Yo-Yo

It was a really hot and humid day in Southeast Texas, but the yard had to be mowed. My normal yardman only worked for me on a part time basis. He was there working, but I decided to help out with the mowing. If he could clean the flowerbeds and push mow, then I would use the riding mower and mow the back of the property then we’d be done faster. Zeno was all enthused about that idea.

Zeno had always said he had never seen a woman work as much and as hard as I did, except for his little wife, Toni. He sure did brag about her, which was a good thing. And, from time to time, when we worked together in the yard he would tell me about his kids. He called his youngest child, Angel. Even though she had been born with birth defects, Zeno would say that she was really smart and something to be really proud of. His daughter, Yvette, was a good girl and acted like another mama to the baby. Zeno said his boy, Nathan, was a typical teenager and tried to get away by the short way and sometimes did not do a good job. He said he had tried to instill in his kids the desire to do things the right way.

Today, Yvette is a mama with a bouncing little boy. Nathan is now a Drill Sergeant in the Marine Corp. He is a big man - a very nice looking man. His Angel, is now dancing with the angels in Heaven.

Back when we were working together, this was one of our days to work side by side. We had spent a cooling off period under the shade tree after we had completed the front yard.

“Well, I guess I’ll get after the back yard and you can finish raking the front, if you don’t mind.” I said to Zeno.

“No problem. Don’t you stay out there though and get too hot.” Zeno was always worried that I was going to have a heat stroke or heart attack on him.

I had probably completed the second lap around the back yard, which is about a fourth of a city block, when I happened to look up and see some older man dressed in all white on the porch across the street. Every once in a while he would dab his face with what looked like a white washrag.

“That’s not such a bad idea,” I thought to myself. “Next time I go into the house, I’m going to get me and Zeno a cold rag to dab our faces with.”

At first I thought him to be Chris’ husband. Chris was a wonderful neighbor who took especially good care of her children. When those babies walked out of the house, you’d think they were going to Church she had them dressed to the nines! But, then I noticed that the car was gone and that no one seemed to be at home. The more attention I paid to the man on the porch, the more I came to realize that this man wasn’t Chris’ husband. He was a mystery man to me. Then…I got a REAL shock!

Mystery Man would appear to motion for me to come over across the street to the house. Then he would remove the white washrag and hold it in front of his crotch. When I would mow facing him, he would remove the rag and start stroking his “little john boy”. Now, being reared among a bunch of boys all my life, that wasn’t a real surprise that he might have an itch that needed scratching – but when it continued I knew that this man was sick in the head.

On about the second lap around the yard, I started looking to see if my shirt was buttoned properly or my pants undone. I thought if there were anything array, it might cause this yo-yo to think that I would come his way. Nope, everything seemed to be in order. In fact, I determined that I looked so hideous that I couldn’t understand what the heck his reasoning was for trying to get my attention. Surely the man didn’t find some sweaty, hobo-looking working girl wearing totally mismatched tee shirt, shorts that well covered the subject, all of the necessary undergarments, with my long hair pulled up under a baseball cap, no makeup, sneakers with holes in the soles and toes of both of them – attractive enough to want to play with him!

I stopped the mower and looked around it, appearing to check for something wrong. I left it running and walked up front to find Zeno. Now, Zeno was my buddy, but I didn’t exactly know how to tell him what was going on without embarrassing us both in the process.

“Zeno, would you go look through the window of the old stable, watch me mow, and when I get to the other side and head south on Pennsylvania, watch the ‘ole boy across the street on the porch of the white house with red trim. Then you tell me if you see what I think that I see.”

“Why, Lin, what is he doing?” Zeno asked.

“Zeno, you ain’t gonna believe this one! Just look and tell me what you see.”

I got back on the mower and headed around that way. I didn’t want to look at him, because if anything was to come of this, I did not want him to say I had encouraged him in any way, shape, form or fashion. So, I kept my head downward and looked at the ground. Every now and then I would peak out from under the baseball cap that I was wearing to check on Mystery Man. Sure enough, there he would go again …. “just a strokin’.”

