“As a result of your counseling, he became sober, is that correct?”
“The credit goes to him for that. Very proud of him for recognizing it and seeking more outside help,” Dr. Eisen says in a motherly tone, looking at Micah. He smiles back at her.
“Now, doctor, it says in your notes back in 2015 that you were concerned for Micah’s well-being. Can you explain these notes right here, if you can read them out loud for us, please?” Astrid hands the doctor a bound set of pages.
The doctor pulls out her reading glasses that rest on a chain around her neck. A photo of the notes appears on the monitor. She reads them aloud.
“May 18, 2015
Anniversary of mother’s death approaching
Micah = incongruence
‘Good Micah, Bad Micah’
Intimacy absent
Integration needed”
“Thank you, Dr. Eisen. Can you explain what you meant by these notes?”
“Yes, I believe so. First of all, these are essentially notes I take when listening to a client, in this case Micah. He mentioned growing up hearing from his mother that he is either ‘Good Micah’ or ‘Bad Micah,’ depending on the actions he was taking or the emotions or reactions he was exhibiting. Throughout adolescence and adulthood, he had still been considering himself as two different entities, depending on what was happening in his life at the time.”
“Could you please give us an example?”
“I remember he talked about an old boyfriend of his cheating on him, or he suspected of cheating on him. He mentioned having thoughts of hurting this person in some way. I asked him to tell me a little more, and he said they were just thoughts. He had no definitive plan of hurting this man. Remember, this was years ago.”
“And Dr. Eisen, can you explain what you mean by incongruence?”
“Yes. It’s the whole ‘Good Micah, Bad Micah’ thing. My job is to help, sorry, was to help Micah understand that we all live with both the good sides of ourselves and the bad sides of ourselves. Congruence is the ultimate goal, to be okay with all aspects of ourselves and to understand that there is no good Micah or bad Micah. Just simply Micah.”
“Thank you. And what about intimacy, this note right here?” Astrid approaches the doctor and points to the line in her notes.
“Oh yes, I remember him saying something about not being able to feel true intimacy with someone like he used to when he was little. I think he was remembering his mother at the time.”
“Why did you bother to write it down?”
The doctor hesitates.
“Well, my initial thinking, why I wrote that down, later proved to be—”
“But why did you write it in the first place, doctor?” Astrid interrupts before Dr. Eisen can qualify her statement.
“Because lack of intimacy is one of the clear signs of a sociopath. But as I was going to say, later—”
“Thank you, doctor. We have nothing more for this witness.”
“Later … you were saying, doctor,” Shawn says, picking up where Astrid had abruptly stopped.
“Later, my initial thinking proved to be false.”
“And why is that?”
“Micah developed, I don’t know, a transformative relationship with Lennox, I guess you’d say? Throughout his courtship and marriage, I saw major progress in Micah’s capacity for intimacy.”
“Such as?” Shawn asks.
“Such as a decrease in jealousy, an assumption of positive intent when it came to what Lennox was doing, where he was, who he was with.”
“Thank you. Doctor, out of the 212 times you saw our client, how many times do you mention ‘good Micah, bad Micah?’”
“Oh, I don’t know the answer to that, sorry.”
“Could it have been only twice? The second time was in December of 2016. Could you turn to that please and read it for us? Page 17, highlighted.”
Dr. Eisen flips to page 17 and reads. Shawn grabs the remote and clicks to the photo of her notes for the jury to see.
“Micah okay
Refers to himself as Micah when talking about dark thoughts
Asked about Good Micah Bad Micah
Says no”
“Thank you, can you explain what you meant by that?”
“Yes, we had done a lot of work around being okay with his dark thoughts. We all have them. It was the first time I noticed that he was talking as if the two sides of him had been integrated. I asked him about it. He laughed and said he hadn’t thought that way in quite some time. It was a good day for me. I felt I’d helped in some small way.”
“Small way, indeed.” Shawn looks at the jury, hoping to put a period on this Hail Mary from the prosecution. “Thank you. We have nothing further for this witness.”
“Is there a redirect?” the judge asks.
“No, your Honor.” Astrid shrugs.
Dr. Eisen removes her glasses and gets up. She walks past Micah and places her hand on his hand. Micah puts his hand on hers and smiles. She nods and walks out of the courtroom.
“The prosecution rests, your Honor,” says Astrid.
“You’re up, Mr. Connelly,” says the judge.
“Thank you, your Honor,” Shawn says. “We’d like to call our first witness, Ms. Jenna Ancelet, back to the stand.”
Jenna enters the courtroom with little to no fanfare. She is dressed in a familiar black-slack-white-blouse combo, albeit different designers. But this time, there is no extravagant scarf, no swagger, no confidence.
She is there for Micah. Shawn can go to hell.
“Raise your right hand. Do you promise that the testimony you shall give in the case before this court shall be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so help you God?” asks the clerk.
“I do.”
“Thank you for being here, Ms. Ancelet,” Shawn says.
Jenna does not look at him.
“Ms. Ancelet, earlier you testified that you were friends with both the defendant and the victim. Could you elaborate on that friendship for the court?”
Jenna
