Del.icio.us
Digg
Reddit
Facebook
StumbleUpon
Charm and Criticism
By then, some of April's loved ones had begun to see a disturbing pattern. "Justin seemed very into appearances," says April's aunt Patti Parrish, a civil court judge. He tried on his jeans from high school every month and fasted until they fit. He made fun of his overweight mother behind her back, and publicly criticized April's singing voice, her taste in clothing and her weight. He warned her not to embarrass him at his company Christmas party and discouraged her from calling or e-mailing him at work. When his barbs made her cry, he mimicked her sobs. Yet April tolerated Justin's mistreatment.
But in January 2001, when Justin was transferred to Jacksonville, April decided to stay put. "She told me that if they lived together every day, they'd kill each other," Amber says. Justin bought a condo in an upscale neighborhood, and the two saw each other on weekends. Usually it was April who drove the three hours to visit.
She just wasn't ready to give up on Justin. He could be charming, and his criticisms dovetailed with some of her deep insecurities. "She was harder on herself than anyone else," says Amber. "She put up with a lot from her men."
Still, there was always a point at which she drew the line.
The man in the hospital bed was soft-spoken and personable, and seemed eager to help catch his wife's killer. But something about him made Detective Howard "Skip" Cole uneasy. Justin's account of the attack was oddly businesslike. "His body language and demeanor didn't seem appropriate," says Cole, 35, who'd been assigned to lead the investigation.
In the days that followed, Cole's suspicions grew. Justin's story was frustratingly vague, and the details kept changing. The case raised a slew of questions. How did Justin escape with minor wounds -- he left the hospital with just his arm in a sling -- while his wife was killed with a single shot? Why did he claim she'd been drinking, when her blood-alcohol level measured .000? Why had he left his cell phone at home that night, and why didn't he use April's, in her purse on the passenger-side floor of his car? What made him drive so far in search of help, when there were mansions and gas stations along his route?
Meanwhile, April's friends and relatives were pondering possible answers. Aunt Patti remembered that in the summer of 2001, April had told her Justin wanted them to take out $2 million insurance policies on each other's lives. "She asked if I didn't think it weird that he was pushing for such a large amount," Patti says. "I told her yeah but said I didn't think they would qualify. She called back the next day and said, 'You can't say anything to Justin. He'll be furious if he finds out I told you.'"
Justin found a company that would cover them. Not long afterward, April began to suspect that he was having an affair. She told Amber she'd found an earring in his bedroom, and in July 2002, she discovered he was playing tennis regularly with a rental-car agent named Shannon Kennedy. Despite Justin's admonitions, April e-mailed him at work, asking him to tell her when he was socializing with other women. Justin responded with a sarcastic message listing every female he'd glimpsed that day.
April told her boss, Ramesh Nair, that she was going to confront Justin on their anniversary -- August 4. She visited her husband that weekend; when she returned, she told Nair that she'd threatened to end the marriage, but Justin had denied everything. She seemed agitated. On Friday the 16th, she drove back to Jacksonville.
The next night, she was dead.
Amber and Patti's first thought was "Justin did it." And Nair was struck by a memory from a few months earlier: "One day, out of the blue, April said, 'If anything happens to me, suspect foul play.' I answered with a joke, and she looked hurt, like, You're not taking me seriously. Don't forget."
Advertisement 
Your Comments
See all
...