The second time around, Zeno walked out and bent down as if to examine the mower. “Yep, Lin, he’s getting it on.” He said.

“Well what should we do?”

“I don’t know” Zeno said.

“Ok here’s what we are gonna do. You go inside the house and call the law, then call Jerry Edward. Jerry can at least observe while the police are on their way. Then you get the camera – we just put the zoom lens on and you start taking pictures of this pervert. If it is attention he wants, it’s attention he’ll get. In the meantime, I’ll just keep my eyes down and hope the law comes quick.”

Jerry Edward is my cousin that lived next door. I was sure hoping that he would be home because I knew he would have a ring-side seat to all of this. And, luckily not only was Jerry Edward there, but he had a friend over as well and Pam, his wife drove up in the midst of all this and witnessed it all. All three served as witnesses.

I knew that with every round I made on the mower, that Jerry Edward, Pam and his friend were probably laughing their buns off at the sight and what all was going on across the street. Who would have thought?

My patience was wearing thin and I was beginning to think that not only would the officers not arrive in a timely fashion, but that the yo-yo would get tired of the charade and leave.

Finally – the law arrived.

“Sir, can you come to the fence?” I heard the female officer ask him. She was young and slim. I figured she had small children and probably a lot of patience and was going to let him walk.

“Do you live here?” She asked.

“Sho do” he said.

“He’s a liar” I hollered at the officers.

She walked over and asked me what had taken place. Jerry Edward, his friend Jerry, and Pam and I all gathered around and explained the last forty five minutes of my life. Before the officer walked back across the street to where yo-yo was standing, I suggested that she ask him to unlock the house door. It was logical that if he lived there, he would certainly have a key to the locked door. I knew Chris had reasons not to trust many of her own family members and I also knew that none of them would have a key to her house.

The officer took me up on the idea and asked him to open the door. As I suspected, he couldn’t open the door! Yo-Yo turned around and said, “That white bitch is just trying to get me in trouble. She’s been trying to get rid of the niggers in this neighborhood. She be prejudiced!”

“You got part of that right Homeboy!” I shouted. “I’m sure trying to get rid of the trash – and I don’t care what color they are! They come in all nationalities and I ain’t prejudiced,” I shouted again.

“LinMarie, be quiet. He’s going to come over here and jump all over you,” Pam said. I think of Pam as the peacemaker. She tries to see good in everyone and sometimes that just agitated me! Now was one of those times. How could she see good in this yo-yo after what she had just witnessed?

“Oh, well, the law is here. Let them take care of it.” I thought.

Officer Monday showed up about that time and I realized that the younger officer had called a Sergeant in for a conference. She wasn’t sure what to arrest the deviate on, but at least, she was trying to come up with a charge that would stick.

Officer Monday made his way over to talk to us. “LinMarie, I don’t know if we can keep him or not. We didn’t see him actually doing anything like you all have described.” Zeno walked up about that time and said, “Well, Officer, you might not have seen it, but its right here on film if you want to see it!”

“Hold on then, that changes the scenario!” Officer Monday said over his shoulder as he walked back across the street. Immediately the four officers who were now on the scene went into a conference. They must have agreed that they had a case against yo-yo because the young lady officer asked yo-yo to turn around and put his hands behind his back. When he did, she slapped the handcuffs on him so fast and escorted him to her waiting patrol car. She rolled the window down so that air could get into the back where he was. When the officers’ backs were turned, he would mouth trash my way.

Finally I got fed up and hollered, “Look Homeboy, I’ve always been told that black men were hung, you must’ve got short changed because my son had more than that when he was born!” Yo-yo went radical. I had insulted his manhood!

Officer Monday ask if we could all give statements. “Sure” we all said simultaneously. The timing was perfect on each statement and we had set up their case for them and even got congratulated over the photo aspect of it all. Without the photos, they would have let yo-yo go.

