Amazing Grace

"Who's there?" I asked nervously, peering into the cold January night. Total silence, no longer even the swish of leaves being tussled by the wind.

"Who the fuck is there?!" I demanded, trying to sound more confident. More silence greeted me. The motion detection light over our garage seemed helpless to penetrate the blackness that surrounded our driveway like a heavy cloak. It was the one thing I had come to hate about moving to this neighborhood since both my husband and I were promoted -- barely any street lights. I reached inside the car for my satchel and clenched it tight.

"I am licensed to carry a firearm and I have it on me," I offered into the freezing darkness. Despite the stern look on my face, I almost jumped out of my skin when I heard a door open behind me.

"Gracie, who in the world are you talking to out here?" asked Garry as he stood in the doorway. I didn't want to admit to him how on edge I was, so I lied. He can be a smothering over-protectionist at times, and I hated how it made me feel weak.

"Just going over my closing arguments for my final day of trial tomorrow," I told him, silently grateful to not be alone outside. "What's for dinner, honey? I'm starving."

Once inside the house, I dropped my bag on the couch and went straight to the bathroom to throw some water on my face and give my heart a chance to stop racing. I could have sworn I heard someone out there, watching me, lurking. I had been on edge for the past two weeks, ever since he got out. Once the DNA tests were entered into evidence, the judge demanded his immediate release. My first big case working in the DA's office. The case that made national headlines. The case that I poured my heart and soul into to secure a conviction. The case where I was sure of the perp's guilt. The case I kept working on for many years after, showing up at each parole hearing and advocating for denial. The case that saw me as the youngest person ever promoted to Deputy Chief of the Sexual Assault Unit in Dallas County, which put me on track to eventually earn a promotion to First Assistant DA -- my current position. How could I have been so wrong?

The question haunted me, but not merely as much as did the look on his face that last time he was denied parole. When he came in to address the parole board that day, he looked a bit nervous, though contrite. Armed with the evidence of his stellar behavior while incarcerated over the previous 11 years, the fellow prisoners whom he helped, and all the classes he'd taught, there was a glimmer of hope in his eyes that his parole would finally be granted. That glimmer of hope faded quickly once I began to testify as to why his parole should be denied. By the end of the hearing, he sulked in his chair, no longer really listening, already certain of what his fate would be.

I watched as his sulking turned into a barely contained rage, glaring at me when he was led out of the room and escorted back to his holding cell. It was in his eyes -- eyes that conveyed a raw hatred and the unspeakable violence he would do to me if given the chance. It didn't bother me at that moment. I went home comforted by the knowledge that there was one less sex offender out on the streets. He needed to serve every minute of his sentence, and even more if it had been up to me.

Almost a year later, his DNA exoneration two weeks ago had shaken that confidence. Before, the fury in his eyes only confirmed for me that he was indeed a violent predator who should remain incarcerated. Now that same look had all new connotations. It spoke of the rage of someone who had his whole young adult life taken away from him. His bright future launched from a good education at Southern Methodist University, extinguished. It was a look that harbored horrific fantasies of bloody vengeance. It was that look that haunted me and had me on edge.

"Gracie, dinner's getting cold," my husband called, bringing me back into the present.

"Be right there," I answered. I peed and washed my hands. Looking into the vanity mirror, I didn't like what I saw. My lack of sleep and nagging worries were taking their toll on my otherwise soft features. Tiny lines of stress ran under and around my eyes, and a single white hair was trying to hide among its dark brown siblings on my head. How had I missed it? I pulled the pin out of my bun and let my tresses fall past my shoulders. After plucking out the offending follicle, I searched vigorously for any more stragglers. Finding none, I left my hair down to soften my look then headed into our bedroom for a quick change out of my heels and work clothes. I joined Garry at the table where he was dishing up our food. I had a hard time keeping up my end of the conversation, an observation not lost on him.

"Grace, are you still stressing about that Shepherd kid?" my husband asked me, once I failed to follow what he was saying for the third time.

