My Name Is River Blue (48 page)

Mr. Lee said
that my scenario of how Carlee died was probably right. However, he was very
hesitant to build a defense that began with the notion that Bill Summers used,
or had someone else use, a truck with his company name on it to run Ant's car
off the road. I had to admit that it was unlikely for a smart, wealthy man to
take that chance. I began to worry that a jury would never believe my story of
why Carlee ended up at her father's house that day. Without Carlee's testimony
about what her father said, who would believe me? Even if the information came
out in court, Big Bill might have a great answer prepared by then. Mr. Lee
advised that we go with a defense that we could substantiate with witnesses.

Mr. Lee and I
were alone in Papa's office when I asked Papa to come in and join us. I wanted
his opinion about my defense. It was the first time that I told Papa about
Carlee's conversation with her father in which he stated that a truck hit Ant's
car. As soon as Papa understood the issue, he killed any notion that Big Bill personally
drove the truck that ran Ant and me off the road.

During the first
days after the accident, a city council member asked Papa how I was doing and
passed along his best wishes. The man mentioned that he had learned about the
accident when he was attending a small party at Big Bill's house the same night.
Someone called Summers with the news, and he apologized to his guests because
he had to leave the party. He wanted to take Carlee to the hospital to check on
her two classmates because he didn't want her driving on icy roads when she was
upset.

I never knew
that Big Bill had friends at his house that night, and I doubted that Carlee
knew or she would have mentioned it during our discussion the night before she
died. I didn't need any more convincing to tell Mr. Lee to work on a defense
that had a prayer of working. We thought we could prove that Big Bill had lost
his temper many times with his family over the past months and was capable of
accidently hurting Carlee in the midst of one of his tantrums over her
relationship with me.

Mr. Lee spent
days talking to me and weeks gathering information from people who knew Carlee,
her father, and me. He did his best to convince the jury that at the time of
Carlee's death, our relationship was the best it had ever been, but that the
same was not true for Carlee and her father. Mr. Lee provided witnesses to
testify that Carlee's relationship with her father had deteriorated into one of
violent arguments and that Carlee, in fact, had to leave the family home after
Big Bill assaulted her. The jury learned that Carlee's mother and younger
brother also left, as they had done before.

It was no
surprise to me when Beth Summers testified that Big Bill had slapped her on
several occasions and that she had left home with Billy Jr. three times. What I
didn't know was that Big Bill had also struck Carlee, and it happened more than
once. Beth witnessed one of the violent acts when Big Bill accused Carlee of
secretly seeing me. After he hit Carlee, she spent the night with Tina, who said
that the side of Carlee's face was still red and swollen when she arrived. I
could think of several reasons why Carlee never told me about her father
slapping her. For one, she probably wanted to keep me out of jail.

I already knew
most of Beth Summers' story of the fight between Big Bill and Carlee right before
Carlee moved into Papa's house. She announced that she was going to school with
me instead of Vandy as her father wanted. Her father ordered her to stop seeing
me, and she refused. According to Beth, Carlee said that she was in love with
me, and that she would do whatever it took to stay with me. Big Bill exploded and
accused her of lying to him all along about her relationship with me. He
slapped Beth for taking Carlee's side and after more arguing, he slapped Carlee.
She packed her things and left for the farm. That was when Beth and Billy, Jr.
moved out for the last time.

Mr. Lee told the
jury a story of the most probable way that Carlee died. He showed them phone
records indicating that Bill Summers had called Carlee more than forty times
during the week before she died. According to Beth Summers, Big Bill was
hounding Carlee to come by his house and patch up their differences. Mr. Lee
speculated that Carlee decided to give her father a chance, and as she feared,
it was an attempt to make her leave Deer Lake Farm and return to her father's
home. The visit turned into a tragic confrontation in which Bill Summers physically
tried to keep Carlee from leaving until he could convince her to move back home.
During their struggle, Big Bill accidently caused Carlee's death when she fell
and bashed her head on the fireplace.

Mr. Lee proposed
that Big Bill heard and then read the incoming text message I had sent to Carlee's
phone and saw an opportunity to avoid responsibility for the tragedy and
destroy me at the same time. Carlee was already dead when Big Bill responded to
me with a text that he knew would make me rush to the Summers' home. After I
found Carlee and placed myself in a compromising position, Big Bill called the
authorities, and they found it easy to believe his story when they saw Carlee
and me. It worked to Big Bill's advantage that I had gone into shock and could
say nothing coherent in my defense when the authorities arrived.

The solicitor
presented a different story from the one Mr. Lee offered. Mr. Stark wanted the
jury to believe that Big Bill and Max had been outside that morning in the
garden to review some work the landscapers had done. When they came into the
house, Big Bill passed by the family room and saw me kneeling over Carlee's
body. Before that moment, he was unaware that either of us was in his house. He
assumed that we had argued again, that Carlee left me, and that I followed her
to his house where I accidently killed her in a fit of rage because she wouldn't
leave with me. Big Bill admitted to kicking me several times when he thought I
was trying to get up and leave. Eventually he pulled a gun from his cabinet to
keep me there while he called 911.

Max Summers
testified that the night before Carlee's death he had attended a party on the
same street where his Uncle Bill lived. After having too much to drink, he
decided to spend the night with his uncle instead of attempting to drive the
five miles to his parents' home. Max stated that he knew nothing about the
incident until he walked into the room a few minutes after his Uncle Bill to
see Carlee and me on the floor, and his Uncle Bill holding a gun on me while he
talked to the authorities. On the witness stand, Max was as sad as I had ever
seen him, and it upset me for him to think that I had any part in hurting
Carlee. I wanted to call Max to explain, but Mr. Lee advised me not to contact
him.

