A Silence of Mockingbirds (23 page)

E
mmet Whittaker had in
mind for some time that David and
Liz might make a good match. Emmet was eager to see David
happy, given all the heartache. It took some scheming, but along
with some help from his wife, Sanna, Emmet finally managed to set
David and Liz up.
Emmet and Sanna had talked about it ahead of time,
of course: how they could get these two together.

Liz Sokolowski is a lithe classic beauty: Audrey Hepburn with fair hair and
shockingly blue eyes. She moves with grace and embodies that 
katharos
 
Jesus spoke of when he said, “Blessed are the pure in heart for they shall
see God” (Matt.5:8).

David couldn’t help but notice her. “I’d always thought she was cute,”
he said. Their first few encounters in early 2008 were sporadic. David
would meet Emmet after work on Fridays for a beer. Liz would join
Sanna for a glass of wine. David had had surgery on his shoulder and
couldn’t drive, so Emmet would pick him up, and because Liz lived closer
to him, she would give David a ride home. Their conversations were
clumsy. Mostly, David would talk to Emmet and Liz would talk to Sanna.

One evening, a large group of HP professionals got together for
dinner and to attend a friend’s play. David decided to ratchet things up
a notch. “I made sure to sit across from Liz at dinner and next to her
at the play,” David said. “But another friend was talking to Liz about
a handsome friend of hers. She wanted to set Liz up on a date. I was
thinking, ‘How handsome can this guy be? Maybe he’s not!’”

Fortunately, nothing ever came of that, thanks to Emmet and Sanna,
who had finally devised a plan to get David and Liz alone. “You want to
meet Sanna and me for breakfast Sunday?” Emmet asked David.

“Sure,” David said.

“Liz might join us,” Emmet added.

Splendid! Breakfast with Liz was something David had been yearning for. On
those Friday nights when Liz would give David the occasional ride home, he
found himself entranced. “I often wanted to reach across and plant a big kiss
on her face,” David said.

Liz, however, didn’t have a clue David was crushing on her. “He was
so quiet,” she said. “We usually sat in different spots, so the only time we
talked was on those rides home. I didn’t get the idea he was interested
in me.”

And David didn’t know that Liz was already in love. “I loved David right off
the bat,” Liz said. “I know that sounds crazy, but I feel like I did.”

The foursome met for Sunday breakfast at a neighborhood bakery.
But when Sanna had to leave for an appointment (or so she claimed), Emmet
suggested everyone else head over to The Beanery for some coffee. The three
of them found a table and had just gotten their mugs of coffee when Emmet
stood up abruptly and announced he had somewhere else to be. It was so obvious
to both David and Liz they were being set up that they laughed.

“Emmet thought we were a good match from a personality standpoint,” Liz said. “He was trying to get us in the same place at the same
time. He wanted David to be happy.” 

In my almost weekly phone conversations with David during the spring
of 2008, he told me about the pretty, smart chick from Chicago. He sent
me e-mails, reassuring me that he intended to be extra careful this time
around. In May, he sent me this note:

Hey Elly May
(his pet name for me),

I will keep doing this group thing for a while and see where
it goes. Anyway, Liz might have no interest in me, so it could be a moot point.
But I hope she is interested; she’s a sweetheart. She e-mailed me on Tuesday
to acknowledge Karly’s anniversary and she offered to help with the playground
on Wednesday.

That had been a big point of concern for me. David knows I
disapprove of the silent treatment when it comes to grief of any sort. A
loving mate doesn’t tell their partner, “I don’t want to hear about all that.”
Initially, I held my tongue (a first for me) because I loved David and,
like Emmet, wanted so badly for him to be happy. When he told me Liz
had sent him an e-mail acknowledging the anniversary of Karly’s death,
he knew it would score big points with me. He was right. It softened my
heart toward Liz right away.

Liz has the gift of mercy, the result of having grown up hearing all
those tragic tales of the Polish people. “I’m drawn to people who have
suffered,” she said— part of why she was drawn to David. “I had a huge
amount of compassion and empathy for him. I couldn’t imagine what it
was like to lose Karly. David was so kind. From the start, I got this sense
that he was a good, good person. I didn’t know if we would wind up
getting married or not, but I thought that we might.”

Falling in love with the father of a murdered child isn’t the hard
part; figuring out how to talk to him about his child is what takes some
skill. Liz wanted David to know that he could talk about Karly with her anytime.

“David can be hard to read. He’s very reserved. He was concerned;
he didn’t want all this to be the focus of our relationship.”

One of their first dates was a trip to Karly’s grave. It
was Memorial Day weekend, this one marking the third anniversary of Karly’s
death. David debated whether to ask Liz to go to the cemetery with him. There
was a lot of complicated history to consider.

