Chapter 6

Evidence Tampering

Eventually, Frank Brown became concerned that there would never be a conviction in this case. He knew that I had hired the most preeminent defense attorney in the state, James Speck, past president and current member of the board of directors of the Missouri Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Speck was a high-priced Kansas City specialist with twenty-five years experience with cases like mine. He defended me with distinguished ethics and impeccable integrity. He hired as part of the defense team, Patrick Eng, a celebrated Columbia, Missouri attorney with expertise in high-profile cases. When the case was dismissed on 4 August 1994, the Boone County assistant prosecutor was removed from the case and the handsome politician and head prosecuting attorney himself took over, and refiled charges. He brought in a new assistant prosecutor, a pretty female with big-city experience from St. Louis, and put on a polished prosecuting investigator to look over Brown's shoulder. Jackson County took an opposite approach: When the prosecutors realized their case was unwinnable, they each in succession transferred it to a less experienced assistant prosecutor, until by-and-by it was given to a new graduate as his first case.

While the isolated librarians and archivists were making their allegations, the most respectable people, including dozens of retired and current appointees in the RLDS Church, stood firm in my defense--among which were liberals like Carl Mesle and James Everett; and conservatives like David Bowerman and Richard Price. The universal encouragement is summarized in a short statement from Garland Tickemyer: "We trust you completely . . . In the meantime, please be aware of our confidence and affection, and call on us for any character support that we may be able to give."(1) In particular, I was aided by people from whom I purchased books in the past. Three local people who owned first edition Books of Mormon were going to testify as character witnesses, including Clair Weldon, who sold me a first edition Book of Mormon on 6 April 1993.(2) All five of the booksellers with whom I have dealt on the Independence Square expressed their support during the last year, each knowing that ex-library books fill the marketplace.(3) One dealer wrote in the Independence Examiner that I will tell her she is not charging enough for a book, she will raise the price, and then I will buy the book: "They [the Hajiceks] have spent years building a business and a reputation for scrupulous honesty," she affirmed.(4) Joe Smith, the lumberjack great-grandson and namesake of Joseph Smith Jr., was honorably going to testify in my trial as a character witness, he having been a frequent overnight guest in my home during his regular speaking visits to Independence. The list of friends and clients seemed endless, and I shall never forget the support.

There were experts too, who were masters and doctors in each profession relevant to the case. The world's finest Mormon historian was coming from Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, to testify about all of the intricacies of Mormon printing history that demonstrated that the librarians were confused, and to testify as a character and material witness. An upstanding university police sergeant, who is a world renowned library security expert, was coming from Washington State, and was expected to testify that the police working this case were confused. Expert library researchers, who were also material and character witnesses, were coming from New York and Philadelphia. A rare book conservator and university instructor was coming from Kenosha, Wisconsin to testify as an expert, character, and material witness. I am indebted to each of those outstanding people for their intellectual ability to attest to what is ethical and right.

The capstone witness in the case would have been my striking and intelligent wife, Dena--sure to captivate the attention of the jury while she recited her firsthand account of the founding of my sundry business ventures, and the establishment of my rare book library. She would have then, in an upheaval of the prosecution's case, affirmed that she was present with me in Wisconsin on 3 March 1992 and in Illinois on 29 April 1993, and with her unimpeachable character and innocent charm would have verified my alibis for those days according to her physical accompaniment and distinct knowledge of my whereabouts. Further, she would have sprung forth the evidence of the bills that she had herself paid and retained, and the corresponding receipts, all in her possession from then to the present day, to document those alibis in such a way that the librarians would have cowered in shame. Were those receipts insufficient to persuade the most obstinate juror, she would have unfurled the bookseller's receipt on his company letterhead, and a canceled check in her own hand, for the Book of the Law of the Lord--with its provenance identifying it by its black sheepskin binding and red manuscript notations. She would have combined that with her above conversant skill in describing the physical attributes of the book, upon its arrival, carefully packed and sealed by registered mail (she retained the postmarked box). She would have presented it with such drama that any reasonable person would understand the absence of any visible indications that the book could have long ago belonged to a library. As an eyewitness of the search of our home, she would have reliably rebutted the jumbled accounts of Frank Brown and his cohorts, and explained why the allegations were scientifically impossible. Her testimony would be believed, not so much because of her luxuriant hair and sparkling green eyes, nor her teary-eyed exoneration of her husband, as the prosecution feared--but because once having the attention of the jury she would have convinced them with her articulate and technical proofs. She would have vouched for my character, ethics, and veracity, not because of naive loyalty as would be presumed by those less informed than she, but because she has witnessed my experiences with religious intolerance in this community, and among her very relations, and knows that it is the sole cause of the accusations against me. She is familiar with my accusers, and they have no credibility except among those of a lesser class.

