“I should be there, if something goes wrong. If they find that bastard not guilty.”
Jenna flinched at her son’s casual profanity—bastard. It had not been like Gus to speak with casual profanity, only if he’d been seriously annoyed or angry. But Darren seemed more frequently angry. Or rather, Darren seemed infrequently not-angry.
“Please don’t think that way, Darren. I’ve been assured the trial will turn out—as it should. There’s nothing we can do about it in any case except wait, and hope.”
“Right. It’s the other side that prays.”
Darren handed over the receiver to Naomi who spoke to her mother in a lowered voice, almost inaudibly. Almost it seemed to Jenna that her once-articulate daughter had acquired a speech impediment.
After a few frustrating minutes on the line with Naomi, Jenna felt an impulse to scream at her.
Don’t! Damn you! Don’t do this. We are all trying not to be crazy, don’t you dare give in.
“Naomi? What did you say? I’m having trouble hearing you, this line is poor.”
“Yeh. OK.”
“‘OK’—what?”
“‘This line is poor.’” Naomi paused, and then said, with startling clarity, words Jenna had never heard from her before, “This line is shitty.”
“Well. You could try to speak louder, then. Couldn’t you?”
She was trying not to react with surprise at her daughter’s vulgar expression—shitty.
This was new, in Naomi. Jenna would have to adjust.
The children were sixteen, thirteen. Not really children any longer. Childhood had ended.
She spoke with Naomi for a few more minutes with strained patience. Naomi’s replies were muffled and might have been laughter, or coughing.
Jenna listened fiercely. Possibly, Darren was there also, beside his sister, and the two were laughing at her.
Because she was their mother, and she loved them? Because they had lost the essential bond between them, that had been possible only with their father? Because they now could not escape one another?
NEAR THE END of the prosecution’s presentation, in what would be the final week of the trial, Jenna realized to her horror—It is Gus who is on trial. Not Luther Dunphy.
She’d been slow to realize this stunning fact. She’d been reluctant.
In exacting detail the succession of prosecution witnesses had described the murders, again, again, and again—but the motive for the murders, which was very carefully questioned by the prosecutor, was always questioned by the defense attorney with the consequence that the jury was hearing, repeatedly, that Luther Dunphy had acted as he had in order to “defend the defenseless.”
These were witnesses who’d seen Luther Dunphy approach Dr. Voorhees and the volunteer Barron, remove a double-barreled shotgun from inside his jacket, and begin firing with no warning. Again and again this scene was envisioned so that Jenna had become numbed by its repetition yet holding her breath, unable to breathe until the witness stepped down.
Witnesses who’d seen Luther Dunphy at the prayer vigil many times of whom some knew his name, and some did not; but all could identify him in the courtroom.
Most of these were right-to-life protesters. They were yet obliged to testify against Luther Dunphy for they had sworn to tell the truth and would be guilty of contempt of court otherwise.
And do you see the man with the shotgun here in the courtroom today? Can you point him out, please?
Yes. That’s him.
Perhaps the witness spoke with regret. Perhaps with sorrow. But there was no mistaking the identification.
So singled-out, Luther Dunphy shifted his shoulders uncomfortably. A faint flush came into his doughy face. He did not look up but stared at the table in front of him. His big hands clenched into fists on his knees. He was one who had lived his life at the margin of others’ attention. Perhaps since boyhood he had not wished to be singled out.
Among the witnesses were medical workers at the Women’s Center who’d just been arriving at the Center at the time of the shootings, who had fled to hide behind a Dumpster in terror of being shot. There were the Broome County sheriff’s deputies who’d been on guard duty at the Center that morning, whom the sudden outburst of gunfire had taken totally by surprise. There were emergency medical technicians who’d rushed to the scene of the carnage, too late to help either of the stricken men.
There was the county medical examiner, who’d drawn back the shroud from Gus Voorhees’s devastated face and upper body.
You have determined—death was instantaneous for both men?
Yes. Certainly.
She had no need to listen yet she was listening. She had no need to look at photographs of the fallen men projected on a screen yet she was looking. It was required for Gus’s sake, she thought. His terrible suffering should be shared, if at a distance. His terrible suffering should be revealed to as many witnesses as possible.
In the jury box the jurors listened, and the jurors looked. For the most part their expressions were impassive. They were very ordinary-seeming men and women—nine men, five women. (Twelve jurors, two alternates.) All white-skinned, and all middle-aged or older. Jenna would have liked to see younger jurors, and more women. (The ideal juror, from her perspective, would have been a young black woman.) She did not want to think of the power that resided in these strangers, to punish the guilty man as he deserved, to provide some measure of justice for the victims.
Mostly, Jenna tried not to observe the jurors for fear she might see something in their faces that might upset her. Tersely she’d said to a friend in Michigan, with whom she often spoke on the phone, that the jurors had seemed to her rural.
It wasn’t a joke exactly. Well yes, it was a joke. But not exactly.
On the final day of the prosecution’s case a former Catholic priest took the witness stand. Through a haze of headache pain Jenna listened with mounting alarm.
