That fear was clear with some rationalists, because the news about the violent incidents around Lasota had spread. “I don't want Ziz ever to think about me,” said a person involved in the rationalistic community of Bay Area in an interview in 2023. “I think I know enough that I am afraid of Ziz correctly.”
In June, Judge Cappelli ruled against destroying the charges, but reduced Lasota's bail to $ 10,000, which means that Lasota could sign a promise of payments and run away. McGarrigle announced the court that Lasota's mother had flown from Alaska, “and she will take him home and make sure he comes back for all judicial data.” The public prosecutor seemed skeptical. “The care of the Commonwealth is the flight,” he told the judge. “There is literally zero ties with the community.” What were the chance that Lasota would appear at the end of August before the next judicial date?
Around the same time Michelle Zajko called her aunt Rosanne. They had not spoken since January since the service for Michelle's parents. She had not appeared at the memorial mass where Rosanne Rita and Rick had ineogalized. But now Michelle called a message: “She told me she was not responsible” for the murders, Rosanne said. “But she said she knew who that was.” She told her aunt that “Lesswrong did” and that she was “the target”.
Not long after, the confidence sold that the house sold it in Coventry, Vermont, where Michelle had lived with Alice Monday, it sold. Michelle and Blank had both disappeared and had left last winter. When real estate agents came to inspect the building, they discovered that the house had not been ready for winter, causing the pipes to burst. One of the family members of Blank has meanwhile submitted a National Missing Persons report and noted that he was last seen in Pennsylvania, wore thick glasses and had one eye that the other did not follow.
When the appearance of Lasota came, on the morning of August 21, 2023, the courtroom gallery was full of defendants who waited to be called for the pleas of the day. Shortly after the court was hit in the hearing, an older woman with gray blond hair pushed a wheelchair into the back of the courtroom. In it sinks aside and dressed in fluent black, was Lasota. Now her hair was also black and it seemed even more confused than when she had been in prison. She wore what an industrial N95 mask mask seemed to be, with valves on either side. McGarrigle, who approached his client at the back of the courtroom, seemed surprised. “What's going on?” He said, leaning. “I mean, what's going on with your health?”
When the Lasota case was called, the woman I learned later, was Lasota's mother drove her to the front, where she was sitting uncertain chair, staring at the floor.
A new public prosecutor had replaced the old one and asked for a continuation to get on top of all the facts. The judge agreed and pushed the trial to December. “I just want the record to reflect that the suspect is here, and we are ready,” said McGarrigle, before Lasota's mother hit her back through the doors.
XII.
Two months later, I traveled to Sonoma County, the house of Westminster Woods and the scene of the protest that apparently started with this great unraveling. I met Sergeant Brian Parks at the local Starbucks. After I heard his report of the original arrests, I asked him why – the open crime order – his department did not come after Lasota when she was arrested in Pennsylvania. “At the moment, if I looked at the system, there are probably 75 crime benches,” said Parks. “We don't have the luxury to try to serve,” he said. “We are now understaffed.”
I told him what I had heard in Pennsylvania from a source close to the case that the authorities had contacted Sonoma County about taking their prisoner. “I heard that there was some communication between us and the desk in Pennsylvania,” said Parks. “I don't know to what extent, so I really don't want to comment on that.”
