“Ms. Marsh, you claim your ex, Mr. Belding, and his mother have made false accusations about the paternity of your three-year-old daughter, Jordan.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Mr. Belding, you’re here with your mother. You claim little Jordan’s biological father may be your own father.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Whoa. So you’ve also petitioned the court for a lie detector test for Ms. Marsh to determine the extent of her relationship with your dad.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Mr. Belding’s father will also be joining us to respond to that accusation in just a few moments. So, Mr. Belding—your own father?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Please explain.”

“He—we were living in Georgia, then he moved back to Indiana and got a room, or he shared a room with Amber. He had nowhere to go, so I took him in.”

“Excuse me, Your Honor, but his sister lives there. He has numerous friends in Indiana. His sister would not let him live there at all. He’s a—he works. He could have lived in other places than with her.”

“He’s lived with her off and on for the past three years.”

“Really?”

“Yes!”

“Excuse me, Your Honor, it was with me and my mom, as a matter of fact, and he slept in a totally different room. It was a three-bedroom house. That was the first house. We never slept in the same room. We’ve always had more than three rooms. There’s been several.”

“Okay, but I have to ask, Ms. Marsh, out of all the places you could live?”

“He had nowhere to go. Literally, I asked his sister and his sister said no. I’m not gonna let a man I call my dad stay on the streets.”

“What other reason do you have to believe that Ms. Marsh was possibly sleeping with your father or you’re not the biological father of her child?”

“Just when I moved back to Indiana, there was a bunch of my friends that had said that she had slept with them after she had slept with me.”

“Excuse me, Your Honor.”

“Excuse me, too, Your Honor. She’s already had one man tested before Zach.”

“I didn’t have him tested. He had her tested. I told him not to do it.”

“Because she told us that it was a possibility to begin with. I have all the proof of that. I know who the father of my daughter is, and it is this man, right here.”

“But she thinks Zach’s the dad but he can’t do nothing with her. He’s not allowed. And yes, she did let me in one time to see Jordan. Three times. But then the other times she slammed the door in my face.”

“Except the night you spent the night and you had sex with her, which was just two months ago, Your Honor.”

“Yeah. We didn’t have sex. Your friend was in the same bed, Your Honor.”

“So, for them to be together for a year, she must be sleeping around, is all I’ve got to say.”

“No. No. He came over with his friend. He was drunk.”

“Why do you doubt that your son is her child’s father when you know your son was in a relationship with her?”

“Yes. Why do you have so many doubts?”

“She gave us the doubt, because she told us very plainly. She came back to Indiana to give birth to Jordan. She had another man—”

“Can I finish? I never said that.”

“She had another man there while the baby was being delivered. There was her fiancé at the time. There was no one else. There was no one else in the room, except for my mother.”

“And her boyfriend, fiancé at the time.”

“I’m sorry that your son didn’t show up.”

“Was there a man at the hospital, Ms. Marsh, that claimed to be your fiancé when you were having the baby?”

“No. No. He didn’t claim to be—”

“She’s lying.”

“—my fiancé at all.”

“That’s perjury. I would never ever get with that man. She already said he’s gonna be the dad. ‘I’m gonna sign the birth certificate.’ We were all there when it happened.”

“Because he’s been around for nine and a half months. Now, there’s been three other men that I know of. And I haven’t been around her for two years.”

“There’s been no men. There’s been no men. She will call me out of the blue. ‘Hey, can you keep Jordan?’ She’ll bring her. I’ve never—I changed my number for her not to call me. I moved an hour and a half away so they would stop harassing me.”

“She just said that Zach didn’t wanna see her and now we harass her? She needs to get her story straight, Your Honor.”

“If she thinks I’m the father, why did she have another man sign the birth certificate?”

“Excuse me, ma’am. I have the birth certificate. I have the birth certificate right here. Birth certificate’s right here and there is no other man on this birth certificate.”

“Can I say, it’s because she lies to us all the time? We don’t know what to believe.”

“Jerome, let me see that birth certificate. There’s no other name on this birth certificate.”

“‘Cause she’s such a liar.”

