GOD BLESS US ALL
IRA
Bill Kissel didn’t see any evidence of “the works of the angels” in Ira’s plan.
He rallied Andrew and Hayley and led a Christmas assault on Cincinnati. Bill didn’t like having to rely on Andrew, but he recognized that Andrew and Hayley and their wealth and opulent Greenwich lifestyle represented the alternative most likely to be persuasive to a court should the dispute reach the point of litigation. He was also determined that the children should suffer no drop in their standard of living. In that respect, Greenwich trumped Cincinnati.
Andrew’s agenda was different, but his goal was the same. Hayley had stopped working at Merrill Lynch when they’d hightailed it out of 200 East Seventy-fourth Street in the spring. She and Connie should be able to raise five children in Greenwich effortlessly. And Andrew hankered after the $20 million trust fund.
Greenwich was a dangerous place for a man like Andrew to live. Essentially, it was only Parkview with more acreage and a waterfront. The general principles were the same: having tens of millions meant nothing if you didn’t flaunt them shamelessly, and there was no such thing as enough. Just as Nancy had with Parkview, Andrew wore Greenwich like a glove. He also shared Nancy’s defining characteristic: the compulsion to acquire and display.
Andrew had started collecting luxury cars. Even as a child, his favorite toys had been cars. It was no different now, except the toys were bigger and more expensive. He was especially fond of Ferraris. But different models appealed in different ways. Andrew couldn’t decide. So he bought four. Then he learned that in Greenwich luxury cars meant nothing. In Greenwich, a man was measured by the size of his yacht. For $2.85 million, Andrew bought a seventy-five-foot Hatteras. He considered it his starter yacht.
Bill, Andrew and Hayley, and Jane and Richard installed themselves in a Marriott near the airport and summoned Ira and Ryan to a meeting on the afternoon of Christmas Day. Before the meeting, Bill and Andrew visited Ryan’s apartment. Bill termed it “nothing but a basement firetrap.” Andrew brought a legal pad and walked around looking at plumbing and wiring, shaking his head and muttering, as if making note of code violations. Ryan thought he was heavily under the influence of cocaine.
The meeting took place in the living room of Bill’s suite at the Marriott, as the children, under Connie’s supervision, played with their many new presents next door. Bill began by announcing that Andrew and Hayley would be bringing the children and Connie to Connecticut with them when they left. “Don’t fight me on this,” he warned Ira. “You can’t out-money me. I’ll bankrupt you. I’ll never, ever, ever let this go.”
“I don’t think it’s right,” Ira said, “but if—”
Ryan interrupted. “No, we’re not giving in.” He pointed at Andrew, who was sniffling and rubbing his nose. “Do you really think he can raise these children?”
“You’d better watch yourself,” Andrew said, suddenly attentive. “I’ve got plenty of money to hire lawyers of my own.”
“Look, Andrew, we all know your family has the most money. But it’s not like the kids are for sale. This shouldn’t be an auction, where the high bid wins. Sure, you can sue us and eventually win because we won’t have enough money to keep fighting. But can’t you see that this isn’t about winning? This is about what’s best for the kids.”
“Stop being such a Boy Scout,” Bill said. “The grown-ups are having a meeting.”
Ryan turned toward him. “I’m going to say something here that I know you won’t want to hear. Even my dad is afraid to bring this up. But I think it’s important. The children should stay in an environment where their mother is spoken about fondly, so that in the event of…of…reunification, they’ll want to be with her again.”
Bill’s face turned Christmas-ribbon red.
“I know that’s an awkward subject,” Ryan said, “but the presumption of innocence is still part of the law, even if it doesn’t exist in this room. We can’t know yet what’s going to happen in the Hong Kong courts. As long as there’s any chance that my sister will have her children back someday, I don’t think they should be taught to hate her.”
“Let’s go for a walk, sonny boy,” Bill said. “You and I need to have a little talk in private.”
Bill and Ryan took the elevator down to the lobby. Except for a massive, brightly lit tree, the lobby was empty on Christmas afternoon. Even so, Bill walked to the farthest corner before finding a spot he deemed suitable. He sat on a couch and gestured for Ryan to sit next to him.
