Redress of Grievances (16 page)

"You
know, it's hard to believe you'd have the guts to come back to Dallas for this
case," Riley sneered.

"Why
is that, Detective Riley?" she asked as she turned to face him.
"Sharon Taggart needs a defense attorney, and I happen to be a damned good
one."

Chapter
Fifteen

EARLY
MONDAY MORNING, Wayne strolled out of his hotel's restaurant with the taste of
coffee and maple syrup lingering in his mouth and a smile on his lips. He
hadn't felt the least bit guilty about ordering the Texas T-bone steak and eggs
with a side order of a small stack of pancakes for breakfast, especially since
they would be charged to Harriett's client. Before she left for Austin, they
had compiled a list of individuals for him to begin interviewing. Chewing on
the remains of his toothpick, he unlocked the driver's door of his sagebrush
green Chevy Tahoe and slid comfortably behind the wheel. Glancing at the clock
on the dash, he estimated that it would take him about twenty-five minutes to
make it to Highland Park High School. Plenty of time.

Highland
Park High School was located on Emerson Avenue, a few blocks from the Dallas
North Tollway. As he swung his vehicle into a visitor's parking area in front
of the two-story red brick building, he vaguely remembered his own days in high
school. The ten-room county high school he had attended bore little resemblance
to the structure in front of him. The spacious grounds were well tended, and
everything looked tidy. The school obviously sat in the middle of a solid,
upper echelon property tax zone. As he climbed the steps toward the front
doors, he secretly made book with himself that everyone he met would be wearing
a jacket and tie.

A
sign in the front entry welcomed him to the home of the Scots and directed him
to the main office. Unlike most of the downtown high schools he had been to
over the years, the hallways were relatively quiet except for the sound of
morning announcements pouring from the overhead intercom speakers. He pulled
open the door to the office and held it for two female teachers as they exited.
Teachers sure hadn't looked like that when he was a student, he thought with a
smile. If they had, he might have taken more interest in going every day rather
than finding something else more entertaining to do, most of which had gotten
him in trouble. Still, stealing a glance at the teachers as they moved
gracefully down the hallway, his thoughts were interrupted.

"May
I help you, sir?" a woman asked slightly louder than necessary.

Turning
his head away from the view he had been enjoying, he was disappointed to see a
gray-haired woman with pinched lips staring at him. Women who looked like her
had made education decidedly distasteful for him.

Placing
his meaty hands on the counter, he said, "Yeah. I would like to speak to
Mr. Benevidez."

"Do
you have an appointment?"

"No
I don't." Wayne reached in his pocket and drew out a business card,
dropping it unceremoniously on the counter.

"May
I ask what this is in reference to, Mr...Graham?" the receptionist asked
as she picked up the card and readjusted her glasses to read it.

"Sharon
Taggart," he answered bluntly.

"Mrs.
Taggart isn't here any longer."

"That's
why I'm here. I'm an investigator for Mrs. Taggart's attorney. Is Benevidez in
or not?"

"We
have cooperated completely with the authorities and already told them
everything we knew."

"I'm
sure you have, dear, but you haven't told me yet," Wayne smiled benignly.

"If
you'll have a seat," she said nodding toward a row of comfortable looking
chairs, "I'll see if Mr. Benevidez is available."

"Thanks."

Wayne
glanced at the clock hanging on the wall just inside the office doors and sat
down. The chairs were not as comfortable as they had looked, and he readjusted
his jacket and pulled up his pant legs slightly before reaching for the latest
edition of the PTA News. Out of the corner of his eye, he watched the
receptionist speak to someone softly on the telephone, all the while casting
furtive looks in his direction. Almost ten minutes passed before a
distinguished looking Hispanic gentleman in his late forties came into the
office and glanced around. The receptionist's eyes led him to Wayne.

The
man was well-dressed in charcoal gray slacks with a white dress shirt and navy
blue tie, all of which accented his slightly graying black hair and mustache.
Extending his hand, the man smiled as he approached Wayne.

"Mr.
Graham? Michael Benevidez. How can I assist you?"

Standing
as he shook Benevidez's hand, Wayne said, "I appreciate you taking the
time to speak to me. I won't take up much of your time."

"Sharon
is one of my best teachers, and I will do anything I can to help. Why don't we
go to my office?"

A
few minutes later, Benevidez sat behind his desk and leaned back, steepling his
hands in front of his face, resting his index fingers against his lower lip. Wayne
pulled an old notebook and a pen out of his coat pocket and flipped it open.

"Before
we begin, Mr. Graham, can you tell me how Sharon is?"

"About
as good as anyone would be in her predicament, I guess," Wayne shrugged
before he began asking questions. "What did Mrs. Taggart teach?"

"Social
Studies, but primarily our Advanced Government classes, and I think, one or two
sections of World Civilization."

"Overall,
was she a pretty good teacher?"

"Superior,"
Benevidez beamed. "In her second year on the faculty, she was chosen as
our Teacher of the Year. The students love her style and were very successful.
She got along well with parents and other faculty members and volunteered to
assist students with projects for their other classes as well as her own. She
was the faculty sponsor for three or four extracurricular activities as well.
Some people teach to make a living, but Sharon truly seemed to have a calling
for working with teenagers, even the ones no one else wanted."

Wayne
laughed, "I can't imagine there would be very many of those in this
school."

"You
would be surprised, Mr. Graham. Every school, no matter how large or small, or
how affluent, has its own little group of troubled students."

"You
said she sponsored some activities. Which ones were those?"

