|
|
| |
Still missing
Gone  Ran Mesika
Translated from An article published on the "Ynet" website on May 20th 2007
Four years ago, Ran Mesika disappeared in the Louisiana swamps. The murder trial will
begin this month. The body was never found. Itay Nachmias, who searched for
Mesika over the entire U.S.A, tells us how to go through 1,460 nights without a
friend:
Outside the backdoor of our bar - "Hasatil" - near the large trash
container, where people usually throw up, take a leak and smoke joints - was
where I first heard Mesika was missing. Actually back then we weren't talking
in terms of missing yet: we just stood there, a few friends, and mentioned that
we hadn't heard from him in a while.
In the seven months that Ran spent in the U.S.A, he would call us every
day. It was sort of a routine. The last customer stumbles out, someone switches
on the lights, everyone rubbing their eyes, drinking one last shot and waiting
for the phone to ring. He phoned a lot, especially after he stopped moving
around in San Diego
and began to drive on from coast to coast, on Highway 10 - 3,959 km to the most
southern highway on the continent. He planned to get rich selling jewelry to
stores along the highway.
Meanwhile, we understood that Ran's parents thought he might not be
calling because of the crazy tornado storms that hit Texas in May 2003. Erlich, one of our
friends, who was in New York
at the time, tried to get hold of him, but nothing. In the meantime, we began
to feel as though something simply wasn't right and despite our worries, we
continued with preparations towards celebrating Independence Day at "Hasatil",
as if nothing happened. You know, like men.
In the meantime, Ran's father, Shimon, made endless phone calls to the U.S. The
American cellular company notified him that no outgoing calls were registered
from Ran's mobile phone in the past days. It was a bit more difficult with the
credit card company, but eventually they agreed to submit information: money
was last withdrawn thirty minutes ago using Ran's card. For a moment, it seemed
as if everything was all right, but then it turned out that 5,000 Dollars were
withdrawn from Ran's account between May 2nd to May 9th.
Shimon notified representatives of the F.B.I in Israel that his son was missing.
40 in
search of one  He would call us every day...
Some of the gang spoke about a hitchhiker who traveled and slept in the
car with Ran, they weren't sure if they should say something about it to Ran's
parents: no one knew where and when he picked him up and Ran himself didn't
tell his parents about him to avoid worrying them for nothing. To those of us
who tried to convince him to drop the hitchhiker, he explained that people
should be given a chance, especially people like the hitchhiker, meaning,
released convicts.
An hour after we heard the F.B.I's report we met on Didi's roof, one of
the gang, and talked about what can be done and how we can help. Without
babbling for too long, we decided we were going to search for him by ourselves.
Our first mission was to raise money for the trip: we went from house to
house and spoke to all our parents, and then friends of our parents, and then
with friends of their friends, and then we simply spoke to people we met on the
street. We didn't have to be very persistent or persuasive. Most parents felt
it was a hopeless trip, but seeing our determination, they understood that we
owe it to ourselves and to Ran, and if we have to, we will swim there.
We hardly slept for three days; we were anxious and busy with the task
that lay ahead. We managed to raise 40 thousand Dollars in 48 hours, including
seven Shekels that Uri and Gilad raised playing Zohar Argov's [famous Israeli
singer] song "Bedui Zaken" [the old Bedouin], one of Ran Mesika's favorite
songs in the world, on the guitar and harmonica on Alenby Street. We dedicated
the third day to travel arrangements and one interview I gave on "Erev Chadash"
[daily television news program], during which I fell asleep twice. We didn't
have a moment to stop, think, digest or get depressed.
While we spent time on our campaign to raise money, Ran's family set up
an operations room at home. We were equipped with maps of the area, telephones,
posters of Ran with the surreal heading MISSING and connected to the
U.S.A embassy, which issued emergency passports and visas to those who needed
them. On May 12, ten days after Ran's last phone call, we were in the air - 13
friends, Shimon and another family member, on a journey to a mission
impossible, confident that we will succeed.
We split into two teams. One flew to the point from which Ran spoke to
Shimon for the last time - Lake Charles, Louisiana, and the second to Miami, following information we received from
the credit card company. We arrived consumed with faith that we will quickly
find him and thought how he would laugh and say we are a bunch of worried
chicks.
