C
HAPTER 39
D
EADLY
D
RUGS
The first real argument between the prosecution and defense during Miriam’s testimony came over this issue of a life insurance policy for Alan Helmick. Richard Tuttle told the judge, “This is clearly hearsay. If the court’s going to admit it, I’d ask that the jury be instructed that it’s not being offered for the truth, just for the effect on the listener. And I would argue that the defense not argue that it’s the truth in closing.”
Jody McGuirk replied, “It’s not hearsay, because we’re offering it for the effect it had on Miriam.”
Tammy Eret joined in on this, saying, “If they bring it up in closing argument, we’ll never hear again that the only reason why that insurance policy was purchased was because Alan wanted it.”
McGuirk shot back, “I’m not saying that at all. I’m not saying anything about purchasing the policy. I’m saying why did she call her (Callister) that one time.”
Eret wasn’t backing down. “This is so sidestepping hearsay.”
Soon Steve Colvin was in the argument as well. “I would just add that the prosecution has elicited several times statements that were offered for the effect on the listener and we’ve never asked for a limiting instruction. So I think that at this time for the court to start issuing limiting instructions would unfairly highlight the fact that some statements are elicited that are not offered for the truth of the matter asserted. I think to avoid unduly and unfairly highlighting, we need to go back and find every statement that’s been admitted and do a limiting instruction for all of them. Otherwise, this is unfairly saying only Ms. Helmick’s testimony needs to be looked at with caution.”
If Steve Colvin got his way, this would be a major headache. It would mean that every witness so far—who the defense thought was bringing in hearsay testimony—would need the testimony explained to the jurors. And the judge would have to remind the jurors that those statements had to be looked at with caution.
Tuttle wasn’t buying any of this and said, “For Mr. Colvin, who didn’t take advantage of that—it doesn’t make sense now! Every situation is judged on its own merits.”
Colvin responded, “The prosecution wants you to preclude Ms. Helmick from explaining why she did something that they are saying is evidence of guilt. That flies in the face of everything that you have a right to do. If we can’t explain why she did it, they can’t be allowed to say that it’s evidence of guilt.”
Judge Robison responded, “I do find that it is the effect on listener that is being elicited—why she made the phone call.” Then Robison asked the prosecution what kind of limiting instruction they wanted to be given to the jurors.
Tuttle replied, “I’d ask for the same language I proposed. ‘Why did you (Miriam) call Elizabeth Callister?’”
Eret added, “When we go to do closing arguments, and I say Miriam was looking to take out an insurance policy, then they’re gonna stand up and say, ‘No, she wasn’t. She only called because Alan told her to,’ and they offer that for the truth. You can’t do that, because it’s hearsay.”
Judge Robison wanted to get into this more in depth, so she excused the jurors and told them to take a break. Once they were out of the courtroom, Robison put together an instruction that read:
You have heard the defendant testify to statements allegedly made by the victim in this case, Alan Helmick. These statements have only been allowed to show the effect on the listener and cannot be considered by you for the truth of the statements.
In other words, Miriam supposedly heard those words coming from Alan’s mouth, and she acted upon what she thought she heard. Therefore, what she thought she heard could never be determined to have been what Alan actually had said. Alan was obviously no longer around to verify that.
As far as limiting instructions being used now, and not earlier when the prosecution had been eliciting testimony, Judge Robison said, “I don’t feel that it is unduly prejudicial to Ms. Helmick. The simple fact is, that if limiting instructions had been requested during testimony earlier, the court would have considered that and determined whether or not it would be appropriate to give it. No such request was made.” Since neither Jody McGuirk or Steve Colvin had asked for limiting instructions, that was their decision and no one else’s, as far as Judge Robison was concerned.
When the jurors came back in, Judge Robison gave them the limiting instructions. Jody McGuirk asked Miriam, “When you called Elizabeth Callister about the health insurance policy, why did you call her?”
Miriam replied, “Alan asked me to.”
McGuirk wanted to know about Alan Helmick and his phone calls and messages. Miriam said, “He just threw his phone in my purse when he didn’t want to carry it. He didn’t like carrying it around in his pockets while he walked around.”
