And Never See Her Again (28 page)

"Now, you have testified before, haven't you?"Jones asked.

"Yes."

"You testified at the last trial back in June of 1999," Jones stated.

"Yes."

"And in June of '99, correct me if I'm wrong, nowhere on that date did you testify to the fact that Spencer Williams told you that and pointed to a black car that went by and said it was a Chrysler or Cougar-type product and that's the car that got Opal. Did you ever testify to that the last time you were here?" Jones asked, repeating testimony Teresa had given to Callahan.

"No, sir, no one asked me," Teresa responded calmly.

"They didn't ask you that last time?" Jones asked.

"I don't believe so, no," Teresa stated.

"Okay. But you didn't tell the last jury that, did you? But you told them that today; is that right?" Jones asked.

"Yes," Teresa responded calmly.

Jones continued with his questioning concerning the car, going over other cars seen in the neighborhood near the time of Opal's abduction. When he was fin- ished,Jones had accomplished his objective. Although Teresa was certain the car in the photo, Ricky Franks's car, was very much like the car she had seen cruising their neighborhood in the weeks prior to Opal's disappearance, she couldn't swear they were one and the same. Again she couldn't place Ricky Franks in that car, or that specific car in the neighborhood.

Jones was creating doubt, just as he had in the minds of jury number one. He naturally hoped for a verdict of not guilty, but even another hung jury would be acceptable. If only one juror out of the twelve was convinced that Ricky Franks hadn't been in his car watching Opal Jennings for weeks, hadn't snatched her from her playmates on the day of her disappearance, Jones would have enough to see Ricky Franks go home.

After several additional questions concerning the automobile seen in Opal's Saginaw neighborhood, Jones's tone softened as he changed his line of ques tioning. "Let's be fair, ma'am. You want this over with, don't you? It's been a horror for your family, hasn't it?"

Teresa took a long, deep breath. Opal's disappearance had been a nightmare. The grief they had all felt, the fear for Opal, the anxious moments each time the phone rang, hoping, praying that it was good news about their precious Opal. Yes, it had been a horror, a terror that no one who has never lost a child would know, and one Teresa wished on no one.

She released her breath and stared at Ed Jones. "It has been very hard on our family and, of course, we would like it to be drawn to a conclusion," she said in a controlled voice.

"You want closure, right?" Jones asked, moving closer to the witness-box. "You and your family want it over with, right? Everybody wants it over with, don't they?"

"I would assume so. Our family, of course, would like for everything to end, but, you know, we just have to wait and see what happens," Teresa said with little emotion in her voice.

"Right, but if Ricky didn't do this, you don't want him to be convicted, do you?" Jones questioned.

"No," Teresa answered honestly. She and the family wanted Opal's abductor punished. If that be Ricky Franks, fine; if not, then they wanted the real perpetrator caught and dealt with. But multiple law enforcement agencies believed they had the right man; she could only trust their judgment.

Bessie, Ricky's mother, and Judy, his wife, wiped tears from their eyes as Ed Jones asked his final questions of Teresa Sanderford. The women both wore Tshirts that read: WHEN GOD CLOSES A DOOR HE OPENS A WINDOW. They believed Ricky had not kidnapped Opal Jennings. They wanted a not guilty verdict. They wanted Ricky home.

After completing his questioning, the defense passed Teresa to the prosecution for additional questioning.

Lisa Callahan pushed her glasses onto the bridge of her nose as she approached the witness-box. After a number of follow-up queries, Callahan turned to Jones's final line of questioning. Callahan asked Teresa if she wanted Ricky Franks convicted if he was not the person that had abducted Opal. If she had put any pressure on the prosecution to convict just any person of the crime, or if she had been breathing down their necks to get someone responsible for the act.

Teresa assured Callahan, and the jury, that was not the case.

"If he is the person that has taken Opal, then I want him to get what he-what the law allows for him to get, jail time or whatever. If he is not the person, then he needs to go home. I'm seeking justice."

Judy Franks wiped tears from her eyes, coated with dark blue eye shadow, as her mother-in-law put her face in her hands and wept. The two women, connected by one man, both hoped that Ricky would be going home soon.