“He was pretty cautious,” Liz said. “He thought maybe I didn’t want
to hear about it, maybe I didn’t want to go with him— but he told me he
was going and asked if I could come along.”

Karly is buried on a gentle hillside at St. Mary’s Cemetery.
Not surprisingly, David picked the spot and planned the funeral without any
help from Sarah. He didn’t want her input. He waited for his family from Ireland
to arrive before burying Karly, so although Karly was killed on Friday, June
3, 2005, Karly’s services didn’t take place until the following Thursday.

When she saw Sarah Sheehan across the room at the funeral home, Noreen Sheehan
hesitated. Should she speak to her former daughter-in-law? Could she speak
to her? It was a question Andrea debated as well. Andrea was so angry she
had no intention of speaking to Sarah, but when David implored his sister
to be mannerly, Andrea walked up to Sarah and said, “I’m sorry.”

“I’m sorry, too,” Sarah replied.

Those were the only words the former sisters-in-law exchanged.

But that was more than Noreen received. “This was the mother of my granddaughter,”
Noreen said, “so I did approach her. I put my arm around her and asked, ‘Sarah,
what happened to our little girl?’”

Sarah never said anything, not then or the next day at the graveside.
The two women sat side by side, and when the time came for them to
put flowers on Karly’s grave, Noreen asked, “Sarah, are you ready to
do this?”

Silence was all that Sarah offered Noreen Sheehan. Karly’s graveside service
was the last time the two saw each other.

Noreen Sheehan struggles with the passage of time. “I could picture what Karly
would have been like at four, maybe, but not what kind of nine-year-old little
girl she would be.”

Karly’s grandmother thinks about all the plans she had for Karly and mourns
for what might have been. “We are left with the sadness, our own and the sadness
of our son losing his only child.”

It’s the memories that strengthen Noreen: “The memories of talking to her
on the phone. She sang happy birthday to me only two weeks before she died and
asked if I would love a cupcake.”

Even now the recollection of that brings a smile to Noreen’s face. “These are
the memories of a little girl I will love forever and never forget, and so life
goes on.”

Andrea has her memories, too.

“I think of Karly every day, mostly of the beautiful little girl who came to
visit, who wanted to visit the chippy fry store for ‘chocolate moatshakes.’
I think of all the goodness she brought to our lives. But it’s hard not to think
of how she suffered at the hands of that monster, and to this day I cannot understand
how her mother didn’t protect her. I know it’s wrong but I hate what Sarah did
to my brother and to my family. She took away a treasured child, grandchild,
niece, and cousin, and for that I cannot forgive her.”

Burying Karly violently tore David from the arms of all he held precious.
While he can’t cuddle her, suds up her hair, or kick a soccer ball between the
two of them, or awaken his sleeping princess with the perfect kiss, David feels
her presence when he’s sitting with her under the tree on that knoll, watching
the deer and squirrels romp like storybook animals. Karly would love that.

A year after Karly’s death, Andrea’s son, who is only seven
weeks older than Karly, asked his mother to take him to town to buy some wings.

“What do you need wings for?” Andrea asked.

“So I can fly straight to Heaven and bring Karly home in my arms,” he replied.

When it grows dark in Ireland, Andrea’s children ask their mother, “Why did
Karly turn off the lights?” And when it rains in County Kerry, as it so often
does, Karly’s cousins ask their mother, “Is Karly splashing in the bathwater
again?”

These are the ways Karly’s cousins keep her memory alive, through stories
of tricks they imagine Karly playing on them.

David and Liz parked on a slope near Karly’s plot. The air
smelled of wet bark. A bright mixture of fresh and artificial flowers were
scattered about the graves like mismatched colored socks. A spinning flower
garden ornament marked Karly’s headstone.

St. Mary’s is a pioneer cemetery, with graves dating back to the mid-1800s.
Catholic families paid $50 for the two-and-half-acre cemetery in 1873. Some
of the graves’ inscriptions have eroded with the passing of time and the soft
rub of gentle rain. Although located by some of the city’s most well-traveled
streets, the cemetery is shrouded with trees: tall ones and short ones, thin
ones and thick ones, a protective shoulder-to-shoulder watch. Sometimes, most
often in the spring, OSU students will bring their books and study under the oaks.

David led Liz over to Karly’s plot. They had brought carnations— something the
deer wouldn’t eat. David knelt in the damp soil, wiped wet leaves from the headstone,
and traced his fingers over Karly’s name.

