This is the stuff that is deadly. I notice that in the jury box eyes are beginning to glaze over. Talk of science.
“What is spectrography?” I ask. “Very briefly.”
“A small portion of the evidence, usually a fraction of a gram, is burned at high temperature. The atomic structure of the substance is disturbed by the heat. In turn, this emits waves of energy, which we observe as colors. These color patterns are focused on a photographic plate and can be read as possessing certain wavelengths which correspond with the precise chemical composition of the substance. It’s a very old process, but reliable.”
He covers the so-called EDX process in similar shorthand fashion. A lot of yawning from the box.
“So you can tell precisely how much iron or copper, or magnesium, so-called impurities, are contained in a sample of metal?”
“That’s right. In theory you take the scrapings from the table, another scraping from a piece of jewelry, and compare them for chemical composition, and in particular the existence of known impurities, trace elements, in known quantities. If there’s enough of them, and they match, voilà.”
“And you can do this with minute amounts of metal?”
“We can. In fact we did not use all of the scrapings we took from the table.”
“You still have more of that sample?”
“We do.”
“So you could turn it over to the police if they needed to do their own tests?”
“We could,” he says, “but there’s no need. They took their own scrapings from the same area.”
This is the point I wish to make; that the cops took their own evidence and have buried it.
“Do you know whether they analyzed the portion they took?”
“Objection,” says Kline. “Hearsay.”
“I’m asking if the witness knows from personal experience,” I tell Radovich.
“Do you know?” says the judge.
“Yes,” says DeShield. “I was present for part of the testing.”
“Overruled,” says Radovich.
“They did tests on the defendant’s jewelry,” says DeShield.
“All of it?”
“To my knowledge, yes.”
“Let’s come back to that later,” I say. “First, can you tell us what you discovered as a result of your analysis?”
“It would be my opinion that whatever made those scratches on the table and left traces of its own metal was custom-made and very expensive,” says the witness.
“And what is that opinion based on?”
“The chemical composition,” says DeShield. “Very high gold content. Twenty-two karat. Somewhat unique for jewelry. Used mostly in India, where labor costs make design and construction of custom-made items of nominal concern. People buy gold there for its intrinsic value. A hedge against inflation,” he says.
“Is that your opinion as to the source of this jewelry?”
“Most likely. Very little is imported for sale here. Too expensive,” says DeShield.
“Did you find markers? Any impurities in the metal?”
“No. It’s the problem with gold of that quality,” he says. “Trace elements—lead, iron, magnesium—these normally will have leached out long ago.”
There’s the semblance of a smile from Stobel, and a knowing glance from Kline, who actually slaps the table in relief, though he tries to conceal this as merely stretching when he realizes he has drawn attention.
“So there is no way chemically to determine a positive identification between the trace metal and an item of jewelry?”
“Not chemically. No.”
“Is there another way?”
“In my opinion, it is possible.”
The smile melts on Kline’s face.
“How?”
“Tool marks,” says the witness.
DeShield had come to me with this a week ago. While he could not match the metals because of their purity, there is another common characteristic of gold. It is malleable, soft, especially in the twenty-two-karat variety he has identified here. He now explains this to the jury.
“The fact is that the underside of that table contains small ridges, raised areas that are part of its design. These are unique in their size and spacing.”
He has a picture to illustrate this, and we place it on the easel, a ten-power magnification that makes these grooves look like the mountains of the moon or, more accurately, according to DeShield, the teeth on a key.
“Find gold jewelry with gouges that match those grooves, and you would have positive identification.”
I allow this to seep in at Kline’s table, like sludge in beach sand, while I plow through our box of evidence. With the rustle of paper, he is all eyes. For a moment he gets out of his chair, looks at Stobel.
“Your Honor, could we approach?”
“Not now,” says Radovich.
Kline would like to break a dramatic moment. He can’t be sure, but there is a chance we have the missing object, the item of gold. How, he cannot know.
I pull out a paper sack, sealed with an evidence tag. All of these items have been collected by us under the watchful eye and direction of the special master, appointed by the court to ensure that there are no chain-of-custody problems, allegations of hanky-panky with the physical evidence. They have been examined and sealed in evidence bags by the special master and turned over to the court.
“Mr. DeShield, I’m going to show you a bag and ask you if you can identify its contents.”
I hand this to him. He reads the tag and opens the bag.
“A number of items of jewelry,” he says.
Kline gives me a look, a pained expression, as if I were leaving him suspended in air. He doesn’t sit but drifts to the witness for a look over my shoulder.
“And where did this particular jewelry come from?”
“The police department,” says DeShield.
“And where did they get it?”
“From the defendant’s home,” he says. “It’s contained in an inner bag signed by Detective Stobel, and there is an inventory sheet,” he says.