“While I’m looking at this birth certificate—you all gotta make me understand this. Now, you all met in high school?”

“Fourteen years old.”

“Yes.”

“At fourteen? So you all were in a relationship, boyfriend and girlfriend?”

“No, not really. Off and on.”

“So it was off and on for years? But during this time you were together, that’s when you got pregnant?”

“Yeah. It was after I had—”

“No. I had moved to Georgia, to live with him and his dad, to join the military.”

“Uh, no. That was totally a surprise, too. I didn’t know she was coming.”

“Her dad—his dad did that. My dad called her down. Zachary didn’t want nothing to do with her. His dad sent for her down there.”

“That’s funny, because I still have messages on my mom’s phone from him saying, ‘Baby, I can’t wait till you get here.’ You got those—evidence?”

“So, now, Mr. Belding, that’s another reason why you think your father—he had her come down there—was possibly sleeping with her too, because he’s the one that decided to have her come down.”

“Yes, Your Honor. And then he left Zachary in Georgia by himself. Came up here and moved in with her and just left Zach. ‘Cause he had nowhere to go.”

“Nowhere. I’m not the kind of woman who’d let a man stay on the streets. We just gave a homeless man a sandwich, not even a day ago.”

“Mr. Belding, another man, in your mind, signed the birth certificate—I have it right here, let me see.”

“Yeah, this is what I was told. I didn’t see no picture.”

“‘Cause he believes everything his mommy says. ‘Cause he’s a mommy’s boy.”

“Now, there is no person listed as father on the birth certificate.”

“That’s ’cause she lies to us about everything. But there was a man. Who introduced you to him? She did.”

“She’s hallucinating, ’cause she was drunk when she showed up to the delivery room.”

“That’s a lie. Your Honor, that’s not what happened.”

“Yes, that is what happened.”

“That’s a total lie. I walked the hospital with her for six hours. We can call my mom.”

“She was drunk. You could smell the vodka on her breath.”

“We’ll find out with the lie detector, ’cause she’s a liar.”

“Mr. Belding, you don’t think you’re Jordan’s biological father and you really think your dad is?”

“I wouldn’t think my dad would do something like that. But if he was drunk—they were living together, obviously. And she walks around the house half-naked.”

“I never walk around the house half-naked.”

“And my dad—I’ve had to tell her to put clothes on when she was fourteen years old. And I went to the trailer to visit him, and she was running from one end to the other with a towel on, and I said, ‘There’s a room full of men out there, little girl. You get some clothes on.’”

“Did your father ever say anything to you about them having a relationship?”

“Yeah. Well, he’s told me they slept in the bed together multiple times.”

“Hold on. So, Ms. Marsh, multiple times. You said it was different rooms in your testimony earlier.”

“Yes. In my three-bedroom apartment, it was different rooms. And then, when we lived at my mom’s, I worked third shift and he worked first. We slept in the same bed, but not together.”

“See? Now, see? See who’s lying? See how the story changes?”

“So, wait, wait, wait. Your story is changing a bit. At first we slept in different rooms. Do you think it’s appropriate for you to be sharing a bed on any level with a man—his father?”

“But we didn’t sleep in the same room at the same time. Why would I have sex with somebody I call my dad? The only man I’ve ever called a dad.”

“Why would you share a bed with him?”

“This is a lot to take in. I’m still not processing that you are sharing a bed with Mr. Belding’s father on any level. But, you know what? I’m ready to talk to your father. Hello. How are you? We are here trying to figure out what in the world is going on. Did you ever share a bed with Ms. Marsh?”

“Kind of. I mean, the schedules between her mother’s schedule, my schedule, and Amber’s schedule, there was always someone there to take care of the baby.”

“So how do you feel if your son is accusing you of being the father of Ms. Marsh’s daughter?”

“It’s a little frustrating. And I feel kind of demeaned by it. And I have never, ever laid a finger on Amber Marsh.”

“Thank you. And I would never lay a finger on him. That is my dad. That is gross. Granted, he’s a very handsome man for being forty-seven years old.”

“Well, sir, your son, he’s concerned that you’re the person that invited her to live with you when you guys went to live in another state. He says you arranged for her to come with you guys. Is that true?”

