A Silence of Mockingbirds

by Karen Spears Zacharias

  On what should have been Karly’s sixth birthday, I sent David a note telling him I didn’t have any idea what it must be like to have a daughter’s birthday without the daughter around. In postscript, I added my wish that he didn’t know either.

  David wrote back: “Thanks for acknowledging Karly’s birthday. She was so big, bright, loving, and such good company at three that I wonder what she would have been like now. I imagine I will wonder that for the rest of my life, with every passing age.”

  Everything outside on this cold day is as still as a child in death. Silent tears will fall into soft pillows this Christmas season and seasons to come as those who loved Karly best, and even those who only know her from the stories retold, continue to remember the cries of a child distressed.

  Others have spoken to me about the tears that Detective Stauder has shed. It’s difficult to read the words of her report, knowing what we all know now, and not see the warning “Danger Ahead” embedded in Stauder’s own words: “I believe the cause and start of Karly’s hair-pulling is the result of her new living arrangement with her mother moving in with her boyfriend.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  As David drove by a gleaming glass office building shortly before their last Christmas together, Karly pointed at the mirrored building and said, “When I’m big and I’m a dada, I’m going to work there.”

  David corrected her and said, “But Karly, when you’re big you won’t be a dada. You’ll be a mommy.”

  “I don’t want to be a mommy!” Karly cried. “I want to be a dada! I want to be a dada!”

  David would recall that incident later in court as the moment when he knew something was terribly amiss between daughter and mother. “I told Sarah, ‘Your relationship with Karly is beginning to crumble here and you’d better take some steps to address it.’”

  Delynn was expecting Karly at daycare on Tuesday, December 7, 2004, the same day the state ruled the abuse case unfounded, but Sarah called and said she wouldn’t be bringing Karly that day because she was taking her Christmas shopping instead. Delynn was flustered by the call. By this time neither David nor Delynn trusted Sarah, yet Delynn felt she didn’t have the authority to intervene. “I was in a weird position between David and Sarah. I didn’t trust Sarah, but I thought, what could I do? The state’s been notified and nobody’s done anything.”

  There were times when Delynn considered she could be wrong. “I was hoping things would get better,” Delynn said. But Sarah called on Wednesday, too, and said Karly was sick and she wouldn’t be bringing her that day either. And then, on Thursday and Friday, Sarah didn’t call or bring Karly to daycare.

  Delynn was worried. “She was gone for the whole week she was with her mom,” Delynn said. With David in Portland for work that week, Delynn didn’t know what to do about Karly’s absence, if anything. If she called David and complained, Sarah would get angry with her. It was clear David and Sarah weren’t on good terms with one another. Delynn didn’t want to contribute to the aggravation between the two of them. Besides, really, what business of it was hers if Sarah wanted to keep her daughter during the week her daddy was out of town?

  On the weekends, David and Sarah had a routine for swapping Karly. They would meet at the Starbucks at Timberhill Mall on Saturday mornings. But on that Saturday, December 11, 2004, Sarah called David to make different arrangements for the swap. Sarah wanted to know if it would be okay if they could meet at his place instead of at Starbucks. Sure, he agreed, suspecting nothing out of the ordinary.

  “She said Karly didn’t look all that good,” David recalled. “I thought she meant Karly had the flu or something like that.”

  Sarah showed up with Karly in tow at about ten o’clock that morning. David was completely unprepared for what he saw: Karly was completely bald, save only for a few wisps of flyaway hair. Her face was bruised. There was some yellowing—evidence the bruising was a day or two old. One eye was slightly swollen. There was a teardrop-shaped scratch under her left eye. Her lips were badly chapped, like those of a person severely dehydrated. A silent, shell-shocked Karly reached for her daddy. David wrapped his frail daughter in a protective embrace and stared, open-mouthed, at Sarah, waiting for her to say something, anything, to explain what had happened to their daughter.

  “I was in shock,” David recalled. He questioned Sarah, demanded to know what had happened to Karly. What had she done to their daughter now? The only thing Sarah said as she handed Karly over to David was, “This happened on my watch.”