Mr. Stark used
the damning text messages between Carlee's phone and my phone. They supported
the theory that she left me, and that I became enraged when she told me in the
text, "It's over." It was easy for the jury to believe that I was
angry when I arrived at the Summers' home to take Carlee back with me. Mr.
Stark also presented the note that Carlee left in my bedroom. For anyone
already in a frame of mind to believe that I hurt Carlee, the note supported
the idea that she was afraid to make me angry. Mr. Stark quipped, "Carlee
apparently had good reason to be afraid."

I almost didn't
recognize Marcy when Mr. Stark asked her to describe the time she met me years
ago at Carlee's party. According to Marcy, I threatened to kill her for asking
questions about my past. She distorted the truth about that incident and worse,
she added what I hoped was a lie when she said that Carlee confided in her that
I terrified her when I was angry. Marcy's testimony upset me as I thought back
to my angry reaction to Carlee's comment about Ant and Tolley House. It was
only one time and that one time didn't define our relationship.

Pointing to the car
accident, which killed Ant and shattered my dreams to play college and pro
football, Mr. Stark told the jury that I was a bitter young man, who was overly
possessive of Carlee and determined not to lose all I had left. He suggested
that keeping a rich girlfriend was my new plan for my future since I couldn't
play football anymore.

No effort,
whether legal or illegal, was spared in the prosecution's attempt to convict
me. Someone did a good job of spreading the details of my juvenile record that
the state was supposed to have expunged when I turned eighteen the prior
December. Before the jury selection, all the jurors heard the information that
was out all over the state. I had been treated for anger management issues. I
had engaged in violent attacks against other children in foster homes and
schools, and I had served time in juvenile prison for causing the death of an
innocent five-year-old boy. When I was in juvie, I tried to eat another boy's
face just because he asked if he could finish my lunch.

It didn't matter
how many times Judge Folk told the jury to disregard anything they heard about
my juvenile record. They heard it, formed an opinion, and it prejudiced
everything they heard during the trial. Even, if at some point during the
proceedings, they were considering the possibility that I never attempted to
kidnap Carlee and was not to blame for her death, when their minds snapped back
to the thought of me gleefully pushing an innocent little boy to his death,
their hearts hardened to the task of punishing me.

With the jury
considering what they thought was my past violent behavior and adding that
image of me to the note and text messages, it sounded to them like Carlee had
decided to leave her psycho boyfriend to seek safety with her father. The facts
supported the prosecution's claim that I tried to take her against her will
from her father's house. The jury could easily conclude that, although I did
not intentionally hurt her, while committing the crime of kidnapping, I caused
her death.

Mr. Stark argued
that my defense was a desperate and despicable ploy to blame a grieving father
for what I did to his child. He said I was a cold, heartless product of a state
system that taught me how to lie and blame others for my misdeeds. He said I
was good at manipulating people, but if I couldn't make people feel sorry for
me to get what I wanted, I had no problem using violence.

Compared to the average
felony case in Bergeron County, I had a speedy trial, and I believe that Bill
Summers' influence was partially responsible. Only three and a half months
after Carlee's death, the prosecution and the defense made their closing
arguments on Thursday, December 16, 2005. It was past time for dinner when the
jury heard the judge's final instructions and left the courtroom. Mr. Lee told
me that the jurors would begin their deliberations the following morning. My
nineteenth birthday was three days away on Sunday.

Uncle Manny,
Papa, and Howie Spearman had sat in the first row behind the defense table that
day. When the judge left the courtroom, Papa said that he had arranged for all
of us to have dinner together in the private dining room of a local restaurant.
Howie had to attend a sports banquet and couldn't join us, but he gave me a hug
and said he would check in with us the following day.

During dinner, I
asked Mr. Lee for his honest opinion. I wanted to know if he believed that the
jury would return with a guilty verdict, because in my opinion, things looked
bad for me. It was a question that he didn't want to answer, but he quietly
agreed with me that the jury would most likely find me guilty.

Mr. Lee promised
that if we lost, we would appeal, and Papa and Uncle Manny swore that they
would never stop trying to prove my innocence. I told them when the jury came
back with a guilty verdict, to let it go and not waste money on something that
was never going to work. I kept wondering what it would take to make Papa and Uncle
Manny understand that people like me were not supposed to get breaks. I was not
going to have some dramatic moment like in a TV movie where some detective
miraculously finds proof that will free me and send the real culprit to jail. I
loved them for wanting to help me, but it was time that they faced the reality
that I was going to prison again for something I didn't do.

***

After dinner, we
took a quiet ride back to Deer Lake Farm, and I realized that if the jury
worked quickly the next day, and the judge called us back to court that it
might be the last time I rode home with Papa and Uncle Manny. After a guilty
verdict, I would be taken into custody and held in the county jail until
sentencing. I wondered if anyone would bring me a birthday cake on Sunday.

When Papa
stopped his truck under the canopy where he always parked, I told them that I
would clean up my room before bed so that they wouldn't have the job of tossing
things that would be of no use to anyone. I told them that I would leave
anything of value for Tyler and them. I knew the way Tyler was growing that it
would not be long before he could wear my clothes, some of which were brand new
from my last shopping trip with Carlee. I tried to be practical. I knew that my
prison sentence would be lengthy, possibly for life, and I didn't see the point
of saving anything for me. I also knew that when the deputies took me from the
courtroom, there was no sense in me having anything with me but the clothes I
was wearing.

Tyler and Lewis
approached us in the driveway to see how the day in court went. I would not
allow Tyler to attend my trial, and I certainly didn't want him there for the
verdict. We couldn't say anything cheerful about the day's events, and I saw
Tyler's eyes water the way they did every day when I came home. I told everyone
that I had work to do in my room and started to walk in that direction.