Mike on Crime (13 page)

“He took an action here which is illegal but understandable,” provincial court Judge Fred Sandhu said in agreeing to the plea-bargain. “This is a situation many people have faced, and will continue to face, when a loved one is dying or withdrawn from a quality of life they had and living becomes a mere existence,” he said.

Jaworski's lawyer, Greg Brodsky, told court his client acted out of love. “Mr. Jaworski had one love in his life, and that was his wife, Sophie,” he said. “If anyone could have asked her if she wanted to live in the condition she was in, she would have said no. But she couldn't answer. She wasn't competent. She relied on her husband to take care of her.”

The court heard that in the hours before he killed his wife, Jaworski sat at her hospital bedside, holding hands and quietly reflecting on 63 years of marriage. Several tubes protruded from Sophie's fragile body, which had been ravaged by colon cancer in recent months and resulted in a nearly 100-pound weight loss. A large, bulbous tumour was visible on her stomach. Doctors figured she had less than a year to live. Jaworski desperately wanted to take her home to spend her final days—but the restraints that kept the elderly woman secured to the bed wouldn't allow it. Nor would the doctors at Seven Oaks Hospital, who had just lifted a ban— at the family's urging— which had been preventing Jaworski from visiting his wife. Sophie couldn't express what she was feeling, as Alzheimer's disease was eating away at her brain. But Jaworski was positive she was suffering. “Thank God she's not suffering anymore,” he told investigators after the killing.

Jaworski—who was legally blind and partially deaf—struggled to understand much of his court hearing.

“This was a man under extreme duress. It was no longer life as he knew it,” said Crown attorney Melinda Murray.

Just before going to the hospital on the fateful morning, Jaworski stopped at his granddaughter's home and left his wallet, other personal identification and a chilling note on the front steps. “Please forgive me,” it read.

LIFE OR DEATH

C
anada abolished the death penalty 1976, some 14 years after the country's 710th and final execution was carried out. And while public debate about bringing back capital punishment continues to this day—usually whenever a particularly heinous homicide makes headlines—it's extremely unlikely it will ever return. However, that didn't prevent me from being able to cover a notorious criminal case for the
Winnipeg Free Press
in which the life of a suspected killer was literally on the line. And I didn't have to go far for it, either. A horrific crime had occurred just a couple hours south of Winnipeg, in the city of Grand Forks, North Dakota. The trial would be held one more hour down the highway, in Fargo. The case certainly hit home with Manitobans—and for me, personally.

My family and I were actually in Grand Forks on the very weekend that Dru Sjodin went missing. We saw the posters going up around town the following morning, having no idea just how serious this would end up being. My wife even recognized her picture as belonging to friendly store clerk she had spoken to while shopping in Columbia Mall. That was just a few hours before this awful crime occurred.

In the early days of my trial coverage, dozens of readers phoned and emailed to weigh in on the case or pass along their sympathies to the victim's family. Some of Manitoba's youth attend the University of North Dakota and knew the victim from campus. Dozens of people made the 150-minute drive south to volunteer in the search for the missing girl. Thousands visit the mall she was abducted from every year. To many, it felt like she was “one of our own.”

It was a truly surreal and memorable experience. I may have just been a short distance from home, but the differences in the Canadian and American justice systems were on full display.

She was the blond, blue-eyed beauty, a homecoming queen and all-American girl with a million-dollar smile. The world appeared to be hers for the taking. Yet Dru Sjodin wouldn't see her 23rd birthday, graduate from the University of North Dakota, get married or accomplish her many goals and dreams. Her future was stolen, her life snuffed out, in the cruelest and most inhumane of ways.

Now the man accused of Sjodin's horrific November 2003 kidnapping, torture and killing was locked in his own battle to survive. Alfonso Rodriguez, 53, was about to begin his murder trial in Fargo in a case expected to attract the same kind of international attention and emotion as Sjodin's heartbreaking, five-month disappearance did. He had pleaded not guilty. Prosecutors were seeking the death penalty if Rodriguez was convicted, based on a previous criminal history that includes a 23-year kidnapping and rape sentence he'd just finished serving in May 2003. They also hinted at the “especially heinous, cruel and depraved manner” in which Sjodin's killing was carried out. What was already known was difficult enough to digest.

“Oh my God.” Sjodin's last known words, screamed into a telephone while speaking with her boyfriend, Chris Lang, immediately hinted at something sinister. It was shortly after 5 p.m. on Saturday, November 22, 2003, when Sjodin was walking out of the popular Columbia Mall shopping centre in Grand Forks and heading to her car. The senior at UND had just finished her shift at Victoria's Secret.

