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A mother's nightmare, a son's ordeal
Woman shares experience of son's murder trial, tells her story through book
BY KATHY CHANG Staff Writer
Hope and faith helped Ann Matthiews deal with every mother's nightmare. In her first book, "Angels Don't Lie," which is part nonfiction and part fiction, Matthiews' 20-year-old son, whom she names Nick Stern in the book, goes from being an ROTC high school graduate who has received an invitation from New Jersey Institute of Technology to attend its Honors College with a possible transfer to Princeton University to study the Cold Fusion project, to being charged with first-degree murder.
Matthiews, who grew up in Metuchen and the Iselin section of Woodbridge, held a signing on Nov. 14 for "Angels Don't Lie," published by Publish America, at The Raconteur in Metuchen.
In her book, Matthiews renames all the characters involved in her son's case, except for her name and her husband's name (Norman).
Around 11:30 p.m. on Oct. 5, 2002, Nick went to a party hosted by one of his friends in the apartment complex in Piscataway where he used to live. By 4:30 a.m. on Oct. 6, however, he was arrested in front of his own home, which is also in Piscataway.
As Matthiews pushed open the front screen door and stepped outside, she immediately saw that her son, who was sitting shirtless with his arms handcuffed behind him at the end of the driveway on the edge of the lawn, was having an asthma attack.
The police officer allowed her to get an inhaler for her son.
Matthiews received vague details of what really happened in the hours after her son's arrest.
"Sadly, I still didn't know more than three men attacked Nick and he stabbed one [whom she named Nisroc] [with a small silver knife that he had in his boot] in selfdefense," she said in her book.
Nick suffered bruising on the left side of his face, a crushed lung, fractured ribs, and had kidney problems.
Through newspaper accounts, Matthiews and her family found out that the boy who was killed was Nick's age.
"He played football like Nick," she wrote. "He wanted to go to college like Nick. I sat and cried for Nisroc's mom. She must be heartbroken. I prayed for the Lord to give her peace and Nisroc to have a throne in Heaven."
The whole experience inspired Matthiews to write a book to help other mothers who stand in line at a jail to not give up.
"Family support makes a difference and brings hope," she said. "There is always hope. This is why I wrote the book, because miracles really happen. It's all about people who love us and shows that a mother never left her son."
Matthiews describes the scene in the Piscataway Police Department after Nick was arrested that morning, where she observed the victim's sister sobbing.
"I wanted to let her cry on my shoulder, but something stopped me from touching her," she said.
The victim's sister told Matthiews that a man named Billy killed her brother.
"Relief washed over me," she wrote in her book. "Ah, so Nick is a witness."
However, Matthiews learned from a licensed practical nurse who had performed her first cardiopulmonary resuscitation on the victim that "some kid with the lion tattoo slit Nisroc's throat."
Nick had the image of a fierce lion tattooed on his right shoulder, which he got for his 18th birthday.
"Standing straight and tall one minute, I felt the air knocked out of me," said Matthiews. I started to slide toward the floor, knees crumbling … My God, My God, My God, My God."
Matthiews vacillated back and forth, reviewing pros and cons of Nick's life, looking for a clue to what happened.
"I thought this was my fault," she wrote. "Four times married, working overtime as a nurse, taking calls, and so focused on Rachel's [Nick's sister] alcoholism that the poor little guy gets pushed into the background for being good."
Then Matthiews thought in the same moment that it couldn't be her fault.
"I never missed a game much less a practice for soccer or football … I play chess with him every night before bed," she wrote. "Until tonight, Nick hasn't had an asthma attack since he was 7, and that is 12 years. We go out to dinner every Friday I'm off. I read with him every night when he was in second grade. I did the whole Alcoholics Anonymous and family counseling with Rachel."
Later on, Matthiews learned from Rachel that her son's nickname was "Billy- Ho," which he acquired from the movie "White Men Can't Jump."
"There went our defense … Nick was Billy," she wrote in her book.
Nick remained in jail for two years during the trial conferences and then the threeweek trial, which started in January 2004. Matthiews said bail was set high at $250,000 with no bond, as a blessing in disguise.
"I didn't know what I would do if I were able to bail Nick out," she said. "I visited him every week and wrote him sometimes twice a day. He wrote me 24 letters, which I have kept. I thought about putting the letters in the book, but I decided that they were too private to put in, but I describe them somewhat in the book."
The first time Matthiews visited her son at the Middlesex County Adult Correction Center [MCCAC] in North Brunswick, she got lost, but eventually found her way.
"I found the signs, pulled down the long driveway and found a spot in a marked lot," she said.
Matthiews had to quickly learn the rules to visiting her son in prison.
"Yeah, you will be searched and you have to take off your shoes, so wear slips," a social worker told Matthiews on her first visit to the prison. "Then you will go into a plexiglass phone booth. You can see him, but you can't touch him …"
After two years of conferences and a three-week trial, Matthiews received what she hoped for.
On the third day of jury deliberations, a verdict was announced.
"I said loudly to the bailiff since we weren't allowed to speak or touch Nick, 'We are going down to smoke during this 20- minute recess,' " said Matthiews. "Apparently, while we had left Nick alone [for the first time during the trial], a bailiff told us that the teenagers on the other side threatened to kill him."
The bailiff told the Matthiews family that he had never heard such swearing, so in the interest of safety, every bailiff and sheriff in the court building was going to assemble a wall around them and Nick.
"It was never the mother [of the victim], but it was the kids [friends of the victim]," said Matthiews.
The 12-member jury found Nick not guilty of first-degree aggravated manslaughter, reckless manslaughter, and possession of a weapon for unlawful purposes, but they did find Nick guilty of unlawful possession of a weapon and hindering apprehension or prosecution.
"Magdalena [Matthiews' best friend and Nick's godmother], Norman and I huddled together holding each other's hands," she wrote. "We looked at each other and squeezed at each good bit of news."
Matthiews told the press that the family was thrilled by the verdict.
"Thank God for Joseph Delacruz and Jack Maple [lawyers for Nick from the beginning]," she said.
After two years, Matthiews finally was able to hug her son.
"It was finally over," she wrote. "My son was coming home. Jubilation filled my heart with relief."
First stop was to the MCCAC to pick up Nick's belongings and then to Mommom and Poppop's (Matthiews' mother's parents) home; Uncle Esau and Aunt Penny's home; Matthiews' parents home; and then finally to the Matthiews' home.
Nick had trouble jump-starting his life that had been tragically interrupted.
"Nick was very quiet and secretive when he came home," said Matthiews. "He wasn't the open, storytelling ego that he was before he went to jail."
Nick was sentenced to five years probation, community service and fines. The judge required him to work full time or go to college full time and also to go to counseling.
Nick hit bumps in the road with failing grades at school, lost jobs, and arrests for possession of marijuana and driving while intoxicated.
"I just sat down with him and looked him in the eye and asked him if this is the way he really wants to go," said Matthiews.
Then the Matthiews family was served with a lawsuit from the victim's family. The civil trials lasted until October 2007.
As the Matthiews family continues to pay legal bills, Nick, 25, is finally clean and sober and works at a health club, where he sells club memberships full time and earns a commission.
"He goes to parole every other month and community service at the recycling center every week," said Matthiews. "He has four more years for a total of nine years' probation."
Matthiews said that at first, she didn't tell her son that she was writing the book, and when she did, he asked her if it was a good book, and he trusted her that it would be.
"A copy of the book is on his desk, and I think he hasn't read it yet … when he is older, I think he will be glad when he reads it," she said.
After writing her first book, which Matthiews said she had to write, she said she will continue writing. She is currently working on two more books.
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