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Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father (2008)
- Charismatic.
- Opinionated. I'd have to point out he was short. But he was a giant of a man. Really a good storyteller. He was completely selfless. - Animated. - Kind. - Jubilant. - Caring. - Devilish. - Laid-back, very approachable. Can I say things that are not completely flattering and wonderful? He had the capacity to have the worst possible gas. And he'd be proud of that. "Yep!" He wasn't a saint. He was a hell of guy. He was just so intelligent, and, um, I'm gonna cry. I'm sorry. Why are you sad? Why? Oh, I'll tell you about it someday. Do you know who that is? Andrew. Do you know who Andrew is? I don't know. Why did Andrew get killed? Because somebody hurt him, buddy. I'm an only child, and I'll get around to why this is of any importance whatsoever, but, trust me, there's a theme. Where were you when you found out? Melanie, who's on the front desk, calls back and says, "Kate, there's a policeman from Sunnyvale on the line for you. Do you want to talk to him?" And I said, "Oh, yes, put it through to the office." "Are you Kathleen Bagby?" I said yes. "I've got a message here from Pennsylvania. You're to call this number. It's the coroner's office. You've got bad news." I said, "Is my son dead?" And he said, "I can't tell you that, madam, but you've got terrible news." I dialed this number that he'd given me. And it was a man, an irate man. The coroner's office was closed down. There was nothing he could do about it. "You have to call back tomorrow morning." I called back to the Sunnyvale Police Station, so he gave me another number, and then I got through to Sgt. Krulac, and he said, "Your son is dead under suspicious circumstances. Have you got any idea why he was in the park?" I said, "My son is dead? Murdered?" He said yes. And then I called David. And I said to him, "Andrew's dead." And he said, "No!" And I heard him throw the phone. I called Sgt. Krulac back, and I said, "We're coming," and he said, "Well, that's good." Through that flight, we thought we'd go get Andrew, bring him back to California, get everything organized, whatever, and then kill ourselves, 'cause no point in going on. That was the first plan. Obviously, we didn't do that. And then she gave me the list to call, and we started calling. I came home, and there was a message from Barbara. - Kate called me. - It was Tuesday morning. I was just coming out of surgery. - I was doing something... - I was in the living room. How many people got a kick in the head from this? Everybody always says, "What would be the difference if one person weren't alive?" I came home on November 7, 2001, to find a message from my sister. Hi. It's Heather. It's about 9: 15. At 3:41 p.m., I called her back. She told me to sit down. In the original news, they said, "Unidentified man in his 30s was found in hospital scrubs." None of those words described who he was, and they could put them on paper and make them true. Nobody said, "This person, this wonderful person, was hurt." We met in first grade at St. Andrew's School in Saratoga, California, and I soon came to think of him as my closest friend. It was here, in the San Jose Bay Area, scattered across the suburbs that make up Silicon Valley, that we all grew up. There was Chris. Do I remember how I met Andrew? It was second grade. And Matt. I can say without shame that we bathed together. Michelle. He was the first friend I made my first day of school. Jon. We met the first day of class because of our names, Atkinson and Bagby. Olivier. We talked for about 20, and I realized, "Wow, this guy's pretty cool." Heather. Oh, I'm sure you got to hear things I didn't get to hear. Between the two of us, we might actually be able to put together a half-decent story. And there was me. My name's Kurt, and I'm a filmmaker. I'm Kurt Kuenne, and I play Indiana Jones. He appeared in every movie I made growing up. We made a movie! He loved playing bad guys... Shut up! Jeff, get the cocaine. A's, huh? You must be a smart boy. ...and having a free pass to smoke and swear in front of his parents. I will fuck you up! Kiss my ass, you son of a bitch! Christ, start the fucking car and get out of here! Fuck you! Fuck all you fucking people! I did not say the F-word. I'm sorry. Which was probably kind of a cool release for a kid who made Eagle Scout by age 15. Mrs. Bagby, having watched it where Andrew was running around yelling and screaming, kind of went... I can't really remember being... "Oh, that's not my son!" Perhaps you have a different idea that I got all upset about it. "Not my son!" And, eventually, I even got them in on the act. Son of a bitch, you little shit! You're a pain in the ass. - You little bastard! - Does that give you the right to go yelling about your penis on the air? It wasn't always fun and games. - You son of a bitch! - Ow! Jesus! Did I actually hit you? - I didn't hurt your hand, did I? - Yes, but don't worry about it. And if you knee me in the balls again, I'm going to kill you. And I know I drove him nuts sometimes. Could you do that one more time? - One more time. - Okay, one more time. One more time. I want to see that one more time. That was perfect. The famous "one more time" line. If I hear him say "one more time" one more time, I'm gonna wring his neck! Jesus Christ, Kurt. What do you want? No, no. I'm just getting... But despite it all, he always supported me. Kurt, another winner! Yes! My God, what are you trying to do? Give our genius a heart attack? None of that. What, do we kiss now or... Oh! He even invested in my first feature film while he was working to save for medical school. Everything was perfect. I don't know what happened. We got bigger, and we got laid! At his memorial service, I talked with his med-school friend Anthony, who told me... One of the major things that Andrew and I did together, or that we had in common, was photography. I had no idea he took pictures, and I'd known him for 22 years. What else didn't I know? I was never going to get to visit him at his hospital and see what he was like as a doctor. I would never be going to his wedding where I would finally meet his entire family at the reception. He would never be telling me anything I didn't already know about him. So I decided to make this movie, to travel far and wide, to interview everyone who ever knew and loved him, to learn everything there was to know, and to make one last movie with him. I had no idea how many years it would take or how I would even know when I was done. But the longer I waited, the more memories would be lost. So I started at home in California, and, as soon as I could, I grabbed a camera. Okay, Andrew, ready? - And said... - Action! How would I describe Andrew to someone who had never met him? The man never wore pants. He only wore shorts. That's right. Constantly! Well, Andrew was very good at pool. Quite frankly, he was a pool shark, is what he was. Well, he had a good teacher. When we first met him, he had this thing with his fingernails. Oh, yeah, he'd always bite his fingernails. They looked like they'd been through a shredder. Too late. He was probably the most determined person I've ever met about doing a particular profession. His mom worked in the business, so... We would sit and discuss a topic like venereal disease. He didn't get an offer to come to medical school at the end of the first year. I remember that was a big downer. I think he felt like he wasn't... like things were kind of stalled for him and he wasn't really... he wasn't living up to expectations. "Well, what are you gonna do?" "Okay, I'll get a job, and I'll apply again." Okay. That's problem, solution. And then, of course, Heather brought home this application she had picked up from Memorial University of Newfoundland. I had to go look up St. John's on the map when he got accepted there. I knew, "That's over in the east coast." He's now engaged to this lovely girl, and he's gonna go to med school. It was great. Graduation, he was in shorts. Hold on a second. We'll come back to this. But before we go any further, you've got to know what happened. The whole truth. So here it is. A couple of policemen met us at the airport in Pittsburgh. Took us over to the hospital. Bill and Clark picked us up and took us over to Bacha's Funeral Home in Greensburg. And then he took us down a stairway. Gurney at the other end... with a white sheet over a body. And... ...went over to him and when we could see his face... ...I said, "It's really him." I kissed him and held him, and Kate kissed him and held him and kissed him some more. Tears are dropping on him, of course, and Kate went to wipe one of those away off his cheek, and a plug came out where he'd been shot in the left cheek. Oh, God. She pushed it back in and cried some more. After that, I lost it. I just ran outside and screamed. I was so fucking mad, I couldn't see straight. God damn it, I hated. I've never hated like that. Didn't even know who I hated. Didn't know who it was then. Just knew that somebody purposely put him there. Whoever that is is a monster. Well, who hurt him? A very bad person. Which bad person? - A lady? - Mm-hmm. What's her name? Shirley. Shirley? Why'd she kill him? I couldn't figure out who she was in relation to Andrew since Andrew talked a lot about women but never really mentioned her. Collette, this is Bagby's new girlfriend. Makes me sick to my stomach now, but I was so excited that he was dating somebody. Come on, Shirley. Get out from behind him. I knew he'd been struggling with me moving on and dating other people. - Or maybe you will. - You already met me! I was excited at the thought that maybe he had found somebody that he, you know, could really be happy with. But it didn't turn out that way. - Did you know her? - Yeah. Do you remember when they started dating? Mm-hmm. She just kind of appeared, and then she was there all the time all of a sudden. And just didn't seem suited for him. He did say that there was a considerable age difference. And