Final Analysis - Catherine Crier [133]
“I didn’t know when I should come,” she said, speaking to Susan at the podium. “But I arranged for a taxi and my son to get off from work, and my cardiologist arranged for some extra medications in case I had a heart attack or stroke, so I came without notice and here I am.”
Her shoulders wrapped in a shawl, Bradley guided her motorized wheelchair to the front of the courtroom. Her son, Edwin, trailed behind and held a microphone to her lips when she stopped in front of the clerk’s desk and addressed the court. “I’m obliged to come to the aid of a very special person.”
Initially, Sequeira objected to the surprise witness, saying that her name was not on the required list. In response, Susan told the court that she was unaware that Mrs. Bradley was planning to attend the trial. Her former Elmwood Avenue neighbor had written to her in jail, upset over the way she was being portrayed in the news. Producing Bradley’s letter for the prosecutor, Susan said that they had spoken about her coming to court but nothing had ever been firmed up.
“Elizabeth, did we discuss your testimony at all?” Susan asked the elderly woman, whose frail body shook intermittently from palsy.
“No.”
“Today is a very special day, isn’t it?” Susan said, addressing her neighbor.
“Yes, April 26 is my seventy-seventh birthday. And I have to apologize for my difficulty speaking, because I’m in the middle of some major oral surgery. If you can’t understand me, let me know and I will try harder.”
During thirty minutes of testimony, Bradley explained that she had been moved to act because the news media “was demonizing Susan in such a way, I was shocked. There was no comparison to the Susan I knew.
“She was an outstanding citizen of the neighborhood and we loved her,” Bradley tearfully recalled.
Elizabeth Bradley said that she was a single mother raising two children when Susan and Felix moved into the neighborhood with their three sons nearly twenty years ago. “We were neighbors and friends. I babysat when Susan had to go shopping. I was like an aunt to the children. They were so adorable. I loved being around them and Susan.”
“You’re being too kind, Elizabeth,” Susan said in between sobs.
“I saw no meanness in the children, except that Eli took a terrible amount of sibling abuse from his older brother, Adam. And his older brother was the apple of his father’s eye.”
Bradley charged that it was not Susan, but Felix, who was emotionally agitated. She recalled one day that she was visiting the Polk house when Felix unleashed his rage on one of his sons. She was not sure which boy it was but said the beating sounded brutal.
“[T]his little boy was screaming something awful. I wanted to cry out but I couldn’t say anything. But the beating was cruel.”
While Bradley disapproved of the physical handling of the boy, she did not interfere, believing that Felix was a therapist and “must know what he is doing.”
“I spent a lot of time around that family and one thing I can tell you, in my lifetime, I never met a more diligent mother, housewife, and assistant to her husband.”
“Thank you for your courage and integrity in coming today,” Susan said.
“I couldn’t live with myself if I didn’t. It breaks my heart. You deserve a better life.”
“I have a brave son like you do, Elizabeth. I have a good life.”
“No further questions.”
Bradley looked to the prosecutor. Sequeira had no questions for the elderly woman. He simply rose and thanked her for coming to court.
Jurors wiped away tears as Susan’s old neighbor rolled her wheelchair out of the courtroom, waving to Susan. “Bye, bye, honey. God bless you.”
Bradley failed to add anything new to the case at hand, but the theatrics meshed brilliantly with Susan’s showmanship. Susan maintained that she had no idea Bradley would come, but she adapted amazingly well to the moment, presenting a surprise witness who had nothing good to say about Felix and nothing bad to say about Susan.
Once back on the stand, Eli continued to bolster his mother’s claims of spousal abuse and her belief