It’s a good thing I’m the only one who reads these postings. Anyone else would think I can’t say the same thing twice. There’s some truth to that, but also not; I won’t know until the next one. But in the event that some else is willing to be bored beyond endurance..I make the disclaimer that nothing said here is meant to make light of what anyone suffered. I have said that I believed an atrocity was committed. I also expressed my revulsion at the shameful and violent treatment of girls and young women in western culture. I re-iterate it here. I thought Stephanie’s testimony was the most interesting (having bumped Ricky from the top spot). Was I ever wrong! Marie takes the cake. Now I should say that I printed off her testimony. It was incredibly long I thought; especially for someone her age. And leaving 1965, I doubt that such a shameless thing would happen in court today. I hope. Since I had a paper copy, I decided to highlight in yellow the plethora of leading questions she was asked. I stopped when my yellow highlighter ran out of ink. I thought I could, only in a speculative way inconsistent with the facts, tell when she was getting confused, and having a hard time trying to remember what to say. Of course, her foisting the blame on her sister for involvement in the needle event, only to take responsibility herself (“Oh, God help me!”), was very dramatic. I wonder if she knew that someone else was blaming her sister as well. I don’t know why, but I suggest that it may have something to do with this:

Q. Did your mother have anything to do with that?
A. No, sir.
Q. Where was your mother?
A. In bed.
Q. How do you know she was in bed?
A. Because I saw - Shirley was in there to kiss her goodbye.

So an awkward situation developed. Shirley was leaving! So how could she be hanging about to serve as a co-conspirator? Where was she going? To rake the leaves? No! Marie says that she was going to rake the leaves. Ricky says it was Shirley! So does Marie…until later. But she’s blown the whole thing here. So now a very odd situation results, to say the least.

There’s also a problem placing events consistently, even obvious ones. For example, we’re told that Marie started living in the house in September, and lived the whole month. When asked when Sylvia and Jenny moved in, she becomes confused. She says 3-4 weeks before school started. Then she corrects herself and says “I mean a couple of days before school opened.” “Were you living there at the time they began living there?” “Yes.” Sylvia was there on July 16th or 17th, as Stephanie asserts. So not only does Marie panic, she gets it wrong twice. Well, that depends on when school began. Time-honored tradition has it beginning on the day after Labor Day, or the first Monday in September. Here’s another good example:

Q. Did you ever see John in the basement with Sylvia?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. When was that?
A. In the month of October.
Q. What did you see John and Sylvia doing in the basement?A. I don’t remember.

But after being prompted, she suddenly remembers. I really like this one:

Q. What day was that done?
A. On Tuesday, a week before she died.
Q. I am sorry, I can't hear.
A. On Tuesday a week before she died.
Q. Exactly a week before Sylvia died?
A. Yes, sir.

Why bother to put her up there at all? Maybe he should just hand a written document to the court and save her the anxiety. But this one is good:

Q. Who else was there?
A. Richard Hobbs, Paula, Stephanie and Johnny and Shirley and Jimmy and Mommy and I and Sylvia and Jenny.
Q. There was no school that day?
A. There was no school.
Q. No school? Why not?
A. We were out for some reason at school. I can't remember the reason.

I’m wrong no doubt, but the reason she can’t remember why they were out of school might be that she’s got the wrong week. Sylvia died on Tuesday, October 26th; that is certain. The Tuesday before was October 19th. Now it is interesting that if we go back one more week, Tuesday 12th, we reach Columbus Day.

But adjustments of the testimony were a must! She said that Sylvia’s cigarette burns were inflicted by Darlene, who is painted as a big bully. This is what she says:

Q. What would she do?
A. Put her cigarette out on Sylvia.
Q. Put her cigarette out on Sylvia, the MacGuire girl would do that?
A. Yes.
Q. You saw it?
A. Yes.
Q. Was your mommy there at that time?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. What did she say?
A. She would try to stop her.
Q. What did the MacGuire girl do?
A. Stopped it and put the cigarette out in the ashtray.
Q. How many times did the MacGuire girl do that?
A. A couple of times.