then the second time I heard him talk about it, he actually fessed to the age difference, and I was like, "Holy shit!" Shirley's got three kids! Whoo-hoo! Me, I always had to give him a hard time, so I'd tease him about nailing grandma. And she seemed so incongruous with who I would picture him with. A person like that isn't just, like, completely normal and then, one day, they become a psycho, you know? I mean, there had to be some signs. She'd just be really inappropriate with things. Poor taste, things that she would say. She was always making sexually inappropriate comments. But never threatening. We never thought of her as being threatening, but, just, something was a little off. Something wasn't right. She started calling me on a regular basis. She talked forever. Crude things about their intimate relationship. But I thought it was kind of odd when I met her that she was not practicing. She had finished residency for quite some time, and yet she was having trouble getting her credentials. Nobody said anything 'cause we all respected Andrew. And if he wasn't putting the pieces together or something, it just makes me think he was just not caring. He was likely 4,000 miles away from where he wanted to be for the rest of his life. He had had a very difficult, kind of heartbreaking type of situation with Heather. Whatever happened with their breakup really kind of devastated him and just left him vulnerable to someone like Shirley. "Andrew! You know you can do a lot better." He said, "Ah, no, I really can't." He'd poke fun at himself all the time. He'd say he was a short, portly little fella. You don't need to go out with a woman because you can't think you can do better. It was a comfort. And, in Newfoundland, it was somebody to be around and he enjoyed it. Oh, it's just a senior-year thing. After graduation, he came back to the U.S. to do a surgery residency in Syracuse, New York, and he was miserable. He hated it. Shirley also decided to move to the States to practice. We were not very aware of his year in Syracuse, what a problem she became to him there. Was a real hard year for him. There was really no time for anything. And the fact that there was this somebody that was making a lot of effort to maintain a relationship with him and represented something else besides the misery that it sounded like his internship was was hard for him to pass up. He pretty quickly realized that surgery wasn't for him and switched to a family-practice residency in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, in July of 2001. And he loved it. He said, "When you finally find that thing that you know is your niche, it's worth everything in the world." And he now wanted her to go away. He did not invite her to Matt's wedding. Yeah, and she thought she was going to be coming. She just already had it arranged. The morning of the wedding, Andrew's cellphone started ringing. And he'd answer it, and it's Shirley. A minute or two later, it'd ring again, and it's her again. Andrew got more and more upset with her. "What is your fucking problem?" And he clicked off the phone. She left 30-some-odd messages on his phone. His phone in his house rang, like, 30 times. Then his cellphone rang He's like, "Oh, it's her. I don't want to talk with her." Apparently, Andrew had already asked Shirley to accompany him to Karl and Marci's wedding, October 20th, before July. He had broken up with her a month before in his mind. It sounds so easy, but it's hard when you're a genuine person who cares. He didn't know how to be a son of a bitch because he wasn't a son of a bitch. Shirley had been really, like, all over Andrew. Just acting possessive of him. I said, "Andrew, hey, do you want something to drink?" and she said, "There you go, hitting on the best man." My jaw dropped. It had to have. I remember going... On the afternoon of Saturday, November 3, 2001, he broke up with Shirley once and for all over lunch at the airport in Latrobe, Pennsylvania. Then he put her on a plane back to her place in Council Bluffs, Iowa, I remember the morning that Shirley showed up. He said, "You'll never guess who showed up on my doorstep at 5:30." And I said, "Who?" He said, "The psychotic bitch." And I told him, I said, "You know, Andrew, when I break up with somebody and put them on a plane and send them 1,300 miles away, they knock on my front door, I'm going out the back door and I'm calling the police." He said, "What do you mean?" I said, "Andrew." I said, "Be serious. Nobody drives 16 hours after you've just broken up with them." I said, "Do not meet her in private." He said, "What can happen?" And he said, "I'm gonna need to catch up with you and we're gonna have to do some serious talking." I said, "Bring some beer. I only live a block away. When do you think you'll be done?" He said, "Well, it's 4:30 now. Meeting her at 6:00. Things people should know about Andrew. He was never late. And you know what? When Andrew didn't show up at 7:30, I knew something was very wrong. And when I went back down at 9:00 and didn't see his car there... I knew something was wrong. Well, let me tell you the events of the day. Andrew didn't show up for morning report. Morning report ended around 8:00. I went down to my office. I called Andrew's house. Hi. You've reached Andrew Bagby. Please leave a message at the tone. Thank you. Called his cellphone. "Andrew, where are you at?" No answer on either one. As I recall, we're getting pretty close to 9:00 in the morning, and Rhonda and I and some of the residents are starting to get a little nervous. I remember Bill coming in and standing in front of the television and telling us. One of the E.R. docs turned to me and said, "They found a body in scrubs out at Keystone Park." Dead silence fell over. A heaviness like I've never felt. And eventually almost everyone was congregated there just waiting for more news. Rhonda got the call, and she said to me, "They need you in Mr. Clark's office right now." And I remember my heart pounding, going up at damn near a sprint. I opened the door, and I remember seeing three Pennsylvania State Police troopers in uniform sitting in the room. And I said, "You're here to tell me about Andrew Bagby." They asked for us all to gather in the conference room. - And they closed the door. - He cleared his throat. He just walked right up to the podium and he said... "Andrew Bagby is dead." I said, "Well, hell, you don't have to look far." They're like, "What do you mean?" I said, "This woman was in town. She was here." I said, "Find her, and I think you'll find who did this." A summary of the evidence against Shirley Turner. He was found on the morning of Tuesday, November 6th, laying behind his car in a parking lot at Keystone State Park in Derry Township, Pennsylvania. A man walking through Keystone Park at 6: 10 p.m. the previous evening, November 5th, had seen his black Toyota Corolla parked next to an SUV. This was 10 minutes after he told Clark he was going to meet Shirley. "Meeting her at 6:00." Shirley drove a Toyota RAV4 SUV. He was shot five times. In the face, the chest, twice in the buttocks, and in the back of the head. He also received a blunt trauma to the back of the head. That didn't sound random. That sounded like rage and vengeance. The ammunition used was CCI.22-caliber bullets. There were six spent casings and one live round on the ground beside him. Shirley owned a Phoenix Arms .22-caliber handgun. She had three lessons with a firearms instructor who said that at her last lesson she was using CCI.22-caliber ammunition and her gun malfunctioned and would sometimes eject live rounds onto the ground. Then she said, "No, I can't find it." Then she said, "I gave the gun to Andrew." She claimed she was home sick all day on Monday, November 5th. The cellphone records show that a phone call was made here, here, here, and here. While she claims to be home in bed, she's making cellphone calls from Chicago, Illinois, at 7:08 and 7: 10 p.m. on Sunday, November 4th. Then another from South Bend, Indiana, at 10: 19 p.m. that night. Then another from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, at 8:07 a.m. the next morning, November 5th, the day he was killed. She logged on to eBay that morning from his computer at his house. And back again. At 11:26 p.m. that night, she makes another call from Cleveland, Ohio, clearly on her way home this time. Then another call from Stuart, Iowa, at 9:48 a.m. the next morning, Tuesday, November 6th. Then another once she got home to Council Bluffs. And this one's to him. But when she realized that she couldn't possibly be sick in bed when she'd been caught making cellphone calls from Pennsylvania and back, she changed her story again. Then she said, "I gave the gun to Andrew in the parking lot, and I saw him put it in his trunk." And that clearly shows if she did this, she planned it. She is a manipulative, deceitful planner of a murder. In order to prove her whereabouts when she made these phone calls, each individual cell tower along her 16-hour drive had to be manually checked, which was a process that took almost two weeks. While the police were uncovering this crucial piece of evidence, Shirley left the United States for her home in St. John's, Newfoundland. We were absolutely helpless for the whole time we were in Latrobe after this initial nightmare. The other residents and Andrew's... They're Andrew friends now... came in, sat with us, brought us meals. They had a sign-up sheet at the hospital to bring us a dinner and sit and cry with us and listen to us and cry some more. Great people. The whole hospital grieved. It was profound. Just picture the masses that just came out for that. From memorials in Newfoundland to California to England. - To St. Louis. - To Latrobe. I'm so proud to say that I loved him so very much. I'd be happy if I had 1/10 the people care 1/2 about me as much as they did Andrew. I know at the point we had the memorial service, she was back in Canada. She was there at the memorial service that we had here. She broke down crying during the service