We rode the elevator back up to the D.A.’s office. The halls were lined with people of every description. Tears were the common denominator. I wanted to scream out my fury. My hands were balled into fists, and I felt like punching a hole in the wall; I wanted to destroy something. It was as if the wind had been knocked out of all of us. Michael and Lauren were sobbing. Patti was in shock.
Kim walked over to a window and stared out, weeping bitterly. Mark kept a close eye on her.
Judge Ito’s clerk, Deidre Robertson, approached and told us that the judge had locked himself inside his chambers and was refusing to speak to anyone. She confirmed Patti’s instant realization that the reason she had stumbled on the defendant’s name while reading the verdict was because she could not believe it. “I’m so sorry,” she said. “The system really let you guys down.”
In the background Kim heard the Brown family chattering. “Do you think he’ll be able to play golf?” one of them asked. Another chimed in, “Do you think he’s going to want to pick up the kids this afternoon?”
I nearly blurted out: The son of a bitch was just found not guilty and you’re worried about whether he’s going to pick up the kids this afternoon?! But somehow I managed to hold my tongue.
Tanya Brown mused, “I wonder who he’ll go out to dinner with now.”
Kim felt as if she were trapped in a mental ward, and she could not remain silent. She yelled out, quite loudly, “Shut up, Tanya! Who cares who he’s going to party with. There is a murderer walking the streets, folks!”
I said quickly, “I need to get out of here. I need to get some air.”
Kim ran outside of the room with me and sobbed, “Thank God you said that. I was ready to jump out the window.”
That afternoon our house was once again filled with friends and neighbors. Our victim’s advocate, Mark, and his wife, Chanele, were the only ones present from the prosecution team.
Kim felt as if she were isolated inside a strange bubble. It was as if a nuclear bomb had exploded and we were the only people left on the face of the earth. Everything was somber and still. Time was suspended.
Kim found herself wishing that she had a vice, something to allow her to blow off steam, to find some release. She thought: I’m not much of a drinker. I don’t use drugs and I don’t smoke. I don’t gamble. I don’t run marathons. It’s a good thing that I’ve never tried cocaine, because that type of escape would probably be very attractive to me right now. There’s nothing I can do to escape from the pressure cooker I am living in.
She wanted to go to the cemetery, but what would she say to Ron? She had never promised him that we would make the murderer pay for his crimes, because she knew that we did not have the power to do that and she did not want to promise something that she could not deliver. Still, she would have to tell him that the killer got away with it. We all felt as if we had failed Ron.
It was about 4:30 P.M. when Kim slipped away and drove to the cemetery. Some members of the press and a few photographers were there, but they left her alone. She sat on the gentle slope of the hill, beneath the large oak tree, staring at the headstone. She thought: I’ll never get used to it, seeing my brother’s name etched into hard, cold stone.
As she looked at the dates that marked the beginning and the end of Ron’s life she realized, with full force, that now no one would ever be held accountable for his murder.
She cried inconsolable tears. Over and over again she said, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. We couldn’t do anything. Please, don’t be mad at me. We tried our hardest. Everybody fought for you, but we let you down.”