“No.”

“He’s lying. My grandma paid for me to go there, because she knew how much Zach meant to me. Now he means nothing. When you stay out of a daughter’s life for three years? You only come over three times? And the one time you do come over, you were drunk.”

“That’s a lie, too, Your Honor. She dropped her off to me three times. The baby didn’t even know me.”

“That’s not my fault you never call or ask about her.”

“She just dropped her off.”

“Oh, really? I thought you just said I harassed you so much you had to move, but now I don’t call.”

“You do harass me.”

“All right. So the court has administered lie detector tests and we will have those results a little later on. And we’ll get down to the bottom of these questions that I can’t seem to get answers to.”

“Ms. Marsh, I wanna hear about who’s helping you with Jordan? He said three years old. You’re claiming he has come by three times. How have you been doing it? This is your witness? Please stand, sir. Step to the podium. Your name is?”

“Tyson Hull.”

“And you are Ms. Marsh’s—”

“Boyfriend.”

“Boyfriend. And you’ve been helping her raise Jordan?”

“Every day.”

“Every single day. I’m Daddy.”

“How long has he been with her, Your Honor? Two weeks? Three weeks? Because Zach just had sex with her less than sixty days ago.”

“That’s a lie. Baby, you know it is. Spent the night with her and everything. Came to see her again and he said he is not to see her, and she slammed the door in Zach’s face. So he thinks he can say when Zach can see this baby and when he can’t.”

“I’m trying to understand. So, Ms. Marsh, you’re saying Mr. Hull is your boyfriend now.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“And you did not cheat with Mr. Belding less than sixty days ago?”

“No. No, Your Honor. That’s a lie. We never had sex. His best friend was in the same bed.”

“You were in the bed with him?”

“Yes.”

“Oh, but it was on the floor? But it was not two months ago. It was less than two months ago, Your Honor.”

“No, it wasn’t. When was this?”

“It was way before me and him got together.”

“And you two have been together how long?”

“Four months.”

“Four months he’s been a dad to a three-year-old.”

“That’s all it takes, ma’am.”

“Mr. Hull, please tell me about the relationship you’ve built with Jordan.”

“It’s just an everyday thing. You gotta be a dad to do everything. I mean, you gotta get a job. Take care of the baby. Play with her. I play every day with her. Take her to the park.”

“You won’t be around long neither. She goes through men like you go through toilet paper, honey. Ask Matt Belding. He can testify that she’s a ho.”

“Oh, hold on, miss. Miss! Let’s watch our language and let’s be respectful in the courtroom.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“That’s something she don’t know how to do.”

“We’ll see who the—I’ll always be the father.”

“No, he won’t.”

“Every single day.”

“We’ll see these DNA results.”

“We’ll see the DNA results. I don’t care what the problem is, I’ll always take it.”

“Well, I’ll call the police on you for kidnapping. He won’t even be around that long because she goes through ’em like toilet paper. So I ain’t worried about what he has to say.”

“We’ll see who’s the father.”

“And so, what are you feeling like, Mr. Belding? Do you feel like you’ve been shut out?”

“I’m upset because this guy, two months out of nowhere, thinks he’s the father of what could be my baby.”

“What could be is your baby. Where have you been? We wanna know. Where have you been?”

“I was just there two months ago, with her. That’s what you keep saying. He was just with her less than sixty days ago.”

“Like she said, she moved without telling him.”

“It was four months ago and he showed up drunk.”

“It wasn’t four months ago. But you slept in the bed with him.”

“Oh, thank you.”

“Hold on. Hold on. ‘Cause I’m tired of this story about how you take everybody in and everybody needs a bed, so I can share mine. No, it doesn’t work like that.”

“That’s right.”

“Let’s really be honest here. You admit that you shared a bed with him that evening even though the friend was on the floor, right?”

“Yes.”

“And we were not together. This was nothing.”

“Wherever he’s been or whatever’s going on between you all within the last several months, you two have slept in the same bed, had contact—”

“Yes.”

“Yes. Been close enough to where he even got in the house and got in the bed.”

