The Story:
Chicago Tribune, January 20
“There was testimony from a sperm bank coordinator who testified that April Goodman deposited Albert Goodman’s sperm there in 1996 without Albert’s knowledge.”
The Rest of the Story: Just how did April Goodman manage to collect her husband’s sperm without his knowledge?
TROTS: Why did you have testimony from a sperm bank coordinator?
Assistant state’s attorney Kevin Byrne: Well, on the initial tape, which was August the 4th of 1998, there was a mention of the sperm bank on the tape. And what April was basically saying to the undercover officer was, once her husband was killed there was a sperm bank that she could go to, have Albert’s children, and Edith Appleton, who’s Albert’s mother, would of course want grandchildren because Albert was the sole heir to her fortune. So once Albert was killed, we theorized, April Goodman could go to his elderly mother–she was weak, fragile–and tell her, listen, it’s tragic that Albert is dead, but guess what, his sperm is on file in a sperm bank. Try to convince her that it would be worth her while to turn her fortune over to April because April could have his heirs, his children. Now, whether the sperm was viable or not, we don’t know. Apparently, according to the testimony, she deposited it after vaginal intercourse with him, and whether she got it in in time for it to be viable we don’t know. But her intent was there as evidenced on the tape.
TROTS: That was more evidence that she intended to kill him?
BYRNE: Right, and it also goes to financial motive, ’cause, you know, there’s no doubt there’s a certain aspect of her motive that was revenge, but we also believe that based on her conversations on the tape, that part of the motive is a financial one. She said many times the financial consideration was of utmost importance to her. She at one point wanted to force him to remarry her and have him drown on the honeymoon so she could inherit his fortune. At one point she’s talking about offshore bank accounts and siphoning off money from his accounts to hers and that sort of thing.
TROTS: Was there any testimony as to how she managed to collect Goodman’s sperm and deposit it without his knowledge?
BYRNE: Yeah, it was after vaginal intercourse, and according to the person who got it from her, she basically said that she scraped it off her leg. That’s what everybody was puzzled about, you know, how could she do this without his knowledge–but after an act of coitus she was able to collect it. Now, again, the viability, we don’t know. We don’t know exactly how viable it was, but she told the person–’cause he was wondering, well, how was this collected?–and she told him it was after vaginal intercourse.
TROTS: Is it still on deposit?
BYRNE: No. What had happened actually was during the course of the pretrial discovery we wanted it tested to make sure it was Albert’s. She represented it to be Albert’s but we were going to do DNA testing on it. So it was transferred over to the Chicago Police Department crime lab, but before they did any testing the defense signed a stipulation indicating that it was his sperm [meaning they wouldn’t contest that fact].
–Jeffrey Felshman