Living with Crazy: Calling in a 5150

At about 8 a.m. Thursday, March 22, Humboldt State University Police Officer Tom Dewey heard over the radio that a suicidal man was barricaded in the bathroom of his Arcata home.

Dewey was interested because the address was the Arcata home, where my husband, John, child and I had lived since 1998. Dewey was especially interested because the suicidal man would turn out to be my husband, and my husband was the prime suspect in an investigation Dewey was now charged with leading.

"We parked outside the residence while [Arcata police officers] dealt with the situation," Dewey wrote as part of his report on his investigation into my husband's crimes at Humboldt State.

"We saw Sterns [my husband] walk down his driveway and climb into an ambulance. Then the ambulance drove away. I learned that Sterns had left the bathroom voluntarily and decided to commit himself ... for a mental health evaluation."

Minutes later, Dewey was at my front door. I let him in. He acted concerned, and I was in shock, but calm and wary. He was the officer assigned to investigate whatever it was my husband had done wrong. I only had a vague idea of how much trouble John was in; John had not told me too much.

With Dewey, I would be polite and cooperate but on guard. At certain points in our otherwise cordial conversation, I would say "I don't know" or actually say "I'm not going to answer that."

As our 2-year-old remained quiet in the upstairs master bedroom, I sat with Dewey downstairs in our living room and, within limits, answered his questions.

Here is what Dewey reported:

"Ross said that she and Sterns had met in the late 1980s. They were married in 1991. They have a 3-year-old son. They lived in Thailand from 1989 to 1992, and in San Francisco from 1992 to 1998..."

"Ross said Sterns has a history of depression, which started in his teens. He has told Ross that he attempted suicide once prior to their marriage. He saw a psychotherapist in Berkeley for his depression from 1994 to 1996. In recent years, it seemed that Sterns had a handle on his depression, and knew how to deal with it now. He has not seen a psychotherapist, psychiatrist or psychologist since arriving at Humboldt State in 1998. He is not presently prescribed any mental health medication.

"Starting last year, it seemed that Sterns was starting to have some trouble with depression again. He was struggling with the depression, off and on. They began looking for employment elsewhere. ...

"On Tuesday, Sterns came home and told Ross that he had been placed on administrative leave. Ross told him that he needed an attorney. ...

"Sterns' depression became more visible late on Tuesday and again on Wednesday. After [he] met with [his attorney], Sterns disclosed to Ross that he was thinking about hurting himself. Ross replied that if Sterns did hurt himself, it would destroy her and [their son]. They talked about things, and Sterns seemed open and rational.

"On Wednesday night/Thursday morning, Sterns was apparently up during the night. At about 5:30 a.m., Sterns was up. He phoned his sister. ... Then depression flooded over Sterns. ... He disclosed that he felt like hurting himself again. ...

"They made an initial plan to have Ross take Sterns to the hospital after she took [their child] to school. Before Ross left for school, Sterns ended up breaking down again. They decided they needed to take Sterns to the hospital immediately, and called for an ambulance to respond.

"I provided Ross with an employee assistance informational sheet. I offered to take weapons for safekeeping. She admivsed me that Sterns possessed no weapons and that there were no guns in the house. We left about 9:02 a.m."

Living with Crazy: March 20, 2001, one day that will live in infamy

As we all know, memory is a funny thing. I don't necessarily trust mine, certainly not related to events that happened almost exactly 10 years ago.

My husband has offered his version of some of the events of March 20, 2001 in "Caught," an entry on his blog, A Life With Mental Illness. He talks about how he was confronted by his boss on that Tuesday morning and asked to leave his job. He had to face coming home and telling me "something bad has happened."

While I have offered my account of John's homecoming and our initial reactions to his life-changing news, here is yet another point of view--from the Humboldt State University Police Department officer who investigated my husband's case.

Yes, in my twistedly sentimental way, I held onto these police reports. The detective's account offers another point of view but also clarifies and illuminates some of the gaps in my own memory. I paraphrase and quote from the reports, written by Officer Tom Dewey, who now serves as chief of the Humboldt State University police.

Late February, 2001

Members of the Humboldt State University police department, like all staff at Humboldt State, received a memo saying that my husband, John, would be resigning from his job as executive director of university advancement to take another job.

March 20, 2001

10:46 a.m.: Officer Dewey, on a field training assignment with another officer, was dispatched to do a "civil standby" at the university's "The Alumni House." This is a former house on campus that was converted into spaces for offices, including my husband's. Dewey had been told that John was placed on administrative leave, was moving out of his office, and that his now former co-workers needed the police to help them make sure he wasn't removing any vital documents or other university property.

