refused his kindness, then he would be forced to hand him over to Smith and Rogers, the nasty cops, who were waiting, ready to pounce.
Let's talk about it, Featherstone urged him.
There's nothing to talk about, Tommy insisted. He said again and again that the polygraph was rigged or something because he was telling the truth, but Featherstone wasn't buying it.
Tommy admitted to being nervous before the exam, and anxious while it was under way because he was late for work. He also admitted that the interview six days earlier with Smith and Rogers had upset him and caused him to have a dream. What kind of dream? Featherstone wanted to know.
Tommy described his dream: He was at a keg party, then he was sitting in a pickup truck with two other men and a girl, out by the old power plant near Ada where he grew up. One of the men tried to kiss the girl, she refused, and Tommy told the man to leave her alone. Then he said he wanted to go home. 'You're already home,' one of the men said. Tommy looked through his window, and he was suddenly at home. Just before he woke up, he was standing at a sink, trying in vain to wash a black liquid off his hands. The girl was not identified; neither were the two men.
That dream doesn't make sense, Featherstone said. Most dreams don't, Tommy retorted. Featherstone remained calm but continued to press Tommy to come clean, tell him everything about the crime, and, especially, tell him where the body was. And he threatened again to turn Tommy over to those 'two cops' waiting in the next room, as if a lengthy torture session could be in the works.
Tommy was stunned and confused and very frightened. When he refused to confess to Featherstone, the nice cop turned him over to Smith and Rogers, who were already angry and seemed ready to throw punches.
Featherstone stayed in the room, and as soon as the door closed, Smith lunged at Tommy, yelling, 'You, Karl Fontenot, and Odell Titsworth grabbed that girl, took her out to the power plant, raped and killed her, didn't you?'
No, Tommy said, trying to think clearly and not panic.
Talk to us, you little lying sonofabitch, Smith growled. You just flunked the polygraph, we know you're lying, and we know you killed that girl!
Tommy was trying to place Odell Titsworth, a name he had heard but a man he'd never met. Odell lived somewhere around Ada, he thought, and he had a bad reputation, but Tommy could not remember meeting him. Maybe he'd seen him once or twice, but at the moment he couldn't remember, because Smith was yelling and pointing and ready to punch him.
Smith repeated his theory about the three men snatching the girl, and Tommy said no. No, I had nothing to do with it. 'I don't even know Odell Titsworth.' Yes, you do, Smith corrected him. Stop lying. Karl Fontenot's involvement in their theory was easier to understand because he and Tommy had been friends off and on for a couple of years. But Tommy was bewildered by the accusations and terrified of the smug certainty of Smith and Rogers. Back and forth they went with their threats and verbal abuse. The language deteriorated and soon included every profanity and obscenity on the list.
Tommy was sweating and dizzy and trying desperately to think rationally. He kept his responses short. No, I didn't do it. No, I wasn't involved. A few times he wanted to lash out with sarcastic comments, but he was scared. Smith and Rogers were erupting, and armed, and Tommy was locked in a room with them and Featherstone. His interrogation showed no signs of ending anytime soon.
After sweating through three hours with Featherstone and suffering an hour of torment from Smith and Rogers, Tommy really needed a break. He needed to find a restroom and smoke a cigarette and clear his head. He needed help, to talk to someone who could tell him what was going on.
Can I take a break? he asked.
Just a few more minutes, they said.
Tommy noticed a video camera on a nearby table, unplugged and neglecting the verbal battering under way. Surely, he thought, this cannot be standard police procedure.
Smith and Rogers repeatedly reminded Tommy that Oklahoma uses lethal injection to kill its killers. He was facing death, certain death, but there might be a way to avoid it. Come clean, tell what happened, lead them to the body, and they would use their influence to get him a deal.
'I didn't do it,' Tommy kept saying.
He had a dream, Featherstone informed his two colleagues.
Tommy repeated the dream, and again it was met with disapproval. The three cops agreed that the dream made little sense, to which Tommy replied again, 'Most dreams don't.' But the dream gave the cops something to work with, and they began adding to it. The other two men in the truck were Odell Titsworth and Karl Fontenot, right?
No, Tommy insisted. The men in his dream were not identified. No names. Bullshit. The girl was Denice Haraway, right?
No, the girl was not identified in his dream. Bullshit.
For another hour, the cops added the necessary details to Tommy's dream, and every new fact was denied by him. It was just a dream, he kept saying over and over and over.
Just a dream.
Bullshit, said the cops.
After two hours of nonstop hammering, Tommy finally cracked. The pressure came from fear-Smith and Rogers were angry and seemed perfectly able and willing to slap him around if not outright shoot him-but also from the horror of wasting away on death row before finally getting executed.
And it was obvious to Tommy that he would not be allowed to leave until he gave the cops something. After five hours in the room, he was exhausted, confused, and almost paralyzed with fear.
He made a mistake, one that would send him to death row and eventually cost him his freedom for life.
Tommy decided to play along. Since he was completely innocent, and he assumed Karl Fontenot and Odell Titsworth were too, then give the cops what they want. Play along with their fiction. The truth would quickly be discovered. Tomorrow, or the next day, the cops would realize that the story did not check out. They would talk to Karl, and he would tell the truth. They would find Odell Titsworth, and he would laugh at them. Play along. Good police work will find the truth.
If his dream confession was sufficiently ridiculous, how could anyone believe it? Didn't Odell go in the store first?
Sure, why not, Tommy said. It was only a dream.
Now the cops were getting somewhere. The boy was finally breaking under their clever tactics. Robbery was the motive, right?
Sure, whatever, it was only a dream.
Throughout the afternoon, Smith and Rogers added more and more fiction to the dream, and Tommy played along.
It was only a dream.
Even as the grotesque 'confession' was happening, the police should have realized they had serious problems. Detective Mike Baskin was waiting back in Ada at the police department, sitting by the phone and wishing he was at the OSBI in the thick of things.
Around 3:00 p.m.,
Gary Rogers called with great news-Tommy Ward was talking! Get in the car, drive out to the power plant west of town, and look for the body. Baskin raced off, certain the search would soon be over.
He found nothing, and realized he would need several men for a thorough search. He drove back to the police station. The phone rang again. The story had changed. There was an old burned house on the right as you approach the power plant. That's where the body is!
Baskin took off again, found the house, picked through the rubble, found nothing, and drove back to town.
His goose chase continued with the third call from Rogers. The story had changed yet again. Somewhere in the vicinity of the power plant and the burned house there was a concrete bunker. That's where they put the body.
Baskin rounded up two more officers and some floodlights, and took off again. They found the concrete bunker, and were still searching when darkness fell.
