Mary's Mosaic by Peter Janney Page B

became aware of this book project, nor would his brother, Mark. Intermittently, and over time since the early 1970s, Quentin’s mental illness had overtaken him with one debilitating episode after another. It was painful to accept, even more so to watch. In the fall of 2009, author Katie McCabe shared with me her experience after a book-signing event for her Dovey Roundtree biography, Justice Older Than the Law , at a Georgetown senior center. There, in the circle of attendees, sat a slumped-over, seemingly elderly man who listened quietly, his head down on his chest. When the talk was over, he approached McCabe and asked her to sign the book, “To Quentin.” The sponsor of the event later told McCabe that the man was Quentin Meyer, son of Cord and Mary Meyer. His mere presence at the event spoke volumes; somewhere within, a part of Quenty still yearned to know the elusive, essential truth that had robbed him of his selfhood, the demons too horrifying to confront. Would it be Dovey Roundtree’s heroic defense of Ray Crump that might ignite a smoldering spark to light? No words were exchanged that day, no more of Quenty pleading, “What happened to my mother?” as he had on the telephone late one night with Timothy Leary so many years before.
    And so, it was by serendipity again, that someone I had contacted asked Toni Shimon, the daughter of the late Joseph W. Shimon, whether she would be willing to talk with me. When I met Toni in 2005, our chemistry was almost instantaneous, only because we shared a certain bond of somewhat similar circumstances growing up in Washington. Indeed, Toni Shimon and I had much in common. Like most of us, Toni, during her formative years, hadn’t known the true nature of her father’s work. As a young adult, however, shepersuaded her father, little by little, to confide pieces of information he probably shouldn’t have. Joe Shimon deeply loved his only daughter, and he didn’t want to lose her—or himself. 4
    Shimon was a unique individual. He was determined to remain a faithful, honest father to his only daughter while being called to duty to “take care of” some of the most “sensitive” problems in the hidden cesspools of Washington. Born in 1907, Shimon first worked as a uniformed policeman in the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department, starting in the early 1930s. He quickly distinguished himself, rising through the ranks to become a detective. By the time of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s inauguration in 1933, Shimon had already established a reputation for being able “to get the job done” with the utmost discretion. He would gain the confidence not only of President Roosevelt, but each of his successors—Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon—all of whom revered his many talents.
    While officially assigned to the White House as a “Washington Police Inspector,” Shimon was also secretly working for the Justice Department through the U.S. Attorney’s Office. In the late 1940s, though still stationed at the White House, he was part of a secret, organized crime task force. The work was dangerous—so dangerous, in fact, that his wife, Elizabeth, feared for her safety and that of their only child, Toni. The couple finally divorced in the late 1940s, when Toni was just two years old. Elizabeth had pleaded for years for Joe to find a different line of work. She was terrified her husband would be killed, their only child orphaned. Moreover, she abhorred the work hours he kept, the secrecy, people showing up at all hours of the day and night, and the impromptu meetings that took place in her kitchen, when she would have to leave.
    It became no secret to Toni that her father carried a gun wherever he went. She had thought her dad was part of the Metropolitan Police Department in Washington, D.C., though not a uniformed officer. Told her father was stationed at the White House during the Roosevelt administration, then a chief inspector for the U.S. Attorney’s