Chris came home about the time the officers started to leave. She told the officers that he was her brother and no, he did not live there. No one had a key to her house except her. I figured when she walked across the street that she would be ready to give me a tongue-lashing. Instead, she hugged our necks and told us to do what we had to do. “Brother or no brother, he won’t do that around my babies and I don’t want him doing it to you, my friends,” she said. That was the Chris we all knew and loved – our good neighbor!

A few months later we were all subpoenaed to appear at a Parole Revocation Hearing. Every one of us showed up. So did all the law who were there that day. I had gotten there a little early at the request of the Parole Officer. I noticed a lady sitting in the hallway next to me. We soon struck up a conversation.

“What are you here for?” I asked curiously.

“My fiancé’ is being tried today.”

“What’s his name?”

When she told me, I could have fallen out of my chair! Here sat this beautiful lady dressed fit to kill. She was the epitome of “having it all together” and she was engaged to YO-YO!

Talk about opposites attracting!

I told her who I was and that I was sorry for her sake to have to continue with the charges. She told me that Yo-Yo had rejected his right to a jury trial and would just go before the parole board alone. She said she did not understand what had caused him to do what he had done. She had a good home where he lived and he had a good mother and good children who loved and cared for him. She began to cry. I could see that she was really hurt.

I hugged her neck and said a little prayer of my own. “God give me the courage to face the outcome of this man’s trial. His life is in the hands of the officers of this court. Give this precious lady the strength to go on without him and perhaps realize that she is worth much more than this and deserves the best in life.”

We were all called into the conference room where we were sworn in. We were told not to discuss the case among ourselves in the hallway. Yo-yo was there. He saw there were 9 witnesses about to testify against him. There were photos that showed what he was doing.

In the hallway, Pam and I chit-chatted about plants and landscaping. The lady sat alone, no other family members were there for Yo-yo.

The door opened, the leading officer appeared, “Ladies and gentlemen, I want to thank you for your appearance. The gentleman has chosen to plead guilty. It will not be necessary for you to appear before this court. You are dismissed.”

We had all gotten dressed up in our finery, had experienced the nervousness of having to testify in court, just to be told to go on home. As we began to turn to go down the hall, I started to turn back to the man’s fiancé’. “No,” I thought, “she still needs time to deal with this on her own.”

That night I sat outside as I do a lot in the evenings. I kept trying to understand why things and people are the way they are. If I could figure that out, I’m sure I could be rich. I guess that it takes all kinds of people to make the world go around but people like Yo-yo need some special help. Maybe back in prison he would get that help. Yo-yo is serving the last of his eighteen years without the mention of parole.

I have often wondered about the woman he would have married. I wondered if she had been able to get on with her life. It has been years now since this took place – it was even prior to becoming a Private Investigator. For her sake, I trust and hope that life has been good to her and that she found someone special to share her life with. Life is for living, not just existing. If God shuts a door, he opens a window – and a window to peer out of may be all that Yo-yo has for a long time.

Johnnie

Since the back of my yard was basically an open field when I first bought my place, people around here had taken to liking to cutting through my lot when they pleased – making a nice – “cow path” as my grandmother would call it. A lot of heated words were said when I stopped them from trespassing. Now, some folks said I was being too picky and some just said was “bad”.

I didn’t really care which one they thought of me – I just knew it was my property and one day I had dreams of landscaping it and making it all into a nicer place that I could enjoy. As long as folks continued to make their daily trek across it to the dope house or to catch up with a “date” it would continue to look like a cattle path out in someone’s pasture.

Johnnie didn’t just cut across the pasture. After she would visit with her friend, Byrd, who lived next door, she would just ump my fence, walk across my back yard and go to wherever she chose. I had run her off at least a dozen times and it still didn’t seem to stop her. She would be so high on crack that she didn’t care. How do you deal with someone who isn’t even with you? You don’t very well.

