Episode Transcript
[00:00:02] Behind the scenes, well, perhaps right in front of their eyes, some disturbing threads are starting to appear. One of them came from a psychiatrist assigned to help determine Neil McKay's fitness as a father and what can only be described as a precipitous moment. Dr. Allen Leader was asked how McKay would react to. To not having custody of Scotty.
[00:00:30] Dr. Lea replied, I think he might take the child and leave the state or country.
[00:00:39] So that leads me to start this episode with a question.
[00:00:44] Is it possible for someone to kidnap their own child? Now, of course, the answer is yes.
[00:00:51] It even has a name or multiple names, depending on the jurisdiction. It's considered custodial interference or abduction, or sometimes just plain kidnapping. But. There's always a but, depending on where you look. The question starts to get a little muddier immediately. So actually, if you go back far enough, you can find. Well, you can find almost anything to make your case.
[00:01:20] Here, for instance, is a passage from a famed English legal scholar, William Blackstone and his commentaries. There's a refuge for anyone seeking a backward looking view of reality. Let's talk the 18th century, shall we?
[00:01:46] Take a deep breath.
[00:01:48] In his authoritative pronouncement on English law, William Blackstone describes custody of children under the age of 21 as, quote, the empire of the father.
[00:02:02] Blackstone goes on to say that the empire of the father, there is no empire of the mother, by the way, quote, continues even after his death, for he may, by his will, appoint a guardian to his children.
[00:02:18] I have to say, using my editorial voice, of course, that this view has a certain fit with a person we've come to know in these chronicles. And of course, there's always the irony of Neil McKay's evil stepfather who, who knows, might have been showing him the way.
[00:02:35] But let's not get ahead of ourselves. I return your attention to this passage from episode 11, which discusses Mr. McKay in light of his failure to gain Scotty in the first round of his custody hearing, McKay said that after the previous hearings on the custody matter, he sought professional psychiatric help at Anchorage's Langdon clinic for the purpose of determining whether he was in fact, a danger to his son. They established in my mind that I couldn't be a danger to the boy. McKay testified of his contact at the Langdon clinic.
[00:03:22] In truth, Neil McKay was up against some formidable barriers. Forget for the moment that some thought him the orchestra leader in Mel's death. For get even the claim from the Anchorage man who noted that Neil McKay asked him about a hitman two or three months before me was killed, who claimed, moreover that McKay's legal secretary, Virginia Saki, had set it up, thereby giving McKay an alibi. Also, ignore for the moment the fact that McKay's defense lawyers found this very evidence using air quotes here, contradictory.
[00:04:02] No. The immediate barriers for Neil McKay are his medical history with medical taken in its broadest sense, which in fact was an ongoing record building in real time, increment by increment over many, many years.
[00:04:22] The most serious of these occurred during his service in the U.S. marines during World War II. He was involved in a Jeep accident on base. His jeep collided with an aircraft in the mid-40s, 1940s, that is, he ended up with a steel plate and his skull.
[00:04:41] His sister Caroline refers to this incident during her April 18, 19, 1977 testimony in the custody matter. I quote, He McKay was in a tragic accident years ago, a jeep accident. On that I was told Neil would not live.
[00:05:00] Neil McKay's physical issues only continued from there. An encyclopedia is worth. 1948, hospitalization for ankle fracture, 1955, cerebral concussion, 1956, hospital admission for, quote, history of headaches and speech difficulty. Also acute alcoholism, laceration of face, 1958, hospital admission for recurrent shoulder dislocation. Hospital admission for simple drunkenness, 1961, compression fracture, L1 vertebrae, 1970, anxiety reaction, also personality disorder, type unspecified. 1972, nodular overdose, perhaps nodular addiction, 1973, anxiety attack, 1974, chronic brain syndrome with psychological tests attached, 1976, migraine headaches, drug abuse, inadvertent and anxiety.
[00:06:04] What worried the doctors, of course, was that Neil McKay could find his way back to drug abuse. Had he ever really left while attempting to take full responsibility for the care and supervision of a three and a half year old son, something he had never done in the entire 53 years he had lived on the planet?
[00:06:29] At its most sublime, this is a case of trying to teach an old dog new tricks, not barking.
[00:07:14] The crisis, the looming crisis of a possible escape seemed to be triggered by the holidays.
[00:07:22] By Christmas, by Christmas and dimension of Hawaiian vacation. Seriously, let's call it what it was, a double headed monster. The first installment came in 1976, when the Irwins, you'll remember him as, the Chief justice of the Alaska Supreme Court, decided they'd ask Scotty to accompany them on their Christmas holiday in Hawaii.
[00:07:49] Neil McKay went ballistic, which, of course, is how Scotty ended up with his paternal ant.
[00:07:58] Foiled again, you might say, Neil McKay.
[00:08:02] By the winter of 1977, Neil McKay was ready to take another charge at Christmas in Hawaii.