This is odd. For the witness, Darlene’s cigarette has burned down to the filter, and it is time to snub it out in the ashtray. But the bully decides to put it out on Sylvia instead. When stopped, she does the proper thing- she puts it out in the ashtray. It’s as though it’s a momentary sadistic idea that comes to mind only as the girl is done with her cigarette; not torture, but using someone as the ashtray. At any rate, a very big problem now occurs…Darlene burns Sylvia. Why Darlene? Darlene smokes! But she did it only a couple of times. This can’t be!

Q. Is that the same Darlene you said yesterday put cigarettes out on Sylvia?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. Now, Marie, I want you to look at this little lady and tell the jury if this is the Darlene MacGuire you said put cigarettes out on Sylvia?
A. Yes.
Q. Did you see Darlene actually take cigarettes and burn Sylvia with them?
A. Yes.
Q. How many times?
A. She would do it every time she came over.
Q. How many times would that be?
A. Every day.

The ashtray is gone. But how did what she say before accord with 150 cigarette burns? It didn’t, so now the answers change. There are a lot more burns to account for! And that’s been done now. So is Darlene still just putting her cigarettes out? If so, she must have been a chain smoker. I point out one more.

Q. How many times?
A. Three or four.
Q. That is all he did?
A. Yes, sir.
Q. What did your mother do about that?
A. Told him to quit it and get out of the house?
Q. Did he go?
A. Yes, sir.

Assuming the transcript is right, she answered a question with a question. Perhaps she is not remembering her lines. Perhaps we can paraphrase: “Told him to quit it and get out of the house? Is that what I’m to say?” I’m sure that’s not what happened, but it is worth noting nonetheless. Here’s another one:

Q. Did you ever see anybody jump on her with their feet?
A. No, sir.”

But she said this earlier:

A. Anna Siscoe would beat her up real bad.
Q. How?
A. Get her by the hair and throw her down and walk in her face and stomp on her stomach, give her a bloody nose and bloody mouth.

Then this:

Q. Did Johnny do anything else to her besides hit her and kick her?
A. He stepped on her foot till it got a blister on her foot.
Q. What part of his foot?
A. The sole of his shoe.
Q. Did she get a blister?
A. Yes, sir.

It would seem that more than one person was jumping on her with their feet. Again:

Q. Did you ever see paper in the sink?
A. Yes.
Q. Do you know where the sink is?
A. No, sir.

Ad nauseum:

Q. Was anybody else down there besides you and Johnny and Paula?
A. No.
Q. Just the three of you and Sylvia, which made four?
A. I was only down there to get a rake.
Q. Was Jenny down there?
A. Yes, sir.

It’s too bad we can’t see the signals. But I’m sure there weren’t any. Put succinctly- it was a travesty of justice that her entire testimony was not thrown out, and the witnessed dismissed as discredited and unrealiable..to say the least. Or maybe better, shamefully manipulated, which would say it all.

But once more into the breach dear friends! Watch how this is spun:

Q. Now, were you present when - strike that - did you ever see your mommy put some marks on Sylvia's stomach?
A. No.
Q. Were you present when the marks were put on Sylvia's stomach?
A. Only for a little bit.

I’m reminded of Stephanie’s testimony; a reference to marks on Sylvia’s stomach. But then!

Q. Now, do you remember the day when somebody put marks, burned some marks on Sylvia's stomach?
A. Only part of the time.

And there it is! We’re spinning like a top. Nothing was said about “burned” in the earlier question. Now, it seems to me that the right thing to have done is to have asked: “do you know how those marks were made on Sylvia’s stomach?” No! He chooses to put “burned” into Marie’s mouth, and the ears of the judge and jury with absolutely no basis in testimony. But burn it will be! Just like cigarette burns. We must make sure that the witness will not get this wrong.

