Victim Impact

by Mel Bradshaw

  “This rocks,” said Nelson, rubbing the cloth between his thumb and finger. “Buy this here in the Falls?”

  Shawn couldn’t help preening a little. “Here? There’s nothing but tourist junk here. I bought it at Sherway Gardens last spring.”

  “And I bet you don’t lend it to anyone, do you?”

  Weird that this cool guy would want to borrow Shawn’s hoodie, but that seemed to be the case. “Afraid not.” Shawn put some regret in his voice, just to keep life pleasant.

  “Right.” Nelson briskly removed the ashtray containing Shawn’s butts. “I understand, Mr. Whittaker, that you were informed of and that you exercised your right to phone a lawyer before interrogation on the soliciting and trafficking charges. And, from what I hear, you’ve been handling yourself well. I just have to ask if you wish to instruct counsel further now that the charge you’re to be interrogated on is break and enter.”

  Choke on it, Bling Boy! Shawn managed not to say.

  Fred Fanning and Meryl were at the boxy, modern St. Catharines courthouse in the morning when Shawn went before the Justice of the Peace in Courtroom 3. The lady in the black gown and green sash huffed and puffed a little before releasing Shawn on his own undertaking without surety or deposit and with only three conditions: he was to neither use nor possess nonprescription drugs; he was to continue to be employed in his mother’s store; and he was to continue to live at home.

  Meryl was sick at heart: she had truly thought that now that Shawn was in his twenties he was through with courts and crimes. Nevertheless, her first reaction upon stepping out with her son and his lawyer into the fresh air was relief.

  “Well,” she said, “nothing too harsh in those conditions. Are you going to ride your motorcycle home?”

  “How else is it going to get there?” Shawn teased. He knew he’d be seeing Detective James Nelson again in Mississauga, and wasn’t feeling nearly so jaunty as he pretended.

  “I just wondered. It’s looking like rain. Now Fred, how about I stand the three of us some lunch before I drive Shawn to the police station to pick up his bike? I see a Tim’s sign up there on the corner.”

  Fred Fanning looked glum and said he’d better hit the road back to Toronto. He already had his car keys in his hand. Shawn spotted the lawyer’s ancient, mustard-coloured Mercedes in the lot across the street—a relic, Shawn guessed, of his long-ago prosperous years.

  “A coffee then, Fred. It’ll be a chance for Shawn and me to say a proper thank you.”

  “If it’s going to rain,” said Shawn, “I’d rather get going. Just one question, Fred. Excuse us a moment, will you, Mom?”

  Meryl thought, since she was paying Fred’s bills, she had a right to be part of this conversation, but she did want Shawn to feel mature. She said she’d wait in her car, parked by the curb in front of City Hall. Five minutes max!

  “Can they lock me up again on this B and E thing?” Shawn asked when she was out of hearing.

  “What thing?”

  “I called you about it last night,” Shawn replied patiently, even though he believed vagueness this vague had to be an act.

  “You mean when you woke me the second time. Your freedom of movement is already constrained by these bail conditions this morning. If they think they have enough evidence to charge you with breaking and entering, they might just give you a court date without ever arresting you.”

  Back home in Mississauga, Nelson and his Latina partner kept coming by the store or the house and pestering Shawn with questions about events at 19 Robin Hood Crescent on the Friday of the Labour Day weekend. The soliciting and trafficking charges were back burner stuff now. They even got him to go before the video camera at the cop shop. Much good it did them.

  What did Shawn know about the Dark Arrows? He said he knew nothing. Well, what about the biker named Scar, who had come to the Handy Buy asking for him? Shawn said he didn’t know anything about that either.

  Nelson shook his head. There were awkward circumstances that needed clearing up. How, for example, did Shawn explain the presence of threads from his asphalt-grey hoodie on glass in Ted Boudreau’s basement window? How did he explain the presence of gum he had chewed on Ted Boudreau’s stair runner? Shawn shrugged. Someone was trying to frame him. He didn’t know who.

