Kathy might have had more to say, but she couldn’t. She sat down and cried. Wendy sat and put her arm around her.
I looked at Coach Fowler. “Do you have anything you want to say in your defense?”
“God, I’m so sorry, Kathy.” His voice cracked. He looked at each of us, one by one. “I can’t tell you how sorry I am. Wendy, I’m not a good husband. I know that. You deserve better. Jody, I’m sorry for what I did to you, and what it did to your life. You deserved better too.”
“Then why didn’t you do better?” Wendy said.
“I wanted to.” He started to cry. “I just couldn’t. I’m sick. I know what I did was wrong. I tried to change. I couldn’t.”
“You’re always telling your athletes about self-discipline. Was that just BS? Or does it not apply to you?”
“I wanted it to be true. I tried.” He was sobbing. “I know exactly what those girls went through. I went through it too.”
“What are you talking about?” Wendy asked angrily.
With his face scrunched in pain and his hair slick as a wet rat, he was barely recognizable as the golden god who reigned over the football field. He choked out the words between sobs. “My stepfather . . . used to . . . to touch me . . . when I was a boy.”
We stared at him, at each other, then back at him.
What makes someone evil? The devil? I don’t believe in that. Biology? Maybe some people are predisposed to that sort of thing. But mostly, I think it’s evil happening to them. Kids who are victims are more likely to grow up to become predators. That doesn’t mean it’s their destiny; a lot of survivors never hurt anyone else. But for those who don’t escape, who stay in the line of succession like unlucky crown princes, evil is passed down like a monstrous heirloom. We’re all victims of the victims who came before us.
“I don’t . . . know why . . . that made me . . . do it . . . it’s not the person . . . I wanted to be . . .” He could barely get the words out. “I’m so sorry . . . I need help . . . please . . . I’m sick . . . help me.”
Tears mixed with the lake water on his cheeks. Snot dangled from his nose in long shuddering strings before landing in slimy loops on the duct tape. He shivered beneath his silver body cast. If I’ve ever seen a more pathetic sight, I can’t think of what it was.
I reached in my pocket for a tissue at the same time that Wendy reached under the steering wheel for a rag. She cleaned him with it, briskly wiping the tears and snot off his face. As she did, she looked over and saw that I was holding out a crumpled Kleenex. In unison, we said: “Oh shit.”
We realized it at the same time. The urge to clean off his face was a tipping point. You can’t murder in cold blood an unarmed person you still have the instinct to nurture.
We couldn’t kill Owen Fowler. But we had no clue what to do with him now.
54
Anna didn’t want to fight with Cooper in the car. He was having a hard enough time simply sitting in it while she drove toward the courthouse through the morning rush-hour traffic. But he wouldn’t let the issue go.
“Don’t do it this way,” he said, again.
“I have to. It’s the only way to get justice.”
“The judge has all the power in this town. He’ll send both you and Jody to jail.”
“He has power because no one’s ever challenged him. He’ll lose that power once this comes out.”
“He won’t go down without a fight. He has contacts, in and out of jail. He might have you killed first.”
“Oh, come on. He’s corrupt. He’s not Scarface.”
“He may wear a robe, but a man acts like any other animal when he’s cornered.” Cooper was sweating, although winter blew in from the open windows. He wiped his brow on his shirt and turned around to look at Jody. “Can you talk some sense into her?”
“I think this is the most sensible thing she’s planned since she got here.” Jody grinned at Anna in the rearview mirror. Anna grinned back.
Cooper slapped the dashboard so hard, Anna jumped. “Dammit, Anna!”
“Coop,” she said. “Let’s not fight in the car.”
“Where else are we going to fight? This is it! You’re about to throw yourself on a funeral pyre.”
“Look,” she said. “I went all the way to D.C. to help people. I didn’t realize how much Holly Grove needed help. This is my chance. This could change everything.”
