I had a meeting with my attorney on 12/18/2006. I should be shopping and preparing for Christmas, yet I was meeting with my attorney. He gave me his Christmas present: the court discovery information from the District Attorney’s office.
Discovery is all of the documentation or information that the DA plans to use in court as evidence against a defendant. My attorney said that he had just received it and had not had a chance to go through it yet. The information was a good 3 inches thick. I was very anxious to read through it.
Arriving back at my Dad’s house, I went upstairs and begin reading through the information page by page. It contained the following items:
- The statement the police wrote up from my “interview” with them
- Some copies of emails exchanged between me and the accusers mother within our forum
- Some emails from another mother in the forum to the police
- The medical report and interview information from the accusers visit to the child advocacy center.
- A copy of my arrest and search warrant
- Logs of the calls where the mother initially called the police
- The detectives notes
Police Statement
The police statement was basically a serious of quotes and statements that I had stated during the interview, but pieced together in such a way as to make it look as if I was trying to hide something. They also quoted the statement I made about “not being able to explain how it happened” as possibly being an accident. I never said that, but they way they wrote up the report stated that I did. What I did say was “I guess it COULD have been an accident, but that I couldn’t explain it.” This statement was proceeded by a good 15 minutes of “Could it have happened due to x, or y, or z, or 2000 other options” followed by a “Well, if it wasn’t any of those, it had to be an accident right? To which I replied, with my “it could have” statement. They also confused the issue of “it” many times.
Unfortunately they are good at what they do…very good. They were able to get me so riled up and confused, I just about said exactly what they wanted me to without even intending to do so.
The Emails
After our party that evening, I sent an email to the Rose telling her that we had a great time, but felt bad we didn’t get to spend more time with them. I expressed an interest in getting together with them another time. She replied indicating she thought that was a great idea. I replied back saying wonderful and also stating that I was surprised her daughter warmed up to me as much as she did, as in the past she was always very shy. I told Rose that Evonne “was a sweety and that she made my night sitting on my lap and almost falling asleep on me”. Again, this particular statement, innocently made would be held against me. In hindsight I wish I would have never sent that email. This should be a lesson for all of you reading this, be careful what you write. This entire email was highlighted in the discovery information. Obviously something the DA intended to use against me.
The other little girl who was interviewed by the Child Advocacy Center (CAC) also forwarded a few emails to the police. One was about some pictures my wife and I had taken at one of a forum get together. In the email I had said attached were some shots of her daughter that I thought turned out well, and other was an email containing a screen shot of our forum once I had taken it down.
The medical report
The medical report was by far the biggest portion of the discovery information. It contained interview questions and background info on the mother and the little girl I was accused of molesting. Out of respect for their privacy, I wont’ reveal too much, but there were a few very interesting items in that report:
- The girls mother (Rose) stated that I had hit my wife in the past. That was a complete lie, I have never in my life hit my wife or even come close for that matter.
- Rose had a history of sexual molestation issues on her side of the family
- Rose’s husband had hit her one time before
- The only evidence found on Evonne was redness in the vulva area. A quick search on: redness+vulva+child in Google results in 146,000 search results. Most of them stating that it is very common in children. Yet somehow the doctor stated that the redness was “consistent with child sexual abuse”. This basically means that the symptoms can be found with victims of sex abuse, but that it isn’t proof. This article from a False allegation law firm states: “Professional examinations that reveal nothing become “consistent with” abuse”.
- The clothes Evonne was wearing that evening were not brought to the CAC for DNA testing. Swabs and fluids from her showed no signs of foreign DNA, nor were there any other signs beyond the redness of abuse.
- The medical report has no information on the father, except what the mother provided. That implies he did not attend…which I found interesting. If I thought my daughter had been abused, I would have been there.
Arrest and Search Warrant
The arrest and search warrant didn’t contain much of particular interest. The only thing in there that I had not seen before was the information provided by the police to the judge to obtain the warrant. Nothing special though, just the facts I’ve already stated here. If you are accused of molesting a child, you are highly suspect by the police of having child pornography, pictures, and sexual “toys” based on police profiling. They found nothing in my house or on my computer. Nothing, nada, zero. Why? Because I didn’t have anything.
Logs of phone calls
Again, nothing exciting here. Just a log of the initial phone statement made by Rose and the police requesting that she come to the police station. Not really sure why this was included, but I’m not a lawyer neither.
The detective’s notes
Now, these were interesting. Nothing earthshaking, but it was interesting to read how I was played. Particularly about how they got me to come to the police station without telling me why. It contained logs of our phone calls and logs of the detectives calls to Rose and other other little girl’s mother.
I literally read this material over and over throughout the course of this whole mess. Those first few days I read it at least 20 times. I wrote down every little issue and question I had about it and provided that info to my attorney. The evidence contained lies, mis-truths, false statements and irrelevant information. The one thing it should have contained that it didn’t: conclusive evidence. There was nothing that linked me to the crime. Absolutely no evidence whatsoever. Yet there it was in my discovery folder to be used against me.
I never showed it to anyone but my wife and Dad. I never will. Frankly it’s just creepy reading about the physical attributes of a four girl, especially in the context of what they were investigating her for. No child should have to go through that or have a report like that written about them. As angry as I was, I felt bad for her.
