Everything She Ever Wanted (28 page)

"Your Honor, it seems to me we're going into an awful lot of hearsay.

. . . It's too bad I couldn't have poor .
 
. . Mr. Allanson here to

come and say what he said or didn't say-but I'm sort of in a peculiar

situation .
 
. . Your Honor.
 
. . . If it's all right for him to go

into hearsay of a man resting six feet under, it's all right for me to

go into something the wife said to her also.

Judge Wofford refused to let either lawyer bargain for future

rulings.

He nodded to Garland, who asked the witness what Walter Allanson had

said to her.

Margureitte's tone was dramatic as she recalled her last conversation

with the late victim.
 
"He said, 'I think it will all be over by this

weekend, that Tommy will either be 'ailed or he will be dead,'and I was

terrified."

"Did he say anything in response to your statement that Tommy didn't do

it [the ambush]?
 
.
 
. . Did he say anything about whether it could be

anybody else that could have done it?"

"Your Honor," Weller objected."
 
I think we are leading a little bit.

Garland grinned ruefully."
 
I think we are, Your Honor."

Bill Weller questioned the defendant's mother-in-law.
 
Even on

cross-examination, Margureitte Radcliffe was a most forthcoming

witness.
 
She was, however, disturbed by quotations attributed to her

from her July 6 interview with Detective Zellner.
 
Even when told that

they had come directly from a transcription of an audiotape, she felt

sure that words had been added or left out.
 
A comparison to the on

inal tape showed no such omissions or additions.
 
"[The night Pat

called you] she had no idea where her husband, Tom, was at that time,

did she?"

"She said he had gone to talk with his mother," Margureitte replied.

"Oh, she told you that?"
 
Weller sounded surprised.

"Yes.

"She didn't tell you that she didn't know where he was and she was

frantic waiting on him?"

"No."

"She told you that he had gone-" He had gone there.
 
. . . I was

frightened."

Garland fought back with hearsay oh'ections and was sustained.

"Now, Mrs. Radcliffe," Weller continued.
 
"Tom Allanson's final decree

on his divorce from the second wife, Carolyn, was on the ninth of May,

1974, wasn't it?"

"To my knowledge, yes, sir."

"And they [Tom and Pat] got married when-the latter part of May

1974?"

Weller led the witness smoothly into a trap.

"They were married on the evening of May 9."

"Oh, they got married the very evening that the divorce decree went

into effect?"

"That is correct."
 
Margureitte sat up straighter and fixed the

prosecutor with a thin smile.

"Now,-isn't it a fact that the late Mr. and Mrs. Allanson would not

accept your daughter?"

" I don't know.
 
They did not know her."

"Well, I didn't say that.
 
I said, they did not accept her as a

daughter-in-law, would they?"

"He said that .
 
. . he didn't have a son, so therefore, how could he

have a daughter-in-law?"

"Yes, ma'am.

"That's right."
 
Margureitte fixed her eyes triumphantly on a

chastened-appearing Weller.
 
She was a disaster as a witness on cross;

she offered too much information and she came across as supercilious.

On balance, Garland's case would have been better off without

Margureitte's testimony.
 
She was more help to the prosecution.

It had been a very long day, this fourth day of trial, and Judge

Wofford released the jury at 6:00 P.m. Ed Garland asked for yet another

mistrial and was again denied.
 
Each request, of course, would add to

the likelihood that an appeal for a new trial would be granted.
 
He was

a cunning attorney; he knew exactly what he was doing.
 
The lawyers

wrangled over legal points in chamhers long after the jury had

dispersed.

On Friday morning, October 18, the first witness was Fred Benson, a

blacksmith and longtime friend of Tom Allanson's.

Garland hoped to throw doubt on Tom's identification in the police

lineup three days after the murders.
 
Benson had been a voluntary

participant in the lineup of July 6. He explained why.
 
"I went in to

see Tom, see, and Detective Thornhill was real nice-took me back to the

cell to talk to Tom.
 
. . . All these Officers were in there [the

police station) .
 
. . and they were fixing to have a lineup.
 
