And Then She Killed Him

by Robert Scott

  “Would you be looking at the Internet at that time?”

  “ No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I was asleep.”

  CHAPTER 40

  “HE WAS JUST GONE.”

  Questions came up by Jody McGuirk about the day before Alan was murdered, and Trish Erikson’s testimony that he and Miriam had been arguing that day. When McGuirk asked about this, Miriam said, “We hadn’t been fighting. He had errands to run, and he was not really in a very good mood. He was just real, real grumpy.”

  As far as the riding lesson for Alan’s granddaughter being canceled, Miriam testified, “Alan decided that he wasn’t sure that he wanted to pick up the grandkids. He wasn’t in a great mood. Originally, he had planned to go to Montrose. He didn’t like having the girls over at the house if he couldn’t give one hundred percent of his undivided attention. I had wanted to pick the girls up. I had started developing a relationship with the granddaughters and was enjoying their company. It was upsetting to me.”

  McGuirk wanted to know why Alan hadn’t called Portia, instead of Miriam having to call her. Miriam said, “I don’t think he wanted to get into an argument with her. He told me what to say to Portia.”

  Miriam added about how Alan spent the day of June 9, 2008: “I don’t know exactly where he went. He was gone for an hour and fifteen minutes. He was still in a bad mood when he got back. He had me call Portia again and say he had a little too much to drink. That’s what he asked me to tell her.”

  Now came questions about the crucial morning of June 10, the day that Alan was murdered. Miriam said, “He woke me up around seven. I’m not sure exactly when. He had the coffee going and thought it was time I got up. He wanted to go feed the horses. We went to the back porch and had a cup of coffee. We talked about doing errands. He thought if I went with him, I’d be sitting in the car a lot. I didn’t want to sit in the car everywhere, because he planned on going to Clifton Water (a company) and a couple of other places.

  “I had things I wanted to do, and I was out of shirts, the kind I’d use in the barn. I knew there was a sale going on, so I thought I’d take that in. After coffee we went down to the barn. He did most of the feeding. I couldn’t lift or carry anything at the time. I could do a little cleaning of the barn, but I wasn’t supposed to do any lifting. I’d had an ATV accident and I had broken a rib and injured my arm at the same time. We kind of got the ATV in a hole and he turned it the wrong way, and we dumped over. My arm got bruised and one rib was broken.”

  Getting back to the morning of June 10, Miriam continued, “After feeding the horses, we went back to the house. While he took a shower, I laid out a shirt and pants for him. Then I laid out a couple of things for him to take in the truck. I left about eight-fifteen. I went to the Orchard Mesa City Market, and I called Sue Boulware from there. That was to reschedule the horse lesson to Friday. I went into the Orchard Mesa City Market to pick up cigarettes and a drink. Then I went to Walmart to get the shirts I’d use in the barn.”

  From Walmart, Miriam said she went to Safeway on Horizon Avenue to get a large bag of carrots, which she was going to feed to the horses. Then it was on to Hastings Bookstore to pick up coloring books for Alan’s grandkids. And finally she drove to the Chinese restaurant around 11:00 A.M. Miriam said she phoned Alan from there, got no answer, and finally returned home.

  Now came the questioning of exactly what happened next. Miriam said, “When I pulled into the driveway, everything looked normal. Alan’s truck was there. I grabbed my bags and purse and went inside. I went through the garage door, through the washroom into the hallway and to the kitchen. I saw Alan on the floor, near the back door. I dropped my bags and went to him. I knelt down beside him, by his left side. He was cold and gray. He didn’t have a pulse. I just saw a little blood under his neck. For a while, I just sat there with him. I didn’t know what had happened to him. I held his hand for a few minutes and tried to make some sense of it all.

  “I finally called 911. I noticed that there were some drawers open. The 911 operator told me to do CPR. And I tried. It was hard. I was trying to do the chest compressions, but I could only do it with one hand. I didn’t have the strength from my right arm, because I was still recovering from the rib injury. I pinched his nose together. And I turned his head sideways. He had saliva in his mouth and a little blood ran out of his nose. I tried to blow in his mouth, but he was already gone. He was just gone.”