“Did you ever keep Alan’s phone from him?”
“No, I did not.”
“Did you ever hide his phone from him?”
“No, I did not.”
“Did he ever use your phone?”
“Yes. He used my phone because he liked to put it on a speakerphone, especially if we were driving. My speaker was clearer than his.”
Getting back to Elizabeth Callister, McGuirk said that Callister had testified earlier that Miriam had phoned her and asked if she could set up a life insurance policy on Alan without his knowledge.
Miriam answered that she had not used those exact words. Miriam stated now, “I asked her because of the size of the policy if he had to have the nurse or whoever came in to do blood pressure and all of that. And she said yes, we needed to have that done. He wanted an insurance policy, but he couldn’t get it at the time. His blood pressure was up and he started smoking again.”
The topic soon turned to the car fire incident. Miriam told her version of the car fire incident and stressed that she’d never made it to the trunk of the car. She said that she’d gotten sick to her stomach and had to rush to the restroom in the building. When Alan first alerted her to the fact there was a car fire, Miriam testified, “I was walking out toward the other stairs to the front door, and Alan came in and said that the car was on fire, that he needed an extinguisher or some water. I didn’t see an extinguisher, and I had a Pepsi bottle in my hand, so I handed it to him.” (This was different from searching for a pitcher of water in the building, which had been mentioned previously.)
As far as the “wick” went, and the smell of gasoline in the restroom, Miriam testified, “He pried the stick with cotton out of the tank and looked at it, and then handed it to me. I went to get some water and I took it with me. I was upset about the car, so I wasn’t really paying attention. I put it in the garbage can in the ladies’ room. I took water back outside and he was calling 911. Somewhere along the line, he asked me to go get it (the wick), so I got it. I just don’t remember the timing on it.”
McGuirk asked, “Do you know why Alan wanted it?”
Miriam answered, “To have it for the police.”
Asked how Alan had responded to the whole car fire incident, Miriam said, “He was very calm. I thought it was kind of unusual. I was not so calm.”
After the lunch break, Jody McGuirk wondered if Alan Helmick sometimes used Miriam in a “secretarial role,” and she said yes. She would take phone messages for him and sometimes return calls. She added, “I called more when he was sick. He asked me to do it more often.”
Asked about when they got up in the morning, Miriam said she usually got up between nine and ten in the morning. As for Alan, it could be any time. He did not sleep well, and he might get up between two and seven in the morning. And then Miriam spoke of Alan sleepwalking. She said, “I came out to the garage one time. He was in the car asleep at the wheel with the keys in his hand. One time he was trying to find something to eat, and he had all the Tupperware out, looking, I guess. I finally got him back to bed, but when I put my hand on a cereal bowl to take out the next morning for him, it had oatmeal in it, so I knew he was up. Another time we were in Las Vegas. I heard a real loud banging on the door, and when I opened the door, he was standing there naked in the hallway. So he had awakened somewhere in the hall.”
McGuirk asked about Alan being sick a lot, and Miriam said, “He was very tired. Flu-y. He would be that way for a little while, for a few days, and then he’d be fine for a few days, and it would just go back and forth. He had back issues during the whole year. With his back, he had two swollen disks, where he had to get an MRI, and he was going to the chiropractor twice a week. When he was sick, he normally didn’t want to talk to anybody. He didn’t want to have to think about things. He just liked to be left alone.”
McGuirk wanted to know if this included Alan’s children. To this, Miriam said Alan didn’t want to talk to them, and at times he didn’t even want to talk to her. And that was the reason she began answering his phone messages. She said she passed the information on to him; but whether he called people back, she didn’t know.
As far as home computers went, Miriam stated that she used the Gateway computer and Alan had an Acer notebook computer. But according to Miriam, he started having problems with it, so he also used the Gateway computer more and more often.
Now came the important questions about whether Miriam had ever signed any of Alan’s checks. To this, she said yes. McGuirk showed her one check after another that she had signed; and to each, when asked why she had signed those checks, Miriam said, “Because Alan asked me to.” Most of these were to Dance Junction, and Miriam could, of course, cash Alan’s checks going to that business.
