Good Morning, Killer - April Smith [98]
BERRINGER: Give me a minute.
RAUCH: I’m surprised, Detective. You often testify in court. In fact, that’s part of your job. Is this case different?
BERRINGER: I’m fine, let’s go on.
RAUCH: Why is it different, Detective Berringer? Is it because you cared about Ana Grey?
JUDGE: We’ll take a fifteen-minute recess.
RAUCH: Are you ready to resume, Detective Berringer?
BERRINGER: Yes, I apologize, Your Honor.
JUDGE: No need. Go on.
RAUCH: You were giving an example of Ana Grey’s obsession with you.
BERRINGER: Ana said she wanted the nine hundred dollars back that she loaned me to fix my Harley. She picked the time to tell me this while I was at the Boatyard Restaurant in Santa Monica with my fellow officers, relaxing after work. She confronted me in front of them and the other patrons. It was embarrassing for the Santa Monica Police Department, which I take a lot of pride in, and to me personally. She verbally abused a woman friend of mine, also a police officer, who was known to everyone at the table, and made remarks about this woman’s character that were potentially damaging to her professional reputation.
RAUCH: This is Officer Sylvia Oberbeck?
BERRINGER: Officer Oberbeck.
RAUCH: What is your relationship to Officer Oberbeck?
BERRINGER: We are friends, colleagues, we came up together, she’s an excellent policewoman, and I have the highest respect for the way she does her job.
RAUCH: Are you romantically involved?
BERRINGER: We have been. In the past.
RAUCH: Did Ana Grey know you were romantically involved with Officer Oberbeck in the past?
BERRINGER: Yes.
RAUCH: What was her reaction?
BERRINGER: She went out of control.
RAUCH: What do you mean by “out of control”?
BERRINGER: She followed Officer Oberbeck and me in her car—her official Bureau car—and tailgated us up to speeds of one hundred miles per hour on the Marina Freeway. She pulled up behind us to the bumper of my car. She was very aggressive, revving her motor and honking the horn, forcing us onto the shoulder. When she got out of her car she was agitated. She said, “I know you were fucking this bitch and this is a perfect example.” Officer Oberbeck was terrified. I was pretty scared myself. She was pounding on the window and throwing rocks and ultimately tried to scald Officer Oberbeck with hot coffee.
RAUCH: I’m sorry, I’m lost, you were on the freeway and she had hot coffee …
BERRINGER: She had a cup of coffee in her hand when she got out of the car and she threw it.
RAUCH: What happened to Officer Oberbeck?
BERRINGER: The window was closed, it didn’t touch her, but that’s an example of how out of control Ana was. Completely out of control.
RAUCH: Was she out of control the night you came to her apartment to break it off?
BERRINGER: At first she was sad, upset, whatever, said she couldn’t take it, we had to make this work out, it was the only good thing she had left in her life.
RAUCH: What did you say?
BERRINGER: I said, baby, I love you, I care about you, but that’s just not going to happen. That’s not where I am right now. I’ve been married twice, I want my freedom, I told you from the beginning.
RAUCH: How did she respond?
BERRINGER: Again, she became more and more agitated. She’d been crying for a while—excuse the expression—she was really pissed off.
RAUCH: Officer Berringer, why did you go to Agent Grey’s apartment that night?
BERRINGER: She paged me.
RAUCH: Where were you?
BERRINGER: I needed to do some cardio training, so I was running the steps in Santa Monica Canyon when the pager came through. The signal wasn’t strong enough—reception isn’t good in the canyon—but I was eighty-five percent sure it was her, because she’d been trying to call me all day, so I ignored the page and finished the workout, and as I’m driving in my car, on Ocean Avenue, I became aware of someone pulling up in back of me, fairly close, putting on their brights. At this point I assumed it was Ana because I’d had that experience