Doc: The Rape of the Town of Lovell (51 page)

Three minutes into the questioning, Aarestad sharply changed direction and asked if Story understood the charges against him. "Yes," he said, "I understand them."

"In order to get them all out of the way once and for all, did you or did you not commit any of those acts?"

"Those rapes? No. Totally not."

Q Do you recall your wife's testimony yesterday morning relative to the quality of your marriage?

A Yes, I do.

Q Would you explain to the jury, please, your characterization of your marital relationship with your wife?

A Well, I think it is excellent. I am content to live with her my lifetime. She has satisfied me completely. . . .

Q Do you love her?

A Yes, I love my wife.

Q Very much?

A Ultimately. Extremely.

Still smiling pleasantly, he explained why he'd bought the Ritter table twenty-three years before. "I wanted an ear, nose and throat table, proctology table, and it is good for all those purposes."

Q . . . This table does not enhance your ability to perform a pelvic exam?

A No, it doesn't.

Q And can you approximate for the jury what percentage of your practice involves what would generally be considered obstetrics and gynecology work?

A In the past I would say maybe twenty-five, thirty percent. . . .

Q How many pelvic exams, Dr. Story, do you believe that you have performed over the years?

A I'd say thousands.

Q Do you have a normal routine procedure that you follow when you perform a pelvic exam?

A Yes.

For a half hour Story declaimed in medical terms—why pelvic examinations were needed, the positioning and draping of the patient, the use of the instruments, the two phases of the exam, the positioning of his own body and the movements of his hands and fingers. Aarestad asked how long a typical exam would take:

A Oh, five to ten minutes. Five to eight minutes.

Q Do you think you could do it in a total of one or two minutes?

A I could do a two-minute exam which would be different. It would be compromised. Q It would not be a thorough exam? A Right.

Story told about a survey that he'd conducted early in his career about the use of a third party in the examining room. "My first secretary asked the patients as they came in what they wanted . . . and it went on for a number of weeks. . . ."

Q And was it their collective opinion they did not want a third person in there?

A It was each individual. Every individual wanted to be alone. Q Has anybody ever requested, over the years, to have a third person in there, as you recall? A Not to me or my nurses that I know of. Q ... And isn't it true that you had some patients come to you specifically because you did not have a nurse in there? A That was the word I received once in a while.

After the morning recess at ten thirty, Aarestad asked if there would be a reason for a patient to place her own hand in the genital area. Yes, Story said, to feel the string of an IUD or to point out a sore place.

Q And would it be possible for them to come in contact with your hand or feel your hand at that time? A Yes, that happens.

Q ... Would you have occasion to move around to either side of the patient with a glove still in your hand?

Q I frequently want to feel something from the abdomen and I move around to the side to do that, rather than reach up between their legs. . . .

One by one Story refuted specific points in the complainants' testimony, using his memory and office records. He said he'd been wearing a lab coat, not a suit, on the date of Hayla Farwell's exam. He hadn't administered a pelvic to Terri Lee Timmons on the date in question but two years later, when she'd been approximately eighteen—"a virginal type vaginal-rectal exam."

Q ... Could you explain that please?

A Index finger in the vagina and the long finger in the rectum.

Q Why do you perform that type of pelvic exam?

A Less pain. The other type exam might be impossible for somebody who needs a rectal-vaginal.

Q ... And you are certain as you sit here today that you did not perform a pelvic exam on April 17, 1968?

A No, I did not.

Emma Briseno McNeil had been hospitalized three months before her pelvic exam on April 18, 1977, Story testified, for "acute abdominal pain, painful infection . . . venereal infection."

Q Now do you recall the testimony of Emma McNeil to the effect that you had paper towels in your room?

A Yes, I remember that.

Q And do you have or have you ever had paper towels in your examination room?

A No, I don't. I use cloth towels in there.

i

Story denied administering a pelvic to Emma Lu Meeks on Oct. 3, 1977, as she testified. He said she'd reported a mole on her left breast that day. No reference to a pelvic exam appeared on the yellowing chart.

Another chart showed that Aletha Durtsche had complained of pain in her head, ears, neck and back, a "minimal cough, sweat." No pelvic was shown on her birthday.

Wanda Hammond's records showed that she'd come in for insertion of an IUD, a sterile procedure which would have required the presence of a nurse.

Annella St. Thomas had testified that he'd performed only one pelvic exam on her, but office records showed that "over the three previous visits she had had a pelvic exam and they were over the course of several years."

The direct examination ended on the subject of mental health:

"DOC"

Q Dr. Story, have you ever been hospitalized for any mental or emotional problems? A No, I have not.