  When the first officers arrived, Miriam said that they made her go outside. “I wasn’t really thinking at that point. I was just numb. I talked with an officer, who was out there. He wanted to know if the dogs barked. I said I’m sure they did if someone came around.”

  Miriam also said that she wanted to get her purse from the house, but the officers wouldn’t let her back inside. She waited around outside for quite a while, and then officers asked her to come down to the sheriff ’s office. Miriam recalled that Detective Jarrell and Detective Norris asked her a lot of questions and took the clothes she was wearing. As far as the questions that were asked, she said, “I can’t remember them. It was all a blur.”

  After being questioned by the police, she went to Merredith Von Burg’s house, because, as she put it, “that was the only place I knew of to go at that moment. I had a good, cordial relationship with Merredith. I stayed at her house for two to three days. While I was there, I worried about what was going on—getting the funeral process started, and things like that.”

  Asked if she was concerned about money at that time, Miriam answered that she was very concerned. She only had $180 with her, and no credit cards. She didn’t even have her purse with her driver’s license inside it. The police had that. As far as the funeral went, she said that she started the process and Alan’s daughters took it from there. Miriam added, “It was hard. There was a private viewing. I don’t really know how long it was. The funeral was wonderful, in that everyone had things to say about Alan.”

  Asked if she had a hard time recalling the day of the funeral, Miriam replied that she did. One line of questioning was interesting. McGuirk asked if she had spoken with a man named Mike Pruett on the day of the funeral: “He mentioned that you told him that you said an ex-employee could have killed Alan. Do you remember saying this?”

  Miriam replied, “I don’t remember, but I could have.”

  “Who were you talking about when you said that?”

  “About Keith Coppage.”

  “Why were you talking about it there?”

  “Cody, a man who worked at the dance studio, had brought it to my attention earlier that day. I think he told me the authorities were already aware of it.”

  In essence, Miriam was now saying that Keith Coppage might have murdered Alan because of their dispute at Dance Junction. The same Keith Coppage whom Barbara Watts indicated Miriam loved. Also, according to Watts, Miriam had written in a journal that Miriam would do anything for Keith, even die for him.

  As to why Miriam went back to her Whitewater home at all, after Alan’s murder, if she was afraid of a killer on the loose, Miriam said that she had responsibilities there. “I had to feed the horses and the dogs. It was too expensive to stay in town and run back and forth there. I didn’t have the money for that. I spent my days mostly sitting in the garage. Alan’s blood was still on the kitchen floor. It seemed different than I remembered. It was everywhere. It was not what I had seen that day. I tried to clean it up, but I couldn’t. Portia finally came over and cleaned it up.”

  Miriam said that she tried getting her purse and driver’s license back from the police, but they didn’t hand it over to her. She added that this was devastating. “I needed my driver’s license to go down and apply for public assistance, and I couldn’t do that. You can’t really do anything without your driver’s license. And I couldn’t get my birth certificate without a valid driver’s license. I was caught between a rock and a hard place. I was only able to pay the light bill. I couldn’t make the house payment.�
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  As far as the money that Merredith Von Burg loaned her, Miriam said she used that to buy groceries, food for the animals, and some gasoline for the car. And Miriam said that she didn’t sell any property that did not directly belong to her.

  CHAPTER 41

  “I LOVED HIM.”

  Now came time for the very important issue of the yellow greeting card under the doormat. Jody McGuirk asked, “Did you leave that greeting card for Penny Lyons to find that day?”

  Miriam replied, “Yes.”

  “Why did you do that?”

  “Up until that point, nobody had done anything about the truck I had seen and called in about. I’d seen it again, and there were other things that were happening.”

  “What were you hoping to do with the card?”

  “I hoped the police would actually take it seriously and maybe watch the road.”

  “And did they do that?”

  “No, they did not.”