Five more friends who were in the U.S.A at the time joined us at the Houston airport,
including one girl. In Israel,
many friends stayed to help with shifts in the operations room and support the
family, we were roughly forty 23-year-old kids who dropped everything and did
what we can to find Ran Mesika.
A few hours after our arrival in the U.S, we were sitting at F.B.I
headquarters in stinking Louisiana
with Joe, a federal agent from the movies. He told us that considering the time
that had gone by, the weather and the nature of the area - characterized by
giant swamps and crocodiles - we are probably looking for bones. We came out of
the meeting shocked and went to get some burgers at "Wendy's". No one touched
their food. A few minutes later we ran out, one after the other, and for the
first time since he went missing, we cried. I haven't eaten at "Wendy's" since.
And the bastard remains silent  The poster
You probably don't need to be a great genius to escape from the Colorado Correctional Center,
and the moves made by Jonathan Lee Vernier - an escaped convict and not a
released convict as Ran thought - were truly not that brilliant. He traveled in
Ran's van, continuously used his credit card to withdraw money, wore his
clothes and even bought a mobile phone using Ran's name. The police and credit
card company followed his moves, but didn't know who he was until his final
withdrawal in Miami.
A security camera that documented Vernier withdrawing money on May 8, gave them
a face, but not a name yet.
The original plan was that half the search team leave for Miami to search for the suspect, but the minute we landed,
the operations room in Herzliya reported that an additional withdrawal was made
in Key West, a small town on an island, 150 km south-west of Miami. Now, let's say you
have to be an idiot to steal a credit card, use it to continuously withdraw
money and think that you will never get caught - but you have to be really
stupid to escape to an island with only one highway leading in to the island
and one highway leading out, and yep, you guessed - it's the same highway.
The Miami team went straight from the
airport to Key West
and started surveillances and searches
in the town. By 06:00 am, there weren't many places in town that we hadn't been
to, except for one trailer park, which was sort of the last stop for us, the
final suspicious place in town. When we arrived, the guard - who possibly
cooperated with Vernier or simply decided to get in the way - didn't let us in
and called local police that arrested us. Despite the situation, we remained
calm and the police quickly understood they caught the wrong people and entered
the trailer park themselves. Within seconds, they identified Ran's vehicle, a
1991 Ford Econoline, parked empty.
We spent the next six hours in surveillance with nothing happening. Part
of the team continued to search the town, watching the access road, until at
12:00 a girl on a bicycle suddenly arrived and got into the van. When she
stepped out of the vehicle, she was arrested by the F.B.I and led the police to
the place where she planned to meet Vernier in downtown Kew West.
Vernier's capture was an operation from the movies. Even America's
Most Wanted, the toughest reality show in the U.S.A, dedicated an episode
to it: on the screen of America's Most Wanted, we see how instead of a
second drink, Vernier gets two F.B.I agents for lunch, and how he shows no
unease and manages to escape from them with infuriating ease.
During the insane chase that followed that getaway, Vernier managed to
steal a motorcycle. From all the people in the world, the girl riding the bike
was an Israeli whose sister was sitting in the operations room in the family
home in Herzliya at the time. After the motorcycle, he stole a bicycle and
jumped into the ocean for a short swim, and then he was caught. After the
police, who finally managed to pin him to the ground, asked him his name, he
answered: My name is trouble and later added I'm the guy you're
looking for. Once he was caught, we were sure that was the end of it, we
will shortly get some answers and find Ran, but Vernier exercised the right to
remain silent.
That is something I fail to understand to this day. What do you mean the
right to remain silent in such a situation? Perhaps Ran needs help? You can say
a lot of things about the police in Israel, but here at least they freely shake
the bastard, make him confess to ten murder crimes and reenact them fifteen
minutes later. I am not sure I am crazy about that option, but undoubtedly,
Vernier owes his life to the F.B.I for not using the oldest technique to get
information out of a man who is not interested in talking. It turns out that in
Israel,
the possibilities are endless and one option is to remain silent. You need to understand, it's not only that he
didn't say anything: it's that in an inconceivable way, they were prohibited
from questioning him. The F.B.I was
afraid to make mistakes in the investigation to avoid Vernier from claiming
that a confession was forced out of him: in the U.S.A that can be grounds for
release.