When the prosecution discovered that we intended to bring exceedingly believable witnesses to the trial, they brought in Betty Johnson, an amateur RLDS genealogist from Lamoni, Iowa, for rebuttal testimony. She shared mutual best friends with Ron Hagaman (my father-in-law). Johnson, though, fit perfectly into the character portion of my own defense, since she had herself written letters to me, requesting my insight and knowledge about Mormon history.(5) Her testimony was presumed to be about a meeting that we had in Lamoni, during which she displayed hostile sentiments about Strang.(6) Her ancestor, Eri Moore, and his family were members of the church under Strang on Beaver Island.(7) Moore was so integral to the establishment of Strang's domain that he was consecrated to be a "Prince and Noble" in the kingdom.(8) However, afterwards he was disloyal and conspired with the government to imprison ninety-nine of the Great Lakes Mormons, on false accusations of stealing.(9) When the Mormons were acquitted of the charges, Moore skipped Beaver Island, leaving his indebted property to be sold at a sheriff's sale. Moore's ongoing endeavors led to the assassination of Strang in 1856. Since the murder of Strang was unquenching, Johnson spewed out promises to retaliate against me for the "misdeeds" of Strang in reducing her family from royalty to peasantry.

Brown reacted to our defense team, character witnesses, and experts by sparing nothing in his attempt to secure a conviction. Without even knowing the elements of our defense contained in this monograph (and other elements of surprise reserved for an unlikely future defense), he saw two years of work misfire. He commenced at the beginning to reinvestigate the case, systematically reinterviewing the witnesses, subpoenaing new records, and analyzing defense exhibits. Barbara Bernauer, the RLDS assistant archivist, helped him to procure all of my telephone numbers. He subpoenaed telephone records from Wisconsin Bell, Southwestern Bell (Missouri), AT&T (toll-free number), and Ameritech (cellular). Since the records confirmed my alibi, he used them instead to methodically contact each number indicated in the records to interview clients, colleagues, friends, relatives, hotels, insurance agents, Realtors, bookbinders, and anybody else whom I called or who had called me, during the spring of 1993. His purpose was ostensibly to find the Book of Mormon that he previously swore could not have been sold, but the outcome was instead to prevent me from doing business. Lee Pement, the RLDS museum curator, collaborated with Brown to obtain the membership records of the John Whitmer Historical Association from Alma Blair, a Graceland College history professor--which the trio did not use to seek witnesses against me as they feigned, but rather to advance prejudice among my colleagues. Brown also obtained credit reports, VISA and American Express statements, hotel bills, newspaper advertisements, and college records, to analyze my purchases, travels, and finances, and left behind a trail of damage.(10) Though Brown confirmed that I was in Missouri to buy a house and to purchase books from Bernauer on 27 April 1993 (I made exactly twenty trips between Wisconsin and Missouri from May 1991 to July 1993(11)), he learned that I was not in Missouri on the relevant afternoon of 29 April 1993, and none of the documents or contacts provided information about the Book of Mormon.

Brown's worst problem was that the state police laboratory in Jefferson City, Missouri, and the FBI Laboratory in Washington, D.C., both repeatedly determined that the fingerprints on the Book of Mormon retrieved from the library table, and those on the checkout sheets for the books used by the patron, were not mine. There are five hundred and eighty-eight pages in the Book of Mormon, and there was not one fingerprint that was mine. Brown was bewildered. The state handwriting experts could not conclusively match the patron's handwriting either, though Brown submitted and resubmitted the handwriting. When the tests failed, I volunteered to write handwriting exemplars and allow Brown to personally (and clumsily) pull about two hundred painful hair samples on 10 November 1994. When the hair samples were negative along with the fingerprints and additional handwriting, Brown was mystified. He needed to find my fingerprints on some substantial evidence somehow.(12)

I believe that most police officers are honest, and fulfill their oath to uphold the constitution and protect American citizens--that is why I campaigned to get a former Independence police captain elected as our current mayor.(13) However, in this case, Frank Brown planted a nickel that inadvertently was dated "1994," to frame me for the pretended 1993 book theft at the State Historical Society of Missouri, and I caught him right in the courthouse. The nickel was providentially among $1.90 in loose change that Brown alleged that I had left behind in the library. The change was in a sealed evidence bag, dated 29 April 1993, labeled with a destination of the fingerprinting laboratory. When Brown was caught with the nickel, the case collapsed.

