15 The White Rabbit

Today is June 06, 1994

Call your detectives and inform them that there has been a robbery at a safe deposit box. All the robbers have been arrested, but the safe deposit manager has called the police again about a suspicious bag. Ask the detectives to talk to the manager.

Decide on your personal information:  who are you?  What’s your name?  How long have you worked for the company?

Read the information below about safe deposit boxes and be prepared to tell the class about them.

“A safe deposit box (or safety deposit box) is an individually secured container—usually a metal box—that stays in the safe or vault of a federally insured bank or credit union. Safe deposit boxes are used to keep valuables, important documents, and sentimental keepsakes protected. Customers rely on the security of the building and vault to safeguard their contents.”  (https://www.investopedia.com)

You called the police and asked them to come over. This is the information you will provide:

• There was an attempt to rob the company.
• A gang entered the safe deposit room during the night and blew up the boxes.
• Police arrived before they had a chance to get away and arrested all of them.
• Clients’ belongings were scattered all over the floor;  you couldn’t possibly know what belonged to whom.
• You contacted all clients. They all showed up except one:  Harold Cavanaugh
• The only item left unidentified was a gym bag which contained about US 2,000,000 and a gun.
• The safe deposit box is registered to one Harold Cavanaugh.
• It was rented in 1971 for a monthly fee of U$100,00, which has been paid for regularly (this month’s payment has not been made yet).
• The last time there is any register of Mr. Cavanaugh visiting the company is September 1974, before you started working there.
• You decided to open the bag and check its contents.  When you saw the money and the gun you decided to call the police.
• Only you and a guard have touched the gym bag.
• Mr. Cavanaugh’s address is:  973 Sycamore Street,  New York

Meet with the detectives. After the detectives report on the situation, tell them to go to the address provided by the bank manager.

Personal information (name, age, etc.): use your imagination

This is the information you will provide:

• You have lived in this house since 1969 when you bought it.
• The previous owner, Harold Cavanaugh, had just died (in 1969) and his parents decided to sell it.  You never actually met him.
• You and your husband had been married for a year and you were expecting your first child.  That’s when you both thought it would be better to raise the kids in a house instead of an apartment.
• You saw the ad in a newspaper and decided to buy it.  You have no information on the whereabouts of the Cavanaugh family.

After processing the gym bag and its contents, this is what you have:

There were 6 sets of prints: you have identified 5 of them:

• one set belongs to the bank manager and another to the bank guard
• the other three sets match: Susan Rewers, Tom Vale, and Sam Ryan
• one set of prints remains unidentified
• the .38-calliber gun’s serial number has been scraped off
• ballistics tests were able to determine that the same gun was used in a safe car robbery in 1971 which resulted in the death of a police officer, Rodney Stewart
• there was 1,985,000 in U$ dollars in the bag

Inform your detectives that you have located Scott Cavanaugh, Harry Cavanaugh’s brother in France. Ask your detectives to talk to him over the phone.

Personal information (name, age, etc.): use your imagination

This is the information you will provide:

You live in Paris, France.  You have lived there since 1969, when your brother died in a car accident.  That’s when all your family decided to move to France as your mother had family there. You got a scholarship to study psychiatry at Sorbonne.  You had a sister, Sarah, but she died giving birth in 1978.  You have never come back to the US.  The police can check that with immigration.  You have no idea what the police are talking about. What robbery?  Who is Susan Rewers or the others?  Never heard of them.

Suggestion to teacher: Place students in groups.  Have each group prepare a list of five circumstances that would make them leave their home country and live abroad for good.  Discuss students’ lists.  Does everyone agree?

Tell your detectives to talk to the FBI agent who investigated the 1971 safe car robbery.

Alexandre White

The police had asked you to try to trace the bank deposits related to Harry Cavanaugh payments for the rent of the safety box. You visit the police station with the information you’ve got:

• Between 1971, when the box was initially rented, and July 1974, deposits had been made by Harold Cavanaugh himself in his monthly visits to the bank.
• Since 1974, the money has been wired to the bank.  As far as you can tell, the amounts were wired from different Western Union agencies in New York.  All wires were in the name of Harold Cavanaugh and, according to your books, they were made using cash.

Think of additional personal information you might wish to include here.  Just one thing: you have never liked cops and that has not changed.