Silent or not, I remember how people sat and stared at his photograph,
trying to penetrate the mind of his ruthless face in some super-natural way, as
though we wanted the photo to tell us where the hell he threw Ran.
Shimon decided we were not wasting time: we will let the F.B.I do their
thing and in the meantime, we began our own search. We rented five cars,
attached Ran's photo to them and split into teams. Each team had photos of
Vernier too, so that if someone recognized him, perhaps it might be helpful to
follow his trail. We also contacted every possible media in the southwestern
seaboard; we gave interviews to local press, television channels and anyone
willing to listen, as well as those who were not. Every morning we got a fax from
Israel
with instructions and boundaries of area for each team to cover that day.
Strangely, each morning we felt as if that was the morning that we will find
Ran.
Unlimited movement  I still miss him...
Our first stop was the Wal-Mart mega store where Ran's last phone call
was made from. We asked to see the security video tapes from that date and saw
Ran go into the store with another person. By then we already knew it was
Vernier. What was most amazing about the story is that the cameras documented
Vernier standing and looking at photos of missing people hung in the entrance,
like in many other places in the U.S.A, while Ran went inside, bought two
sandwiches and gave him one.
The first indication we received after we published the story on
television and radio, was from Jerry Sawyer, an owner of a large farm on the
long and curvy Highway 14 in
Lake Charles.
He identified the vehicle in the photo, and delivered eye testimony to the
F.B.I: on the night of the last call from Ran's phone, he saw the van driving,
and even stopping, on his property. When he went closer, the vehicle quickly
drove off. We searched his property for days, slowly expanding the search area.
Jerry, moved by our energy and strong bond of our friendship, invited us to
stay in his house for the entire period and even joined us on the search. To
this day, he keeps in touch with Shimon, meets him every time he arrives in America and
coordinates the continuation of the search.
In our first days in Lake
Charles, we refused to accept what had probably happened.
We were so confident we will find him, that our faith rubbed onto strangers,
who suddenly thought they saw him. We searched footage from security cameras of
malls, fuel stations and parking lots for hours. We drew hope from everyone.
Even when the van returned from lab tests with results indicating that, a great
deal of Ran's blood was absorbed in the entire rear part of the van; we would
not allow ourselves to think about it. However, as time went by and the search
moved into more abandoned and distanced places, we were no longer sure who or
what we were looking for. The instructions we received told us to slowly drive
on the side of the road and if we find a large concentration of birds, stop and
use our sense of smell. The fear of finding him was as great as the fear of not
finding him.
We went to every location where Vernier used Ran's card to withdraw
money. We went through snake-filled swamps with F.B.I tracking dogs; we sailed
in boats with underwater sonar systems under bridges in crocodile infested
swamps. We asked about unidentified bodies in hospitals. We walked in ditches
on the side of roads for entire days. We showed photos and asked every person
we met if they saw Ran or Vernier. In the early stages of the search, people
still recognized their faces from pictures. Later no one recognized Ran
anymore.
During this entire time, Vernier continued to exercise the right to
remain silent. On the other hand, inmates who served time with him began to
make up stories that he allegedly told them in order to gain benefits. Every
hallucination of every lunatic in prison was carefully checked; we went through
completely imaginary descriptions of places where Vernier supposedly dropped
Ran. We did not disregard anything. We believed everyone and everything. When
bits of information were received from various fortunetellers, including Uri
Geller, we treated the information seriously. That is how, for example, we
ended up searching for a water source under a tree near railway tracks for
days, because that is what they said. Amongst ourselves, we developed psychotic
theories: he is alive but suffers from amnesia, or lost his mind to heavy drugs
- became a junkie and feels ashamed to talk to us, or joined some cult and
erased all of us from his consciousness. The experiences we went though were
completely detached from reality. We understood that everything can happen to
anyone, and more importantly, that no one is safe.