  Miriam said that it had been the wrong thing to do, but she was in a panic at the time. “I used Penny badly. She’s a friend of mine, and I shouldn’t have done that. It didn’t accomplish anything. I thought the police might listen to her, since they weren’t listening to me. I feel very badly about using her now, but I had seen that white truck and the way it had behaved. It was driving around the side of the house and I saw it from the master bathroom window. I went down to the garage, because I thought it was maybe someone that I knew. And when I opened the garage door, it drove by slowly, and then they just kicked it into gear and spun gravel and left.”

  McGuirk asked if Miriam saw who was driving the truck. She responded, “It was a white male, with kind of light, curly hair. I called law enforcement about it. I called Mr. Hebenstreit. I didn’t hear anything back from him about it. Then I saw the truck again, a week later. I heard the horses running around at night, and I went out and checked and shined a light down there and saw the truck again. As soon as I shined the light, it moved off.”

  Asked if she phoned law enforcement about it this time, Miriam said that she hadn’t. As to why, she replied that they hadn’t done anything about it after her first call. McGuirk wanted to know why Miriam stayed in the house if she was scared. Miriam replied, “I still had animals to feed. I didn’t have money to go anywhere, and I didn’t want somebody pushing me out of my own house. I didn’t have family in the area, and Alan’s family had changed.”

  McGuirk said, “Was anything else happening around your property?”

  Miriam answered, “I would come home and there would be a back door open. Just little things. At first, I thought I was going nuts. Then I started putting it together.”

  McGuirk wanted to know how law enforcement had treated Miriam. She replied, “The day they came to measure the house, I was sitting in the garage, and when the gentleman left (Mike Piechota), he told me they really needed to talk to me. He said it in a way that was very mean. I felt like he was treating me as a suspect. I had asked for my driver’s license back and they wouldn’t give it to me.”

  As for how Alan’s daughters began treating her, Miriam said, “I believe it was three days after the funeral, Kristy called me and told me they were going to sue me for everything. I knew their attitudes had definitely changed. I knew they were treating me like a suspect at that point. And Alan’s friends—it was strange. When something like this happens, you usually reach out, and nobody reached out to me. I felt like I was drowning the whole time. I couldn’t seem to get ahead. I didn’t know where my next income was coming from.”

  Miriam said that she just wanted to leave Grand Junction to be closer to her son, Chris. She added, “It wasn’t until I put him on the plane that I decided to go. He was there (in the Grand Junction area) for several days and I felt secure while he was there. And when I put him on the plane and he left, it just started all over again. Like I was alone. I drove all the way through to Brunswick, Georgia.”

  Asked if she had law enforcement’s permission to go, Miriam said, “I didn’t ask. No one said I couldn’t go.”

  “Were you running from law enforcement?”

  “ No.”

  “Your son, Chris, testified that you acted mad when he told you that he spoke to law enforcement and told them that you were staying with him. Were you mad about that?”

  Miriam responded, “I wasn’t mad about that. He had spoken with them, and he didn’t tell me about it right away. He told me about a week later. I wasn’t happy about that. If I had wanted someone not to find me, I wouldn’t have gone to see my son.”

  McGuirk next wanted to know why Miriam had used Sharon Helmick’s identification. Miriam said, “After all the things the police took from the house, that’s actually the one thing they left. They had my driver’s license and birth certificate. Her ID was in a drawer all by itself. You can’t even get a hotel room without a license. I hadn’t planned on using it in any other way.”

  Miriam had also done possible ID searches on her son’s computer when she was in Florida; McGuirk asked about that. Miriam responded, “It was kind of a last-ditch effort to find an ID that I could actually send in to get my birth certificate and get a Florida driver’s license.”

  As to why she didn’t call any of Alan’s family when she got to Florida, Miriam said that she wanted to put all of the bad memories of Alan’s murder behind her. “I was not in a good state to call anybody. I needed to put my head under a pillow for several weeks.”