Questioning also came up as to why Alan supposedly didn’t want to talk to Alan Watkins concerning bank accounts. Miriam replied that she thought this was strange and it upset her. She added, “I got angry at Alan because I didn’t know what was happening. I didn’t like being put on the spot. He said not to worry about it, that he would take care of it. He was keeping me at arm’s distance on things.”
Back to computers, McGuirk asked about Internet searches on the computers regarding various medicines. Miriam said, “He’d been ill, and I brought it to his attention that he couldn’t keep his blood pressure down. We didn’t know if it was a combination of the medications he was taking or what was wrong.”
McGuirk asked, “Did you look up articles about horse euthanasia?”
“No, that would have been Alan, not me.”
“What about articles concerning the death of Heath Ledger?”
“I don’t know if he did.”
“What about an article concerning death by liquid nicotine? Did you look that one up?”
“ No.”
“Some of the searches were done at odd times. One o’clock in the morning. Two o’clock in the morning.”
“That was probably when Alan was up.”
“Would you be looking at the Internet at that time?”
“ No.”
“Why not?”
“I was asleep.”
C
HAPTER 40
“H
E
W
AS
J
UST
G
ONE
.”
Questions came up by Jody McGuirk about the day before Alan was murdered, and Trish Erikson’s testimony that he and Miriam had been arguing that day. When McGuirk asked about this, Miriam said, “We hadn’t been fighting. He had errands to run, and he was not really in a very good mood. He was just real, real grumpy.”
As far as the riding lesson for Alan’s granddaughter being canceled, Miriam testified, “Alan decided that he wasn’t sure that he wanted to pick up the grandkids. He wasn’t in a great mood. Originally, he had planned to go to Montrose. He didn’t like having the girls over at the house if he couldn’t give one hundred percent of his undivided attention. I had wanted to pick the girls up. I had started developing a relationship with the granddaughters and was enjoying their company. It was upsetting to me.”
McGuirk wanted to know why Alan hadn’t called Portia, instead of Miriam having to call her. Miriam said, “I don’t think he wanted to get into an argument with her. He told me what to say to Portia.”
Miriam added about how Alan spent the day of June 9, 2008: “I don’t know exactly where he went. He was gone for an hour and fifteen minutes. He was still in a bad mood when he got back. He had me call Portia again and say he had a little too much to drink. That’s what he asked me to tell her.”
Now came questions about the crucial morning of June 10, the day that Alan was murdered. Miriam said, “He woke me up around seven. I’m not sure exactly when. He had the coffee going and thought it was time I got up. He wanted to go feed the horses. We went to the back porch and had a cup of coffee. We talked about doing errands. He thought if I went with him, I’d be sitting in the car a lot. I didn’t want to sit in the car everywhere, because he planned on going to Clifton Water (a company) and a couple of other places.
“I had things I wanted to do, and I was out of shirts, the kind I’d use in the barn. I knew there was a sale going on, so I thought I’d take that in. After coffee we went down to the barn. He did most of the feeding. I couldn’t lift or carry anything at the time. I could do a little cleaning of the barn, but I wasn’t supposed to do any lifting. I’d had an ATV accident and I had broken a rib and injured my arm at the same time. We kind of got the ATV in a hole and he turned it the wrong way, and we dumped over. My arm got bruised and one rib was broken.”
Getting back to the morning of June 10, Miriam continued, “After feeding the horses, we went back to the house. While he took a shower, I laid out a shirt and pants for him. Then I laid out a couple of things for him to take in the truck. I left about eight-fifteen. I went to the Orchard Mesa City Market, and I called Sue Boulware from there. That was to reschedule the horse lesson to Friday. I went into the Orchard Mesa City Market to pick up cigarettes and a drink. Then I went to Walmart to get the shirts I’d use in the barn.”
From Walmart, Miriam said she went to Safeway on Horizon Avenue to get a large bag of carrots, which she was going to feed to the horses. Then it was on to Hastings Bookstore to pick up coloring books for Alan’s grandkids. And finally she drove to the Chinese restaurant around 11:00
A.M.
Miriam said she phoned Alan from there, got no answer, and finally returned home.