and sobbing really loud, and, you know, I wonder if it wasn't all just for a show. And then fear at that point for, you know, Heather's safety. She came up and sort of butted one of my friends out beside me and said just awful things and, obviously, I cared a lot more about him than he ever cared about me. And I definitely wasn't important in his life. Got an e-mail from Shirley. A horrible, scathing e-mail. It was all basically, I was nothing, and she was everything. How wonderful their love was and how that'll never die now. To try to lure her back to the United States, Shirley was invited to the memorial service in California, but she didn't take the bait. So, finally, she was charged. She was arrested in St. John's, Newfoundland, on December 12, 2001, and was let go on bail the very same day. And then this flight risk. It seemed to me common sense that if she isn't in the jurisdiction where they want her, she's fled. Crown Prosecutor Mike Madden did not even argue against her release on bail and instead entered the courtroom with an agreement already in place for her release. Pending the next hearing in the extradition process to the United States, all Justice David Russell required Shirley to do was post $75,000 in sureties. $65,000 of this was posted by her personal psychiatrist, but I'll come back to him. Turn in her passports, sign in once a week at the local police station, promise not to leave Newfoundland, and avoid contact with these people. And with that, the government of Canada let a probable pre-meditated first-degree murderer walk the streets. - I thought it was crazy. - Should never be. - Should never have been. - I thought it was insane. Who the hell is the system protecting? I could not believe this was happening. But the most unbelievable part was when we found out about you. Kurt, this is Matt Oetinger. I just got a call from Mrs. Bagby. The abbreviated version is what's her bucket, that bitch, held a press conference and announced she's 4 months pregnant with Andrew's baby. They can't prove it until the child's born. If it is true, the Bagbys are going to sue for custody. My movie now took on a whole new meaning. It was no longer just my search for what was left of your dad. It might be the only way you could one day go back in time, see, and get to know him. This is a time machine. Yes. A time machine. And I vowed to collect every memory for you before they were gone. So, finally, I set off. First, I would go to England to interview your grandma's side of the family for you. Then I'd return to the U.S. to do an epic road trip across North America. I'd start on the west coast of California and motor east, stopping to interview all of your dad's friends and family along the way. And I would keep driving until the land ran out in St. John's, Newfoundland, the eastern-most point in all of North America, where the last living piece of Andrew, you, would be waiting for me. I grabbed a digital video camera, a 16mm wind-up movie camera, and an old Nikon. I have a good idea. I'll go back in time and stop you from dying. And set off on a quest to bring your dad back to life. And while I raced to rescue your history, your grandma and grandpa quit their jobs, dug into their savings, and gave up everything to move to Newfoundland to fight for your future. I met Kate and David in the spring of 2002. I'll never forget it. They needed a lawyer to assist them in making sure that their rights and the baby's rights were protected, I guess. I instantly liked them. I thought that it was so important that they have a relationship with that child. Our lawyer Jackie went to see Betty Day, an administrator somewhere in the hierarchy of Child Protective Services, and told her that we, the Bagbys, are concerned about the safety of the baby because the mother is accused of a pre-meditated murder. To me, I thought they were very emotionally intelligent in how they were bearing up under all of this incredible stress. You know, that was a Sunday afternoon. The next morning, they had to sit in the courtroom and look at her. When your grandma and grandpa first arrived in Canada, they were told, "The law is slow." And they weren't kidding. February 15th. Prosecutor Mike Madden acknowledged that the extradition request had been received. They adjourned until March 11th, when they decided they'd reconvene to select a date for the extradition hearing on March 25th, where they decided to set the date for the extradition hearing for May 27th, where they got caught up debating the French-versus-English translations of Section 32 of the Extradition Act, and decided to adjourn for a specific translation until June 11th, a hearing which lasted five minutes, at which Judge Derek Green said he wasn't in a position to rule on the translation and they would adjourn again until July 30th. And while they waited for justice and for you to arrive, your grandma and grandpa made a new home and new friends. They made friends all over St. John's. People in the legal community, the medical community. But here at St. Michael's, yeah, they got right in there and got right involved. It seems like they've always been here. Basically, they have more friends in Newfoundland now than we do. Well, it's a very small province. The land mass is as big as... Well, maybe not quite as big as California, but not far off. And yet we only have scattered over that land mass. You can't go anywhere in St. John's without running into somebody you know. I mean, it's the oldest city in North America. It's a very safe place, I think. The big drawback against living here is getting out of here. The weather here is terrible. The weather is awful. We have 8 months of winter and 4 months of bad weather. And the other very consistent thing that I hear is that the people are so friendly. How would you describe them to someone who had never met them before? Oh, do you have an hour? I was hoping you would ask me about Kate and David, who are very... Young at heart. Childish. That's not the right word. He's an engineer in the truest sense of the word. The guy likes Pintos, okay? Logical. Does things in steps, logical steps. Comparing Andrew as a teenager and Dave as a teenager, - they're almost twins. - He's the older model. - It was wonderful. - It was wonderful. He always calls you "mate," his father does. "Mate." "How you doing, mate?" And Kate calls you "love." Oh, I thought she was feisty. Like a little ball of fire. She's so tiny, and then big things come out of her. It's great if she's on your side because she'll always stand up for what she believes in and those that she loves. They're a rare pair. They were from the start. In itself, it's quite a story, their marriage, you know. I was going to come here for the two years, then I was going on to Australia for two years, work my way around the world. And then I was going back to Devon. And I wasn't going to get married because that was not on my list of things to do at all. I was in the Navy, stationed on an aircraft carrier, the Hornet, in Long Beach, California. A guy came into the shop one day, E.T., electronics shop, and said he had two English nurses who wanted to go to Disneyland. We were too cheap to pay the fare. Yeah, two cheap English nurses. And I took the little one and left him with the tall one. And, uh, they didn't work out so well, but we did. We went out 13 times in the first two weeks. And he could quote Shakespeare, by the way, so I knew it was all right. Five months later, I'm married. So we moved down to San Diego and started working on a baby. But nothing happened. We tried to get pregnant for a year, two years, with no result. At some point, they mentioned that they might adopt. And then, I mean, it was like a miracle. Coming to St. Louis and sleeping in my mother's bedroom seemed to make people pregnant. And then, of course, Andrew didn't come. He was two weeks late. Things people should know about Andrew. He was never late. Hi. It's Heather. It's 9:00 Thursday. Shirley went into labor around 3:00 in the afternoon, Newfoundland time. On July 18, 2002, you were born. Shirley named you Zachary Andrew Turner. You grandma and grandpa came to the hospital to see you, but Shirley wouldn't let them in the door. The stood five feet away from you on the other side of a wall. They left a gift for you. Well, your dad was an amazing person. You're gonna get such a broad range of different perspectives of this guy. You're gonna know what his character was like and you're gonna know what fun he was to be with and you're gonna know that you can be proud of him. I flew to England to collect the memories of your grandma's side of the family for you and arrived just in time for a very special occasion. Well, we're on the eve of my wedding, for a start. It's been a bit hectic. We're just trying to fit this interview in between all of the preparations. Your dad crossed the Atlantic to come here almost every summer, but instead of heading to the tourist attractions in London like everyone else, he'd head to the outskirts to spend time with his grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. He was a king to me, man. Seriously, man. And, in particular, with his cousin John. The main thing, I guess, about being an only child is that I get to choose my brothers. Others of you don't. Sorry. John, me brother, and Andrew were born within a month of each other. In fact, I think it was about 30 seconds of the normal child, "Who are you? Who are you?" And then suddenly, snap, that was it. We often said at least they would have each other through life. John would always have Andrew, and Andrew would always have John. For me, kind of blur into this haze of me and Andrew running around castles, country homes, gardens. I mean, these fantastic historical places. And, to us, they were places to play hide and seek, buy water pistols, shoot each other, and then get told off and thrown out. The interesting thing always was, just like the cultural differences between someone coming from the U.S. and someone in the U.K. That used to really bug me, the fact that I knew he was going to get "Star Wars" kind of 6 months before me, that was a killer. 