The Happy Housewife (Samantha Sherman Book 1) (6 page)

Don and Sam then exchanged their current phone numbers and Don gave Sam his card and Nathan’s card. Nathan’s last name was Barrett, Sam noted. Don then led her back down the hallway. This time as she passed the bedroom where Dan’s body was she looked in. She couldn’t resist. Fortunately, Nathan was talking to the forensics person and glanced up only for a second before looking back down. Sam disregarded him and took one last look at Dan’s lifeless body as she moved by.

Sam collected Mrs. Thomas, grabbed both of their purses from the kitchen counter, and made her way out to the car. Mrs. Thomas was moving particularly slowly and didn’t respond much to Sam’s polite chatter. Sam hoped Mrs. Thomas wasn’t going into shock.
Wow
, it was hard to believe it wasn’t quite noon yet. What a day.

A
fter Sam got Mrs. Thomas settled into their guest bedroom to take a nap, she headed back downstairs to finish her casseroles. She figured she could at least get the first one over to the Myer’s house before Mrs. Thomas woke up. She’d bring the other one to the Walters after dinner when she was more certain they would be home from the hospital.

It was good to have something to work on as she absorbed what had happened that morning. She put together the casseroles while the forecasted afternoon thundershowers pounded through the neighborhood. She hoped they would cool things off. By the time she finished the casseroles, the storm was over. Not hearing anything from upstairs, she left Mrs. Thomas a note and walked the first casserole up to Evelyn Myer’s house. Evelyn’s parents were Byron and Jamie. They had one other daughter, Madison, who was a year older than Lindsey at Holy Spirit Elementary School, the Catholic School attached to their parish. Sam knew Jamie the best of the Myer’s family from ‘Room Mother’ activities.

The Myer’s house was only three up on the opposite side of the street so Sam only had a few moments to think about what to say. As she arrived, it looked like there was a lot of support already there. Several extra cars were in the driveway and Sam could see people milling about inside the house.

A woman she didn’t recognize answered the door. Sam smiled and said, “Hi. I’m Samantha Sherman from down the street. I wanted to come by and express my condolences.”

“Hi Samantha, I’m Jamie’s sister, Sarah. Thanks so much for coming by. Byron is in the kitchen and Madison is around too, in the living room I believe.”

Sarah ushered Sam inside. “How is Jamie holding up?” Sam asked.

“Not well. She’s upstairs. The doctor gave her some sleeping medication … it’s been rough.”

Sam nodded her understanding as she spotted Byron down the hall in the kitchen. There was another knock at the door and Sarah turned back to open it. Sam continued towards the kitchen. Several adults that she didn’t know were in the living room. She saw Madison sitting in one of the chairs reading.

The kitchen was a little less filled than the living room. That was odd because Byron was in the kitchen but, Sam guessed, maybe everyone felt as awkward as she did. Most people probably wanted to show their support but didn’t know what to say to Byron for more than a minute or two. Byron saw her out of the corner of his eye and, while nodding to the woman who was talking, acknowledged the casserole. “Sam, thanks so much for the casserole.”

Sam gave a half smile and put the casserole in the freezer. When that was done, she moved over to where Byron was chatting. Byron gave Sam a big hug and she pulled out the ‘I’m sorry’ speech she had rehearsed. He gave her a half smile and nodded, absently running his hand through his hair. She wondered how many times during the next couple of days he would hear the same few lines.

They talked for a bit longer and then Sam excused herself as more mourners came in to talk to Byron. As she made her way to the living room to speak to Madison, she picked up parts of conversations going on around the room. She stopped when she heard the Earth Liberation Front mentioned and listened in out of curiosity as a tall woman in a long skirt asked, “Is that one of those environmental groups?”

Sam moved closer to the people talking. A short man whom she recognized from the neighborhood responded to the skirt woman. Everyone else in the group was looking at him as if he was some kind of authority. “Sort of, Liz. It’s what we call an ‘eco-terrorist’ group. They do things like burn down housing developments to stop urban sprawl. There haven’t been any incidences in Northern Virginia until now. The FBI will definitely be involved in this.”

