by Marcia Clark
A quick glance at the jury told me they were in love with Dorian. Now most of the jurors were smiling, and a few were even chuckling. Score one for the good guys. O’Bryan thanked Dorian and tried to sound as though he meant it. Ronnie had on his poker face, but I was gratified to see that Saul looked worried. That is, until Ronnie sat down and whispered to him. I knew he was telling Saul to chill out. Sure enough, Hildegarde nodded thoughtfully and put on a neutral expression.
I looked back at Nancy and Bennie to see how they were holding up. It hadn’t been gruesome testimony by any means—at least, not compared to what I’m used to. But Dorian’s testimony had left a clear, if inferential, picture of a violent confrontation in that garage, and somehow her understated delivery had made it even more compelling. Nancy stared straight ahead, covering her mouth with one hand and clutching Bennie’s arm with the other as though it were a life preserver. But Bennie was staring hard at Saul and with such searing intensity it wouldn’t have surprised me to see Saul’s head burst into flame.
We moved on. I called Kwan to talk about the blood on the scarf and in the car: it matched Melissa’s. I called a representative of the luggage manufacturer. He testified that the suitcase under the tool bench and the suitcases on the shelf above belonged to the same set.
It was time to put on the “soft” witnesses: the ones who’d describe the demise of Saul and Melissa’s marriage. The friends told of the fights, the lawyer told of how Melissa had consulted him about a divorce, and two of Saul’s girlfriends, who were surprisingly forthcoming, told of how he’d cheated on Melissa with them. I’d wanted to call the volunteer Melissa had caught him with, but she’d decamped to France. Supposedly for a job. Maybe this one would let her perform her duties in a vertical position. Which, come to think of it, wouldn’t necessarily change the nature of her “work.”
“Did you know Saul was married?” I asked the girlfriend named Wendy. Or, as Bailey called her, Winsome Wendy.
“Well… yeah. And I know I was wrong to do that, you know? And I’m sorry. I guess—”
“Objection!” O’Bryan said, half rising from his chair.
But Winsome Wendy, either because she was tougher than she appeared or because she didn’t understand, plowed ahead.
“I guess that’s why I was willing to come here today. To make it right, you know?”
“The objection is sustained,” the judge ruled. “For what it’s worth. You want the answer stricken, Counsel?”
The jury looked at O’Bryan, and I could swear Juror Number Four had raised an eyebrow. O’Bryan did the wise thing and used the moment to endear himself.
“Nah, who’m I to stand in the way of redemption?”
It got him a laugh and earned him some juror love. Score one for the bad guys.
I looked at Saul to see if he was laughing—a mistake because he should be looking remorseful; even if he hadn’t killed his wife, he was a shitheel for cheating on her. The corners of his mouth twitched, but he’d managed to rein himself in. Damn.
I’d planned to call a few more friends to paint the picture of marital discord, but since no one had seen the defendant get physically violent with Melissa, and the jury’s eyes were starting to glaze over, I decided it was probably overkill. I leaned over to Bailey.
“Time for the trump card, such as it is?” I whispered.
Bailey nodded and went to fetch our witness: Officer Susan Abrams. Still in uniform because she was in the middle of her shift, Officer Abrams raised her right hand, swore to tell the truth, and adjusted the microphone as she sat down. I quickly established that she was one of the police officers who participated in the search of the house in which Melissa and the defendant lived. Then I pulled out the photograph of the room where she found our key piece of evidence.
“Officer, did you personally search this room?”
“Yes, it’s a small study at the back of the house.”
“And what, if anything, did you find of significance there?”
We always say “if anything” to avoid the objection that the question assumes there was something significant to be found. It’s a silly formality. Why would I be asking her about the search if she didn’t find anything of significance? Lawyers have to say a lot of useless things like that.
“I found a diary.”
I turned to Bailey, who produced the actual diary in a plastic evidence envelope. Pulling on a set of rubber gloves, I took the envelope and the box of gloves up to the witness stand. Officer Abrams gloved up and removed the diary from the envelope.
“This is the diary I found.”
“Please look at the last entry.”
She turned to the page.
“Is that what you saw when you found this diary?”
“Yes, it is.”
“Please read the entire page for us.”
The officer did so, and concluded with the final line: “ ‘I know if I don’t get out of here, he’s going to kill me. If I’m dead when you read this, it’ll be because he killed me.’ ”
Officer Abrams did a nice job of it. A few peeks at the jury while she was reading from the diary showed that they were riveted. Juror Number Four was nodding to himself and taking notes. Excellent.
“No further questions,” I said, and sat down.
Bailey leaned in and whispered, “I think I saw Juror Number Nine wiping away a tear.”
More excellent still. Score another one for the good guys.
Ronnie’s cross started out to be an uninspired do-over of all my questions on direct—the typical move defense attorneys make when they really have nothing to ask. And then he dropped the bomb. It started innocuously enough.