Karly had been baptized at St. Mary’s on Easter, Resurrection Sunday. She wore
her daddy’s baptismal gown. It all seemed fitting now, almost poetic. This child
who so willfully kept rising above the darkness. She was joyful and merry, curious
and cute, and so very independent.

David had taken her to Avery Park one late summer afternoon to play. When it
came time to leave, Karly put up a fuss— she was not ready to go, not yet.
“Hold my hand,” David said, holding out his open palm. Karly reached up to
take her daddy’s hand, then, pausing briefly, she grasped his wrist instead.
It was a technical defiance, one that had David laughing to himself as they
walked off into the golden sunshine.

One night David was in the kitchen preparing dinner, but Karly didn’t want to
wait for supper; she was hungry now. She walked toward the refrigerator. “Karly,
do not touch that fridge,” her father instructed. The impetuous child put out
her hand and touched it ever so slightly with her index finger. She then looked
up sweetly, assuredly at her father. Score! Another technicality. David had
to fight to keep from laughing at Karly’s willful ways.

These joyful memories break his heart. The times he had to stifle his laughter
in order to teach his daughter to do better. That impish personality that was
all bubbles, and brightness, and boldness, all Karly— that is what David misses
most. It is not the memory of her death that haunts him; it is the memory of
her living.

David began to sob as grief pitched through him. Standing behind him, Liz reached
out and placed a hand on his shoulder. It was a simple gesture, but the sentiment
was not.

“I’d never seen him like that before,” she said. “The only thing I can do is
be there to support him, whatever grieving he needs to do, now and forever.
I want to be there.” 

Karly had done that once: touched her daddy’s shoulder in that very same way.
It was the Saturday night after her death. David was lying face down in the
bed. He’d been inconsolable then, too. All of a sudden, he felt Karly’s little
hands rubbing his shoulders. She didn’t say anything, and neither did he, but
his breathing relaxed and he fell into a deep and restful sleep.

A visitation from the child of Resurrection. 

“I know that was Karly saying goodbye to me before she went to Heaven,” David said.

I
nmate 16002306 has refused
all my requests for an interview. One law enforcement official offered that
perhaps the reason Shawn Field will not meet with me is that it gives him a
certain amount of control. The causes of child abuse are multidimensional: drug
abuse, mental illness, domestic violence, or an abusive childhood, to name a
few. Some abusers do it simply to exercise power and control.

Perhaps the theory that Shawn Field wanted to extort money from
David is true. But it could also be true that Shawn Field tortured Karly
because he is a sick bully. He liked the power it gave him. David believes
this and so do I. It certainly helps explain why Shawn began to torture
Karly almost as soon he struck up a relationship with Sarah.

I have no relationship with Sarah. We have not spoken to
each other in the past few years. I cannot tell you what she thinks. I can
only tell you she continues to act as if life is one big party thrown in her
honor. Her Facebook is full of photos of her all dolled up, or scantily clad,
at one party or another. She’s usually snuggled up to some new groovy guy— often
several of them— although they are getting older and older.

On what would have been Karly’s ninth birthday, Sarah made a
trip to Corvallis and, while she made no mention of Karly, Sarah did
put up this post on her Facebook: “Status update: traffic in Seattle to
be expected. Traffic in Corvallis, OR? Effing annoying. I’ve been at the
same gd traffic light for twenty minutes. Gah, I
LOATHE
this town!!!”
(Emphasis Sarah’s).

People who know this story often ask me, what do you make of
Sarah? It is a difficult question to answer. I am conflicted. I love and
adore the girl that I met in that Helix classroom all those years ago.
But the Sarah who repeatedly placed Karly in the hands of her killer,
and lied about it as she was doing it, evokes grief and sadness. Not
only is Karly lost to us forever, so is the Sarah I once regarded as a
daughter.

The most telling moment of this entire story for me came the
day I visited the Oregon Court of Appeals. Because Shawn Field was
appealing his conviction— an appeal he lost— the evidentiary files were
being stored at the Judicial Department’s building in Salem. I spent a
few days going through the documents, word by word, photograph by
photograph. When I came across a video investigators had made at
Shawn’s place the day Karly died, I asked if I could view that tape.

Having already been screened by security, I was escorted to a room
with a television. It was while watching, and re-watching, the tape that
I realized that when Karly was at Shawn’s house she slept on the floor.
While there were bunk beds in the tidy bedroom, there was only one
mattress: the one for Kate. Sarah testified that Shawn was fanatical
about the all-white couch in the living room, yelling at her if she so
much as let Karly sit on the couch, worried that she might accidentally
tinkle on it.

