Bitter Remains

by Diane Fanning

  Grant was the one who wanted to go to Texas, Gaskins said. “He comes up with the idea that: ‘Let’s go see your sister in Texas. Your mother died. You were pregnant at the time that she died. And you never got a chance to go back and see her while all of this was going on. This would be a good time to go see her. We’re moving this weekend, so we can rent a U-Haul trailer and on the trip, what we can do, is take a piece of furniture that we have in storage and give it to Karen,’ her sister in Texas.”

  Amanda, still oblivious, agrees, Gaskins says. “Unknown to Amanda, Grant has been out doing some very, very bad things. He has killed Laura. He has dismembered her body. He’s bought coolers. He’s bought chain saws. He’s bought ice. . . . Unknown to Amanda, Laura’s body is concealed in the back of that U-Haul trailer, hid behind furniture that totally concealed what’s behind it. They get to Texas. . . . Monday night, July the eighteenth, Amanda sees Grant pacing around the front yard. He’s acting very upset and very nervous. And she goes out in the front yard and asks him what’s going on. And he tells her that when Laura fell in that apartment and she hit her head and she died, it was an accident. It wasn’t intended to happen that way. ‘She died and it was an accident and you have got to help me convince your sister to help me dispose of her body. And if you don’t do it, none of us are getting out of here alive. And if I can’t do it, then I can get it done with one telephone call.’ And he pulls out a machete—and I’m sure all of you know what a machete is. It’s a knife about this big,” Gaskins said, spreading his arms wide. “And he whacks [Amanda] across the leg with it and he says, . . . ‘You’ve got to tell your sister that you’re the one who knocked Laura down accidentally and caused her death. Karen will never help me—a black man from North Carolina.’

  “The next morning, Amanda tells it to Karen just the way that Grant has told her to tell it—that she knocked Laura down and she hurt her badly and that her body is in the back of the U-Haul, but Karen—Karen’s older than Amanda and had raised her. Karen sat Amanda down and said, ‘. . . Are you covering for Grant?’ And she nodded her head affirmatively that she was, in fact, covering for Grant.

  “Amanda did help Grant dispose of Laura’s body in Texas. But she only did it because of fear of what would happen to her and to the children if she didn’t help. Now, Amanda is charged with two different offenses here. She’s charged with first degree murder, which, as you know, is the premeditated, deliberate murder of another person. The evidence will show that she had absolutely nothing to do with killing Laura—not a single thing. . . . The second offense that Amanda is charged with is being an accessory after the fact to a homicide that Grant committed by killing Laura. The state alleges in that indictment that Grant, not Amanda, killed Laura. And what Amanda did was to somehow assist Grant with the disposal of the body when she was in Texas. The two offenses are diametrically opposed to each other. On the one hand they say she committed first degree murder. On the other hand, they say that Grant committed the murder but she voluntarily helped dispose of the body in Texas.”

  The defense attorney argued that once the jury heard the evidence, they would “conclude that Grant the sociopath . . . the master manipulator, the professional liar, a man who has been convicted of first degree murder . . .” was who had committed the crime. “We believe the evidence that you hear from this witness stand will convince you that Amanda did not participate in any way in Laura’s death. The question that you will be called upon to decide is whether she voluntarily participated in concealing what Grant had done.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  TESTIMONY in the trial began that same afternoon with the state calling Chevon Mathes, Laura Ackerson’s business partner and friend, to the witness stand. Just as in the earlier trial, Chevon broke down in tears when she read aloud the e-mails she had sent before she knew Laura was dead. The defense followed up by focusing on any negative comments Laura had made about Grant’s lies and her fear of him.

  The next witness was Detective James Gwartney from the Kinston police, who had begun the investigation into the disappearance of the young mother before turning it over to the Raleigh police investigators. Gwartney’s cross-examination began on the second day of the trial, but consisted largely of questions that Gwartney couldn’t answer about Grant Hayes, drug dealers and covering digital trails.