Anna turned onto Main Street and approached the courthouse square. There were more protesters than ever. She slowed to avoid hitting them. People in Guy Fawkes masks raised their fists and chanted Jody’s name when they saw the SUV.
“You don’t have to get yourself killed trying to fix the world,” Cooper said.
“Isn’t that what you signed up for in Afghanistan?”
“I was serving my country. It was my duty.”
“This is me serving my country,” Anna said. “This is my duty.”
“What about us? What am I supposed to do when my girlfriend gets killed?”
Anna was silent.
“Right,” Cooper said. “There is no ‘us.’ We’re just ‘friends having fun’ while you’re on a break from your real life.”
“Coop.” She brought the car to a halt at a stop sign and turned to him. “That’s not—”
“I can’t watch you drive into an ambush. And I can’t be in this car.” He swung the door open, got out, and slammed it shut behind him. He strode into the square, where he was quickly swallowed up by the crowd of protesters.
Anna was so startled, she just sat there looking into the place where he’d disappeared. A car behind her honked, and she turned forward, blinked, and put her foot on the accelerator again.
“Don’t mind him,” Jody said from the backseat. “That was just his claustrophobia speaking.”
Anna nodded and gripped the steering wheel tightly, so Jody wouldn’t see that her hands were trembling.
Twenty minutes later, the sisters sat next to each other in court, waiting for the judge to take the bench. Anna’s heart pounded painfully against her ribs.
She glanced back behind her. A dozen reporters sat in the row behind them. She wished she had copies of her motion to give them. But it was already 9:00 A.M. The side door opened and Judge Upperthwaite walked out, followed by his legal entourage.
“All rise and come to order,” the clerk called. “This court is now in session.”
Anna and Desiree came to their feet in sync. Jody was slower; she groaned softly as she rose. Her stomach had gotten so large, it looked like it was going to pop right out of her striped poplin shirt.
“When last we adjourned,” the judge said, “we dealt with an issue concerning a witness. Now that that issue has been resolved, does the defense intend to call any more witnesses, or does it rest?”
“Neither,” Anna said, rising to her feet. “I am moving for you to recuse yourself from this case, declare a mistrial, and dismiss all charges against Jody Curtis.”
The audience murmured.
“Ms. Curtis, we have been through this, months ago. I have already ruled on your recusal motion, quite clearly. You have your record, and when—if—Ms. Curtis is convicted, you may appeal. I’m certainly not declaring a mistrial. If you have another witness, I will call in the jury. If you do not have one, I will consider the defense to have rested.”
“The defense does not rest,” Anna said. “I want that clear for the record.”
The stenographer nodded at Anna as her fingers flew over the machine.
“I am filing my Motion for Dismissal and my second Motion for the Honorable Lawrence Upperthwaite to Recuse Himself.” Anna walked up to the law clerk and handed him four copies of the papers to time-stamp and file. She set one on the prosecutor’s table.
“Ms. Curtis, your conduct is close to contumacious.” Judge Upperthwaite’s voice dropped to a
low growl that would have scared Anna back when she was a rookie lawyer. “I have made my ruling and told you to move on. Now move on.”
She heard movement in the audience and turned to see what it was. Cooper sat in the front row, passing out copies of her motion to the press. It was exactly what she needed done. Technically, the journalists had a right to the motion, but she wasn’t confident that Judge Upperthwaite would allow them access to it. Cooper smiled at her, and she smiled back.
Her motion described the FirstDown company and the relationship between the judge’s wife and the coach. It also listed the criminal cases Upperthwaite had dismissed as DA and judge. She’d attached the paperwork Rob gave her yesterday and sent a copy to the Fraud and Public Corruption Unit at the Department of Justice. And, God bless him, Cooper was making sure the press had it.
She turned back to the court, feeling stronger now that she knew Cooper was behind her. “My first Motion for Recusal was based on the fact that your wife was a business partner with Coach Fowler in a company called FirstDown. Further research has shown that you are the person who declined to bring all the cases against the coach. You did this in your capacity as a DA, and when you were elected to the bench, you continued to do it by declining arrest warrants. You were also the person who placed all these cases under seal.”
