Facing a jury trial and the real prospect of state prison, Wendy accepted a plea.

She received two years of supervised probation, two hundred hours of mandatory community service, a permanent criminal record for assault, and an order to pay every dollar of my medical expenses.

And the family business, its reputation gone and its accounts under audit, was forced to liquidate its primary assets to cover the restitution and the legal fees.

The empire Wendy had committed fraud and violence to protect did not survive the protecting.

It was gone within the year.