Because of our mutual sentiments that the police always protect us, newspapers carrying the story did not consider the sergeant's possible motives or the relevance of the coin to the case.(14) The newspapers suggested that the nickel must have been a piece of trivial evidence. Contrarily, the nickel was important or he would not have planted it in the first place, and it would not have resulted in the subsequent implosion of the case. There was obviously something lacking in this case that made the nickel so significant. No one but the most base and depraved person would still believe anything that Brown said about this case, or that I was guilty.

The issue was that Brown confessed to fabricating, falsifying, and forging an evidence tag indicating that he intended to "find" my fingerprints on the coin. There were also questions about the sergeant's access to a basket of change during the search of our home during 1994 (the date of the coin), and access to other portable items such as ink pens and note pads that disappeared from our home. Further, Brown had forced me to use a specific pen of his own provision for the handwriting exemplars, and required me to write the samples on top of a blank note pad that he pulled from his evidence-gathering satchel.(15) A single note pad that Brown claimed to have obtained at the library, "miraculously" multiplied into three note pads, and he wanted to find my fingerprints on at least one of them.(16)

Until that day, 10 April 1995, I defended myself with the assumption that Brown and the librarians were just confused, blinded by their intolerance of my religion. I knew that Brown was suppressing exculpatory evidence and interviews,(17) but I never imagined that he would create evidence.(18) But before the discovery of the coin, at an evidentiary hearing in the Circuit Court of Boone County that afternoon, Brown's apparent perjury became excessive.

To sustain the search in which he obtained the Book of the Law of the Lord, Brown had to explain why he was searching for that particular book without a warrant. The assistant prosecutor was ready with a sequence of questions, and Brown had prepared answers. He had a warrant to search only for the Book of Mormon or receipts related to the Book of Mormon, and not to search for the Book of the Law of the Lord.(19) Brown trumpeted that his reason for looking in the Book of the Law of the Lord, specifically, was that he was looking in it for a receipt for the other book, the Book of Mormon. There were twenty thousand alternative books, and my office is idiosyncratically bordered with plastic buckets full of sorted receipts, but Brown said that he had to open that exact book in the vault while looking for a receipt for a different book. Snickers echoed throughout the courtroom, and Brown scowled at me--I knew then that his biases had resulted in more than confusion. Brown glared at me while passing on his way off the stand, and I invoked my right to examine the evidence.

There were six of us in the reciprocal discovery session that evening in the Boone County Courthouse: the prosecuting attorney, the assistant prosecutor, the prosecution's investigator, the University of Missouri police sergeant, the defense attorney, and me. When my attorney and I arrived, the prosecution had their evidence arrayed on a boardroom table. We brought ours in several hefty cartons. The prosecuting team trio was numbed as they dug through our devastating exhibits in amazement, and we explained what we were going to prove with each item. While Brown watched me, I set up a sophisticated camera, macro lens, copy stand, and lights that I had brought with me. Then I lined up a dozen rolls of film and told them that I was ready to begin. Brown's earlier scowls and glares had softened to a deathly pale stare.

The evidence was interesting and varied. There was an ink pen that Brown explained was the one the library patron used to sign the checkout sheets.(20) It was covered in fingerprint dust, and in an evidence bag (by this time it seems superfluous to point out that my fingerprints were not found on the pen). There were also the checkout sheets in another evidence bag. I looked at them contemplatively, and then at my request a blank piece of paper was obtained along with a pair of scissors. I handed the bagged pen to Brown and told him to cut the bag open, while all of the participants watched me curiously. Then I took the pen and marked an X on the paper and carried it over to the checkout sheet for comparison. There was no match--the pen was a phony. Brown had been previously questioned about the existence of a pen, and he had responded that there was none extant. I photographed the evidence and went on to the next item.(21)

