[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
case, but it s true that Jed s wife was the complaining witness. He had wiped
his hands of the matter once the police locked her up, and he was moving
East.
No diagnosis was made, according to the LAPD, Mike reported.
They had an easy conviction for aggravated harassment, based on the telephone
records of her calls to Segal s home and office, and the letters to his wife.
Just a lock-up, no psych report.
Ellen Goldman is a classic case. I read Dietz, Zona, Sharma all the current
experts on the subject.
What s a classic erotomaniac? I asked.
To begin with, he responded, most of the subjects of the disorder are
women, young women like Ellen Goldman in their early thirties.
Their victims are male, usually older, and usually men of a higher status,
socioeconomic class or even an unattainable public figure, like a celebrity or
politician. Jed fit every one of those categories when she first encountered
him in California.
We were all listening attentively.
It s interesting, too, that almost half of the subjects studied were
foreign-born.
Again, like Goldman. And a lot of them adopt different persona that they use
for writing letters to their subjects, because they re so smart and articulate
in this instance, the Cordelia Jeffers correspondence.
How long before they give up this delusion? Joan wanted to know.
With other obsessions, so-called simple obsessions, David told her, the
subjects only made contact for less than a year. With erotomaniacs, these
episodes have gone on for ten or twelve years, with repeated efforts to keep
in touch with the man. They make phone calls, write letters, stalk their
subjects at home, in offices, on airplanes, in hotels you name it. They are
convinced that s the delusion that if they can get the obstacle, the other
woman, out of the way, the man they re obsessed with will be united with them
and able to declare his love.
Wasn t Jed aware of any of this, with Isabella? Didn t it ever occur to him
that Goldman was her killer? I wanted to know.
Absolutely not, David said.
When Goldman got out of jail, there was an order of protection still in
effect by the court. She was not allowed to have contact with either of the
Segals. And she was otherwise sane enough to avoid them at first, knowing that
would land her back in jail.
So she didn t bother Jed when she first got to New York last month. At least,
not directly not that he knew about.
There was enough publicity about his move to find his office at CommPlex,
after the Senate race. But I d have to guess that she spent more of her energy
finding out about you, once she learned you were dating him. Was that fact
ever in the newspapers?
Yeah, Liz Smith did an item in her column, Mike added, SEX CRIMES CRUSADER
DOES SENATE LOSER, Something like that. That s how she knew about you. We
figure she found out about Isabella by intercepting some of Jed s messages on
his voice mail at CommPlex. He said she did that all the time when he was in
California.
She had her eye on you, Alex, David continued, trying to figure how long
you would last with him. Then along came the ultimate antagonist, in the form
of a Hollywood goddess: Isabella Lascar. You were a mere mortal, but Isabella
Page 156
ABC Amber Palm Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abcpalm.html
was serious competition.
Ellen and I apparently had that much in common.
But I thought Jed and Isabella had discussed their stalkers with each other?
I queried aloud, remembering that snippet of conversation with him.
Yes, that s true, in general, David told us.
But it had never occurred to either one of them that they were being harassed
by the same person. Isabella was a celebrity and had been exposed to a lot of
unwanted attention, as you know, Alex. When she started to get hang-up calls
at the hotel she didn t know what their source was, and the letters from
Cordelia Jeffers were a complete mystery to her. She never divulged their
exact contents to him and Jed thinks that s because she knew how guilty he
felt about betraying you.
When David called me tonight after he finished his meeting with Segal, he
asked me to come over to his apartment to talk to him about the interview. I
got there about nine, with Joe Duffy, one of the other guys who worked the
squad with Mike.
Up to that minute, I was still convinced Segal was the killer.
But David said Segal could prove his alibi that his lawyer had the Cape Air
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]