Note: You can change font size, font face, and turn on dark mode by clicking the "A" icon tab in the Story Info Box.
You can temporarily switch back to a Classic Literotica® experience during our ongoing public Beta testing. Please consider leaving feedback on issues you experience or suggest improvements.
Click here
It became obvious to her that between school work and the legal research she was going to have to do quite a bit of writing and information gathering so Becky started shopping the pawn shops for a used computer.
She was lucky enough to find one for about five hundred dollars and after spending two days trying to figure out how it worked it finally dawned on her to call her cousin and ask for help. Developing computer skills wasn't the easiest thing for her but at least she didn't have to learn how to type; she had acquired that skill in high school.
Within two months she had learned enough Word Perfect to type out her home work and was already working on dBase so she could start storing the vast amounts of legal information she knew she would be accumulating.
Over the next several years, Becky spent a great deal of money consulting lawyers and hiring private detectives for Ethan. Almost every one of them would take her money, work a few days on the case, and then come back and tell her that nothing could be done. Once in a while, one would string her along trying to milk her for every penny he could until she figured out what they were doing. Then, they would tell her that his case was hopeless and all the leads they were working on had gone dry.
In 2006, the doctor she worked for changed her hours, working longer days but closing the office on Fridays. Which suited Becky just fine; it gave her more time to spend on Ethan's case.
By the winter of 2008 she was almost broke for the third time and the trails were as cold as ice. Half the people involved in the case were dead and the only ones left alive were the deputy, who had became sheriff a few years back and the two brothers, Bert and Sammy.
In the several attempts made to talk to him, the deputy never talked about the case with anyone. The two Oglethorpe brothers were now in prison and even if they chose to talk, and they wouldn't, no judge was likely to consider their testimony credible. To make matters worse, without some evidence to back up Ethan's story, no appeals court was ever likely to listen to them.
Even to Becky, it was beginning to look as if she and Ethan were never going to be together and she knew that something had to break soon, she didn't know how much longer she could stand the awful loneliness of waiting for him. A few years ago she had had to have a full hysterectomy, and she wondered if he would still want her now that she would be unable to give him any children. She had to hope. Her youth dwindling, all she had left was her hope. That, and her love for him.
Chapter Seven -- "The Prisoner"
They say that prison is hard on a man, and even harder on an innocent man. A guilty man can resign himself at some point to the fact that at least in some way he deserves his fate but a truly innocent man never can. It takes a strong man to keep his sanity and not be tempted to take his own life under such circumstances.
Ethan knew that it would take every bit of his strength just to keep prison from changing him into the kind of man he did not want to be. Locked up or not, he refused to become what they had accused him of even if never saw his freedom again. He convinced himself that Becky would be better off without him and he didn't want her to cling to any false hopes.
And so, the last thing Ethan did before he left for the state prison at Columbus was to call Becky and tell her not to come and see him. "Forget about me," he told her as he struggled hard to fight back his own tears, "there's nothing you can do for me. Don't come see me, don't call, and don't you dare waste your time waiting for me." Then he hung up abruptly before she could protest.
In prison, no one believed him when he proclaimed his innocence. The other prisoners laughed at him saying "Everyone's innocent in here!" Some even tried beating him, thinking they might get him to say otherwise. And for the next ten years, when ever a particularly hard case would arrive at the prison and hear about the "Innocent Man", the new prisoner would brag that he was going to be the one to get Ethan to admit he was guilty.
He started working out and lifting weights and it became an almost religious routine for him. He did it partly to have something to do, but mostly to keep his body in shape just so he would survive the beatings. As his body became more muscular and developed, the other prisoners thought that he was preparing to fight back; then when he didn't they became confused.
At first, they thought he was a coward, then they thought he was just plain stubborn and eventually they thought he was crazy. A few speculated that it was because he was really guilty and the beatings had become some form of penance for him.
Through all the beatings and trips to the infirmary, Ethan never fought back.
