The Snake and the Spider

by Karen Kingsbury

  He moved closer to the jury and raised his voice. “This is the most important decision you will ever make in your lifetime. For God’s sake, consider it.”

  Then he spoke of the technicalities again, the reasons why his client should not have been convicted of first-degree murder and the reasons why he should not have to suffer the penalty for such a crime.

  But the jury looked bored and Bevis quickly turned his comments back to those that were more emotional.

  “If you condemn Earl Smith to die he will go on death row.” Bevis nearly shouted the words. “And for what? For what? Retribution? Is that what’s in your heart? Do you think that’s going to bring those boys back? Do you want three people to die instead of two? Would that make society feel better? Would it help those grieving parents?”

  He paused a moment and took a deep breath.

  “Believe me,” he said, his voice once again at a normal level, “I feel sorry for those people. I can’t imagine what they’ve been through. But do you think having the blood of a third person on their hands will make them feel any better?”

  Bevis shook his head sadly and began to pace in front of the jury, discussing the history of the death penalty and what were by his standards the cruel ways in which it was often carried out.

  “There is no such thing as a merciful execution,” he said, stopping suddenly and facing the jury. “I’ve seen that chair, I’ve been in there. Let me describe it to you a little better.”

  There was silence in the courtroom as Bevis continued. For the first time, the jury appeared to be listening intently, riveted at the thought of hearing details about the electric chair.

  “First,” Bevis began, “a metal cap will be brought down on his head. Then a mask, a cloth bag, will be placed around his head. He will be strapped in an open chair and an electrode will be placed on his left ankle with a jellylike solution to conduct the electricity.”

  Spider squirmed uncomfortably in his chair as his attorney continued.

  “He will be facing twelve witnesses in another room through a glass panel. Then, the executioner will come in, a person known to no one but the governor and the prison warden. And he will pull the switch.”

  Bevis paused again. “At that moment, several thousand volts of electricity will course through this man’s body, causing him to violently jerk at the restraining devices.”

  The jurors seemed to flinch at the thought.

  “And the smoke will sizzle up from his burning flesh and then, only then, will the state have its pound of flesh.”

  Bevis was quiet a moment and when he spoke again his voice was barely more than a whisper.

  “Is that what you want? Will that bring those boys back? I ask you to commit one final act of mercy, for to do otherwise would serve no purpose, moral, legal, or otherwise.

  “Don’t pull that switch,” Bevis said and he might as well have been on his knees.

  The jury, which included at least one Christian minister, then spent seventy-five minutes deliberating on the idea of pulling the switch.

  When they returned to the courtroom, Judge Foxman ordered everyone to their seats. The Barbers and Bouchers held hands while the jury foreman read the decision. All of them knew that regardless of what the jury recommended the decision was ultimately up to the judge.

  “We, the jury in the case of the State of Florida versus Earl Lee Smith, do hereby recommend that the defendant be electrocuted until death as penalty for two convictions of first-degree murder.”

  Gene White turned toward the boys’ parents and nodded his approval and from across the courtroom Bob Brown felt his breathing quicken. He had brought about the arrest of a man who was about to be sentenced to die for his crime and there was no describing the array of emotions he was feeling. In the front row of the spectator section, the boys’ parents squeezed the hands they were holding a bit tighter.

  “Very well.” Judge Foxman nodded and cleared his throat. He directed his attention toward Spider.

  “In that case you, Earl Lee Smith, being now before the court and attended by your attorney, Thomas Bevis, and having had a fair trial by the jury of your countrymen and having been found guilty of the crime of murder in the first degree with a recommendation of death by the jury, will face your penalty. What have you to say?”

  Smith stared at the floor and ignored the judge’s question.

  “Saying nothing, it is the sentence of this court that you be incarcerated until such time as you will be electrocuted until you are dead. May God have mercy on your soul.”

  The boys’ parents closed around each other, blocking out the circus of media cameras hungry for an emotional moment. Then the Barbers and Bouchers did an amazing thing. They bowed their heads and prayed.

  “Lord, we thank you that justice has been done in this courtroom,” Roy said softly. “But we ask you to work in the life of Earl Smith and John Cox so that at some point they may become remorseful for what they have done.”