"He's not a kid anymore," I reminded him, "and no, I'm not stressing over his release," I lied. "He's been in prison for the last 12 years, no way he would risk going back by doing something stupid," I told Garry, with more confidence than I really felt.

"Then what is it that's got your attention?" he asked. "Why aren't you paying any attention to me?"

"It's just this trial," I half lied. "I just want to make sure my closing is air tight tomorrow." It was true that the case was eating at me, but that wasn't the real reason. I didn't have the courage to voice it out loud, not even to my husband.

"Just keep talking to me and keep me company. Your voice is always soothing, even when I can't hold up my end of the conversation," I told him. Finally some truth.

"Are you going to be alright while I'm gone?" he asked, reminding me that he was leaving the next day for the annual state-wide parole officers' conference in Austin.

"I'll be fine," I told him. "You'll only be gone for a couple days." It was Wednesday. The conference was Thursday and Friday. He could come back Friday, but I knew it was custom for him and his friends to get together and unwind until late that last night of the conference. I didn't want to deprive him of his fun by asking him to come back Friday night. They'd have a late breakfast Saturday morning then he'd drive back to Dallas. It was a short drive from Austin, a little more than 3 hours.

"I could have my buddy Mark come by and check on you...?"

"Don't be silly. I'll miss you, but I'll be ok. Just come back ready to show me how much you've missed me," I demanded, only half-jokingly. The stress of the past few weeks had drained us of our time and energy, and it had been over a month since we'd had sex. I needed my fix. "Besides, I'll be ovulating, and we can try again." I had stopped taking my birth control months ago, finally feeling far along enough in my career that I could safely start a family.

"Ok," he said with a smile, and came to give me an affectionate kiss. Then he went on telling me about his day, something about finally tracking down some perp who had skipped town and traveled out of state without permission, missing his last two scheduled check-ins. When we were done eating, Garry offered to clean up and let me get an early start on my sleep. I kissed him gratefully and made a dart for our bedroom, carrying my refilled glass of wine. As soon as my head hit the pillow, the screams began all over again. The same screams that had haunted me regularly ever since I was 4 years old. My mother's screams of horror and pain. Like every night, I needed the wine to drown them out and get to sleep. But they were louder that night, and harder to keep at bay.

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The next morning I awoke much earlier than I needed. The lack of any light coming from the windows told me I still had a while before I had to be up. I tried to go back to sleep but couldn't, my mind racing back and forth between my anxieties about my current trial, the whereabouts of Augustine Shepherd, and the image of my mother being brutally assaulted, seared permanently into my brain. After about a half hour of continual tossing and turning, I grabbed my phone to check the time. When my eyes cleared enough to register the number 4 in the first position, I groaned. I struggled for another 40 minutes to get just a little more sleep. The moment I finally drifted off, my alarm rang out. It was going to be one of those days...

The recently built Lew Sterrett Justice Center in Dallas seems like any other office building in the downtown financial district, until you encounter the immense security checkpoint one has to pass through before gaining access to the offices, clerks, and courtrooms on its upper floors, or the jail in the back of the building. When I arrived that morning, the usual Sheriff's deputies manned the body scanner and bag x-ray, and they greeted me warmly despite the frigid cold still hanging over the city. For them it was just another normal day. For me it felt anything but.

It was two hours before court came in session and instead of going over my closing arguments, I sat in my office staring at my computer, arguing with myself. On my desk lay the defendant's rap sheet, a file over an inch thick. Derrick Sorrell was 26 years old, but his record stretched back to when he was only 14 and started racking up offences in truancy court. Some possession of controlled substances charges followed those, then some misdemeanor thefts. And finally there was this case: felony theft of property greater than $1500 in value, aggravated by the use of a firearm. He'd taken a shot at the victim during the commission of the robbery but missed. Then he just took off running. By his criminal history alone, this was someone I wanted off the streets, irrespective of his guilt in this case.