“Ms. Curtis, I’m warning you.”
“The coach needed someone to cover up all his abuse over the years. He might have paid some families directly. Some girls might not have made complaints. But the ones who went to the police—now, that was a problem for him. But you were the Holly Grove DA for fifteen years. And judge for the last five.”
“Ms. Curtis! You are in contempt!”
“Was FirstDown a front? Is that how Coach Fowler paid you?” Anna’s questions were not for the judge. They were for the reporters.
“Guards!” The judge’s voice shook with fury. “Step her back.”
A CSO pulled her arms behind her back and handcuffed them. She didn’t resist.
“Sorry, Ms. Curtis,” the guard mumbled.
Anna met Cooper’s eyes. He looked extremely unhappy. This was exactly what he feared.
She looked back at the courtroom as she was being led out. The last thing she saw was journalists looking through the papers Cooper had handed out. Someone took a cell-phone picture of her being led away. And then the door swung shut. She was in a foul-smelling back room. The guard put her in a cinder block holding cell, shut the door, and locked her in.
55
Better bring your toothbrush” was a joke that Anna and her prosecutor friends made when a lawyer really messed up. The idea was that a judge would hold them in contempt and lock them up for the night. Of course, that rarely happened in real life; before this, Anna had only ever seen one lawyer “stepped back.” But now, Anna really wished she had a toothbrush. It was going to be a long night.
The holding cell behind the courtroom was bare except for a bench and a small seatless toilet. It stank of urine and bleach. Still, when the CSO came to get her a few hours later, Anna didn’t want to leave. Because she knew the place they would take her next would be worse.
She was taken to the garage and loaded into a cold van with a bunch of other inmates. A guard chained her handcuffs to the van wall. The back of the van was freezing cold, and Anna shivered for the whole ride. At the central cell block, she was fingerprinted and photographed, then put in a holding pen.
It was a larger, smellier version of the courtroom holding cell, only with company. There were nine other women, ranging from homeless meth heads to carjacking bank robbers. Anna was the only one wearing a suit. She sat on the bench in a corner and tried to make herself invisible. The wall radiated coldness and sucked all the warmth from her body. She shivered and hugged her knees.
A big woman came over and stood in front of Anna. She wore a hooded sweatshirt over a Bud Light T-shirt. She had huge calloused hands and pockmarked cheeks. “Hey,” she said. “You that lawyer says Coach Fowler was a rapist?”
“That’s me.” Anna stood. She had to tilt her head up to meet the woman’s eyes. The inmate had at least five inches and sixty pounds on her. Anna tried to remember some moves from her self-defense course. Most of them involved kicking the assailant in the groin, which wouldn’t be so effective here in the female holding cell.
“Good on ya,” the woman said. “He did it to my cousin too. She was never the same after. Hope that man rots in hell. Hey, you’re shivering. You cold?”
The woman pulled off her sweatshirt and held it out. Anna took it with wonder.
“Thank you. I hope your cousin is okay.”
“Eh. We all got scars. Some’s just harder to see.”
Anna pulled on the sweatshirt and curled up on the bench. She lay awake, wishing she knew more about Michigan contempt rules. She only knew that contempt of court had no statutory limit. In theory, a person could be held in jail on a contempt charge forever. But the press had seen the whole thing. DOJ had received her motion. At the very least, Jack would raise a ruckus. She hoped she would be free when her niece was born. Jody, too.
She lay on the bench, wishing sleep would come.
At 4:00 A.M., Anna was handcuffed and led to an underheated transport van. The guards wouldn’t tell her where she was going or why. There were no windows in the back of the van. She had no idea where she was.
When the van stopped, the back doors swung open. Anna was led out into a dimly lit parking garage. After a moment of discombobulation, she recognized the place. It was the subterranean garage of the courthouse. She was led into a service elevator and to the holding cell behind Judge Upperthwaite’s courtroom. The CSO locked her in, and the van driver left.
