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Murder in the Dollhouse: The Jennifer Dulos Story

 Often, in pop culture, murder is shown as the end result of many weeks or months of physical abuse. In "The Sopranos" and "Big Little Lies," there is an escalation of violent acts that ends with a killing or a near-killing.


But sometimes--in situations of "coercive control"--there isn't this notable buildup. As far as I can tell, coercive control is about *emotional* abuse. Fotis Dulos did not physically attack his wife *until* the day of the murder. Instead, he terrorized her by dragging the underaged children to impromptu "driving lessons" in unsafe conditions, purchasing a gun and making it accessible to the kids, berating her throughout zero-sum divorce arguments, and repackaging his girlfriend as "a new mom" (despite court orders that required the girlfriend to make herself scarce).

The actual murder was in no way an "I just snapped" situation. Fotis Dulos plotted and plotted. He altered a license plate to make it inconspicuous. He had his hair trimmed so that he could frame (or try to frame) an employee. He "traded murders" with a friend, as if he were a character from "Strangers on a Train." (The second murder did not occur, but Fotis Dulos did try to make it happen.) Dulos also staged a scene so that it would look like his wife had been abducted near a public park. With all this planning, Dulos still made dumb errors. It seems he never heard about luminol. And he drove to a "gritty" section of Hartford because he imagined--if someone spotted a bloody tee shirt there--a "gang violence" narrative would quickly take root. What Dulos failed to imagine was that Hartford would have many, many security cameras, precisely *because* of the high crime rates. These cameras would capture Fotis--again and again--as he carried various shredded garments to many public garbage bins.

Reflecting on a possible "moral" for the Fotis Dulos story, the writer Rich Cohen lands on this: "Sometimes, it's better to be poor." Wealthy people in divorce situations can torment each other with many legal gestures, demands for a guardian ad litem, demands for psychological evaluations. Even if one were not a murderous psychopath, one might dream of *becoming* a murderous psychopath--after several weeks in the minefield that is otherwise known as a New Canaan divorce.

My question is this. Psychopaths exist in all strata (I assume). So, if you're poor and you involve yourself with a psychopath, it's highly likely that things will not end well for you. Maybe it's *not* "better to be poor."

In any case, I thought "Murder in the Dollhouse" was intriguing. It would be helpful if Michelle Troconis--still living--would admit everything that she (clearly) knows. I'm not holding my breath.
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