“Oh yes,” said the skirt woman. “I was here yesterday when Detectives Vitriola and Barrett came by. They also said the FBI would most likely be taking over the case. They were pretty sure though that the kids weren’t involved, just in the wrong place at the wrong time, but who really knows?”

The group lapsed into silence and Sam looked back over at Madison. She looked so forlorn, even while she flipped through a book. Sam felt a surge of compassion. She went over to the chair that looked too big for the small girl and squatted down to visit.

Madison seemed absolutely lost so Sam stayed with her for a while. Eventually Sarah came over from her place at the front door and asked Madison if she wanted something to eat. Sam said her good-byes and, with a feeling of relief, headed back home.

When Sam got back to her place, she headed straight for her study. The door to Mrs. Thomas’s room was closed and she didn’t hear any noises from inside. At this point in this strange day, she mentally gave up the idea of trying to get anything on her ‘to do’ list done. There was too much going on.

Sam was curious about the Earth Liberation Front (ELF) that she heard about at the Myer’s house and before from Lynette. She knew of them but wanted more information. As with most of her searches on new topics, she started with Google. She typed in Earth Liberation Front and scanned the results. Well, there was an earthliberationfront.com website … she scanned down further and found a link to the FBI. It was probably the better place to start; definitely more accurate than the group’s propaganda page. She clicked the link and found some congressional testimony from back in 2002. It was by James F. Jarboe who was a “Domestic Terrorism Section Chief” and the topic was “The Threat of Eco-Terrorism.” She read on, skimming the introduction and pausing when a section of testimony caught her eye:

The FBI estimates that the ALF/ELF have committed more than 600 criminal acts in the United States since 1996, resulting in damage in excess of 43 million dollars …

The FBI defines eco-terrorism as the use or threatened use of violence of a criminal nature against innocent victims or property by an environmentally-oriented, subnational group for environmental-political reasons, or aimed at an audience beyond the target, often of a symbolic nature.

Sam was shocked by what she was seeing. She had vaguely heard of these groups while she was in the Coast Guard. She knew, for example, that ALF stood for Animal Liberation Front. However, since her primary mission in the Coast Guard had been search and rescue, she had never been directly involved with them.

Sam found arson information in the next section:

The most destructive practice of the ALF/ELF is arson. The ALF/ELF members consistently use improvised incendiary devices equipped with crude but effective timing mechanisms … The ALF/ELF criminal incidents often involve pre-activity surveillance and well-planned operations.

The testimony went on to list a series of terrorist acts of destruction for which both groups had claimed credit. The incidents described included the arson of new housing developments. She also noticed that a lot of the people charged and convicted for these crimes were relatively young. Many were in their twenties.

Sam checked FBI testimony to Congress from 2004 and 2005 and found similar information. The additions were that there was more destruction since the original 2002 testimony (1100 criminal acts by 2004 with 110 million dollars in damage) and that the threats of violence against people had become more pronounced. A report by CBS news from 2005 backed this up and indicated that the FBI considered eco-terrorism to be the number one domestic terrorist threat.

Sam found a report from 2006 about Operation Backfire where the FBI rounded up a group of ELF members who had formed a cell and were active at multiple sites in the Pacific Northwest. They were responsible for eighty million dollars worth of damage at one university lab alone. Most of the destruction was done through arson.

She saw a link to an ELF fire in Woodinville, Washington, in 2008. The arsonists left a sign that said, “Built green? Nope, black! ELF” at a construction site of new $2,000,000 ‘green’ homes. The list of articles about destruction went on and on.

Sam went back to her Google search and clicked on another one of the links. An interview popped up between a director, Sam Green, and a former Weatherman, Mark Rudd. The interview was about Green’s film from 2003 called the
The Weather Underground
. It sounded like the Weather Underground was a radical 60’s group whose goal was to overthrow the government.