  David didn’t know what the hell Sarah meant. Was that some sort of admission of abuse on her behalf? Sarah turned to leave before he could spit out another word but not before David realized making the switch at his house had been a very bad idea. Nobody had seen Sarah with the battered Karly.

  Bloody hell.

  It was a trap designed to fix suspicion on David. Under any other circumstances David would have done what any reasonable person would do, the thing her mother should have done, and taken Karly straight to the hospital. His mind was racing, his blood pumping as David sought to soothe his distraught daughter.

  “It was very out of the ordinary for Sarah to drop Karly at the house, instead of at Starbucks,” David said. “I thought she was reckless and irresponsible. She gave me no prior warning that anything was wrong with Karly. She simply dropped her off and washed her hands of it.”

  A trip to the hospital would ensure the abuse case would be reopened, but it would be his word against Sarah’s, and the state agency had already made it abundantly clear he was the primary suspect in the investigation they’d just closed. Besides, David worried that if he took Karly to the hospital the staff would insist on separating him from Karly, and there was no way he was letting her out of his sight now.

  Terror seized his stomach. Clenching his jaw, he carried Karly into the house and sat on the couch. Karly clung to him like a baby chimp, frightened. Nuzzled in her father’s neck, she didn’t cry, didn’t move, and didn’t speak. She wanted nothing more from her father but that he never let her go.

  David was furious. He no longer questioned whether Shawn was abusing Karly—he was sure of it. The problem was figuring out a way to convince the investigators they had the wrong person. “I was very concerned about getting blamed,” he said. “I was frustrated with their decision-making process. I thought it was ridiculous they were accusing me.”

  David was convinced the state agency was looking for any excuse to take Karly away from him. “They were so busy trying to compile a case against me, they never bothered to find out what was happening to Karly,” David said. “They continued to assume I was abusing Karly, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary.”

  David put balm on Karly’s lips. He tried to get her to drink as much as possible. He knew he had to document the condition she was in, so he held out a digital camera and snapped pictures of an emaciated-looking Karly, battered and bruised, clinging to her daddy. Then, around two o’clock that afternoon, he took Karly next door to the home of his good friends, Dave and Jennifer Woolley.

  Jennifer and Sarah had been friends since 1994, but their friendship had worn thin in 2000. Jennifer told police investigators Sarah often failed to pay her share of the rent when they were roommates, and Sarah still owed her quite a bit of money. Moreover, Jennifer said she wanted to distance herself from Sarah’s irresponsible reputation. Sarah simply could not be trusted. Despite the breakdown in the relationship between Jennifer and Sarah, David had continued his friendship with the Woolleys after the divorce.

  David knocked on their front door.

  “David was holding Karly,” Jennifer said, later recalling that disturbing day. “She was very pale. Her hair sparse. She looked like a cancer patient. She was bruised and scratched from head to toe.”

  David haltingly explained that Sarah had brought Karly to him in that condition and he wanted Jennifer to be an eyewitness.

  “He was very somber,” Jennifer said. “He seemed to be at
a loss for words.”

  Jennifer Woolley was not alone. She had a friend visiting who did not know David, who did not know what kind of father or man he was. She only knew she saw a man holding a battered child.

  Karly clung to her father so much that every time he’d attempted to put her down, Karly woke up whimpering and terrified. His daughter refused to be left alone. But finally, and probably out of sheer exhaustion, David was able to get Karly to sleep.

  As soon as he was sure she was asleep, David put her to bed and attempted to file a report with DHS. He called Matt Stark at about 7:30 that evening but Stark’s phone went to voice mail. David left him a message, asking him to return the call.

  Exhausted emotionally and physically, David crawled into bed around nine o’clock. Earlier that evening Corvallis Police Department received a phone call from a woman who identified herself as a teacher, and thus a mandatory reporter. She wanted to talk to a police officer about a possible abuse case. The child, bruised and bald, was at her father’s home on Walnut Street. Her name was Karly Sheehan.