“Well, yes, Your Honor. I wanted him there, and I had him sleep in the bed ’cause I wanted him there. I want him to be a dad. But he’s not. He’s not calling. He’s not showing.”

“She just said he harassed her.”

“Maybe he would stay if he sleeps in the bed with me. And he left that morning at eight in the morning to go to work.”

“To not go anywhere. ‘Cause he was hungover. The only reason why he came over ’cause he was hungover.”

“Now we’re getting to the truth now. So, when you had him come over—”

“No, he came all by himself. He knocked on my window. Like I do all the time, to go see her. In the middle of the night. Like, he tries to see Jordan. She slams the door in my face. Just went there last week to see her. Moved without telling me.”

“Last week? You don’t even know where we live. Moved. Not anymore. I just said that. If you listen—duh!”

“He was there last week? We moved three or four months ago. So how can he be there in the last week? He just said he came to where he thought you lived. But you were gone and you moved without telling him.”

“Yeah, ’cause we moved, ’cause they’re harassing us.”

“She keeps saying that we don’t try to see the baby and then she says we’re harassing her. Which way is it?”

“Thank you, Your Honor. Can we just do the lie detector test and the DNA test so I can go home and get my beautiful little girl?”

“Yeah, ’cause we’re getting our baby.”

“You ain’t getting nothing, honey. She didn’t see her the first two years she was alive.”

“Okay, everybody. I’m done now. Okay, that’s fine. I’m done.”

“I don’t have a problem with a man that has enough heart to love a child. Absolutely. That’s a beautiful thing.”

“That’s great.”

“But you all tell two completely different stories. Thank goodness for a DNA and a lie detector test. So let’s get this done. First, we’re gonna do the DNA results.”

“These results were prepared by DNA Diagnostics and they read as follows. In the case of Marsh v. Belding, pertaining to whether Mr. Belding Sr. or Mr. Belding Jr. is the father of three-year-old Jordan Marsh—Mr. Belding Sr., you are not Jordan’s father. Thank you. Already knew that.”

“Mr. Belding Jr., you are her father.”

“Thank you. Yeah, that’s my baby. That’s our baby.”

“That’s my baby. Not yours.”

“Mine. You think so. You think so.”

“I got rights now.”

“Yes, you do, sir.”

“Before we go, you were very concerned and wanted to know the level of intimacy shared by Ms. Marsh and your father, Mr. Belding Sr. That concerned you.”

“Of course it did.”

“I have the lie detector results right here. Are you ready? The question read as follows. Ms. Marsh, you were asked, ‘Have you ever had sexual intercourse with your ex-boyfriend’s father, Mr. Belding Sr.?’ You said no. And the lie detector determined that is the truth.”

“There you go, buddy. I told ya.”

“So you know now that they haven’t had any sexual activities, yeah. Exactly. And so you can put that to rest, too.”

“Yeah. But I’m still disgusted that they shared a bed together.”

“I’m disgusted, too. But you know what? That doesn’t have anything to do with Jordan, right?”

“Nope.”

“And now let’s focus on her. I wish you all the best of luck. Take care of that beautiful little girl. Good day.”

“Ms. Criss, you say that before your brother’s tragic death one year ago, he told you that he was not the biological father of the defendant’s eighteen-month-old son, Malachi. You have petitioned the court for a paternity test to defend his honor. Is that correct?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Ms. Thompson, you claim that the plaintiff’s brother, Vantrease Criss, is Malachi’s father, and say today’s results will prove your case and clear your name. Is that correct?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Ms. Criss, I’ll start with you. You say you need to know.”

“Yes, I need to know. Explain.”

“First, I’m here on the behalf of my deceased brother and my mom, just ’cause this girl is claiming that my brother has a baby with her, which I don’t believe. You know, it’s been a lot of different stories. It was said that she was doing this for the money, and also she said this was another man’s baby before it was my brother’s—before she came to my brother.”

“I never said it was no another person’s baby.”

“Yes, you did.”

“I never said who my baby father was.”

“Yes, she did. She’s flip-flopping.”

“I never flip-flop.”