[00:08:12] Emboldened by what he saw as success at meeting all of Judge Madsen's full custody requirements. There was a list that included no drugs, taking parenting classes, and acceptable governess for Scotty and an acceptable home. Neil S. McKay was positively itching for that Hawaiian vacation so long denied him.
[00:08:34] So then, on the plus side of overconfidence, McKay filed a petition for permanent exclusive custody of Scotty. The effective date was September 12, 1977.
[00:08:49] Except.
[00:08:51] Except Neil McKay had skipped the court mandated drug test.
[00:08:56] Sorry, Neil, but that's going to look suspicious.
[00:09:00] The Judge Madsen as anxious to be rid of this case as much as Neil McKay was, moved the hearing for full custody up to December 24, 1977, Christmas Eve.
[00:09:14] Something must have snapped in Neil McKay's steel encased brain because he immediately wrote to Judge Matson.
[00:09:23] Under all the circumstances McKay declared, I'm writing at this time to request an understanding that no hearings will be scheduled in this case. During the period of December 2, 1977 through March 19, 1978.
[00:09:38] Scotty has been invited to visit his 81 year old great aunt who lives in Lakewood City, California, which is an easy distance of Disneyland, has been invited to spend some time on a ranch in Idaho, would like to spend some time on the beach at his home in Honolulu, and has a father who has had no vacation in over a year.
[00:10:03] It's worth noting here because of some of local issues in Anchorage.
[00:10:10] Neil McKay has really factually located, relocated to to Hawaii, to Waikiki. He's got a condominium there, still owns real estate in Anchorage, but effectively he's out of the Pacific somewhere.
[00:10:33] So he had his attorney, Dave Talbot, write another letter, this one to Bob Wagstaff. It was a time bomb.
[00:10:44] Dear Bob, Neil had some urgent business requiring his presence in Hawaii. And so he and Scotty flew to Honolulu Sunday night, December 11th.
[00:10:56] Neil was lucky to get a reservation on such short notice. And Western Airlines said it was either go Sunday night or not at all until after New Year's.
[00:11:07] I know from the papers you filed last December that you are a strong believer that Scotty should spend some time in Hawaii. So I trust this development is okay with you.
[00:11:20] What Dave Talbot failed to mention in his friendly little missive was that Neil McKay was supposed to notify the court before taking Scotty out of Alaska and that he was to post a $250,000 performance bond.
[00:11:39] He done neither.
[00:11:42] Now Scotty was gone and all hell was about to break loose.
[00:11:56] Sam.
[00:12:23] Tired of fighting with Neil McKay over every little comma and period.
[00:12:31] He Given Neil McKay conditional custody of Scotty. And he'd made the terms and conditions of that conditional custody very clear. Spelled him out word by word, line by line. He even included a condition that allowed for his order to be reviewed, which, in fact, D. McKay had invoked. Invoked, that is, before he decided to ignore it completely.
[00:12:59] Here's the applicable clause from Judge Matson's order dated 6th May, 1977.
[00:13:09] You know, the one that talks about the money.
[00:13:13] Further, that so long as this order remains in force and effect, it is ordered that Neal S. McKay is not to remove Scotty from the State of Alaska during any visitation without one first posting with the court, a performance bond and the sum of $250,000, which may be in the form of a secured property bond, guaranteeing full and faithful compliance with the orders of the court with respect to Scotty.
[00:13:44] That clause, that performance bond, was there for a reason. The court had been forewarned. In court, no less.
[00:13:52] Let's hear the full story.
[00:13:54] Seattle based physician and psychiatrist Dr. Alan Leiter had been called to testify on Neil McKay's fitness for fatherhood and witnessing Neil McKay's in court testimony. He was in court before he was called up to testify. Leader called it inarticulate. Said he witnessed emotional turmoil within the plaintiff. He was barely functional at the beginning. That's what I heard.
[00:14:22] And then when he was on the stand, he was asked what would happen if McKay failed to gain custody of Scotty.
[00:14:31] That's not acceptable to Mr. McKay. Leader said he would continue till he had his son. I think he might take the child and leave the state or country.
[00:14:42] Let's repeat that. I know I've already said it, but I think he might take the child and leave the state or country.
[00:14:58] The 26th floor penthouse, the Ilakai Hotel and Condominiums is iconic.
[00:15:04] Its balcony is the backdrop for the swooping helicopter shot framing actor Jack Lord in the opening credits of the original Hawaii 5O. This time, however, the action was 17 floors down in unit 929.
[00:15:21] At the door of unit 929 were Brookhart, a lawyer who'd been hired to represent Scotty and Hawaii, and and Honolulu Sheriff Raymond O.
[00:15:34] They were there to serve Neil McKay a temporary restraining order in order to show cause, directing him to appear in the Honolulu courtroom and show why he should not be required to return Scotty to Alaska. By the time Brookheart and Sheriff Ho showed up at McKay's door, they knew something else.
[00:15:54] Neil McKay had made inquiries about his son's birth certificate. Said he wanted his son to have a U.S. passport.
[00:16:03] Once they had the passport, he planned to leave for foreign jurisdiction, perhaps Hong Kong, which would put the pair even farther out of reach.