No one, not even the guards understood why. How could they? The fact is that Ethan had changed the day he killed Jimmy Oglethorpe. Ethan wasn't afraid of the men that beat him, far from it, he was afraid he might kill one of them. Ethan had killed once and he never wanted to do it again, even if it meant loosing his own life. He had taken a human life and he hated himself for it. In the deepest part of his soul he felt guilty about it. His mind was tortured, torn between the guilt from what he had done and the reality of knowing that he had been given no choice.
But it all changed the day Bert and Sammy Oglethorpe showed up one cold December day at the prison. Both men had been convicted of running a methamphetamine lab and each had been sentenced to ten years imprisonment.
Thinking that it might gain them prestige, the first thing they did was to brag how they had helped railroad Ethan for killing Jimmy. It didn't have the results they expected. When word got around that Ethan was actually innocent, Bert and Sammy were visited by a few of the 'lifers' and ended up spending two weeks in the infirmary. Both brothers learned then that prisoners have their own sense of justice.
Two things happened after that, no one ever beat Ethan again and the Oglethorpe brothers were moved for their own good to the maximum security section of the prison! It seems the two brothers began showing up every day at the infirmary with various bruises and minor cuts and contusions. For reasons unexplained, it took the warden six months to make the decision to move them there. Maybe the warden had his own idea of justice too?
After everything that had happened to him, Ethan was surprised when every 'jailhouse lawyer' in the prison began coming to him one-by-one offering to help him with his appeal… even the ones that had beaten him. And, for the first time, he began to have hope that he might see his freedom again.
But even with their help, his case looked hopeless. Ethan and his new found friends spent the next five years trying to find some angle for an appeal but there just wasn't one. You either had to show that the judge had made an error, a witness had committed perjury, or that the defense had been denied access to either a key witness or piece of evidence.
The brothers would never testify about their part in sending him to prison. Even if they did, no one would believe them for everyone would think that they had been intimidated into lying. And without the knife, he could never prove self-defense. And the knife was still missing.
Even if it did turn up, it would not be admissible as evidence unless he could prove that the prosecution or police had known about it and withheld it from the defense. Just when he was about to give up all hope, help came from an unexpected place and the Georgia Supreme Court finally agreed to hear his appeal. It was scheduled for June 2nd 2008.
Chapter Eight -- "The Clinic"
Doctor Mark Jennings was born and raised in the town of Magnolia. While attending the county's schools, his teachers quickly realized what a bright student he was. It was another time back then. People were different and when he made the National Honor Society the whole town was proud of him. Even though it was a poor community, when he graduated, they took up a collection to help him with his college expenses. It had humbled him deeply. He was from poor parents himself and knew how hard everyone worked and how hard life was for the poor people of Magnolia. Mark Jennings never forgot what his hometown did for him.
The scholarship he got to Emory University helped get him through college but it was the town's help that got him through medical school. Had he not been urged by his instructors to specialize, he would have become a family practitioner and returned to his hometown to start his practice.
And, in some ways, he had regretted that decision. But, when in January of 2008 old Doc Harris died and he heard the town was going to be without a doctor and the hospital was to be closed, Mark Jennings decided it was time to pay the people he owed so much too back.
As a doctor, he knew that the town was just too small to support a full time hospital and had no illusions about it reopening as such. The Harris family had been trying to sell the building unsuccessfully for months; but, there were no takers. After all, who needs an empty hospital in the middle of nowhere? So, when Dr. Mark Jennings made them an offer for it they went for it like sharks at feeding time.
The doctor would have gladly paid twice the price they were asking for the hospital. He knew the building alone was worth it. He wanted to surprise the town so he made sure the sales contract included a twenty percent penalty should the sellers disclose to anyone that he was the buyer until 90 days after the date of sale.
Since most everyone that worked for the county was somehow related to old man Harris, it wasn't hard to keep the sale secret. The whole county was surprised when he opened the hospital as a free clinic and began providing medical services at the hospital on Fridays and half-day Saturdays.