“You’re flip-flopping because, first, you said it was another man’s baby. That’s why you didn’t tell my brother that it was his baby.”

“No, I told your brother.”

“No, you did not. You said when the baby came out, the baby started to look like Vantrease, and that’s why you said it was my brother’s baby.”

“I never said that. When my baby first came out, I didn’t tell nobody. And I never directly gave a name of who my baby father was.”

“So you never told—”

“Right. Didn’t know who you baby daddy was?”

“No, I didn’t say I didn’t know who my baby daddy was. I said I never told nobody who he was.”

“All right. I wanna take it back because I wanna understand from the beginning. I wanna understand, what was the nature of your relationship with Mr. Criss, Ms. Thompson? How long did you all date? Where’d you—”

“They didn’t date. She had no relationship with my brother. She’s a—”

“We had an on-and-off type of relationship.”

“How long y’all was together?”

“I’ve been knowing Vantrease since—”

“Knowing. Knowing and together is two different things.”

“I was on and off with Vantrease since—”

“And his friends, too?”

“No, not—never his friends.”

“Yeah.”

“Never.”

“Are you suggesting, Ms. Criss, that Ms. Thompson was sleeping with your brother’s friends as well?”

“Yeah, couple of them.”

“Yes. No, I never slept with his friends. That’s just the number one rule—you don’t do that.”

“Right. But we were just on and off. He had a lot of girlfriends, a lot of different girlfriends.”

“So what made you think you was special?”

“Oh, baby, I knew I wasn’t special.”

“So you knew he had a lot of girlfriends?”

“Yes.”

“So how—how y’all was in relationship?”

“Because it was an on-and-off relationship.”

“Let’s be clear. You don’t have to be special to someone to get pregnant.”

“No, you don’t.”

“So let’s say that, then. It’s the truth. I’m just wondering how long the relationship lasted. Even if it was just a sexual relationship, how long?”

“We’d been freakin’ since 2017. The beginning of 2017.”

“She said freakin’.”

“Freakin’? Okay. So take me to the day you find out you’re pregnant.”

“Well, I was at my brother’s girlfriend’s house at the time. And she was like, ‘You looking like a little pregnant.’ And I’m like, ‘I ain’t pregnant—’”

“Looking a little pregnant? So I set up—I called the doctor, set up an appointment. And when I got there, they did say I was—they confirmed that I was pregnant. And they confirmed that I was already seventeen weeks.”

“So at that time, you knew exactly who the father of your child was?”

“Yes.”

“And did you call Mr. Criss?”

“Yes, I told him that I was pregnant.”

“Did he question whether or not he was the father?”

“No.”

“That’s a lie.”

“Did you tell him he was the father?”

“Yes. I’m like, ‘Vantrease, I’m pregnant, and it’s your baby.’”

“That’s not true, Your Honor.”

“What do you know, Ms. Criss?”

“I know that my brother was denying the baby. This girl was pregnant, but she never told Vantrease that it was his baby. She was saying that she was pregnant by somebody else. But when the baby came out, the baby came out looking like Vantrease. You know, he’s a handsome little boy. That’s when he called me. I guess they was having some little family issues. And that’s when he called me like, ‘Sis, this girl saying that she got a baby by me and she going through some stuff. Can you come and get the baby?’”

“Uh, I come and get the baby, even though he still denying, like, ‘I don’t know if this is my baby.’ So I come and get the baby. As I come and get the baby, I got the baby, I’m buying the baby clothes, I’m buying the baby Pampers. I’m buying the baby shoes, milk, whatever the baby need in my care.”

“So if you were doubtful and if your brother was doubtful, why did you say ‘I’m gonna go get the baby’ and then invest so much time, energy, money?”

“Because I wanted this to be his baby. You know, the baby looked like him. It did—the baby did look—when the baby was younger, it favored Vantrease. And I wanted—this would be his first baby. You know, he don’t have any kids. You know, me and him already close. So I’m like, ‘Oh, it’s a baby,’ I’m excited. ‘Let me go get it.’ So I go get it, me and my mom, examine the baby. ‘Okay, look, Ma. Look at me, look at Vantrease.’ We both look alike. Look, we got the baby up to me, we got the baby up to Vantrease. We’re like, ‘This is your baby, boy. This is your baby.’”