[00:16:16] Expecting trouble, the sheriff brought multiple police officers to the Illici. They pounded on the door, and when no one answered, they started to break it down.
[00:16:26] One of the people inside called security. His name was Charles Sullivan. Sullivan was there with his wife Jean. The older couple, he was 67, she was 62. Said they didn't know where Neo and Scotty were, did not know where they could be reached. They believed, they said, that he was on the island of Kawai, the westernmost major island in the Hawaiian chain.
[00:16:51] But the Sullivans were lying. The Kawaii angle was a ruse, a long ball designed to take the cops off the scent. And yes, that's the same Gene Sullivan that Neil McKay knew from Fairbanks.
[00:17:07] In fact, while the police clustered like cockroaches at The Illici, Neil McKay and Scotty were hiding across the street at the Discovery Bay condominium in a unit owned by the Sullivans.
[00:17:21] At their age, they decided that Fairbanks was too cold and too dark.
[00:17:27] Hawaii had beckoned. And here's the crunch. Neil McKay had managed to sell the Sullivans on the notion that people from Alaska were trying to kidnap Scotty. And Chuck and Jean were just the folks to call after having owned that hotel in Fairbank. Say now it's several addresses and Honolulu. One at the elai on the 20th floor, at least one at the Discovery Bay, and another two units at the Villa at Eaton Square Condominiums near the Eaton Square Shopping Center.
[00:17:58] During the next few days, Neil and Scotty shuffled between various Sullivan properties, cat and mouse, mouse and cat.
[00:18:08] Once Neil McKay's lawyer, Dave Talbot arrived, they turned that game into double jeopardy. And Robert File, thousands of miles distant in Anchorage, hired a private investigator named Steve Good. Now came on.
[00:18:24] And you have to know that Neil McKay was going to be pissed that Robert File was paying for the private investigator out of Scotty's inheritance.
[00:18:38] Sam.
[00:19:06] The following is taken directly from the document ledger to Brookhart from Steve Goodenow, Lawyers aid Incorporated, dated April 6, 1978.
[00:19:19] And I quote, the initial surveillance began on February 27, 1978, when a David Talbot was observed at the Iliki Room 929.
[00:19:32] From the onset, it was realized that following Talbot would be difficult at best. Due to the number of exits and entrances and topography of the Wii area, it was necessary to utilize a number of investigators to conduct surveillance. At your office's request, we started a 24 hour surveillance of Talbot And Jean and Chuck Sullivan immediately upon learning of Talbot's presence in Hawaii. This phase lasted until 6:45pm on March 9th, 1978.
[00:20:05] This segment of our total investigation consumed the most man hours. Up to six men at any one time were necessary to conduct surveillance. There's no question that Talbot and Sullivan assumed from the beginning that there may be have been a tail on them. Talbot was extremely difficult to follow because of his lack of a use of a pattern. Talbot would walk backwards to coin an investigative term, he would enter a building, go to several floors, rock around corners and stop. Etc. We were forced to use at least three to four men to follow Talbot.
[00:20:42] One of the greatest difficulties was the fact that Jean and Chuck Sullivan owned so many vacant apartments in the Elai and surrounding regions. We know that at least two of Sullivan's apartments had interconnecting phones. It was impossible to watch just one apartment since there were at least six apartments in three separate buildings within a quarter of a mile where the subjects would sleep and spend their time.
[00:21:08] Jean Sullivan, while giving testimony on three occasions gave three different addresses to her present address on the date of testifying.
[00:21:20] These were PH11 at Discovery Bay, 2025 the Iliki and 929.
[00:21:27] The Illici must be realized that there are at least 2,000 people at any given time at the Illici as well as as well as approximately 692 apartments and two 42 story towers at Discovery Bay.
[00:21:43] That coupled with the fact that the villa, a condominium where the Sullivan's owned perhaps two units was used by both Jean Sullivan and Talbot to conduct meetings, complicated the surveillance situation. The villa must house at least a thousand people and has the Eaton Square shopping complex attached.
[00:22:04] The surveillance logs indicate that Sullivan and Talbot were noted using pass keys to gain entrance to the villa, which made surveillance difficult.
[00:22:14] These facts and others that are evident when reading the surveillance log points out why so many man hours were expended keeping track of the subjects.
[00:22:27] Indeed, this was the kind of operation that could at any point allow them McKay, Scotty to slip away entirely. And at least two things are worth noting here. At least two.
[00:22:43] One of course is you note that good now is keeping track of man hours because he wants to be paid and this is a complicated job and he keeps having to hire people because McKay and Sullivan and Talbot are all over the place, number one.
[00:23:07] Number two, are they ever really going to find them?
[00:23:15] Because it seems like the Sullivan plan have a huge supply of places to stay, we suspect we intuitively think no time will run out. They will. They will be found.
[00:23:38] And of course, that's what good now hopes find them. Let's get this job done. Let's just get this job done.
[00:23:50] Easier said than done.
[00:24:01] See you next time.
