Dear Readers,
I have switched over to WordPress, and my new blog address is LoriTellsAStory.com. Come join me for tales of murder, mystery, mayhem and marriage.

Lori Brasier

Looking For Love In All The Wrong Places

Tonia Watson will be back in court this week, tethered and in orange jail garb, sitting next to her boyfriend and co-defendant, Alan Wood, also tethered. Both, police say, are stone cold killers.

I'm not much interested in Alan. In twenty or so years in courtrooms, I've seen plenty of Alan Woods.  There is a coldness, a flatness about their eyes. It sounds like a cliche, I know. But the reason cliches are cliches is that they tend to be relentlessly, boringly true. I saw it in Daniel Franklin, a man who got out of prison and immediately knifed his ex-wife and her two little girls. I saw it with Coral Watts, a serial killer who celebrated his murders by taking himself out to eat at local restaurants. Alan Wood, a convicted sex offender, arsonist, and now accused murderer, has those eyes.

Alan and Tonia, both parole absconders, are charged with first degree murder in the heartbreakingly cruel death of an elderly woman in Royal Oak last Fall. Nancy Dailey was 80 year old when she let Tonia and Alan into her life, paying the two drifters to rake the leaves in her tidy yard. Police say they repaid her by slitting her throat in her kitchen, but not before Alan first tried to break her neck in her bedroom, then dragged her down the hallway by her hair, as she cried.

Nancy Dailey, in one of her final statement to her executioners, said "I tried to help you, you dirty birds," according to a statement Tonia Watson eventually gave police. Tonia, according to police, stood by as Nancy was killed.

On Thursday, the two will be in district court for a preliminary exam to determine if there is enough evidence to bind them over to stand trial. There is. Prosecutors are expected to present DNA tying Alan Wood to the crime scene. That, along with Tonia's statements to police, and the fact that the two were using Nancy Dailey's stolen credit cards when they were arrested two days after her murder virtually assure that the case will go to trial.

Here's what I want to know about Tonia. Who are you? And what will you do now? We know that Tonia is a chronic thief and drug addict. She has almost a dozen prior convictions. She is a heroin and crack user who tested positive while on parole. She has children from different men, some who abused her. She left those children behind when she hooked up with Alan, a man she would insist she loves.

Tonia, if she is eventually convicted, is an anomaly. Women don't generally murder or participate in murders, particularly those of strangers or near strangers. In fact, women kill once for every ten men who commit murder, and when they do, the victim is usually a spouse or close family member, according to statistics compiled by the U.S. Department of Justice.

Another interesting statistic about deadly women. If we do decide to kill you, the method will be something nice and tidy, like poisoning or smothering. No guns or knifes. Nothing messy. Nothing like what happened in Royal Oak.

People who knew Tonia on the streets in the weeks leading up to the killing tell me she was cunning, and much smarter than Alan. That she was likely the driving force that led to the killing, that there was "something wrong'' with her.

Her attorney is likely to argue that she was a mere bystander who had no idea that a killing was in the works. That she was just a woman smitten by a man, a woman in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Perhaps the truth lies somewhere in the middle. Prosecutors, as they sometimes do, may be offering her some kind of deal to ensure that the person they say used the knife to end Nancy Dailey's life goes to prison forever. Testify against Alan, describe that horrific afternoon, and you can plead to second degree, and someday walk free.

Testify against your man.

So I've been watching for clues. What will she do? She is a mother, after all. She has witnessed new life - and doesn't that bring with it hope? Doesn't that teach us in some profound way the sanctity of life. Can you cradle a newborn in your arms. then stand by while your lover knifes an old woman? Then go shopping afterward?

Will you testify against your man?

I found a clue in the notes her parole officer kept the day of her arrest, following Nancy's murder.
Tonia was distraught, to be sure. Overcome with grief. Not about the death of a kind old woman who wanted nothing more than to live out her life in her garden, to walk down her quiet street and visit with her neighbors. It was not about that.

Tonia "was worried about how she was going to live the rest of her life in prison."


A legitimate worry, Tonia. That's for sure.
 









 

Gluttony On The High Seas

Oasis of the Seas, the largest cruising ship in the world, docked at St. Thomas

I am posting this two hundred miles or so off the coast of Cuba. It is costing me 65 cents a minute to be online, so if I could figure out how to post using the Morse code, I’d do that. Instead, I’ll just type fast.