One day, in particular, she must have been really high, because she walked right into the back door of my office. Let me explain something. Out the back door of my house about twenty feet, is the back door of my office. This layout has plusses and minuses.

I had been working that day on a wedding dress that I was trying to get done for a lady to pick up.

I didn’t hear the back door open. My back was to the door. All of a sudden, I could simply feel the presence of someone in the room. Johnnie was standing there asking me “What are you doing in my house?” I turned and around – there she was – with a knife in her hand.

Now if you have never been faced with a drug addict holding a knife pointing it at you, you have never experience the fastest adrenaline rush you could ever have.

“What do you mean your house? What are you smoking?” I asked calmly – very calmly.

“F… you get out of my house.” She was shaking the knife as she was telling me to get out.

I had a phone right behind me, but there was no way I could get to it. I just knew that I had to get that knife away from her and subdue this girl somehow.

As if talking to someone over her shoulder, I said, “Hey how are you doing?” As she turned around to see who I was talking to I lunged toward her, knocking her back against the wall with my body. My hands were trying to get the knife out of her hands.

Evidently her head banging on the wall knocked some sense into her, because she took off running out the back door. I got the phone – dialed it – 9-1-1.

“9-1-1 what is your emergency?”

“I had an intruder at 495….She had a knife that I took away from her. I believe she is still in the neighborhood.”

“Is the subject still there?”

“No, and while you are asking all these damned questions, she’s getting away.”

“Ma’am we are trying to help you. Please calm down. What was she wearing?”

“Blue jeans, red shirt and pink tennis shoes.”

“White female?”

“No, black female.”

“Do you know her?”

“No not personally. But her name is Johnnie – her street name that is.”

“Ok Ma’am we’ll get an officer out there as soon as we can.”

Some thirty minutes later an officer arrived. That poor boy in blue got a real good tongue lashing from me – I was still shaking from the idea of that girl having a knife on me in my house!

“I guess you were on a coffee break and couldn’t be disturbed? What took so long? I could have been dead by now.”

“Ma’am I was on another call. I got here as soon as I could.”

I really didn’t care at that time where he had been nor who else had a problem. I don’t think I was so much angry at him as I was angry that I had been caught off guard and let the women in my office I knew better than to leave a door unlocked. And, during the time, I sat there waiting for the officer to arrive, I was reliving the ordeal and came to realize just how close I had come to saying, “This is the big one Elizabeth” like Fred Sanford on Sanford and Sons.

After I told the officer what had happened he said, “Well ma’am there isn’t anything we can do because we didn’t see her here nor did we find her here. It is your word against her word!”

At that point – I hit my boiling point!

“So, what you are telling me is that anyone can come on my property, without my permission and not be caught by your people and there ain’t anything I can do about it?”

“Basically that’s right, Ma’am.”

“That’s some bullshit! You get me your boss. That ain’t right. That ain’t right at all!”

“I am a Sergeant.”

“I don’t care if you are the Pope, I want your boss or I am heading to IAD (Internal Affairs Division).

He walked away as if to leave and I heard him calling his commanding officer to come out to the house. It wasn’t long, til my wish was granted. I got me a commanding officer. And, it happened to be someone I knew.

“LinMarie, just calm down. The law is the law.”

“Well the law stinks.”

“Maybe but it is the law. I would advise you to get you a pistol, learn to shoot it and protect yourself. Just remember we cannot be everywhere all the time. If you have a complaint of how long it takes an officer to get here, take it up with City Hall. Tell them that we need more officers.”

That wasn’t the only incident I had with Johnnie – there were two more.

Pat with City Glass was over installing solar screens on all my windows. He had his oldest daughter with him at the time. She was “helping her dad”.

Johnnie slammed the back door to Bird’s house – I said, “Watch her Pat; she’s gonna come right across that fence and shoot me the finger.”

