Where Mercy Is Shown, Mercy Is Given - Duane Dog Chapman [61]
I was fine with that because a body receipt was enough to get Mary Ellen off the bond. I didn’t care about Halligan or where he ended up as long as Mary Ellen and Fred were released of their obligations. The judge took them off the bond right away. This Dog always gets his man.
END OF INTERMISSION ONE
CHAPTER 12
Lucy Pemoni
When I was a young boy, my grandpa used to tell me the story of Humpty Dumpty. Over the years, I adapted that famous children’s rhyme to fit my personality a little better.
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men
Got together and put him back together again
Whenever I’d repeat my version of the nursery rhyme, Grandpa was quick to point out I wasn’t repeating it right. But I knew exactly what I was saying. I liked my version better because I’ve always been a fixer of men, not a destroyer. I never liked the thought of a man being so fragile that he breaks. I visualized the king’s men busting out a giant tube of Elmer’s glue and piecing Humpty Dumpty back together until he was as good as new.
In a way, that’s how I see myself when I capture fugitives today. I am not out to destroy these people. My intent is to help them put their lives back together. I believe everyone deserves a second chance and an opportunity to right the wrongs they have done.
There’s a human limit to how much pain someone can take before they break. When I was in prison, I watched plenty of guys pay an inmate named Skinner to take his toilet brush and break their arms so they wouldn’t have to work in the fields. When he hit their bare skin, their arm would break. You could actually hear the bone crack. The guys screamed in horrible agony for a few minutes and then, as quickly as the pain hit, it was gone. The mind takes over and protects the body by putting it into a state of shock so you stop feeling anything. I thought these guys were all nuts. There was nothing that would ever convince me to harm myself like that just to avoid hard labor.
Murder one didn’t break me. Mexico didn’t break me. Losing my daughter didn’t break me. But there were times when I thought I just might shatter from the fallout of the “N” word debacle. I told Beth on several occasions I wasn’t sure I would make it through. But she didn’t buy into my self-pity. Beth has always been tough on me, but she is also my greatest supporter. When we took our vows to stand by each other through thick and thin, we both knew we’d be in for a heck of a ride. There’s no one I’d rather have in my corner when the chips are down than my Beth.
After the Enquirer story broke, I met an eighty-five-year-old black man who put his arm around me and said, “Where I come from, Dog, that word means ‘slave.’” He began to cry as he continued. “Growing up, all I heard from people was ‘N***er, go get this and go get that.’ It was not considered a bad word—it was just the way things were back then. I can promise you though, this will pass.”
All I could manage to say to this man was “I’m sorry.”
“Dog, I promise you, this is going to pass. You will be forgiven.”
I didn’t understand what he meant by “pass,” because I’d spent the thirty years since I left prison paying for my felony. I didn’t want to spend the next thirty paying for my ignorance.
The old man began to tell me a story about a guy who drove his car off a bridge with a woman other than his wife in the passenger seat. He got his seat belt off and was able to swim to safety, but he left the woman in the car. He fled the scene but didn’t call the authorities until after her dead body was found the following morning. The next day he called the police to tell them his car was in the river and so was the woman. That’s when