“And you retrieved this from the police department with the special master?”
“I did.”
“Why did you do this?”
“Because the prosecution was not going to place it in evidence,” he says.
“Objection,” says Kline. “How could he know that?”
“It’s a given,” I say. “You have closed your case and the jury has not seen it.”
Radovich nods. “Overruled. The answer will stand.”
“Do you know whether this is all the jewelry belonging to the defendant?”
“I’m told that it’s all the jewelry belonging to the defendant that the police found when they conducted a search of his home.”
“And do you know whether they examined it for chemical composition, or comparison to the traces of metal found on the victim’s coffee table?”
“I’m informed that they did. I have a copy of their report.”
All the reasons you don’t want to bury unproductive evidence. The other side will beat you over the head with it.
“And what did they find?” I ask.
“They were able to exclude every piece as not consistent with the chemical composition of the traces of metal found on the table.”
“And have you examined the jewelry belonging to the defendant?”
“I have.”
“And do you confirm the findings of the police crime laboratory that this jewelry belonging to the defendant does not correspond to the chemical composition of the trace metals found on that table?”
“I do.”
“And have you examined these pieces of jewelry to determine if a
ny of them contain tool marks corresponding to the ridges on that table?”
“I have.”
“And what did you find?”
“None of the pieces contain such tool marks.”
“And to your knowledge, all of this information was available to the police, was it not?”
“Yes.”
Kline looks at me at this moment, seething with anger.
“Thank you. Your witness.”
He cannot resist the obvious question, even before he reaches the podium.
“Mr. DeShield,” he says, “did you not just tell us that the item of jewelry in question is likely to have been ripped off of the perpetrator?”
“It’s a distinct possibility,” says the witness.
“Then isn’t it probable that the item in question would not have been in the defendant’s home when the police searched it?”
“That’s true,” says DeShield, “but then I would have assumed that the police would have found it at the scene.”
Acosta actually grabs my arm and chuckles when he hears DeShield’s reply. This sticks like a burning hot poker from Kline’s ass, the thought that police not only buried their findings on the jewelry from Acosta’s house, but may have destroyed evidence when they discovered that it did not belong to their principal suspect.
Kline looks at Stobel, who actually shrugs his shoulders, a whaddya-gonna-do kind of expression.
“Isn’t it possible that the defendant removed it before he left,” says Kline, “and discarded it?”
“Objection, calls for speculation.” I’m up out of my chair.
“Sustained,” says Radovich.
“No more speculative than that we should have found it at the scene,” says Kline.
“You asked the question,” says the judge.
Kline fumbles at the podium with a yellow pad. His pen lands on the floor and he has to stoop for it. When he comes up, he is clearly puzzled, and pissed.
This is clearly not his finest hour. There is some shuffling in the jury box, and after several seconds Kline finally regroups and finds his place in his notes.
“Now. Now. You say,” he says, “that positive identification is possible. Exactly how specific could one of these tests be to determine what you called positive identification, the metal scrapings with the jewelry?”
“Which test are you talking about?” says DeShield.
“Well, any of them?” says Kline, like take your pick. He is obviously angry with the witness.
“As I said, given the gold content of the trace metals taken from the table, chemical analysis would not be useful to determine a positive identification with a specific piece of jewelry. But tool marks are another matter.”
“Yes,” says Kline. “The tool marks. How specific could you be in that regard?”
“I couldn’t say for certain until I examined it, but. . .”
“Then you haven’t seen this jewelry?”
“Objection. Counsel should allow the witness to answer the question before interrupting,” I say.
“Sorry,” says Kline.
“As I was saying,” says DeShield, “an examination of the jewelry I believe would be dispositive. I believe that the marks would permit a definitive identification.”
“Then you haven’t seen the jewelry?” Kline is obsessed with this. By now he is thinking we must have it, holding it for a dramatic moment, but how?
“I haven’t seen it. Not yet,” says DeShield.
This sets Kline off.
“Then you know where it is?” he says.
“No.”
“You just said you haven’t seen it yet.”
“That’s what I said.”
“Does Mr. Madriani have it?”
“I don’t know.”
Kline looks at me and for a moment I actually wonder if he’s going to demand that I take the stand.
“Your Honor, we have a right to know if the defense is withholding evidence,” says Kline.
“Your Honor.” I jump in before Radovich can say anything. “We’re aware of the rules of reciprocal discovery. I will assure the court here and now that we have not violated them. We’ve produced everything to date that the law requires us to produce. Beyond that we cannot be compelled.”
This is a legalism that does not satisfy Kline.
“Your Honor, a straight answer,” he says.
“In chambers,” says Radovich. He gavels down. “Five-minute recess.”
Inside it are Harry and I, Kline and Stobel. Kline is animated, clearly angered by my antics of hide-the-ball. He is telling the judge that he has figured it out.
