I've stewed about how to write this half of the blog. This half details the 3 year epic journey through the legal system. So many dates, so many notes, so many emails.....it's all overwhelming. The dates I will be using need to be confirmed but the story is the same.
June 4, 2007
It's Monday morning so that means my usual weekly therapy session at 9am. This one is going to be a doozy because on Saturday I had my confrontation with my abuser that my therapist organized and monitored. In that meeting I read my letter to my abuser and at the end he flippantly apologized for what he had done. He admited it! In front of my therapist! But oh what a shallow, hollow, meaningless insincere "apology" it was. I kinda think he was looking to save his ass and thought that his words would make it all go away. Well they didn't. I cried all day Sunday out of frustration and decided to take the next step.
Into Fred's office I go and I have barely sat down and said hello when I blurted out the words......I want to go to the police. Holy dinah! To know that 1 year before that he had advised me that there is no Statute of Limitations on these types of abuse and suggested going to the police. My reaction that day was one of intense fear - I had been groomed for years to never say anything or bad things would happen and there was no way in hell that I was going to the police.
Fred, in a very calm manner, asked me what had changed my mind. Simple answer: He had admitted his guilt in front of a 3rd party and he had zero remorse. I'm sure Fred was the proverbial duck at that moment - calm and collected on the surface but swimming frantically under the water!! We talked about the legal issues and potential liabilities/civil law suits and I decided that I needed to get some legal advice before I went to the police. Fred called my lawyer and explained the situation and why I needed to see him and the appointment was set for the next day.
June 5, 2007
I think the world of my lawyer. He is a lovely devoted family man who has numerous photos of his children and grandchildren in his office and loves to point out the newest addition whenever he can. To know that I was going to walk into his office and cause him hurt and embarrasement by disclosing my situation was very hard. He gave me a big hug and asked me a few questions and told me that I had nothing to worry about from a civil suit perspective and told me he was proud of the way I was taking a stand. That went well!
June11, 2007
It's Monday again and here I am back in Fred's office. We said our good mornings and I swallowed hard and said......I'm ready to go to the police. Fred works closely with the police in their troubled youth division so thankfully he knows his way around the detachment. Usual circumstances would dictate that I would have to enter at the front counter and tell my story to whichever officer on General Duty was available and that office would then pass the file over to Serious Crimes and from there an officer would be assigned to my file. All of which could take days if not weeks. Fred excused himself and phoned the Superintendent of the entire detachment ( a very lovely lady I might add!) and she personally handpicked a constable to handle my file. I found out later that this did not sit well with the female corporal head of Serious Crimes! The meeting was set for the next day at 1pm at the detachment. I had absolutely no idea what I was about to walk into.
I'm sitting on the bench in the waiting area with Fred. I have a water bottle in my hands that I was twisting so hard in my hands I rubbed the ink off of the bottle. I am sitting right by the door. In a nanosecond I could be up off that bench and out the door. That thought crossed my mind a thousand times in those few minutes. Everywhere around me officers are chatting and going about their day - it is after all just another day at the office for them. For me.......I feel like I am about to sent to the chamber of doom.
The door opens and a tall dark haired female officer steps out and nods to Fred. This is it.......I am about to walk thru that secured door by myself and I will not come back out the same person that went in. The tension in the air is palbable as Fred rises to his feet and looks at me, waiting for me to do the same. I want to throw up but I can't because I can't breathe. He takes me by the arm - gently but firmly - and steers me in the direction of the "door". The officer introduces herself - her name is Michelle - well now at least we have something to make small talk about as we go up to the next floor in the elevator. The door opens and all I can see are rows of desks and I hear the sounds of officers talking. Interior decorating is not in the budget of the RCMP but apparently they get a smokin' rate on drab green/gray paint because it is everywhere. I follow Michelle down a short hall and she opens the door to a room and motions for me to enter. Now, how dumb am I - I think we are going into a private office like a doctor's office so that we can talk in private. Well think again! This room is a grey box. There is no window. There is a table with 2 chairs. There is a camera mounted above the table aimed directly at the chair I will sit in. There is no clock on the wall. Nothing. The door shuts with a loud bang and scares the hell out of me. I am directed to sit in the far chair. I am in the "hard" interview room I will come to learn.
And so it begins. The most humiliating, terrifying, gut wrenching, embarrassing, soul splitting experience. Out onto the table goes a tape recorder and the officer hits the play button. She reads aloud the date and time and her name and mine. She turns to me and advises me that this interview will be both audio and videotaped. I nod my head. Lesson 1 - all answers have to be spoken so that the tape can record it. " Yes" I say, "I understand and agree". And with that......the 2 1/2 hour regurgitation of 20 years of my life begins. I am very proud of the fact that I never cried once during those 2 1/2 hours. I gave all of the information in as much detail as I could. At the end of the interview the tape is turned off and I feel absolute exhaustion. The officer turns to me and tells me that she is going to have him arrested but that I can make the choice of how he appears at the detachment. She will send a marked car over to his house, arrest him and bring him for questioning or she can call him and ask him to appear at the detachment on his own within the next 24 hours. I chose to take the high road and asked her to call him and allow him to present himself. Oh how I wish I could take that choice back. We are done, she and I, and she opens the door and the cool fresh air conditioning hits my face and I am suddenly aware of how hot I am and how flushed I feel. She leads me to the elevator and walks me out of the detachment. I cannot look at her. She knows so much horrible stuff about me know. She walks a bit further down the side of the outside wall, out of range of the security camera and gives me a big hug and tells me how sorry she is that we met under these circumstances. She promised she would do her absolute best to see that the charges she is going to recommend to the Crown Counsel will be approved. I thanked her for her kindness and understanding and went home at 3:30pm and went to bed for the rest of the day blissfully unaware of how the next 3 years were going to be an emotional battle that would bring me to my knees more than once.
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