a trial and without having, before hand, any experts for the doctor who had just talked to the judge informally far from his court. A trial with those new experts would be messy… The DA and the doctor’s lawyer met in the county jail to release Dr. Lennox.
And yes, Tony Lennox was free, his infant daughter dead, and his private practice gone. The Health Department had suspended his medical license the same day of the initial guilty verdict by the Grand Jury, even though the outcome had been a negotiated settlement later for a lesser charge without a trial.
The doctor AND his lawyer would have harder time to get his license back. Judge Good could not do much to retrieve his suspension once it had been taken in the state Capital by the Medical Board and by the Education Department. It was on their website – even though the original indictment had been wrong..
His lawyer drove the doctor home. No one had called his wife who herself had kept quiet throughout the ordeal and she had not called or visited him in the several days he had been in jail. She did act surprised and gave him a tepid hug when he showed up at the door. Somehow she did not seem happy he had been released and expressed neither surprise nor emotion.
“This is very happy news for you both!” The lawyer said, “for now your husband is back at home and probably for good. You don’t need to worry any more. I will get back to you tomorrow to discuss where we go from here.”
Hurrah!!… Really? The lawyer did not have much to congratulate himself about the work he had done, though his client a day before was a homicidal man and now was clear and free! But obviously it had not been his doing. According to what the D.A. had told him, it was all concocted by the judge as HE had gathered more experts; I should have been the one, instead of the judge, getting all those experts before negotiating the lesser guilty settlement. He admitted to himself. I should not have settled at all if I believed my client was innocent and I should have taken better steps to clear him as the judge has done. Obviously the judge believed him more than I did.
Once at home, Dr. Lennox appeared quiet, depressed, and did not say much to his wife as she herself did not seem happy to see her husband released from jail so unexpectedly early ‘plus that does not mean that you are not guilty; they just have doubts.’ They ate supper in silence. She was obviously grieving for the loss of her daughter and she probably blamed her husband for utter stupidity, even if he had not killed her. She did not seem happy about having him back at home and was not told by the D.A. or by his lawyer if the verdict of Guilty was still hanging over his head.
SHE thought Tony was most likely guilty; well, not perhaps for tossing the crying, sick infant girl against the wall, but for not having awakened her when the girl fell, so both could have taken her to the ER then. Instead of seeing his not having been awakened her in the middle of the night as a sign of consideration and kindness towards her, she was mad about it. She had not given a thought to the possibility that his not having taken their girl to the ER right away may have been HIS judgment call, as was his having kept an eye on her for the rest of the night. She only thought that he had been stupid and careless! She was now distancing herself from him…
Judge Good assumed correctly what would be happening at the doctor’s home. He could not do much at that point even if he gave the doctor all his own mental and heart support from his own home. And he did not credit himself for having won such a victory for the doctor against the D.A., and in spite of the doctor’s lawyer, so inept! Tony needed all the compassion he could get, but he wasn’t getting it from anyone, and definitely not from his wife. Both probably will sob all night in silence, he thought. He doubted they would be trying to have another child any time soon… or ever. And so he chit-chatted with his wife Barbara quietly in their living room over a-couple-of-drinks-a-piece till late hours.
“I imagine I will be meeting tomorrow with both the defense lawyer and the prosecutor to talk about the official conviction wording if there is any,” he said. But I don’t want to make a statement myself to the Press. Perhaps the D.A. will be honest, and kind enough to consult with me before he gives out to them the official version of his current position, accepted by the court, by MY court.”
“I also imagine,” said his wife, “that the hospital, the pediatricians, the ER doctors, will be fuming when they read about his early release from jail with no conviction ‘based on just doubts, on insufficient evidence’.”
“We’ll probably also read a few derisive articles in the papers too, perhaps by advocates against child abuse, especially the SBS expert, blaming my court of incompetence ‘for letting the doctor go scot free’ in spite of so much bloody evidence, without a trial, and without regard for the needs of other children,” Kenneth said.
Part B
A TRAGEDY
(Chapters 8 through 14)
8
Ramifications Of A Wrong Conviction
Dr. Tony Lennox spent most of the whole next day at home, staring without sound at the TV but not really watching anything. His wife Patty had not prepared breakfast, perhaps she was thinking of having a coffee some place else, and she was gone from the house as soon as she was done in the bathroom. Not even a Good Morning, or a Bye, or I’m going to… Nothing.
He also left the house at noon, just to wander by the river edge and perhaps stop for a hot dog. Tony bought the Tuesday paper: He read on the front page a brief statement of his having had ‘a preliminary release from jail’ due to new evidence that shed significant doubt on the initial verdict of guilty of ‘Negligent Homicide.’ The note did not say much as neither the judge nor the D.A. had said much else. It promised to bring to the reader more information when that was made available.
When Tony came home two hours later, he found it empty. His home had been for several months occupied during the day by his infant daughter and a nanny. Now his wife was not there either though she normally worked just mornings in a local clinic as a secretary and one would have expected her to be at home in the afternoon… Their marriage had had some ups and downs early on, but it seemed to have improved after the arrival of their daughter. Now he feared that on top of and after the unbearable ordeal of losing her, Patty might just leave him. He sensed that she could not stand the sight of him close by, not in bed and perhaps not around him at all…
That afternoon the bell rang. A post-woman at the door requested his signature as she gave him the feared, green-banded, certified envelope from the State Health Department stamped in the Capital. It notified him of his license being suspended as of the day of his (initial) ‘guilty verdict’. He had been told by his colleagues that THAT would happen right after the verdict and that THEY at the Capital were following his case very closely. They, at OPC, had their own doctors and lawyers examining his case when they heard of his release, and they would come to their own decision, regardless of his case in the Supreme Court and possibly in spite of it if -even if ‘unlikely,’ they anticipated- he happened later to be cleared completely of wrong doing.
Along with the suspension, the letter told him to surrender to their local state office of OPC his Medical Diploma to practice in the state and his current three year registration card. Though he had renewed his license and prepaid for the 3 year registration just two months earlier, he would never be refunded for the approximately 34 remaining months when he could not practice. Thieves! he would call them later when after he requested a refund, it was denied. ‘We never refund for unused months’ they told him when he asked for it, even though he made it clear to them that other state departments, like the DMV, do make such refunds for instance for the remainder of the registration fee of cars when they are sold. No use.
With