There was the Book of the Law of the Lord in another plastic evidence bag. Brown cut the bag open to reveal that the book had been damaged during the year that he possessed it. Something else was more important: there was a "Property of Graceland College Library" stamp secluded on page twenty-seven that just "magically" appeared so late as 25 January 1995, after a stamp that earlier showed up on page nineteen was determined to be inconsistent with Graceland College's practice of invariably stamping page twenty-seven of every book.(22) I immediately knew something was wrong, because there were no library markings apparent on the book when Dena and I purchased it, and it was repaired by a fine book conservator who never saw any library stamps in the book. The book was displayed to many people while it was in the vault in my home, including Ron Hagaman and Richard Howard (the police officer and the RLDS Church historian, respectively). The two other trained police detectives did not find any library markings on the book when they inspected and obtained it from me during the search on 6 May 1994. I photographed the book and the stamps, and used a fine stainless steel ruler to measure the markings. A scientific examination of the photograph, measurements, and genuine Graceland College stamps revealed that Brown's stamp was two millimeters too small to be an authentic stamp from that library, and it was irregular in color and distorted. We later found expert and material witnesses who would have testified that the stamp was Brown's forgery, created with a logotype rubber stamp manufactured from a third-generation photocopy.(23)

Among the most compelling pieces of evidence was the catalog card from the State Historical Society of Missouri, and the checkout sheets, for they bring the case to a complete circle. In the preliminary hearing, the librarian called the card a "first edition card." In her later deposition my attorney therefore queried her, "What is a first edition card?" She explained, "On the shelf list it indicates that it is a first edition book. If it is." At the discovery meeting we realized that the card did not indicate that it was a first edition book, and logically it was therefore not a first edition book. Further, the typed card had been altered in a ballpoint pen to imply that it was a rare book. Similarly, the typed checkout sheet had been tampered with, with the addition of the handwritten date, "1830."(24)

Anyone who spent time with me in the last year knows how insistent that I have been of my inculpability. That innocence is what led to my next discovering the coin. A guilty man would have been intimidated by the physical evidence, but not I--for something was plainly askew, and I looked so close as to examine the finely engraved dates on some loose coins, peering transparently through the sealed plastic evidence bag.(25)

The misdated coin was the last item discovered, visible through its sealed Mylar bag. The defense filed a motion indicating that besides the coins, "Brown has tampered with other items of evidence in this case," and that I was being denied my "right to a fundamentally fair trial guaranteed by the 14th Amendment."(26) The motion was unnecessary, for the prosecutors were themselves working on motions to drop all charges.

The case was suddenly over, as dramatically as it began. The librarians and police detectives had independently participated without a conspiracy, but each reinforcing the certainty of another. The librarian at the State Historical Society of Missouri was confused about her book. Insulated librarians and archivists affiliated with the Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints were intolerant of my cultural background, and steered the investigation to me. Their confidences were so powerful that they influenced the police to tamper with evidence to cinch an unlikely conviction. However, the efforts of my enemies were uncoordinated and lacked omnipotence--besides, I was innocent--so truth was on my side: "Give thanks unto the Lord, call upon his name, make known his deeds among the people" (1 Chronicles 16:8).

1. Garland Tickemyer to John Hajicek, 19 May 1994.

2. See receipt from Clair Weldon, 6 April 1993 (used by permission); and see also "Invoice" for another first edition Book of Mormon from John Windle, Menlo Park, California, 18 March 1993.

3. Barbara Young (The Old Book Shop), Georgine Harmon (Sherman's Odds and Endtiques), Dorothy Christina (Reader's Heaven), Lee Updike (Classic Treasures), and Dennis Sharier (formerly of Reader's Heaven). I recommend each of these ethical booksellers for their general stock and inexpensive books.

4. Barbara Young, "Book Dealer Gets Bum Rap from Police, Newspaper," Independence (Missouri) Examiner [19?] May 1994.

5. See, for example, Betty Johnson to John Hajicek, 8 January 1991 [postmarked 8 January 1992]; John Hajicek to Betty Johnson, 6 February 1992; and genealogies of Strang, Post, and Moore families, in the handwriting of Betty Johnson.

6. For the content of the meeting, see meeting notes of John Hajicek, and meeting notes in the hand of Betty Johnson, entitled "Sunday," handed to Hajicek at his departure.

7. Benjamin Austin, Louis L. Austin, and their daughter Sophia Austin were on Beaver Island from May 1848 to September 1851. Sophia Austin married Eri J. Moore, who joined the church on June 1849. All four were listed with former members who, by unanimous voice of a September 1851 conference, were determined to be "apostates and faithless, perjured, conspirators" against "innocent and faithful Saints" and "deserved the judgments of God and abhorrence of good men."