'Cause, you know, it'd be like, "Don't you dare tell me anything about this film!" He was almost kind of, as well, my kind of chaperone into discovering the U.S., really. You hear people discriminate against a whole country just in one fell swoop. But I was fortunate enough to know very differently to that. I really cherish that, because it is my brother that got married here tonight. Bizarrely enough, one of the things is I always wanted Andrew to be my best man at my wedding. As I would soon find out, he was in good company. I had always wanted him to be my best man. I had asked him to be my best man. It just made sense to have him as best man. I can only assume that you would have asked him to be your best man. Everybody grab your glass. We're gonna turn it over to the best man, Andrew. Best man's a little bit of a poor title for these things. I mean, the best man's really the groom. I've got to try and sum up in, like, 2 minutes or so, 'cause, you know, then people will start looking at their champagne and thinking, "Bagby, shut up or die." I miss him. A lot. That I wish he was here at the wedding with us. That I'd just like to sit him down and talk to him again. Just to have him here with us. I really believe your dad was there that day. And if we could have heard him give his toast, it might have sounded something like this... Why am I standing up here? I guess part of it I've already said. We're brothers and I love you and I know you love me and... Yeah. I kind of need to move on from that. 'Cause, like I said, I'm a Bagby male. We don't gush very much. It made me realize that it doesn't matter where you come from. You can meet someone and, literally, within minutes, you can be closer than someone you've known for 20 years. And someone who'll maybe just end up being a friend for the rest of your life. And last question. Is there anything you'd like to say to Zachary? Zachary. Right. Yeah, I hope to see you soon, Zachary, anyway. Jackie had been down earlier in the day to file the papers that we wanted custody of the baby. We finally went to court. - You mean family court. - Yes, family court. You know, they negotiated with her. I think you know that already, and what access they got with Shirley, they negotiated. We're coming up with agreements with this accused murderer. And then Shirley Turner came up with something else just at the moment when it was all looking good. She always did that so that it was extended. It was like, "I don't have to pay for my lawyer. You have to pay for yours, so the longer I can make it, it's better. You'll run out of money." But then she finally agreed to give us one hour a week in Unified Family Court. Shirley delayed your grandma and grandpa from meeting you for almost a month and had them treated like common criminals in order to see you. She required that during their one-hour visit, they be fully searched and monitored by a supervisor while she waited in the next room. When did you first meet him? Meet him personally or meet him by seeing the light in Kate and David's eyes? I mean, we were searched and everything. I couldn't wait for them to search. I would've zipped off all my clothes and been... as long as I could get into that baby, you know? We went around the corner, and there was this overpowering thing. We did not do complete tug-of-war, though. I just gave him to Kate. No, no, no. - We shared. - We took turns. The next visit, he was really... The next time, he was dirty, so I changed his diaper. And that's when he opened his eyes to just kind of look at me, and that's when I said to David, "Oh, my God, he's Andrew." I had seen lots of pictures of Andrew at this point and even pictures of him as a child and I thought, "Holy crow," you know. "There's no doubt." We wanted more time. So we went back. And this time, she accused us of keeping him beyond the time so that he was distraught when he went back to her. She'd try a lot of manipulations without thinking them through. And this one was a no-brainer, really. If she accuses us of doing anything wrong to the baby, she's indirectly accusing Maureen of being a slouch. - The supervisor? - The supervisor. You know, Maureen's not gonna take that. So she just didn't think it through. While your grandparents and Jackie battled Shirley for more time with you in family court, the law in the extradition proceedings was still slow. September 19th. The extradition hearing finally began, and evidence was finally presented. But just as everything was moving along smoothly, Shirley's lawyer Randy Piercey threw a wrench into the works. Because the "authority to proceed" with these hearings provided by the minister of justice early that year had failed to specify subsections (i) or (ii) of Section 229(a) of the criminal code, the authority to proceed was invalid, the 90-day limit to amend it was now past, and therefore all extradition proceedings against Shirley should be dropped so she could get on with her life. Judge Derek Green now had to rule on whether or not to throw out the entire case, which would take place on October 18th, which was delayed four days until October 22nd, where Judge Green told Piercey to forget about it and said they would continue with the extradition hearing on November 14th. Meanwhile, I came back to California, pointed the van east toward Newfoundland and set off across the continent on my way to see you, stopping all over the map to collect the memories of a whole spectrum of people your dad touched. But it was when I pulled into St. Louis to see your grandpa's family... - Are you the oldest? - Yeah, I'm the oldest. Bob was the middle one. He's one year younger than me. ...that I discovered a very special place where your dad had left his heart. Andrew and Bob were very, very close. To see them around each other, you'd think that Andrew had grown up his entire life around Bob. You wouldn't know that it was a once-a-summer relationship. Bob used to take Andrew out and let him drive the truck before he was old enough. And they'd play pool. And my dad was very good at pool, but then Mack came along who was even probably better at pool. I would say he was excellent, but he wasn't as good as me. He probably still owes me around $30,000. Okay, Mack is my daughter Rhonda's first husband. I don't know. They just clicked. I mean, they just clicked. I can't explain why or anything. Automatically my little brother. That's the way I looked at it, you know. We just become friends. This is our clubhouse that me and Bob had. And he used to love to come down here. As soon as he'd hit town, we'd come down here and just stay for days. Dave and Katie and them would come out. Always have a big barbecue or fish fry. Get the johnboat and head up the river. He was the captain. Me and Bob got to the point where we didn't even think about who was gonna drive the boat if Andrew was here. At nighttime, they'd stack up logs and build a bonfire. And we'd buy fireworks, you know. It'd be beautiful 'cause it was real dark out there. "That's really stupid, me checking to see if you're hurt when you're gonna be a damn doctor. You ought to know yourself." I said, "If you're smart, you'll be a gynecologist." Doctor came into the room and said he had bad news. He said that the cancer had spread to his bones and to his liver. Bob looked at him and said, "I want the truth." He said, "3 to 6 months." I mean, I can come down here anytime I want. I just don't have time anymore, really. I lost... I lost total interest in a lot of things when Bob died, for some reason. I know it was hard on Andrew, too. 'Cause he wrote me a little note, a letter. Bob was very proud of him. Imagine him and Andrew are laughing at me right now. Both assholes. Are you sad now? Yeah, I'm still sad. I'll be okay. Come here. Come give me a hug. That'd make me feel better. He was great. If there's anything I can do, I'll be there. Well, we hope to see him. And we can show him pictures and everything. We'd love to be a part of that as well. To share our lives with him. Oh, how I wish I could be there and pinch those little cheeks. Zachary, you'll never know what you missed. On November 14, 2002, Judge Derek Green declared that a properly instructed jury could likely find Shirley guilty and ordered her incarcerated in the Clarenville Correctional Centre for Women, awaiting a decision from the minister of justice to surrender her to the United States. She always seemed to know exactly when to turn nice. And it was a pretty obvious time to turn nice. Suddenly, Shirley turned around and gave your grandma and grandpa custody of you for as long as she was in prison. We could stop in and see him whenever we liked. And we did. They were so excited, it was Christmas Eve, and, you know, it had started to snow a little bit. The doorbell was ringing, and someone showed up with a present. And then Alan Goodridge, he was a professor, one of Andrew's professors, he showed up with something. I don't know what. And then, you know, finally, I said, "What? Have you got the Magi showing up at your house?" We went to church with them on Christmas Eve. If Zachary got fussy, you know, they would pick him up and they would feed him and they'd walk to the back of the church. If there's people in this church that don't know the five of us, it looks like these are the grandparents, we're the parents, and Zachary is our child. I said, "We look like terrible parents!" He was besotted with them, the child was. You know, no one could comfort him. Only Kate. They were so happy. But it wasn't all sweetness and light. You came with strings attached. The reason we reached consent and the reason she reached consent is if you reach consent, you have some control. We'd accept a phone call a day from jail to talk about Zachary. Which the foster home would have done anyway, see? This is Aliant Telecom. - You have a collect call from... - Shirley. You may press 1 now to accept the charges. - Hello? - Hi. Or "Mommy with baby." We'd