Roo's Busy Morning and Sparky: Chapter Six

Friday morning, from the prospect of my dining room, I was looking out the window assessing what further damage had been done to what I call my garden and the squirrels call their salad bar. 

I could see my neighbour Grant's three cats in the courtyard. Chester (or Pester) was lurking under a bush; Tigger, an amply proportioned orange male fraidy cat was ambling on the path in front of the back row of townhouses and Roo, a pretty, slim, grey tabby female was sitting on the step in front of Grant's door, which was open.  

I saw some movement on the path. It was a raccoon! I wondered how the cats would react and called Bruce so he could watch too. I explained the situation to him as he came into the dining room but I had lost sight of the raccoon by then. Bruce found him.

“He’s going through Grant’s door.”

“Omigod!” I said, “I better call Grant.”

Roo was already on the job. Chester stayed resolutely under his bush and Tigger had fled for all I could tell, but Roo engaged the raccoon and it was quite a fight. I was worried that Roo might have taken on more than she could handle. I called Grant. The phone rang once and he answered. “There’s a raccoon in your house!” I said.

Grant had been in his kitchen, right by the door, so he was instantly there with the phone in his hand to watch as Roo chased the raccoon down the path and off the north edge of the property.

You go girl.

Sparky's Funtime Summertime Murder Mystery
Chapter Six 

Sparky here. This is Chapter Six of my story about how Gerry Ringbold met his untimely end. The story starts here.

Before the court case about Pea's will, there were no media mentions of Gerry Ringbold anywhere. And then, suddenly, he was everywhere.

In the early days of the battle, Ringbold was a fresh-faced, skinny lawyer, recently called to the bar. He was representing two second cousins who had not been remembered in the will. 

The pictures printed along with the stories show an incredible transformation. Ringbold started skinny, but had a bulge over his belt before the first year passed. His head grew fat faster than his middle and by two years into the court battle, he looked like a half-inflated parade balloon. Close to the end of the case, he looked fully inflated, red-faced, with a neck like a bowling ball and almost egg-bald.   

Ringbold kept up a steady barrage of statements for the media while he fought for the two cousins. In 2002 when he filed his clients' papers with the court he said, “My clients are concerned about untoward influence on a vulnerable victim.” A month later, when lawyers for Pea’s estate asked to dismiss the case because it was stupid (not their exact words, but the meaning was there), Ringbold, with what looked like tears in his eyes, said his clients “were hurt by this callous treatment by their family.”

In October 2003 when he asked the court to make a decision about evidence he claimed the other side was withholding, he said, “The records show a pattern of interference, even a malignant intention. Mark my words, there is a dark underbelly here and my clients will fight to bring it into the plain sight of the law.” 

In February 2004, when the court ruled that Ringbold's request in October the previous year really was stupid: “My clients have proven that there was a clear family conspiracy to direct the hand of a woman who had lost any personal capacity to made decisions of her own. With malice, with foresight, with cunning and skill these people have usurped the mind of their hapless victim and brought justice to its knees.” 

In June 2006 after a judge finally threw the case out of court: “Today’s decision is a travesty and proof that the court system is corrupt beyond all imagining, that no one is safe from the machinations of fraud artists and everyone should fear that their true intentions will not live after they have died. My clients will appeal this grotesque miscarriage of justice.”

The battle over Pea's will provides proof, in case anyone needs it, that you can keep anything alive in the courts if you have enough money. His clients' money was all Ringbold had apparently, because, over and over again, in response to his raving allegations, Pea’s lawyers said one thing: “the impugned statement is not in the will.”

By the way, even if the phrase had been in the will, it couldn't be used as evidence that someone was forcing Pea to do something against her will or that Pea wasn't mentally sharp. One motions court judge put it this way: "expressing compassion for those struggling with addiction is more sane than is this application."

The statement that kept Gerry Ringbold busy for five years was actually in the trust documents that Pea set up on her 60th birthday. That’s where it says, basically, that the city will get the money so long as it continues to allow free access to everyone to the park. 

In the end, Ringbold's clients did not appeal. They had got nothing for their trouble except a court order to pay a large chunk of the legal fees of Pea’s estate.

I suppose you have to admire someone who manages, as Ringbold did, to dig in and fight for five years, sacrificing youth, ethics and conscience for the sake of a couple of million dollars – which was all the cousins wanted. 

As for the cousins, when I searched their names I found one of them had actually died before the court case was finished. The two second cousins – they were twins – were in their 80's and lived in assisted living facilities in upstate New York when the court case started. The surviving cousin is still there, vastly old, as I write this. I wondered how Ringbold came to represent them.

You can read Chapter Seven here.