Body Hunter (22 page)

Chapter Twenty-seven

As the defense prepared to present their case, courtroom onlookers wondered if Faryion Wardrip would take the stand in his own defense. But they would have to wait. John Curry had other witnesses he planned to question.

John Dillard, Wardrip's parole officer, was the first to take the stand in his defense. Dillard described Wardrip as a model parolee, in fact, as his “best client in the intensive electronic-monitoring system.”

Dillard told the jury that when Wardrip was released from prison in December 1997, he had to wear an ankle bracelet that monitored his movement. He and Wardrip had worked out a schedule every week and the parolee couldn't stray from that plan. In addition, at least once a week, Dillard would surprise Wardrip with a visit and monitor his whereabouts by checking out his workplace and residence.

Dillard testified that Wardrip never violated the conditions of his parole and attended mandatory anger-management classes and Alcoholics Anonymous and Narcotics Anonymous meetings regularly.

“Did Mr. Wardrip go to AA and NA meetings beyond the time that was required?” Public Defender John Curry asked.

“Yes, he did,” Dillard replied.

When it was time for the district attorney to question Dillard, he asked if Wardrip had requested to be released early from the monitoring program.

“Yes,” Dillard said. “Wardrip requested several times to be released from the electronic-monitoring system.”

Dillard didn't mention in court that no one had ever been released early from the monitoring system.

Curry's second, and last, defense witness was called to the stand.

Fred Duncan, owner of the Olney Door and Screen Company, walked slowly to the stand. He had volunteered to speak on behalf of his former employee. Duncan had always liked Wardrip. He found him to be dependable and hard working. Even after Wardrip's confession had become public, and his guilty plea at the beginning of the trial, Duncan found it difficult to believe he could be responsible for the ghastly murders.

When Duncan first learned of Wardrip's arrest he had been furious. He had even considered taking action against the DA's office for trespassing on his property in order to obtain the paper cup needed for DNA testing. But time and information had softened the senior Duncan.

Duncan told the court that in the fourteen months Wardrip had worked for him he had never missed a day of work.

“He was an excellent employee,” Duncan said. “We moved him on up, and he was learning purchasing.”

Duncan stated that his opinion of Wardrip as an employee hadn't changed much since his arrest.

Under cross-examination by Macha, Duncan admitted that he was never told that Wardrip had been in prison for the murder of Tina Kimbrew.

“We understood that he went away because of a vehicular homicide,” Duncan said.

“Has your opinion of Wardrip changed since you found out he confessed to killing five women?” Macha asked.

“I'm not here to get involved in that decision. I'm here to tell you what he did for me,” Duncan responded.

It was clear that Fred Duncan had thought highly of Wardrip as an employee. Macha decided not to press the witness further. Duncan was dismissed.

Testifying in court had been hard for Duncan. Tears swelled in his eyes as he made his way to the courthouse parking lot.

 

 

John Curry stood and addressed the court.

“The defense rests, Your Honor,” Curry said.

Speculation about Wardrip's testifying had been answered. He would remain silent.

Initially, Wardrip had expressed his desire to testify before the court.

“The DA will ask how you felt when you killed this one, then that one,” Dorie Glickman had advised her client.

“Can they do that?” Wardrip asked, agitation in his voice.

Glickman didn't want her client on the stand. She feared he would show hostility toward the prosecution and play right into the DA's hands by demonstrating that the anger he claimed to have overcome still lay just below the surface.

There wasn't much more Curry and Glickman could have done. They had called the witnesses they believed would benefit their contention that Faryion Wardrip was a changed man who deserved to live, a point that Curry planned to argue during his closing argument.

But Barry Macha had four rebuttal witnesses that would cast a shroud of doubt over Wardrip's alleged change.

Sheriff Tom Callahan again took the stand to tell the jury that while he was escorting Wardrip to his jail cell after his February arrest, Wardrip told him he was innocent.

Then the first of three emotionally charged witnesses was called.