“The item of jewelry is being held by Lenore Goya,” he says. “Her fingerprint on the victim’s door. Now it all makes sense,” says Kline.
“Is this true?” says Radovich.
“I don’t know what he’s talking about,” I say.
“You have the missing jewelry,” he says. “It no doubt belongs to his client,” Kline tells Radovich. “All the pieces fit. It’s how she muscled her way into the case.”
“Who?” says Radovich.
“Goya,” says Kline.
He calls it extortion, and Radovich cuts him off.
“I don’t want to hear any more of that,” he says.
Kline comes off like a man on the edge.
“A straight answer.” Radovich looks at me. “Do you have the missing item or not?”
“I don’t have it,” I say. All the inflection is on the personal pronoun, which sets Kline off again.
“If anybody else has it, I don’t know about it,” I say.
“No games,” says Radovich. “I won’t have games here.”
“Well, he’s playing games,” says Kline.
“No games,” I say. “We may, I admit, have theories. But theories are not discoverable,” I tell the judge.
“You know where it is?” he says.
“I don’t know anything,” I tell him.
Radovich lays both hands palms down on the desk and shrugs.
“He says he doesn’t know,” he tells Kline.
“He’s lying,” says Kline.
“You’ve asked me and I’ve told you, Your Honor. I don’t have it, and I don’t know where it is.”
“Sure,” says Kline, “but Goya does.”
“You know that? Prove it,” I tell him.
“Your Honor, we move to reopen the state’s case, to call Lenore Goya to the stand,” says Kline.
“And we object,” I tell Radovich. “The state had every opportunity to call Ms. Goya during its case. It was aware of her fingerprint on the victim’s door and it failed to call her. Now they think they made a tactical mistake and they want to revisit it.”
Radovich is a million faces, expressions like melting butter behind the desk.
“I’m inclined to agree,” he says. “You had your chance,” he tells Kline. “It’s not that I’m unsympathetic.” He gives me a look as if he’s not sure he believes me.
Kline makes a last hit, and the judge cuts him off.
“Unless you can make an offer of proof,” says Radovich, “some hard evidence that Ms. Goya or Mr. Madriani has the item of jewelry in question, I’m not gonna allow you to reopen. We have to move on.”
Harry and I turn to leave.
“And you, Mr. Madriani,” says the judge. “You better not be comin’ into my court with any last-minute evidence of jewelry discovered the night before you close. Do we understand each other?”
“We understand each other,” I tell him.
He gives me the evil eye. “Good,” he says.
As I brush by Kline on the way out I can feel a shudder run through his body with this contact. He comes up
close in my ear so that no one, not even Harry, can hear this.
“You tell that bitch,” he says, “you tell her that I want it.” He is actually holding my arm as he says this, a grip like iron so that I have to pull my shoulder to one side to get away.
When I look in his eyes, it is there: all of the hostility, months of shallow, concealed enmity toward Lenore suddenly bubbling to the surface, finding expression in this—a piece of missing evidence.
CHAPTER 29
THERE COMES A TIME WHEN YOU ARE FORCED TO TAKE your chances. If you are lucky and blessed by wits, these moments occur only infrequently, snippets of panic in the middle of a trial. You try to minimize them, hedge your bets, cover your ass, but in the end you close your eyes and cross your fingers. One of these is about to happen in our case.
Jerry Franks dabbles on the edge of expertise in a dozen fields of forensics. He is master of none. His résumé has the substance of the Sunday comics. That his testimony is based on any organized body of knowledge is an item that must be taken on faith, like the beatification of the saints. He is, in short, the man you call when you wish to purchase an opinion. His credentials are not simply subject to question, they are for sale.
For all of these reasons Kline veritably gloats when I call Franks to the stand. In the war of “my expert is better than your expert,” anyone using Jerry Franks could be construed as mentally challenged.
While he may have mastered the jargon, his grasp of the science is not always there.
He is short and stout with tousled hair, what is left of it, and thick glasses in horn-rim frames. These are set with clear glass, like windowpanes, so that I have always assumed they are for effect. His sport coat is part of the uniform for court, corduroy that went out twenty years ago with leather-patched elbows, and pants so stiff with perspiration that they might produce dangerous vapors under the press of an iron. His black shoes are strangers to polish, with a hole in one sole that I have seen him display with pride when he crossed one leg in a hearing a year ago. He cultivates the image of the debauched professor, someone who you might guess has drunk his own juice from some lab experiment.
As Franks climbs toward the stand, Stobel says something to Kline and the two men actually laugh, so that there is no question as to the butt of their joke. Among lawyers in this town and the more perceptive jurors, Franks’s opinion on any subject is likely to carry the weight of helium. With a jury this is less certain, though a good attorney can usually cut him to shreds.
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