But we were pretty certain he committed this robbery. Sorrell was identified by the main eye witness and picked out of a lineup. When the police arrested him, it was during an unrelated routine traffic stop for an illegal turn. The officer who performed the stop reported smelling the odor of a controlled substance in the vehicle and conducted a search that turned up an unregistered firearm but no drugs. The officer then ran Sorrell's license and discovered a bench warrant for an unpaid citation for failing to fully stop at a stop sign. He was arrested and brought to the station.

Sorrell claimed that he had purchased the .9 mm pistol from a private seller at a recent gun show, but it matched the description of the firearm given by the witness whose property was stolen. Sorrell also fit the general description of the suspect in the theft case so on a hunch, he was put in the lineup of suspects brought before the eye witness later that day. That's when he was picked out.

A good defense attorney with a more respectable-looking client could have gotten the search of his vehicle thrown out, and subsequently, his inclusion in the suspect lineup would have been ruled in violation of his rights. The eyewitness identification, therefore, would be inadmissible. With good counsel the whole case could have been dismissed. But Ben Sullivan, his public defender, didn't stand a chance of getting that ruled in his favor. All he could do was try to negotiate a plea for a lesser charge. We had offered a plea deal that would have seen the defendant spend only 20 months in state jail, but it was refused. Now he was looking at a minimum of 7 years. But that's not what nagged at me.

No, my unease stemmed from the file open on my computer screen. Sorrell's alibi was that he was home sleeping, but the only witness he had to support that contention was his girlfriend. She also had a record, including drug charges, and I shredded her credibility pretty easily on the stand. But just to give myself added ammunition, I requested that the lead investigator subpoena Sorrell's cell phone records to check his whereabouts during the time of the robbery. The records showed that his phone was stationary during that time, located in or around his home. His phone had received a few flirtatious text messages from other women, to which he did not respond until much later that evening. A YouTube video had also been watched from his device, during the time when the crime was allegedly committed. I determined these records to be inconclusive, reasoning that he could have left his phone at home during the commission of the crime and someone else could have used it to watch the YouTube video. But I didn't turn the file over to his defense attorney.

By law, we prosecutors are supposed to turn over any and all exculpatory evidence to the defense. I did not feel like the phone records were exculpatory, but a defense lawyer could argue that they were. Besides, Sorrell's defense counsel could have independently requested the cell tower data. It wasn't my fault if his attorney chose not to pursue that angle. But that excuse rang hollow, even to me. In my 13 years as a prosecutor, few public defenders had ever gone to such links. They were too overburdened and under-resourced.

Three weeks ago, I would not have given the situation a second thought. As police and prosecutors, we also often feel overburdened, fighting an endless wave of deviance and depravity in a justice system that doesn't give us the tools to truly stamp out the problem. We tend to take a broader view of the people we charge. When we're dealing with a habitual offender being a continual menace to his community, we try to use any tool at our disposal to get that person put away. Sorrell fit that description perfectly. If he actually hadn't committed the crime in question, I knew he had committed some other offense that we hadn't caught, so I had no problem prosecuting him. But Augustine Shepherd's exoneration two weeks prior had disrupted my easy faith. A niggling doubt was eating away at my inner peace, and I just couldn't shake it.

I opened a new email window addressed to Ben Sullivan, Sorrell's dense attorney, and attached the file. But I hesitated, hovering the mouse pointer over the 'send' button. A knock on my door saved me from having to make the decision. I welcomed Rebecca, my fellow assistant DA, into my office for a chat. I didn't fill her in on the crises of faith I was having, just let her talk. She was there to pep me up for my closing later that day, as we always did for each other whenever one of us had a trial. By the time she left I was no longer in crisis. I deleted the email without sending and went back to practicing my closing arguments.

It turned out to all be for naught. We had a postponement in the trial and I didn't get to make my closing. I went home that evening with the strangest feeling, equal parts frustration and relief.

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Friday was equally uneventful at the office. The judge was out sick, so we would resume the conclusion of the case on Monday morning. My day passed unremarkably, looking over the list of arrestees from the previous evening and figuring out which ones would be charged, and then making assignments to the attorneys more junior than me. All was fine until my drive home. I got the feeling that someone was following me leaving the courthouse. It wasn't yet 5:30 but it was already dark outside, one of the things I hated about the winter months. I drove a winding path to get to my house but when I stepped out of the car, I still felt the presence of someone lurking just out of my vision. Despite my heavy coat I broke out in chills. I hurried to my door, clutching tightly at the .22 in my purse.