  Special Agent Lolita Chapman of the State Bureau of Investigation followed the Kinston investigator to the stand. Like Gwartney, she had only been involved in the case for the first couple of days. She told the jury about her role in searching and interviews.

  Prompted by the prosecutor, Chapman read selected passages mentioning Amanda Hayes from Laura’s phone call log and her journal, demonstrating that, contrary to the defense’s opening statement, there was friction and hostility between the two women. There were multiple instances of Amanda calling Laura psycho-crazy. In response, the defense attempted to show that particular epithet was something that Amanda got directly from Grant.

  Raleigh Police Sergeant Dana Suggs explained his role in locating and securing Laura’s Ford Focus near Grant and Amanda Hayes’s apartment. On cross-examination, defense attorney Johnny Gaskins asked, “If that vehicle had been two or three miles away, that would have indicated that someone had to assist with moving that vehicle, wouldn’t it?”

  “That’s possible, yes,” Suggs said.

  Randy Jenkins, the owner/manager of Bill’s Grill, told the jury about his encounter with Laura on the last day of her life. The defense asked if Laura mentioned that she was supposed to be in Raleigh at three.

  “No,” Randy said. “She said she was going to Raleigh after our meeting.”

  “I gather she was alone?” Gaskins asked.

  “Yes.”

  Laura’s artist friend, Oksana Samarsky, gave her testimony about Laura just the same as she had in the first trial. She told the jurors that the first time they met, Laura had her boys with her.

  “How was Laura with her children?” prosecutor Boz Zellinger asked.

  Oksana’s face brightened. “She made me smile. She really made me want to have kids someday. . . . She was very bubbly and full of life when she was around them and they were, too. They just loved her to death.”

  On cross-examination, Gaskins asked if Laura ever mentioned Amanda, and Oksana said that she had not. “Did Laura speak to you about Grant Hayes?”

  “Not much,” Oksana said. “I didn’t even know his last name. She mentioned she had custody issues with him but I really don’t know that much.”

  —

  DETECTIVE Amanda Salmon again delivered the story of her part in the investigation of the homicide. She testified about finding an Apple Store receipt in Grant and Amanda’s apartment. Gaskins asked her if Grant paid cash for that purchase. She said he did. Then the defense attorney pressed her on the payments on other receipts but she said that she had not seen any of the others.

  Lauren Harris, Grant’s friend and one-time manager of Monkey Joe’s, stepped forward next. She offered the same information as in Grant’s trial.

  Heidi Schumacher, Laura’s best friend, had briefer testimony, since the state did not ask her about Grant’s physical violence toward Laura or the threats made to both of them. But on cross, the defense broached the subject from the first question.

  “Were you involved in an incident when Grant attacked Laura?” Gaskins asked Heidi.

  “Yes, that was when they were living on Mitchell Mill Road right before little Grant was born.”

  When the defense pressed her for details, she gave them, but Heidi seemed hesitant to volunteer any information that would draw attention away from Amanda’s culpability. Gaskins then provided her with a copy of the parenting report that Laura had prepared for Dr. Ginger Calloway. Once he confirmed that Heidi had proofread the document for her friend, he had her read aloud many of the responses from Laura’s sixty-page parental history.

&nbs
p; “Grant had very harsh views on the value of women and sex,” Laura wrote. “He used sex as a tool to punish and mold my behavior instead of as a way to show affection. If he continues to behave like this, I think it will continue to cause chaos in any relationship. Also, the belief system Grant holds with regard to women will ultimately be passed along to Grant IV and Gentle. I think this will give them lower self-esteem and chaos in their adult relationships. . . . Grant III told me that he was molested as a child. That he has had sex with over two hundred women. He also told me he had sex with his aunt. He showed no disturbance over this. This disturbs me. I don’t want our children to think that this is acceptable.”

