We find ourselves outside a 4 story office building in Freehold, NJ.
Jim is in a police van on the hostage negotiator’s phone with his brother Chris.
Chris is holding one man hostage, a very prominent attorney, at least in his own mind, John Sleastak, Esquire. Chris had told Mr. Sleastake’s staff, and the other tenants, there was a fire drill, so only he and Mr. Sleestak remained in the building.
It would come out later that Mr. Sleastak had been one of Chris’s clients for a few short months.
Apparently their relationship had taken a turn for the worse recently.
The county’s best hostage negotiator had been on the phone with Chris for over an hour when Jim arrived.
The hostage negotiation team was trying to piece together the facts as quickly as they could.
Jim grabbed the phone from the agent and said: “Chris, it’s Jim, talk to me.”
Chris said: “Hey brother, how's your day?”
Jim said: “Chris, there’s a lot of police out here that are very interested in seeing you exit the building. It looks to me that they wouldn’t care if you left the building dead or alive. I’m going to come in and escort you out, without weapons. You know how I hate guns.”
Chris didn’t seem to hear his brother’s pacifying, yet sobering last exchange. He said:
“Do you remember when I was little and you taught me that assholes must have consequences? Well you were 100% right as usual! I am just here to teach someone that valuable lesson you taught me.”
The line went dead.
The hostage team were recording the entire conversation and many of them were listening in real time.
The man in charge asked Jim: “How capable and likely is your brother to take someone’s life?”
Jim responded: “Extremely capable, and very likely. Let me put it this way. If Chris felt justified, he would slit your throat sitting at lunch and finish his chicken parm sandwich while you bled out, without any increase in blood pressure or feelings of guilt or remorse.”
The entire hostage negotiating team turned ashen and all took a deep breath.
Jim continued: “Your best bet is to let me go in there and defuse the situation.”
With that Jim called his brother and told him he was coming in.
Jim got up and the detective said. “We can't allow you to put yourself in jeopardy. What if he shoots you?”
Jim said: “Every moment we sit here, that hostage comes one moment closer to death.”
Jim then laughingly said, “My brother wouldn’t shoot me.”
They offered him a bulletproof vest and a helmet and he laughed at them and said: “Do you know how long it takes for me to get my hair looking like this?”
He left both the vest and helmet in the police van.
Jim called and said: “Chris, I'm approaching the building. Whatever you do, do not come by any window as I'm sure there's snipers ready to take you out.
I'm on my way up. Don't shoot anybody until I get there!”
Members of the SWAT team immediately converged on Jim and told him he wasn't allowed to enter the building.
Jim said, “I'm going upstairs to get my brother and Mr. Sleestak safely out of the building. So I think you’re going to get the fuck out of my way.
Apparently over the past couple of hours you haven't had any success right?
You don't really know who you're dealing with here. And that's not your fault. My brother’s a very special person and you'll never be able to negotiate with him no matter how smart you think you are.”
He entered the building and put on a pair of latex gloves he had stashed in his pants pocket.
He found his way to Mr. Sleestak’s office and announced himself (loudly) to avoid being shot. He quickly came upon his brother.
Chris was sitting across from the very prominent attorney John Sleestak, Esquire, in Mr. Sleestak’s inner office.
Jim introduced himself with a slight laugh in his voice.
“Mr. Sleestak I presume!”
He then leaned over the desk and shook the man's hand.
Jim sat down next to his brother and said:
“So Mr. Sleestak, what did you do to piss off my brother? As long as I can remember, Chris would never throw the first punch, and would never bully anyone, so you must have done something really stupid.
The fact that my brother's sitting here with a gun pointed in your direction clearly shows that.
So Mr. Sleestak, how did you get everybody in this situation?”
Mr sleestak said: “You're just as crazy and disrespectful as your brother! Don’t you know how prominent I am!?”
Jim said with just the right amount of sarcasm: “Oh yes, your prominence is obvious and almost blinding.
And I've taught him everything he knows so I'd be very careful with your words from now on.
So tell me your version from the beginning.”
Mr. Sleestak began to recount his version of what precipitated the events of the day.
“I needed Chris’ help and he refused to take my call. So disrespectful and unappreciative. He works for me so that was unacceptable. He finally answered the phone and melted down for absolutely no reason.”
He finished with: “It was innocent really. Chris is completely overreacting and seems unhinged. Don’t you see that? He shouldn’t be talking to anyone at anytime and needs mental help.”
Both Jim and Chris laughed out loud in perfect unison.
Jim said: "I am sure there is more to it than that, so put your thinking cap on sir."
Mr. Sleestak continued. “Well, we hired Chris a few months ago to prepare our taxes. I tried to call and text him the other day, and he texted back, ‘during this busiest of times, the last week of tax season, please email me your questions and I will get back to you as soon as I can.’