Sjodin's cellphone went dead. Police later found her car sitting empty in the snow-swept mall parking lot. An immediate appeal for help was launched. Posters were plastered around Grand Forks and surrounding communities. Police went public looking for tips. The case quickly captured international media attention due to a combination of the random nature of the abduction, Sjodin's “girl-next-door” looks and her family's willingness to speak out. There were tearful family appearances on all the major network shows.

Rodriguez, who was living just across the border in nearby Crookston, Minnesota, was quickly identified as a suspect. He was arrested and charged with kidnapping. But there was still no sign of Sjodin. And Rodriguez wasn't talking. An unprecedented investigation and search continued. Numerous federal, state and municipal police agencies and more than 200 officers became involved. Nearly 2,000 volunteers turned up, including family, friends, fellow students and complete strangers from all over, to help search daily over a frozen plain that spanned two states and dozens of kilometres. It all ended in sorrow on April 17, 2004. Sjodin's body, wrapped in a blanket, was found in a ravine just outside Crookston. There would be no miracle happy ending.

North Dakota abolished capital punishment decades ago, but Rodriguez was now facing potential death because he allegedly kidnapped Sjodin in North Dakota, then disposed of her in Minnesota, making the act a federal crime, not a state crime. North Dakota hadn't executed someone since 1905. The case was expected to generate much regional debate about the merits of the death penalty. Even Sjodin's loved ones appeared divided, with some suggesting nothing but death for Rodriguez would satisfy them while others questioned whether it was what Sjodin would have wanted.

“This is a decision most of us wanted. If this case doesn't warrant the death penalty, then they might as well just do away with it,” said Bob Heales, a Sjodin family friend and private investigator who led search efforts for months.

U.S. Attorney General John Ashcroft's decision to seek the ultimate punishment for Rodriguez upon conviction came despite strong opposition to the death penalty in North Dakota. “My overall sense is that people are very accepting of the decision in this case,” said Heales, noting the extraordinary circumstances of Sjodin's case.

Sjodin's mother said she supported the decision to seek the death penalty. “We look forward to the case moving ahead,” Linda Walker told the
Grand Forks Herald
. “We appreciate the continued support and prayers we have received from people who have brought Dru into their hearts.”

Richard Ney, the expert death-penalty attorney who was helping defend Rodriguez, said he was disappointed but not surprised. “One thing that certainly disappointed us is that this decision was made despite the longstanding position of the people of North Dakota against capital punishment,” Ney said. Ney predicted the wide opposition to the death penalty in North Dakota would pose a practical problem for the defence and for the trial in general. “The jury in a death-penalty case can only be made up of people who say they are not morally opposed to the death penalty, or they will be excluded from the jury,” Ney said. “In a state where there is not widespread support for the death penalty, it may be more problematic to get a jury of one's peers.”

The life-and-death battle was about to begin.

THURSDAY JULY 6, 2006

There was an angel in the courtroom. Dru Sjodin's family members said they felt her spirit when they walked in to face the man accused of kidnapping, torturing and murdering her.

“She sits on my shoulder. She's my strength,” Allan Sjodin told a throng of nearly two dozen reporters outside the Quentin N. Burdick federal courthouse in Fargo. “She's always in our hearts. She will be forever,” added Sjodin's mother, Linda Walker. The couple was expecting the death penalty trial against Alfonso Rodriguez to finally begin and walked into court with a mix of emotions. “We're tense. And very anxious, of course,” said Walker.

Unfortunately, the case got off to bumpy start when a computer glitch forced an unexpected adjournment. Lawyers were supposed to begin selecting jurors to hear the case against Rodriguez. But the trial was delayed when justice officials noticed the first 15 prospective jurors who were supposedly randomly selected from a pool of nearly 600 all hailed from the same small town of Valley City, ND. The company behind the computer program originally claimed it was a statistical “anomaly” and not a sign of a problem with the random selection process. They later conceded there might be a glitch. US District Judge Ralph Erickson said it wasn't safe to proceed and decided to put off jury selection for a day so that a new list of 15 could be generated.

“We have one mission here. And that's for justice,” Allan Sjodin said after learning of the adjournment.

FRIDAY JULY 7, 2006

It was a clear message sent from several prospective jurors: Finding an unbiased panel to hear the case was going to be a monumental task. The challenge only grew larger after an entire day of intense examination by prosecutors and defence lawyers yielded just one person that lawyers could agree was suitable for jury duty. Many others were sent packing based on their candid responses to questions about Sjodin case.