  Later Nelson asked how Shawn explained the presence of his fingerprints in the late Thornton Laverty’s truck. How did he explain the presence of his fingerprints on the jewel case of a CD stolen from Ted Boudreau’s house and found in said truck? How on earth did he explain taking Ted Boudreau’s computer to the Fair Share?

  It was after the discovery of the computer that Shawn was charged with first degree murder, and a Justice of the Peace sent him to the Maplehurst Correctional Complex in Milton.

  These developments triggered a certain amount of media attention and a change in his legal representation. On September 25, a thirtyish barrister named Natasha Cullen approached Shawn’s mother and volunteered her services. She had, she said, already spoken to Fred Fanning, and he was agreeable to the idea of handing Shawn’s case over to her. She was willing to take it on for less than Fanning was charging. A heartbroken Meryl told Natasha Cullen that she’d speak to Fred and to her son.

  The three-way meeting took place at the jail, some forty klicks from the Handy Buy. Morning visiting hours were from nine thirty to eleven fifteen, but—owing to some unexplained “situation”—the guards didn’t let Fred and Meryl in till ten. There were four sets of locked doors to pass through before they reached a room resembling a high school cafeteria with a glassed-in guard station in one corner. Under the artificial light, they were confronted by rows of rectangular tables, at each of which four hard, backless stools were bolted to the floor. There was no way not to be overheard by people at neighbouring tables.

  When the prisoners were at length allowed to enter the room through a door on the opposite side, Shawn affected to look as if none of the institutional hardness bothered him. Meryl was in two minds about this. She didn’t want his spirit broken, of course, but she wanted him to have a proper realization that he was confined among adult offenders for the first time in his life and that he should never allow himself to feel that he belonged here. When Shawn made no move to embrace her before swinging himself onto the stool opposite, she thought physical contact must be forbidden. Then she saw other prisoners hugging sweethearts or parents. Mastering a pang, she turned briskly to Fred Fanning and urged him to tell her son about this Cullen woman, who had shown such confidence she could get him out.

  “She’s a publicity seeker,” said Fred. “But that doesn’t mean she isn’t good. She belongs to a firm that’s always trying to outdo itself in involvement in headline-catching cases. Three-parent families, mercy killing, people detained on security certificates, mortgage fraud, whatever’s in the news. Her thinking is that the reputation she establishes will attract enough business in future to offset lower fees now. At the same time, she does her homework and, considering the tough cases she takes on, her success rate is remarkable.”

  “Is she a babe?” said Shawn.

  Meryl gave him a dirty look. Her dirty looks had never had much effect on him. This one was the dirtiest yet, but he didn’t care. He was all grown up.

  “Why don’t you check her out?” said Fred, plainly anxious to pass on a client who had grown too hot for him to handle.

  “You’re not going to be checking her out, honey,” said Meryl. Her voice sounded hard to her. “We know this murder charge is a crock. You have to decide whether you think Ms. Cullen has what it’s going to take to clear it all up. Now I’m counting on you, Shawn.”

  At Shawn’s invitation, Natasha Cullen came to Maplehurst the next day. She had a thin, acne-scarred face and a chest flatter than a fit man’s. She wore no make-up. Her grey-blue suit looked like an airforce uniform that had spent three years behind the wire of a prison camp. Shawn’s first thought was that this is what the policewoman in Niagara Falls should have looked lik
e. Then he’d never have made the mistake he had. Still, it was his habit to be pleasant with someone he was meeting for the first time, and he looked for something flattering to say.

  “I like your hair, Natasha.” He did like it. It was sandy-coloured and shorter in the back than in the front, where it fell in a curve over her forehead.

  She combed it back with her fingers. “I’ll give you my stylist’s name later,” she said. “First things first. If I represent you, I don’t have to believe you’re innocent. My job is to compel the Crown to make its case. If they don’t make it, you’re not guilty. I understand there are a pack of things you don’t want to talk about. Fine. But I do need to know everything about that Friday night that the prosecution knows or has a good chance of finding out before we go into court. Clear enough?”