In Israel, we were
all such happy party animals, but in America, we went to bed early. In the
morning, we searched the stinky Louisiana
swamps and in the evening, each one sank into his corner without talking much.
Most of our communication came down to glares that said it all. With the little
energy we had left, we told each other about our nightmares and dreams, in
which Ran speaks to us.
One evening, which we will probably remember for the rest of our lives,
we bought a lot of food and alcohol and got back to Jerry's house. Some of us
even called it "going home". We put on some music, got drunk with Jerry, chased
armadillos, had fistfights, laughed, danced and went crazy. I know it sounds
crazy, but I think that night saved our sanity.
Here's to you, bro  Ran is truly someone special
The search was planned for a month, but we didn't even believe it would
take more than a week. After a month, we couldn't keep it together anymore,
both mentally and financially. On the last day of our search, feelings ranged
from complete despair to madness of the final straight. On the way back to Israel - when
we saw the size of the area we covered, the size of the swamps and crocodiles -
we began to think that it would probably not happen. That perhaps we will never
see him.
When we arrived in Israel,
the entire gang gathered in a public garden. They brought a psychologist who
asked that we talk about Ran, play some sad games, such as close our eyes,
wander around the courtyard, trying to understand the uncertainty and fear he
went through. We wanted to die. It took over a year for people to get back to
themselves.
People who don't know Ran Mesika don't understand the sort of person he
was and how his disappearance shattered us. It is true that they say only good
things about people that something happened to them, but Ran is truly someone
special. Handsome, funny and smart, constantly surrounded with dozens of
friends who never gave up on him. Kind with the smile and innocence of a child,
which probably led to him to this mess.
Eighteen months after we returned, the episode of America's Most
Wanted finally aired and Shimon offered a reward of 50 thousand Dollars to
anyone who helped solve the mystery. Now take a sit and hold on tight, a person
called Jonathan Vernier called the F.B.I. after seeing the episode from his
prison cell and decided to submit extensive information he had in exchange for
the reward. He probably understood from the episode that the prosecution, with
our help, has a lot more on him than he thought, and was attacked with a deadly
cocktail of panic and greed. Do you feel like screaming? So did we.
Nevertheless, a deal was made, agreeing that Vernier reenact the murder
and admit to it, and in exchange his family would receive the money and the
prosecution would not demand the death penalty.
Vernier played games with Shimon, the family and the F.B.I for a long
time. He claimed that he would reenact the murder and then changed his mind. He
promised to lead investigators to the place where he abandoned Ran and then
kept his mouth shut. During this entire period, we hoped that something would
happen and a solution would be found, but eventually Shimon understood Vernier
is bluffing, that his agreement to the offer was only an attempt to buy time.
He decided to back down from the deal for the sake of his sanity and that of
the other family members. We feel as if someone dropped scorching lava into an
open wound.
As for Vernier, whatever happens he already got 29.5 years inside - we
arranged for 17.5 years for all the theft and felonies he committed after he
escaped from prison and he got another 12 years for the escape itself. With
such repertoire, he will report for his trial for the murder of Ran Mesika,
scheduled to begin in a month in Lake
Charles, Louisiana.
His three attorneys will have to present a very serious defense line to save
their client from the death penalty.
I miss and think of Ran to this day, as I am sure everyone else does.
There are still songs we cannot bear to hear. The gang is the same gang, some
are still overseas and others are back in Israel. Most of us keep in close
touch, united forever by the pain. We made a promise to Ran's mother to bring
him back and returned without him. We sat with her for weeks with our heads
dropped, feeling a sense of failure, that remains to this day and gets stronger
every time we meet the family. We are there for birthdays and holidays. They
are the first stop for anyone returning from overseas.
Four years have passed since Ran disappeared. "Hasatil" has closed and
we opened the "Douglas" instead of it.
Sometimes at the end of the evening, when the last client stumbles out, someone
goes to the stereo system and puts on "Bedui Zaken" and then we raise a toast
for Ran Mesika.
Assisted in preparing the
article: Eran Lev. A special thank you to the Mesika family for their
cooperation. If you have questions or information about Ran and you are not
Jonathan Vernier, visit: www.ranmesika.com
|
|
|
|
|
|
