Doc: The Rape of the Town of Lovell (26 page)

Then Doctor's lawyers warned that sooner or later she would have to tell everything she knew or be held in contempt. Father in Heaven, she prayed, I'm getting it from both sides. I'll go to jail! What'll happen to my children?

She drove to Emma Lu's house. "They're pressuring me," she told her old aunt. "What's gonna happen if I have to say your name, and I can't, and they send me to jail?"

"I've had it with all those people!" Aunt Emma said. "Go ahead, Diana. Tell 'em I'll testify."

Two days before the formal Medical Board hearing, Diana answered the phone at home. "What's going on?" Doctor asked. "I just heard from my lawyer that Julia Bradbury and Emma Meeks are listed as witnesses against me. Diana, do you suppose you could come over?"

As she changed from her grubbies to head for the Storys', Diana felt like the rope in a tug of war. In the past, her allegiance had always been to her employer. Doctor had even delivered her children. She'd baby-sat Linda and Susan Story, exchanged holiday gifts, written poetic tributes to Doctor and delivered them tremblingly to his life-giving hands. The Storys always told her she was different from other Mormons.

When she'd returned to the clinic after several years away, she'd found a mess. Doctor's gross income was over $100,000 a year, but she saw ways to streamline the system and clean up unpaid bills. She even turned up a tax shelter v. here he could stash his profits at a good rate of interest. She had a secret laugh over that one; the administrators were LDS.

The very next year, the Storys took in so much money that they had to pay $25,000 in income taxes. Marilyn acted depressed, Doctor sulked, and they both made Diana feel guilty. She thought, They hate the government so much, they'd rather make less money than pay their fair share.

By then she'd begun to wonder about a few other things. One woman flat refused to pay her bill. "I'll never pay it and Dr. Story knows why," she confided.

Then Diana began to notice that Doctor was spending long periods in the examining room. She thought she detected a pattern: lengthy sessions with vulnerable women, single women, women whose marriages were troubled or whose husbands were sick or weak, and short workmanlike sessions with bright forceful women or well-married women or women whose husbands were important or powerful. His favorite patient was a married blonde whom everyone else in the office despised. He frequently dilated her for "headaches," sometimes even at night. The woman's arrival seemed to set Marilyn on edge. "Her again!" she would complain. "I don't like that woman. I don't know what's going on in there. I think she has designs on him." Marilyn would pace the hall outside the examining room.

Over the years, Diana had watched her dear friend change, beginning with Annette's death. Marilyn was no whiner, but a few complaints had worked to the surface. She said she couldn't relate to Lovell or its people. She'd wanted to leave from the first year, but Doctor had refused. They'd made few close friends. She'd always found physical closeness difficult, even with her daughters. More than once she made it plain that her sex life as a doctor's wife was mostly a memory.

As Diana drove toward the Storys' home, Aunt Emma's friend Julia Bradbury popped into mind. One day in the early eighties, Julia had stopped Diana on Jersey Avenue. "Diana," she said, "quit billing me, because I'm not paying for what Dr. Story did to me. Someday somebody's gonna clean that man's plow."

Diana had told Doctor, "We have a problem with Julia Bradbury. She doesn't want to pay. She is very unhappy about her exam."

"Give me her chart," he instructed. He brushed through it, snapped it closed, and said, "Well, forget it. We don't need patients like her anyway. We'll just write it off."

On an early morning not long afterward, she'd gone into Examining Room No. 2 to empty the wastebasket and found a wad of moist tissues with the strong smell of semen. She'd checked the appointment book and noticed that the blond femme fatale had been examined at 2
p.m
. the day before. Diana had quietly resigned.

Dr. Story's latest words repeated in her ears as she pulled up in front of the house in response to his summons.
Diana, do you suppose you could come over?
It was so unlike him to plead.

When he ushered her in, she was already crying. She refused his offer of a tranquilizer. A red-eyed Marilyn sat on the sofa twisting her hands.

DIANA HARRISON

"Diana," Doctor said, "this is getting out of hand. Look at you. You're just too upset. Why don't you and Bill take some time off? We'll just send you to Hawaii. Then you won't have to go to that hearing."

"Please," she said. "No."

"All those women," he went on. "These two latest ones, Emma Lu Meeks and Julia Bradbury, they're good friends. They take walks together. They just worked up this story together."

Diana knew better. Julia had confided in Emma Lu, but not vice versa. Her aunt was still too ashamed.

After a while, Diana realized there was nothing she could say or do that would help. She didn't want to sit there and parrot polite falsehoods. She left as she'd come, in tears. She wondered if the long friendship was over.

34

MARILYN STOW

Marilyn scanned the witness list and couldn't believe how many names there were. The hearing was set for the farm town of Wor-land, seventy miles south of Lovell, and was expected to last three or four days. John still treated it like Flag Day at the Ft. McPher-son cemetery in his Nebraska childhood. He told Marilyn they would commute to the hearing, but Charles Kepler, Loretta's father and leader of the defense team, said, "I want you in Worland twenty-four hours a day. You need to be rested."

"I can't leave my patients," John insisted.

Kepler convinced him that he had to.

Reluctantly, they checked into a Worland motel. Marilyn couldn't shake the glooms. Some of these Wyoming places were so dry and bleak. Well, everything's in God's hands now, she told herself, but isn't it always? She turned to her journal for comfort. It was really a collection of entreaties and thank-you notes from her to the Lord. If she was too depressed, she didn't write for weeks. The last four entries showed her state of mind:

MARILYN STORY

Jan. 12 Lord, forgive me. I have wavered and doubted and become depressed. I have fallen into the trap of looking at all this from a worldly perspective. Help me to be more stable and steadfast!