“The Bible states, ‘he who kills shall be killed.' That's God's message,” said one woman, who also admitted her husband and parents have made their views about capital punishment crystal clear in the wake of her jury subpoena. “Everyone close to me is very much for it and that [the accused] should get the death penalty,” she said.

An elderly grandmother of six was also sent home when she admitted her mind was already made up about Rodriguez's guilt. “Given the evidence already provided through the media, I believe he committed the crime,” she said. She also proclaimed she's in favour of executing people who commit “horrific” crimes.

Another woman expressed doubt at her ability to be fair, noting she has a daughter the same age as Sjodin who was attending UND at the time. “It will be hard for me to be impartial, knowing it could have been her,” she said.

A married, middle-aged stay-at-home mother of three told court she would only consider death—not the alternative of life in prison with no parole—if Rodriguez was found to have committed an intentional murder. “Why should the life of a criminal be spared?” she asked.

MONDAY AUGUST 14, 2006

The jury was finally set. The answers would finally start coming. How exactly did Dru Sjodin die? Was the University of North Dakota student killed immediately? Did she suffer? What prompted the shocking daytime kidnapping outside a busy Grand Forks mall? How well planned was the attack? Did she know it was coming? Why was she targeted? And what exactly do prosecutors mean when they say she was murdered in an “especially heinous, cruel and depraved manner?”

Assistant U.S. Attorney Keith Reisenauer held nothing back in his opening statement. Jurors were told how Sjodin was kidnapped from the busy Columbia Mall parking lot in Grand Forks and how her body was found five months later in a ravine near Crookston, MN, after snow melted. Sjodin was nude from the waist down, her hands bound behind her back, a rope around her neck and the remnants of a plastic bag still around her face. She had also suffered a slashed throat and possible stab wound to the chest. “He left her in a ditch to die,” said Reisenauer, who also alleged that Rodriguez sexually assaulted Sjodin before killing her.

Rodriguez's lawyers also made an opening statement and offered up an unusual defence—taking no issue with the allegation Rodriguez killed Sjodin but focusing almost entirely on where the murder took place. Defence lawyer Robert Hoy told jurors Rodriguez shouldn't face federal charges because Sjodin was likely already dead by the time she got to Minnesota. “This is simply the wrong charge in the wrong court. It's entirely possible Dru Sjodin died... in a matter of minutes while still in the Columbia Mall parking lot. The transportation of a deceased person across state lines is not a federal kidnapping,” said Hoy. Hoy said prosecutors laid the federal charge “in their zeal to become involved in an already highly publicized case.” He said Rodriguez should instead be facing a state charge of murder, which would not make him eligible for the death penalty if convicted.

An autopsy couldn't provide a conclusive cause of Sjodin's death but found asphyxiation, trauma and/or exposure to the winter elements could all be factors, Reisenauer said. Doctors were also unable to pinpoint a time of death.

Police found Sjodin's cellphone just a few feet away from her body—a discovery that could prove critical for the theory of the prosecution. Sjodin had called her boyfriend, Chris Lang, as she walked out of Columbia Mall around 5 p.m. following her shift at the Victoria's Secret. The line suddenly went dead. Police believe it was at that moment Rodriguez grabbed Sjodin and forced her into his car.

Lang was concerned and called back at least eight times but got no answer. His hopes were briefly raised when he got a call from Sjodin's number around 8 p.m. However, Lang could only hear static and muffled sounds. The connection was lost again, said Reisenauer. Police traced the call to a cellphone tower near Crookston, MN, and focused much of their search on the area but were initially unable to find anything. But prosecutors intended to argue that phone call proved she was still alive while in Minnesota.

Police began looking at known sex offenders in the area and interviewed Rodriguez two days after Sjodin went missing. He was living at the time about 6.5 kilometres from where Sjodin's body would eventually be found. He admitted he had been in Grand Forks on the day in question to do some shopping but claimed he was in a movie theatre at the time, said Reisenauer. When asked to name the movie, Rodriguez initially couldn't but later told police it was
Once Upon A Time
starring Antonio Bandares. However, his apparent alibi began to unravel when police checked around and learned the movie wasn't playing anywhere in Grand Forks at the time.

Police got a warrant to search Rodriguez's vehicle and home and made several key discoveries. A knife— matching an empty sheath found near Sjodin's car in the Grand Forks parking lot—was in the trunk. Rodriguez claimed he was using it to cut sheet rock, but his employer claimed that wasn't true. Police also found tiny droplets of blood in Rodriguez's car, which they eventually matched with Sjodin's DNA. Forensic experts were also able to find a strand of Rodriguez's hair on Sjodin's body and fibres from Sjodin's shirt and jacket on his boots, gloves and in his car. They had the proverbial smoking gun.