He didn't have a lot of experience at family practice, but his partner, Victoria Mercer did. It was only a few years ago that she had moved from family practice to urology. "Vicky", as her friends knew her, had mentioned that she missed it sometimes. When Mark told her that he could use her help, she jumped at the chance. She even got her husband Lyle to help them get supplies for the clinic at little or no cost. He worked for a pharmaceutical supplies service and had convinced the owner, his father, that it would be good press for the company to be seen doing some charity work.
One of the local girls, Cindy Benson, now Cindy Benson Thomas, volunteered her time and was a one woman office staff, acting as receptionist, file clerk and insurance expert all in one. For several years she had been known as the town floozy and was well on her way to becoming a full time drunk. That is until she turned up pregnant one day.
Motherhood changed her. In fact, it changed her so much that even old Doc Harris was so impressed when she stopped drinking, smoking and sleeping around that he gave her a job at the hospital.
She eventually married one of the local farmers and was quite well off. She didn't need to work, but when Cindy heard the clinic was being opened she didn't hesitate to volunteer her services.
Cindy would file any insurance, Medicare or Medicaid if a patient had it and use the money to pay for the medical supplies, utilities and any medicine that the doctors could not get from the pharmaceutical representatives. Thanks to some creative accounting, no patient was ever turned away, whether they had insurance or not and no patient ever paid a co-pay. The two doctors simply paid the expenses out of their own pockets.
Becky Daily had heard from a pharmaceutical representative about the two 'crazy' doctors that were going to be driving over a hundred miles from Atlanta, where they lived, to the small town of Magnolia just to open a clinic there two days a week just so the town's people could have free medical care.
Her funds were almost completely depleted and she was becoming desperate. The professionals she had hired had come up empty, but they had all been outsiders.
Perhaps the town had changed in the fifteen years since she had left. Just maybe, Becky thought, she could do a little better. She knew that sooner or later, everyone has to go to the doctor. Where the town's folk wouldn't talk to outsiders, maybe enough time had passed for them to talk to her. She came up with an idea would them come to her.
She called Dr. Jennings and asked him if he had found a nurse for his clinic. When she told him her name, he remembered her from high school and they both started reminiscing about the old days. And so, every Thursday night, after work, Becky began making the trip from Columbus to Magnolia to work as a nurse in the free clinic run by Doctors Jennings and Mercer. But unlike the others who worked at the clinic, she wasn't doing so from any sense of civic duty. As far as she was concerned, the whole town could burn to the ground.
Chapter Nine -- "The Sheriff"
In the fifteen years since he had helped railroad his best friend into prison, Johnny Wilkins never got a good night's sleep. When the guilt he was caring had became too much for him to handle, he started drinking. And the drinking cost him his marriage.
When his wife Liz, left him, taking their son Scott, with her, he found himself all alone and began to wonder what it had all been for?
In the devil's bargain he had made, Johnny had secured his future. He owned his home and even old Doc Harris could never take that away from him. Jack had been killed answering a domestic dispute about eight years after Ethan went to prison. And true to his word, old Doc Harris saw to it that Johnny was elected sheriff. But without his family, he didn't even care about the job that he used to love. He really didn't care about anything any more.
He forced himself to stop drinking, but it was too late, Liz refused to take him back. He guessed she'd finally had enough. Deep inside, he couldn't blame her. He had made her life a living hell.
Johnny had never told her the truth. Hell, he'd never told anyone the truth. He was too ashamed to. Keeping it bottled up inside him like a cancer had torn him apart and his guilt had just grown stronger and stronger with every passing day. Finally, early one morning, he found himself sitting of his living room holding his service revolver pointed at his head with one round in the chamber.
He hadn't slept at all the night before; his mind filled with the faces of the friend he had betrayed, his wife and the sixteen-year-old son that he didn't even know.
But he hadn't pulled the trigger that morning even though he wanted to. It was a blur to him now. He remembered having his finger on the trigger and slowly squeezing it. But at the last moment, something made him point the gun upwards just as the hammer fell. The round missed him, instead leaving a hole in his ceiling.