Feb. 22 There is still more than a month till the hearing. It seems like it will never end some days. Help us to be steadfast, Lord. Thank you for all the answered prayers.

Feb. 29 Another accuser has come forward. Satan wants us to "go under"—as long as Peter kept his eyes on the Lord, he didn't start to go under. . . .

Mar. 10 [A quote from] Oswald Chambers: "Have you been bolstering up that stupid soul of yours with the idea that your circumstances are too much for God?"

The hearings in the Washakie County courthouse were closed, even to family and press, and she spent her time walking in the crunchy crusts of leftover snow and reading Scripture in the motel room. Right in the middle of things, John had to rush to Lovell to treat his nurse's husband for severe stomach pains; it turned into an appendectomy.

On breaks from the hearing, John sometimes hurried back to the motel to see her, but he hardly mentioned the testimony. He still seemed bemused, and she was amazed at his tolerance. Even if he was completely cleared, those awful Mormon women had sullied his good name. That insult could never be forgiven.

35

THE RECORD

The psychopath [or sociopath] makes a mockery not only of the truth but also of all authority and institutions.

—Arnold Buss, M.D.,
Psychopathology

BEFORE THE WYOMING STATE BOARD OF MEDICAL EXAMINERS In the Matter of the License of JOHN H. STORY, M.D.

(Excerpts)

Defense Counsel Charles
G.
Kepler
The thing that I find very concerning, they are charging the doctor here with rape. You haven't heard that term yet, but that's exactly what we're talking about. At some point they are going to start talking about him using his penis to dilate a woman so that he could conduct a pelvic examination. I can't conceive how that could be done except by him placing his penis in her vagina. And I don't care whether you're a doctor or a lawyer or somebody walking the streets, that's rape. The only thing that I don't understand is why we are having it before this particular board. It seems to me that rape is a criminal charge and it should go before a criminal body rather than before a body of this kind. ... I will try it as a criminal charge just as if we were before a jury. . . .

Assistant attorney general Kathy Karpan
Your Honor, I must object. This is not a rape proceeding and I believe that your instructions to the board and, I think, our statute will not

be followed if Mr. Kepler is allowed to transform this proceeding. • • •

Hearing officer John F. Raper
Well, the objection is sustained. . . . This is a separate proceeding from a criminal proceeding. ... If the prosecutors of some county want to take an interest in it, that's fine. . . .

Kepler I
appreciate that. ...
I
want to make clear also before I go on with evidence that I personally do not believe that the doctor is guilty of any of these charges. We are going to place him on the stand. And I think one of the things that is going to be beneficial to you is we're going to have his medical records which he kept meticulously. ... I think it will give you an insight into not only Dr. Story and his very careful record keeping, but also as to the nature of the complaining witnesses. . . .

We're going to try to bring in evidence so that you understand the town of Lovell a little bit better than perhaps you do now. It is a small community. It is made up of many Mormon families. The Mormons are a very collusive group, closely related. You're going to find in the town of Lovell, half the Mormons are related to the other half or vice versa. They are close in their marriage. They are very clannish and they are certainly a rumormonger. . . . The Mormons in and of themselves and their clannishness will give you an explanation when this is all over with as to how these things came about, how these things got started.

You will find that two of your prime witnesses are sisters. The testimony will show that their mother had been an official and was an official not too long ago in the Mormon Church, and I think it will show that she used her official capacity to help at least orchestrate what you're going to hear in the next couple of days. . . .

TESTIMONY OF DEE COZZENS

Q ... What year did you go to work in Lovell as the hospital administrator?

A August of 1968, I believe.

Q And how long were you there?

A Through November of 1974.

Q ... What was the substance of the suggestion you made to Dr. Story?

"DOC"

A Just a suggestion that he have a nurse or someone in the examination room with him when he had a woman in there. Q Did Dr. Story respond to your suggestion . . . ? A No. He just kind of shook his head and that was about all. I don't recall he was upset at anything. We left it at that.

36

DIANA HARRISON

Diana hoped she looked respectable. She'd spent hours deciding on her slack-pants ensemble and applying her makeup. She never left her house until she looked her best.

She'd been subpoenaed by both sides, and as she walked toward the witness stand, she felt torn. What did the state want from her? And Dr. Story's lawyers—did they expect her to deny what she'd seen in his office? Whatever happened, she was going to back up Aunt Emma Lu and her friend Julia Bradbury. Those dear old ladies wouldn't be going through this ordeal if it weren't for her.

The questioning went faster than she'd expected. The assistant attorney general drew her out about the day she'd talked Minda Brinkerhoff into coming into the clinic. Then she testified about her admiration for Doctor and Marilyn. "She's a very good person," Diana said.

She tried to keep her answers truthful, minimal, and inoffensive. She was just starting a sideline business in draperies and didn't need enemies on either Side. She testified that she bore Doctor no ill will. From time to time she glanced his way, but he always seemed to be scribbling on his yellow scratch pad. He looked like

an elf next to his three lawyers. The poor man, she thought. How did he ever get into a mess like this?

She was asked if she knew Minda BrinkerhofF, Meg Anderson, Arden McArthur, Irene Park, Carol Beach, Aletha Durtsche. Yes, she said. What about Jean Anderson Howe? Diana said she knew the name. She confirmed that they were all LDS.

The cross-examination was short but intense, much of it about office procedures. Diana testified that there were times when a nurse was present during pelvic exams and it didn't matter to her personally one way or the other. Her own exams had always been routine. Yes, it was possible to interrupt Doctor during pelvics; it happened on an average of once a day.

Q
(By
Loretta Kepler
) What was his behavior toward women?