Stordock is a 41-year-old, four times married, thrice divorced, mother of three children. She is an office worker, Jewish by religious conversion, lady who was reared in rural Wisconsin as the eldest of 3 children. The family home was very insecure with her parents fighting, threatening each other and ultimately obtaining a divorce. Her mother subsequently experienced serious mental illness on several occasions leading to institutional treatment while maintaining a hostile dependent guilt inducing depressed response in Mrs. Stordock. The relationship with each of the first three husbands resulted in a child, but also sufficient problems that in each instance a divorce followed. Her relationship with her own daughter, Louisa, has tended to parallel that with her mother, with poor communication, frequent misunderstanding, acting out, and neurotic dependency. She has tended to dominate members of her family, has had neurotic attachments and alliances with family members bidding one against another, tying together the family by means of crises, and at times, threats of suicide.
Mental states examinations reveal a tense, preoccupied but cooperative woman, with at least average intelligence. There was no indication of any organic brain difficulty. She is well-oriented and able to perform intellectual tasks without difficulty. Her external facade is that of an hysterical type of personality with one of denial and suppression of prominent defense mechanisms. She also is quite suspicious of others, particularly males, and tends to project her own ideas onto them. She is not secure of her femininity and is very dependent upon other persons for their positive opinion of her. She tends to overreact to the ideas and feelings of others and is quite capable of acting very impulsively without consideration of possible harmful consequences. She has not been able to develop close sustained relationships due to this lack of trust and poorly communicates intimate emotions. In the face of stress, particularly from males who may be viewed as threatening, she is capable of losing contact with reality.
My diagnosis is schizophrenic reaction, chronic paranoid type. It is my opinion that as of the time of the alleged events she was unable to appreciate the criminality of her conduct and unable to conform her conduct in the law. As of the time of my examination it is my opinion that she is able to understand the nature of charges against her and to participate in her own defense.
The italicized sections are the most telling. She had neurotic relationships and pitted one family member against another, controlled the others through crises and threats of suicide, and could be dangerously impulsive. Do neuroses and impulsivity add up to the kind of mental illness that gets away with murder?
* * *
On July 31, 1970 (seven months before the final hearing), the case was turned over from DA Boll to the twenty-seven-year-old Victor Mussallem. It took me ten months of digging to uncover some fascinating aspects of his behavior in this case. During my second visit to the Madison Clerk of Courts Records Department, and after an exchange of probably thirty e-mails with the person helping me do the searches, I was knee-deep in microfiche pages when I discovered (by rereading every motion and set of voluminous invoices sent to the court) that Mussallem was not happy with the diagnosis of Dr. Joseph B. Brown, the state’s main psychiatrist.
Dr. Brown said Suzanne was not legally insane because she exhibited not one single characteristic of insanity or psychosis. So Mussallem sent Suzanne back to see Brown, for three hours in September, and then in October, for more testing and evaluation. Afterward, Mussallem himself spent a total of 9.25 hours in conference with Dr. Brown during the course of those two months. I saw no evidence of him conferring with the other psychiatrists. Could there have been any other reason than to try and convince Brown how wrong he was? Or to try and win him over to Mussallem’s side? We know Mussallem was corruptible, because he was disbarred later on, and perhaps he thought Brown had a price, too. His frustration at not reaching this goal might be one reason he spent half of the twenty minutes of the final hearing discrediting Brown’s evaluation.
If we jump ahead from the hearing in January 1971 to Suzanne’s release from the state mental hospital eleven months later, we can see more medical evaluations, if you can call them that. On November 30, 1971, the superintendent of the hospital, who was also her legal guardian, Dr. Darold Treffert, adjudged Suzanne well enough to be paroled. She never returned to the mental institution and one year later, on December 7, 1972, Dr. Treffert swore she had now “fully recovered her mental health,” though I could find no reports about her progress. I’ve had several mental health professionals react with shock at how quickly she was released from the mental institution and subsequently completely healed. It’s just not reasonable, they all said. No one ever, and they meant ever, gets healed from schizophrenia.
* * *
One could get confused reading the prior materials. And since I am not a mental health professional, I sought analysis from competent professionals. I consulted one psychiatrist (Dr. Laura d’Angelo), a nurse practitioner (Rose Presser) who works in behavioral health (in addition to my psych nurse cousin), another Ph.D. psychologist (Robert Kinney), and a licensed therapist (Marlene Kramer), none of whom had any connection with and very little pre-knowledge of the case. Below is a summary of what they told me.
I asked Dr. Laura d’Angelo, who is slim and attractive, with salt-and-pepper hair and dresses in business casual clothes suitable for the Florida climate where she lives, to look at the doctors’ letters, which included those of GP Washburn and two psychiatrists assigned to the case (Clinton and Roberts) who determined some kind of psychosis in Suzanne. Dr. d’Angelo asked if there’d been any history of hearing voices or psychotic breakdowns prior to the murder episode, and I said not as far as I could determine. “Schizophrenia is not a disorder that suddenly appears in th
e 40s. It typically manifests itself in the late teens or early 20s. And there is no ‘cure’ for schizophrenia. It is a condition that is managed throughout a person’s life.”
Presser, who reminded me of a slightly younger Meryl Streep, similarly explained the diagnosis of chronic schizophrenia is very suspect, because Suzanne had no symptoms of hearing voices and breaks with reality previously, and these behaviors usually begin in the teens. Getting completely cured is out of the question. Such a condition can only be managed for the rest of the patient’s life, through medication.
The refined Kramer, who sat with perfect posture and a sense of deep intelligence, and always looked as if she could have become a model some decades ago, said Suzanne was mindless about her personal life, i.e., five husbands and three children. Despite her impulsivity she managed to go back to school and finish her undergraduate, as well as master’s, doctorate, and law degrees. And her majors and research generally had to do with criminal justice or abused women.
I thought about Suzanne’s degrees. Her Ph.D. dissertation was sloppy, and that seemed consistent with impulsivity. Any writer knows how tedious and mind-numbing rewriting and copyediting can be, each requiring skills of focus and patience, which are opposites of impetuousness. And what about all her research centering on women in prison? Wasn’t that just a little narcissistic? Plus her not securing any meaningful employment after all those degrees also suggested impulsivity. Working as a junior associate in a law firm requires long, grueling hours under the strict control of partners who looks down on associates; while becoming a full-time academic means overwhelming teaching prep in the first years and a solid plan for research and publication, most projects taking years before they see publication in a journal article. The Suzanne I knew would not like those kinds of jobs.
With One Shot Page 23