To everything there is a season,
a time for every purpose under the sun.
a time to be born and a time to die;
a time to plant and a time to pluck up that which is planted;
a time to kill and a time to heal ...
a time to weep and a time to laugh;
a time to mourn and a time to dance ...
a time to embrace and a time to refrain from embracing;
a time to lose and a time to seek;
a time to rend and a time to sew;
a time to keep silent and a time to speak;
a time to love and a time to hate;
a time for war and a time for peace.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8


Thank you to all those who have commented, both in the comments section of this blog and elsewhere.

I have pasted below the text of the statement I read in court on Monday. I think one thing that made the court hearing so emotional is that I had known Nancy for about 15 years. We had spent many hours playing pinochle and while we were not close, I felt like I knew her pretty well. I appreciated her for being good to Peter and my grandma for those 15 years.

About two weeks before Nancy killed Peter was the last time I spoke to her. "Peter honey, it's Jay," she said sweetly as she handed the phone over. Peter was going through a tough spell and I remember saying to myself, "Well at least Nancy is still a constant." She later told detectives that she had been planning the murder for about three weeks...so perhaps I am the all-time chump.

I spoke again to Peter a few days before he was murdered, as related in the second half of this blog entry.

Yesterday, I was struck by the comparison the TV reporter made on the air between my grandma and me...grandma as the forgiving, heart-of-gold mother of the murder victim, and me as the "less compassionate" son. Well, that is accurate, and I am okay with that; I meant every word of what I said to the judge and Nancy.

On the issue of forgiveness, my grandma and I reached detente the night before the hearing. While we totally disagree with each other on this issue, we respect the other's right to their own opinion.

Regarding the statement, I originally drafted it as a statement to Nancy, then found out that I must address the whole thing to the judge, then found out from some informed sources that if I wheeled to address Nancy directly a couple times for short bursts, that the judge quite likely wouldn't stop me, especially if I turned back and resumed addressing the judge in short order. So that's what I did. And here it is:

**************************************

Thank you for allowing me to speak, your honor.

In her statements, Nancy has made it clear that she believed my father would have felt so abandoned by her leaving or committing suicide that he couldn't have coped, which strikes me as being extraordinarily arrogant and narcissistic.

I would like to tell you something about my father, who I always called Peter, that Nancy clearly didn't understand. Until the day Nancy killed Peter, he was a survivor. On his 41st birthday, in 1980, his wife Marcy, who he described as his soul-mate, and was my mother, died from leukemia. Was Peter so devastated that he gave up? Absolutely not. He faced life, and took on, with courage and grace, the difficult task of raising two young boys on his own. Since he managed to keep going when Marcy, his soul-mate, died, I think he would have been fine if Nancy was no longer in the picture.

After my mother passed away, Peter went through a string of unsuccessful relationships and engagements. Regardless of the heartbreak, he continued on. When these relationships ended, Peter knew that his feelings of regret (and sometimes relief) were only temporarily, and he knew his boys, Jed and me, loved him unconditionally. He never quit on us.

And he didn't quit on Nancy, either. Despite the fact that Peter got tired of Nancy's inability or unwillingness to find a job, despite the fact that Peter didn't appreciate her seemingly endless quest to take more classes and avoid working, he didn't leave her or kick her out; he just appreciated her for who she was. And for all of Peter's acceptance of Nancy, what was his reward? A gunshot through the back of the head at point blank range, while he slept. Nancy's choice to shoot Peter, who trusted her, while Peter was asleep and most vulnerable, is the most sickening act of *betrayal* and *cowardice* I have ever encountered in my life.

I want to tell you something that Nancy obviously didn't know about Peter's philosophy on life. I wish Nancy would have asked Peter about this before she murdered him. One day when Peter was very upset, I told him a story about Sam, a Jamaican exercise instructor at a gym I went to. Sam was so loud that you couldn't help hearing him and appreciating his love of life. Sam would shout to his class, "Are you happy to be alive?" "Yes!" the class would shout back. "Regardless?!" Sam would yell. "Regardless!" he class would shout back. Peter was really moved by this story and practically yelled over the phone: "Yes! That's exactly right! I love it!" Peter had a long-time fondness for Jamaican culture, and this story really resonated with him. Peter was happy to be alive, *regardless*. And Nancy violently stole that from him.

As Nancy told it to the police, she had enough of the world and wanted to end her life. But she claimed that she didn't want Peter to feel abandoned, so she killed him first. Then she had second thoughts, and as it turned out, she lacked the courage to kill herself, and the firefighters rescued her. We all have flaws and shortcomings. But carrying out only the "murder" half of a planned murder-suicide demonstrates a special and extraordinary type of cowardice.