I wasn’t wrong – she bounced about half-way over the fence and got her “Lucy” hung – she ripped herself to kingdom come! Of all the times that girl had jumped the fence and never had a nick of any kind – this time – she ripped her “girl parts”. Blood was everywhere. I mean everywhere.

“You want me to call the ambulance?” I asked a screaming cussing Johnnie.

“No, but it hurts so bad.”

“Well don’t look like you are going to be fooling around any time soon.”

“Screw you!”

“No thanks”

Pat’s daughter was now glued to her dad’s leg. Pat has laughed, even years later and said “that traumatized my daughter and she remembers that to this day!

How Johnnie got fixed up – I won’t know – that was one chick that would never be tamed.

My final experience with Johnnie was one night I was enjoying a glass of iced tea on the back yard when I heard a loud ear-splitting wail. I could make out Stephanie’s (the neighbor next to Bird) voice screaming to me for help. I jumped the fence and asked what was wrong – I thought something was wrong with Stephanie, since she was in a wheel chair.

“It’s Bird! It’s Bird!” Johnnie was screaming “He’s dead!”

“Move,” I said with authority although my heart had begun to pound. “Let me see.” There lay Bird on his back with blood coming out of his mouth. Officers began to arrive while I was attempting to find a pulse and a heartbeat it seemed that he had died immediately.

Johnnie kept getting in the way – wanting so badly to help.

“LinMarie, get her out of her” an officer demanded. “She’s in the way.”

“Come on Johnnie; just let them do their job.” I said. “You are not going to help Bird by carrying on this way!”

“F… you! I ain’t going nowhere,” Johnnie continued to cry and scream.

Poor Stephanie was all upset and shaken. Stephanie had crippling arthritis and was in a wheelchair. I knew we had to get Johnnie out of there to keep from upsetting Stephanie more.

“LinMarie shut her up and get her out of here NOW PLEASE,” implored one of my friends on the police force.

“I’m trying,” I answered.

“Not hard enough” he snapped back.

The struggle began for real about then. She was street tough to being with and being on drugs had her adrenaline up. Johnnie was tough anyway – and any way you looked at it – my buddy was admonishing me to control her! “Not so darn easy,” I kept thinking as I gave it my best effort.

After thirty minutes of this tug of war with me shouting at her to calm down and then alternating a controlled voice to say, please calm down and be quiet,” the officer had had enough. He came over and said “SHUT YOUR MOUTH NOW and get over by my car.”

“Which one is it?” Johnnie asked as calm as could be.

“The one that spells P-O-L-I-C-E on the side.”

“Okay” and off she went – ever so meekly.

I wanted to laugh so loud and so badly. The officer was so stern and business like. Johnnie was so totally out of it. And, yet, she did exactly what he said like a school child would obey the principal. If it hadn’t all been so serious, it would have been a great comedy script. But a man we all knew and liked, lay dead on the floor.

That was about the last adventure I had with Johnnie. Though a few short months later I saw her, haggled, weary, ill. I was told she had aides, couldn’t afford any medication and was dying.

Bird had tried to help her, but he was only a stepping-stone when she needed something firm to put her foot on for the moment. The truth was Johnnie wasn’t ready to get off the crack and until she was, nothing nor anyone would have been ever to have helped her.

I heard she died within six months of Bird. She was a wild thing with a mouth that could out cuss a sailor. I hope, somehow in her last days on earth that she was able to find the peace that she wanted – or that she was yearning for – or whatever it was in life that she wanted. I don’t believe she ever found that search here on earth – so maybe – just maybe – she found it in death.

Sherry Kay

Sherry Kay

"I'm innocent!" she said when she arrived at my house that Sunday afternoon. This was the first time I'd seen my cousin in many many years - at least twenty years. She looked good, trim, fit, tanned. She had her boyfriend, who I will call Brad, with her.

"Well, what does the law have on you if you are out on bond?" I asked.

"Well I did shoot him." she said, smiling over at her tall, lanky blond haired boyfriend with a smile.

"I need a place to stay, I want to move out of the Houston area and he's getting a job over here" she said.

