Fatal Vision (54 page)

"That may have been what I said. The numbers are apparently not accurate. There were a lot of fingerprints destroyed. I don't to this day know how many."

"So when you said fifty fingerprints were destroyed, you now say that this was not accurate?"

"That was a common statement at the time, sir. It was—that figure was being used a lot. It was just kind of a common thing in talking about it."

"All right. Now, do you recall appearing before a body of approximately a hundred law students in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, on or about February 11, 1971?"

"I remember the appearance. I don't remember the date."

"Who arranged that, Doctor MacDonald?"

"Mr. Segal. He is a professor of law at the University of Pennsylvania and it was one of his classes, and there was some discussion about the MacDonald case at Fort Bragg, and he asked me if I would mind answering some questions from his law students."

"Well, I have an article from the
Daily Pennsylvanian
—I assume that's a newspaper at the University of Pennsylvania— and it says that 'Captain Jeffrey MacDonald charged that both the military investigators and FBI agents falsified and destroyed evidence in an attempt to railroad him into a conviction.' Can you tell us about the FBI, and can you elaborate a little bit on this falsifying and destruction of evidence?"

"First of all, your propensity to use newspapers as evidence mystifies me. Second of all, I don't actually remember ever saying that."

"Well, all right, moving ahead, do you remember a letter from Fred Kassab on November 6, 1971, in which he rebuked you because you were in the area and had not called or visited him? And in response you said,
‘I
have been in Long Island on several occasions in the last three months to continue work on finding three—possibly four, more might be added, according to current stories in hippie family number two in North Carolina— fugitives?''

"This is in reference to what we talked about yesterday," MacDonald said. "This is my trying to keep Freddy at bay. You know, you are taking it out of context. You should have read the whole letter. You probably did, but you don't want the grand jury to hear it."

"Weil make it available to the grand jury," Woerheide said.

At the start of the fourth day, Woerheide again asked MacDonald if he would submit to either the polygraph or sodium amytal examinations.

In response MacDonald read a statement that had been prepared by his attorneys, both Segal and Michael Malley, a former Princeton roommate who had worked for the defense during the Article 32 hearing and who had remained involved in the intervening years. The first part of the statement maintained that no useful purpose could be served by a polygraph examination because the technique lacked scientific validity and because the results were inadmissible as evidence in a majority of state and federal courts.

MacDonald continued to read: "Sodium amytal. Mr. Malley has called to my attention as part of his advice that he has known me for twelve years. That we were in the same class at Princeton. That we were roommates prior to my marriage to Colette. And we have talked at length about my feelings, my emotional well-being, and—" He paused. He was beginning to weep as he read the prepared material. "—my ability to cope with the memories in my life after these murders."

It was with apparent difficulty that he continued. "He believes he knows me as well as he knows anyone and to the extent it is possible for one man ever to understand another, he believes he understands my feelings towards myself and my life.

"In his professional opinion, it would be prohibitively dangerous for me to undergo a sodium amytal examination. This is a drug which causes a person to essentially relive the episode. It is not simply recalling, as most of us recall the past, but it is a complete reliving with most or all of the emotional feelings— anguish, fear, and grief—to go with the experience."

So overwhelming, apparently, was the intensity of these feelings that MacDonald was once more overcome by emotion simply by reading about them. He sobbed audibly, unable to continue.

"Take your time, Doctor. Take your time," Woerheide said.

In a moment he pressed on. "After the session, this experience is remembered, and the person has the same reactions as if he had actually relived what was discussed."

Once more his sobs prevented him from continuing.

"Doctor MacDonald, you are reading that. Would you prefer to have it marked as an exhibit and placed in the grand jury record that way?"

MacDonald waged an apparently successful battle to regain a measure of self-control. "I think I'm over that part," he said in a firmer voice. "I'll just finish if it's okay."

"All right."

"After the session, this experience is remembered and the person has the same reactions as if he actually relived what was discussed. Because Mr. Malley knows me so well and knows the murders of my family are the most unspeakably difficult thing I've ever faced, he believes that I cannot recall to this day or describe them without the constant problem of breaking down.

"I function normally because I try so hard to avoid having to recall, to retell, and to relive. I usually am successful in avoiding to have to confront these memories in direct detail, but this success is a day-to-day battle.

"Mr. Malley believes, as does Mr. Segal, that if I were to undergo the sodium amytal session, the reliving the murders would be so emotionally upsetting that I would not thereafter be able to pick up my life.

"They believe that a drug-induced flashback would be so painful that my normal and largely successful-to-date attempts to live with this grief would be destroyed, either permanently or for a long time, so as to make me incapable of living under the circumstances as a normal person in a professional life as is now possible.

"Accordingly, they do not feel the extreme and dangerous resort of the sodium amytal is warranted. Both Mr. Malley and Mr. Segal are friends and lawyers charged with representing my best interests, and they cannot recommend that I undergo it. My advice from them in the strongest possible terms is not to undergo such a potentially debilitating experience."