“Oh, so you all were, like, rooting for it. You all were like, ‘Look—’”

“We was always not in denial. We was not in denial until after Vantrease died.”

“What happened?”

“She was just really like clout chasing. And then, you know, when you die—”

“What’s clout chasing?”

“Clout chasing is like she wasn’t doing what she was doing when she just told Vantrease. She was under the radar, not trying to keep it a secret. But when Vantrease got killed, she was all ‘Baby Vantrease this, Baby Dooski this.’”

“I’ve been saying ‘Baby Dooski’ before he passed.”

“When your brother passed away, what did your family think? Were they all saying ‘We still don’t know if this baby is ours’?”

“Right.”

“But after you had the baby for two weeks—and then I got the baby again after that. I got the baby again after that two weeks. Because we were still rooting for the baby not be—Even my brother was like, ‘I don’t know why you keep getting that baby. That’s not my baby.’ You know, he was telling me not—”

“Yeah, he was telling me—”

“Oh, he said that?”

“Yes, am I lying?”

“No.”

“He was saying that.”

“Oh, so the first time he asked you, ‘Hey, she needs a little help. Can you help?’ Well then, you all got yourselves so worked up and wanted the baby to be his and he looked like us and you’re doing all this. And you all kept getting the baby. And he was like, ‘Hold on, I just asked y’all to help one time. Don’t go overboard because I don’t know if that’s my baby.’”

“Right, exactly.”

“So then you all said what? I mean, if he’s telling you, like, ‘Look, y’all, I don’t know about this,’ then—”

“I was saying like, ‘Okay, brother. This baby do look like you. Let’s just go get the DNA test and prove that this baby is yours or not.’ He was dodging, like, ‘No.’ Because he didn’t want the baby to be by her because, again, she was sleeping with his friend.”

“Well, now that you say that, I wanna get to that. Were you sleeping with anybody else, Ms. Thompson? Let’s just be honest. Whether it was his friends or anybody else.”

“I don’t—I had a boyfriend.”

“But at the time when I had got pregnant, or conceived my baby, I was not sleeping with nobody. But I did have a boyfriend.”

“Okay, thank you.”

“Wait a minute. This was after the fact I found out I was pregnant. That’s when I got into a relationship.”

“No, you thought your boyfriend was that baby’s father.”

“There’s no possibility that my boyfriend could be his father. We didn’t start messing around until after I found that out.”

“So you’re saying you met your boyfriend after you already conceived Malachi?”

“No, after I found out I was pregnant with Malachi.”

“Well, that’s probably what I meant. After you conceived, that’s after you was pregnant. Okay. So, now Malachi’s nineteen months. What kind of relationship did he have the opportunity to develop before Mr. Criss’s untimely passing?”

“None, really.”

“None? Like, he’d seen him when we was outside, but that’s about it.”

“So no real relationship at all?”

“No. The only thing he has is his music, that’s about it.”

“And so what have you told him about his father?”

“Well, he’s too little now, he don’t understand, but I do tell him, ‘That’s your dad,’ and if you see a picture of him he’s gonna say, ‘Da-da.’”

“He’s adorable.”

“Yeah, he is.”

“Ms. Criss, I do have to ask you this—you’ve been so supportive. Why did it take you so long, it’s been nineteen months, to just come to court and really get the answers?”

“Um, we actually had a DNA test. First, she said it was a DNA test in the mail. And it’s still in the mail. It’s been in the mail since—”

“No.”

“So, now—wait. Tell me the story. It’s in the mail? What?”

“Yeah. She said she was going to order a DNA test when she got her taxes. So she got her taxes. When me and my mom contact her like, ‘Did you order the DNA test?’ ‘Oh, yeah, I ordered the DNA test. It’s in the mail. It’s still in the mail.’”

“No. It’s not there because the one that I was trying to get, her mother didn’t want—”

“She’s lying.”

