The Murder of Jeffrey Dryden:
The Grim Truth Surrounding Male Domestic Abuse
Troy Veenstra
Smashwords Edition © 2011 Troy Veenstra in association with Veenstra Publications. All Printed and Electronic Rights Reserved.
This book is based on the actual events surrounding the abuse & murder of Jeffrey Scott Dryden. Information for this book was taken from personal interviews with the victim’s family and friends, press articles, court documents, medical reports as well as the authors own personal eyewitness accounts.
All information pertaining to this book has been researched with “due diligence,” thus having a primary and secondary resource. Furthermore, the family of the victim states that everything is true in regards to what they observed, witness and felt during the course of these events.
http://www.veenstrapublishing.biz
Parental Warning: This book contains Graphic details taken from the trial court, which details acts of violence; furthermore, this book contains some mature words not suitable for younger children.
Edited by: Sharon Evans, Roxanne Guild, Paula Dryden & Linda Irons
First Print
In print ISBN #
ISBN: 1466494867
ISBN-13: 978-1466494862
Ebook ISBN #
IN MEMORIAL
This book is dedicated to the Memory of Jeffrey Scott Dryden, Beloved Son, Brother, Nephew, Cousin, Uncle & Friend.
May you rest in peace knowing that Justice was finally served.
May 15 1982 – July 18 2010
INTRODUCTION
At 2:45 am on the humid summer morning of July 18, 2010, my cousin, Jeff Dryden, became a statistic. Actually, we, as a family also became statistics; we became a part of another group of families and friends that are related to someone killed by an act of domestic homicide. As for Jeff, he became a victim of the ever growing, yet, socially ignored disease that plagues the world of the male societal philosophy.
Stabbed in the neck, murdered in cold blood by his alleged 21-year-old girlfriend, Chiquita Rena Fizer as he attempted to flee from her after a dispute over her cell phone, Jeff became, and subsequently was a victim of Male Domestic Abuse.
After a year of constant sorrow and dread, anger, pain, and sadness felt by his family and friends, his killer was finally placed behind bars to serve 14 to 45 years behind bars for pleading No-contest to the charge of 2nd degree murder. Still holding on to the ideal that it was all an accident, she will have to live with the fact that she is an abuser, not a victim, but a murderer.
As his cousin and as an author of other written works I feel that the burden, or rather the privilege of telling his story now falls upon my shoulders. Thus, it is with this book that I will tell you what led to Jeff’s final breath, the horror and fear he went through while being involved with his female abuser.
It falls to me to tell the people of this world the truth behind Male Domestic Abuse. The truth as to what a wonderful person Jeff was, as not all men raise their hands to their lover. Not all men are abusers, as our society would like you to believe, but instead, to tell you of the growing number of men that raise their arms not to abuse their female lovers but instead to cushion the blow of their anger as they strike out to abuse their men and in some cases, such as Jeff’s, KILL…
“It has been said that time heals all wounds, but those that know pain, those that know the loss and heartache of a loved one know that wounds never fully heal. Instead, our wounds become scars, reminders of a time before the pain and heartache. A time---before scars...”
---Troy Veenstra (2011)
CHAPTER ONE:
SUNDAY JULY 18 2010
6AM
“Jeff’s… Jeff’s dead,” Eric whimpered over the phone, I could hear the panic in his voice, the almost cracking of his tone as if forcing himself to say those two words. “Eric, what… what was that?” I paused, hearing nothing but the faint echo of his breath against the receiver, waiting for me to finish my question as I tried to give my thoughts sound, “what do you mean HE’S DEAD?” I asked. My mind not fully registering his words as my thoughts feathered through me like a haze of faded photographs, flashing back to the last time I saw Jeff at the campgrounds of my aunt and uncles trailer home.
“I… I don’t know… Jim (our step father) just came knocking on the door and told me that Jeff, our cousin, was dead and then… just walked away,” he sobbed with an almost troubled sigh. “He said something about…,” Eric paused, “Something about what Eric?” I asked, needing more information than just hearing that my twin cousin was dead. “Something about him being stabbed in the neck by his girlfriend,” Eric responded as my mind fell into a great void of darkness, trying to think of what she looked like, yet faltering in my gaze to remember. “I’m… I’m not really sure what’s going on but mom’s not answering the phone at home right now.” He hurriedly stated as I paused once more. My thoughts vacant, drawing a complete blank as what to ask… what to say next.
“Troy,” Eric said quietly in an almost weakened whimper, I could hear the care, the concerned sadness brazening through his tone. “Troy, do you think… do you think he’s really dead?” he asked like a saddened child experiencing the despair of a tragic loss for the first time. “I…,” I paused for a moment, remembering a time not long ago when our father passed away. Remembering how Eric took the events back then. Recalling the tears that glistened down the sides of his face, the silent state of sadness he quickly fell in to.
Suddenly in those bleak memories, all I could imagine were those same dismal tears on the face of his twin brother; upon the faces of his family, the sorrow of it all causing a cord of dread to splinter deep in my heart as their pain showered through me in an awkward reflection of my own.