I am on the Oasis of the Seas, Royal Caribbean’s grand new ship, the largest cruising ship in the world. My husband and I have landed in this lap of luxury by using a credit card to pile up points and qualify for a free cruise. Suze O would no doubt disapprove of financing a vacation in this manner, but then she’s not basking in the Caribbean sun this morning, waiting for her 11 a.m. massage, now is she?

We have cruised before, although on nothing this spectacular. We began several years ago when we realized you could book a family vacation on a ship and not actually have to spend any time with your kids. (Anybody who tells you traveling with children is fun is flat-out lying). These cruise lines have great Kids Clubs on board, so all you have to do is herd the little darlings to deck 15 right after breakfast, hand them over to certified camp counselors and off you go. While you’re exploring various ports of call (which generally involves a lot of duty free shopping and Pina Coladas) your children are safely ensconced on board, stringing together puka shell necklaces and learning about The Secret Creatures Under the Sea and The Magic of Waves. You fetch the little sailors upon your return, feed them dinner, scrub them down, then pop them into bed.

This cruise is childfree. And this ship is like nothing I’ve even seen. It is 17 decks high and carries 6,100 passengers, not including crew. It is organized around seven “communities” including high rise suites that look out over  “Central Park,” with grass, meandering paths and 12,000 full grown trees and shrubs. You can zip line on this boat, rock climb, gamble, play miniature golf and take surfing lessons on the upper deck, where there are two wave pools. There are four swimming pools and half dozen Jacuzzis. You can even ice skate. There is an indoor rink on deck 4. There are dozens of high end shops, like Coach, and more than forty restaurants and bars. Some are open around the clock. And at many the food, which is fabulous, is included with the price of the cruise ticket.

All of which has left me a little uneasy. While everything is lovely and the service nothing but spectacular, it seems to me that this two year old cruise ship in some ways speaks to our seemingly unquenchable thirst for the biggest, the best, the next best thing. It is a mammoth floating testament to our fondness for excess, our need to be indulged. 

I mean, really. Have we become so demanding as consumers that we now think we should be able to ice skate on a ship sailing near the equator? (And am I the only one who sees the irony here? I flew fifteen hundred miles to Florida to get on this ship and escape ice, and now I can skate? Well, damn, it appears I forgot to pack my parka.)  

Off the coast of the island of St. Martin 

Do we really need the experience of New York’s central park, only a smaller version, when we are sailing some of the most spectacular waters of the world and visiting gorgeous tropical islands full of exotic fauna and wildlife? And isn’t it a bit strange to be making waves in artificial wave pools while on an ocean that has REAL waves seventeen decks below.

I fear that this is just one more example of how we’ve become less authentic in the way we live our lives.  Wouldn’t it be better to go climb real rocks, surf real waves, skate on a frozen pond in frosty woods? Do we want to do it on a boat just because we can say we did?

But back to the food. Maybe I never noticed this before but great food in all-you-can-eat restaurants open 24 hours a day produces a gluttony that should probably be declared illegal under maritime law. People eat and walk on this ship. People dance and eat. They get on elevators and eat. I’ve seen people sit in Jacuzzis and eat.

Let me tell you about my husband. When on vacation, his favorite time of day is eating time. Followed by nap time. Then casino time. If he could live on the Oasis full time, he’d be very happy, but soon dead of a food induced coma.

Yesterday morning, returning to the table after his third trip to the mammoth buffet at the Wind Jammer café, he attempted to conceal yet another three pieces of bacon under large chunks of pineapple on his plate. He thought he could get away with it. He was wrong. I am, after all, an investigative journalist. When confronted, he first tried to claim that he had “inadvertently” picked up the bacon. Because, yes, greasy pieces of pork can easily be mistaken for a whole grain muffin. When questioned further, he claimed the meat was in fact “turkey bacon.” In pursuit of the truth, I tasted it. That turkey once had a curly tail.

So we drift merrily along, stuffed and satiated and zip lining and rock climbing and ice skating on this floating city on the sea. Here are some interesting numbers. It takes six engines to take this 225, 282 ton ship through the Caribbean and costs $130,000 a day in fuel. This ship is so large that if you jog on the running track for 12 laps you will have logged five miles. (We managed one and a half laps yesterday before stopping for croissants.) On average, 34,000 people board each month, in other words, the entire population of Waterford Township. There is a multi-national crew of 2100 from 71 different nations. Crew to passenger ratio? Do the math. That’s one gracious Lithuanian or Chilean for every three bloated, self absorbed Americans.