After opening desk drawers for his co-workers, pointing to his computer and showing them some personal computer disks, my husband was able to leave with several boxes, which he put into the back of our Toyota Corolla.

***

12:10 p.m.

Humboldt State University Police Chief Thomas Foster tells Dewey that my husband's boss has information that my husband 1) falsified claims for meal, gift and travel expenses, and 2) forged university officials' signatures. Foster assigned Dewey to initiate the criminal investigation.

Foster also told Dewey that he had just received a call from my husband, in which John "made reference to some of his actions" and promised that he "wanted to fully cooperate with the police and provide details about those actions."

Dewey next conducted a computer criminal background search on my husband, which showed that he had no criminal history.

***

1:35 p.m.

Dewey called our house and spoke to John, tape recording the call.

Dewey first expressed concerns about my husband's welfare.

"That's so nice," my husband responded to Dewey's words. He explained he was going to go see a priest at a local Catholic church. My husband was raised Catholic and said he prayed, though he wasn't a regular church-going member of the Church. "You know, to be honest, I'm really--sorry I hurt people," my husband said. "That's how I am. Stupid. And wrong. And I feel bad."

Dewey said he told my husband that we all make mistakes--some are little and some are big-and that the true test of a person's character was not that he made a mistake but how he dealt with it.

My husband continued to express regret, including for hurting his co-workers. "And you know, I need to just say, this is what happened ... [and] make it as right as we can."

My husband said he would help Dewey untangle his misdeeds, gave Dewey permission to search his office, and said he didn't keep anything work-related at home.

The two arranged for my husband to come into the police department at 1 p.m. the next day.

"I promised Sterns that I would not arrest him when he came into the station Wednesday," Dewey wrote.

***

My husband has since told me that my anger over his plan to go see police and my demand that he seek legal representation drove up his level of suicidal thinking--and psychosis. He was anguished by guilt. His instinct and desire was just to go in and talk to Dewey, tell all, help the police with their investigation, and unburden himself.

Over the next 40 hours, my husband would start to "lose it." His mind, his sanity, however you want to define it.

Living With Crazy: He can't really be thinking about killing himself

Your husband has told you that he has been thinking about killing himself every day for about a year. Wouldn't the most safe and sensible thing be to get him to a psychiatrist or to the emergency room?

Yes, of course.

But, I wasn't being safe or sensible.

What? John kill himself? It just didn't seem real. He could be moody and withdrawn sometimes, but so desperately unhappy he wanted to die? We had a good life--or we seemed to up until he arrived home from work a few minutes before--in the middle of the day--and announced that something bad had happened.

I had never dealt with someone who was suicidal, or anyone who was in this kind of crisis. Again, I couldn't believe it. John?

Not only was he the smartest person I knew, he was the guy everyone went to if they were having troubles with work, family, romantic relationships. He was a great listener, and he had been a lifelong volunteer for different nonprofits, where he was often in the position of helping people with problem solving. This included, when we first started going out, working on a crisis hotline in San Francisco, talking people out of taking their lives. Before, our baby was born, he had volunteered at San Francisco's Zen Hospice, tending to people who were dying. Surely, someone with with this sort of background had to know himself pretty well and to have a pretty healthy sense of self.

How could he be so incredibly depressed he was suicidal? I just couldn't believe it.

In any event, the longer we sat there on our sofa, the more my mind turned to his news he was under police investigation.

The investigation must have been on John's mind to, because he announced he wanted to call the Humboldt State University police. He got up, went to the phone, and was put right through to the chief, whom he knew from working around campus. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry," I heard him say.

Then he made an appointment to go in and meet with the police in a few days.

I absorbed this news, and then thought, shit, he can't go into the police and just tell them everything he did--whatever it was he did.

People under police investigation are not supposed to talk to the police. I didn't just learn that from TV shows or movies. In a former life, I had been a newspaper reporter--a crime reporter to be exact. That's just how it was. A suspect risked a lot. As the Miranda warning goes, anything a suspect says--even something seemingly benign--could be interpreted in certain ways and used against a suspect in a court of law.

I was also aware of the phenomenon of false confessions. Yes, people do confess to crimes they don't commit. Residents of the San Francisco Bay Area might remember the highly publicized case of Bradley Page, an Acalanes High graduate and UC Berkeley student prosecuted for the 1984 murder of his girlfriend, Roberta "Bibi" Lee, also a UC Berkeley student.