“Eric…” I swallowed hard, forcing myself to speak, “Let’s just wait until we know more… maybe he was just injured or something,” I sighed. “I should be home from work in about an hour and we should know more then---okay?” I asked, hearing nothing more than a shallow grunt, a speckling sigh in his tone that told me he already knew the truth, already allowed himself to feel the pain, the sadness breaking through his heart at the loss of another. “If you hear…,” I paused for a long moment, hearing the strains of his own pain as he fought back his grief, his own jagged memories of hurt and appalling loss, ”If you hear from mom, have her call me on my cell okay?” I demanded. “Yeah… just… just get home soon,” he whimpered. “I will,” I said as he hung up the phone.
Almost immediately I called my mom but got no response from her, I knew that she and my aunt Linda were more than likely in the thick of the whole situation, trying as best they could to comfort my aunt Paula, while at the same time contacting the other sisters and finding out more about what truly happened. Having no other way to confirm what was going on, I went online to The Grand Rapids Press. It was here where I found a brief article that depicted just enough information to confirm what Eric told me, just enough information to allow my mind to acknowledge the loss of another, the loss of a family member once more. Reporter Jeff Engle wrote (Engle, 2010):
WYOMING -- A 28-year-old Wyoming man died early this morning after he was stabbed, according to police. The man was found dead near an apartment complex in the 900 block of 44th Street SW at about 2:45 a.m. Police initially responded on reports of an injured person, and the man was later pronounced dead at the scene. Police have a suspect in custody, but have not released his or her name. The stabbing is under investigation.
This brief art
icle was just enough to confirm Eric’s heartbroken words. Confirm yet another tragedy to our family as a whole, and send us all down a spiraling adventure filled with tears, hate, sadness and anger. It would open our eyes to feelings we never wanted to feel, things we never wanted to see, and a disease ignored by the masses. It would lead us to the incident that foretold of my cousin’s murder by his abusive, 21-year-old girlfriend, Chiquita Rena Fizer and her rein of abuse upon our beloved.
Hours Earlier
It was still dark when they arrived at her home, the damp summer humidity leaving a slight eerie heaviness in the air as if foretelling of the grief to come. Slowly they roamed through the slight blades of damp grass like dark shadows of despair.
Walking up the slightly lopsided wooden steps, preparing themselves for the situation that was about to unfold like the countless times before, they readied for the gut wrenching cry, the weep of dread and sadness, recalling the sound from previous families and loved ones; they prepared to hear them yet again this day.
I would like to think that Detective Pols of the Wyoming Police Department held Paula’s (my Aunt’s) hand firmly in his grasp, gazing into her troubled eyes. I imagine he could already see the dread, the horror of the unknown echoing through her as a distant memory from her past rumbled through her like a torrential storm.
Those same passionate words; the cry of sympathy, spoken years earlier by other officers when she was told of her husband committing suicide, leaving her with their twin boys and unborn daughter. The sadness and sorrow, the tear stricken grief of a mother lost in misery after told her 28-year-old son, was dead, murdered in cold blood; the victim of a domestic homicide.
To think of the pain she felt at that moment disturbs me now even a year later, as I am sure that the sanity of it all crashed down upon her like an unbearable wave of hopelessness, only becoming worse with trepidation and confusion as Detective Pols spoke those ill words of grief and sorrow to her. His voice soft yet firm, caring yet stern, as he told her that Jeff, her first-born, her baby, had been stabbed in the neck and that her son had passed away. Only to follow those words of grief, of sadness with even more distraught and horrendous news, by telling her that they believed the monster that killed him, the woman; the abuser that took her baby from her was his very own girlfriend.
I can only imagine the heaviness she felt in her heart as her mind raced with images of her fallen son. Her legs weakening with each passing thought, buckling to the strain, succumbing to the devastating heartache and fury as her mind continued to race through all the recollections, all the past happy memories, shattering through her like shards of broken glass. Falling down to the floor, lost in an inferno of sadness mixed with hate, confusion mixed with loss, of outright horror and shock. It pains me to think of it now, what horrors ran through her, what dread fixed upon her soul that moment, those seconds, those breaths, after being told of such a loss and death.
It was my mother Roxanne, whom told me that they came to her in this way, leaving her dreadfully in the news of this great misfortune. Leaving her in complete shock, leaving her to reach out to those she could count on the most; reaching out to her family, her sisters who came, ever so willingly, ever so lovingly, to her aid.
Jeff & Jason
“Cut of the same cloth,”
From the time they were born Jeff was always half of a group known as “the twins,” in my extended family, his brother Jason being the other part of that dynamic duo. Never did anyone ever ask where Jeff was without finishing that sentence with an “and Jason,” nor was there a Jason without a Jeff. Even after they became adults, moved out, and lived separate of each other they were still referred to as “Jeff and Jason,” or “the twins” whenever we had a family get-together or saw one without the other in passing.
