I'll Be Watching You. M. William Phelps

he understood the charges against him, but didn’t “know why [he] assaulted the women.” He had no explanation. It was something that had come over him, he seemed to say. Some sort of change.

      Mary Ellen had seen it. Ned had gone into her bathroom one person and had come out another.

      Those in the courtroom were unaware that during the past week Ned and his lawyer had made a plea agreement with the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office. But that’s not what had stunned everyone in the courtroom that day. It was the word “women.” The plural form Ned had used while addressing the court.

      Wasn’t it only one—Mary Ellen Renard?

      Women? What is he talking about?

      Ned said he had no words to describe his actions. No excuse.

      But clearly, in saying so, he had admitted to both crimes.

      Fred Schwanwede asked the court to order a psychiatric evaluation before Ned’s sentencing date, which was scheduled for May 13, 1988.

      II

      Under the plea agreement offered to Bruno, Ned faced a maximum of twenty years, minimum of ten, a sentence that, of course, shocked both Mary Ellen and family members of Ned’s first victim. Even more outrageous to both was that with good behavior, Ned could be eligible for release—not parole—inside eleven years.

      Eleven years.

      A little over a decade behind bars for murdering one woman and savagely, cruelly, attacking a second, nearly killing her, too.

      Fred Schwanwede and the Middlesex County people wanted to close the Middlesex murder they believed Ned was responsible for. The problem with charging Ned with the crime—he had never been indicted for it—was that he knew the victim. He had dated her months before the crime took place. That meant, Schwanwede perceptively pointed out, that any trace evidence connecting Ned to the murder would ultimately be thrown out of court. Ned had every reason to be with the woman. All he had to say—and he was an expert at manipulating people and situations—was that he and the victim had reunited. They were talking about getting back together.

      All that being said, there wasn’t a lot of evidence against Ned. Thus, the best way out of it all was to offer a plea. Having him admit to the crime would be a major coup.

      “The family had suspected him all along, but they never had what they needed to close the book on it,” Schwanwede said. “To have him admit that he did that was helpful to them. For us, it wasn’t so much about closing out a cold case, but bringing some peace to the family.”

      The thing that surprised Schwanwede most was that Bruno had allowed Ned to plead the case out the way it had been written: aggravated manslaughter. Generally speaking, as time goes on, a case against a suspect grows colder. The Middlesex case was already pushing five years. Ned was likely never going to be arrested for it. That was clear. Yet, he admitted to killing the woman, stabbing her to death. Why wouldn’t he fight for a lesser charge instead of signing the plea the way it was written?

      This baffled everyone.

      What no one knew, of course, was that Ned Snelgrove had a plan himself.

      30

      I

      Most defendants who plead out their cases sign on the dotted line, face a judge for sentencing, keep their mouths shut, and fall into prison life best they can, hoping to one day sit in front of the parole board and argue for early release. Ned Snelgrove, the Bergen County court was about to learn, was quite a bit different than most defendants it had seen pass through its walnut-and-maple doors.

      Ned had been told that it was a good idea for him to write to the judge before his sentencing and, in perhaps a compassionate way, apologize for his actions. He should relay a feeling that he was willing to accept punishment, whatever that may be, move on, and get some help while incarcerated. The thought was that Ned could begin his sentence on a powerful, positive note. Although the judge was unlikely to lower Ned’s sentence, the letter might prove that Ned knew what he did was wrong and understood that he had hurt many people.

      As everyone was about to learn, however, Ned Snelgrove was not your average criminal.

      II

      On Thursday, April 14, 1988, Ned sat down in his cell and began drafting a letter to the judge. He opened by saying he was writing to “describe what happened” in both his crimes. Ned claimed both “incidents” were generated by chronic sexual urges he had developed in grade school for “unknown reasons,” which later grew into an uncontrollable penchant he had for perpetrating violence against women.

      The letter, all at once, was shocking, disturbing, and chilling. Some later said, it was perhaps a plea on Ned’s part for help. He described his life leading up to both crimes as being tormented by these unmanageable feelings of attacking women and putting them into a state of not being able to defend themselves. He got off on it, he said in not so many words. He agonized over what was an “enormous”—he underlined the word—“sexual arousement” he would get when seeing women, the good-looking ones with large breasts, rendered unconscious and incapable of defense.

      He wrote about being able to restrain himself, most of the time, although there have been a few very close calls.

      He said he knew it was all wrong, but he couldn’t do anything to about it. He tried. He really did. But it was “difficult,” he added, just to “control” his own “hands,” as if they had a life of their own.

      He expected that this sickness—which he hadn’t told anyone about—was one of the reasons why his friends and coworkers had such a tough time believing that he had committed these crimes. He had easily fooled them all. Same as Mary Ellen and his first victim.

      Over the next several pages—in powerful, frightening detail—Ned described how he had killed the woman in Middlesex and attacked Mary Ellen years later. It was almost as if in writing it out, Ned got the same cathartic sense of fulfillment all over again that he had gotten while committing the actual crimes. I held [her] throat, he wrote of the woman in Middlesex, pressing down with my thumbs, for as long as I could….

      When they had a chance to read the letter, the judge, along with Fred Schwanwede and even Ned’s attorney, John Bruno, couldn’t believe Ned had put such incredibly vile words on a page.

      The passion.

      The gall.

      The elements of murder.

      A confession?

      Why? For what purpose?

      Ned wanted everyone to believe that the letter was a new beginning for him: a point at which he could start to heal his perverse mind. The violent feelings he had, Ned explained, defied “logic.” He knew they did. He wasn’t naïve. He understood that not everyone thought this way. Still, he wrote, Fred Schwanwede was likely going to argue that he was a cold-blooded, heartless killer, but he wanted the court to know that he wasn’t. If he had been that type of murderer, Ned justified in the letter, why, then, would he have chosen the victims he had? He wasn’t some sort of “Green River Killer.” Some lunatic who prowled the streets for victims. His victims, Ned argued, were “unlucky.”

      Wrong place, wrong time.

      That’s all. If they hadn’t been near him, he insisted, they wouldn’t have been attacked.

      III

      Ned’s letter was nothing more than a narcissistic rant, unlike anything the court had ever seen. It was all about Ned and why he had acted on his violent thoughts. There was little remorse. No apology. But he did “hate” himself, and he was upset that he “had it made” at the time of his arrest.

      Great job.

      Great friends.

      Good family.

      He couldn’t understand why he had chosen this specific time to act out. It made no sense to him. He had let everyone down: I cry every time I think of my parents…,