This is the information you will provide:

Yes, you participated in the bank robbery.  You were a college student at the time and an activist in the anti-Vietnam campaigns.  You wanted to save the boys in Vietnam.  Nobody was supposed to get hurt.  Tom lost control when he saw the police officer come and shot him.  You had stayed in the car at the time, ready to drive them all away.  Susan was in the bushes on the other side – she was the lookout. Sam and Tom were the ones who went to the safe car, but you did not see anything. You did not see the police officer.  You really regret what happened.  You went underground with Susan, the other girl who participated in the robbery (think of what you did during those three years, running away from the police: worked in bars, waitressing?  Moved around often?)  By the way, Susan was Tom’s girlfriend at the time of the robbery. It was Tom who planned everything.  For three years, you and Susan managed to keep away from the police.  Then, in 1974 you went your separate ways.  In 1983, you were in the parking lot of a shopping mall and a car crashed into yours.  You suffered head trauma and was taken to a hospital unconscious.  When you regained consciousness, the police arrested you.  You were sentenced to eight years in prison and you have paid your debt to society.  Today you work for this non-profit organization (an NGO) helping children who have lost limbs as a result of explosions of left-behind land mines in Africa.  You haven’t seen Susan since 1974 and you haven’t seen the money since the day of the robbery.  You don’t remember who kept the gym bag, but you think it was Tom who took it with him.  Tom died two weeks later from an overdose.  Sam, the other person involved in the robbery, was also caught and served 20 years.  You had been romantically involved with Sam before the robbery but haven’t talked to him ever since he was arrested.  You have moved on with your life.

Suggestion to teacher:  Ask students to think about NGOs they know.  Here are some questions you may ask or activities to carry out:

Which NGO would you like to work for?  Why?

Are there any NGOs in your city?

Some people argue that NGOs are taking over activities that should be the responsibility of governments.  Do you think NGOs are a good idea?

A billionaire philanthropist has hired your group to help him create an NGO in your city.  Get together and present an idea.

Your group has decided to donate U$10,000 to an NGO.  Which one would you choose and why? (You might wish to have students research the names of different NGOs over the net and present some to class.  Or, you could have students represent an NGO and try to convince the class that their NGO should receive the donation.)

This is the information you will provide:

It was Tom who proposed the robbery.  The money would be spent financing campaigns against the Vietnam War. Of the members of your anti-war group, only Susan and Meg had the guts to participate.  Meg stayed in the car, ready to drive you all away.  Susan hid behind some bushes; she was the lookout.  Tom had the gun and had it pointed at the guard who was driving the safe car.  You got in the safe car to get the money, which you placed in a gym bag.  You never saw the police officer approaching, just the gun shot.  You panicked and ran to the car.  The others did the same.  As soon as you were out of sight, you split.  You went home and got high.  Tom had the gym bag and said he would keep it safe and that they should all keep a low profile and not try to contact each other for a while. He would try to get in touch when things calmed down. Two weeks later you heard about Tom’s overdose.  You tried to reach Meg and Susan, but they were nowhere to be found.  You felt terrible about the death of that police officer.  Nobody was supposed to get hurt.  You got involved with other anti-war groups and participated in three other more successful bank robberies.  Then, the FBI caught you.  It was a bit of bad luck, actually. You had been in a bar, high as usual, and you started hitting on a girl at the counter.  You thought she was a “working girl” and offered some money for her services.   It turned out that she was an undercover police detective who arrested you for solicitation.  Well, at the police station, you were recognized and eventually sentenced to 20 years in prison.  You were released some years ago and have been working with a moving company ever since.

Suggestion to teacher: Conduct a debate in class around the issue of prostitution and solicitation. Do you think prostitution should be legal or illegal? Should solicitation be considered a crime?

Personal information (name, occupation, etc.): use your imagination

This is the information you will provide:

• Yes, you participated in the group
• When Susan and Tom started talking about robberies, you decided to quit; you didn’t agree with the use of violence
• You were not in the city the week the robbery was carried out (think of something you can prove)
• You quit  university two weeks before the robbery (why?)

About the other participants:

• Meg and Susan were passionate about the campaigns
•  Sam and Meg were having an affair
• Tom and Susan were also together
• David was obviously infatuated with Susan
• Steve was a moron, a simpleton.  You don’t think he would have the nerve to do anything
• You have no idea what happened to any of them

Suggestion to teacher:

Teach the expressions:  have the nerve to do something/have the guts to do something/be brave

Ask the class to sit in groups and create five situations that would require someone to have the nerve or the guts to carry out. Discuss the situations.

Ask the class to write a definition of a “brave person” or describe someone they know to be brave.  Or:  create a poster completing the sentence below:

A brave person is someone who….

Inform the detectives that Steve Cole (from the list provided by the FBI agent) is deceased. They should interview David Morton.