With the sound of the gun firing still ringing in his ears, Johnny realized that it wasn't to late to make things right. He had no illusions about ever getting his wife and son back, but perhaps there was still something he could do to make things right for Ethan!
The next day Johnny called the D.A., Roger Foster and asked him to come to his office so Johnny could talk to him.
When Foster got there and Johnny told the man about the knife and that he had been sitting on evidence for fifteen years, the D.A. became enraged. Foster was a narrow minded, spiteful man who had been elected on a 'Tough On Crime' platform and the idea of having to let a convicted murder free didn't sit well with him. While not the smartest lawyer in the world, he did know that if it ever got out that the sheriff and former sheriff had conspired to send an innocent man to jail, every case the two lawmen worked would be appealed and he would spend the rest of his term in court.
He looked Johnny straight in the eyes and said, "What the hell are you bringing this up for at this late date?" Without even waiting for an answer he continued, "Get rid of it! I'll be damned if I am going to spend the rest of my career in court fighting the appeals of every jailhouse lawyer you and that idiot uncle of yours put away! Do you understand me?" With that, the man stomped out of Johnny's office. Johnny just smiled as he unlocked a drawer in his desk and carefully placed the knife in it. He was hoping that was what the man might say.
Chapter Ten -- "The Evidence"
When she had started working at the clinic, Becky's heart was bitter and hard. At first, she hated having to come back to her hometown and all its bad memories. But, as the months passed, the more she saw of the town and its people, the more her heart began to open up to them.
In her bitterness, Becky had forgotten how poor of the community really was and it occurred to her that she had it far better off in Columbus than most of the town's folk did. She began to realize that they were basically good, hard working people that had for years been exploited by the Doc and his family. To make matters worse, things had deteriorated even more before Doc Harris died.
The Doc had kept an iron-hand control over the town's economy and they had drained it every chance they could. It seemed to her that the old man had been the only thing that had kept the Harris family there for when he died, one-by-one they all began selling off their various business interests in the town to whatever out-of-town investor they could find.
Of all his relatives, only the sheriff, Johnny Wilkins and his cousin Cindy remained, probably because they had been the black sheep of the family had no real interest to sell off.
If Cindy knew anything, she never mentioned it to Becky, but that was because everyone involved had been careful not to tell her for fear she might spill what she knew while in a drunken haze.
Becky had been working at the clinic for almost five months when she got the call from Johnny Wilkins asking if he could meet her somewhere and talk to her.
Even thought Becky didn't trust the man, she knew he might be her last chance to learn something that could help Ethan so she agreed to meet him at 4:00 that Saturday afternoon at the clinic after it closed. Becky was surprised when she looked out into the lobby, as the doors were being locked, and found the sheriff waiting for her; she had expected him not to show up. He had a small blue gym bag sitting on the floor next to him.
When Becky walked into the lobby the sheriff rose to his feet and, for just a few seconds, the two just stood there looking at each other, neither of them sure what to say to the other. It was then that Doctors Jennings and Mercer walked in followed by Cindy.
Becky had told them all about the meeting that morning. As Dr. Mercer and Cindy sat on one of the couches near him, Dr. Jennings leaned with his back against the wall opposite the man. All eyes in the room looked at the sheriff expectedly.
The lawman bent down to the floor and picked up the gym bag. Holding it with one hand, he opened it, reached inside and pulled something out. When they saw what it was, everyone stiffened for he was holding in his had a dusty clear plastic evidence bag containing a knife.
"Is that?" Becky asked, she could barely get the words out.
The sheriff lowered his head and said in a low voice, "Yes."
"Where did you find it?" She inquired, her heart racing.
Without raising his head, the lawman answered, "It was under Ethan's car in the impound lot. It must have gotten stuck somewhere in the undercarriage. I guess the knife was knocked loose when the tow truck lowered it to the ground."
"Who found it?" Becky asked.
