The most prominent memories I have of that trip are the view of orange metal bars, and the fact that we couldn’t go anywhere without a guard counting us off, then having to unlock the doors or gates of orange bars before we could be counted again in the next area. At one point, we were taken to a room where a few of the criminals were able to chat with us, but I don’t remember what they talked about. I remember looking down at the metal ashtray on one of the tables, and seeing tiny stubs of what appeared to be joints of marijuana. Perhaps the prisoners just smoked non-filtered cigarettes. Ultimately, that field trip left me with the message that I would never do anything that would land me in jail. Between that and my faith, I became what I thought of as a “model citizen.”
* * *
When I was pregnant with Allison, I entered a courtroom for the very first time. I had been issued my first speeding ticket, and my husband told me that I could get out of the ticket if I just went to court. Following what I believed to be the wife’s duty, I obeyed Frank and went to court—alone. Just me, and my very pregnant stomach, as I was in my sixth or seventh month at the time. Not knowing what to do, I sat on the bench as close to the back as I could get, waited, and listened. I remember I was really scared. I had on my favorite blue-and-white print knit maternity top, stood up at some point to face the judge—and perhaps pled guilty, utterly defeating the point of taking the day off of work and going to court in the first place.
My second time in a courtroom was divorce court. Frank had moved out of the house in October 1997, explaining that he would “be back in six months to a year,” giving me a chance to “straighten everything out.” In January 1998, my lawyer served Frank with the divorce papers, and Frank acted out with one final burst of abuse towards me. After yelling at me through the screen door, he punched the window where my face was, but the glass held. Then he got into his car, accelerated into the closed garage door, threw the car into reverse, and flew out of the driveway for the last time.
March 31, the night before our divorce court appointment, Frank called me and asked me to give him a ride to Minneapolis, so that he could catch a bus back to Chicago. Frank never acknowledged the fact that we had divorce proceedings the next morning, he never hired an attorney of his own, and he never showed up in court. I was granted the divorce by default. I got full legal and physical custody of the children, the house, and the red compact car I had received my first speeding ticket in years before.
In the spring of 2000, I was summoned to appear in court again: Frank was petitioning to lower the court-ordered child support payments he hadn’t been paying anyway. The original plan had been that Frank would stay in Chicago, and the judge would communicate with him via a telephone call. At the last minute, Frank told me he was driving to Minnesota from Chicago for court, would be staying at a hotel in the town where we lived, and would like the children to spend the night with him there. Fearing that he was going to steal the children from me, the children and I went into hiding the afternoon before court. I made sure that the daycare knew Frank was in town the next morning, when I dropped the kids off, and then drove the few miles to the courthouse to defend my right to receive child support.
I sat out in the hallway of the same courtroom I had entered two years earlier to get my divorce and waited for my name to be called by the bailiff. I sat in the hall for a couple hours, my anxiety growing with each tick of the clock. My mouth got dry, my heart pounded, and the hallway got quieter as each person had their turn in court. Then, when I got up to go to the restroom, I saw Frank. He was sitting about a hundred yards from me, looking as calm and relaxed as if he were waiting for his favorite movie to start. Finally, my name was called. The terror I felt inside combusted enough to propel me into the courtroom. I wasn’t going to let Frank intimidate me.
My attorney was seated at the table on the left side of the aisle, the county-appointed child support worker assigned to my file on the attorney’s right, and an empty chair for me on the attorney’s left. Across the aisle, a court-appointed public defender was seated at the table alone because no one knew that Frank was out in the hallway except me. He hadn’t informed the court of his change in plans. The proceedings began, the bailiff made the telephone call to Chicago, the judge identified herself to Frank’s housemate, who had answered the phone—and that’s when they discovered that Frank was out in the hallway.
The proceedings went pretty quickly after Frank was called into the courtroom. Frank was sworn in, we were each asked to attest to the financial information we had supplied the court with earlier, and then the judge asked me if I had anything I would like to say. I stood up, opened my mouth to begin my simple statement, and tears began pouring down my face. “I’m a full-time mom,” I began. “I don’t get the luxury of taking any time off from that job.” In retrospect, I realize that this statement didn’t appear to have anything to do with the surface level argument of whether or not the monthly child support payment should be lowered. It was coming from the anger and anguish buried deep inside of me, which had read the claim that Frank could no longer afford to make the payment set at the time of our divorce because he had been fired from that job. No one in that courtroom seemed to care that he had only made one out of every six monthly payments for the preceding two years, or that he had never once driven to Minnesota to visit his children in the two years since our divorce, but he could find a way to drive the distance when it was a matter of financially benefiting him. No one cared that I was doing everything in my power to provide a stable and loving home for my children, even when it meant sacrificing my dream job of working at an advertising agency as a copywriter because the hours were prohibitive. No one cared that I was working two jobs in order to fill the void left by the missing child support payments. No one cared that I never got a break from the pressures and struggles of being a full-time employee and a full-time mom.
