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the first person she saw.' "
Delores Holland, Heather's neighbor remembers firmly when
she heard the car door slam and the sound of tires leaving the
Plourds' driveway. ^H
"Twenty minutes to ten."
This early testimony is important in matters of establishing
time, but not sensational. Jurors #6 and #12 take notes, while
the other ten pairs of eyes move .from Jim Jagger to the witness.
Joseph Inman is next. He has a full reddish-brown beard,
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wire-rim glasses, and he speaks with a slight Texas drawl not
unlike Lew Lewiston's. He wears western boots and a cowboy j
beltbuckle. He is a good witness. He describes coming up behind
the red car with the red Arizona plates that was merely creeping
along Old Mohawk. Inman identifies photos of the Downs car as
the car he saw.
Deputies carry in a huge map eight feet long and three feet
iwide, an overview of the vital areas in this case: Diane Downs's 'duplex on Q
Street, Heather Plourd's mobile home on Sunderman
Road, the spot where the .22 casings were found on Old Mohawk
Road, the point at which Joe Inman observed Diane's red car
inching along the road, and the hospital. I:
The times the victims had been at each point are noted on the
chart so that the jury can see for themselves.
The shooting had to have occurred at five minutes to ten. It
was 10:15 when Joe Inman first observed Diane's car; he followed
348 ANN RULE
her for two-tenths of a mile for two minutes at a speed of six miles
an hour. At 10:17 p.m., he reached a straight spot in the road and
passed her.
Diane was only four and a half miles from the hospital at that
point--and yet it took her almost twenty-two minutes more to
reach the Emergency entrance.
Jim Jagger attempts to sway Joe Inman on his recall of time
and speed. He cannot. Inman will not equivocate.
Judy Patterson leads off the McKenzie-Willamette ER witnesses.
She is nervous, but she remembers it all--the Code 4, the page for
all available personnel, her conversations with Diane.
"She told me the kids were laughing and talking, laughing at
something Danny had said--and talking to Christie. That it was
an awful thing to be laughing one minute, and the next ..."
Patterson recalls the two versions of the shooting Diane gave.
Only after she steps down does she realize she forgot one exchange.
"Diane looked up at me, that first night, and asked flatly, 'Are they dead
yet?' No emotion. Just, 'Are they dead yet?' "
One after another, all of them who were in the ER a year ago
take the stand. Shelby Day is next. She had dreaded testifying,
but she does well as she recalls that Cheryl was dead on arrival,
with blood already clotted in her throat, a straight line on the
heart monitor.
Rosie Martin tells the jury about her first sight of Diane
standing by the driver's side of her car. "I asked her what was
going on, and she said, 'Somebody just shot my three kids--' "
Rosie had suctioned Christie Downs's occluded airway. And
then she had spent most of her time with Dr. Foster as he worked
over Danny.
What does she remember about Diane Downs's wound, Hugi
asks.
"I just remember an entrance and an exit--somewhere on the
forearm . . . She asked how the children were, and I told her the
doctors were in there wprking on them. And then she--the mother--
. laughed, and she said, 'Only the best for my kids!' and she
laughed again and said, 'Well, I have good insurance.' I thought it t, was
peculiar--but I was thinking about the kids."
The mother's demeanor?
"She seemed very composed."
As the hospital personnel continue their testimony about the
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night of May 19, 1983--particularly about the bizarre comments
of the defendant--the jurors become more and more subdued.
At afternoon break, no one in the gallery leaves.
Diane doesn't wear handcuffs into the courtroom, but there is
always a faint rattle of chains just before she enters the room after
recesses. Every time she walks in, she smiles.
Dr. John Mackey is to be the next scheduled witness. But his
beeper sounds and he rushes from the corridor on an emergency.
Court recesses early. The gallery disperses reluctantly. There is
the danger that they will not be able to get into the courtroom
tomorrow.
Tuesday, May 15.
The lines are longer this morning, a huge crowd on Day Six,
pushing against the rope barrier an hour before the courtroom
doors will open.
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