But Teresa Sanderford was only the first state's witness to take the stand. There would be many to follow who, convinced of his guilt, would testify that Ricky Franks was the man who had abducted Opal. As much as his family wanted Ricky Franks to go home, there were others that wanted nothing more than to see him spend his life behind bars.

The stage had been set with the testimony of Teresa Sanderford. The initial witnesses called by the defense would be those heard during the first trial. Many of the questions would remain the same and much of the cross-examination by the defense would be similar. If anything appeared noticeably different, it was the determination with which each side approached the tasks of proving guilt or innocence.

On the first day of trial, thirteen witnesses took the stand, including two of Opal's aunts, two former jail inmates, and five-year-old Spencer Williams. Their testimonies remained the same, with the defense taking a more aggressive approach in cross-examination than they had in the previous trial. Some jurors appeared to give their undivided attention to the testimony of each state's witness, while at least one gray-haired man seemed bored by the proceedings.

The addition of state's witness Myra Stevenson, manager of the Decatur, Texas, Golden Fried Chicken, which had once employed Ricky Franks, was presented to show that Franks, unlike the man whom defense attorneys categorized as mentally comparable to a child, was fully competent of holding a job.

Stevenson, her black jeans and blue shirt accented by a black-and-white-striped headband, told the court that in the three to four months Franks had worked for her, he cooked and waited on customers. According to Stevenson, while waiting on customers, Franks had taken orders, made change, and run the cash register. She emphasized that the register was not computerized but did have food dots affixed to help employees with ordering. Giving an example, Stevenson stated Franks would have to know to press four chicken tenders, rather than four tender dinners in order to complete the transaction correctly.

While manning the drive-up window, Franks had also been able to take the order, remember it, and give it to the appropriate customer, in addition to completing the monetary transaction. Stevenson insisted the task could not be completed by a twelve-year-old child, as the defense had suggested. For his efforts Franks had been paid $5.50 an hour.

Franks's former boss described Franks's general appearance as "somewhat clean." He had worn his hair in a ponytail and was sometimes clean shaven, but at other times not. Stevenson admitted Franks hadn't been fired because he was incapable of doing the work, but because he showed up for work dirty, had been sent home to clean up, and had never returned.

Myra Stevenson's testimony ended with Greg Miller asking, "What was your opinion of his intellectual level?"

"If he didn't do something right, I'd say, `Ricky, you know better than that.' He'd grin. Ricky wasn't dumb."

As Stevenson left the witness chair, Ricky Franks watched her cross the courtroom, a smirk across his face.

A man donning a blue striped Western shirt, blue jeans, and leather belt, with GENE tooled on the back, strolled to the witness-box. Gene Morrison, a retired truck driver, had been asked to testify by the state that he had resided in Saginaw for more than thirty-five years. Many of those years Morrison lived only a few houses from Danny Doyle, Ricky Franks's half brother. Morrison stated he had seen Franks at his brother's house on many occasions. In addition, Doyle had worked on Morrison's plumbing several times, and Franks had been in Morrison's home at least once, helping his brother.

The defense had few questions for Morrison, the state had made their point-Ricky Franks was familiar with the Saginaw neighborhood where Opal Jennings's abduction had taken place.

The jury was excused to return to the jury room while the next witness was questioned outside their presence. Judge Gill would decide if Robert Wood, a Mansfield policeman and former Tarrant County jailer, would be permitted to testify in front of jurors.

Wood, at the time of Franks's arrest and indictment for the kidnapping of Opal Jennings, oversaw Franks at the county jail. Wood had overheard Franks on a couple of occasions tell other inmates that he wouldn't be indicted, because they couldn't find a body. Franks didn't think he would be caught because there was no body. He also had said he picked Opal up, but took her to the store, then dropped her off back at her house. Wood admitted that Franks hadn't told him personally; he had only overheard the conversations between Franks and other inmates. At the time Wood not only overheard the conversations, but he also observed Franks crying in his cell.

"He didn't want to be convicted. He wanted to go home to his family." That was how Wood explained Franks's weeping.

