The arduous job of completing his 3.850 motion continued for Doc. It was his last legal recourse. Just going through the Grand Jury transcript, the lies—large and small—were overwhelming. He shared what he could with me, starting with Gardner’s testimony…
Georgia Cappleman: What is your name sir?
Gerald Gardner: Gerald Gardner.
Cappleman: Would you spell that please?
Gardner: G-E-R-A-L-D G-A-R-D-N-E-R.
Cappleman: How are you employed sir?
Gardner: Self.
Cappleman: And what type of work do you do? Landscaping?
Gardner: Yes ma’am.
LIE #1 I can guarantee he has never been a landscaper. He does odds and ends jobs that would be considered manual labor. He could not be a landscaper with no driver’s license and no truck and no education, a drunk, a drug addict, thief, and now murderer.
Cappleman: And do you know or did you know Adam and Samira Frasch?
Gardner: Yes, ma' am.
Cappleman: How did you know them?
Gardner: I was referred by them from a friend to go help do some work. And I started working for them…
Cappleman: Would you pull that microphone just a little bit closer to your mouth.
Gardner: They liked my work so they wanted me to work for them so I started working for them.
Lie #2 We never liked his work. I had a lot of work to do cleaning up the house, pool/jacuzzi and yard after my ex-wife left the house. I hired, JB, my limo driver, who in turn hired his brother, Juan, and friend, Gerald, to help him with each job I contracted JB to do.
I had to get on them continuously because of ignorance in what they were doing and slow progress. I went from hourly pay to contract set fee with a timeline goal for each project.
Samira and I were not married and she came over for a visit and oversaw them while I was at work and they all complained that I was hard on them, but Sam was a slave driver. Lol She was a hard worker and demanded hard work and quality labor for them to get paid. She realized that JB was not doing any of the work and was taking the money for the jobs and paying Juan and Gerald less than their 1/3 share each, so she told me that I needed to keep JB as my limo driver and just keep Juan and Gerald for odds and ends jobs at all my properties that she and I needed them to do or assist us with.
They were never good workers on their own. You had to be with them or monitoring them continuously, especially on new projects they had never done before. One day I came home from work and Samira was pissed off and had fired Juan and Gerald. She still had broken English at the time and would mix French with English when she was mad. After deciphering the two languages, I learned that she had taken her eye off of them to work in the backyard pulling weeds in a flower bed she was planting and putting down landscaping felt and wood chips, and she had caught them smoking weed.
JB drove us on a trip with the limo the next day and begged me to rehire Juan and Gerald because they both had multiple DUIs (driving under the influence of drugs and/or alcohol). Samira and I were upset at them for using illegal drugs on our property and also while they were supposed to be working. To us, that was like they were stealing from us since we were paying for their time. We also did not like having to pick them up and drop them off after they worked for us. JB negotiated on their behalf and said he would bring them to work and pick them up if we would hire them back. He guaranteed me that he would charge them for the transportation and guaranteed they would never drink or do drugs on the job or they would deal with him.
We agreed to hire them back and Samira said she was not only going to watch them like a hawk, if they thought she was a slave driver before, she was going to buy a whip and really show them. Lol She started calling Gerald “J” for short because she thought his name started with a J and he never corrected her.
Cappleman: So you did landscaping type work for them?
Gardner: Yes, ma’am.
LIE #3 We hired a landscaping company to maintain the yard, shrubs, flower beds, trees, etc. Gardner occasionally would assist me in small projects with my car maintenance, or installing or moving things around the house. Samira would continually buy furniture and decorative accessories, art deco pieces that would need hanging.
I am a tech junkie so I was always adding and hanging a bigger/better TV or speaker system or computer gadget. I was never into gaming myself, but I always bought the latest game consoles for the kids (Sony PlayStations, Xbox 360s, and Nintendos with all the newest and baddest controllers and accessories to go with the games out there. I had those memberships to the video game rental companies and if my kids really liked a game and played it a lot I would buy it for them.)
Cappleman: Did you do any other type of work around their house?
Gardner: Well basically I did their landscaping, like wash the car or the house and just small general stuff like that.
LIES #4, #5, AND #6. In addition to not doing any of our landscaping, he never washed our cars. I was meticulous about our cars. I had only a few auto detail/car wash places that I trusted to do that.