Now came the questioning of exactly what happened next. Miriam said, “When I pulled into the driveway, everything looked normal. Alan’s truck was there. I grabbed my bags and purse and went inside. I went through the garage door, through the washroom into the hallway and to the kitchen. I saw Alan on the floor, near the back door. I dropped my bags and went to him. I knelt down beside him, by his left side. He was cold and gray. He didn’t have a pulse. I just saw a little blood under his neck. For a while, I just sat there with him. I didn’t know what had happened to him. I held his hand for a few minutes and tried to make some sense of it all.
“I finally called 911. I noticed that there were some drawers open. The 911 operator told me to do CPR. And I tried. It was hard. I was trying to do the chest compressions, but I could only do it with one hand. I didn’t have the strength from my right arm, because I was still recovering from the rib injury. I pinched his nose together. And I turned his head sideways. He had saliva in his mouth and a little blood ran out of his nose. I tried to blow in his mouth, but he was already gone. He was just gone.”
When the first officers arrived, Miriam said that they made her go outside. “I wasn’t really thinking at that point. I was just numb. I talked with an officer, who was out there. He wanted to know if the dogs barked. I said I’m sure they did if someone came around.”
Miriam also said that she wanted to get her purse from the house, but the officers wouldn’t let her back inside. She waited around outside for quite a while, and then officers asked her to come down to the sheriff ’s office. Miriam recalled that Detective Jarrell and Detective Norris asked her a lot of questions and took the clothes she was wearing. As far as the questions that were asked, she said, “I can’t remember them. It was all a blur.”
After being questioned by the police, she went to Merredith Von Burg’s house, because, as she put it, “that was the only place I knew of to go at that moment. I had a good, cordial relationship with Merredith. I stayed at her house for two to three days. While I was there, I worried about what was going on—getting the funeral process started, and things like that.”
Asked if she was concerned about money at that time, Miriam answered that she was very concerned. She only had $180 with her, and no credit cards. She didn’t even have her purse with her driver’s license inside it. The police had that. As far as the funeral went, she said that she started the process and Alan’s daughters took it from there. Miriam added, “It was hard. There was a private viewing. I don’t really know how long it was. The funeral was wonderful, in that everyone had things to say about Alan.”
Asked if she had a hard time recalling the day of the funeral, Miriam replied that she did. One line of questioning was interesting. McGuirk asked if she had spoken with a man named Mike Pruett on the day of the funeral: “He mentioned that you told him that you said an ex-employee could have killed Alan. Do you remember saying this?”
Miriam replied, “I don’t remember, but I could have.”
“Who were you talking about when you said that?”
“About Keith Coppage.”
“Why were you talking about it there?”
“Cody, a man who worked at the dance studio, had brought it to my attention earlier that day. I think he told me the authorities were already aware of it.”
In essence, Miriam was now saying that Keith Coppage might have murdered Alan because of their dispute at Dance Junction. The same Keith Coppage whom Barbara Watts indicated Miriam loved. Also, according to Watts, Miriam had written in a journal that Miriam would do anything for Keith, even die for him.
As to why Miriam went back to her Whitewater home at all, after Alan’s murder, if she was afraid of a killer on the loose, Miriam said that she had responsibilities there. “I had to feed the horses and the dogs. It was too expensive to stay in town and run back and forth there. I didn’t have the money for that. I spent my days mostly sitting in the garage. Alan’s blood was still on the kitchen floor. It seemed different than I remembered. It was everywhere. It was not what I had seen that day. I tried to clean it up, but I couldn’t. Portia finally came over and cleaned it up.”
Miriam said that she tried getting her purse and driver’s license back from the police, but they didn’t hand it over to her. She added that this was devastating. “I needed my driver’s license to go down and apply for public assistance, and I couldn’t do that. You can’t really do anything without your driver’s license. And I couldn’t get my birth certificate without a valid driver’s license. I was caught between a rock and a hard place. I was only able to pay the light bill. I couldn’t make the house payment.”
As far as the money that Merredith Von Burg loaned her, Miriam said she used that to buy groceries, food for the animals, and some gasoline for the car. And Miriam said that she didn’t sell any property that did not directly belong to her.