And I still can’t get over the food. The kitchens on this ship use 82,000 eggs a week in preparing meals. Where do they even find that many chickens? In the course of a seven day cruise, passengers consume 15,600 pounds of chicken, and 16000 pounds of beef. And drink! Twenty thousand bottles and cans of beer, and 2,225 bottles of wine.

So does all this make for a perfect vacation? Will we all waddle off the ship on Saturday morning refreshed and ready to face our everyday lives? Does a week on the Oasis help nurture our souls in a world that sometimes seems soulless? 

                                                                       ********

One morning, we left the ship for the day and went snorkeling in a place off St. Thomas called Turtle Cove. Green Sea Turtles grazed on the sandy bottom below us as we bobbed in the warm agua sea. A barracuda swam lazily by with his toothy grin. I floated on my back for a while, and watched the clouds drift in a brilliant blue sky.  A diving boat close by tossed fruit in the water and we were suddenly engulfed by a swarm of bright yellow fish, some splashing onto the surface, glistening in the sun.

Ah, I thought. Such luxury.

A Drinking Woman's Guide to Housekeeping

Like many women who have full time careers, and even some who don't, I hate to clean house. The way I look at it, I spend all day covering crime for the Detroit Free Press, so it seems like a crime for me to then have to come home and mop the kitchen floor. But I also detest a dirty house. So you see the obvious and inevitable quandry here.

For many years, I solved this problem with a cleaning lady. But then Tammy left for a full time job last year, and after a couple of disasterous experiences with new cleaning services - including one that declined to a)make beds b) load dishes or c)empty trash containers unless they were overflowing, I opted to start cleaning my own house.

This was met with some skepticism by family and friends, mostly because they had never actually seen me in the company of a mop.  But I soon latched onto Speed Cleaning, a clever book by San Franciso resident Jeff Campbell, who once ran his own highly successful cleaning business. If you follow the Speed Cleaning rules (clean from top to bottom, carry your tools with you, etc.) you can polish off a bathroom in eleven minutes flat. After a few weeks of practice, it got so I could clean my three bedroom, two bath house in just under two and a half hours.

The problem, though, was that I still loathed it and took to dreading Saturday afternoons, the time I'd set aside to do weekly cleaning. I began dreading Saturday on Wednesday night. After awhile I began dreading Saturdays on Saturdays, right after I'd finished cleaning for the week.

My big revelation came to me on a Saturday afternoon around the holidays when there was plenty of champagne in the house.  Have a Mimosa while I clean! I could tackle the chores the same way I braved dental work, with a little mind altering substance. A sort of liquid Nitrous Oxide in a champagne flute to dull the pain.

It worked. And it's been working ever since!

I also want to note that today, February 22, is National Margarita Celebration Day. I am not making that up. My editor at the Detroit Free Press told me this, and she would never lie about such things.( I suspect she is something of a Margarita expert. I'm just saying.) So in celebration of this national holiday, and for all the women dreading Saturdays, I offer up The Drinking Woman's Guide to Housekeeping.

1)Be somewhat particular about your choice of cocktail in designing your Drink And Clean Regimen. After much study and experimentation, I've found that Mimosas work well, although a Bloody Mary may be called for, particularly if you've got some extra grunge to tackle - for instance, if your inlaws have been visiting for a week. These drinks tend to be light and easy to make since almost everybody has the ingredients on hand. Avoid getting too fancy - you start messing around with Manhattans and White Russians and you'll inevitably end up having to trot off to the store for some obscure ingredient like Grenadine or Creme de Cacoa, and this will throw off your entire cleaning schedule.  On the flip side, a can of beer doesn't quite have the panache you're after either. It lacks that element of pampering. Slugging down a can of Coors Light, while loading up the dishwasher, will make you look like Roseanne, in one of her 1980s re-runs. And it's always best to avoid Grown-Up, Smoking Room Cocktails, like Martinis or Scotch on the Rocks. They pack too much of a wallop and are unsuitable for mid-day tippling. You start drinking gin Martinis at two in the afternoon, you're NEVER going to get that bathroom floor clean, although you might end up napping on it.

2)Start your cleaning session by contemplating cleaning. You want to make this experience as cerebral as possible. While contemplating, mix one part orange juice and one part champagne in a frosted fluted glass. While sipping and contemplating, open up your laptop and scan the New York Times online to give yourself something to think about as you slog through the drudgery.

3)After you've finished reading the Times (and have succeeded in forgoing the crossword puzzle because you are a person of discipline and there are chores to be done) pour what's left of your Mimosa in a coffee cup, and freshen it up with more champagne. The coffee cup will provide adequate cover should a neighbor stop by and it's less likely than a flute to topple over as you move from room to room.

