W is for Wasted (Kinsey Millhone 23)

The account had been opened nine months before on January 8, 1988, which must have been shortly after Dace arrived in town. The initial deposit was $597,500. The last transaction, a withdrawal of $200, was date-stamped October 1, 1988, leaving a balance of $595,350.

I said, “Whoa. I heard he had money, but I had no idea the total was anywhere close to this. I figured a couple of hundred bucks. Where’d it come from?”

“That’s what I didn’t have a chance to tell you. He went after the state and sued ’em for twelve million dollars—a million for every year he was incarcerated. After weeks of haggling, he agreed to a settlement. At six hundred thousand dollars, the state got off cheap. He probably could’ve held out for more, but he wanted his life back. He had his freedom. His reputation was clean again and he was eager to see his kids.”

At least I understood now why the bank valued Dace as a customer. Maybe they pegged him as eccentric; all that money and he was still living like a tramp.

The next item was a plain white number-ten envelope that contained school pictures of three kids—a boy and two girls—who I assumed were his. The first name, the name of the school, and the year, 1973, were noted on the back of each photo. A boy, Ethan, appeared to be in his midteens at the time the picture was taken. The middle child, a girl named Ellen, was probably fourteen, and the youngest, Anna, might have been eleven or twelve. By now, the girls would be in their late twenties, the boy in his early thirties. Aaron and I both studied the faces before returning the photos to the envelope.

The next document was a divorce decree in which Evelyn Chastain Dace was named as the plaintive and R. Terrence Dace, the defendant. Dissolution of marriage had been granted in August 1974. This document was followed by a quitclaim deed signed by R. Terrence Dace as grantor, in which he had conveyed the described house and lot to Evelyn Chastain Dace, including all oil, gas, and minerals on and under the property owned by the two of them as joint tenants.

The manila envelope that surfaced next was packed with a number of newspaper clippings from the Bakersfield Californian and the Kern County News, covering the period between February 28, 1972, and November 15, 1973, detailing the murder of a teenage girl who’d first been reported missing the morning of February 26, 1972. The black-and-white newspaper photo of the victim was enough to break your heart. She was a beautiful young woman with long, dark hair and a bright smile.

I skimmed, picking up a paragraph here and there. It helped that Aaron had given me the broad strokes. Knowing how the story turned out put the bits and pieces into context. Herman Cates and R. Terrence Dace were tried separately, court dates and appearances stretching over a protracted period while both defendants were assigned court-appointed attorneys, who probably requested time to prepare.

Herman Cates and a second suspect, R. Terrence Dace, were accused of the abduction and murder of fifteen-year-old Karen Coffey, a freshman at Bakersfield High School. Dace denied any involvement and the state’s case rested, in large part, on the eyewitness testimony of a neighbor who claimed that she saw Dace on the property the day of the abduction . . .

Dace’s defense attorney presented an alibi defense, that he was home with his wife the night of the murder and therefore didn’t have an opportunity to commit the crime. Mrs. Dace’s testimony was supported by a next-door neighbor, Lorelei Brandle, who was at the house during the time in question. The defense also challenged Cates’s credibility in tying Dace to the crime. The jury was unimpressed, and after deliberating for four hours, convicted Dace of felony murder. Dace was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole and began serving his time in January 1974.

It wasn’t difficult to imagine the sequence of events. After Dace’s conviction and sentencing, his wife filed for divorce, insisting that he quitclaim the house to her. Or maybe he’d voluntarily relinquished claim in light of his disgrace. Once he was freed from prison, sued the state, and collected his settlement, the money must have looked like a way to make amends. I could imagine him arriving in Bakersfield, eager to contact his children so he could tell them his name had been cleared. Big mistake. According to Dandy, the reunion was a disaster. In the end, they’d severed their relationship and he’d traveled to Santa Teresa in hopes of reconnecting with whatever remaining family he could find.

Occasionally, the teller would lean forward and look at an item herself, but for the most part she seemed content to observe without comment.

Aaron came to Dace’s social security card and a California driver’s license that had expired in May of 1976. He made a note of the social security number, Dace’s full name, and his address at the time the license was issued. “The initial ‘R’ stands for Randall,” he remarked.