He also never pressure washed the house. We had a licensed and bonded gentleman with his own company and equipment to do that every 3 to 4 months on schedule, unless Samira wanted him to do the shower glass, mirrors, and windows in between. Then he would stop by in between jobs. He did driveways, too. He was the coolest guy and very reasonable with his fees, so he was in high demand and only worked in Golden Eagle because word of mouth kept him busy.
Cappleman: Okay what type of relationship did you have specifically with Mr. Frasch?
Gardner: Just normal relationship, friend relationship.
Cappleman: Did you all do stuff together socially?
Gardner: No.
Cappleman: What about Mrs. Frasch?
Gardner: No.
Cappleman: Nothing socially, nothing romantic, nothing like that?
Gardner : No—
Cappleman: It was strictly--
Gardner -- just regular work. I just kept it strictly business…
LIE#7 Only if you consider extorting Samira and stealing from us business. And note how Cappleman is bound and determined to never refer to me as Dr. Frasch.
Cappleman: And I want to ask you about February 22nd, 2014. Were you supposed to do some work for them that day?
Gardner: Yes ma'am.
LIE #8 If he was supposed to work that day, why did she not pick him up like he originally said she was going to do? If she didn’t go get him, it meant she didn’t need him.
Cappleman: And was that at 8374 Inverness Drive?
Gardner: Yes, ma'am.
Cappleman: And had you done work at that residence before?
Gardner: Yes ma'am.
Cappleman: Did you also do work at their other homes?
Gardner: Yes, ma'am.
Cappleman: Okay. And what time did you arrive that morning to work?
Gardner: Approximately about 10:00. I think about, average 10:20, something like that.
Cappleman: If the gate showed you coming through at 10:53, would you agree with that?
Gardner: Oh, yes, ma'am.
LIE #9 The time on the camera at the gate was never verified. The clock on that gate is always off. See how she leads her questions to get him to agree to arriving a little later to help him look less guilty. She is smooth in her approach and saying things that have not been factually verified, like the time at the gate.
I was said to have left that gate at exactly 8 AM. I swear on a stack of Bibles that I left out of the gate earlier than 8 AM that morning. It was more like 7:45 AM because the receipt from Chick-fil-A said 7:54 AM and it takes somewhere between 6 to 10 minutes to go from the gate, wait in the drive-thru to get served, and then pay. The receipt shows that I did all that before the gate camera’s clock showed me allegedly leaving at 8 AM that morning.
I left Chick-fil-A and headed to Pep Boys, arriving at 8:28 AM. The clerk had to go and get the gas cap and ring me up and the receipt said 8:34 AM. It is about a 30 minute from Chick-fil-A to Pep Boys on the other side of town, so the business clock receipts are more accurate than the Golden Eagle subdivision’s cameras’ clocks.
Cappleman: So when you arrived what did you do? You had somebody with you; didn't you?
Gardner: Uh-huh.
Cappleman: Who was that?
Gardner: My son.
Cappleman: How old is your son?
Gardner: 14.
Cappleman: Ok, so you arrived there what did you do?
Gardner: I arrived there, I went there to the door bell, like I normally do, just to let her know I am there. I rung the doorbell three times and I could never get no response. So I was like, hmm, you know, it's kind of strange. And I was like maybe, well, she in there probably asleep.
LIE #10 It was not something he normally or ever did, to arrive and ring the doorbell, especially unannounced and uninvited. Plus, we always went to his house and picked him up and when he was done working for us, we took him home.
LIE #11 It would be strange if anyone came to your house, tailgating illegally through your subdivision’s private, supposed-to-be-secure-and-manned gate, unannounced, uninvited, and rang your bell. If they had good intentions, they would leave and realize you are not home, or if you are home, you want to be left alone.
LIE #12 If anyone ever came to our house anytime after 5 AM on weekdays, I was there and up, and if I wasn’t there, Samira was up at 8 AM. On weekends, it was 6 AM for me and 9 AM for Samira. We rarely slept in, even in resort hotels.