Robert Kimbrew, a small weathered man with a big hurt in his heart, told jurors about the 1996 and 1997 mediation sessions with Wardrip in which Wardrip had told him and Tina's mother that he had never killed anyone before smothering their daughter.

The pain Kimbrew had carried with him for fifteen years showed on his face.

“Did he look you in the eye and say he never hurt anyone before Tina?” Macha asked.

“Yes,” Robert said bitterly.

“Did he tell you that he was never so under the influence [of drugs and alcohol] that he didn't know right from wrong?” Macha questioned.

“Yes,” Kimbrew responded.

Kimbrew was obviously embittered by Wardrip's deception during the mediation sessions.

“It's so important to be truthful and then find out it was a total lie,” Kimbrew said.

As Tina's father left the stand, he looked toward his daughter's killer, hoping to make eye contact with him. But Wardrip's eyes remained on the open Bible in front of him.

“I call Elaine Kimbrew Thornhill,” Macha announced.

Elaine and Robert Kimbrew had divorced prior to Tina's death, and Elaine had remarried. She had been in the front row of the Wardrip trial each day, lending support for the prosecution. Although Wardrip had served time for killing her daughter, Elaine appeared determined to see that the five-time killer was taken out of society.

From the stand Elaine talked about how she and her first husband had both been told they would never have children. Then she got pregnant. During a difficult delivery, Robert Kimbrew had been forced to decide between saving the life of his wife or his child.

“But I had a special doctor,” Elaine told the court. She and Tina both pulled through, creating an exceptional bond between them.

“I know everyone in the courtroom in here won't understand what I'm talking about, but the mothers will,” Elaine said, crying. “On May 6, 1986, I woke up and felt her body leave my body. I knew something bad had happened to my baby. I said somebody has to go and see about her.”

There wasn't a dry eye among spectators or jurors. The pain and anguish of a mother who'd lost her only child cloaked the courtroom in misery.

Elaine's testimony hit Wardrip hard. He jotted a note to his counsel asking if there was any way to stop her testimony, to stop the pain she was obviously going through.

While Macha and Curry approached the judge's bench for a sidebar discussion, Elaine Thornhill stared at Faryion Wardrip, willing him to look at her. Only three feet away, Wardrip kept his eyes down, avoiding Elaine's cold, hard stare.

The prosecution's last rebuttal witness was Catie Reid, the younger sister of Terry Sims.

Reid was only fourteen at the time of her sister's death. The girls had been close, with Terry often looking after Catie.

“She taught me to ride go-cars and took me to movies,” Reid said fondly. “She was at every swim meet and softball game.”

Reid told a touching story about how she was embarrassed to use a wooden tennis racket when she joined the school tennis team.

“We didn't have a whole lot of money,” Reid said. “I was the only one on the team who used a wooden racket. I made quite a fuss about it. And then, one morning before I left for school, there was an aluminum racket waiting at the front door. Terry bought it.”

Reminiscing about her sister brought tears to Reid and her other sister, who sat in the audience.

The four rebuttal witnesses had brought to life the slain victims of Faryion Wardrip. Tina Kimbrew and Terry Sims became real people, not just statistics of a drug-addicted serial killer.

Macha had presented all his witnesses, all the evidence he believed necessary to obtain a death sentence for Faryion Wardrip. He returned to the prosecution table and waited for his turn at closing arguments.

The shrewd district attorney had deliberately not introduced all the victims in his opening statements. His instincts had been right on target. The impact of presenting one victim at a time had visibly shaken the jury. As they deliberated, they would remember victim after victim laid at their feet. All casualties of Faryion Wardrip.

Because the burden of proof rested with the State, John Curry was the first to present arguments to the jury.

Curry, who had remained in his seat throughout the trial, stood and ambled over to the jury box. Breathing heavily, the rotund public defender began by talking about Faryion Wardrip and the changes he had made in his life since the murder of Tina Kimbrew. He cited his attendance at AA and NA and reminded jurors of the words of Wardrip's parole officer, John Dillard.