  Hours after David had fallen asleep in his own bed, someone banged on his front door. Roused by the pounding and still a bit dazed, David opened the door.

  “Officer Cox with the Corvallis Police Department,” said the young police officer.

  Cox was a general patrol officer. He’d been with the department for three years, but he’d already distinguished himself, earning an Officer of the Year award for his extraordinarily high number of arrests for DUIs, drivers impaired by drug or alcohol abuse. (Cox would later resign from his post at Corvallis following an internal investigation into the aggressive and questionable tactics he employed to earn that award.)

  Officer Cox told David he wanted to see his daughter. David told the policeman Karly was sleeping but the officer insisted he needed to see her. So David escorted Cox upstairs to Karly’s room. The officer shined his bright flashlight on the sleeping toddler. Alarmed, Karly bolted upright and commenced crying.

  “I took a look at her body,” Officer Cox recalled later in court. “Much of her hair was missing. It looked like her hair had been pulled out of her head.”

  Cox studied the bruises splotched across Karly’s face and head and made note of the numerous scratches on her face and the side of her head. He did not take any pictures of Karly, but he looked at the ones David had captured earlier on his digital camera.

  David explained how Sarah Sheehan had dropped the bald-headed and badly bruised Karly off that morning. The lawman told David he was headed over to visit Sarah, but before leaving he issued an ominous warning: “If your story doesn’t check out, I will be back for you.”

  After the officer left, David checked on Karly. She was in his bed, snuggled under the covers and so physically exhausted she couldn’t keep her sleepy eyes open. David knew his own fate and Karly’s would be determined in part by Sarah. Would she lie and say Karly had been perfectly fine when she’d dropped her off earlier? If she did, David figured the policeman would be back to arrest him. Such an arrest would undoubtedly mean he would lose his job, and it would likely mean deportation. At the time, running seemed like the worst of his options, but David didn’t yet know the full extent of the evil Karly encountered, or he might have snatched up his daughter’s hand and caught the next plane.

  Every loving parent understands that while their best dreams revolve around their children, so do their worst nightmares. David had woken up in the middle of Karly’s nightmare and he was at a complete loss as to how he should rescue them both.

  Even though it was well past midnight when Officer Cox left David Sheehan’s home, the policeman drove straight to Shawn Field’s duplex at 2652 NW Aspen Street. He knocked on the door and both Sarah and Shawn answered.

  It is standard procedure for a lawman to separate people he thinks may have conflicting stories, such as suspects or victims, but Cox didn’t separate Sarah and Shawn. Shawn made it clear he didn’t want Sarah talking to the police alone. That should have set off all sorts of alarms in Officer Cox’s head.

  Shawn and Sarah could have easily have said that the last time they saw Karly, she was perfectly okay, and no one would have been the wiser. But instead of denying Karly’s condition, Shawn gave Officer Cox a ready explanation for Karly’s injuries. He told Cox that earlier in the week he’d seen Karly balling up her fist, rubbing her eyes, and pressing her thumbs into her forehead. Those bruises on Karly’s forehead? Those were the corresponding marks left by her thumbs.

  And that hair loss?

  Well, Sarah explained to a none-the-wiser officer that Karly had recently been diagnosed with trichotillomania, a weird hair-pulling disorder. It was a little psychotic, for sure, but they’d been getting treatment for her. Kids. They do the craziest things.

  Cox glanced around the tidy duplex. He noticed the Beaver blanket thrown over the couch and the framed professional photographs of Shawn’s daughter hanging in the hallway. He saw no sign of anything to give him cause for concern. No half-spilled prescription bottles. No worn roach clips. No empty Jack Daniel’s bottles. Cox concluded there was no indication Sarah or Shawn were under the influence of drugs or alcohol. He’d know that. He was, after all, the leading cop in the state on such arrests.

  Before leaving, Cox urged Sarah to get Karly to the doctor again, pronto.

  No problem, she assured him, they were taking her to a specialist later that week. Then Sarah thanked the officer for his obvious concern.