4)Gather up your cleaning supplies. Place your cell phone in your cleaning apron with the hope a friend or your mother will call to chat. It is impossible to clean, drink and chat at the same time. Chatting and drinking are to be prioritized. I like to think of this as a modified version of "mindfulness"- the Buddists' concept of living in the moment - only with booze.

5)Start in the highest part of the house, in my case, the second floor, and working with gravity, clean top to bottom, left to right, using your feather duster, and when necessary, your whisk broom. Keep your "coffee" cup on a high window sill or shelf to avoid getting dust and debris in your, um, Folgers.

6)After you've dusted and scrubbed, get started on the floors. Before you do, though, return to the kitchen, since you'll need another Mimosa, or in the alternative, a Bloody Mary (see reference above to excessive grunge). Vacuuming and mopping can work up a hell of a thirst and you'll want something close at hand. This is also a good time to break and call somebody to bitch about having to do housework (see reference to Mindfulness in Step 3). If you can't get anybody on the phone, write something pithy on your Facebook, preferably something designed to garner sympathy in light of your endless chores, then log on to the Huffington Post. Read thoroughly, since you will have already used up all of your New York Times material while scrubbing and dusting and will need something new to think about.

7)Back to work, only now with Arianna's take on the Greek Economic Crisis to get you through the next hour. Contrary to most efficiency experts, it is entirely possible to drink and vacuum at the same time, although it requires practice, concentration and the right kind of vacuum cleaner. Canisters are tricky, since you need both hands to vacuum and tug the canister along. An upright works better. You can glide the vacuum with one hand and hold your drink with the other. Mopping, however, requires that you put your drink down at least part of the time, at least when it comes to wringing.

8)There! Now your house is clean! Celebrate. Refresh your drink. You are pleasantly relaxed and ready for a nap. Or if you're so inclined, a pedicure.

In the hours after a session of Speed Cleaning With Mimosas, a few moments for a pedicure.


Here are my two favorite Cleanin' and Cocktailin' recipes. Please send me yours in the comment section.


Lori's Mostly Magnificent Mimosas

As I said, keep
 it simple.
One part champagne. Don't use expensive wines. The orange juice is the dominant flavor so anything fancy is wasting money. Cooks Champagne puts out a perfectly decent extra dry champagne for about seven bucks a bottle.Then add one part orange juice. If you want to splurge - and you should, for heavens sake, you're cleaning house - then go for the fresh squeezed. If you want an extra special Mimosa, make it a Morning Glory Mimosa, with a shot of Pineapple vodka. I know. Pineapple vodka gives one pause for concern, but the orange juice takes care of business and reins it in.

Mother's Bloody Mary
Frankly, I don't think you can go wrong with Mr. T's Spicy Bloody Mary Mix and a shot of Absolute. In a pinch, spice up tomato juice, or even V8 with a dash of hot sauce, worchestire sauce, lemon juice, salt and pepper. Stir with a celery stick, although some folks like green olives on a toothpick. No accounting for taste.

I Spy. You Spy. We All Spy. Is it a crime?

Meet Leon Walker. You'll like him. He's very pleasant, nice looking, well spoken and polite. Smart too. Landed himself a very successful job as a computer technician for Oakland County, the wealthy community north of Detroit, where a lot of the automotive and high tech money is. We call it Automation Alley. Leon, 34 single, and a resident of the tony suburb of Rochester Hills, fits right in.

If law enforcement has its way, though, Leon will soon be a convicted felon. His crime? He snooped in his wife's email. Yep. You read that right. Suspicious that his wife Clara was cheating, he used her password to log onto to her gmail account, and discovered that yes! She was cheating and not just cheating with anyone! Leon was Clara's third husband and he discovered she was cheating with her second husband, a man who had been arrested for beating her in front of a child she shared with her first husband.

If you need to grab a pen and paper just to chart this tawdry mess you may be excused for the moment.

Leon, upon discovering the tryst, immediately notified the first husband, worried about the child Clara and the first husband shared. And since Leon and Clara also shared a young daughter, Leon was also worried about that child as well. It appeared from Clara's email that both children had been exposed to the man Clara claimed had once been violent toward her. The first husband immediately filed for a change of custody and attached the purloined emails to his motion.

Clara, once she realized that her email had been accessed contacted the Oakland County Sheriff's Office. At first, investigators told her it was a civil matter. That was how they handled all such complaints in the past. But Clara, whose persistence is matched only perhaps by her ability to acquire, then discard husbands, continued to complain.

