Chapter 22: Into the Belly of the Beast

The bailiff turned down a short hall and we followed him. He stopped at a door and opened it. He made the gesture for me to go on through it and he stepped aside. I felt Frick’s beefy paw on my shoulder to momentarily stop me. He went first and I followed him through the doorway. I felt sort of like Alice and the looking glass. I was now in a complete alien setting for me. Frick once again put his paw on my shoulder and guided me over to some seats along one wall. The courtroom was a lot smaller than what I imagined it to be. Up front was the judge and what I assumed was the court recorder, or what ever they were called. Then also there was what I thought was the witness box, a seat up front by itself and a simple microphone on a goose neck that was attached to the side of the judges platform.

Looking around I just had noticed Ginny B and what I thought was her defense team. She stared icy daggers at me when I passed. She was dressed well, when was she not I thought. It was then I saw her hands had been manacled and the cuffs were attached to a chain around her waist. There had to be a story why she was manacled and I probably didn’t want to know the reason why.

I didn’t even get a chance to sit down and I was called to the witness chair. I wanted to make sure I knew where I was going and when I walked to the front of the court room. I pointed to the chair and looked questioningly at the bailiff. He nodded and I saw a brief smirk on his face as well as the judge’s I bet they thought what a rube, oh well it was my first time as a witness. Before I sat down I knew enough to stand there and swore that I would be honest and truthful in my answers. After I sat down the prosecutor stood up and walked over to stand in front of me.

The judge before the prosecutor could ask me his questions the judge told me, “For the record please state your name, your residence, and your occupation. And oh give your relationship to the defendant as well.”

I responded as he requested, and as far as address I said Minot, North Dakota for the time being anyway. That my relationship to the defendant was former boy friend and I emphasized the word former. I wanted to make that fact known and understood. When I emphasized former the way I did I saw Ginny tense up and try to stand up. As soon as she did that her defense team and what I figured was a security service member behind put their hands on her shoulders to push her back into sitting down. Now I think I knew the reason for the manacles. This wasn’t her first attempt at hurting someone, probably Jeff Valentine was the object of her wrath. I made sure to keep her in my field of vision in case I had to make an emergency exit.

The prosecutor stood in front of me and began his line of questioning. “As we all know now you were once romantically involved with the defendant. That is a given. Would you tell us in your own words how you came to know the defendant and about how long were you two together,” he asked.

“Well sir, I met Ginny B my junior year in college. The girl I had originally asked to go with me to a fraternity formal felt that there was no chemistry between the two of us and decided she didn’t want to continue dating. Though she did think enough of me to fix me up with an another girl on her floor in the dorm.”, I said.

I then continued. “She arranged for us to meet at the student union grill room and see if there was any interest in either of our parts. At the time that was agreed upon I walked into the grill room and immediately was dazzled by this coed with a huge smile looking directly at me. I to be honest was immediately smitten.”

Ginny at the defendant’s table beamed at my comment. She wouldn’t be much longer after I finished what I had to say.

I added, “It was then that I asked her attend my fraternity formal. She accepted and I couldn’t believe that she had. I thought I had to be the luckiest guy alive. We began dating on a regular basis after that.”

I stopped to gather my thoughts and how I was going to say what needed to be said without me appearing to be a totally whipped wimp.

“Continue please Sir,” the Judge.

“I plan to Judge I just wanted to present it in as unbiased manner as I could,” I responded.

“When you are ready please continue,” the Judge said.

“Ginny made a big impression with my frat brothers at the formal. She was the most attractive girl there and was the center of attention. Surprisingly she stayed by my side all evening. After that night, what the saying, Oh yeah I was in love.”

The prosecutor asked his next question, “How did your relationship progress after that first date?”

“At first I was on cloud nine. The next couple of weeks were perfect, she acted so loving and caring towards me. We saw each other almost daily sometimes not for long but we still saw each other. We would meet and study together. The emphasis here is ‘we were together’ it was a short time later that the wheels fell off the bus.” I answered.

“It was at the next fraternity party and as usual she was at my side holding my arm. I didn’t think much about it then but later I realized it was Ginny making sure all the coeds knew that I was hers from the arm holding.”

“Did anything happen at this time that you would call unusual or concerning?” the prosecutor asked. He was following the script we had worked out earlier.

“Well, yes there was a whole set of incidents that set off red flags. Some were even painful,” I truthfully answered.

For the next twenty minutes while I was in the witness chair I described how Ginny became more and more possessive of me and jealous of any female friends or acquaintances who came up to speak to me at a party. I described how she got so angry at a party that she went after a girl who had been a long time friend of mine. That party I had to physically pick her up and carry her out of the room to keep her from attacking the other girl. I also carried the scars on my arm where she dug her nails in to my skin when she was in one of her rage episodes. To emphasize the point I rolled up my shirt sleeve and showed the Judge the divots from where she had grabbed my arm and dug her fingers in.

While I was talking I saw the defense attorney scribbling away like crazy. It was no doubt about questions he was going to ask me or comments about the validity of the evidence that I presented.

The next series of questions the prosecutor was going were either going to make or break the validity of my testimony. There were two he was going to ask that I knew would be probably set her off. So I prepared to answer them and move to get out of her way if she decided to go on a rampage.

The first question he asked was one of the expected ones. Did I think Ginny was capable of murder considering her rage and poor impulse control.

I answered, “Yes sir, I do. It has been my experience being her boy friend she lost her cool easily and would easily go into a rage and was capable of anything including murder.”

“Would that include friends and acquaintances as victims?” he asked.

“Yes”, I responded.

Ginny was getting agitated and I saw her struggling some with the manacles.

“Would that include parents?” he added.