bring him up to the prison for a weekly visit. That was astounding. Imposition. Each week, they would drive two hours to the jail where Shirley was so that she would be able to see her son and to follow the visitation rights, because just as Kate and David wanted visitation rights, they had to honor Shirley's visitation rights. And in the winter. But the weather, needless to say, in Newfoundland. The weather here is terrible. To make that journey was awful. Only Kate and David would have done it, really, I think. Nobody else would have done it. The one guard, the one day, said to Kate and David, speaking to Zachary, "Zachary, I hope some day you will realize how brave and courageous your grandparents are." Like, I think if I could be a quarter of the grandma that Kate is, I'd be such a success. You know, seeing them with Zachary. Just to see the looks on their faces, Kurt, when they'd have him, you know. You know, to see them so happy. And then, you know, that ended, didn't it? Now crossing the east coast of the U.S., I was almost to you. I pulled off the main road for one last stop, a small-town utopia where your dad had spent the last four months of his life. It was here that I would find the only people who knew what he was like as a doctor, just days before they would graduate and scatter to the winds. Latrobe is famous for Mr. Rogers. Of children's TV fame. Rolling Rock beer. It's the birthplace of professional football, though some would argue that. At Strickler's Pharmacy, I'm told that the banana split was invented here in Latrobe. And Arnold Palmer. Mr. Palmer's a very important figure in this community. This is a community where people don't even lock their doors. Your dad's door was directly across the street from the hospital, giving him a 30-second commute to work. And I said, "Can I call you 'Andy'?" And he goes, "Actually, I don't like Andy." He said, "You can call me 'Andrew,' you can call me 'Bagby,' you can call me 'Bags'." I never did. Ten minutes after I arrived, Dr. Bill DiCuccio picked me up to show me around town. His class, it was Bill DiCuccio. And after hanging with Bill for a short while, I completely understood why. This is yours to take with you in your travels to remember the Chief Resident's office. They were like Mutt and Jeff. They were Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Bill was just devastated, as we all were, but especially so. I think Bill had spent more time with him. And I know there was a third-year resident, Clark, who was quite close with him. He was this surgical resident from Syracuse. Being a former surgical intern, that's a big deal. They're all about cutting, and what we do is a little bit different. It's more about people. I would say to him, "Now, you go out there and you listen to the heart and you talk to those people because, you know, people talk. They're not just unconscious all the time." Your dad also had an office visit every Monday afternoon at the last place he was ever seen alive, a clinic in the small town of Saltsburg, a beautiful 30-minute drive away through the country, past a lovely spot called Keystone State Park. He was already, just within a couple of months, already getting patients to call and specifically ask for him. Hi. I'm Dr. Bagby. People trusted him when he walked into a room. 'Cause medicine's a little like being a detective. Has anyone else in your family experienced this? When you think of people who have passed, you can't help but paint a rosy glow around them. More than half of it is being able to get a story out of somebody. It's not what's happening in this case. I'll always be grateful to him because he diagnosed my nephew's cancer. He diagnosed it early enough that he was able to get complete treatment. He was really pretty outstanding at this stuff. He was told he may never have children. He just has a newborn baby. He always told me that he wanted to practice in a town the size of Latrobe and be like the doc of the town. Know everybody, know everybody's family. And we really thought he'd found heaven. But we packed our bags, went to bed, 'cause we knew we were leaving the next morning. And we stayed in the upstairs spare bedroom of Andrew's house. The next morning, we saw him off at 6:30. And as I say, that's when I noticed he was blinking for the first time. And he did that when he was a little boy when he was nervous or worried about something. Just blink. Blink, blink. And I wanted to say to him, "Oh, Andrew, what's the matter?" He stood up. And I remember he looked at us such a long time. But he came over and he kissed me and kissed his dad. And then he got halfway into that room and he came back and kissed us again, and we went with him and he kissed us again at the door. And then he got across the hospital there, down that alley and just went... And he was gone. That was the last time until we saw him dead. And I can remember Andrew saying, "If I die tomorrow, all I want you to do is sit and toast a beer to me." Do you remember that? When his parents had finished cleaning out his apartment, they gave me his last beer. We have one bottle remaining. We're gonna crack Andrew's last Fuller's ESB right now, and Kurt and I are gonna sip it together. A little toast to our friend. To Andrew, my good friend, I can't wait to see you again. And then, of course, the unthinkable happened again. They let her out of jail again. And we had to give him back on January 10, 2003. Shirley was out of money and out of a lawyer, so she wrote directly to Judge Derek Green, who responded through his secretary with instructions on how to write her own appeal of his decision to incarcerate her while awaiting an order from the minister of justice to surrender her to the States. I have a few friends who are judges, and there's no way they would ever have responded in the way that judge responded to Shirley. She did and was let back onto the streets by... Judge Gale Welsh. Judge Gale Welsh. Welsh refused to even consider Prosecutor Mike Madden's argument that Shirley's appeal was frivolous, even though multiple Legal Aid Commission attorneys had reviewed her appeal and refused to waste their time representing her. And if you could have seen her, I knew that we were going to be seeing Shirley Turner walk free the minute that woman walked into the room, Judge Welsh. She was almost fawning with Shirley Turner, as I saw it. "Oh, Dr. Turner," she said. "I recognize that you're not represented but also know that, as a doctor, you're quite capable, so I'm going to run... Dr. Turner, I'm not trying to exclude you, however the argument would work to your benefit. That's why I'm particularly interested in Mr. Madden's response." I'd taken Zachary to prison. I'd sat in that same little room with her. And here I am having to listen to this and the judge fawn on this woman. And Welsh actually asked an accused murderer to promise she'd behave herself. "If I make an order giving you judicial interim release, it would be on the basis that you would not attempt to flee or hide or avoid subsequent judicial proceedings related to this matter?" "Yes." "Is that completely understood by you?" "Yes, I completely understand." And here are David and I as if we don't even exist. And we don't exist. They don't care about us. They don't even care about the victim. She concluded that... And this is from her written decision. "Dr. Turner's detention is not necessary in the public interest. While the offence with which she is charged is a violent and serious one, it was not directed at the public at large. There is no indication of a psychological disorder that would give concern about potential harm to the public generally, as her crime, while violent, was specific in nature." She is saying, in effect, if I understand that sentence, even if she did it, she's not a danger to the community because she's already killed the only one she wanted to kill. He's the one she was mad at. He's dead. So she's not likely to kill again. And I find that logic absolutely atrocious. Most of us do not kill people who anger us. We go kick a door, scream and shout, some of us throw a punch, but we don't set them up and kill them. You have here a human being who thinks they have the right to kill other people who anger them. And you still let them out in the general populace. I find that appalling. She was again let go on $75,000 in sureties, not one penny of which had to be paid. And with that, the government of Canada let a probable pre-meditated first-degree murderer walk the streets again. And they gave you back to her. And after that, things got really weird. We went and wrote another consent order. And we agreed to a schedule of visits with 3 or 4 hours three times a week and an overnight every two weeks. We got them to let us have more contact with Shirley - in order to... - Pass him back and forth. Otherwise, we never could have done it. Because we've always had to arrange for a third party. And then that third party would be not available. And we saw that we'd never get visits with the baby because she could always find a reason that there was nobody there, you know? So this evolved into us actually spending a great deal of time with Shirley Turner. In order to be around Zachary. - What kind of things did you do? - Go to the mall. Go to the movies. Swimming lessons we took him to. She came here, bold as brass, coming to be "in our face" kind of thing. I had enormous fears for them. I had a fear that Shirley would go for them. And they didn't seem to be worried for themselves. In fact, they said they weren't. That, at this point, that they didn't care. Can you describe what that process was like for you? - Disgusting! - Oh, disgusting. But going up to the door, I mean, was... Having to be with her... ...was just nauseating. We religiously did not talk about the case. She'd try to suck us into conversation. Like, she'd talk about, "Was Andrew's hair light when he was a baby?" And we'd just shut up. I thought it was like being at war. Nobody wants to do it, but you got to do it. So facing this bitch... ...that's