I hope that for the rest of Nancy's days, she ponders the results of her actions and thinks about the agony she has thrust upon my family and me, and the trail of shattered lives she is leaving behind. I hope Nancy is haunted by this every moment of every day, whether she is awake or asleep, for the rest of her life.

A week after the murder, we had a hastily-organized memorial service for Peter in Tacoma. I was deeply moved by the large turn-out from Pierce College, where Peter was a teacher. Peter's knowledge and eccentric personality clearly helped to make him a well-liked and well-respected teacher, and for many students his sense of humor and love for math were infectious. This became even more clear when the campus newspaper ran a front page story about Peter and a glowing editorial about him. In some ways, I wish Nancy could have seen this outpouring of love and support for the man who she murdered, but in other ways, I'm glad she didn't; she didn't deserve to see it. She deserves instead to be locked away and isolated where she can do no more harm.

I cross-examine myself frequently about what I could have done to prevent this. But I keep coming back to the facts: Nancy pulled the trigger. Nancy ordered the gun. Nancy told the gun shop not to call her at home when the gun arrived. Can you imagine the pain I felt when I went to Peter’s house and I held the brown paper bag from the gun shop with the clerk's writing on it that said "do not call"? Nancy knew that Peter was not a violent person and having a gun in the house would have been totally unacceptable to him.

Also, Nancy went to several different stores to buy fuel for the fire, insidiously planning to not make a store clerk suspicious of a person buying too much lighter fluid at once. Do you think Nancy can imagine what it felt like for me to hold the receipt showing that she had purchased lighter fluid and a six pack of cream soda? Do you think Nancy can imagine what it felt like for me to go to the murder scene on March 9th and see the blood-stained mattress, smell the smoke, and fall to my knees in grief?

What kind of conniving, evil person can meticulously plan for the murder of a man she lives with, while simultaneously carrying on the appearance of domestic tranquility, (now shown to be an obscene charade) until the moment she pulls the trigger? Only a monster is capable of accomplishing the acts she committed.

Various people have said Nancy deserves forgiveness, support, and understanding. But I disagree. Her meticulous and clandestine planning demonstrates how definitively she knew right from wrong. If Nancy needed help, she should have asked for it before she murdered Peter. If Nancy needed support, there were plenty of places to go for that. But she made a conscious choice; a deliberate, pre-mediated, and depraved choice to violently end my father. As long as I live, I shall never forgive her for that.

When I was a child, Peter read aloud to me some of his favorite stories by Joseph Conrad, including "The Heart of Darkness," and in that story, I was introduced to the personification of evil for the first time. On March 7, Nancy showed all of us her own Heart of Darkness. This will burden her for the rest of her life. Certain religious people often say, "May peace be with you," but I hope the opposite is true for Nancy. I hope her Heart of Darkness never lets her find peace, as long as she lives.

[Turn to Nancy] Nancy, may you *eternally suffer* for what you have done to my father and the pain you have caused for everyone who loved him. I hope you have deep regrets about never being able to freely visit your daughter and grandson and that those regrets make you twist in silent mental agony as you sit in your cell until the day you die.

[Turn to judge] Your honor, on March 8, a Pierce County Medical Examiner called me. She told me what had happened to my father--the only contact number they had was mine, so I heard it before the rest of my family. I wonder if Nancy can imagine what it's like to get that call. I wonder if Nancy can imagine the chain-link reaction of pain she unleashed when I told my brother Jed that our father had been murdered, when I told my uncles that their brother was dead, and they set about informing other family members.

Whether Nancy likes it or not, I got to see into the remnants of her soul that day. She showed me the face of horror, and demonstrated with chilling clarity that she is an evil, conniving murderer. On that day, I got an unobstructed view into Nancy's heart of hearts, the very core of her being. And I what I saw was revolting. What I saw is who she really is--a *coward* and a *cold-blooded killer*.

I have heard soldiers say that every time they kill someone in combat, they lose a little piece of their soul. I think that's probably true, and I also think that if a person plans and executes a sneak attack on their spouse by way of a gunshot to the back of the head while the spouse is asleep, then the person who did the shooting doesn't just lose a *piece* of their soul, they lose *all of it*.

[Turn to Nancy] Nancy, I don't think you have any of your soul remaining, and I doubt you have a shred of humanity left in you.

[Turn to Judge] Your honor, I think Nancy deserves neither leniency from the criminal justice system, nor forgiveness from my family and me. I urge you to impose the maximum sentence on her; she deserves nothing less.

Thank you.