"Let's
see," Benevidez thought. "I'm sure she was a class sponsor for one of
the grade levels. Might have been the junior class because I know she worked on
organizing the prom one year. And it seems like she was the sponsor for the
Think Tank and Young Lawyers."

"Think
Tank? What's that?"

"It's
an academic competition between area high schools. Sort of similar to the
Jeopardy television game."

"They
any good?" Wayne smiled.

"Very
good, and we have the trophies to prove it, especially the Young Lawyers. They
were second in the State competition a couple of years ago, and Sharon was
confident they would make it to the national competition in the next year or
two."

"Did
you have many opportunities to interact with Mrs. Taggart?"

"Many
times. I found her to be cooperative and always with the best interests of the
students and the school in mind. There were times we disagreed, naturally, but
we were able to reach a satisfactory resolution most of the time."

"What
types of disagreements?"

"Nothing
huge, and mostly it involved a problem with another teacher whom she didn't
think was effectively teaching. But that was something that only started fairly
recently."

"Did
it lead to other problems?"

"I
really don't want to say anything bad about Sharon."

"If
you don't, I'm sure someone else will, Mr. Benevidez. It would be better for
her attorney to know about any personal conflicts now, so that they aren't a
surprise later if they should come up at the trial."

Benevidez
thought for a minute before continuing. "About a year or a year and a half
ago, Sharon was involved in a verbal altercation with another faculty member,
Mrs. Sanderson. I had to separate them and counsel both of them."

"What
started the argument?"

"Sharon
had a student who was having difficulty in Mrs. Sanderson's class. As I
understand it, Sharon went to her room to see if she could help. Apparently
Mrs. Sanderson told Sharon that she didn't need any help. She had been teaching
for nearly twenty years and didn't need teaching lessons from a younger
teacher. Sharon said something else to her and left the room. Just before the
bell for the next class, apparently Mrs. Sanderson went to Sharon's room and
told her, in front of students, that she would teach her class any damn way she
wanted to and that Sharon could go to hell. Sharon called her an incompetent
hack, and well, the discussion disintegrated from there. Although they did take
the argument into the hall, there was a little shoving involved and another
teacher came to get me."

"Did
you take any action against either woman?"

"I
sent them both home for the remainder of the day to cool off." Chuckling
slightly, Benevidez smiled. "Although I did sort of have to agree that
Mrs. Sanderson wasn't the best teacher on our faculty, Sharon admitted she
hadn't handled it in the best way and formally apologized to Mrs. Sanderson as
well as the class. In fact, she used the whole incident as a lesson in how
not
to handle a disagreement."

"Were
there any other incidents like that?"

"Never,
and I really just chalked it up to the fact that Sharon had only recently given
birth to her daughter and was simply under stress."

"If
possible, I'd like to have a look at Mrs. Taggart's classroom," Wayne
said.

"I
think there's a class in there this period, but if you can wait until it's
over, the room should be empty for the next period. It was Sharon's conference
period."

"Who
is teaching her classes now?"

"The
district sent a permanent substitute who had credentials in the same subject
areas. So far he seems to be working out fine. However, I'm sure the students
miss Sharon."

"I'm
sure," Wayne said as he pushed himself out of the chair and stretched his
back.

"You're
more than welcome to wait in the lounge area if you want. There's a
coffeemaker, but I can't guarantee how good the coffee is."

FORTY
MINUTES LATER, Wayne trudged up a flight of stairs to Sharon's second floor
classroom. Closing the door behind him, he looked around at the thirty desks,
which were aligned in a semi-circle facing the front dry erase board. The walls
were decorated with posters depicting political and historical figures. A map
of the world that was painted directly on the wall covered the back wall of the
room. Portions of it were filled in, and string lines led from various regions
of the world to newspaper and magazine articles concerning world events.
Although he had never seen it before in a classroom, there were curtains on all
the windows and the whole room had a homey feel to it.

Sharon's
desk was situated in the front corner of the room, opposite the door. Two tan
file cabinets and a large bookcase sat behind the desk in easy reach of anyone
seated there. Pulling out his notebook again, Wayne perused the materials on
the bookshelf and made notes to himself. The books appeared to be arranged by
subject and were equally divided between American politics and World History.
One file cabinet was devoted to curriculum materials while the second was
filled with file folders with students' names on each one. Going through the
file drawers, he continued making notes as he pulled out a few folders, hoping
he would be able to make copies of the material in each.

"Excuse
me," a man's voice boomed. "Do you have permission to be in
here?"

Turning
his head toward the classroom door, Wayne saw a large muscular man filling the
entrance, his hands on his hips.

"Sure
do. From Mr. Benevidez."

"May
I see your visitor's badge?" the forty-ish man asked.

Pulling
himself up to his full height, Wayne estimated that they were about the same
height and weight, although their weight was distributed a little differently.
He reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out the bright yellow plastic
clip-on pass.

"Sorry,
sir, but we try to keep our eyes open for strangers on campus," the man
said as his defensive posture relaxed somewhat.

"No
problem," Wayne nodded. "And who might you be?"

"I'm
Dylan Fields. My room is across the hall. I just happened to glance in and see
you in here."

"Do
you know Sharon Taggart?"

"Of
course."

"My
name is Wayne Graham, and I work for her attorney. If you have a couple of
minutes, I'd like to ask you a couple of questions."

"Sure,
I guess it'll be okay. How is Sharon? I sure miss having her in here to talk
to."

"Why
is that?"