Wood had written up the incidents and given them to his supervisor, as instructed.

Roger Polson, a member of the Mansfield Independent School District (ISD) Police Department, and former Tarrant Countyjailer, also testified outside the presence of the jury.

Polson, a large man, stated that he, too, had been assigned to the section of the county jail that Ricky Franks was housed in prior to and after his indictment for Opal Jennings's kidnapping. Polson had overheard Franks telling Chris Freeman, aka Andrew Bouyer, who had testified in Franks's first trial, that he had picked Opal up, took her to a convenience store, got a pack of cigarettes-and that's all. Like Wood, Polson insisted he hadn't interrogated Franks, only listened to him talk.

"After he was indicted, I heard him say, `They can't indict me, they don't have a body. If they found the body, I'll probably fry-but they'll never find her body.

Poison stated that Franks and Freeman would yell back and forth between their cells, indicating that Franks liked to talk a lot, with conversations going on from morning till night.

On Polson's cross-examination Ed Jones stated to the court that the defense would like to present evidence that Ricky Franks was on medication at the time Polson claimed Franks had the discussions with Freeman. Jones requested time to go get the jail records to present at that point in his cross-examination. Judge Gill denied the request.

Jones then asked for time to be given to the defense for supplemental discovery in the form of a motion for a continuance. The motion was denied. Jones requested that the personnel records of Wood and Poison be allowed into evidence by the defense. Judge Gill denied that request. Judge Gill announced that following a recess, both Wood and Poison would be allowed to testify before the jury.

The court broke for the noon recess. Greg Miller, as always, returned to his office to review trial notes. Judy Franks sat on a bench outside the courtroom and waited for permission to take her husband his lunch: two burritos, a Dr Pepper, and two bags of M&M's.

After the recess Greg Miller called Wood to the stand. Ed Jones rose and announced that the defense would like a running objection, as presented outside the presence of the jury.

Both Wood and Polson reiterated statements each had made before the court while the jury was out. Leon Haley took an antagonistic approach in an attempt to discredit the officers.

"When guys are up there charged with offenses like Ricky Franks, you don't like them much; isn't that fair?" Haley asked Wood.

"No, that's not fair," Wood responded.

Polson reported that Franks had conflicts with several of the men in his area, and although he and Freeman were friends, Franks and Freeman would have occasional tiffs over cigarettes or commissary. The Mansfield ISD officer also stated that if Franks didn't get his way about things, he would get upset.

Most in the courtroom were captivated by the former jailers' accounts of Ricky Franks's life in jail, with the exception of one white-haired bailiff, who snoozed at his post at the front of the courtroom.

The expression on Ricky Franks's face was one of contempt as the second of the two officers was excused. Franks, like most jail inmates, was unaware that everything he said, everything he did, had been closely scrutinized by jailers on each shift.

As in the first trial, James Blackburn, a former jail inmate, testified for the state.

"He said he'd been stalking her for a year and went over to get her to get satisfaction," Blackburn told the second jury.

A male juror, wearing a crisp white shirt, was visibly disturbed by Blackburn's words. He placed his hand over his mouth, his expression angry.

"I took it he meant to have sex with her," Blackburn said.

Lisa Callahan, anticipating the defense's strategy of discrediting the state's witness, presented a chart that indicated that Blackburn had been arrested for unauthorized use of a motor vehicle. Probated and back home by June 26, 2000, he'd seen the news of Franks's arrest. Likewise, Greg Miller presented a similar chart when he called Chris Freeman to the stand.

As Ed Jones cross-examined Freeman, he, too, reviewed the record of the former Tarrant County inmate.

"You are a criminal; don't you agree?"Jones asked.

"No, I don't agree," Freeman replied.

While Jones cited Freeman's past record, Freeman interrupted Jones by saying, "I object."

"You can't object," Jones said. Jones, Franks, his codefense attorneys, and the prosecution all joined in laughter.

Psychologist Lawrin Dean and Special Crimes Assistant Assistant Chief Mike Adair rounded out the first day of testimony, with Adair to continue the following day.