“Okay, well, what is the one that’s supposedly in the mail? Did you say something was in the mail and it never came?”

“No, I never said it was in the mail.”

“She’s lying.”

“So, basically you say she said to you ‘I’m getting one and it’s in the mail,’ but it never came?”

“In the mail. But it’s still in the mail.”

“So you felt like she was avoiding you?”

“Yeah, she was avoiding me because she knows this is not my brother’s baby.”

“No, I was never avoiding it. I wanted a DNA test each and every time. I will do it.”

“But we didn’t get one, and that’s why we’re here today?”

“Exactly.”

“Yes.”

“Ms. Criss, your mother actually sent in a statement. She was unable to make it today. She sent a statement to the court, which reads: ‘Theadosha claims that my son Vantrease is her son’s father, but I don’t believe her. I didn’t even know anything about Malachi until after he was born. My son never said anything to me about having a baby. I have asked Theadosha for a DNA test several times, and every time I’ve asked, she’s always had an excuse.’”

“Exactly. And Marianne Miller is telling the truth.”

“I never had an excuse. I always was ready to get a DNA test. Been ready to get a DNA test.”

“Well, we’re here today to find out if Malachi is my nephew or not.”

“Yes, we are.”

“So talk to me about the relationship your family has with Malachi, Ms. Criss.”

“We don’t have no relationship with him.”

“You don’t? So even after you came to get him those times?”

“Yeah. Then you just stopped?”

“Yeah. Because why would I keep continuing to—I’m broken in a million little pieces. I just lost my brother. That’s the closest thing to me. Why would I put all my emotions into this baby, then to turn around and this baby not his? And then I’m gonna be broken again, because I thought this was my brother’s baby.”

“And what are your thoughts, Ms. Thompson? I see tears in your eyes.”

“Because my thought is, I wouldn’t lie about it. And then he’s gone, so why would I still be claiming someone that’s not here? It’s very hard being a single mother, very hard, and then I have a son at that. Boys don’t really listen to their mothers, and all I wanted was—when I do decide to have kids, I always wanted the father to be there, and unfortunately, he can’t. And I’m just—that’s why I’m here today, because I need to prove to everybody that he—not even to everybody, to his family—that Vantrease is the father of Malachi.”

“And are you hoping that they will be a part of Malachi’s life if, in fact, he is the biological father?”

“She know we are.”

“Yes, and I know how they is. We—she know we are. We are family-oriented. We love everybody in our family. And if this baby is—”

“That’s all I want.”

“Yeah, if this baby is my nephew today, I give her an apology and a hug and take my nephew today. So, yeah.”

“And that’s all I want.”

“Let’s go to the results.”

“These results were prepared by DNA Diagnostics and they read as follows. Because there wasn’t a blood card available to test the DNA of the deceased, Vantrease Criss, we performed a DNA test with his surviving parent, Marianne Miller. In the case of Criss versus Thompson, when it comes to eighteen-month-old Malachi Thompson—it has been determined by this court that the percentage of relatedness between Ms. Marianne Miller and Malachi Thompson is 0.001%. They are not related.”

“You knew! You knew it wasn’t. You knew it wasn’t, and you’re wrong for that. You’re wrong for that. And I just want you to stop on Facebook saying that’s my brother’s baby, because you knew in the first place it wasn’t.”

“I didn’t know!”

“Ms. Criss, let’s use respectful language. I know you’re so upset.”

“I’m so upset. She knew. That’s why she was doing all this running around and didn’t never wanna take the DNA test.”

“Ms. Thompson, I have to ask you, for Malachi’s sake, do you know who his father is?”

“No, and I—quite frankly, I really don’t care. I’ve been doing it by myself since forever, so I’m gonna continue to do it by myself. That’s no problem with me. I decided to have him.”

“Well, good luck to you. Listen, you came because you wanted your child to have a father. Just because it didn’t turn out the way you wanted, I’m not gonna let you now start doing all this stuff and all this popping off like it don’t matter, because he don’t need a daddy, because he don’t need this. You needed yours and your son needs one, too. If there is a chance that you can identify who he is, then do it. Yeah. Give Malachi a dad.”