Well, in the year or so before becoming a mom, I had written about Page's confession--having gained access to the transcript of it. Fascinating document; it showed clearly how a mentally distraught, eager-to-please suspect could be led by persuasive detectives, after hours of interrogation, into saying things that could come off as incriminating. With an absence of physical evidence, and in the era before DNA testing, Page was convicted in his girlfriend's killing solely on the basis of this so-called confession, in which, I recall, he never actually said anything to the effect of "I did it" but "If I were to do it, this is how I would."

I saw my husband as being sort of Brad Page-like--mentally distraught and eager to please.

John was also anguished by guilt. Yes, it was clear he had been caught doing something wrong, something illegal. He had been escorted out of his office by campus police after being confronted.

Hearing that he was going to go meet with police, I envisioned him spending hours with detectives and perhaps taking responsibility for things he didn't do.

After the interview, I thought, he'd be taken into custody. Jail. What about our child?

I was suddenly angry. What did John mean he was just going to walk into the university police department and talk to detectives? No, I told him, you're not going to do that.

You're going to get a lawyer.

If only I had thought about getting him to the hospital.

Living with Crazy: Something Bad Has Happened

As I write this, I realize it has been nearly 10 years since the occurrence of the life-changing events I have begun to describe. Ten years.

Ten years ago, I was a stay-at-home mom to a 2-year-old. My husband, child and I lived in a spacious two-story rental house in the middle of the redwoods, just outside the college town of Arcata. My husband was bright, personable. He was a loving husband and father, and he seemed to be doing well at his job. He was giving our toddler and me a nice peaceful life

My days were filled with looking after my child, feeding him oatmeal in the morning, changing his diapers, getting him dressed. We'd go to this fitness center in town, where I could exercise and he could play in a baby sitting facility known as Kids Korner. After the gym, we'd go get me a mocha at this Whole Foods-type, locally owned grocery store which had a cafe. The barristas would whip up extra milk foam for him. The two of us would sit there together, chatting in the way you can with 2-year-olds. I would drink my mocha; he would devour his foam.

We might to go a playground, or meet friends from my moms' group, and he could run around a playground with some other kids. Or he and I might go for a walk along any of the trails into the redwoods that surrounded Arcata. Sometimes, on a nice day, I'd take him to one of the beaches a few miles west of Arcata and up north along 101. The beaches in Humboldt County are gorgeous and varied. One might roll with amazing sand dunes we'd roll around it. Others held huge logs, bleeched by the water, that had swept back to shore. They made for excellent climbing.

The beaches were almost always empty. We'd be the only ones there. Outside of the towns, Humboldt County represents one of the most remote parts of California.

After the playground or the beach, we'd go home, have lunch, and then it would be naptime.

My husband usually would come home around 5:30 p.m. We lived close enough to the Humboldt State campus that he could walk home. However, on a rainy day, my son and I would go pick him up--we only had one car. We would bring my husband home, and altogether, we would eat dinner.

Evenings were spent playing with our toddler, running trains around his Thomas the Tank engine set, or actually pretending to be trains, the three of us tearing around the upstairs, in and out of our bedrooms, falling on our child's bed, tickling him, and then running around some more.

I missed the Bay Area. I missed our big-city life in San Francisco as up-and-coming professions. But after our son came in 1998, my husband felt eager to leave. The city, with the dot-com era heating up, was becoming too expensive. He convinced me it would be a good idea to give small-town life a try. A college town seemed like a good place to experiment with a more low-key life-style. There would be some of the culture you get in a more urban area, just on a smaller scale.

That life of small-town bliss came to an end with my husband's big news on March 20, 2001.

But you know, I didn't take it in, the reality of the news that was coming in to me. What he was telling me was frightening, traumatic, life-changing.

But I listened to his words calmly, as if they didn't really mean disaster. No, this will all blow over in a day or two, I thought.

I realize now his news had suddenly thrust me into a state of disbelief, shock and denial--a state that would last for years, and lingers to to this day. When he suddenly appeared at home on that Tuesday morning--a workday morning--and announced, "Something bad has happened," I ran downstairs, hugged him and said something vaguely supportive like "We'll deal with whatever it is together."

I led him to the living room sofa. Somewhere between the hug and the couch, he explained that he had been fired from his job as a Humboldt State University fundraiser. He said he had been caught padding his expense accounts and falsifying documents to make it look like he was more successful than he actually was.

He sagged into the sofa cushion: "I"m sorry. I'm so sorry," he said. And then he told me that he had been severely depressed for more than a year and had, on a daily basis, been thinking of killing myself.

Once again, I said something consoling and stroked his hand. But that strange calm stayed with me. I didn't know what else to say, so we sat together quietly for a while.