Mark Rudd was asked if he thought there were any parallels between the Weather Underground and ALF or ELF. He essentially replied that while he was sympathetic to their objective, he thought that violence hurt their cause. He characterized what ELF did as “violence against property which is part of the destruction of the environment” but concluded that despite this “righteous violence” it was “misinterpreted” by the media and the public and therefore, “I don’t think it benefits the struggle.”

Sam read some more, realizing that she was getting off topic. The director, Sam Green, had some caveats but was generally more pro violence than the former Weatherman. He praised the rioting in Seattle at the 1999 WTO conference because of “the huge impact it had on the way we talk about and think about globalization.” He concluded that “violence and nonviolence can work together in certain situations—violence against property.”

Sam was mildly surprised that people still thought this way, although perhaps this was a fringe element. She clicked back to her search and decided to look at the groups’ websites next. She went to the ALF and then the ELF websites. She found on each site prominent disclaimers that the website had nothing to do with any illegal activities.
Perhaps that was because website writers could be criminally charged if they were found to be promoting violent action on their sites
, Sam thought. She was concentrating so hard she didn’t hear the swish of hose.

“That looks just awful.” Sam jolted upright as she heard the voice directly behind her. She whirled around and found Mrs. Thomas looking over her shoulder.

“Mrs. Thomas! I didn’t hear you. Were you able to sleep at all?”

“Absolutely. That’s a very comfortable bed you have there. Are you an ELF person?”

Sam smiled at Mrs. Thomas’s characterization, “No, no. I heard the name mentioned and was curious about them.” She quickly decided not to pass on what had happened over the weekend in Loudoun County. Mrs. Thomas had enough on her plate. “Can I get you something to eat or drink? I was just about to make myself a sandwich.”

“Sure, hon. That sounds great.”

Mrs. Thomas slowly moved ahead of Sam down the hallway and to the stairs. When they reached the kitchen, Sam made sandwiches.

Mrs. Thomas was quiet for a bit and then asked, “So, does your interest in ELF have anything to do with that fire over in Loudoun County?”

Man, she was sharp
, thought Sam. She looked up and Mrs. Thomas was looking at her with the same perceptive look as when she caught Sam checking out her outfit the day before. Sam smiled, “I didn’t want to add to your already awful day by going into it, but yes, I heard over at the Myer’s house that whatever happened over the weekend was connected to that group.”

“So sad about those kids. I didn’t know them personally, but I know who the Walters boys are. They go to my high school. I read about the fire this morning in the paper before I found Dan. He was supposed to be up early to catch his flight so I finally went in …” Mrs. Thomas broke off, her voice quivering. She took a deep breath and then asked, “Do you know the condition of the child that lived?”

“No. While you were sleeping I took a casserole over to the Myer’s place. Evelyn Myer was the one who died. I was going to go over to Dwayne Walters’s house later tonight when his family will be back from the hospital, hopefully. I initially heard that they don’t know whether he will live or die. I don’t have any update on his condition.” Sam paused and then, when Mrs. Thomas didn’t say anything, she went on, trying to distract her, “I was reading those websites and thinking about how young the people involved in ‘eco-terrorism’ are. I wonder what makes young people do that?”

Mrs. Thomas looked up and said, “I’m sure it’s a variety of reasons like anything else but I bet they have found something to feel passionate about, that gives their lives meaning and they’re still too young to know that passionate outbursts can have life long consequences. They think they’re invincible and right and just.”

“You’re so perceptive, Mrs. Thomas. I’m so impressed.” Sam paused for a few beats and then added, “I’m real sorry to leave you but I have some errands to run before I pick up Lindsey. Will you be okay here alone? I’ve got books in the study or there are movies in the family room.”

“I’ll be fine and I can watch Lindsey tonight if you need to go over to the Walters’s house later.”

“Thanks, Mrs. Thomas.” Sam quickly threw her dishes in the sink and grabbed her purse. Her initial search on the Internet had peaked Sam’s curiosity so she wanted to do some additional research at the local library, Kings Park. The drive there was short, about five minutes, ten if she hit the light at Braddock Road. She pulled in the parking lot and checked her watch. She figured she had about an hour and a half before she needed to go get Lindsey.