Personal information (name, marital status, etc.): use your imagination

Profession:  Ornithology professor at YNC College

This is the information you will provide:

• You were part of the anti-Vietnam group
• Did not participate in the robbery
• Susan was a troubled young woman.  Her father died in Vietnam when she was 15.
• Her mother was too drunk to remember she had a daughter.  Mother died three years later when Susan was 18 and had just gotten into college.
• Susan had a younger sister.  You don’t remember her name.
• Susan had some money from her inheritance.  Used it to buy the gun used in the robbery.
• At the time of the robbery, she had used up almost all her money and was going broke.

Tell the detectives that one of the prints in the gym bag matches David Morton. Tell to bring him in for questioning.

The police have identified your fingerprints in the gym bag. This is the information you will give the police:

• Susan gave you the gym bag for safe-keeping;
• You rented a safety box in 1971 in the name of Cavanaugh (how did you know him?  How did you get his Id and social security number? Remember that Cavanaugh’s family did not know you, but maybe you knew them…)
• Every month Susan and Meg would ask for some money for expenses, which you would give them;
• You were in love with Susan;
• Last time you saw them was in 1974.  You have not heard anything from them since.  You have not touched the gym bag since, but you kept on paying the rent of the safety box.
• You remember that Susan had a younger sister Kate. Maybe she has information about her sister. You still remember Kate. She was an exceptionally bright kid and had just gotten to college at the age of 16. She wanted to be an anthropologist.

Inform the detectives that they have located Susan’s sister, Kate Rewers. She is married and goes by the name of Mrs. Kate Simmons. She works at the American Museum of Natural History.

Personal information: make it up. Just remember that you are married.

• You don’t know where Susan is. You haven’t seen her since 1985.
• She came to visit in 1985 and never came again.
• You know she is alive because you get a Christmas card from her every year.
• If the police ask you for the Christmas cards, tell them you never keep them.
• When she visited in 1985, Susan said she was happy because she had met someone special.
• She only mentioned his first name – George – and that he was a pilot.
• She showed you his picture. You remember the picture.  George had been wearing a pilot’s uniform and he looked very handsome. (Use your imagination here:  color of eyes, hair, etc.  Uniform from ABC airline company. Age: looked around 40)
• Susan said she had gotten a new identity and that you wouldn’t be hearing from her again. She didn’t tell you her new name.  She said it would be better if you didn’t know.

Tell your detectives to talk to the Manager of the ABC Airline Company and see if they can identify the “George” mentioned by Kate.

Personal information (name, age, etc.): use your imagination

• There are 5 Georges in your file:

George Manson, age 43

George Reily, age 50

George Thorn, age 34

• In your file of retirees:

George Keith, age 63

George Robertson, age 96

Caroline Reily has just come into the station and turned herself in. She claims to be Susan Rewers and wants to talk with the detectives in charge of the 1971 safe car robbery investigation.

Tell the class to interview her (as a whole group this time).

When you heard that the police had called your husband, you knew it was time to turn yourself in. You have come to the station voluntarily. Your husband and children don’t know anything about your past. They don’t even know your real name.

Personal information:

• Married George Reily in 1985 (9 years ago)
• Had 3 children (names?  Ages?)
• Housewife
• Active member of the community
• Could never forget what happened; regrets it
• Nobody was meant to get hurt
• Had been on the lookout the day of the robbery and did not see that policeman approaching (blame yourself for that every day)
• Panicked when Tom shot the officer
• Went underground with Meg
• In 1974, you managed to buy yourself a new identity (Karoline Mitchel) and you and Meg parted ways.
• Worked in several different diners around the state
• Got a job in a café near an airport
• Managers of the café were nice, kind people; you lived with them
• Met George in the café and fell in love
• He doesn’t know about your past and neither do your children
• You have tried to re-build your life and become a helpful member of your community (how do you help?)
• Your father died in Vietnam when you were 15
• Your mother got depressed and started drinking
• She would be drunk most of the time.  She died when you were 18
• You went to college and an aunt of yours took in your little sister.
• You are sorry about what happened.  You were only 19 years old, and you were angry at the government.

Remind students that of the four people involved in the heist, two have been caught and served time (Sam and Meg) and one has died (Tom). The only only who remained uncaught and unpunished was Susan.

Ask students as a group to decide:

1.  Whether to charge Susan. What would the charges be?
2.  If Susan is charged, should she be found guilty or innocent?
3.  If found guilty, what would the appropriate sentence be?

Alternatively, split the class into two groups:  prosecution and defense.  Have a debate.