the price we had to pay to make sure we had a good connection with Zachary. He knew us. We knew him. So that when she finally went to prison... ...he'd have a smooth transition into our life. I just feel awe about that. I can't... I don't know how they did it, Kurt. I don't know how they did it, but I know why they did it. And, finally, after thousands of miles and memories, on a rainy Sunday afternoon, we met. Hello, bud! Hello! This is your Uncle Kurt. Hi, buddy. He knew your daddy when he was a little boy. It's Uncle Kurt. It's okay. Is there anything that you would like to say to Zachary? Oh, wow. Without tearing up here? First of all, I saw your pictures. And you are a very cute kid, and you look exactly like Andrew. Definitely the cheeky Andrew face, definitely. Zachary, you're a lucky little boy. And you're an unfortunate little boy. Your father, who you'll never know, was such an amazing guy. And he touched so many people in such a short period of time. It's not just stories. He was a real person. Quite frankly, don't let anybody lie to you. Wouldn't eat anything green until he went away to college. Zachary is asleep in the other room. He's spending the night. And you're an unfortunate little boy because you're more than likely to grow up without your biological father or your biological mother. But with a little bit of luck, you'll get to grow up with Andrew's parents. And let me tell you this. They did the most amazing job. You couldn't ask for two better people. Grandma loves you, yes, she does Granddad loves you, yes, he does Daddy loves you, yes, he does Uncle Kurt's here, he loves you, too We all love you, all we can Darling, darling little man So, from that perspective, you're the luckiest little boy in the world. They love you more than life itself. And if you ever need anything, I'm not far away either. And know that we'll be there for you in every way that he can't be. Zach, when you're old enough and you watch this, if you ever want to talk with me personally or you want to come and see me, you have an open invitation and you should know that. And you're loved and I love you and I care about the person you're gonna become. We love him, and we do simple things like send him books. - Happy Birthday! - Can't wait to meet him. I hope to get the chance to meet you. Oh, I hope I'm Uncle Ken to Zachary. 'Cause if you're anything like Andrew, it's gonna be good. I think you'll turn out just great. It says "Student Affairs." Are you a student? Who knows? Maybe someday you'll be applying here to the Faculty of Medicine. Does this look exciting? We're gonna do an interview. Even though things started tragically, you know, he's the blessing Andrew left behind. I parked the van two blocks away 'cause it was the only vehicle for miles with California plates and would give away to Shirley that I was in town. - Sort of a stealth van, you see. - Exactly. If she knew, I was afraid she would find excuses to withhold you so that I couldn't see you. Every time the doorbell rang, I hid in the back bedroom, as it could have been her just dropping by unannounced. Hi, David. Hi, Kate. This is Shirley. On the days we didn't have you, I discovered your dad's medical-school world, met his classmates, found more footage of him for you. And, finally, I found myself face-to-face with the thing that had set me on this journey in the first place. One of the major things that Andrew and I did together, or that we had in common, was photography. Sometimes we'd bring the cameras out and go around the lake and by the pond, and take some pictures around there. I told Andrew, I said, "Listen, you're gonna have to show me a few tricks or whatever and show me some of your pictures." I'd still love to see some of the pictures that he took through medical school. I've never seen any of them. Him and his dad had done quite a bit of photography together. Right after this happened, I fired out an e-mail saying we should try to think of some sort of memorial award. And I felt like that would be something also that his dad would really feel honored by. And then have a wall in the medical school. To be able to say year after year, you know, these are the winners, and people could look and be like, "Wow," you know, "look at this." I think I have a meeting tomorrow morning to participate in the judging tomorrow. And I find it interesting that you say that you hadn't heard that. I wonder if part of it was eventually maybe have his dad independently say, "Oh, who took this picture? It's a really nice picture." And have him say, "Oh, me!" I don't know. But it's something he did. On July 18, 2003, you turned one. Shirley decided to hold a birthday party for you at McDonald's. She started to open presents. Well, he wasn't interested in presents. He wanted to get down. So, when he got down, he made for me. Shirley was very, very angry. So she said, "He loves you more than me. Why don't you take him?" Zachary always, from the time he could choose, would choose Kate over her. That was obvious, and other people talked about it. Kate is a warm and loving mother. She was a phony mother. I love you. Mommy loves you. Yes, I do. She knew the motions, but there's no warmth in it. Zachary. I love you, baby. Mommy loves you. Mommy loves you. She said that she had kids and that she wasn't interested in living with them either. Andrew said she kind of went off to medical school and left them. And she said that they lived with their fathers, and she said that children were more trouble than they were worth. I believe she's using her own children now to manipulate the system and to make Kate and David suffer, even if she goes to jail. Fortunately, there are enough people here who are in the system, the justice system, the child-protection system, that I know personally who have told me that that will not happen. The next hearing in the extradition process was set for September 25th, your dad's 30th birthday, where she would likely be re-incarcerated and at last returned to the U.S. for trial. But, for now, it was time for me to go home. - I have to say bye-bye now. - Gonna say "bye-bye"? Bye-bye to Uncle Kurt? You gonna give him a hug? - Can I have a hug? - Grab him and take it. Was that funny? Was that funny? Bye-bye, sweet pea. I'll see you later, buddy. Well, you'll be a little bigger next time I see you. He had just completed the child health checks that they do. He's ahead of his time. He's doing great. He's up to par on everything, but he doesn't like to wave goodbye. - Bye-bye! - Bye-bye! One of them said, "That's fine, 'cause he's got lots of time to learn that." Is there anything you'd like to say to Zachary? I'm hoping I'm gonna have all the opportunity to say those things to Zachary. We had been out. We came back here. There was a little card in the door from Constable Walsh saying, "Would we contact him?" - I was here. - Mark and I were here. I was at my house. I was home watching the 6:00 NTV news. And the next thing, I saw a picture of Shirley and Zachary and saying that they were missing. And I was just screaming at the top of my lungs. And I immediately fell to the floor. So I immediately went over to their apartment. We came here. So we got in the car and went over there. - Our vicar came by. - I'll never forget that moment. They're gonna find them. They're gonna be okay. You're overreacting. You're gonna think the worst. Look, you know, she's probably gone for a night. My first thought was that she had left. She had taken him and run. She couldn't do that. She couldn't possibly do that. That was about 2 or 3 hours of uncertainty. The emotion was overwhelming. They called us and told us they were doing a search of the beach out in Conception Bay South. I thought, "They're doing that for a reason." I had received a call. "We're having a press conference on the Turner case." I went to Father Chris, I just whispered to him, "I think you better stay, because I think I'm gonna be coming back here with some really bad news." He told me that they had found a baby. Along with an adult. I knew then that there was two bodies. "They're working to identify the bodies." I said, "You got to come pick me up." We came to the door, and it was Jackie and Constable Walsh. I thought, "Oh, my gosh, somebody's with them now trying to tell them." We went in, and I told them. And what I saw after that I will never forget in my life. Rage. Absolute vicious rage. Someone has done that to someone you love. If the person who did this had been here, I'd kill them. Period. No questions. Kill them! Strangle that fucking bitch right here, right now! Period. No questions. Kill them! And then we went to have to identify him, and we couldn't touch him because they said he was forensic. He hadn't been through the autopsy yet. There's this table and sort of white sheets up all around him. With a white sheet over a body. You could see over the sheets, clearly, it was him. It's really him. And then Kate's legs quit. She just went straight to the floor. David was lying on top of Kate on the floor. We managed to get them out. I don't know how we did it, Kurt. I don't know how I got out myself. That poor little baby. A summary of the evidence against Shirley Turner. Part Two. In July of 2003, Shirley met a man at a bar in downtown St. John's. They went out twice until his friends showed him articles on the Web saying she was accused of killing her last boyfriend. He told her he didn't want to see her anymore. She then called and left over including one saying that she was pregnant and that he needed to... Step up to the plate and be a fucking man. She wasn't, as her autopsy showed. The night she killed you, she made a phony phone call from her apartment to a friend's answering machine, claiming to be at this man's house with you. She took your brother T.J.'s car at about 11:38 that night and drove to the man's house. She got lost along the way and asked a woman for directions along this road around 12:45 a.m. She parked behind his house, left a used tampon and photos of the two of you on his property, completing