Love Story: In The Web of Life by Ken Renshaw (snow like ashes TXT) 📕

he had to obey the Incident Commander,the Sheriff, when told to call off his dogs.

When asked whether the Sheriff had asked abouthis credentials, he said, "No, all he did was rant threats atme."

Sheriff Bogend's testimony was ideal for thecase. The sheriff admitted he had heard of other police Departmentsusing psychics in missing person’s cases but had no personalexperience with psychics. The Sheriff kept getting angrier duringthe detailed questioning, When asked why he didn't use thebloodhounds, the Sheriff said he did not know the dogs, how wellthey were trained, or the reputation of their handler. He said thathe had called for bloodhounds from someone he knew and had workedwith in Pine Mountain: they didn't get there until much later, atwhich point, too much snow had fallen. When the issue of thebloodhounds was perused, the Sheriff admitted that he figured thehandler would later want to be paid and he didn't want to gothrough the paperwork for using unbudgeted or non-county resources.The county already had a dog handler on contract.

When quizzed about whether budgetaryconsiderations had entered his decision not to take Mr. Manteo'sadvice, he got very angry and shouted, "He isn't a countyrecognized contractor. Search and rescue is a job for people on theCounty payroll."

Mr. Willard was cool and let the jury observeSheriff Bogend's embarrassment for a long minute before hedismissed the witness.

In cross-examination, the defense attorneytried to restore Sheriff Bogend's credibility, but, the damage wasdone.

Steve Manteo was called after the Sheriff. Herecalled his experience the night of Lucy's loss. His testimony wasright along the deposition you provided me in the backgroundpapers. At the end of his testimony he was visibly moved, almostcrying. The jury saw that.

Candice Montgomery was called and did a goodjob of explaining how people can mind-to-mind communicate at asubconscious level through shortcuts in eight-dimensional space. Ihad read the background paper by her that you gave me. I reallyunderstood her ideas after her testimony. The jury seemed attentivethroughout her testimony.

She said that, because of the lateness of thehour she would delay showing her video tomorrow morning.

Dr. Peter Gallagher testified that he and someof his colleagues had reviewed her work and could find no fault init.

The judge adjoined the court atfive–fifteen."

****

Wednesday of the trial went quickly. Mr. S. andhis chaperones, Buster and his associate, and the lady reporterfrom San Jose were in attendance. Elizabeth noted that several newreporters, identifiable by their laptop computers, had shown up.There were only a few other spectators at the trial.

I started by showing Candice's movie; the jurywas interested and amused.

I then called a Deputy Sheriff who gave thetimeline from the Incident log.

I then called the Search and Rescue Team memberwho had found Lucy. He said by one-thirty in the morning the searchwas about to be called off, and things were disorganized. He saidthat on a hunch, he and his partner had decided to search down BearCreek. Nobody seemed to be in control then so they undertook thesearch without the Incident Commanders permission.

I congratulated him on hisinitiative.

I then called Jill Franklin, the Rocky ButteManager of Emergency Services Department. She verified that Countypolicy was to use all available resources in emergencies such as asearch and rescue incident. She said that it was reasonable andon–policy for Incident Commanders to use civilians in searchoperations. I asked whether the County might not be concerned aboutliability lawsuits from civilians who were injured during searchesor rescues while under direction of county personnel. She saidthere were "good Samaritan" laws that covered that and the IncidentCommander would further be insured by a small county self-insurancepool, which covers smaller claims, and was further insured by avery large policy with the California State Association ofCounties, Excess Insurance Authority.

Surprisingly, Dean Buttress didn't object. Icontinued. "Does that mean there is a very large liability dollarpolicy covering Sheriff Bogend and any settlement would be paid bya State-wide insurance pool?

Jill replied, "Yes."

"That means that in emergency situations, anyliability the Incident Commander creates is insured against. He isnot risking County money that is used for paying teachers, fixingpotholes, or keeping the libraries open."

Butters looked as though he would object butdidn't.

Jill replied, "Yes."

"Is there any problem with paying searchprofessionals who show up, such as bloodhound handlers, if theylater bill you for professional services."

"Not if their fees are customary andreasonable. We have to get many approvals for off-budgetexpenditures, but we do it all the time."

"Thank you," I said, wondering if Dean Buttressdrank his breakfast today. I decide to go for it.

"One more thing, Ms. Franklin. I'd like toclarify the idea of acting as a reasonable person during anemergency.

Let me give you a hypothetical situation:Suppose you had a cattle ranch and we were in the middle of adrought and the cattle were dying of thirst. Further, suppose youhave an unused well drilling rig on your property. Then, a man whoclaimed he was a water dowser showed up and said he had dowsed yourproperty and that water could be found if you drilled a well at thefar end of your corral.

Wouldn't a responsible person, who might ormight not believe in dowsing, drill the well at the end of thecorral if it wouldn't cost too much?"

I was shocked Buttress was letting me get awaywith this.

Jill responded, "Yes, It would be irresponsiblefor the man to let his cattle die of thirst solely because hedidn't believe in dowsing."

"The person should act?"

She answered. "A reasonable person would takeaction"

I said, "Thank you."

Judge Cartright adjourned court for aforty-five-minute lunch.

We adjourned to our conference room for our baglunches. Elizabeth shook her head in disbelief and said, "I can'tbelieve that Buttress sat there while Jill told the jury a hugeamount of money was in the pot and that it wouldn't come out ofcounty funds. He sat there while you drilled hypothetical wells.Amazing!"

Elizabeth made a cell phone call to our nextwitness.

After lunch, I noted that there were aboutfifteen more spectators in the courtroom who looked more likehousewives than reporters.

Elizabeth seemed puzzled, "The local grapevinemust have been listening to my cell phone call."

After the court reconvened, I called JaniceCloud, a thirty-something looking lady, dressed in a