“Why am I here?” she asked the CSO.
“Your sister refused the new lawyer the judge appointed her. Said she already had a lawyer, and it was you. Guess the judge had to let you come back, because of her right to counsel. If he didn’t, it’d be a mistrial, or something. The judge wants her to be convicted fair and square. So you get to make your closing argument now.”
At 8:55 A.M., Anna was uncuffed and taken back into the courtroom. The contrast between the cold cinder block cell and the warm rococo courtroom was startling. Desiree sat at the prosecutor’s table; Jody sat at the defense. The audience section was packed, with Cooper sitting in the front row directly behind Jody. Anna became aware that she was still wearing the stained old sweatshirt. She took it off. Underneath was the same smelly suit she’d worn in court the night before, but at least she looked like a lawyer, albeit a wrinkled one.
Jody jumped up and hugged her. Her belly got in the way, but her arms squeezed her tight. “You okay?”
“Yeah, you?”
Jody nodded, held her stomach, and grimaced.
“Don’t go having that baby while I’m locked up, okay?”
“I’ll try. This kid already has a mind of her own.”
Cooper leaned over the rail and wrapped his arms around her. “Thank God,” he said. He felt so warm after the cold holding cells.
“Did you hear the news?” he asked.
She shook her head. “I’ve been on a bit of an Internet vacation.” He took out his phone and pulled up the Detroit News website. The first headline said: “Anonymous Hacks Judge, Claims to Find Evidence of Bribery.”
“After your little speech yesterday,” Cooper said, “Anonymous hacked into FirstDown’s bank records. It turns out, only the coach paid in. Only the judge’s wife took money out. And the deposits were made on dates that correspond to cases the judge nolle’d for the coach. To the tune of almost a million dollars.”
Anna’s eyes were drawn to a chart that the News had compiled, in which they compared the evidence in her motion to the financial information that Anonymous hacked. It showed a pattern of the coach depositing, and the judge’s wife withdrawing, six-figure sums in the
weeks after each case against the coach that the judge dismissed. The coach had been bribing the judge for years, to cover up his abuse.
At precisely 9:00 A.M., the side door opened and Judge Upperthwaite walked out. The look on his face reminded Anna of a cornered animal.
56
Plan all you want, it is a very different thing to actually kill a person than to fantasize about it. In your fantasy, you have superhuman strength. Or your action takes no strength at all. You just do it, your arms gliding effortlessly through the weightlessness of your dream world. In reality, you have to plunge a knife or pull a trigger. You have to look into the eyes of an actual person. You see their humanity. You have to push past the respect for life that has been drilled into you since before you could talk.
I’m not saying it’s impossible. It happens every day. But for normal people who have lived their whole lives as law-abiding citizens, trying to be polite and well-mannered, respectful of their elders and kind to animals, good listeners and good employees; for people who use their turn signals, and hurry to get to work on time, leave tips for their letter carrier, and put dollars in the Salvation Army’s red bucket, hoping to make the world a little better—killing another human being is not an easy thing.
We had a good plan. The problem was in the execution.
We sat, three women stumped, on the bench seat. Owen Fowler faced us in the wheelchair, his teeth chattering despite the warm summer night. He was soaked from Wendy’s earlier waterboarding. Maybe he was cold, despite the layers of sweatshirts, or maybe he was terrified.
Our plan had been to drown him. Let him know why we were doing it, let him feel the full weight of our justice, then waterboard him to death, cut off the duct tape, and throw him into the lake. His body would be unscathed except for lake water in his lungs. It would look like a boating accident. He’d gone drunk-boating often enough—and had been seen drunk-boating often enough—to make this plausible.
But the idea of pouring water on his face, as his eyes bulged in terror, until he died—it was impossible. He was a monster, but he didn’t want to be a monster. And even if he was monstrous, he was a person, made by God, in all his flaws.
A Good Killing Page 27