  “Crystal clear.” Shawn liked this dumpy chick’s torque.

  “Let’s go through some of the Crown’s evidence,” said Natasha Cullen. “When you said you never lend your hoodie to anyone, was that before or after the police told you they were interested in the break-in?”

  “Before, I think.”

  “Good. And—I take it—before you were advised of your right to retain and instruct counsel with respect to the break-in charge?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Good. And, subsequent to being so advised, did you admit that the hoodie was not out of your possession or control on the Friday of the Labour Day weekend?”

  “It was late. I don’t remember.” Let’s see how uptight this makes her, Shawn thought.

  Natasha Cullen ran a set of crooked upper teeth over her lower lip.

  “Whatever statement the police took from you will have to be disclosed to the defence. We’ll see what they think they’ve got then. You say it was late. Would you say you were deprived of sleep?”

  “Maybe. I didn’t ask to lie down.”

  “With all those police around, you were too intimidated to ask. Your DNA was collected from cigarette butts. Was that DNA taken with your consent?”

  “No. I left the butts in an ash tray, and the police took them to the lab.”

  “Were anyone else’s butts in that ash tray?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Did you see anyone else smoking in that police station?”

  “No, I didn’t.”

  “Not surprising considering that smoking is illegal in all workplaces in Ontario, including government offices. Are you a regular smoker of tobacco?”

  “I smoke Mary Jane when I have a choice,” said Shawn with a wink.

  “And I take it you usually do have the choice, when you’re not in a police station—is that a nod? Yes? Then let’s not complicate the question. Let’s just say no, you’re not a regular smoker of tobacco. Perhaps this drug you are not used to, namely nicotine, influenced you to say things in your statement you would not normally have said.”

  Shawn laughed. “Pretty cool. What are we going to do about my prints in the truck?”

  “There’s always something we can do.” Natasha Cullen shut her notebook and pushed back her hair. “But before we go further, are you retaining me? Your mother says it’s up to you.”

  Cliff Whittaker knew Shawn was in trouble again. The drug trafficking charge pained him, but he didn’t really know what ecstasy was, so the crime couldn’t help but seem a bit abstract. He understood the pills were related to amphetamines, which were common enough among truckers trying to squeeze a few more hours into a day. Cliff had more respect for his body than that but wasn’t inclined to be judgemental. And then these X tabs were supposed to be hallucinogenic as well, which no one thought made driving easier. Maybe in a club setting they were safe enough. As for talking to a prostitute, that was something that as a single man he’d done himself, not that he was about to admit it to Meryl.

  Cliff had signed his family up for a long distance rate plan. He believed he stayed in touch pretty well while he was on the road. Still, separated by two thousand kilometres or more, with Meryl’s voice his only sensory link to home, he found it hard to come to grips with the doings of his younger son.

  How difficult Cliff found it Meryl well knew. Her husband was in northern Manitoba when the more serious charges were laid on September 23, so Meryl made a point of asking the Peel Regional policewoman who broke the news to her whether the force could postpone releasing Shawn’s name to the media until the young man’s father returned home. Detective Rodriguez replied that she was not in a position to make any promises of this kind, but that she would be certain to relay Meryl’s request up the chain of command. So it was that on his way south from The Pas, Cliff heard on the news that charges had now been laid in the case of the Labour Day weekend break-in and murder in Mississauga, without ever guessing that Shawn could be involved. Nor did Meryl speak to him at three a.m. on September 28, when he at last brought his cab’s wheels to rest in his own drive.

  On waking up at eleven thirty, Cliff found by his pillow a note in her hand asking him to come to the Handy Buy as soon as he’d had his breakfast and by no means to turn on the radio. This was odd to his way of thinking. But he couldn’t ask Dwayne, who was at his classes. When he phoned the shop, Meryl said she was with a customer and that she’d speak to him when he came down.