I bolted the door quickly behind me and only then did I turn on the lights. In fact, I turned on every light in the house as I made my way to my bedroom to change out of my work clothes. When I reached our master bedroom and flipped the switch, there on my bed sat Augustine Shepherd. He had a gun pointed straight at my head. I was too scared to scream.

"Don't even think about it," he said with an ice cold glare, motioning toward my purse. I suddenly felt dumb for announcing to the world I was armed the previous night. "Put it on the floor slowly, then step back." I did as I was told, still trying to breathe. He picked up my purse, found the gun inside, and tucked it into his pants.

My heart was beating out of my chest with fear. This was not the same lanky 19 year-old I'd sent away to prison all those years ago. Clarisse Ferrarer, his accuser, had described thinking he was "really cute" when he first began to talk to her at the party that fateful night. Well, "really cute" was long gone. Augustine was now a MAN, bulging with muscles from all the weightlifting he'd done in prison. He'd had smooth baby skin back then, and barely any facial hair. Now his face was rugged and scarred sporting a sinister goatee, a bald head, and there were all manner of prison tattoos all up and down the dark chocolate skin of his arms. He stood at approximately 6 feet, a full 7 inches over my 5'5", 127 lb. frame. I'd faced down taller men before, but his added bulk just made me feel like he could squash me at any moment.

"Wh- wha -- what are you doing here?" I stammered. He laughed at me.

"You know God damn well what I'm doing here, Gracie Elizabeth Sterling," came his gruff reply. The years had added a deep baritone to his voice that wasn't present when I first prosecuted him 12 years ago.

"Augustine please!" I begged. "It wasn't my fault. I didn't know--"

"You can save all that bullshit," he interrupted. "It's too fucking late for your explanations. It's payback time, bitch."

"Wh- wh- what are you going t- t- t- to do to me?"

"What am I gonna do to you?" he repeated, as if it was stupid of me to even ask. "'What am I NOT going to do to you?' might be a better question. I'm gonna take from you, Grace. I'm going to take from you all the things you tried to take from me: my freedom, my respect, my integrity, my dignity. All that and more," he said. The hair stood up on the back of my neck.

"B-b-b-b-but my husband will be home soon. He's a parole officer, and he carries a gun. Two guns!"

"Ha!" he bellowed. "Bitch, don't even try lying to me. I've been following Garry during the day to learn his routine. Yesterday I followed him to Austin, saw him check into a hotel, and saw the details of the conference he's attending. So no, nobody's coming to save you. You're all alone tonight, and I've got you all to myself to use and defile you how I please."

"But Augustine why?" I tried to stall. "You just got out! If you hurt me, you'll go right back. Is that really what you want?"

"What I really wanted can never be," he said slowly, deliberately. "So what I want now, I'm gonna take. So you can start by taking off that blouse, and taking off that skirt."

I was in full-blown panic at that point, and memories of my mother's screams began flooding my mind. I needed any reason to delay while I thought of a plan to try and get out of the situation. I tried to reason with him. "Look at you, Augustine. You're not a skinny kid any more. I'm sure there are plenty of women who would sleep with you without being forced at gun point. Why do you want to risk going back to prison by doing this to me?!" That was actually not a lie. Augustine had grown into quite the specimen of a man. If he wasn't filled with so much anger and hate, I could imagine that there would be plenty of women who would be more than happy to welcome him back to the free world by showing him a thing or two that he'd missed. Perhaps it was the fact that I was the one asking, but something about that question just seemed to make him angry, and fire flared in his eyes as he stepped towards me.

"I said strip, bitch!" he growled at me as I shuffled backwards in fright, "or I can rip those fancy clothes off for you." The backs of my legs hit the bed and I fell back on my behind, searching for another angle to try.