The Stranger in the Woods_ The - Michael Finkel

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A side door to the jail swings open and three sheriff’s deputies emerge, armed and wearing bulletproof
vests, along with a prisoner, hands cuffed in front, his beard like Spanish moss. One deputy stations himself
ahead of Knight, the other two grip each elbow, and they march him across Court Street toward the
Kennebec County Courthouse, with its sentry of granite columns. Red and yellow leaves scatter in the fall
breeze, and television cameras are shoved into Knight’s face, but he manages to remain impassive, his gaze
directed at some unseen spot in front of him.
The upstairs courtroom is all dark wood and maroon carpeting, with a giant brick fireplace in one
corner, the walls a haunted-house display of oil paintings of old judges staring sternly from gilded frames.
A memorial service was held here to commemorate Abraham Lincoln after his assassination in 1865.
Wooden pews in the back creak with spectators, and the press photography and television section is full,
everyone awaiting Knight’s arrival. Boxes of files are carried about. McKee, Knight’s attorney, wears a dark
suit; Maloney, the DA, a fire-engine-red jacket. Knight’s brother Joel—same thin lips, same sharp nose—
sits with his son and daughter, both of whom look to be in their twenties. This is the first time they will see
their uncle. The son’s leg bounces, and I overhear Joel saying, “Nerves. Perfectly normal.”
Knight is brought in, stationed behind the defense table, and uncuffed. The room quiets. A court officer
says, “All rise,” and Justice Nancy Mills appears like a magic trick through a red curtain hanging over a
doorway. She smooths her black robe and sits down, then sets a pair of reading glasses low on her nose and
begins. For those not charting moons or seasons or chin hair, it’s Monday, October 28, 2013, nearly seven
months after Knight’s arrest.
A solution has been found. Knight will plead guilty to thirteen counts of burglary and theft—the vast
majority of his raids could not be prosecuted because of a six-year statute of limitations and many were
never reported at all—and instead of going to prison, he will be admitted into the Co-Occurring Disorders
and Veterans Court.
This is a program that substitutes counseling and judicial monitoring for incarceration, designed for
defendants facing criminal charges who are also affected by substance abuse and mental illness—the cooccurring
disorders. In Knight’s case, his afflictions are alcoholism and either Asperger’s syndrome,
depression, or schizoid personality disorder. These labels may not be precisely accurate, but even the DA
agrees that a long prison sentence for Knight would be cruel, and admitting him to the program is a way to
legally resolve the case.
Knight stands, clasps his hands behind his back, and Maloney reads the charges. If it weren’t for the