  Cliff opened the fridge and looked at the pot of active-culture yogourt Meryl had left for him. She thought he ate too much grease when he was on the road and tried on the rare occasions when he was home to clean him up. He’d never got used to the taste of yogourt, though, especially Meryl’s healthy unsweetened kind, and he needed a proper breakfast if he was to handle a heavy conversation. He reached for the eggs, boiled one for four minutes, and broke it over a piece of whole wheat toast. Not much grease there. When he’d finished that, he felt he could use another piece of toast at least, but his trousers were already tight in the waist, and he didn’t want to have to replace all the forty-twos in his closet with forty-fours. He wolfed down a banana in three bites before he could think whether the potassium—good—outweighed the calories—unnecessary. Coffee he didn’t bother making. He could get that at the Handy Buy. It would be bad coffee, but no worse than he drank every day on the road, and there was no point in spoiling himself for the two days he was home.

  Meryl had a lineup at the till when Cliff arrived, so he slid into the washroom and did the one o’clock inspection for her. Where did the toilet paper go? Someone must be collecting for a Hallowe’en costume as a mummy. The tiles and porcelain were exemplary, though. The trucker’s eye had lots of basis for comparison. His Meryl kept her place so clean, he believed, that she inspired the customers to wipe the basin and mirror after themselves.

  During the next quiet interval, Cliff sat to Meryl’s left behind the counter on a stool matching hers. The compressor on one of the freezer cabinets was growling a bit. He wondered if he shouldn’t have a look at it after their talk. The only other sound was the dry swish of passing traffic. The sky had been darkening when he drove down from the house, but he could hear without looking out that the clouds had not yet burst. Wet tires had a song of their own.

  Beside him, Meryl seemed to be gathering her courage. She opened her mouth, shut it again, then straightened her shoulders and, facing her husband, came out with what she had to say.

  “Cliff, Shawn has been charged with breaking into a customer’s home and murdering her.”

  “Hold on!” Cliff wrestled with his shock. When he studied Meryl’s face, she must have seen that he doubted his hearing, for she was nodding grimly. He couldn’t think what to ask first. “Which customer are you talking about?”

  “Her name is Karin. I don’t know if you know her.” Meryl sounded knocked flat, but pushed on anyway. The way she always did. “Regular for gas, sometimes treats. Early thirties, I’d guess. Summer evenings, she’d come in for ice cream with her husband.”

  “Oh, yeah—redhead, right? I just didn’t connect her with the Karin they’ve been jawing about on the radio. I heard there’d been
an arrest.”

  “Shawn.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “He’s in jail.”

  “They must have made a mistake.”

  “Cliff—Cliff, you’re never here.”

  She exaggerates when she’s upset, Cliff told himself. “I know my boys,” he soothed.

  “Remember, Shawn did break into cars.”

  “Youthful pranks, Mer. He’s grown up since then.”

  “What sitcom did you get that from?”

  Cliff felt the sting. It meant Meryl was more than upset. She was angry, something that didn’t happen more than twice a year. Experience told him that when it did, his best course was not to pour fuel on the fire. They said nothing more to each other until after the next two customers had been served and left the store. Then the sky opened. The start of the rain, sheets of it drumming the tin roof above them and pounding the asphalt apron in front of the store, practically guaranteed the couple an undisturbed interval. When they sat down again, Meryl’s hand slipped into Cliff’s.

  “I’m sorry, baby,” she said. “I’d love to share that old-time view you have of boys that soap people’s windows and tip over their outhouses and then grow up to be responsible homeowners and truckers. But what if Shawn?—what if?—oh, Jesus, Cliff—maybe Shawn turned out . . .”

  “What?”

  “Different.”

  Cliff was momentarily shaken. “You think so?” he asked.

  “I don’t know what to think. He won’t talk to me about what happened that night. I mean—” She looked down at her hand tucked into his. “Even if he did it, he’s still our son—but I’ll never be able to feel the same about him.”

  “Mer . . .” Cliff breathed again. She hadn’t made her mind up yet. He could still hope. “Why couldn’t it be a mistake?” he asked. “Like the one the police made with that Arar guy you hear about on every second newscast. Fred Fanning will straighten this out.”