I wasn't going to let anyone move into my house with me. For some reason I didn't trust her. I knew she was spoiled and got whatever she wanted to her entire life. I knew she had given her folks a lot of grief. I knew the family members who knew her best weren't supporting her at all during this time. I didn't know who had posted bond money for her. "Well, I can rent you the house in the back until you go to trial."

"Great, it'll be me, my daughter and my boyfriend."

"Ok but I don't want any parties, no drinking, and no loud noise."

"No problem" she said. They began moving in the next weekend.

It wasn't long into their first little while here that the cursing woke me in the middle of the night. It was loud. She was calling the boyfriend everything but a white boy. That's their problem, I figured.

The next day she left me a note that the toilet needed fixing. They were out and about, so I went in to examine whether it was something I could fix or something I needed to call a plumber for. It was clogged with food and LOTS of toilet paper. I had to call the plumber this was more than I could handle.

I was dumbfounded when I walked into the little house. Food left on plates with flies and magets, beer bottles everywhere, a pistol on the night stand, pills - bottles of pills were everywhere. I knew this was a violation of her bond.

I had already fought to clean up the neighborhood, and here, I'd brought the rift-raft back into it. We had regular "chats" out the back door about my expectations of her living there. During one of my absences from my home, Sherry Kay broke into my home - with a key she had found, and stole many family heirlooms (which she had never been a part of during her upbringing and I never got back), VCR , clothes, dishes, pots, pans, anything that she thought she wanted and damages to my flooring - she'd poured some sort of acid all over the hardwood floors.

I reported her to the police - had to if I was going to get an insurance claim on anything - who then reported it on to the Harris County District Attorney's office. During this absence of mine, she also moved out - leaving 3 full truck loads of garbage and debris - mainly beer bottles, left over food and pure trash -along with some empty pill bottles and used condoms to be hauled off by me and my crew.

They moved to the West side of Beaumont - substantially white population at the time - because "we didn't like all them niggers walking the streets around us." Most of those black people had become my friends and were very protective of me. I would defend them under any circumstances if they were in the right.

About a month prior to her trial, I received a phone call from the Assistant District Attorney who was handling her trial. "You are going to be getting a summons to appear in court at her trial."

"I don't want a summons. She is related, and even though I'm pretty steamed at her, I don't want to testify."

He asked me what all had happened once Sherry Kay came back into my life. I started from the beginning - the house, the admission of guilt, the boyfriend, the thefts, the destruction, the booze, the gun, the pills.... everything that he already knew based on the report from the police department in Beaumont who'd already seen the damages and the trash, etc from the little house.

Sherry's trial came quickly after the call - I had fretted and worried for several weeks. I'm sure she was also.

"Do you solemnly swear....?"

"Yes" I stated.

I was certified as an expert in Domestic violence, having had worked with the victims assistant center, spoken on television, radio, and working with the domestic violence center, psychology and social work background in college and having been a survivor of domestic violence myself.

Never had Sherry Kay said she was abused, at least not to me, by her husband that she had killed. There were no bruises on her at the time of her arrest. There were no scratches, bite marks, ligature marks, nothing to validate her story of being an abused woman.

The night before I was to testify, she made a phone call to my mother asking her to come to the trial the next day hoping that my mother would prevent me from testifying against her. My mother phoned me after that call - and I told her, "stay out of this. Just stay out of this." Mom didn't come to the trial, but Sherry did admit to me in the hall that she had hoped my mother would've come so that she "would make you not testify."

Good grief! I was in my 40s! And, I had to tell the truth because the district attorney already knew the truth and I surely wasn't going to perjure myself!

My testimony lasted what seemed like forever. I had to look at Sherry Kay and her boyfriend who sat there mouthing at me the entire duration of my testimony. The Judge called the boyfriend down twice - admonishing him for his behavior and I believe he was removed from the courtroom.