Another big question, why did he have his son’s mother who drove them there, leave before he could check that we were home and wanted him working that day? We never hired him to work on Saturdays. Doesn’t this suggest that he already knew we weren’t home and was there to steal things and hide them in the bushes or pass them onto somebody else? I told one person that we were not home and were at the beach, without mentioning that Samira was still back at home in Tallahassee, and I suspect he passed the intel onto Gardner and Gardner was passing the stolen goods to him. So Gardner was shocked when Samira turned out to be there and caught them on the pool deck.
Cappleman: Let me stop you. Was there anything unusual about the cars that were
parked out there or anything about the front of the house?
Gardner: Well yeah, it was unusual because of her car being pulled down by the garage door and it's normally parked right there by the sidewalk pretty much every time I go over there because that's where she parked when she get home. She get the kids and then go into the house.
LIE #13 Samira parked her Hummer all over the place, especially with as many vehicles as we had. Because of having the two babies and all of their stuff, she would usually park in the front yard, closest point to the front door. Sometimes with groceries she would park way down the driveway to the last garage door, because that was the closest point to the kitchen through the garage, the door to the house inside of the garage.
Cappleman: And what vehicle was that?
Gardner: Her Hummer.
Cappleman: Anything else unusual about the front of the house?
Gardner: No ma’am.
Cappleman: All right, after you didn't get any response to your doorbell ringing, what did you do?
Gardner: So I just—you know, I told my son, I said, well, since—we got something else to do later on in the day. So let's go on and go in the back, you know, because I know I had to finish washing the back pool deck. And so I went in there. I went back there to the back door and I grabbed the handle. And I opened the handle; that's the only thing I touched was the handle.
LIE #14 It has already been established that he was not there that day to finish up washing the back of the pool deck. Also, the pool deck was clean as anyone can tell by all the photos taken that day of the pool and pool deck.
LIE #15 He said he went back there and grabbed the handle. He went through a locked gate, either breaking in or picking the lock or scaling the fence or gate to get to the screened-in pool enclosure’s screen door.
LIE #16 He did not just open the handle to the door because I locked all three doors to the screened-in pool enclosure. I also made sure the gates to the fence around the backyard and house were locked.
LIE #17 It is impossible to get to the pool without going through two entrance points that have locked handles or padlocks on them, or by going through the house front door and a number of six total doors that have access to the pool inside the house, from various rooms.
Cappleman: What was that, the screen door?
Gardner: Uh-huh.
Cappleman: Let me back you up just a little bit. You said you had to finish washing off the pool deck. Had you been doing that earlier?
Gardner: Yes, ma'am. I had did it earlier because I had—prior to that week, I was over there already. And I washed the bathroom out to the pool deck where she kept her dog.
LIE #18 He said at the trial that he was there the day before pressure washing the house. When that was proven to be a lie, his story changed. It changed several times and none of it is believable.
Cappleman: All right. And how did you do that? Did you use the hose that was out there, like a gray colored hose?
Gardner: Yes, ma'am. Uh-huh.
LIE #19 He said at the trial he used a pressure washer. What is an honest, thinking person supposed to believe?
Cappleman: And would you have left the hose laid out over the pool deck?
Gardner: At that time I don't normally do that. I normally wrap it back up.
LIE #20 He hardly ever wrapped up the hose after using it. I would get on him all the time for leaving not only the hose out, but the cleaning supplies and bleach bottles with the lid off. A big no-no, poison risk, with a toddler and pets around. He was extremely irresponsible in that regard.
I did not leave the hose out on the pool deck that morning and Samira rarely used it, if ever. That is why I wound it up but did not hang it up that morning, because I wanted it out of the walkway area of the pool deck. I laid the circular pile at the pool edge and let the end of the hose lay just over the pool edge and turned the water on at a slow drip to add water to the pool because I could see the pool level was a little low and could hear the pool pump surging from taking in air through the skimmer return at the edge of the pool.
Cappleman: So if it was laid out over the pool deck and hanging into the pool, you would not have done that?
Gardner: No, ma'am.
LIE #21 As previously mentioned, I wound it up and he unwound it to clean up quickly after he hit Samira and threw her in the pool, thinking he would wash away any potential evidence or blood.
Cappleman: All right. So you arrive, you open the screen door—
Gardner: Yes, ma'am, and I went—
Cappleman: —which leads to the pool?
