In Memory of Baby Beth

Today I am thankful that I realized why I vomit when I think of my missing granddaughter.

I've had trouble holding down food since August. 

Now, after visiting the doctor, I understand that there was a medical condition that was causing it.  That was resolved in October in the saddest way possible.  It was resolved. 

The vomiting began again in November, after my daughter started talking about her kiddo being with her dad. 

Now, at first, I didn't really blink about it.  I was worried about the little girl because of the craziness of her family life, the violence in the home, and the threats of her father to take her to live with his undocumented alien parents in Dallas.

I didn't know that her dad had followed through with his threat and taken her out of state. 

I figured that he was just having some type of daily daddy time.  The more evasive my daughter became about their daughter's whereabouts, the more sick I became.


When I learned that she had been out of state for 90 days, I fell ill.  When I was told he would probably have her six months, I became worried.  She could lose residency here and my daughter could lose the chance to see her. 

When I think of it, I throw up. 

I'm not joking. 

When I asked my daughter when the child would return and received a series of rude text messages that would rival the content of many Jay Z songs.....I became frightened.  My daughter doesn't talk like that.

So.....my ex-husband said that he had a private investigator track the child's father down to Texas.  The trail grew cold in Arlington. 

Now that I think of it, my ex could have tracked the man down.  His family is full of stalkers.  They should be able to locate the kiddo in no time.  Why am I worried? 

I have a famous Voodoo Queen from New Orleans praying for the little girl. 

I figure that it couldn't hurt. 

******

In meditation today, I remembered baby Beth.  I remember how she looked at her funeral. 

At that memory, I found myself stifling vomit.   

She was 18 months old.  In her casket, she was so swollen that she looked like an obese four year old. 

The caretaker did a decent job hiding the bruises but the thought that someone beat her to death made me sick. 

Her death touched many people in the community.  At the funeral, we sat surrounded by politicians and media personalities.  One reporter would be sued by the father for telling the truth, the father needed to be investigated.  The message was clear, the father would sue anyone who tried to get to the truth. 

The reporter was right on the money.  Intuitively, I know who did it.  The DA said that there was no proof. 

******

Beth was born three days after my twenty-sixth birthday.  I remember the phone call.  I remember looking out the window of our rental home on a retro blue dial phone talking to her father and taking the news for Michael.  Michael called her dad Dopey because he did a lot of drugs and had a tendency towards making stupid decisions.  Michael and Dopey had known each other since childhood.

We wouldn't hear from Dopey again for 18 months.  We never got to see Baby Beth in person.

I remember the day she died.  It was May 23, 1998.  I arrived home after spending a day in training where I took a volunteer job visiting with the mothers of newborn children.  We had moved.  I was in the kitchen of our new home.  I had a cordless phones for the first time in my life.  Dopey called and said the darndest thing. 

He said that he had just dropped Beth off at daycare and was driving to work in his truck.  He hung up before I could ask if he had dialed the right number.  Perhaps he meant to call his wife? 

The next morning, I saw the news.   Shortly after Dopey called to say he dropped his daughter off, the babysitter discovered Beth on her bed.  She was no longer breathing.

The babysitter stood trial for Beth's death.  I made the papers for blasting her defense attorney: he blamed the child's death on her brother.  If a child kills another child in daycare, the babysitter is not doing her job.  That is probably why the DA offered lesser charges towards the babysitter; by blaming the brother, she admitted guilt.

After I said my peace in the news, no one repeated the a$$hat lawyer's claim. 

I am convinced that the babysitter didn't do it. 

To this day, I firmly believe Dopey killed his child. 

I say that because he and his wife were frequent flyers in the DV system.  It was not uncommon for him to be bailed out of jail on Mondays for beating his wife black and blue.  He had nearly an entire shelf dedicated to the three files where the district attorney kept information on his crimes. 

Somehow Dopey figured out that I volunteered for the DA's office and would call me at home asking me to do things to ruin the case against him.  I wound up asking to be transferred.  I did not want to do anything to keep that joker out of jail.  Worse, my ex-husband started yelling at me when my boss called the house, so I wound up leaving my job out of embarrassment.

I was happy not to have to deal with Dopey again but sad at the same time.  I spent a lot of time tracking down the families of undocumented workers (without ID) who had died in our city.  I will never have closure.  I will never know if their bodies found their way home.  Somehow....the closure of the cases were the reward for the job. 

It pissed me off that people were protecting Dopey.  Why? 

Dopey and his wife later divorced.  The family court awarded Dopey custody of the remaining two children.  I wonder why in the world our state does not have laws that take domestic violence into account in custody litigation.  How many children have to die before we get wise to the issues at hand?  Men who abuse their wives can and do abuse their children.
*****

Dopey has called over here once in the past few years.  He wanted to let us know that his eldest son was driving.  I honestly feared that he had beaten his son to a pulp and wanted to blame it on a car crash or something. 
I can't figure out how he found my unlisted phone number.  I find it weird.  He had it!

He is one face I never want to see again. 

Beth's story is the one that fills me with the most rage. 

When I pin or write about domestic violence, I am usually thinking about Dopey. 

There are some people that I wish would fall into a pit of piranhas.  Dopey is one of them. 


He is evil.  He is pure evil.  How in the world can someone like that exist in the same world as the rest of us?  I'll never understand.

May Dopey NEVER cross my path again. 

Love ya,

S.