Eventually, the Oakland County Prosecutor's office charged Leon, who has no prior criminal record, with computer hacking, a five year felony. The Detroit Free Press covered the story. The outrage was immediate and worldwide, with thousands of people demanding that the case be dropped and plenty admitting that they too had been guilty of the very felony Leon was now facing.

What makes this case so interesting - above and beyond the deliciously awful facts - is that it is a case study of what happens when law can't keep up with technology. The hacking statute under which Leon Walker is charged was written more than two decades ago, and appears to be designed to prevent employees from walking off with trade secrets or to punish people who steal other people's identities. It is unlikely legislators were anticipating the ongoing reality show that is Clara and Leon. (They have since divorced.)

And snooping - particularly among warring spouses - is not at all uncommon. Just ask any divorce attorney. In fact some experts estimate about 45 percent of divorces involve some sort of clandestine behavior - reading emails, hacking Facebook accounts, opening snail mail, spying. So the Leon Walker case begs a bigger question. How nosey can you be in your marital home?

Leon's pugnascious and highly entertaining attorney, Leon Weiss - who appears to always be on the verge of a cerebral hemorrage over the treatment of his client - trotted the matter up to the Michigan Court of Appeals and at first it seemed he'd found a sympathetic ear, with the higher court issuing a stay, and the judges noting they had "serious concerns" about whether the statute applies to cases of domestic snooping.

But by the time Leon and Leon got before the three membert panel in December for oral arguments, those judges appeared to have a change of heart. Under the strictest reading of the law - you can't access another person's computer or computerized accounts without their permission - Leon's actions might very well be criminal, they said, ordering that the case proceed to trial. It is now set to go befoer a jury in March.

Oakland County prosecutor Jessica Cooper has been steadfast in defending her decision to charge Leon Walker, despite almost universal criticism. The fact that he'd discovered Clara back with a man she once said beat her is inconsequential, she told me in December. And she questioned whether the public reaction would be different if Walker had been snooping in email about Clara's bank accounts, or had been reading email exchanges she might have been having with her divorce attorney. Walker, Cooper says, is a computer hacker who should face the consequences.

So what will twelve of Leon Walker's peers decide when they hear the facts? And what will you do the next time your spouse - or even your kid - leaves a Gmail account open on the screen?

Better think twice.


.

Going To The Dogs

Famous Amos pauses for a photo op

Last week, my buddy Amos stopped by the courthouse pressroom to pay me a visit.

Now, I'm accustomed to attorneys dropping in on occasion to speculate on the IQs of various sitting judges. And cops sometimes knock on my door to give me a scoop. Defendants - at least those not in custody - will often track me down in my third floor office to profess their innocence.

Amos came by to get his ears scratched.

Amos is a chunky chocolate lab, 70 pounds of wiggling, tail-wagging love and affection. Think of a luscious brownie - the kind that gives you comfort in your darkest hour, sweet and satisfying and nurturing. That's Amos, a confection with big brown eyes and a pink tongue that tends to lag to one side if he's been romping. There is an air of kindness about him. He'll put his head in your lap and gaze up at you as if to say, "Come on now. Everything's going to be okay. So how about a game of fetch to take your mind off your troubles?"

So it's not surprising that Amos is employed as a court therapy dog, the first in Michigan, and part of a growing national trend. He is particularly good with children who are faced with having to testify in court, and those who end up in the system because of neglect or abuse. A half hour of Amos Time and children are calmer and happier as they face what are often some of the most trying times in their young lives.

Amos once aspired to be a seeing eye dog, and was in training at the Leader Dogs for the Blind in Rochester, Michigan. But his natural exhuberance - he'd rather trot with his tail wagging then walk sedately next to his trainer, and he tends to pull on the leash - got him bounced out of Leader Dogs. The new therapy dog project, Canine Advocacy Program, or CAP, launched by Dan Cojanu, was just beginning and Amos seemed a perfect fit.

Cojanu spent years as the head of the Victims Advocacy unit in Oakland County's Circuit Court in Pontiac, Michigan, helping people in enormous pain, suffering from terrible loss, navigate the court system. It was tough, rewarding work. Now retired, Cojanu spotted a kindred spirit in Amos.

After several months of research and training, Amos was soon on the job, in and out of courtrooms, called to duty by judges and court personnel and social workers to help children who had been traumatized. He spent hours with young girls in Childrens Village, the county facility where abused children are often housed. He hung out with kids in district courts waiting to testify against adults who had harmed them. He socialized with court personnel, who are also often stressed by their workloads.