Gardner: And I went in…
LIE #22 Would anyone who rings a doorbell to a front door go around the back of a house and enter a back entrance, not bothering to yell, “Is anyone home?” That’s called breaking and entering!
The only reason you wouldn’t be calling out, “is anyone home?” is if you didn’t want to alert the neighbors. The neighbor, Mr. Bass, saw Gerald arrive but never heard him yelling or announcing himself. Isn’t that suspicious? Yet, it was never challenged as being abnormal behavior, especially for an estranged worker and employee like Gerald.
Gardner.: And I felt kind of funny about it because when I went into the pool, I seen the bathroom door open and the dog was out…
LIE #23 This would not be unusual or any reason for him to “feel funny” because we always left that pool bathroom door open to let the cats and dogs have access to the screened-in pool. We only let the door open 6” and I placed a large, carpeted cat loft and play tower in front of the door when we left for weekends so that it would not be noticeable from the backyard or lake by passersby.
Gardner: And I was like, okay. So I guess she might have opened the door for me to wash the bathroom out because she kept the dog there and keep the smell out the house…
LIE #24 We never allowed Gerald to come to our house and work unsupervised, or his son who I had never met and would not let or pay a teenage boy to help. (Especially if he was Gerald Gardner Jr. and a thief like his dad.)
Gardner: And so I didn't ever touch nothing. I walked in there with my son…
LIE #25 Their stories changed several times pre-trial and at trial. Gerald said his son stayed out on the street, and then the son said he saw Samira’s sandal in the pool on the step in the shallow end.
Gardner: We walked up there and looked into the house. And I was like this don't look right, because the house looking cozy, didn't look like it would normally look.
LIE #26 Why would he say, “this don’t look right”? When he wasn’t even supposed to be at our house and after breaking into two locked access points—a locked gate and a locked door? Unless he had been there before when we were not home, stealing things, and that day it didn’t look right because Samira was home and caught him there.
Cappleman All right. So the door to a bathroom that leads right to the pool was hanging wide open?
Gardner: Yes, ma'am.
Cappleman: All right. And they had a dog that was loose?
Gardner: Yes ma'am, she had a little white poodle.
Cappleman: And that was—that dog was running around the pool area?
Gardner: Just running around out there in the pool area.
Cappleman: Okay, so you noticed that something seemed wrong about the house?
Gardner: Yeah. So I went up there and I told my son…
LIE #27. Went up where? Was his son with him or was his son up at the street as the look out? Saying up there on our property would correlate to the elevation of the property. The back of the house and property slopes to the lake and the elevation difference from the street to the backyard is 20 feet.
Gardner: I said, well, we may need to start again…
LIE #28 Start what again? He had not been there the day before like he testified in court to start anything, except maybe a burglary.
Gardner: My hair just stood up on my arms. So I turned around, I said, “come on, son, let's walk out…”
LIE #29. Again, where is this happening? Is his son with him or did his son stay out on the street?
Gardner: You know, and he was walking by me and he was looking. He said, “Look, daddy.” So I looked and down in the pool there was one of her shoes on the top step and the other shoe was on the bottom step.
LIE #30. It was a sandal, not a shoe. The altercation happened so fast he did not remember what type of footwear she had on when he pushed her and/or threw her into the pool.
Gardner: And that is something I had never seen. Out of the whole five years I been working for them, I never seen that. And so I…
Cappleman (interrupting): And those shoes, were they in the shallow end or the deep end?
Gardner: They was like on the shallow end because one was on the top shelf in the shallow end and one was in the bottom of the pool on the other—in the shallow end.
Cappleman: Okay.
Gardner: The step. And so I looked from here to her, and there she was. When I seen her, I just took off running.
Lie #31: Why did he just take off running and not stay and jump into the pool and try to save her? He knew how to swim. This slip is more consistent with his original story that it was just him.
The Grand Jury transcript went on and on and was just one of many documents in the case that had to be sifted and sorted through and all pared down so that the evidence could be presented to a judge.
The trial, itself contained a staggering amount of lies and contradictions that needed to be addressed, starting with the testimony of a man, Luis Torres, who had sold a boat to Doc and maintained it for him in Miami. At the trial, Torres told the court that Adam, speaking to him on the day of Samira’s death had told him a serious problem had come up…