  This led into questioning about going on Internet dating sites, and Miriam said, “It was for communication, something that was lively and interesting, so that I could laugh a little bit again. A little intelligent conversation. I joined those sites to chat with someone. I wasn’t looking for anyone in particular. I did it as an escape from always feeling bad. I had been drowning most of the time. I couldn’t get out from underneath it.”

  McGuirk asked why Miriam used Sharon Helmick’s name when she joined the computer sites. Miriam responded, “It was hard enough using one name. There would have been confusion of going back and forth between ‘Sharon’ and ‘Miriam.’ So I just used it.”

  As far as meeting Charles Kirkpatrick, Miriam said, “It was a fling. I didn’t see him again after that. I wasn’t interested.”

  After a long period of questioning, Jody McGuirk began to wrap things up. She asked, “Were you keeping Alan from his family?”

  “No, I was not.”

  “Were you writing checks on his accounts without his permission?”

  “No, I was not.”

  “Did you set his car on fire in Delta?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Did you shoot your husband?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “Do you know who did?”

  “No, I do not.”

  “Do you miss him?”

  “Yes.”

  “Could you have done anything to hurt him?”

  “ No.”

  “Why not?”

  “I loved him.”

  For Miriam Helmick, the direct examination had been the easy part. Now she was about to be questioned by the prosecution, and Richard Tuttle had believed almost nothing of what she had just said.

  CHAPTER 42

  A BATTLE OF WILLS

  Richard Tuttle began by asking, “You described Alan as the love of your life in 2005?”

  Miriam answered, “Yes.”

  “Was he the love of your life in June 2008?”

  “Yes.”

  “But you said in January 2005 that you really didn’t like him. Do you remember saying that?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Barbara Watts testified that by Valentine’s Day, you were in love with him and living in his house. You went in the course of a month from the El Rio Rancho Motel to living with him. Can you describe the El Rio Rancho Motel?”

  “It’s just a weekly-stay motel.”

  “Would you describe it as a cheap motel?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how
much did it cost to stay there?”

  “One hundred seventy dollars per week.”

  “And at the time you came to Grand Junction, what did you have with you?”

  “Clothes, a couple of suitcases, and I brought my dogs with me.”

  Tuttle asserted that Miriam Giles had come to Grand Junction with very little; and within a month, she was living with a wealthy man in Delta. Tuttle added that Miriam’s lifestyle changed dramatically once she moved in with Alan Helmick; Miriam agreed. Then Tuttle retold the story of Laegan McGee coming over to her at Boomers in 2005, and Miriam saying to McGee in a singsongy voice, “I hear wedding bells.”

  Tuttle asked, “At that time, Laegan McGee talked about how you actually labeled off on your fingers, ‘He’s gonna buy me a studio. He’s gonna buy me a house in Whitewater. He’s gonna buy me horses.’ Do you recall saying that?”

  “I recall her saying that. Those conversations happened over the course of a year. We hadn’t even decided to buy a house in Whitewater at that point. We hadn’t talked about horses at that time. Wedding bells maybe, but not the rest of it.”

  Tuttle asserted that Laegan McGee was surprised about Alan Helmick, since she thought that Miriam Giles and Keith Coppage were a couple.

  Miriam replied, “I didn’t have a boyfriend. I had dated a fellow in Mississippi, but that was it.”

  Tuttle was very dubious that Alan Helmick wanted to buy a dance studio because it would help him pay less to the Internal Revenue Service. But Miriam responded, “He knew that I liked to teach. He wanted a tax break. So together, it worked out. I certainly wouldn’t have done it on my own.”

  “So, in the course of two months of meeting you, he’s now a big dance aficionado and this is his dream, not yours.”

  “I don’t know if you’d call it a dream. I mean, that’s just the way Alan did things. When he decided to do something, he moved on it, and he moved on it very fast. He enjoyed dancing.”

  “What about horses? Whose passion was that?”

  Miriam replied, “He had this list of things to do over the next ten years. He wanted to trail ride up to a lake on the Mesa, where he could camp and go fishing, places where you couldn’t go by car or truck.”