Because You Loved Me. M. William Phelps

Because You Loved Me - M. William Phelps


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kids. She wanted so bad to show off Billy to them.”

      No sooner had they stepped into Donna’s house, then Nicole raved to Billy about the kids: “This is [so and so], isn’t he so cute, Billy? This is [so and so], isn’t she just a doll?” Then Nicole turned her attention toward Billy, kneeling down to get in the kids’ faces, “Isn’t he cute, kids, just like I said?” She smiled and stared at Billy. She was so happy just to share with the kids the relationship she had with the boy she loved.

      Donna saw Billy as a “clean-cut kid, very quiet. He was friendly. He obviously wasn’t as playful with the kids as Nicole, but he was polite and nice.”

      To Jeanne Dominico, children were the essence of life. They energized her spirit. Donna’s oldest child, who was six years old on the day Jeanne’s body was discovered, had problems communicating with people throughout his life, especially Donna. He wasn’t talking too much and had trouble explaining to her with hand gestures what he wanted. One day, Jeanne noticed something in the child that doctors, Donna said, had routinely told her not to worry about.

      “He was just nuts about Jeannie,” remembered Donna. “My son wasn’t talking as he grew older and I was getting concerned. Jeanne had been in the school system at one time as a paraprofessional.”

      So Jeanne knew immediately, after spending some time with the child, that there was a problem. Doctors were telling Donna that “some kids just talk really late.” But Jeanne convinced Donna the child needed special testing to find out what was wrong.

      “That’s when they found out he had autism. It was only because of Jeanne. Without her, I have no idea what would have happened to my son.”

      CHAPTER 15

      Chris McGowan was overwhelmed by what he found inside Jeanne’s modest blue-shingled Cape on the night of August 6, 2003. As the night wore on and the enormity of the crime settled on him, Chris had a hard time accepting the fact that he was never going to see Jeanne again.

      She was gone. It all seemed real now.

      At the same rate, however, by nine o’clock, Chris was growing frustrated that he still had no idea how Jeanne had died.

      “I knew she was gone,” he said later, “but they still hadn’t told me how.”

      Reliving the scene in his head over and over, all Chris could think of as he stood outside Jeanne’s house was that she had fallen and hit the back of her head on the corner of the stove. It was the only logical explanation.

      Why didn’t I show up sooner? I could have saved her life.

      “While standing there, as the police continued showing up and the night progressed, I kept going over it. All I could see was the blood underneath Jeannie…and I thought for sure she had fallen and split her head open.”

      For the entire time he was at the scene after the murder, a police officer shadowed Chris, watching his every move.

      “What happened? How did she die?” Chris asked more than once.

      “Sir, we can’t say right now. Just relax. Please try to stay calm.”

      “What happened?”

      At one point, Chris ran into a cop he knew, a sergeant with the NPD he later described as a “close personal friend.” The guy was walking around the scene in front of Jeanne’s.

      In the eyes of the police, Chris was undoubtedly on the top of their list of suspects. After all, he had found Jeanne. He didn’t have a solid alibi to back up where he had been, and didn’t have anyone who could say where he was at the time of Jeanne’s death.

      Still, he didn’t want to believe it. “Even to this day,” Chris said later, “I never for a second was made to feel like I was a suspect in this. They never made me feel that way.”

      Chris approached his friend. “Can you believe this?” he said, shaking his head in doubt.

      “Chris,” said the sergeant, “I don’t know what to tell you. I have no idea what’s going on here. I’m so sorry.”

      Stumbling with his words, Chris shrugged. Then babbled: “Jeannie…it’s Jeannie. I cannot believe this.”

      “I know, Chris,” said the sergeant. “We’re going to get you out of here as soon as we can.”

      The scene continued to populate. Word spread throughout town. A large crowd continued to grow on the opposite side of the crime scene tape. While Chris spoke to his friend, a detective walked over.

      “We need to get you down to the station so you can answer some questions. You gonna be OK with that?”

      “That’s fine. Absolutely. Anything I can do to help.”

      “Come with me.”

      The detective walked Chris toward an unmarked cruiser. Along the way, he asked questions about Jeanne. Who she was? How did Chris know her? As they walked, making their way through the crowd, Chris heard the detective say to a colleague, “She’s here.”

      She’s here? thought Chris. Who?

      “Great. She’s here already,” said another detective, rolling his eyes.

      “What do you mean? What’s going on? Who’s here?” asked Chris.

      One of the detectives gestured with his head in the direction of the woman. She was holding a notepad, looking around, making her way toward them.

      The woman was a reporter from a local newspaper, a small daily that routinely kept its front-page focus on crime.

      “Oh, great!” said another cop standing close by. “Can you believe it?”

      Chris looked. It was the last thing he needed at the moment: some reporter getting involved as the crime scene unfolded.

      When the two detectives realized the reporter was heading toward them, they ducked Chris into the front seat of a cruiser.

      And that’s where he sat for the next fifteen minutes by himself. Until, “I just couldn’t sit there anymore,” recalled Chris. “So I got out.”

      Donna Shepard was back on the scene walking around. When Chris saw her, he got out of the car and called out, “Donna?”

      “Chris.”

      They hugged. Then Chris paced back and forth as Donna stood by his side and watched.

      Chris asked one of the cops assigned to “watch him,” who was following him wherever he went, if he could use Donna’s bathroom. “I really need to go.”

      “No. Sorry, sir. We can’t let you do that. Can you wait?”

      “No, you don’t understand, I absolutely need to go now, or I’m gonna wet my pants right here.”

      The cop traded dialogue with a colleague for a moment and then told Chris, “Over there…in the back,” and waved his flashlight toward the backyard by some trees.

      “What?”

      “Sorry…but I can’t let you out of my sight.”

      “Can’t I get a little darn privacy here?” Whether he wanted to believe it, every move Chris made was being monitored. He at no time felt police were treating him any differently than they might anyone else at the scene. But as he walked behind a bush to urinate, the cop stood next to him, shining a flashlight on him.

      “I’m not dropping anything here,” said Chris, “I’m just taking a leak.” He felt the cop was looking to see if he tossed something—like a piece of evidence—into the bushes.

      The cop didn’t answer.

      “They had to be sure, I guess,” Chris commented, “that I wasn’t trying to hide evidence or something like that.”

      After Chris finished relieving himself, he


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