8. Conference Minutes, 8 July 1850, Library and Archives, Reorganized Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

9. U.S. v. James Strang, et. al.

10. See the subpoenaed records disclosed to the defense.

11. See Journal of John Hajicek.

12. Forensic Laboratory Report, Criminal Laboratory Division, Missouri State Highway Patrol, Jefferson City, Missouri, 19 July 1993, and 15 February 1995; and Report, FBI Laboratory, Federal Bureau of Investigation, Washington, D.C., 1 September 1993, and 3 February, 18 May, and 14 July 1994; Frank Brown and Jack Watring, University of Missouri Police Department, to FBI Laboratory, 2 March 1995; and Frank Brown, faxed letter to Donald Lock, Criminal Laboratory Division, Missouri State Highway Patrol, 14 March 1995.

13. See Ron Stewart, Mayor, Independence, Missouri, to John Hajicek, 5 May 1994, the day before my arrest.

14. I naively presumed that the planting of evidence, boosting of evidence, perjury to sustain unwarranted searches, throw-down weapons, high-tech transference of fingerprints, discrimination, racial beatings, brutality, sexual misconduct, bribery, extortion, drug and money expropriations, firearms trafficking, oppression of the poor, and general corruption, were symptomatic of large-city police departments, and had not reached medium cities with patriotic names like Columbia, Lexington, Jefferson City, Independence, and Liberty, each in Missouri.

15. The set of pens and note pads were sought when I volunteered handwriting exemplars and hair samples on 10 November 1994.

16. Brown repeatedly said that he received (singularly) "a pad of papers, loose papers, and several pencils that the suspect left behind" (Frank Brown, University of Missouri Police Department, Report Narrative, 19 May 1993; Frank Brown, Cross Examination, Preliminary Hearing, Missouri v. Hajicek, Circuit Court of Boone County, 15 September 1994; and Deposition of Frank Brown, 3 January 1995, 66:17).

17. Frank Brown interviewed people across the nation about this case. Nearly every contact told him that the theft was implausible, and that I would not steal a book. He suppressed those interviews. Conversely, when an occasional lead indicated to him that I was a fanatic Mormon, he eagerly added the information to his reports. Suppressed physical evidence includes the aforementioned "loose papers," which the defense believes contained exculpatory research notes used by the legitimate researcher at the State Historical Society of Missouri.

18. I should have known, since the head librarian at the Connecticut Historical Society displayed how easily librarians of Americana can forget the American Constitution, and turn to framing people: "Just between you and me, and the other thousand people on this list, one friend wanted to know why, when [a book dealer suspected of theft] came to our recent book sale, I didn't plant a pamphlet on him, call the cops, and send him back whence he came [jail]. Brilliant idea; sorry I didn't think of it" (Everett C. Wilkie Jr., Head Librarian, Connecticut Historical Society, to Rare Books and Special Collections Forum, EXLIBRIS @RUTVM1.BITNET, 6 December 1993).

19. Alan Slayton, Search Warrant, State of Missouri, County of Jackson, 6 May 1994.

20. Brown repeatedly said that he received "a pad of papers, loose papers, and several pencils that the suspect left behind" (Frank Brown, University of Missouri Police Department, Report Narrative, 19 May 1993; Frank Brown, Cross Examination, Preliminary Hearing, Missouri v. Hajicek, Circuit Court of Boone County, 15 September 1994; and Deposition of Frank Brown, 3 January 1995, 66:17).

21. Deposition of Frank Brown, 3 January 1995, 16:17 and 17:21. See photographs of pen, and marked paper in possession of John Hajicek.

22. Annette Weaver, Columbia Books, Appraisal for Prosecutor's Office, Independence Court House, 25 January 1995; and Frank Brown, University of Missouri Police Department, 6 May 1994.

23. The comparisons were made with Graceland College Library books readily available in Lamoni, Iowa antique shops. Diane Shelton, the Graceland College librarian acknowledged under oath that the library does not even stamp its rare books, but only the circulating books. Those stamped books, she admitted, are often discarded or sold at book sales (Deposition of Diane Shelton, 23 December 1994, 27: 11-15 and 82: 6-15).

24. Laurel Boeckman, Direct Examination, Preliminary Hearing, Missouri v. Hajicek, Circuit Court of Boone County, 4 August 1994, 6: 1-5; Deposition of Laurel Boeckman, 3 January 1995, 12: 1-3), emphasis added; and photographs of "shelf list card" and checkout sheet, in possession of John Hajicek.

25. Photographs of the coins are in possession of John Hajicek.

26. See Motion to Compel Deposition of State's Witness Detective Frank Brown, Missouri v. Hajicek, Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri, 14 April 1995.

Book Copyright � 1995 John Hajicek.  All rights reserved.