This was a hostile witness, the prosecutor had told Jenna. The ex-priest had not wanted to testify though he was an eyewitness to the shootings; he’d been served a subpoena by the district attorney and had had no choice but to cooperate, under penalty of being found in contempt of court.
Donald Stockard had left his church parish in Lincoln, Nebraska, in 1996, and had left the priesthood the following year. He’d been a protester at the Broome County Women’s Center for several months but he had not, he insisted, known Luther Dunphy by name.
“Mr. Stockard—or, excuse me, shall I say ‘Father Stockard’?”
“I am no longer a priest as I explained. ‘Mr. Stockard’ is fine.”
“And why are you no longer a priest, Mr. Stockard?”
“For a—personal reason.”
“Was it because your parish in Lincoln was unhappy with you? Complained to the bishop about your sermons? Wasn’t that it?”
“It was a confluence of reasons . . .”
“‘A confluence of reasons’—can you explain?”
“I did not feel—I do not feel—that the Catholic church has been sufficiently active in opposing abortions—legalized infanticide—in the United States . . .”
Stockard spoke haltingly. He was very ill at ease, with a sallow, damp-looking skin, a faint stammer. His face was long and morose and his mouth quivered with emotion.
“You were disciplined by your bishop—wasn’t that it, Mr. Stockard? You were moved out of the parish and forbidden to ‘recruit’ anti-abortion protesters . . .”
“I elected to quit the priesthood. I was not ‘fired.’ My decision to quit was not made quickly but after much anguish . . . I still have strong ties to my parish in Lincoln. I have strong ties to my beliefs. I am not so alone as people think.”
Jenna saw how, for the first time since the start of the trial, Luther Dunphy lifted his head, and regarded the witness with concern. He was sitting very still, his fists now on the table in front of him. Stockard, in the witness chair, stared blinking at the prosecutor as if he feared about wha
t the prosecutor would ask next.
But the prosecutor only asked Stockard to describe what he’d seen at the Women’s Center on the morning of November 2, 1999.
Stockard said that he’d just glimpsed Luther Dunphy that morning, and had not spoken with him. Dunphy had hurried past him without seeming to see him standing on the sidewalk in front of the Center, just before the attack.
He had not, Stockard said, exactly seen the attack; he’d seen Luther Dunphy following behind the minivan that had turned into the driveway, and he’d heard the shotgun explosions a second later which were deafening, and with others he’d recoiled in panic and confusion, backing away—looking for places to take cover . . .
“You saw the fallen men? It was clear to you what had happened?”
“I—I think I saw the fallen men. It wasn’t clear—immediately—what had happened. We were all—we were terrified, frankly. The first thing you think in such a situation is that your life is in danger—your instinct is to run away . . .”
“Your instinct wasn’t to run to the fallen men, and see if they needed aid?”
“In these circumstances, I’m afraid—I did not . . .”
“And why was that?”
“I told you—I was in fear of my life . . .”
“Were you hiding?”
“Some of us were—we’d tried to hide . . . No one knew exactly what had happened. It was very confusing.”
“But you’d recognized Luther Dunphy, with the shotgun?”
“I don’t think I knew Luther’s name. I—I don’t think we had exchanged names. What had happened had happened so fast, I wasn’t able to think clearly . . . No one knew if there might be more than one person with a gun. Or if the person with the gun was going to shoot again.”
“Were there police officers at the scene?”
“Yes—two deputies. They were stationed at the Center. But they didn’t seem to know what to do either, at first . . . Then other law enforcement officers arrived, and an ambulance.”
“And where was Luther Dunphy all this while? Did he try to flee the scene?”
“No. He was kneeling in the driveway just waiting. He’d put the shotgun down on the ground . . . I think he did that. Or maybe I learned that later. But he did not try to flee. It looked like he was praying.”
“He was praying?”
“It looked like he was praying. That’s what other people have said also.”
“Did you see for yourself that Luther Dunphy was ‘praying,’ or was this something you’d heard from others?”
“I—don’t know. It’s very confused in my mind.”
“But you saw the fallen men?”
“I—I did see—the fallen men . . . But I didn’t recognize them, I didn’t know who they were.”
“Did you surmise that they were Dr. Voorhees and his driver?”
“I—might have. I did know Voorhees—we all knew Voorhees. And the driver, he was familiar to us. One of the volunteers at the Center . . . I didn’t know his name.”
“Major Timothy Barron. That is his name.”
“Yes. I know now.”
“Mr. Stockard, did you conspire with Luther Dunphy to assassinate Augustus Voorhees and Timothy Barron on the morning of November 2, 1999?”
“No. I did not.”
“Did you know beforehand of the defendant’s intention to assassinate Augustus Voorhees and Timothy Barron on the morning of November 2, 1999?”
“No. I did not.”
“You did not?”
“I—I did not.”
“Did you ever speak to Luther Dunphy about Dr. Voorhees? In any way?”
“I—might have. But just briefly.”
“Did you ever encourage him—in any way?”
“No . . .”
“Can you recall what you talked about?”
“Not clearly . . .”
Stockard was very uneasy now. At the defense table Luther Dunphy had ceased looking at him, and was staring at his clenched hands.