  Talking about Amanda, Laura wrote: “I think he married her for several reasons that I don’t believe she is aware of yet. Grant III has convinced Amanda that I am crazy and he urgently needs her help saving the children from me. I hear these things had prompted her to marry him very quickly and to stand behind him when he boldly lies to the court. . . . Now because they are married, Grant III has the ability to take Amanda to court for alimony when they divorce.”

  Laura went on to contend that Grant spoke to her about getting control of Amanda’s money and made it clear “I would lose our court case and he would win because in the court system, the one with the most money wins.”

  Heidi also read aloud Laura’s statement about Grant’s belief in the imminent demise of the American government and his comment that “the children won’t stand a chance with a poor, crazy, weak, white trash woman like me.”

  Gaskins wrapped up Heidi’s reading of the document after more than an hour with Laura’s summary of the situation. “Grant III has told his parents he wishes I was dead. . . . Grant III want me out of the picture so that I cannot interfere in the lives of our children. He wants to raise them to be . . . his ‘401K plan’ or ‘retirement plan’ and his ‘empire.’ He wants me out of his life so that I cannot interfere with his new wife.”

  On re-direct, ADA Boz Zellinger had Heidi read a few lines about Amanda Hayes that the defense had not highlighted. “This would also explain her uncalled-for hostile attitude towards me. Please note that I wrote her a thank-you note for everything she’d done for my family and when she bought me a plane ticket to come get Grant IV in March 2010. I have maintained that attitude with her at all times.”

  —

  AMANDA’S daughter Sha Guddat (nee Elmer) once said, “I would have rather buried my mother than go to her murder trial.” But there she was, stepping up as a witness. She began telling the story of her life with Amanda and how her mother met Grant. Sha explained that, although she worked for Grant booking gigs through Rare Breed Entertainment, she was never paid by him. She got any spending money she needed from her mother.

  On cross, Sha told the jury about the sad state of economic affairs in her mother’s household that had placed them on the verge of eviction. Blaming the financial problems on her stepfather, she said that Grant was “very talented when he could focus, but he couldn’t focus on anything for more than five minutes. He couldn’t finish anything he’d started. He’d have ten projects going at once and never finish any of them.”

  She read a short passage from “Broomstick Rider,” the song Grant had written about Laura, and which Sha had turned over to the police. In retrospect, she recognized that lines like “I have intentions on killing you” and “My bullets will get you soon” were incredible indications of Grant’s premeditation.

  “You made references to how you tried to contact your mother after she left to visit her sister in Texas?” defense attorney Gaskins asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Grant was constantly trying to prevent you from having conversations, in fact, with your mother, wasn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “He didn’t want you talking to her on the telephone, did he?”

  “No.”

  On re-direct, Boz Zellinger zeroed in on that latter point. “You talked with your mother during that time period, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And did you hear the phone taken out of her hand and turned off immediately?”

  “No.”

  “And you talked to her several times during that week, didn’t you?”

  “I did briefly.”

  Then, Zellinger got clarification from Sha that when the police searched the apartment, they were working a missing persons case. On the other hand, when she later found the reciprocating saw manual, the body parts had been found in Texas.

  —

  THE next witness was Raleigh Police Detective Keith Heckman of the technical unit. He repeated his previous testimony about the location and activity on cell phones of Laura Ackerson on the last day of her life and on those of Amanda and Grant while in Richmond, Texas.

  On cross, Gaskins asked him to call a phone number from the old 2011 records to see who answered. The prosecutors objected. The judge asked, “Call it now? In 2014?”

  When Gaskins said, “Yes,” the judge sustained the objection.

  Gaskins launched again into his contention that the phone records proved that Grant was a drug dealer. But Heckman countered a lot of the statements the attorney attempted to establish as facts and gave him no satisfaction.

  The state called Sha’s husband, Matt Guddat, to the witness stand. He spoke of his first meetings with Amanda, on Mother’s Day 2011, and with Grant, on Sha’s birthday on June 7, 2011. He answered questions about Sha’s irritation with Amanda pushing her around and said that he’d only been in Grant and Amanda’s apartment on one occasion, when they all went out to dinner together for Sha’s birthday. He said he used the hall bathroom at that time and it had a black shower curtain and toilet seat cover.