He leaned in so close that Ryan could smell his breath. “The children will not be staying here,” he said. “Your father knows that. You can see he’s going to cave in. And you’re a son. You’ve got to listen to your father.” He leaned even closer. “That’s what sons do.”
“No. Even if you bully him, you’re not going to bully me.”
“Why, aren’t you the brave little idealist. I’ve already told you I’ll bankrupt your father. I’ll ruin your mother, too. And—now listen carefully—I will make sure that you never practice medicine in this country.”
“What kind of threat is that supposed to be?”
Bill began to shake his finger at Ryan. “And if you think your girlfriend is going to stick around after I destroy you, you’re wrong.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Mr. Kissel.”
Bill smiled. “Look at it this way,” he said. “Why would a twenty-year-old kid—”
“I’m twenty-four.”
“Don’t interrupt me. Why would a twenty-year-old kid—twenty-four, I don’t care—want to raise three young children by himself, the girls ten and seven, the boy four? And then the next year the oldest girl eleven? And the year after that, the oldest girl twelve?”
Again, he leaned in so close that Ryan could both smell and feel his breath.
“I can think of only one reason: to molest them.”
Ryan was too stunned to reply.
“And I’ll make sure people know what you’re doing. Your medical school first. Then your girlfriend. Then the newspapers. I’ll put it all over the country. There won’t be anywhere you can go. Think about it: child molester. There won’t be anything you can do.”
Bill pointed his finger directly at Ryan’s face. His voice was barely a whisper. “Don’t think for a minute I don’t mean it.” Then he stood and walked back to the elevator, leaving Ryan alone with the Christmas tree in the lobby.
Even Andrew apologized that night. “My father,” he said to Ira and Ryan, “I can’t explain—he’s been like this his whole life.”
28. SIU LAM
NANCY WAS TRANSFERRED TO THE SIU LAM PSYCHIATRIC Centre in the western New Territories in late November. Her expat status may not have been the only factor in the decision to incarcerate her there instead of in the notoriously overcrowded maximum security Tai Lam Centre for Women, but it did not work to her disadvantage.
Not even Human Rights Watch could find much wrong with Siu Lam. A 1997 report noted that “the facility is quite pleasant: its rooms and corridors are spacious, airy, and painted in soothing colors. It also possesses attractive gardens with flowers, fish, and birds, tended by some of the inmates. As the facility is located on the side of a hill, inmates held there enjoy rather dramatic views of the surrounding area.”
On the day of her admission, Nancy was evaluated by psychiatrist Henry Yuen, who was chief of service at Siu Lam’s Department of Forensic Science. Yuen summarized his impressions in a report he wrote the next day: “consciousness level: alert; mood: neutral; attitude: cooperative; speech: relevant and coherent; suicidal idea: deny.” At no time did any doctor who examined her at Siu Lam detect any sign of mental illness.
Nancy was soon adopted by a small coterie of Parkview wives who believed that turning her into a cause might bring meaning to their lives. They made into an article of faith the proposition that Nancy had been a battered wife who’d finally put an end to years of abuse by the only means available t
o her.
Siu Lam’s liberal visitation policy (hours were from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. seven days a week, except Mondays and Wednesdays, when the hours were 9:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.) allowed these women to spend half their waking hours in Nancy’s presence. The closer to her they claimed to be, the greater Parkview cachet they acquired.
Nancy decided she also needed her mother. She asked her new friends to tell Jean that she would welcome a visit. Offered a reprieve from the shunning that she’d expected to last for the rest of her life, Jean flew to Hong Kong immediately. In their first moment together in almost five years, Jean said, “We just kind of melted into each other.” From that day forward, Nancy and her mother were inseparable. They never discussed the past. To both of them, only the future mattered.
In July 2004—more than seven months after she’d arrived at Siu Lam—Nancy contacted her children for the first time. They’d been in Andrew and Hayley’s custody all year. Ira would have fought Bill in court until he was bankrupt, but he would not let Bill harm his son. Because he had no doubt that Bill would carry out every threat he’d made against Ryan, Ira allowed Andrew and Hayley to bring the children back to Greenwich. Andrew used the private Marquis jet in which he owned a time-share. He billed the seven-thousand-dollar cost to the estate. Andrew and Hayley’s expansive house—newspapers described it as a mansion—on two and a half acres in the exclusive backcountry section of Greenwich became the children’s fourth home in eight weeks, not counting hotels.
