Last Dance, Last Chance

money for an insurance policy, but a check of Anthony’s bank records had showed them that his checking account was tapped out. For months he had been trying to get out of New York State and move to Florida. They assumed he would then cross the Caribbean to some out-of-the-way spot where he could set up practice as a doctor again. A wife with ties to the States would only get in his way. And he had at least one woman waiting in the wings for him: Tami Maxell.
    “But he can’t divorce Debbie,” Sedita said. “If he did, his mother would cut him off from his dad’s estate—which is considerable.”
    As awful as it was to contemplate, poisoning Debbie might have seemed the only way Tony Pignataro could be free of the constraints of his marriage and still inherit his share of Dr. Ralph’s estate from Lena.

19
    D ebbie Pignataro was probably the one who could give the investigators the best read on her husband, but she seemed oddly loyal to the man who had put her through so much. She appeared to be more confused than angered that someone had poisoned her. It may have been that she couldn’t bear to look at it head-on.
    In September, Frank Sedita and Sharon Simon, the victims’ advocate, went to Mercy Hospital, but Frank stayed in the lobby while Sharon went up to visit with Debbie.
    Sharon empathized with women in a way no man could ever hope to. She hadn’t grown tough during her years of dealing with victims, and she considered Debbie a victim—perhaps someone who had been a victim for a very long time.
    “I know they call me Ms. Morgue, Dr. Death, or Morticia,” Sharon recalled with a laugh. “I’m ‘the one who talks to dead people.’ I’m the one whose beeper sounds at the most impossible times, calling me out to a murder crime scene.”
    Like most professionals who work with the saddest events of life, Sharon had become used to the black humor they need to keep from crying. Her job required that she had to spend a lot of time at homicide scenes, morgues, and funeral parlors as she comforted the survivors of murder victims.
    “When Frank Sedita called me, he had such a serious tone in his voice that I wondered what was wrong,” she said. “I went down to meet with him and our District Attorney, Frank Clark. I’d heard about the Pignataro case, and now they wanted me to work on it with them.”
    Sharon Simon hasn’t had an easy life herself, which may have a lot to do with how she identifies with victims. She had been married for twenty-three years—happily, she believed—when she was served with divorce papers in 1992. She was grateful that her two sons, Yuri and Damien, were grown when her marriage crumbled. They stood by her, but she lost the home she had lovingly restored with countless hours of hands-on work. Sharon knows how to communicate with women where they live, but she empathizes with men, too. It was Sharon who had sat with Dan Smith throughout the painful hearings about Sarah’s death. She had seen Debbie then, but had never spoken to her.
    Now Sharon would be on the other side, helping Debbie—if Debbie would let her. She wondered if Debbie would recognize her from their earlier courtroom time together. And if she did, would Debbie even give her the time of day?
    Like most women, Sharon had been through the wars of love herself, and she had also been a crime victim. “I grew up in Union City, New Jersey, and I’m a fighter. My response when I’m in danger is always immediate—and it’s to fight back.”
    Once Sharon was walking home from a visit at a girlfriend’s house when two men began to follow her. One of them jumped out and tried to push her into their car. “I scratched this guy’s face and drew blood. I saw the look on his face, and I thought, Now I’ve done it. He punched me and fractured my jaw, and I lost a tooth besides. My own instinctive response isn’t very healthy. Sometimes you shouldn’t fight back. You can only do that in certain places. If you’re in an elevator, you’re not gonna be fighting back. Every guy’s different. Fighting back might buy you some time—or fighting back might get you killed. So I tell women if you hit someone, be prepared that they’re going to hit you back.”
    Sharon McVeigh Simon got to know law enforcement well in New Jersey. Two of her uncles and a grandfather were Jersey City detectives. “It was an Irish Catholic family,” she said. “My father was one of eleven children. I was one of three