Once the movie comes out, more people will read the book, and people who see the movie will have the story percolating in their consciousness. The players in the story are still mostly alive, so the movie will change the trajectory of their lives, as it will change the trajectory of mine. It’s a story that continues on. It keeps rippling out, as it has for decades. It has become a meta-story.
I wrote in the book that the attack changed my life into a “before” and “after.” Having written an acclaimed book about it, getting so much media attention, and now, with the production of a movie, that night is intrinsically knit into my identity. That night was utterly transformative in terms of my own character arc. For better or worse, it continues to define me.
Many other things happened to me as a result of that one event. One of the threads, for example, was a true metaphysical understanding of how interconnected we all are. When I realized how badly my friend was hurt, I emotionally went to this place of pure love in order to save her life. I wasn’t able to share this experience with my friend because she was unconscious at the time, and she never wanted to hear about it afterwards. When I started the investigation, however, I not only found the young girl—now a woman—who had rescued us that night, but I found the nurses who had cared for us in the hospital—the ones who had healed my battered body and held my hand so that I knew I could get through it. They all told me that they had gone to the same emotional place of pure love. Somehow, through this flowing of blood, this act of radical evil, we all met in this place of radical love through our interconnectedness. Those nurses are still deeply connected to me in my life. I’m part of them in a way that will never go away. That’s what they expressed to me. What I experienced on behalf of my roommate, they experienced on behalf of both of us—even though they didn’t know us. We were all brought together through this flowing of the life force, which is blood. Radical evil was healed together through radical love.
The MOON: You had all the bones in your upper body broken, so you were in a hospital…
Jentz: Yeah, but not for many days though. I was only twenty years old so I healed up pretty fast. They released me after ten days, and they released my roommate after nine—even though she’d had surgery to repair the back of her head. I’d never survive that kind of attack now.
We were showered with love and attention. Oregonians were so shocked that something like this could happen in their midst. Yet, the people of this little town were pretty sure they knew who had done it, but they kept it a secret. They didn’t want to say anything—not out of malice towards us, but more out of fear and a strange culture that said, “Don’t make waves; mind your own business. Don’t stick your nose into other people’s affairs.”
The MOON: People told you they knew who had attacked you?
Jentz: Many people told me they believed they knew who had done it. It was a very violent seventeen-year-old boy who was constantly beating up his girlfriend. So I investigated for several years, not believing it could possibly be this local kid, and then finally did in fact fully believe it was him. The book really lays out the case to prove it.
The MOON: But the police didn’t do anything.
Jentz: No, not at the time. They either bungled the investigation, or swept it aside, hoping it would go away when my roommate and I left town. I was never able to prove how or why they failed to arrest a local kid whom so many townspeople believed was guilty. I think it’s quite likely the kid’s father had something to do with it—convincing the police to look the other way—so the kid was allowed to escape consequences. And after three years, the statute of limitations on attempted murder had expired, so at that point, it didn’t matter what I found out. In 1980 he was a free man and no criminal case could be brought against him.
I did work with a victims’ rights group afterwards to change the statute of limitations on attempted murder, which was eliminated in 1996, but that wasn’t retroactive. My attacker is still a free man. He did serve four years in jail for a crime he committed against his hunting partner, and the reason he was nailed for that was because I’d brought him to the attention of the police and the DAs and they were watching him very carefully.
The MOON: So on your first trip back, did you go by yourself?
Jentz: I went with my partner at the time, but then I did go back many times by myself. I developed allies up there, so when I went back I wasn’t really alone. I wasn’t a stranger. One of the first allies was the young girl who had rescued us in the park. Her name is “Boo,” and she started investigating with me. I first found her boyfriend because his last name was quite prominent so it was easy to find him in the phone book. But he wouldn’t see me at first because he was too traumatized by what had happened. He and Boo were no longer together, but he referred me to her. She had just moved back to the area and we became very close, like sisters, and we are to this day. She’s a rancher woman. She could pack a gun and drive a backhoe. She was a good friend to have along when you’re a single woman starting your own investigation into your own attempted murder.
Then I found an extraordinary couple—Bob and Dee Dee Kouns, from Portland—who had investigated their own daughter’s murder. The process had turned them into victims’ rights advocates and they had a lot of contacts who were very useful. They helped me with the investigation in ways that would never have happened without them—opening doors in the Oregon State Police Department for the investigation, and gaining access in the Oregon legislature to get the statute of limitations changed. As part of an organization—their organization—I had power I probably wouldn’t have had if I were just pursuing the investigation as an individual.
As the years went on I developed a whole community with deep bonds that I maintain to this day. In retrospect, it’s hard to imagine how impoverished my life would have been if I’d not gone back to the scene of the crime.
The MOON: It sounds as if your return was healing for the community, as well.
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