So on the last night of her life, Karly slept on a folded-up blanket on
the floor in Kate’s room. Seeing that pallet on the floor in a room that
sang Kate’s name with its leopard-print décor, Hilary Duff poster, and
cat toys, I realized how diminished Karly must have felt, sleeping on the
floor like a servant girl, not even allowed to sit on the sofa.

I sometimes wonder whose betrayal hurt Karly most: Shawn or
Sarah’s? Every child expects their parent to be their protector, their
defender, their safe shelter. It must have been very confusing for Karly
to have her mother choose her own wants over her daughter’s needs.

The public might find it startling, but the people who work on
the front lines of child abuse assessment centers routinely encounter
mothers, who for a host of complex reasons, put their children in harm’s
way. Or, more commonly, inflict the abuse themselves. Even after all
these years of diligent research, I struggle to understand why Sarah
repeatedly left Karly alone with Shawn. As a mother and a grandmother,
my heart breaks for the neglected and abused children among us. We
can and we must do better by them.

David sued the Oregon Department of Human Services for
negligence in Karly’s death. The lawsuit maintained the state did not
conduct appropriate follow-up on abuse complaints, lost photographic
evidence, failed to properly train workers, and failed to have Karly
examined by a medical examiner. The state’s attorneys were aggressive
in their response, putting the blame where the state had always put the
blame: on David. “The damages alleged by (David Sheehan) were the
direct and proximate result of his own negligence in failing to report to
the state facts he knew about Karly Sheehan’s condition.”

The case was settled out of court with a non-disclosure clause. David
has established an endowment through the Benton County Foundation
in Karly’s honor. “I think every kid should have an equal shot at life,”
David said. “I think it’s a pretty sad reflection on our society that there
are fundamentals that kids just don’t have. I wanted to try and do a little
bit to level that playing field.”

Once the community learned of Karly’s death, David received a
deluge of condolences, cards and donations. He used the money gifts
along with Karly’s college fund to build a playground at Avery Park in
memory of Karly. For locals, Avery Park represents the best of Corvallis.
There are kites flying, bicyclists pedaling, joggers running, dogs fetching,
families picnicking, people visiting, and children laughing. David spent
a lot of time with Karly at Avery Park.

In September 2007, I stopped by the memorial playground and
called David to tell him I was there. A toddler in a red t-shirt and blue
jeans was scooching down the slide as his mama held onto his dimpled
hand. Nearby, a copper-headed girl squealed in laughter as her mother
gave her a push in the swing. David told me there was a plaque inscribed
with Karly’s name on the wooden structure attached to the slide.

David and the good people of Corvallis built the memorial to
Karly in a grassy sanctuary, surrounded by lichen-covered trees. This
is the place where children kick their way to the sun and back without
ever leaving their swings, where wind speaks in whispers and laughter
hollers as loud as it wants.

When David and Liz have children, if they are so blessed, they will
take Karly’s brothers and sisters to that playground and speak to them
of the sister who died. One day, when those children are old enough to
understand, David will tell them of the whole story of Karly. David and
Liz will remind their children that evil is always threatened by goodness
and that the only way we can truly honor Karly is to be good and joyful
like she was.

Six months into his third term, and only a couple of weeks
after the sentencing of Shawn W. Field, Scott Heiser resigned his position
as Benton County District Attorney. He cited Judge Janet Holcomb’s conduct
in the trial as the reason for his departure. Justified or not, his feud with
Holcomb was legendary. He had filed motions to have her disqualified in nine
high-profile cases. Heiser said he would ask the Commission of Judicial Fitness
and Disability to assess Holcomb’s conduct in the trial of Karly Sheehan.

Heiser now works with the Animal Legal Defense Fund on behalf of those who
can’t defend themselves.

Dr. deSoyza left her job, too. I asked her if she left her
practice behind because of Karly’s case. She marked up her departure to issues
with administration. Specifically, Dr. deSoyza said she wanted to take unpaid
leave to go visit family in Sri Lanka, but the administration wasn’t keen
on the idea.

When a job at the Oregon State University campus opened up, she
thought it was the perfect position, from a mother’s standpoint. She gets
vacations and most of her summer off. There are no rounds or weekend
rotations.

There’s also no chance she’s ever going to deal with the nightmare
of child abuse again. “Most of my patients are younger and middle-aged
women,” she said. “It’s interesting to work with college students, but I
miss my babies. Pediatrics was a pretty large part of my practice.”

She still thinks about Sarah Sheehan, about the “what ifs” of Karly’s
death. “Sometimes I wonder if Sarah had not been my patient, whether
I would have been more suspicious. Having had a relationship with her
the way I did, she didn’t seem like the kind of person who would put
their child at risk.”