  He paused a moment, tears filling his eyes. “Thank you that finally this ordeal is over. And please God, wherever Daryl and Jim are right now, let them know that we love them. And how very much we miss them.”

  THE PAIN FOR THE BOUCHERS AND BARBERS DID NOT END, however, that January morning in the Florida courtroom. The media continued to run stories about the murders and at one point Timothy Boucher, who was fifteen at the time, came home from school in tears.

  “They told me Jimmy was cut up in tiny pieces after he was killed!” Tim cried angrily. “How come you didn’t tell me, Mom?”

  Faye was shocked at this and asked Timothy to explain himself.

  “Everyone at school’s been reading the papers and they said Jim’s bones were found all over the place. He was cut up in tiny pieces.”

  Faye sighed, finally understanding where her son’s confusion lay. Throughout the course of the investigation and the trial she had sheltered her other children from the details of what happened to Jim and Daryl. Now she knew she would have to be honest.

  “Tim, the boys were not cut up, believe me.” She put her hands on her son’s shoulders and looked directly into his eyes.

  “Then what’s this about police finding their bones scattered throughout the brush.”

  “Your brother and Daryl lay there for a long time before anyone found them. Eventually their bodies started to decompose and the animals got to them. That’s why their bones were scattered about.”

  Of all the horrible things she might have said, she had never imagined saying such a thing to one of her children. She pulled Tim into a hug and held him for a long time while he sobbed in her arms.

  The grief did not stop there.

  Despite the fact that Spider had been sentenced to die, his attorneys continued to fight for an appeal on whatever grounds they could conjure up. Because of that, the bones of Jim and Daryl were not released to their families for proper burial.

  “They’re state’s evidence, ma’am,” an officer explained to Faye when she called once to demand that their bones be returned. “It could be years.”

  And it was.

  Over the years several attempts were made to earn an appeal for Spider’s death sentence. Finally, in 1988, attorneys argued that Spider’s terrible childhood was responsible for his role in killing the two teenagers. Attorneys cited the fact that Spider’s mother had been raped prior to his conception and that he had been forced to witness his stepfather’s suicide.

  After listening to the argument, Judge Foxman finally agreed to overturn the death sentence.

  “Although this man definitely deserves to die for the crime he has committed, the time has come to put an end to the legal circus surrounding this case. There needs to be an end at some point and I have decided the end will be here. I hereby overturn the death sentence as it was assigned to Mr. Smith and sentence him to life in state prison.”

  The decision came as a shock to the Barbers and Bouchers, who attended the
appeal hearing as they had many others in the past.

  There was more bad news after that.

  By 1991, shortly after the boys’ bones had finally been returned to their families, it became evident that although Snake and Spider were now both relegated to life sentences, the courts would likely set both men free as early as 1996 because of time off for good behavior and the fact that prisons in Florida are overcrowded.

  When the dust had settled all that was left was an even greater emptiness for the couples.

  Not only had their sons been murdered and left to rot in Florida scrub brush, but now the criminal justice system had let them down.

  In the wake of these events, Roy Boucher grew even sicker than he’d been before, the diabetes ravaging his already weak body. Finally, in 1992, he died with Faye by his side holding his hand.

  The Barbers, no longer wishing to be reminded of the painful memories, moved away from Metamora in the mid-1980s and when Daryl’s bones were finally released they were buried near his parents’ new home in northern Michigan.

  As for Faye, by 1993 her remaining children were nearly grown but she was constantly haunted by one aspect of Judge Foxman’s decision to overturn Spider’s death penalty.

  “He told us that it was time to put it behind us, time to move on so that finally the nightmare would be over,” she said once. “But those were our sons who were killed, a part of ourselves. My husband is dead now, my children scarred for life. The judge thought the nightmare would be over just because he overturned the death penalty. But he was wrong. The nightmare will never, ever be over.”