  Back at the police station, Officer Cox filed an incident report. It was posted at 4:46 a.m. and marked No Press.

  Welfare Check:

  On 12-11-04, I responded to 4111 N.W. Walnut Blvd. on a welfare check. Karla Sheehan’s (age 2) parents (David and Sarah Sheehan) are divorced and she rotates who she stays with. Karla has recently started pulling her hair out and hitting herself in the face and scratching herself with her hands/fingernails while staying with Sarah at 2652 NW Aspen. Karla’s hair was very thin and much of it had been pulled out. Karla had several small scratches and bruises on her face and head. David and Sarah believe that Karla may have psychological and head. David and Sarah believe that Karla may have psychological problems and are getting her an appointment with a specialist on 12-13-2004. The scratches, bruises and the missing hair that I observed on Karla appeared consistent with self-inflicted injuries.

  Cox sent his report to DHS, and to Detective Karin Stauder, as required, standard operating procedure for any potential child abuse case.

  Nobody wants to be called out on a child abuse case, but patrol cops like Cox, in particular, don’t like them. Child abuse cases are labor-intensive, requiring a lot of paperwork and follow-up. There’s little glitz and glamour attached to the work, and very few awards, but a lot of heartache.

  Cox was the state’s eyes that night, and he did not take photos of Karly. He did not take the time to interview Sarah and Shawn separately, to look for any inconsistencies in their stories. Cox did not approach Sarah or Shawn with the same level of distrust that he did David. The officer had threatened David with arrest but took Sarah and Shawn at their word. Some of his peers at the Corvallis Police Department feel that Cox’s investigation that night was shoddy, done haphazardly so that he could hurry back to the work that brought him the most notoriety: trolling for drunks.

  Cox should have taken photos of Karly that night but he didn’t. The only documentation was the report he made based upon his own observations. A photo would have told an entirely different story than the one Cox reported. There was no way anyone could look at photos of Karly from that night and think all was well. As the father of young kids himself, Cox should have approached the case with more due diligence. His conclusion that Karly’s condition was self-inflicted threw the entire abuse investigation off the grid, and it was one of the primary reasons why Shawn Field was not considered a suspect until after Karly’s death.

  Back at the house on Walnut Street, David waited and waited, but Cox did not return to ma
ke an arrest. It was well past one o’clock when David crawled back into bed. His head sank into the pillow. It had been the most draining day of his entire life. There would be more days like this to come. But David didn’t know that yet, so he fell into a still and silent sleep.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  The last letter I sent to Shawn Field came back marked “Return to Sender, Refused.” He has the right to do that, refuse to speak to me. I understand why he doesn’t want to talk to me. He believes because Sarah was once part of our family that I’m biased. He and his parents, Hugh and Ann, fear anything I write will put Shawn in a bad light.

  Shawn continues to deny that he had any part in Karly’s death. Jack, the fellow who meets with Shawn weekly for Bible study, told me, “Shawn is very upset with God. He doesn’t understand how a loving God could allow many of the things that have happened.”

  And that was before the cancer was discovered.

  Three years following Karly’s death, I received a note from Jack alerting me that Shawn was seriously sick and asking I pray. “Shawn has been ill for nearly three weeks and yesterday they discovered he has a good-sized tumor in his chest. At this time, I don’t know if it’s malignant. He is in tremendous pain. Ann and Hugh wonder how much they can take. I would appreciate your prayers.”

  The tumor proved to be a very aggressive cancer. Shawn was moved from the prison in Pendleton to one in the Willamette Valley, where he received the best medical care our state is able to provide.

  I saw Shawn’s cancer as one more sad twist in an already tragic tale. David summed up my feelings best: “I think the mom in you probably senses the anguish of Ann Field.”

  It’s true. I feel a good deal of empathy for Shawn’s parents. I wonder if they feel they failed at parenting. Much like Sarah’s parents have done, Hugh and Ann have picked up the pieces of their son’s messy life since he was a high school student at Santiam Christian High School in Corvallis, Oregon.