They

brought these two car theft boys out.
 
They were little bitty short

guys, looked criminal-criminal-type-looking people-with moustaches."

"You don't mean to say that just because they had a mustache-" Garland

cut in quickly.
 
Several of the jurors had moustaches.

"You know.
 
What I'm trying to say-they didn't look like Tom.

If you've seen Tom, he's twelve foot tall, only man in the world I have

to look up to."

Two other lineup members were fire fighters, who had stripped down to

their T-shirts and trousers.
 
Benson volunteered to stand in the lineup

so that Tom would have a better chance.
 
He was a big man too, and he

figured he would offset the "little bitty" criminal types.

Benson had also known Tom's ex-wife for many years, and Garland

elicited his opinion of her.
 
"Mr.
 
Benson," he asked.

"Do you-from your knowledge of Carolyn Allanson of Athens, Georgia- Did

you hear what people generally said about her in reference to her

reputation for truthfulness and honesty?"

"Most anybody in Athens-" "Answer yes or no."

"Yes, sir."

"Was that reputation good or bad?"

"It was very bad."

"And based on that reputation, would you believe her on her oath?"

"I wouldn't believe her if she was standing on a stack of Bibles.
 
I

told Tom-" Benson was just getting warmed up.

"Just answer the questions," Garland stopped him.
 
"All right, your

witness."

Weller dispatched Tom's fellow farrier quickly.
 
Looking chagrined,

Fred Benson turned to the judge.
 
"Your Honor, I didn't get to say all

I wanted to say-" "You have said all they will allow you to," Judge

Wofford explained.

Pursuing his strategy to cast doubt on Tom's identification in the

lineup, Garland called Hugh Maples, a private investigator working for

the defense team, to the stand.
 
He recalled the circus atmosphere that

Fourth of July weekend at the East Point police station.

"Did you have occasion," Garland asked, "to be at the East Point jail

in the presence of Tom Allanson on an occasion when there was a

disrobed hippie girl?"

The jurors exchanged glances.
 
Every day there seemed to be a surprise

or two in the testimony.

"Yes, sir."

"Tell the jury about that incident."

"This was on a Saturday prior to the lineup.
 
. . . Pat was back there

. . . talking with Tom.
 
. . . Chief of Police Godfrey was up at the

other end of the hall talking with this hippie girl .
 
. . she had just

taken a shower and was complaining about no towels.

"How was she dressed?"

"She wasn't dressed."

"Did that attract any attention from the policemen?"

Several jurors smiled and a few gallery members tittered.

"Several.
 
Yes, sir.
 
. . . Detective Zellner leaned around the

corner.

He called someone to come there, and I turned and saw it was Officer

McBurnett."

"And could Officer McBurnett see the defendant, Tom Allanson?"

"Yes, sir."

Garland ended his questioning there.
 
Had the jurors understood that

this prior viewing would have further contaminated McBurnett's

identification of Tom in the lineup?

Ed Garland knew in his bones that Pat had concocted a story for Tom to

tell, believing her version would fly better than what he might say.

Garland didn't want Tom on the stand, and he certainly would not put

Pat on the stand; she was so unstable emotionally that he couldn't

predict what she might do.
 
So Garland was left with a defense that

only nibbled at the edges of the questions in the jurors' minds.

Bill Weller kept making sarcastic references to the fact that most of

Tom's witnesses were "horse people," as if that would automatically

make them lie for him.
 
Bill Jones, the liquor store eyewitness, had

been pretty well tainted as a defense witness.
 
So Garland could only

chip away at the lineup and at Carolyn Allanson's reputation for

honesty.

None of it was really enough to fight double murder charges.

There was a hush in the courtroom as an old man made his way to the

witness stand.
 
Walter Allanson-Paw-had come to testify for his

grandson in a murder trial where his own son and daughter-inlaw were

the victims.
 
He had loved Tommy since the day he was born.
 
He didn't

look like a sentimental man.
 
Actually, he appeared to be a

weather-beaten old cuss whose expression reflected no discernible

emotion.