“He was Dillard's best client in the intensive electronic-monitoring system,” Curry reiterated.

Then, to most everyone's surprise, John Curry began to cry. His emotional conduct surprised many in the courtroom, not least of all his client.

Wardrip was glad that Curry had become so emotionally involved with his case, but believed his attorney should have bridled his emotions while addressing the jury. He wondered what effect it would have on the outcome of his sentence.

“ ‘I know I'm responsible,' Faryion said. Does that mean he's a changed man? I don't know,” Curry remarked. But the defense wanted jurors to believe Faryion was changed. That he would no longer be a threat to society.

In far less than the time allotted by the court, Curry completed his closing. He returned to his seat and began writing a note.

“I'm sorry, Faryion. I didn't do a good job for you,” Curry wrote, folded the paper, and passed it to his client.

The statement and Curry's emotional presentation to the jury both surprised and irritated Wardrip. Curry had let his emotions take over. He'd shown the jury how personally painful the case had been. His attorney's sensitivity made Wardrip believe he didn't have the kind of lawyer he really needed to defend him.

Barry Macha stood, buttoned his suit jacket, then walked to the wooden easel he had used throughout the trial. As he turned the easel to face the jury, a large poster board with five eight-by-ten glossy photographs was a glaring reminder of the victims. In the center was a graduation photo of Terry Sims, surrounded by pictures of Tina Kimbrew, Ellen Blau, Toni Gibbs, and Debra Taylor.

As Macha began his closing arguments, jurors stared at the faces of the once-vibrant young women whose lives had been extinguished by Faryion Wardrip.

“There are five witnesses,” Macha said as he motioned toward the photos. “You didn't get to hear from them.”

Macha emphasized that, in both the murders of Sims and Gibbs, Wardrip took a knife with him and left with it, implying his intention to kill.

“Terry tries to defend herself,” Macha said. “She's screaming, fighting. What's he doing? He's ripping her clothes off. He can't get them off fast enough. He cuts a cord to tie her hands. He forces his penis into her mouth. He does the same thing vaginally.

“If you're like me, you'll never forget what he did to her in that bathroom. No question, she was stabbed in that bathroom.”

The reliving of Terry's brutal murder was overwhelming for the Sims sisters. The tears poured from their reddened eyes faster than they could wipe them away.

“Three weeks later, he finds a nurse. What do nurses do? They help people. She sees him and asks if he needs a ride. He no longer works at that hospital. Ask yourself, why is he there at seven-thirty in the morning? Why is he carrying a knife? He took her to that field because he wanted to rape her and murder her,” Macha said angrily.

Macha reminded jurors that it had been more than fourteen years since the deaths of Sims, Gibbs, Blau, and Taylor. That in that time an innocent person had been charged and tried for the Gibbs murder. And in spite of the time lapse, Wardrip still remembered all the names of his victims. He knew exactly what he had done.

“This isn't about rape,” Macha said. “This is about power and control over women. Not so much sexual power, but to make them do what he wanted them to do.”

He reminded jurors of Debra Taylor and how Wardrip was forced to dump her body in the open field because people in the club had seen them together. How Taylor's body had lain exposed to the elements for days while her family searched for her.

“Having your loved one missing twenty-one days, twenty-eight days. You can't imagine what has happened to her,” Macha said as he slapped his hand on the jury rail. “I can't imagine the anguish.

“Toni was left outside in weather so cold that it preserved her body. Preserved the sperm inside her.

“Who convicted him? These girls did. I hope you listen for their screams. You know their names,” Macha said, looking at the pictures of the five smiling faces.

The eyes of everyone in the courtroom were transfixed on the photographs of the victims. Everyone's but Faryion Wardrip's.

“Sims had two sisters and one brother. Her dad died when she was one. Debra Taylor's daughter is pregnant with her granddaughter. She won't be here to help raise her. Why? Because of the selfish controlling conduct of this man,” Macha said, pointing to the defendant.