Since Amos made his 2008 debut, he has been followed by Dodger, a yellow lab working his magic in the Bay County Prosecutors office, and Rylan, a very elegant Doberman who is working with war veterans who end up in metro Detroit's Novi district court.

Dodger, working in Bay City to help traumatized kids.

It makes sense, when you think about it. Everything about a courthouse is cold and antispetic and intimidating. The walls are marble, the ceilings high, the light harsh, the benchs unyielding and stiff. People in a courtroom are often at their most vulnerable, but there is no soft spot to lay your head, no quiet cozy corner to rest your mind. There are rules - shut off your cell phones! No food. No talking! No hats! - and armed deputies to enforce those rules, plus all kinds of protocol nobody understands. "All rise!" the court clerk announces each time the judge enters the courtroom. Up and down. Up and down.

And the judges! Think about that! Perched up high and wearing black and peering down on the minions, like ancient crones from a scary nursery tale. Some aren't even old, but I'm guessing in a child's mind, scary nonethelss. More powerful than Oz. We understand why Dorothy and the Tin Man trembled. So it's no wonder kids clam up and can't talk.

Then along comes a furry friendly face. No judgment there. No questions to answer. No strange courtroom rules. Just a dog who likes you and seems to listen. Who will let you pet him. Who brings a few moments of normalcy into an otherwise insane world.


Cojanu tells a wonderful story about a little girl struggling to relay to the court the trauma she'd undergone. Because Cojanu is kind and ethical, he does not reveal much about the girl, or the hearbreak she has suffered. But he talks about the moment the girl turns to Amos, lifts his floppy ear, and reveals in a very loud whisper, all the information she needed to relay.

Amos, as was expected, was a sympathetic listener.

Hiding Out In Hawaii

Aloha! I am hiding out this week on the Hawaiian Island of Kauai with my friend Jeanne, whom I’ve known since the eighth grade. We are belatedly celebrating our December birthdays. We are not sharing which birthday – but it was a biggie, and we decided it merited something special. We are staying in Jeanne’s oceanfront condo and wake every morning to the sound of the waves.

This is a most astonishing place, wild and ferocious. It is an island mostly undeveloped, with ragged mountain tops and deep valleys, verdant rain forests and wide swaths of pasture where cattle graze under a cerulean sun. Feral chickens wander about and sometimes peck at our patio door.

My mother Bonnie has come along to chaperone. Now it might seem that women our age would not require looking after, and I suppose that’s true. We’ve spent the first few days on this luscious island swimming and hiking, shopping and snorkeling. We’ve been drinking Dom Perignon at night because there is a Costco on this island and Jeanne has a credit card. 

But there was a time when Jeanne and I had a rather, um, extensive criminal history. It is our past that keeps us close these days. We know each other's secrets.

Jeanne and I were what my grandmother used to call “late bloomers.” As teenagers, we were skinny and knock kneed. We wore glasses and got good grades. We had wild, wavy hair that would greatly expand in the humidity of Southern California summers. On some days, we looked liked human Q tips.

We couldn’t get dates. Homecoming dances came and went. The popular girls went steady and we stayed home. We wrapped our frizzy hair around empty orange juice cans each night, slathered Noxema on our faces and prayed. The phone never rang.

In an effort to fend off Geekyness, we aspired to be Bad Girls.  In high school, we were often Minors In Possession, pooling our baby sitting money for bottles of screw top wine. We smoked like fiends. We never met a speed limit we wouldn’t break, a stop sign we wouldn’t run.

Eventually, we stole a car.

This major felony began with a boy, of course. It was our senior year. With prom looming over us, our GET A BOYFRIEND campaign was in full swing, and by Christmas we’d both landed a couple of misfits, just like ourselves.

Eric was mine, a sweet boy, with Irish skin so porcelain that after a few minutes in the sun he would turn a rosy shade, prompting the meaner kids in the school to nickname him “Pinky.”

Jeanne had snagged a tall lanky kid named Anthony, who was all nose and ears. This kid’s nose was so large that he would be just as tall if he were lying on his back.

The prom came and went, a blur of rented tuxedos and Chicken Kiev. We drove out to Santa Monica afterward and made out by the pier. A few months later, we all graduated. Then the question for Jeanne and me became this – what to do with these two? We no longer needed prom dates. We weren’t particularly attached to these goombas. But we also didn’t want to be back in that dreaded no man’s land of No Man.

Anthony solved the question for Jeanne. We got wind that he was seeing another girl.