Frank won that day, just as he won the request in 2009 to discontinue paying monthly child support payments in general. The judge decided that his inability to work, because of back surgery, freed him from the obligation to pay current monthly payments. Frank still owes for what he hasn’t paid in the past, though I think my odds for receiving it are probably worse than winning the lottery. When I feel like having a sick chuckle, I call the automated child support payment line. In May 2010, the past due balance was more than $30,000.00.
But I’m an idealist. I believe in platitudes like the goodness in the world overcoming the bad, equal work for equal pay, and the victim finding vindication through the justice system, in the type of justice doled out on the television programs of my youth. Beaver Cleaver, for instance, saw that his mom and dad always knew what was best for him, and loved him unconditionally; Andy Griffith always caught the crooks in Mayberry, in spite of how crafty they thought themselves as being, and he was very successful at balancing his full-time job with being a single dad; Lucy managed to get into husband Ricky Ricardo’s nightclub act week after week, yet his love for her never faded. Nowadays, justice continues to prevail thanks to the dedicated efforts of the many men and women involved in maintaining the balance on Law & Order. Unfortunately, life doesn’t imitate art.
* * *
Since I had always been a “good kid” and had friends who were from “good families,” most of my dealings with the police and court proceedings have been as a victim. I spoke with an actual police officer for the first time in Chicago, when I was having the gashes in my head stitched up on Valentine’s Day 1978 (I had been walking home after school and had no idea what caused it, as there was no damage to the jacket hood I was wearing). I watched my mother speak with another police officer in 1983, when he came over to write the report on our apartment break-in. When Allison was in kindergarten, I discovered that one of her classmates had a sheriff for a dad. I spoke with him when he was sent over to the house to write the report on my becoming a victim of identity fraud in 2006. I consider these all to have b
een nice encounters. Each officer was present to take a report designed to help me. What I wasn’t prepared for, then, was the treatment Allison and I began receiving after her running away. There was no warning. One day, I just opened up the mailbox and saw a letter-sized envelope with the return address of “Office of the District Attorney.” Our first one came Monday, May 4, 2009.
I took the pile of mail into my bedroom, set it on the bed, and returned to the kitchen to prepare after-school snacks for the kids. It was hard to maintain a regular look on my face and attitude in my voice, but I didn’t want to scare anyone more than I was already scared by that ominous-feeling envelope.
About half an hour later, when the kids were happily distracted with their own activities, I stole back into my bedroom with a table knife. Inside the envelope were two pieces of paper. Both appeared to be form letters, one with information, the other seeking information.
“Dear Ms. Jeanette Lukowski OBO Allison,” the letter began. “I am a Victim/Witness Assistant for the [. . .] County District Attorney’s Office. Your name has been given to me because you are a victim of a crime that occurred within the jurisdiction of [. . .] court. I will try to help you and keep you informed of the status of the case in which you are a witness. . . .” The letter continued with more information specific to the court case regarding the predator who had lured Allison to the East Coast and sent her the bus tickets for the trip to meet him, and explained that the other enclosed form (a victim impact statement) needed to be filled out and returned as soon as possible.
Once I felt the message contained within that envelope was safe, I called Allison into my bedroom so that she could see the paperwork as well. There were only four questions on the form, asking about physical injuries sustained, costs incurred, and what we would like to see happen to the defendant. I invited Allison to answer the second question herself: “How did you feel after you were victimized?” On a three-by-three-inch piece of paper from a pad resting by the phone, Allison wrote in red pen: “I felt like I wasn’t good enough for anything besides sex; I felt stupid for falling for his lies; I felt like I betrayed myself [which was scribbled out]; I felt like no one will ever love me because” [with the because also scribbled out]. Later that evening, I filled out the victim impact statement, including the three comments that were still visible, and mailed it back to the D.A. the next day.
On Saturday, May 23, we received the next envelope. “Mom, there’s a letter for you and Allison, from the county attorney’s office,” Tommy announced, coming in with the mail.
Allison was almost eager to see what was inside that envelope as I was, but my heart warned that this might be something for which I would want to sit down first.
I moved over to the dining room table, set the rest of the mail down, and took a long, steady look at the front of the envelope. Yep, it was clearly addressed to Jeanette on the first line, and Allison on the second. A quick glance to the upper-left-hand corner also confirmed that this was some kind of official correspondence regarding her running away. It was from the county attorney’s office, but this time, it was a local return address. As I turned the envelope over in my hands, I noticed it was a bit thicker than a regular one-page letter might be.
Allison got as close to me as she could without touching. I took a deep breath and carefully slid a finger under the flap to open the envelope. I remember that I considered getting a table knife, to slit the envelope open more carefully, but knew Allison would be too impatient if I did. Instead, I very carefully slid my finger across the top of the envelope, hoping to keep the return address intact.
Reading the contents was a little more erratic. I pulled out the thick bundle of papers, and noticed a tri-fold brochure. The brochure said, “Crime Victim and Witness Rights and Services” across the top of the gray-marble paper. I remembered seeing this type of brochure before—the day I received a correspondence from a local social worker who had wanted to make sure we were aware of counseling services available to families in crisis. I moved the brochure to the back of the pile in my hand and took a look at the first page of folded papers.
