William R. Perry - By His Hand

By His Hand

William R. Perry

DISCLAIMER: "This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are products of the author's imagination and are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental."

Copyright 2023 Red Cape Publishing

All rights reserved.

Case #: SV061422

Originating Agency Case #: N/A

Person Delivering Evidence: Ofcr D. Daniels

Date Evidence Received: 4/13/22

Time Evidence Received: 20:22

Location Evidenced Received: 3131 Goshen St. Chatsworth CA

ITEM #1

QTY: 1

Description: Multi-page handwritten document.

Location Stored: SVPD Locker 23 - Original scanned into database SV061422-1.pdf (Transcription below)

ITEM #2

QTY: 4

Description: 32gb SD Storage disks from Pentax K1 Mark II DSLR Camera

Location Stored: SBPD Locker 23 - Original files copied into SVPD secure digital hard drive. Contains - three hundred and fifty-one (351) unique .DNG files (duplicated and converted to .JPG for review) and seven (7) .MP4 audio/video files

ITEM #3

QTY :1

Description: Google Pixel 6 mobile phone (818)445-XXXX

32GB micro-SD disk extracted and files copied to SVPD secure digital drive. Contains - 12 unique .MP4 videos and 164 .JPG images.

ITEM #4

QTY: 1

Description: Adventist Hospital Incident Report

Transcript of handwritten letter follows:

## BEGIN TRANSCRIPTION ##

To whoever finds this, please give it to the police, or newspapers, or whoever you think will read it. Please dont send it to one of the fucking tabloids. Thats the last thing I want.

Im writing this to clear my name or at least explain. Im fully aware of how much this sounds like bullshit. I questioned everything that happened the same as you will. Im not making excuses. I just ask you to look back at the man you knew before this all started. Is any of this consistent with THAT version of me?

Ask anyone who knows me. I was a good guy. I was a good dad. A good husband. Not perfect, by any means, but not the monster that you know now.

Im not saying that I didnt do any of it. Obviously, there is a mountain of evidence, and of course the photos and the video and all that. But again, I ask you to look at who I was and try to open your mind to concepts like faith and evil and spiritual warfare. Im not asking you to forgive me and Im not trying to plead insanity to save myself. I just want people to know what really happened and not the narrative that seems so simple and so obvious.

If you know me, or at least knew me from how I was before, youd know I was pretty cheerful. I was pretty funny too. I wasnt the freaky, loner type. People liked me, I think. My co-workers and friends from church all enjoyed being around me. I took pride in being someone that they counted on to make any job or service project more fun. I was always cracking jokes. I even tried stand-up one time.

I was not (am not) the creepy, two-faced sleeper that was all churchy on one side while hiding some dark, fucked-up, other life.

If you spent any time around me in the last few years, youd know that I live with a lot of physical pain. I treated my body pretty harshly, growing up with martial arts, skateboarding, and lots of other risky sports. I guess I started paying for all that abuse in my forties. Arthritis isnt caused by that stuff, but when it set in, I really began to suffer. My shoulders, hips, and knees just seemed to get more painful year after year. I went to doctors, but they just said I was cursed with being from the shitty end of the gene pool.

The pain in my hands was the worst part because it took things away from me that I really loved. As my joints began to ache and swell and twist, I found that I couldnt enjoy playing the guitar anymore. My huge collection of guitars and amps just sat there. But I couldnt bring myself to sell them. It felt like giving up on being some happier version of me.

It started in my hands. They started to ache all the time. It was mostly on my left side, which I always thought was odd. It was extra shitty because I use my left hand for making chords on the guitar and as it became more and more of a hassle, I finally just stopped playing.

All the pain stuff had been going on for years. Id gotten used to it. I bitched about it. I accepted it. From time to time, Id ask the guys in my LifeGroup (our weekly couples bible study) to pray for me. It was kind of a last-ditch effort as all the doctors I spoke to had made it clear that osteoarthritis wasnt something medical science was dedicating any effort to or having much success with.

Most every morning Id wake up with joint pain and stiffness in my fingers. Sometimes they wouldnt open at all without prying them open. There would be these blindingly painful, audible clicks as the tendons of my fingers would get caught in the deformed bony structures of my joints. Just getting coffee in the morning became a chore. I started wearing slip-on shoes so I wouldnt have to hassle with tying them. Stupid, old-man stuff. Im still in my fifties, but it made me feel like a doddering old fool. It really stole my confidence in my work and in my relationship with my wife. Its pretty emasculating to need to have your wife open every jar for you.

It was about three months ago when it changed. I used to consciously keep my hands open at night so that they wouldnt lock up in a particular position, like a fist.

The first morning that I really noticed it, I didnt give it much thought. My left hand was super tight. My index and middle fingers were extended with my middle finger overlapping the index, sort of like crossing my fingers for luck. It really sucked to pry them apart. The muscles in my fingers were pulsing and undulating like when you get a calf cramp. It hurt like a motherfucker.

It happened again the next night. My hands were weak by morning like theyd been holding a hammer and pounding nails all night. The same weird, cross-my-fingers-for-luck position. That was the big difference at first; the fact that it was the same thing twice. I called my doctor who was only doing tele-health appointments. He chalked it up to O.L.D. Syndrome. Im sure he used that joke all day long. I didnt think it was funny the first time I heard it and it didnt get funnier over time.

After about a week, it sort of changed. Not the pain; that was nearly constant. The difference was the way my hand was gnarled up. Now it was a fist. My thumb was tucked under across my palm and the nails of my fingers were biting into the skin of my thumb. It didnt quite break the skin but that didnt keep it from really hurting. My knuckles were white from the effort of straining all night.

I found some weird buckwheat-stuffed gloves on Amazon that you put in the microwave to heat up, and then youd put your hands in them to help soothe the muscles. It worked to help relieve the muscles, but it didnt do anything to stop it from happening.

That went on for a couple of weeks, I guess. Each morning my left hand would be in some new awkward death grip. In fists some days, fingers and thumb extended the next. Never quite the same way twice in a row.

Since the guitar was no longer an option, Id chosen photography as a new hobby. Ive come to regret it now for obvious reasons. Id been watching videos about photography to get better at it, but I didnt think of myself as a pro-level photographer. I was doing headshots for local actors and senior portraits for my daughters friends. Thats the only reason why I was taking pictures at the church. It was just for fun and so I could learn more about photography and get some experience.