Now, I would make a few comments that I’m sure are wrong, as if I haven’t been wrong enough already. I’m asked to believe that this slogan, as I’ve referred to it in order to avoid be morbid, though I can’t avoid that any longer, was done with a sewing needle. I wonder how you would carve words on someone with a sewing needle. How deep can you get them? Wouldn’t you have to drag the needle back and forth over and over again to achieve any depth? Of course, doing so would ruin the letters! And make a terrible mess to boot. Would this person stand still? How long would it take? That’s the odd thing, or at least one of them. They’re in the kitchen! It’s full of knives! I bet you could cut words into someone pretty quick with the right knife! And despite being in the kitchen, we send little Shirley or Marie searching for a sewing needle. There is a disorder known as Self-Injury Disorder. It takes many forms, but a particular manifestation that afflicts girls is when they carve words into their bodies. They don’t use sewing needles! They typically use something like a razor. Why? It’s sharp, you can make letters without ripping yourself up dragging a sewing needle back-and-forth, and it will leave a pattern of scaring clearly readable to all who see it. So why a needle? Because one of the witnesses refers to it as tattooing! And he knows how tattoos are made. You have to write it out on paper so the tattoo artist has it right. Then you use a template; to get it centred, to make sure that the letters line up, etc. You use ink, which we see as Gertrude rights out the slogan with a pen. And tattoos are made with needles! Someone’s been in a tattoo parlor before! But alas! Tattoos are made by the needle punching the skin and depositing the ink under it. And would that be done with a sewing needle? How long would this take to make the slogan on her stomach if this home-made tattoo could even be made with a needle? And why heat the needle? What purpose did that serve? Would it make the needle go deeper? I don’t see how that’s possible. But if we’re going to call it “burned” into the skin, then they’ll have to heat the needle. And why heat it with a match? How much heat will a single burning match generate? And how many matches will we need to heat this sewing needle- over and over and over and over. I don’t know what kind of stove Gertrude had, but if it was a gas stove, you could get the needle red hot, though I don’t know why you would do this, in no time flat. Instead of 500 matches, maybe Darlene could use one of her cigarettes to heat the needle. I found this in one scholarly article: “The temperature of tobacco that burns at the tip of a cigarette may reach 900ºC.” That is hot! The tip of a sewing needle would heat up quick!

Why a needle? I can’t say for sure; but if I knew tattoos, and I was shown the slogan on the girl’s body, and I didn’t do it, I might conclude that it was a tattoo, and therefore required a needle. But ink as well! And as for the branding..there is nothing whatsoever to indicate that what is in the sink could possibly have made the brand in the slogan photo. It has an eye-hook on the end, with an almost complete circle, which the mark on the photo does not have. And as to burning paper in the sink to get it hot enough…if I toss paper into the sink, and light it with a match, it will burn in no time flat! To get a “branding iron” hot enough to actually brand, I will need much more heat than that produced by a bunch of paper that burns in a matter of seconds. And not just burn! It will ignite, and then flare up. I won’t even be able to get this implement hot. When cattle were branded..they don’t light some paper on fire in a sink, and then stick a branding iron into it for a few seconds, and then brand the symbol for “South Rivers Ranch” onto a bull. You would use a fire that would burn down to extremely hot, slow-burning embers or coals, let the end of the iron sit in the embers or coals until it is red hot..and then…everyone will know that your bull is from ”South Rivers Ranch.” And that’s the odd thing..you couldn’t do that in the basement. Wait! Yes you could! We know that they have a coal-burning furnace! Stephanie went down into the basement to put coal in, only to drop some on her sister’s foot! I bet you could get a branding iron pretty hot in there in no time! But no need to be in a hurry; just keep lighting paper in the sink; besides, what’s happening in the kitchen is going to take forever. But were they burned into her? Or were they made with a sharp object? I would think that the coroner would have been able to tell us; distinguishing between burns and cutting/scratching doesn’t seem like it would be too hard. I’m not a coroner. But I know about covering all of one’s bases! This is what the pathologist said: “This again I felt was either a sharp or hot object or a hot, sharp object.” Excellent! It could be either, or both! And he doesn’t know the difference between burns and cuts. I know it’s not 2015; but I also know it isn’t 1885 either! It’s 1965, and I find the conclusion troubling. It’s too bad I can’t get Dr. Quincy to stand by me! Or maybe Dr. Donald Mallard. But I doubt that even Dr. House would see his way through this puzzle. And passing through the breach once more, I find myself curiously intrigued by the idea that what was on the girl’s stomach was done in ink or dye. 

Techtonicus October 2015