  Reader Letter

  Dear Friends,

  Back when my writing career started, I was a reporter for the Los Angeles Times. I began in the sports department, writing game stories and profiles of prominent athletes. I was quickly promoted to a general assignment reporter, writing features and covering prominent crime cases for the front page of the Sunday paper. The position was the most coveted on staff, but there was nothing glamorous about following the grim details of abduction, tragedy, and murder. Many nights I lay awake, praying for peace, staring at the ceiling, unable to sleep. I could usually find a redeeming character in each true story I covered – the detective who held tight to her faith, the private investigator with the Bible verse on his desk. I was intrigued enough to adapt a number of these stories into books. But the darkness in these stories was more than I could bear. After writing four true-crime books, I knew I needed a change.

  Not only did I want to escape the darkness of crime stories in Los Angeles. I wanted to be part of the light. I wanted to tell stories with real struggles and trials, real tragedies and triumphs – but I wanted to tell them in light of redemption. I wanted to write stories that gave people a reason to believe.

  I wanted to be a bearer of light.

  And so that is what I became. I began writing redemptive hope-filled fiction and I trademarked it Life-Changing Fiction ™. I have 25 million copies of those novels in print now, and miles of letters from readers who have found hope and light reading my stories. But many of them – many of you – wanted to know where my writing journey began. I often get asked that question when I speak and at every book-signing.

  For that reason I acquired copies of these early works that had been out of print for years, though they remained available via second-hand retailers and the internet for significant sums of money. In rereading them, I wasn’t pleased by the offensive language that was added without my consent when they were first published. After a fresh edit, I decided to make them available again to those who wanted to read them. Also, sometimes there is benefit in reading a cautionary tale, a story about innocent people caught in the crossfire and people who chose darkness and bore the consequences. That said, these stories are not for everyone. Though there is always a redemptive character, they are not stories of redemption. While these are different from the books I now write, they still remind us that life often turns on the smallest of hinges and that seemingly innocent choices can provoke dramatic consequences—including the loss of life itself.

  They are true stories of choices and consequences, true stories of tragedy and darkness in a world that desperately needs light. There is no knowledge of light without darkness, no sense of good without evil, and no understanding of our desperate need for God without understanding how far gone we truly are.

  I know that’s true in my own life, and I am grateful for the journey God has led me on and the grace I’ve been shown along the way. For those wondering how I got my start as an author, it all began here and with the three other true crime books (Deadly Pretender, Final Vows, and Missy’s Murder) I wrote as a young mom. Every road has it’s beginning, and I’m thankful for mine. But I’m immensely and eternally grateful for the love of God that called me to a brighter place and ultimately allowed me the opportunity to write Life-Changing Fiction ™. Bad things still happen in the lives of my characters because that’s the reality of our fallen world. There’s death and extraordinary hurt and pain. But that is not the end of the road or of the story. Amidst the darkness, there is a great light. There is hope. There is redemption.

  Thank you for allowing me the chance to share a bit more of my journey as an author and participating with me as we bring light into a dark world. And no matter where you are in your personal journey, please never ever forget that your life is precious to me and to the One who created you.

  You can connect with me on Twitter @KarenKingsbury.com or on Facebook. I’d love to hear from you.

  Karen Kingsbury

  About the Author

  Karen Kingsbury is America’s favorite inspirational novelist. There are more than 25 million copies of her award-winning books in print, including several million copies sold in the past year. Karen’s recent dozen titles have all debuted at or near the top of the New York Times Bestseller’s list. She is also a public speaker, reaching more than 100,000 women annually through various national events. Karen lives and works outside Nashville, Tenn., with her husband, Don, and their five sons, three of whom were adopted from Haiti. Also living nearby is their only daughter, Kelsey, an actress in inspirational films and married to Christian recording artist Kyle Kupecky. For more information visit www.karenkingsbury.com. Karen is also on Facebook (facebook.com/AuthorKarenKingsbury) and Twitter (@KarenKingsbury), where she regularly interacts with nearly half a million reader friends.

  About Bondfire Books

  Bondfire Books is an independent epublisher based in Colorado and New York City. We publish fiction and nonfiction—both originals and backlist titles—by today’s top writing talent, from established voices to up-and-comers. Learn more about Bondfire and our complete list of titles at www.bondfirebooks.com. Follow us on Twitter @bondfirebooks and find us on Facebook at facebook.com/bondfirebooks.