Jeanne and I began spying on him. It seemed the only thing to do. I was driving a 1966 Dodge Dart. One afternoon, we watched Anthony pull his car to the curb in front of this girl’s house. She came running out, and embraced him.

Jeanne and I turned to look at each other, horrified. Here’s the thing about Bad Girls. We don’t like to be punked. We like to think we’re the ones calling the shots.  It wasn’t just the fact the Anthony was cheating on Jeanne, it was the notion that she never got the chance to tell him so long, see you later. When you’re young and awkward and geeky, these things count.

Jeanne had a key to his car because she sometimes took it to wash while he worked as a box boy at the local grocery store. After the girl and Anthony went inside, Jeanne and I hopped into Anthony’s Cougar and drove off. Grand Theft Auto proved to be exhilarating. We drove around the block, our hearts pounding.

But how to top this? We drove to my house and I rummaged in my mother’s closet for a blouse. Something large. Jeanne was morose. “How could he,” she moaned. The only thing more exciting about having a boyfriend is having one who cheats on you.

“Here,” I said, handing her a blouse. “Try this on.” It was extra large. I grabbed pillows off my mother’s bed. “Tuck these under your shirt. You’re about to become an expectant mother.”

I look back now, over the decades, and wonder about us, how reckless we were, how willing we were to rampage about, wreaking havoc. How darn much fun we had.

We drove back to the girl’s house. We parked Anthony's car in a different spot. Jeanne, looking ten months pregnant, waddled up to the door and pounded on it. Anthony answered the door. So did the girl. And so, eventually did her parents.


"Jeanne, please," Anthony moaned. Her parents were gape mouthed. The girls eye's were wide with astonishment, then horror.

"Are you going to come home and take care of this baby," Jeanne demanded with just the right hint of hysteria in her voice. "Are you abandoning your family?"


Anthony turned to the parents. "I barely know this girl," he said, jerking his head in Jeanne's direction.

"Not so!" Jeanne shrieked. She waved his car keys at him. "I've been out driving your car! Look, now it's parked across the street. If you're not the father of this baby, why do I have your keys?"

The girl and her parents all turned to look at Anthony in an apprasing way.

"Give me those damn keys," he scowled. Jeanne tossed them to me, and I threw them over the roof of the garage. Then we stomped off, leaving them all in the doorway.

When we got back into the Dodge Dart, we laughed until our faces hurt. Anthony never called again, and we didn't much care.

That summer marked the end of our crime spree though. Soon we were too busy in college and our careers. Then we married men we love and raised families. No time to steal or terrorize.

So now I sit on this lovely island with my good friend and we look back over the years, and toast to the fine lives we've had.  We are comfortable in our own skins, we can laugh at our mistakes and rejoice at our successes.

We don't have to stake our our men. They come home to us every night.

Not too bad for a couple of skinny girls with orange juice cans in their hair.

 l   

Babies Behind Bars

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Dontez Tillman, one of Michigan's young lifers, was 14 when charged as an adult with murder. Convicted at age 15, he is currently serving a life sentence in an adult prison. 







I sat in a courtroom this past week, and watched yet another child, this kid's face still round with baby fat, go away to prison as an adult.

It is Michigan's ugly little secret. We are second in the world in the number of juveniles we sentence as adults. There are currently more than 350 kids, some as young as 14, serving life sentences in this state. We're topped only by Pennsylvania, with 444.

Barbaric? Consider this. Totalitarian governments - Syria and North Korea, for starters -  do not treat children as adults in their justice systems.  Colorado and Texas flat out ban sending kids to prison for life. (Texas? Yes, you read that right. Texas! That bastion of compassion!)

Leonard White was 15 years old, and at 5'1'', small for his age, a special education student struggling to fit in his first year of high school when one day last June, while at a friend's house, he was bullied by an older and much larger teen.  Johnathan Rickman, 17, weighed 330 pounds and stood nearly a foot taller than Leonard when he pummeled Leonard and threw him to the ground.

Leonard then grabbed a kitchen knife, chased the older teen out the door and into the street, where he stabbed him once. It was a mortal wound. Rickman died a few minutes later. Leonard White was charged with first degree murder. A jury, perhaps taking into consideration Leonard's size and the prior bullying, convicted him of the much lesser charge of manslaughter in December.

Nevertheless, an Oakland County Circuit Court judge, citing Leonard's "lack of impulse control" sent him to prison for four to 15 years earlier this month. Leonard White, deemed by society too young, too irresponsible, too immature  to vote, drink, drive, make love, go to war, obtain a credit card or sign a contract, was now an adult, in the court's view.