On July 4, Nancy wrote to Zoe and Ethan in Greenwich, and to Isabel at summer camp in Maine. To Zoe and Ethan she wrote: “Hello!! What’s new and exciting today? Enjoying your summer activities? I’ll bet you both do about 100 things each day…There are so many fun things to do all summer long…”
To Isabel she wrote: “Is it really hot at camp right now?…I’ll bet you are making some really nice things in Arts and Crafts…How is the camp food this year?…I remember at Parent Weekend, sneaking back through the back door to grab more potato chips!! I’ll bet your drinking tons of Coke…My favorite too…Keep having lots of fun!!”
She didn’t say anything in either about where she was, or why, or when (or if) she might ever see them again.
In August, she sent Zoe and Ethan drawings of strawberries. She asked, “Can you count all the times you ate ice cream? I’ll bet you both have had at least 100 ice cream cones this summer!! I love strawberry and chocolate ice cream ymmmmm…I miss you…I’m feeling a little better but still need some rest…”
She also drew strawberries on her letter to Isabel at camp. She wrote: “I went to camp at age 9 for 8 weeks—a girls camp in Indiana called Camp Pokegan (Poe-kay-gen)…I always ate a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich with extra bacon!!”
Ira drove to Maine to pick up Isabel at camp and bring her back to his house for a visit. Nancy wrote to her there: “How is Chicago…remember when Zoe took our picture in the car park? I was hugging you and I was wearing my jeans with the Red Dragon on the front…I’m sure Grandpa Ira has plenty of macaroni and cheese & waffles. Make sure he takes you out for pizza!!…I’m feeling much better but still need to rest a bit longer…”
She wrote to Isabel again in early September: “How was camp? I’ll bet this summer was better than last summer…Did your horse remember you?…Was the food the same? Did they still have that giant bowl of potato chips? I can’t believe you’ve been to camp 2 summers in a row!! It will be really fun to have Zoe go with you one of these summers…she’ll have a blast!!”
She wrote to all three children a week later: “Are you all ready for school to start? New school supplies—Zoe—2nd grade! Isabel 5th grade! WOW!! And Ethany-Boy kindergarden! Wow you are all getting so old—so grown up…”
Nancy drew hearts and flowers on the pages of her letters and closed each one with “I love you…I hug you…I kiss you…I squeeeeeze you,” followed by a heart with “Love Mommy” inside.
Not all intra-Kissel communications that summer were so affectionate. The teacher-student bond that Hayley and Jane formed on the Stratton Mountain ski slopes had strengthened over the years to the point where Jane sometimes described Hayley as “the sister I never had.” In June, Hayley turned to Jane in order to vent about Andrew in much the same way as Rob had turned to Bryna to vent about Nancy the year before.
In one phone call, Hayley told Jane that she was going to leave Andrew. She’d learned that he was having an affair with a Greenwich woman he’d hired as a public relations agent as he tried to raise his business and social profiles. “I am busting my ass taking care of five kids, while he’s off having dinner with her in nice restaurants,” Hayley wrote in an e-mail. “It amazes me that I’ve let him treat me like that. I’m a smart person. I can’t believe I’ve stayed in the relationship this long. But this is the ultimate humiliation and I can’t take it.”
Andrew seemed unbothered by Hayley’s pique. He traded in his $2.85 million, seventy-five-foot yacht for a $3.6 million ninety-three-footer. He’d named the first yacht The Five Keys after himself, Rob, Jane, Hayley, and Nancy. He was more selective the second time. He called the new yacht Special K’s and he liked to point out, “That’s singular.”
Cushioned by the $20 million trust fund, he also began to diversify his business holdings. One of his daughters liked horseback riding, so he bought the stable. He grew annoyed one night at having to wait for a table in a Greenwich waterfront restaurant, so he bought a controlling interest in it the next day. He was drinking more, so he bought a liquor store. Most colorfully, he acquired partners in Sicily and began to import olive oil.