I kept calling and texting as his demand for me to email him was disrespectful. Chris finally answered my call and he was so disrespectful. I have never been talked to that way before.”
Jim said: “Oh, you’re an asshole! Chris, please shoot him.”
For a moment, Mr. Sleestak thought Chris was going to, but he and Jim just burst out laughing again.
Chris said: “I think you're skipping over a few important points. First, how many times did you call after I politely asked you to email me?”
Mr. Sleestak said: “I don’t know, a few times?”
Chris said: “53 times after I politely asked you to email me.
And now why don't you take your time and try to recollect what you said when I finally answered your call. The fact that you're lying right now is not making your outcome any brighter.
So tell my brother all that you said.”
Mr. Sleestak swallowed hard, and beads of sweat were turning into rivulets on his forehead. He looked like a rat caught in a trap.
As if he had multiple personalities, suddenly his whole demeanor changed. He took on the persona of an enraged 14 year old girl passed over for the slow dance by the handsome quarterback at the high school dance.
He loudly whined: “Once Chris answered the phone, I told him that I was a very prominent attorney and no mick CPA with only one comma after his name was going to dictate how or when I communicate with him. I told him as long as I was paying him, he was going to answer my call and stay on the phone as long as I wanted him to, whenever I wanted him to.”
He looked at Jim with full smug arrogance and bravado and said:
“I'm a very prominent attorney. Your brother's lucky to be doing work for me. Get the fuck out of my office, both of you.”
Jim said: “Well Mr. Sleestak you are definitely an asshole. I came here to defuse the situation. You're not making it very easy for me.”
Jim noticed Chris’ grip on the gun getting a little tighter and said:
“Brother, would you let me hold the gun for a minute?”
Jim noticed that the hammer was cocked and he was sure there was one bullet in the chamber that had Mr Sleestak’s name on it.
Chris gladly handed the gun to Jim which should have brought this hostage situation to a close immediately.
But remember, we are dealing with an asshole.
Even though Chris was now completely disarmed, Mr. Sleestak made a sudden move under his desk. Jim and Chris both heard the magnetic latch of a gun safe releasing.
Jim didn't shoot Mr. Sleestak immediately but he waited until he started to raise his weapon. Mr. Sleestak took one bullet mid-chest.
The bullet was so powerful it propelled his body back in his reclining leather chair, straining the springs. Then the chair violently came forward and Mr. Sleestak was brutally thrown, face first, onto his desk.
His heart had already stopped. His gun was still in his right hand and it came to rest next to his head on the desk.
Jim said: ”Wow, you're right about this one Chris! I was so close to defusing the situation and he couldn't stop running his mouth. I am really surprised he wasn’t dead already when I arrived earlier. Very proud of you for showing such restraint.
Let's get out of here.”
Jim thoroughly wiped down Chris’ gun and left it on the desk. He also wiped down any surfaces that Chris may have touched.
He called the hostage negotiator and told him that he and his brother were going to exit the building out the front entrance and that no one would be carrying any weapons.
He also told them that their attorneys should be there by now and that neither he or his brother would be making any statements to any law enforcement personnel.
Just before exiting the building, Jim removed his latex gloves and put them in his back pocket.
When they exited the building Chris was immediately handcuffed and put in the back of a police van.
Jim and the attorneys were long gone before anyone realized Mr. Sleestak was deceased.
At the trials, forensics proved that Chris had not fired the weapon.
Once Mr. Sleestak’s death came to light, Chris’ hands, arms and clothes had been swabbed and checked for (GSR) Gunshot Residue, and there was none.
By the time they got a warrant to test Jim, any residue on his skin was long gone and the clothes and latex gloves he wore the day of the incident could not be located for testing. If they could have tested the latex gloves, the tests would have come out quite differently.
There were three trials for both Jim and Chris.
Jim’s trials all ended in hung juries and he spent zero days in jail as there was no direct evidence he ever pulled the trigger. In fact, all three judges commended him for trying to defuse the situation.
Chris was found not guilty of murder for the same reasons, but was also found not guilty of taking a hostage by reason of temporary insanity due to “Tax Season Psychosis.”
The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)
defines Tax Season Psychosis as:
A fragmented physical, emotional and mental state suffered by tax preparers, similar to a psychotic break.
Symptoms include
- Hearing voices
- An inability to regulate anger
- Dehydration
- Extremely violent thoughts
- Extremely violent episodes
- Excessive pizza and donut eating
- Throwing calculators
Symptoms appear most commonly between January 1 and April 15 each year.
Tax Season Psychosis is exacerbated by exposure to assholes during tax season.
Suggested Treatment Protocol is making sure assholes have consequences.
Chris made a full recovery.
