She Wanted It All - Kathryn Casey [154]
Chapter
19
The flags flew at half-mast at the Texas State Capitol the following Monday, February 3, 2003, on the first day of testimony in the Celeste Beard case. Over the weekend, the U.S. had suffered a tragedy; the space shuttle Columbia had exploded in the Texas skies as it descended toward earth. Austin and the country mourned.
Two hundred fifty miles northeast in Nacogdoches, searchers retrieved shuttle debris, while at Woolridge Park, a green, public square with a gracious white-pillared gazebo across from the Travis County courthouse, the gnarled branches of graceful oaks reached out across the sloping grounds like arms offering shelter. Under them, the city’s homeless rearranged shopping cart estates. The winter had been a difficult one, at times bitterly cold, but this day was a balmy respite, 60 degrees by the nine o’clock start time. It was expected to be near 80 by afternoon.
Even on quiet days courthouses are unsettling places. Those who work there try to make them homey, bringing family photos, their children’s grade school art, and doughnuts to share. Opening day of a big case, the anxiety is so powerful it seems nearly palpable. It bristles in the faces in the hallways, sparks from the fluorescent lights overhead, and sends a static tension through those who file into the courtroom. The Blackwell-Thurman Criminal Justice Center was no exception that morning, as it buzzed with anticipation. Half a block away, on Tenth Street, TV-news satellite trucks waited for sound bites. Inside, lines formed at the first-floor metal detectors and elevators filled with the curious.
Just after nine, Judge Kocurek announced the beginning of the case styled State of Texas v. Celeste Beard Johnson. The 390th District Court was standing room only as Celeste, looking reserved in a pink sweater set and beige skirt, stood with her crutches beside her attorneys as Assistant D.A. Gary Cobb read the indictment: one charge each of capital murder, murder, and injury to the elderly.
“How do you plead?” Kocurek asked.
“I am not guilty,” Celeste said firmly.
“Is the state ready?” asked the judge.
“The state is ready,” replied Allison Wetzel.
“Is the defense ready?”
“The defense is ready,” said Dick DeGuerin.
“Ms. Wetzel, you may begin your opening statement,” said the judge.
With that, Allison Wetzel stood before the jury. “On October 9, 1999, just before 3:00 A.M., Steven Beard woke up suddenly, in excruciating pain,” she said. “His intestines were spilling out of the front of his body. He didn’t know what had happened to him. Police found a spent shotgun shell at the foot of his bed. He was rushed to Brackenridge Hospital. The doctors didn’t know if he’d make it… ”
Nervous, perhaps intimidated by the cameras stationed throughout the courtroom or the reputation of the attorney who glowered at her from the defense table, Wetzel began tentatively, reading her statement. But soon she gathered momentum, her voice growing secure and her eyes flashing as she commenced where Steven Beard’s troubles had begun, the day he met an “opportunistic country club waitress.”
As the story developed, Wetzel told of Beard’s vulnerability, after nursing his beloved Elise through cancer. She recounted his first months with Celeste, when she entered his life as a housekeeper, then divorced Jimmy Martinez and set her sights on Steve and his millions. They married, yet Celeste quickly showed her true nature, emptying his safety deposit box. Steve initiated divorce proceedings, which would have left Celeste with nothing. “That divorce filing taught Celeste Beard a lesson,” Wetzel said, explaining that if Steve divorced Celeste, she got nothing. If he died, she got it all.
Celeste sat between DeGuerin and Catherine