her attempt to frame this man for what she was about to do, then took you down to the ocean behind his home. A night watchman in the area thought he heard a baby crying in the distance around 2:30 a.m. Shirley took her prescription for Ativan, prescribed for her by psychiatrist John Doucet, mixed it into your formula, then took some herself. The only good thing we know about this is that you were not conscious and you did not suffer. She then... She then walked to the edge of a pier and with you strapped to her stomach with a sweater, she jumped into the Atlantic Ocean. Mommy loves you. Yes, I do. Mommy loves you. Did you have a nice nap? What did you dream about? Mommy loves you. Mommy misses you. He was found face upward with his eyes wide open. And the policeman who found him said that he had wrapped him in a blanket rather than a plastic bag, and he and another officer carried him gently back. And he made very sure that he kept the body very far away from the wicked woman who had murdered him. When I sit here, I hate her so much. When we came here, David and I realized what Shirley Turner was. She was the devil. But people think that you're some kind of basic religious nut if you believe in the devil. I haven't prayed since Zachary died. I haven't. I have some issues I have to deal with. You know, my faith has been tested by this. Was a beautiful service. A real tribute to the little boy. Oh, I don't know how many people were here, probably 300 or 400. Maybe more. I don't recall. I've never seen a coffin so small before. They shouldn't have them that size. He was in his little suit that he'd had the pictures taken in, I think. What went in it? What went in it? His little ball. And I don't remember if she put a truck in. Lots of kisses and hugs and tears went in it. Lots of hopes and dreams. Your grandma and grandpa went back to England and spread your ashes with your dad's. They went back to St. Louis and spread your ashes with your dad's. And I didn't go with him. Andrew wanted to be cremated. Oh, yes. Yes. What bothers Kate is that she did not go with him to the crematorium and stay with him right to the end. He went from the funeral home to the crematorium all alone. In plastic bags. With only his head sticking out! Come on, Kate. He wouldn't care about that. That's why we went right up to the oven doors with Zachary. This is what that fucking bitch didn't know! Or maybe she did know. This is what she's leaving. Maybe she did know. If she thought about it at all, she didn't give a good goddamn! And this is what I hate her for. I hate her for a lot of things. Stealing the rest of Andrew's life and virtually all of Zachary's life and then this. Leaving us like this. A couple of times, lying in there in bed at night, I considered fixing the problem myself. Pick a night when Kate took a sleeping pill, so she wouldn't know I was up. Get up in the middle of the night. Dream up a pretext. Go kill Shirley and come back and go back to bed, so Kate would not know. That way, number one, she could not harm Zachary. And number two, even if they did catch me at it, I'm the first one they come looking for, of course, but Kate could truthfully say she didn't know that I was doing it, so she might still get to bring up Zachary and get him started, even if I go to prison in Canada. We've worked through possibilities ad nauseam. Suppose we grab Zachary and run. Number one, we got to get off the island of Newfoundland. The big drawback against living here is getting out of here. There's only three ways to do that. Ferry, boat, airplane. The airplane and the ferry would be covered as soon as Zachary's missing. We'd have to hire a boat somehow, which means you take in a third party to the crime of kidnapping. We can't go home. We cannot ever identify ourselves as ourselves. Have cash only stashed all around the country. Zachary would never be allowed to know his family, our friends. So that path... big, big, big, big risk with a horrible life. So that's out. Legal approaches we might have taken. Invent something. File affidavit saying Shirley slipped one night when we were around and said a threat of some kind that might get her incarcerated. But that would just be our word against hers. The best shot we had at keeping Zachary alive was I kill her myself. Other than doing that, I can think of no other way to save Zachary from that bitch. There's a logic in it. But I didn't do it. 'Cause I trusted government to do its job. Government is supposed to stop that so I don't have to do it personally. In this case, they didn't even get her off the street and they even gave her a baby to look after. My understanding is that proper protocols were followed. I have asked my officials to, did ask them some time ago, to follow up with the board to see, in fact, that all the proper protocols had been adhered to. They were gambling Zachary's life. They were gambling the lives of anyone in the general population that Shirley came in contact with. We, the vast majority of good people who don't kill people, are stuck. We got nowhere to go. We figured we'd hold a press conference and try to push for changes in law. The morning that we had scheduled the press conference, I was in the shower. Kate came in with the phone. "It's Jackie. She says we can't hold the press conference." Technically, there's still a press ban in place. I said, "Fuck them. Fuck them! If they want to lock me up for talking while they let murderers walk around free, just..." We believe that Shirley Turner bears 100% of the responsibility for the murder of our son, Andrew. We believe that the legal system helped her to kill our grandson, Zachary. When Shirley Turner was formally charged and escaped to Canada, we naively thought she would be sent back to Pennsylvania within a few weeks at the most. When we learned that she was out on bail, under an order from Justice David Russell, we were numb. Numb! Good afternoon. Judge Russell's office. I'm a documentary filmmaker, and I'm doing a documentary about the Zachary Turner case. I think all he might have done one time was probably a bail review. Is that what you're calling about? Yeah, it was December 12, 2001, actually. Yeah. Okay. Judge Russell is sorry, but he won't be able to be interviewed in connection with that matter. Crown Prosecutor Mike Madden didn't even argue against her release on bail that day and instead entered the courtroom with an agreement already in place for her release. Mike Madden speaking. I'm a documentary filmmaker. I was a friend of Andrew Bagby. Wondering if you would be interested in possibly being interviewed for... No, I don't think so. Not one penny of her bail sureties had to be paid by anyone who signed, nor did they have to show proof of ability to pay. No money's put up. No money at all. It's useless. They could have put 20 cents or $20 million. Wouldn't have made any difference. Her psychiatrist put up the $65,000, and that's another issue altogether. Hi. You've reached Dr. Doucet's office. Please leave your name, telephone number, and a brief message. Hi. I'm calling for Dr. Doucet. My call was not returned. Time. We thought it was all about time. Each step in the extradition process, each incomprehensible delay, four weeks, six weeks, over and over again, there was another knife in our guts. "The law is slow," they told us, and it was! Our lawyer Jackie went to see Betty Day, an administrator somewhere in the hierarchy of Child Protective Services, and told her that we are concerned about the safety of the baby because the mother is accused of a pre-meditated murder. And nothing happened. Hello. Department of Health and Community Services. Hi. I'm trying to reach Elizabeth Day. Elizabeth Day is not available. At the tone, please record your message. My call was not returned. If you were in the Family Health Services, wouldn't you want to know who this accused murderer was arranging for her baby to stay with? Nobody ever came to see us. Before we left Sunnyvale, we got a police report to say that we were good people. Our friends and my employer, et cetera, write letters that we were upright members of the community. Nobody asked us for that. We could have been convicted child molesters in California. - They didn't care. - And nobody would've known. She wrote directly to Judge Derek Green, who responded through his secretary with instructions on how to write her own appeal of his decision to incarcerate her. - Mr. Kuenne? - Yes? Yeah, this is Chief Justice Green. What I did is on the record and will speak for itself. Okay. Okay. Under an order from Justice Gale Welsh, Shirley Turner was released on bail again, and we went numb again. And we had to give Zachary right back into the hands of Andrew's killer! "There is no indication of a psychological disorder that would give concern about potential harm to the public generally." Shirley's last boyfriend before Andrew told Pennsylvania police that Shirley attempted suicide on his front doorstep after he broke up with her and had threatened to kill him. "There is no indication of a psychological disorder that would give concern about potential harm to the public generally." Eight people had restraining orders against her. "There is no indication of a psychological disorder that would give concern about potential harm to the public generally." If anyone had bothered to check the jail records during her two-month stay, the prison psychiatrist put her on suicide watch every 15 minutes, she was incredibly disruptive, and even threatened to stab another inmate with a fork. "There is no indication of a psychological disorder that would give concern about potential harm to the public generally, as her crime, while violent, was specific in nature." The man she was terrorizing called the police and reported Shirley, but because he didn't leave his name, no one took any action. "Her crime, while violent, was specific in nature." Andrew rejected her, and she killed him. Zachary rejected her. He paid the price, too. "Her crime, while violent, was specific in nature." Of course