  On cross-examination, Matt said that Grant had not been with them on Mother’s Day because he’d been in Hawaii. On Sha’s birthday, Grant had dropped Amanda off at the restaurant but had not stayed for dinner.

  —

  PATSY Dwyer, facility manager for the Raleigh U-Haul, a voice not heard in Grant’s trial, now stepped up to testify. She told the jurors that Grant said he was going on a fishing trip with his family and wanted plastic to secure the coolers of fish bait and keep them from overturning in the van.

  Patsy said that she was used to people coming in very stressed, but Grant was different: “He was glassy-eyed as if sleep-deprived” or “punch-drunk,” she recalled. Grant, she said, talked about Jimi Hendrix and “Purple Haze” and told her he’d been up all night playing music with his friends.

  When Grant asked to call his wife to make sure he wasn’t forgetting anything they needed, Patsy handed him her phone. When he finished, he asked her for a plastic drop cloth.

  Gaskins tried to get Patsy to admit that Grant had also purchased moving blankets in her store. However, she insisted that she couldn’t remember. He showed her a photograph of the transported piece of furniture, and although she admitted that the blankets it was wrapped in looked like the ones sold by U-Haul, she wasn’t certain that they were hers.

  —

  THE next witness, Susan Dufur of Wal-Mart, gave a repeat performance of her testimony in the earlier trial, complete with a replaying of the store security video.

  —

  RALEIGH Police Detective Dexter Gill, looking like a worried, anxious Jeb Bush, stepped into the box next. He was the one who’d received the call that the Kinston missing person case had ties to Raleigh.

  He told the jurors of his trip to Texas with Detective Robert Latour and the interview with Karen Berry. Then he introduced a number of pieces of evidence, including the coolers, the Motel 6 receipt in the name of Amanda Smith, the khaki green suitcase and the towels from the shed.

  Then Gill talked about bringing back the large piece of furniture, Karen’s computer, and the body parts found on the first day of the search. Gaskins elicited nothing revealing on cross-examination.<
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  —

  DETECTIVE David Moore of the financial crimes unit told the jurors that he had prepared the cell phone–analysis report using Grant’s actual phone rather than cell provider records. He read text messages from Grant to Laura and to Lauren Harris, as well as one from Laura to Grant.

  On cross, defense attorney Gaskins took Moore to the phone calls between Grant and Amanda, trying to get him to say that they were proof that the two were in different locations when they occurred. When Moore would not cooperate, Gaskins asked, “Can’t you know where the two phones are from triangulation?”

  “I don’t know, sir. I don’t do that.”

  —

  THE final witness in the fourth day of the trial was Raleigh Police Detective Zeke Morse, sporting a multicolored bow tie. He had participated in the search of the elder Hayeses’ home and the canvas around Grant and Amanda’s apartment, and had followed up on dozens of small details in the investigation. One of the pieces of information he’d sought was whether or not there was a GPS built into the Durango. There was, but he found out that it wouldn’t have begun collecting data unless an air bag had been deployed.

  Gaskins focused on the canvas when he asked his questions. “Did you have anyone that lives near that apartment of Amanda and Grant . . . reporting they heard a Skil saw running on the night of July 13, 2011?”

  “Of the people I spoke to, no.”

  “Did anyone report anything unusual at that apartment on the night of July 13, 2011?”

  “Again, of the people I spoke to, no.”

  —

  TESTIMONY ended for the day, allowing time for the state to present a request to the judge. The problem at hand was the johnboat taken into evidence. Prosecutor Boz Zellinger said that it won’t fit in the elevator so they could not bring it into the courtroom. They wanted the jurors to go downstairs to view the close quarters the boat offered when packed with four coolers and two people.

  The defense objected, claiming that the same result could be achieved by showing photographs to the panel. After some back and forth and a moment for contemplation, Judge Stephens asked Gaskins, “What is your objection?”