As I sat in the courtroom and watched this boy grapple with his sentence, I was struck by this - he didn't have to shave for this important court appearance - one that will forever change his life - because he's not old enough yet for facial hair. His is the body of a child.

And I would suggest this. His brain is that of a child as well.

Breakthroughs in brain imaging in the last decade tells us what anybody who has ever raised a child already knows - there's nothing in that kid's noggin but a pile of Play Doh.  The all important frontal cortex - the mass of brain matter located right behind our foreheads that involves complex reasoning - is mush in adolescents, and not fully formed until we're well into our early twenties.

A fully formed frontal cortex stops most of us, as adults, from chewing out our bosses, running red lights, sleeping with the sexy neighbor next door while our spouse is out of town, or buying a yacht on a $40,000 salary. The frontal cortex is the policeman in our brain, warning us not to do something stupid.

With kids like Leonard, the policeman has not yet come on duty.

I live with a 15 year old boy. Or rather, I cohabitate with him. To "live" with him implies we share a life, when in truth, he is of an entirely different species and we simply orbit around each other. My son is disorganized and slovenly, sullen and sometimes angry. He spits toothpaste all over the sink.  His personal hygene is hit and miss. He chews with his mouth open. It is akin to sharing a home with an orangutan, only one that can talk.

He is particularly fond of vile language, and has recently taken to dropping the F bomb in casual dinner conversation, hoping no doubt for a reaction from his father and me. His father and I ignore it. Instead, we say, "pass the butter, please," and "God, I can't believe there's another Republican debate on tonight." We know to pick our fights.

In short, he is a cretin, just like every other 15 year old boy walking the planet. He has little understanding of cause and effect. There is limited concept of consequences. It is as if he reinvents his universe every ninety seconds or so - never understanding that the thing he said, or did, two minutes before resonates into the present.

Do you understand, son, that if you choose to wear an oh-so-cool Detroit Lions sweatshirt - instead of your winter coat - to the bus stop in 15 degree temperatures, that you will soon be freezing your ass off?

Even the august justices of the US Supreme Court have come to realize just how dumb kids are, how they are works in progress that cannot be held to adult standards. In Roper vs. Simmons, a 2005 case, the high court forever banned the death penalty for juveniles. In 2010, citing those important brain scans, they found it unconstitutional to send kids to prison for life in cases other than murder. And in November, they agreed to hear a case out of Florida about whether juveniles should be sentenced to life when convicted of murder.



One day two winters ago,  I drove to the Thumb Correctional Facility, a prison in Lapeer, Michigan to interview two boys serving life sentences, convicted as adults of first degree murder. They were both 14 at the time of the crimes. Now, 15, they would never go free.

Dontez Tillman had been running with much older kids in the city of Pontiac in the summer of 2008. Dad was long gone, and mom was overwhelmed with other children. Barely 14, he was out night after night, smoking pot, drinking and wilding with the big guys, trying to look tough.

During the course of three hot July nights, this gang of hooligans, high on marijuana and machismo, beat up homeless men, perfect victims because they were too frail to fight back. Two of those men died. The older teens escaped, but Dontez and another 14 year old Thomas McCloud, weren't smart enough, sophisticated enough, to escape police.

Prosecutors offered these two mopes a deal. Tell us what you know, identify the older kids, and we'll let you plead to second degree murder. You can be out in ten years, at age 25.

Their mothers though, told them no, don't cooperate with police or prosecutors. In their mothers' lives, law enforcement is the enemy. Boys listen to their mothers, particularly when they're in big trouble. They stood trial. Both boys went down as adults for first degree murder. Some of the jurors wept when the verdicts were read. One wept so hard the judge had to stop the proceeding. Both boys cried.


At the prison, I sat in a little room with windows so that the guards could keep an eye on us. Dontez was lanky in that way teen age boys are - all legs and arms, his skinny wrists poking from his prison uniform.

And he was earnest. Taking classes. Keeping his cell clean. Staying out of trouble.  He was doing okay, he said, but looking forward to going home. Back with his mom, and his sisters, back to school. Back to being a boy.

I told him there was no trip home. Did he understand that? That he would never again sit at his mother's table for dinner. No graduating middle school into high school. No drivers training. No dates with pretty girls. No proms or graduation. No wedding. No children. Nothing but the cinder block walls of this prison.

He looked at me and I saw my son, bewildered by this big and confusing world, trying to process information too overwhelming yet for his young brain.

"I know," he said. "But maybe someday?"