Danielle Nicole van Dam
God rest her soul. May the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth come forth and may the lies and deceit be exposed for all the world to see.
Posted on 07/12/2002 7:06:01 AM PDT by MizSterious
By Kristen Green
UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER
July 12, 2002
Denise Kemal was fired June 28, more than two weeks after her nationally televised testimony, because the company has a zero-tolerance drug policy.
Losing her job has ruined her life, Kemal said yesterday. "I've always wanted to fly," she said. "It took me years to get my job."
She said she is appealing the dismissal because smoking marijuana "wasn't an everyday thing." While she waits for an answer, Kemal, 28 and recently divorced, watches the Westerfield trial from the couch of her new Florida apartment.
Kemal was called to the witness stand by the prosecution June 10. She was at the van Dam home Feb. 1, the night 7-year-old Danielle van Dam was last seen, and spent the evening with Brenda van Dam, the girl's mother.
The two had become friendly through their husbands, who both work at Qualcomm. A spokeswoman for Southwest confirmed that Kemal had been fired, but declined to elaborate. She said company policy states that the "illegal use of drugs, narcotics or controlled substances off duty and off company premises is not acceptable and may result in termination because it can affect on-the-job performance and the confidence of our customers in the company's ability to meet its responsibilities."
Kemal said she was just answering questions posed to her during Westerfield's trial because "I want to make sure he gets convicted."
"Because of him, it's just ruined everyone's lives," she said.
Kemal testified that she went out with her Tierrasanta neighbor Barbara Easton and Brenda van Dam to Dad's Cafe & Steakhouse in Poway two Fridays in a row, Jan. 25 and Feb. 1. They were celebrating Kemal's upcoming move to Baltimore, where she had been transferred for work.
The second night out, Feb. 1, she was introduced to Westerfield, whom she has described as "creepy." Westerfield is charged with kidnapping and murdering Danielle. If convicted, he could be sentenced to death.
Kemal said the three women first celebrated her move Jan. 25. Kemal and Easton, who lived in the same apartment complex, shared a bottle of wine before driving to the van Dams, Kemal testified. She said she smoked some marijuana in the van Dams' garage before they left for the bar.
The next week, the three women decided to spend that Friday night partying at Dad's again after Damon van Dam canceled plans to go out of town and agreed to stay home with the couple's three children.
On Feb. 1, they smoked pot in the garage a second time, Kemal testified, and she and Easton shared a beer. Later in the evening, they partied at Dad's, where they ran into Westerfield. At one point in the night, they went to van Dam's sport utility vehicle to smoke marijuana again.
Kemal said her supervisors learned that she had smoked pot because customers mailed newspaper articles about her testimony.
She had never had problems at Southwest before the trial, she said. In fact, she regularly received letters of commendation from airline passengers since she was hired in November 1998.
Once, a Texas couple she had met on a flight sent a box of candy to her home. Kemal, in turn, shipped them a set of candles for their living room.
Kemal said that even after Sept. 11, she didn't have any reservations about flying.
"I did it because it's my job, and I love my job," she said. "I get to travel and meet different people. I like to serve the public."
Now, go back and listen to the sanitized and heavily edited 911 call played for the jury in June (transcript available here). It sounds quite different without all the inane babbling. She still appears to be quite calm, except for the interjected "oh my god" a few times. And the timing is weird, too. I most likely would have spent some time searching the house, the yards, the park at the end of our street, scouring the neighborhood and calling friends' homes first, instead of walking downstairs from the child's bedroom straight to the telephone. But that's just me, I guess.
If anyone can provide that original link, I'd like to do a side-by-side comparison with the actual 911 tape and the different version played for the jury in the courtroom.
No, it's most of us, shezza. Their response was abnormal.
That is suspicious in itself. Not only did they immediately get it reported before even touching the neighborhood, but they did what someone here called "premature disclosure".
If you notice, Brenda made sure to give all the details, including times, to lay out the "story" from the night before. Is that normal for a panic-stricken mother?
Isn't it far more likely that the person would be near hysteria instead of giving details that were not even sought?
It stunk from those first moments and it's been downhill ever since.
God rest her soul. May the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth come forth and may the lies and deceit be exposed for all the world to see.
I think she says Danielle's hair is blond but the dispatcher repeats it back as brown. The six feet thing was transcribed originally probably because she says "60" when saying about how much Danielle weighed.
**FREE NINJA DAVE**FREE NINJA DAVE**FREE NINJA DAVE**
Bite yer tongue, err .. keyboard. Larry, Moe and Curly are cool !
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