Officer Dave Cox resigned from the Corvallis Police Department
in 2007 amidst allegations that he was arresting sober motorists on DUI charges.
Cox averaged twenty-plus arrests a month for drunken driving charges. Eight
citations was the average for most city police officers.

The Oregon State Bar disciplined Clark Willes, the defense
attorney who opened up his case files to me, in 2008 for fraudulent behavior.
Willes had his client sit in the gallery and put another person at the counsel
table in an attempt to keep the state’s witness from positively identifying
the defendant. Willes disclosed the ruse himself following the testimony of
the state’s witness.

Detective Mike Wells left the Corvallis Police Department
after a distinguished career. He now works as a special agent with the Oregon
Department of Justice. In 2007, he received DOJ’s Officer of the Year award.
He has traveled around the nation, telling Karly’s story and instructing others
in the field how to avoid the pitfalls that led to her death. Throughout the
investigation of Karly’s murder, Detective Wells was disturbed by Sarah Sheehan’s
actions. “I have never lost one hour of sleep over whether Shawn Field killed
Karly, but I have lost sleep over what role Sarah Sheehan played in Karly’s
death. Rightly or wrongly, the decision not to charge Sarah with anything
was made early on.”

On the first anniversary of Karly’s death, most of the jurors gathered
together to remember the little girl for whom they’d rendered justice.
They thought it would be an annual event but it hasn’t been.

One juror wrote recently to say that he had thought the trauma of
the trial was all behind him, until he was called to serve on yet another
jury. “It wasn’t at all emotionally charged, simply awarding financial
damages, but once I sat in the same courtroom, in the same jury box,
looking out of the same windows and seeing the similar fall colors in
the leaves, I teared up and had such an anxiety attack that I asked to be
removed, which was quickly granted after they learned I was a juror for
the Karly trial,” he said. “It kind of surprised me, since I rarely think
about the trial or any of the key players.”

Flashback moments like this juror experienced are referred to in
military circles as post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. You don’t
have to go to war to suffer from it.

Karly was one of eighteen children who died in Oregon in
2005 because of child abuse. Two years after Karly’s death, and due in part
to the tireless efforts of Representative Sara Gelser of Corvallis, the Oregon
State Legislature unanimously passed a bill in support of child-abuse victims.

Karly’s Law mandates that if a caseworker or law enforcement
officer interviews a child with suspicious injuries, they must take photos
of those injuries and the pictures have to be shared with the Child
Abuse Response Team. Additionally, a previously designated medical
professional with specialized training in child abuse must see that child
within forty-eight hours.

These safeguards were put in place as a direct result of what were
deemed the failures in Karly’s case. While Matthew Stark conferred
by phone with Dr. Carol Chervenak on Karly’s case, the doctor never
examined Karly herself. Instead, Karly was seen by her family physician,
who did not have the tools necessary to make the correct diagnosis.

Joan Demarest has opened her own practice, focusing on criminal
defense, victim advocacy, and family law. Additionally, she devotes
time each week to helping OSU students with legal problems. She
also worked alongside Representative Gelser in the push to get Karly’s
Law passed. “Gelser approached me after Karly’s trial and wanted help
drafting meaningful legislation that would make it less likely that this
could happen again,” Demarest said.

“Rep. Gelser had been told by DHS that the real problem was
that they weren’t able to access people’s criminal histories,” Demarest
explained. “I told Gelser that was nonsense. Shawn Field had no
record of note.” Demarest told Gelser that the failure was that Karly
was never seen or treated by a trained child abuse specialist like Dr.
Chervenak. “As you may recall, we had a patrol officer concluding that
Shawn Field’s explanations of Karly’s injuries were valid,” Demarest
said. “Representative Gelser did an amazing job working with different
factions and getting Karly’s Law passed. David Sheehan and I testified
at the hearing.”

Rep. Gelser says that Demarest came to those hearings with a baby
in arms.

“Most prosecutors move on to the next thing after a case is done,
Joan did not.

“Her willingness to come to the capitol multiple times with a
newborn didn’t go without notice. I specifically remember checking
before the hearing on where there would be a comfortable place for
breast-feeding while Joan was in the building, because her son must
have been only about three or four weeks old at the first hearing. She
came not only for the hearings, but she sat in the gallery when the bill
was voted for on the floor.”

Putting Shawn Field away was not enough for Joan Demarest. She
continues in her efforts in helping improve the lives of children.

“Over the years since the case, I’ve watched as Joan continues to
talk about ABC House,” Gelser said. “Joan encourages people to make
contributions or to serve on their board. I’ve seen her urge contributions
to child abuse-related causes instead of gifts to her children on their
birthdays.”