Sherry Kay's husband had became a Christian. He was begging her to get off of her drugs, her drinking and stop running around on him. His vehicle was packed. He was leaving. Her meal ticket was about to leave her. She hid his keys - all he wanted was his keys to the vehicle so he could leave. In return, she walked down the hall, came back with a 45 pistol and shot him - dead.

After moving into my house, she was "anxiously waiting for the insurance money" but was "doing okay with the social security benefits from her daughter." And, she told how she wished she had some of that money that she had taken from her mother - before she died. She had drank and partied hard. Still was.

Sherry Kay was convicted of murder. She received twenty years in prison. As she was hauled from the courtroom she turned and said "I will kill you - I will know what prison is all about and I will kill you when I get out." Later that evening at home, I received numerous phone calls - threatening ones - from her boyfriend and others who wouldn't identify themselves.

My husband had me leave town. He sent me away for two weeks, until things felt safe and more calm. I changed my phone number. I put in a security system. I did what I needed to do to protect me.

I could've pressed more charges with the threats she had made. I didn't. I was given paperwork to file with Texas Department of Criminal Justice as a "victim". Each and every time her parole came up - I would write in opposition of her release.

Sherry Kay's older half sister took "S", Sherry Kay's daughter in. Sherry Kay had her on so many medications it wasn't even funny - it took Barbara and a good doctor a while to wean her off of the medications and even the breathing machines. Stability in her diet and sleep schedule also helped. Her grades improved. She blossomed.

Sherry Kay did get released in 1997 with certain conditions - one being of not having anything to do with me, no contact with me personally nor through a third party. She has now broken that stipulation. She has joined facebook and befriended cousins - who never knew her.

Sherry Kay was basically abandoned by her father, a Garsee - a brother to my dad - when he and her mother divorced. Sherry Kay was adopted by Freddy. At another Uncle's funeral, she was introduced to her biological father, a shocker for him. Her mother kept in contact with several aunts/uncles and my parents for years. That was how Sherry was around some of us - but not near as many relatives as we have.

So, she never knew cousins her age - most of us were older who would visit them. Now, after three years out she has found these cousins on Facebook who find her the "victim" and "feel sorry for her" and "want to give her a second chance." Which, if that is their choice, I'm proud for them. However, her disruption of lives continues because when I "unfriended" many from facebook - it was as if "you drew a line in the sand." I didn't speak but to 3 people about my decision and another cousin's decision to befriend her. But, after UNfriending someone - the world knew!

I was accused of dividing the family - because several others "UNfriended her". When she wrote about it - I truly had no idea what she was talking about. I don't have time in my world for the petty. And, I surely wasn't going to allow my personal life to be available to Sherry Kay.

I wish none of them any harm. I hope that Sherry Kay has indeed changed, however at this point, I don't see it. "She just wants to be a part of the family." That is because her sisters and brothers have nothing to do with her - that's called a "clue" in my world. I don't want any part of it. I want the peace that I have in my world. I don't want to have to worry if she were around me. I don't want to mingle with her - and it isn't because I don't want her to have a second chance at life - the threats are too vivid - too engrained in my mind - and I don't want her around me nor knowing my business.

I used to keep up with the Judge in Sherry Kay's case - he had encouraged me to continue the fight against domestic violence. We saw each other on occassion during political rallies or functions. When I wanted to open my own Private Investigations office, I phoned Judge Guerra and asked his opinion about the field of work. He was encouraging as always. At one point in his career, he was up for a Federal Judgeship in Laredo.

Over time, I have learned that family is something you are born into - but the real family of life is who you end up with in the end. For each person I delete from my life who is a negative, God has been gracious to give me many more to replace them - and my new family - has been the biggest asset and joy in my life!

Someone asked me, "why would you post this story?" I am doing it for protection - many who know me, know that I do not scare easily - but I want the world to know what this woman has threatened and what she is capable of - and I pray to God that she never harms another person - whether physically nor materially. This is not done to be vendictive in any manner. I hope you understand.