the crime was specific. She didn't shoot into a crowd of people. We could not conceive how they could let a probable pre-meditated murderer... probable pre-meditated murderer walk the streets. "Dr. Turner's detention is not necessary in the public interest." Who the hell is the system protecting? "Dr. Turner's detention is not necessary in the public interest." We waited and we waited and we waited for the authorities to do their job and lock her up! You got a dead body with five holes in it, and it means nothing! Under an order from Justice Gale Welsh. Good afternoon. Court of Appeal. Hi. May I speak to Judge Welsh, please? - Is she expecting your call? - Probably not, no. And now we've got a second dead body that couldn't breathe through water. I just spoke with Judge Welsh, and she said no. She said no, so I just wanted to let you know. "Dr. Turner's detention is not necessary in the public interest." Son of a... Son of a... She had to be stopped. The people who were supposed to stop her didn't. And she got to kill again. And I'm gonna do my damnedest to see if I can make them change the way they deal with killers. And with that, your grandma and grandpa became activists. We victims... We want, number one, the whole truth public about why Zachary died. They've developed a program, a support group, for people who have had a death through, you know, violent death. Welcome to our first Victims of Homicide annual vigil. In this last year, I've just taken training to become a child advocate in the dependency court system. John Doucet, the psychiatrist who posted $65,000 bail for Ms. Turner, was found guilty of professional misconduct. It was David Bagby and his wife who launched the complaint against Doucet. The three-person panel ordered Doucet to undergo psychiatric counseling. There was a lot of sympathy for David and Kate. I think it got them at least a result that they were hoping to accomplish. Mr. Wicks, Child and Youth Advocate for Newfoundland and Labrador, is doing a Child Death Review, which is a formal investigation and the output of it is a report saying, "Here's why that baby died." And recommendations for changes to cut the chance of that happening in the future. Obviously, once that's done, then we would like to see that go to whatever legislative bodies, either provincial or federal, can write laws to make these recommendations real. And a report into the death of Zachary Turner will be released in Newfoundland. He was drowned by his mother. Your grandma was temporarily injured in a fall and couldn't make the trip, so your grandpa and I came alone. Dr. Markesteyn conducted an exhaustive investigation over a 15-month period. He reached two key conclusions. One, Zachary Turner's death was preventable. And, two, Zachary was in his mother's care when he should not have been. The government has received a scathing report that concluded the child-protection system failed Zachary Turner. A serious lack of judgment at the senior-management level. Substandard child-protection practices contributed to the outcomes. There are 58 recommendations in the report. I am announcing our action plan. We will develop policy specific to children whose parents are charged with a violent crime. The part I was most interested in, as I said, is bail. Why was Dr. Shirley Turner granted judicial interim release, commonly known as bail? This is the one question that Dr. Markesteyn did not and could not answer. So, that's still an open wound, if you would. May I? He did say this, "Had Dr. Turner not been released on bail on 12 December 2001 or on 10 January 2003, my review would have been unnecessary. Zachary would be alive today." I would like to see Parliament pass a law denying bail to people accused of murder. Put them on the fast track to get to trial and get on with it, get to the truth. The only way I can see it changing is for every citizen who cares about this to tell his M.P. that "This law is stupid. Change it." And, of course, such a selfish thing to do. She not only killed Andrew, but she left three other children without a mother, which is very sad for them. And what kind of regret does that give you? Well, if things were different, I guess it's possible he'd still be alive and rather than memories of just one year, there'd be a lot of years there now. - Tough losing a little brother. - Yeah, definitely. Zachary should be right here with me. He should be off going to school now, getting ready to go to school. I am going to continue to scream long and loud about bail for someone accused of what Shirley did to my son. I'd traveled the world for years looking for what was left of your dad. I'd made dozens of new friends. Dr. DiCuccio has made the trek out to California. But there was still one question I couldn't answer. How would I know when I was done? And what was I really looking for? Both as spirituality and as grief, the relocation of the other person is essential. It's interesting you should ask that. My first response was, "That's not a person." That is simply a mass of tissue and protein and fat and water. Something leaves a body when death occurs. What was I trying to find? To resolve our grief, we have to be able to accept the reality of that loss. Who's interviewing you, Kurt? Get our questions answered to the extent that they can be and to basically surrender to the things that we can't have answered. And how would I know when I'd found it? I appreciate you doing this for him. 'Cause I know he talked about you a lot. - He'd talk about you. - Really? Well, then, you're not a good moviemaker, huh? 'Cause that's what he always told me. I know he loved you. And then to be able to continue to live remembering the person. To be able to remember their life, not only their death. No, no, no. I can feel it. It's not far off. It's too late. I didn't want to stop making this movie. That would mean I'd learned everything there was to know and finished my one last movie with him. Earl Grollman says grief is love's unwillingness to let go. He doesn't like to wave goodbye. I'll miss you. - Well, I'll be going. - Bye. One more time. And action! It is my brother that got married here tonight. One more time. And action! This is your Uncle Kurt. One more time. And action! When the person says, "Life will never be the same again, will it?" they now know where they are and what's involved in moving forward. There were so many stories I wanted to tell you. And somewhere I hope you're watching. I almost gave up making this film when you were killed. I couldn't see the point anymore. But something kept me going. And then one day I realized what it was. This film was no longer a letter to you. It was now a letter to someone else. We thought we'd go get Andrew, get everything organized, whatever, and then kill ourselves, 'cause no point in going on. Everybody always says, "What would be the difference if one person weren't alive?" You've still got a hell of a lot to live for, and you've still got a lot of friends and a lot of family who love you very, very much. You are the most amazing and... I love both of you. ...the strongest people I've ever known. - I love you guys. - I love them very much. - I love them very much. - I love them very much. Now, how am I gonna do this without weeping? I admire you and respect you so much for two things. One, for such a wonderful young man that you raised. It doesn't matter what happened. They raised a wonderful man. Thanks for bringing such a wonderful person into the world. You know, Andrew contributed a lot to me as far as who I am today. We won't forget their son. ...and for having the strength to make it through something like this. With what you've been through, to still be carrying on, still to hold your heads up and keep going and pushing forward is amazing. They've done it in such a way that it makes you proud to know them and to be related to them. I think God put some people down on Earth just to be examples for the rest of us. You are two very, very special people. There's a few things in my life that have had an effect on me like those two people. I don't know how else. I love them. - We love you. - Well, we love them. - We're always thinking of you. - And I think about them daily. My thoughts are never far from either of you. I love them and pray for them. God's blessings on them both. Oh, they know I love them. I feel very blessed, as I say, to be among their friends. I just thank them for being my friends for 30-odd years. We're very lucky to have them as our neighbors and our true friends. God bless you guys and call me. And as one of Andrew's very good friends told us very soon after he was murdered, we still have children. Kurt, Matt, Chris, on down the list. I feel like I got lucky in life 'cause they're another set of parents. Kate and David were a big reason why I am the person that I am today. We're all their kids. I'll always be there for you guys. And I love you both dearly. We all love you guys so much. There's really nothing that I wouldn't do for them. Do you feel better? Do you feel better? Yeah. Yeah, you make me feel better. I know that no matter what, you're going to find ways to continue to help people because that's the type of people you are. That's how good you are. I just hope that Dave and Kate realize how much he loved them, because just in the short period of time that I knew him, that was the one truth that I knew to be absolute. I'm glad I wasn't a rebellious youth, because it would have been completely and utterly fucking wasted on David and Kate Bagby. I mean, totally. I had my ear pierced for two weeks. They never noticed. I'm finally sitting at the dinner table, and I actually said to them, I'm like, "You know, Mom, Dad, it's a good thing I'm not looking for attention because hello!" And they just had a look at it, and they're like, "Oh, that's nice. When did you get that done?" And I love you, and I know you love me and... Yeah. I kind of need to move on from that. 'Cause I'm a Bagby male. We don't gush very much. |
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