“Dear Ms. Lukowski and Allison,” the letter began. “The above defendant has been charged with . . .”
I was confused. Having only ever seen divorce documentation to this point, I had to run through the meaning of the word “defendant” before my brain recognized that this was being sent to Allison as well. So, she wasn’t being charged with anything—someone else was. The someone else, then, I discovered when I continued reading the letter, was the man who gave her a ride to the commercial bus station the afternoon she ran away. Based on the testimony Allison had given to Officer Richards on Sunday, April 26, and Wednesday, April 29, the state was charging Gregory’s father with contributing to the delinquency of a minor.
Allison and I exchanged somewhat shocked looks. Her eyebrows were raised above wide eyes, a look that probably mirrored my own. Then, we both returned our attention to the rest of the papers in my hand.
“As a victim,” the letter continued, “statutes guarantee you certain rights, which are outlined in the brochure enclosed with this letter.”
Wow, I thought, she’s actually finally being treated as the victim in all this.
I flipped to the next page, eager to see what else was making the envelope so thick. The second page was a restitution and victim impact report form letter, similar to the one we had been sent by the state where Nicholas was being remanded. Okay, I had seen something like this before. But what else was making the pile so thick? I flipped to the next page.
The third page was almost a mirror copy of the first page of letterhead, but this page had Gregory’s name in the defendant’s section. He was being charged with criminal sexual conduct because of the photographic images of his genitalia he had allegedly sent to Allison’s cell phone via text messages, or “sexting,” within the eight months she had known him. Following that page, there was another restitution and victim impact report form, just as had been behind the letter identifying his father as the defendant.
I remember numbly refolding all of the papers, putting the gray brochure back in the middle of them, and inserting them all back into the envelope. Then I walked down the hallway to my bedroom like someone in a trance, threw the envelope onto my bed, and returned to the kitchen to focus on the rest of the mail. As I walked, my only coherent thought was disbelief. I wanted to ask Allison how we had gotten involved in all of this drama, but knew that she wouldn’t be able to supply any reasonable explanation either.
On May 27, Allison and I met with the victim’s advocate from the local D.A.’s office. The woman was very nice, but after about fifteen minutes, she felt the need to bring the district attorney himself in on our conversation. He came into the conference room, greeted us both with a smile and a handshake, and then sat down to address our many questions. When specific information was not readily available to him, he excused himself long enough to retrieve “the file,” and came back in carrying two inch-thick file folders of different colors. Was one file for the father, while the other was for the son, I wondered? The district attorney offered no explanation, simply saying that some of it was the “out East” stuff.
While he didn’t itemize everything contained within those files, the district attorney talked about how “we’re all adults here,” or “we’re all aware here of what’s happened,” and how “she’s done the things they talked about . . .” meaning the three “men” involved in helping her run away, numerous other young men who may have been investigated without our knowledge as a result of her hours of testimony given to Officer Richards, the perpetrator who provided her with the bus tickets, and even a few of the investigating police officers who stepped in while Officer Richards was off from work.
Now, I understood that Allison played a real role in all of this, and while I sure didn’t want to think about it, I got really annoyed by everyone’
s ready assumption that she did all of the sexual stuff the guys involved in the various cases said she did. I just wanted to shout at the district attorney, “Are they telling you she was doing lap dances or something? She was fourteen when they dated, and Gregory was nineteen, sir!” But I kept my mouth shut, like I’d been trained to do all of my life. I didn’t want to make matters worse for Allison.
* * *
Although there were many names mentioned during the testimony Allison gave to Officer Richards on the afternoon of April 26, 2009, only three men were ever charged. Though Alex, who drove her from the high school on April 24, was investigated for having sex with a minor, the charges were dropped on the technicality that Allison never admitted to having sex with him. Six months later, I discovered they had been sexually active. Alex had told the truth, but Allison hadn’t.
Nicholas’s girlfriend was also involved, but never charged. When questioned about the use of her credit card to purchase Allison’s eleven bus tickets, the girlfriend claimed Nicholas told her the tickets were for his younger sister. I can only hope she now sees him for the predator he is.
A few months after her return home, Allison made the off-hand remark that she had court cases against a father, a rapist, and a predator. Part of me wanted to draw her into my arms and hug the hurt little girl of my memories. Another part of me wanted to shake her, to make the teenaged girl see how her needy behavior had led to Gregory, Alex, and Nicholas. I had tried encouraging Allison to develop friendships with girls when I heard her talking exclusively about boys. I had tried keeping her in Girl Scouts after we moved back to Minnesota, but she refused to go. I had tried to connect her to our church, even though she had missed the window for confirmation instruction once again. I had tried to get her involved in extra-curricular activities at the high school. Too often, though, Allison would see my efforts as interference. She would yell at me to stay out of her life, she would tell me that she wasn’t like me, she would blame me for the migraine headache which inevitably came after crying. Rather than get into another fight by saying the wrong thing, I kept my mouth shut. I shrugged my shoulders, smiled, and looked back at the food I was stirring on the stove.
Heart Scars Page 16