Hayley told Jane she suspected that not all of Andrew’s business dealings were legal. She said she was getting worried, for the children’s sake and for her own. “I don’t want to have to explain to the kids why he’s in jail,” she said.
Shortly before Halloween, Nancy wrote the children another letter: “Zoe’s first Halloween we dressed her up as a baby pumpkin—she couldn’t walk yet and just rolled around on the floor. Isabel—your first Halloween you were Tinkerbell…we took you trick or treating at Uncle Andy’s apartment…Ethan was only two days old for his first Halloween so no trick or treating for him!!”
Then Nancy was released on bail. No one awaiting trial on murder charges in Hong Kong had ever before been freed on bail. And no one would ever know why Nancy was. On November 1, 2004—almost exactly one year after she’d killed her husband—a secret hearing was held in the chambers of Mr. Justice Michael Burrell of the Court of First Instance, the court in which Nancy would be tried. For reasons never disclosed, Mr. Justice Burrell voided Nancy’s no-bail status and set bail at US $1 million, a sum quickly produced by the members of Nancy’s Parkview coterie.
Burrell’s ruling was unprecedented. There is little doubt that it would have stirred controversy in the press. Under Hong Kong law, however, the judge could not only seal the transcript of the hearing but could order the press not to report the result. Thus, when Nancy was set free on the afternoon of November 4, 2004, no one in Hong Kong outside her closest circle knew anything about it.
29. OUT ON BAIL
FROM SIU LAM, NANCY WAS TAKEN DIRECTLY TO A NINTH-FLOOR apartment in a nondescript housing unit located just below the intersection of Bonham Road and Pok Fu Lam Road, near the University of Hong Kong. Her Parkview coterie had rented the apartment for her.
Paying the rent might not have been a problem for Nancy, but paying her legal fees was. Ira had continued to write checks to Mallesons Stephen Jaques in amounts sufficient to keep Simon Clarke’s batteries charged, but with trial not scheduled to begin until May 2005, the major legal expenses still lay ahead.
Having exhausted his own life savings of $800,000, Ira raised another $225,000 by auctioning a Bridget Riley op art painting that had been in his family since 1975. But Clarke estimated that he’d need at least another million dollars.
At this point Nancy’s fortunes received a boost from an unexpected source. And quite a boost it was. A
Goldman Sachs partner—a former colleague of Rob’s in the Hong Kong office—let it be known discreetly that as long as his anonymity was guaranteed he would underwrite the cost of Nancy’s defense. Excitedly, she wrote to Michael Del Priore to tell him that the colleague had just written a check for $1 million, with more to come.
She also wrote to her children: “Its almost Thanksgiving! Turkey Day gobble-gobble!!…Is it getting cold outside? All the leaves start turning colors—my favorite time of year. I like stepping on the leaves and hearing them CRUNCH!…”
Simon Clarke flew to New York in December to take a statement from Michael Del Priore. Clarke knew the affair could not be kept secret. He also knew that the existence of a lover could be used to explain Nancy’s motivation for killing Rob. When he learned that telephone records documented more than three thousand minutes of talk between Nancy and Del Priore in the month leading up to the killing, and more than a dozen conversations in the days between the killing and Nancy’s arrest, Clarke realized he’d better meet the man. In addition, Nancy would not stop talking about him.
Clarke and his barrister, Alexander “Sandy” King, had seen from the start how unlikely it would seem that in fifty hours of conversation the two lovers had never discussed getting the wealthy and purportedly abusive husband out of the way. And who would believe that after the fact she hadn’t told her lover she had done it and asked for his help in regard to disposing of the body and incriminating evidence?
But unless Nancy were to implicate him—which she could not do without admitting her own guilt—there was no basis for filing charges against Del Priore or even for requiring him to give a statement under oath. Yes, there would be innuendo. But innuendo was not enough for extradition.
Clarke spent two days with him in New York City, explaining that he could have no contact with Nancy until after the trial. The prosecutor would certainly ask her when she’d last been in touch with her lover. Clarke spelled out for Del Priore how vital it was that Nancy be able to deny truthfully that there had been any communication between the two of them since her arrest. By the time of her trial, Del Priore had to be portrayed as just an indiscretion, a regrettable part of Nancy’s distant past.