"Well, that certainly is your privilege, sir," Woerheide said,
^ut
and no one will make any inferences on the grounds that you have not agreed to subject yourself to these tests. Now, we had one other request in regard to the notes you kept of your recollec-lions in 1970."

"Let me give you an answer to that this afternoon," MacDonald said. "I mentioned it once and Mr. Segal spiraled through ithe roof, stating that was obviously attorney-client stuff."

Woerheide moved on to ask MacDonald about his association with the Fort Bragg boxing team. "Did you work out with them?" "Yes, for a short period of time." "You've always had an interest in boxing, I take it?" "Right."

"And in college were you on a boxing team?"

"It was a very loose club. We had a club at Princeton and I worked out with them. We never had any matches."

"Now, at Fort Bragg, was there any talk between you and the coach about being the team physician?"

"Right, he said they needed a physician and I had just come into the gym and I was watching the boxers work out one day and we started talking and he said, why don't you work out with us, and I started working out with them and then he mentioned the field trips—matches at other posts—they needed a physician. So,
I
thought that was a great idea. So I said, well, if it were possible I would like to do that. And he mentioned specifically there was a long trip to Russia coming up that he would like to have a physician on board for."

"When was that trip to be made?"

"Sometime in the spring."

"Do you remember when you talked about this Russian trip?"

"No. It came up on several occasions."

"Well, we're getting into the area very close to February 16, 17. Did you, on that day, meet the coach and discuss this Russian trip?"

"I
don't remember whether
I
did or not, sir.
I
've been asked that several times. And in the middle of summer, when my lawyers were questioning me about the events, that was really the first time that it ever clicked that that may have been the day—that there may have been a discussion on that day. But I'm not sure. I honestly don't recall that."

(Though in his "diary" for February 16, 1970, he had written:
Heard from boxing club coach who said I would probably hear within several days about the proposed 30-day trip to Russia. . . . Colette is almost as happy as I am. . . .

"During your growing-up period," Worheide asked, "did you ever live away from home for any extended period of time?"

"Yes, I did." ' "Will you tell us about that?"

"I went to Texas when I was a sophomore in high school. I lived down in Baytown for, I believe it was Thanksgiving to Easter of that year.''

"With whom were you living?"

"Friends of Bob and Marian Stern. I don't know if they were really friends. They were business acquaintances." "And the Sterns were friends of your family?" "Right."

"What did you say the name of these friends was?" "Jack Andrews."

"Was he, you might say, a contemporary of the Sterns and your father?"

"I believe he was a little younger. He was a young engineer for Humble Oil at the time. My father and Bob were older."

"Did he have a family?"

"He sure did."

"A wife and kids?"

"A wife and a boy, Jack."

"A boy, Jack? Was he about your age?"

"Same age. That's why I went down."

"What was the reason for your leaving home and living in Texas for this period of time?"

"Well, we just met them. Jack Andrews was kind of a free-spending type Texan who at least talked big. And he asked me at one time if I would like to come down and meet his son and spend a couple of weeks. So I asked my parents and they talked it over with Bob and Jack and came back to me and said, if you want to go, fine. And so I left at the end of our football season."

"Did you transfer to a school in Texas?"

"Not initially, because I was just going to stay a couple of weeks. But around Christmas time they asked me to stay. They thought it would be interesting. And I did, too. I was having a blast. So I called home or wrote home and they said, sure. So I entered the Robert E. Lee school in Baytown, Texas."

"Were there any family problems which resulted in your living away from your family for this rather extended period of time?"

"Not that I'm aware of," MacDonald said.

* * *

"Now I take it," Woerheide said, "being a doctor, you collected medical supplies?" "Sure did."

"Did you have any pills, and I have no idea what sort of medication it is, that some people refer to as uppers or downers? I think those are things that have a tendency to stimulate your bodily functions or relax your bodily functions one way or another."

"There was a bottle of Eskatrol diet pills which had some amphetamines in it."

Having seen the CID report which stated that testing of MacDonald's blood "did not reveal the presence of any dangerous drugs," Woerheide did not pursue that line of questioning, and MacDonald volunteered no further information.

Slowly, Victor Woerheide, though still keeping his distance, began to circle closer to the events of February 17, 1970.

"I know you've been asked this question before," he said, "and I believe I can anticipate what your answer is going to be, but I believe the grand jury should have the benefit of hearing it. Did you have any problems of any type—specifically between you and Colette—regarding anything?"

"We didn't have any problems," MacDonald said. "That, as a matter of fact, has been overlooked in the past."

"There were no quarrels or disputes?"

"Nothing major."

"Were there any minor quarrels or disputes?" "Yes, I'm sure there were." "Do you recall any?" "No, quite frankly."

"Well, did Colette complain about such things as spending money without you consulting her as to what you were spending money for?"

"Absolutely not."

"I complain to my wife when she does that." "Absolutely not."