Witnesses and Victims

"Have you ever been shot?" he asked me.
"I've been shot at, but not shot." I replied.
"Well I have... four times." he shouted back. And before I get a word out,  he asked the next question.

"Have you ever been stabbed?"
"No" I answered.

"Jumped?" he asked.
"Just once," I said. "I lost."
"I been jumped all my life. Some times, a couple mtimes a day" he interjected.  "And after I turned 16 I never lost."

"You ever been arrested?"
 "Nope,"  I replied. "And you?"
"Whenever possible" he replied. "Three squares and a bed" he laughed.

"You grow up with a real mama and daddy?" he continued with his questions.
I nodded.
"The same one?"
I nodded again.
He looked at me incredulously.
"I didn't know neither of mine from day one." he said.

"They dropped me off at at the church door, then the church dropped me off into the foster system and I couldn't even begin to tell you how much crap I been through and how many places I've lived in. When I reached 16, I ran away from the system and the rest of the story goes downhill from there."

He described most of the foster homes as a combination of slavery and abuse. His escape from the foster system  brought him to the streets of Seattle, where he acquired a street mom and street dad and street sisters and brothers. He told me how they taught him how to shoot up, hustle tourists, dumpster dive. Work the streets. They lived in parks, under the freeways, in places no one knew about.

"They're all dead now," he said emotionless "every last one one of 'em."

"Wow. I'm so sorry, " I said, "How'd they die? "

"Most OD'd. One jumped off the freeway overpass just over the Convention Center. One died in prison. And two others were killed in fights.

Now, he said, he is alone.
He is homeless.

I study his rotting teeth.
Little black things are moving in his hair.
I asked him how old he is.
He said he didn't know, maybe 45?

 "Do you use?"  I asked him as casually  as I ask cashiers "where's the restroom?"
"Whenever I can" he replied. "You got anything?"
"Just Bayer Aspirin" I said with a smile as I added, "chewable, orange flavored. Prevents heart attacks."

He laughed and I said no more.
Just waited patiently with notebook in hand.

He looked me up and down and then said, "sit down". So we sat under this big tree in this park where the homeless hang not far from the Courthouse, while I interviewed him about the case I was working on or several hours.

He was just one of a list of witnesses I was hired to find and interview. 

The Victim 

The victim was not who I representing.
I was representing the accused perp, the man who allegedly raped and murdered her.
Let's call him "Joe".
This was when I was a Criminal Investigator for a Public Defender.

Our client Joe admitted to having sex with the woman. But only consensual sex, he claimed. He gave the police a statement I had reviewed.  He said she had no clue she was dead before they "done it."

Joe said she was laying in the doorway, " drunk and made up all pretty" he said.
He claimed she smiled at him with "them  bedroom eyes"
He took advantage of the invitation, he said.
"She never once said no" Joe said.

Joe was high on crack that night and also fueled up with Everclear.
So he said he didn't realize when he was having sex with the woman, she was already dead.
He thought she  liked it.

The prosecutor didn't agree.

According to the police report, police logs and 911 tapes I studied, shocked tourists believed they witnessed Joe raping a woman in the alley.

One 911 operator  asked, "Is she fighting back?"
The man on the other end answered, "No ma'am, she's not moving."

Once the policea and paramedics arrived, arrested Joe and realized the victim was deceased,  the Medical Examiner did an autopsy.
It was determined the woman was long dead from a heroin overdose before she was raped by Joe.

I recall the Public Defender who handed  me the case telling his legal assistant to research charges for necrophilia vs. rape.

My job as a Criminal Defense Investigator back then was to find witnesses, hopefully favorable to Joe. That's why I was sitting under the tree with the homeless guy.

The Witnesses

Finding witnesses is always a challenge.
Sometimes all I have is first or strange names. Like Scabby Abby. Female.
Other times I get lucky and get photos.
That's how I found this guy.
The grey dreadlocks and long gray beard were a dead giveaway as I wandered through the parks of Seattle where the homeless congregate.

We sat under a tree in the park that day for three hours.
Other homeless folks wandered by, he introduced me... the Investigator...
and they all sat down and shared stories about Joe.
None of them had seen the actual assault, everything was "here say."
They were primarily witnesses to Joe's character.
And in that area, Joe's character could not be more exemplary.

When Joe had a bottle of Thunderbird, someone else got half.
When he cooked Meth, he always  did it clean and stashed a third for his friends.
And they all felt strongly, each and every one of them, that Joe would never rape a live woman, let alone a dead one.

The End

The criminal justice system is very busy at the moment. It was especially so back then.
Jails and prisons are overloaded.
You walk into any Public Defender's office and each Defender's desk is piled sky-high with thick case files.

Courthouses could benefit from revolving doors for the number of folks who come and go.
Unfortunately,  America's court houses need big thick doors and metal detectors and guards with guns  for the amount of human ticking time bombs who pass thorough our sacred portals.

In Joe's case, the prosecutor dropped the charges. I never found out why.  I do have my theories.

It could be that no one could identify the homeless woman. She was buried as "Jane Doe."
It could be all the witness statements I got on behalf of Joe were persuasive.
Maybe the M.E. thought since she was dead, and Joe had no intent to commit a crime, no harm done.
Or it could be Joe's case simply did not warrant enough money or attention to rise to the surface in a sea of sludge that outweighed his case.
Bottom line, just when you think things can't get any worse in your life, think about Joe.
Or better yet, think about the lady in the alley.

Then... repeat after me:
"There but for the grace of God, go I."