From the moment they were born; from the moment they both took breath upon this world, they were one of the same soul, both of the same mind and being. Both cut from the same cloth, both brothers and friends. Never was there a closer bond between the two for any other than their twin and never, at least not really, would one betray the other. They were like the day and the night, Thunder and lightning, they were brothers unlike most others.
Driving home from work that damp humid morning it pained me to think that I would never be able to say “Jeff and Jason,” again without feeling a great emptiness inside me each time his name escaped my lips. It upset me to think how I would have to catch myself from instantly saying his name each time I saw Jason and I wondered then if anyone else was thinking the same thing at that moment. Most importantly however, it pained me to think how Jason would react, and go on each morning having to gaze into the mirror everyday only to see Jeff’s reflection gazing back at him, the memory of what once was, the feelings of what could never be again and the pain that would go on each passing day.
Could the day go on without the night? Would a storm still be thriving and wonderful with only the thunder but no lightning? Would Jason be the same without his brother by his side? These are the things that rolled through my mind that morning, and these are the thing that I think about even now, wondering, thinking, and praying for Jason each day.
12PM
“The knife slipped…”
If you ever have, the unfortunate pleasure of finding yourself taking a sociology class, one of the first things you will learn is a term sociologists refer to as a “Mediated Culture,” also known to some as “Media Shadowboxing.” This term is often used when applied to how the mass media (such as TV, press, and radio for example) constantly bombard us with their version of facts so much that our society eventually falls prey to these interpretations of events, regardless the lack of actual truth.
This is similar, oddly enough, to some forms of repetitive verbal abuse, or abusive “conditioning,” where the abuser continues to abuse the victim with verbal, demeaning attacks until they begin to believe it themselves, thus breaking them to the point of conditioning.
This persuasion, or rather personal skew on the facts (or in cases of abuse, the victim’s perspective on themselves) thus changes the intrinsic mood and attitude of the public until such a time comes where the truth of what really happened is undeniable by most or thought as conspiracy by others. In fact, if you take this same construct to the next level, you can easily show that, at certain times in our own Nations History, it has been the, “Mediated Culture,” which has set the tone of our own personal morals and beliefs. Thus changing the moral and ethical values of all people to what the media has dictated to be politically correct and moral.
As was the case when the local media began reporting on Jeff’s murder, and to this day, I have never heard them apologize for their spin on the facts. I guess to some (not all) members of the mass media, the dead; the victims and their family have no say in the truth when it comes to the ideology of a mediated culture. Yet I will not fault all members of the media, as there were a few reporters from the Grand Rapids Press that followed this story to the end, monitoring what was going on, and eventually, with accuracy of the truth as their guide, reported the reality as it unfolded.
That said however, it wasn’t until early that afternoon that I was able to get a hold of my mother and get a clearer image on the situation than what I had been able to obtain after I got home that morning. The local news had reported that the Wyoming Police were called to the scene of a domestic dispute, and that a white male, (name unknown at that time) had been stabbed in the neck by his girlfriend after he came at her with a knife. The girl reported to witnesses on scene that they were arguing over her cell phone and that as he lunged at her with the knife, “the knife slipped and he was cut.” Other reports from the local TV news reported that there had been domestic assaults between the couple before, but did not state who the aggressor was in past incidents.
Thus, almost immediately, reporters from both facets of the media (TV and Press) began to write articles and show stories that left the reader or viewer to believe that Jeff was the a
buser. Thanks to this form of “Mediated Culture,” comments left on local news sites instantly made Jeff out to be the abuser and Chiquita the rightful feminist whom defended herself against an insane and drunk brute looking for a fight.
One of the reports that I saved during this time was done by FOX17, in which they stated that witnesses had told them that they heard screaming and ran out to find Jeff with a sever stab wound to his neck. The article reported that several people tried to help Jeff by applying pressure to the wound and/or calling an ambulance and other emergency services.
One of the witnesses stated in the article, "It was hard because he looked right at me, and I'd never seen anybody look like that before. He looked up at me for a second as if to say, it looked like he was saying help me, and he just kind of laid his head back down and that was that, it just happened that fast (Reporter, 2010)."
Strangely enough, the article went on to add what Chiquita was doing as others were trying to save her “so called” boyfriend. One of the neighbors stated that, "The first thing she (Chiquita) did was run up to me and grabbed me and said, ‘oh my God we were arguing, he's drunk, and he grabbed a butcher knife and we started fighting for the knife and it slipped."
I and several of my family members, after reading this article again later, thought it strange that as others were trying to save her lovers life, the first thing that Chiquita did was go up to a neighbor and lay down a basic foundation for a defense. Sadly, as we are a nation lead by the words of the media or rather, once more, we are a “Mediated Culture.” Most people that made comments on that report took her for her word, and made her look like the sweet, poor, African-American girl defending herself from the drunken white hillbilly (yes, the whole issue of race eventually peaked its evil head out). It would not be until later that night that the truth of what really happened began to filter through as to what transpired that warm summer morning.
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