Q Have you ever received any counseling of any kind for any mental or emotional problems? A No, I have not. Q In your opinion, do you have any? A No, I don't believe so.

79

TERRILL THARP

As he assembled his notes for the cross-examination, the young prosecutor was worried that his case was slipping away. The jury seemed impressed by the slippery little doctor's command of medical jargon and technicalities. That was an advantage every physician had: instant respect, automatic believability. For himself, Tharp had regarded the performance as an attempt to obscure the issues. Story's testimony was like the first few snorts of a pumping jack when it went on-line in the oil fields: mostly noise.

He often found himself wishing that criminal trials could be scored like prizefights. At times he thought he was well ahead and at times he wished he'd never left the farm. Juries were so hard to read, especially this one. He'd wanted a jury of stable married men —they despised sex freaks and tended to be more protective of women than women were of themselves—but just about every husband in Big Horn County had been out calving or lambing or otherwise preoccupied.

So far, the only indication of this predominantly feminine jury's leanings had come when Story's faithful nurse Judy Gilford testified that in her heart she knew what went on in the examining room. The juror at the far end of the first row had shaped her lips into an exasperated "Oh, God damn!"

But what about the others?

Tharp still wondered if he'd weakened his witness list too much by dropping the McArthurs. Aletha Durtsche seemed strong till Aarestad tore into her on cross-examination. Dear old Emma Lu helped the state make a comeback, and so did Terri Timmons and Mae Fischer, but Emma McNeil's testimony proved weak. Several jurors had winced at Story's claim that she'd had a "venereal infection." Tharp was sure that the remark was hog-slop, as believable as earlier Story claims about "incest" in the Durtsche family. But did the jury know?

The doctor was a master slanderer—there was no doubt about that. With the aid of dubious medical records, he'd portrayed Wanda Hammond and Annella St. Thomas as liars. The Hammond chart showed insertion of an I.U.D., but Wanda swore up and down that she'd never even considered having one inserted. The St. Thomas chart showed post-rape visits on dates when Annella had been living in another state. Tharp wondered about the origins of the two charts; they hadn't shown up in the arrest-night sweep of Story's office. To the young prosecutor, the surprise exhibits seemed blatantly doctored. He thought he knew which doctor had done the job.

Tharp studied his notes till Story was sworn, then quickly forced him to admit that even by his own testimony he'd been alone with seven of the nine complainants and could have assaulted them "if you were so inclined." Then he turned to the subject of the bogus charts:

Q Where were those charts the night your office was searched?

A The safeguarding of the charts is not—that's delegated to other people. I have no idea.

Q You have no idea where they were?

A In the office. That's all I know. Someplace in the office.

Having sown some doubt, Tharp set about characterizing the "Lovell Medical Building" as a one-man pelvic mill:

Q Will you find Hayla Farwell's chart there, please? . . . What is the first pelvic examination you ever gave her?

A I believe it is June of 1967.

Q The
first
pelvic examination, Doctor?

A Maybe I should take your chart apart.

Q Take a look at December, 1962. . . . When is the first pelvic shown?

A December 5, 1962.

Q ... When is the next pelvic shown?

A Her next office visit. The seventeenth, I guess that is.

Q Then the next pelvic?

A Let's see. The next one is on February 20.

Q 1963?

A Yes.

Q Did you give her a pelvic on April 25, 1963?

A Yes. April 25.

Q Did you give her another pelvic May 4, 1963?

M
r.
A
arestad
I
think
I
am going to object to this as irrelevant.

T
he
C
ourt
What is the relevancy here, Counsel?

A Well, I want to ask him if he knows how many pelvics he gave her.

T
he
C
ourt
All right. Overruled.

Q
(By
M
r.
T
harp
) Between
1962
and
1967,
your last pelvic, how many pelvics did you give her? Any idea?

A I would have to count them up.

Q More than twenty-five be accurate? . . .

T
he
W
itness
I
think twenty-nine is what
I
count,
I
believe.

The cross-examination slogged along as Story flipped slowly through his charts. He admitted that Julia Bradbury had had twelve or fifteen pelvic exams, Aletha Durtsche at least nineteen, Mae Fischer eleven. On the days specifically in question, the records showed that Aletha had complained of a cold, Emma Lu of a mole, others of various nongenital disorders. Tharp turned to the subject of Emma Briseno McNeil and her "venereal infection":

Q Now you stated that Mrs. McNeil had—what condition was it you described? . . . Pelvic inflammatory disease?

A I didn't put it on the chart. I protected her by not putting it on the chart.

Q Did you report this?

A If I can say one more—

Q No. Did you report this? Did you report the disease?