Authors: Ken Englade
Beyond Reason (21 page)
Chuck Reid. (Bill Hoy)
Jim Updike. (Bill Hoy)
The Haysom brothers listen to first-day testimony in Elizabeth’s sentencing hearing. Front row, left to right: Richard Haysom, Howard Haysom. Seated behind them, Veryan Haysom. (Dan Doughtie,
RoanokeTimes
&
World News)
RoanokeTimes
&
World News)
Elizabeth Walton, an old friend of the Haysoms, who testified on Elizabeth’s behalf at the sentencing hearing. (Bill Hoy)
Updike presents Elizabeth with one of her diary entries during their battle of wits at the sentencing hearing. (Lynn Hey)
Judge William Sweeney sentenced Elizabeth to two consecutive forty-five year prison terms for her role in her parents’ murder. (Bill Hoy)
Actually, Gardner and Reid had pretty well deduced the basic outline months before, but for Beever and Wright she began filling in the details. Some of them anyway.
She and Jens had gone to Washington, she said, just as she had told the Bedford investigators. But they didn’t get lost, and they didn’t spend all their time together in movie theaters. They arrived on Friday night, March 29, 1985, and checked into the Marriott Hotel, where she had made reservations. The next morning, Saturday, she and Jens went shopping for a birthday present for Jens’s younger brother. Jens wanted to give him a knife, she said, a specific kind of knife that could be purchased only in a martial arts store. It was called a butterfly knife.
They went to a store in Washington, where they were told that District law prohibited the sale of butterfly knives. But the clerk was helpful, and he recommended a store in nearby Maryland. So they drove over there. They quickly found the kind of knife they were looking for, Elizabeth said, and, since she was carrying the cash, she paid for it.
By then, it was lunchtime, so they went to eat. Over lunch, she said, Jens told her he wanted to get together with some friends of his from Atlanta who were coming to Washington for a basketball game. This surprised her, she explained to Beever, because they had driven from Charlottesville specifically so they could have some time to themselves. Without putting up much of an argument, she agreed and told him to take the car. While he was gone, she would pass the time by going to a movie.
They left the restaurant, she said, and Jens dropped her at
the cinema. On the way, he told her that if he wasn’t back by the time she got out of the movie to go back to the hotel and order meals for both of them from room service. If he still wasn’t back, she should go see the midnight showing of
The Rocky Horror Picture Show,
and he would pick her up there afterward. As she got out of the car and walked toward the ticket booth, he called after her: “Get
two
tickets,” he said. She wondered why he had said that, but she got them anyway. She went inside, pocketing the extra ticket.
the cinema. On the way, he told her that if he wasn’t back by the time she got out of the movie to go back to the hotel and order meals for both of them from room service. If he still wasn’t back, she should go see the midnight showing of
The Rocky Horror Picture Show,
and he would pick her up there afterward. As she got out of the car and walked toward the ticket booth, he called after her: “Get
two
tickets,” he said. She wondered why he had said that, but she got them anyway. She went inside, pocketing the extra ticket.
When she got out of the movie, she stood on the sidewalk hoping that Jens was waiting for her or that he might return. After a few minutes she gave up and got in line for a second movie. The name of it, she brightly told Beever, was
Witness.
She bought two tickets for that movie as well.
Witness.
She bought two tickets for that movie as well.
“Why did you do that?” Beever interrupted.
“I just went and did it,” she said, shrugging. “I was in a fluster. I half thought Jens was going to come up, to tell you the truth.”
“There is one small point,” Beever added. “He didn’t know you were going to see
Witness
, did he?”
Witness
, did he?”
“No,” she agreed.
Beever motioned for her to continue.
After she saw the second movie, Jens still had not returned, so, Elizabeth said, she walked back to the hotel. She took a shower, changed clothes, and ordered two meals and a bottle of liquor from room service. While waiting for Jens to return, she sampled freely from the bottle and picked at the food. By 11:30, when he still was not back, she left the hotel and took a taxi to the Georgetown cinema where
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
was playing continuously.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show
was playing continuously.
Afterward, she stood at the curb waiting for Jens, certain he would appear at any minute. Just when she was about to give up and return to the hotel, he drove up. The problem was, he was traveling against the traffic. Thankfully, the street was all but empty.
“I shouted at him, ‘You’re on the wrong side of the road,’” she said, but by then he had stopped beside her and she was reaching for the handle. When she opened the door,
the car’s overhead light went on, and she saw that Jens had a sheet draped across his waist. It was covered in blood.
the car’s overhead light went on, and she saw that Jens had a sheet draped across his waist. It was covered in blood.
Elizabeth got excited in the telling. “I screamed at him, ‘Are you all right? Are you okay? What happened?’”
By way of an answer, he gave her a wild look and yelled, “Shut up!” Then he yelled twice more: “Shut up! Shut up!”
“I shut up,” she said.
She got in the car, closed the door, and they drove in silence to the hotel. When they got to the parking garage, he halted out of the light and ordered her to walk to the window and get a ticket so they could drive through the gate without him having to stop. He drove through the barricade quickly, then waited for her on the other side. She got back in the car, and Jens drove to a particularly dark area of the garage and pulled into a parking slot.
Beever and Wright were following her story intently, the coffee forgotten and growing cold on the desk. Except for that one time, they had not interrupted her.
Jens turned off the ignition, Elizabeth said, and swiveled to face her. “He told me, ‘I killed your parents.’”
Before she could respond, he ordered her out of the car. Go to the room, he commanded, and fetch a change of clothes. Instead, Elizabeth slipped out of the raincoat she had been wearing and offered it to Jens. It was long enough to cover him from his shoulders to his knees. Together, they walked through the garage and took an elevator to their floor.
At that point Beever interrupted her again.
“Did you believe him?” he asked, meaning did she believe that he had indeed killed her parents.
Elizabeth pondered the question. “There was blood everywhere,” she said, swallowing a lump in her throat. “I had never seen so much blood. I didn’t know what was going on.” Shaking her head, she added, “I didn’t know whether I believed him or not.”
She paused, remembering. Some of the blood was his, she added, telling the detectives that Jens had suffered cuts on his left hand. As well as she could remember, they were on
his thumb and little finger. In the room, without further explanation, Jens stripped and climbed into the shower, calling out instructions to her as he lathered up. Go down and clean up the car, he told her.
his thumb and little finger. In the room, without further explanation, Jens stripped and climbed into the shower, calling out instructions to her as he lathered up. Go down and clean up the car, he told her.
She did. When she came back upstairs, he was asleep.
“DID HE TELL YOU WHAT HAPPENED AT LOOSE CHIPPINGS?” Beever asked.
“He said a few things. He said things like ‘My God, your father put up a hell of a struggle.’ And he said something about seeing just masses of blood.”
“What did you think of him then?”
“I was terrified.”
“Terrified of him?”
“I think it crossed my mind that he might roll over and kill me, too.”
With Beever questioning her closely about the details, Elizabeth finished her tale. She said the next morning they gathered up his bloody clothing and stuffed it in a bag to be disposed of later. Most of it was dropped down the garbage chute in their dorm when they got back to UVA. She said she never again saw the knife that she had paid for that morning, but Jens had told her that he had thrown it away.
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