“You have been observed talking together, Mr. Stockard. Several witnesses have told us. But you can’t recall what you talked about?”
“I . . .I recall that Luther Dunphy happened to mention that he’d noticed that the abortion doctor and his escort sometimes arrived before the police guard, at about seven-thirty A.M., and that this was—surprising. He asked me if it was routine, that Voorhees arrived as much as twenty minutes before the police.”
“And what did you tell him, Mr. Stockard?”
“I told him—I think I told him—that I had not noticed . . .”
“Was it common for you to arrive so early, when the Center doesn’t open until eight A.M.?”
“It opens for the public at eight A.M. It opens for women seeking to abort their innocent babies. But the medical staff arrives earlier of course. And so, some of us arrive earlier.”
“Including Luther Dunphy?”
“I am not aware of Luther Dunphy’s schedule. It was my impression—though I didn’t think much about it, at the time—that most of the protesters arrived at varying times, and some days, some did not come at all. There were protesters more likely to come in the morning, and protesters more likely to come in the afternoon. Sometimes, they ceased coming altogether—they never returned. If someone was missing, I would not be likely to notice—I didn’t keep track in that way.”
“Did Luther Dunphy often miss a vigil?”
“I think he is a carpenter, or a roofer. He has a demanding job. He may have been working part-time . . . None of this I knew at the time, but I have read in the paper since his arrest. I’ve tried to explain, I did not know the schedule of any of my fellow protesters.”
“Did you speak often to Luther Dunphy, though you claim not to have known his name?”
“No. I did not speak often to him.”
“And why did you speak with him on this particular occasion?”
“I think he spoke to me . . . He just fell to talking, as people do. We are bound by a common interest for which we feel strongly—‘defending the defenseless.’”
“Can you elaborate, Mr. Stockard, what you told Luther Dunphy?”
“I might have told him—in reply to his question—that it did seem to be, lately, that Voorhees was arriving earlier than the police guards. I mean, I agreed with his observation. I think that was how it was . . .”
“And what else did you say?”
“What else did I say? I—I don’t know—maybe I mentioned that Voorhees sometimes drove the van himself, and his escort took the passenger’s seat. They came to the Center together most days. But I think that Voorhees didn’t feel the need for an escort—a kind of bodyguard. That’s what we’d heard.”
“And why would anyone on the staff at the Women’s Center require a ‘bodyguard’?”
“They would not. It was all exaggerated, for publicity—that right-to-life protesters were intrusive and violent and that they, the abortionists, had to be protected from them—from us.”
“There is no need for bodyguards? Or law enforcement?”
“Not usually. There is not.”
“But sometimes?”
“Not—often.”
“Really, Mr. Stockard? Since two individuals were killed who’d turned up for work at the Center, by one of your Right-to-Life protesters, it doesn’t seem to you that there is any need?”
“But not usually. Not often . . .”
“Will you answer a little more clearly, whether Luther Dunphy asked you specifically about the time of arrival of Dr. Voorhees, in relationship to the arrival of the police officers?”
“I don’t know what you mean . . .”
“Did Luther Dunphy ask you, or did you volunteer the information?”
Stockard hesitated. His long somber face was damp with perspiration. He was blinking rapidly as if he could not bear to look at the prosecutor; and he could not bring himself to look at Luther Dunphy who was seated only a few yards away.
“I think that i
t was me—it was I—who asked him. And Luther Dunphy who volunteered the information.”
“But why did he tell you this, if indeed he told you?”
“Why? I don’t know why . . . We talked about Voorhees, and the Center, and abortions, and the need to stop legalized infanticide, an abomination . . . We talked about many things.”
“But you’ve just said, you rarely talked.”
“Except this one time . . .”
“And what did Luther Dunphy say, after he’d volunteered the information about Voorhees’s arrival?”
“I—I do not recall that he said anything further.”
“He did not say anything further?”
“He did not. Not that I recall.”
“He did not say—‘Voorhees is unprotected then. He could be killed then. There are a few minutes when he is vulnerable—he could be killed.’ But Luther Dunphy did not say that?”
“No! Of course not.”
“And you did not say that?”
“Of course not.”
“And when was this exchange, Mr. Stockard?”
“When? I—I’m not sure—maybe a week, ten days before . . .”
“Before the shooting?”
Stockard sat very still and did not speak until the prosecutor repeated his question and he said, in his halting voice, that trembled with indignation and anger, “Y-Yes. Before the shooting.”
Next, the prosecutor asked Stockard if he’d noticed that following the exchange Luther Dunphy began to arrive early each morning at the Women’s Center and he replied nervously that he didn’t know—he had never taken “much particular notice” of his fellow protesters for there were many protesters, as he’d tried to explain; they came to the Center, they participated in the demonstrations, then they weren’t seen again for a while—but then, they might show up again. He didn’t know any names, or if he did, they were just first names—“Not surnames.”
“Was it, on the whole, an orderly demonstration?”
“Yes! Our demonstrations are fundamentally prayer.”
“But there are some disruptions, at times?”
“When there are new protesters. Sometimes a new protester is more vocal.”
“Do protesters become upset?”