“Now, Officer—and I trust the prosecution will not object to an obvious point that may be a little outside your field of expertise—there’s no way to know exactly when that last entry was written, is there? At least, there’s no forensic science that can tell us when ink or pencil was put to paper, correct?”
I wanted to object, because I had a bad feeling about where this was going. But I knew this to be true, and any expert—mine or his—would agree to the unremarkable proposition. I sat tight and held on to my poker face. Officer Abrams shot a quick, puzzled glance my way but answered without further hesitation.
“No, not that I’m aware of.”
“And so that writing could have been there for days, even weeks or months, before Melissa left, correct?”
“I suppose.”
“Or, conversely, that writing could have been done days, weeks, or even months after Melissa left, isn’t that right?”
Officer Abrams’s expression had grown even more perplexed. A fast look at the jury told me they were equally confused, but many were leaning forward in their seats. I would’ve done the same if I hadn’t been busy acting like I didn’t give a damn.
“Well, no. How could that be? I mean, the handwriting matches. It’s Melissa’s.” Officer Abrams shook her head and shot O’Bryan a look of contempt. “She couldn’t have written it after your client killed her.”
Much as I loved the snarky dig, I knew it could be trouble. Juries don’t trust cops who come out swinging. They generally like their officers neutral and unbiased—“Just the facts, ma’am.” Saying that Melissa couldn’t have written the entry after Hildegarde had killed her was about as biased, and obviously improper, as it got. Juries have been known to turn on us for less. I tried not to cringe when O’Bryan made his objection.
“Objection!” Ronnie said. “Motion to strike! That is obviously improper!”
“It was,” the judge said. “Ladies and gentlemen, you’re ordered to disregard that last remark.”
The jury nodded solemnly. I kept my poker face on, but I was in a quandary. Was Ronnie actually claiming someone dummied up this diary? Forged Melissa’s handwriting to frame the defendant? Who? According to everyone I’d asked, no one in Melissa’s life had even known she kept a diary. And I couldn’t think of anyone with a plausible motive—friends or fa
mily—who had access to the evidence after we’d seized it. Flashing back on all the people I’d spoken to, I couldn’t come up with a single one who’d given me a suspicious vibe. Had I missed it? I glanced at Hildegarde, who had a smug little smile on his face.
“Now I want to ask you some personal questions, Officer Abrams.”
I prepared to object—how could anything personal about the officer be relevant?—but his next question brought me to a dead stop.
“How long have you known Melissa Gibbons?”
I could’ve objected. The question assumed she’d ever known our victim, but I knew that’s exactly what O’Bryan wanted. If I objected it’d only help O’Bryan to underline the point; worse, it would look like I’d known all along and was trying to hide it—whatever it was. I surreptitiously inhaled and pressed my lips together as I wrote on my legal pad to Bailey: WTF???
Bailey, her expression stony, wrote back: NO FRIGGIN’ CLUE.
Officer Abrams opened and closed her mouth silently as though she had gills. When she finally found her voice, it came out rough. “What? What are you talking about? I never met the victim.”
“Really? Aren’t you married to Angus Warren?”
Officer Abrams’s brow furrowed as she answered slowly, “Yes.”
“And you’re aware that your husband, Angus Warren, was previously married to a woman named Jeanine Stryker?”
“I, ah… yes. I think that’s her name.”
“Oh, come now, Officer Abrams. You’re all remarkably friendly, aren’t you? Amicable divorce and all that, you all see each other socially, attend the same parties. Isn’t that true?”
“Yes. I just… didn’t remember what her maiden name was. We don’t see each other all that often, honestly.”
“But you do see each other, don’t you? You’re not trying to tell this jury otherwise, are you?”
“I… no, of course not. I just don’t get—”
“Of course you do. Jeanine Stryker is Nancy Gibbons’s sister. Melissa is Jeanine’s niece.”
Officer Abrams’s face froze. I struggled to look nonchalant. The defense had just thrown a veritable grenade into the heart of the case. By proving that Officer Abrams had a connection to Melissa’s family, he’d shown there was someone with both motive and access who could’ve altered the evidence.
Officer Abrams was red-faced and steaming. “You’re saying I forged Melissa’s handwriting and made that last entry? That’s crazy! Why on earth would I do such a thing?”
“I ask the questions, Officer Abrams,” O’Bryan boomed. “You give the answers. So please explain to us why you never told the prosecution about your relationship to Melissa’s family.”
The only hope we had was for the officer to keep her cool and show the attack wasn’t worth taking seriously. One look at her told me that hope was about to be obliterated. Officer Abrams had pulled herself up in her seat, and now she leaned forward, her face an angry fist.
“You’re out of your mind! How dare you.”
O’Bryan, loving every devastating second of it, turned to the judge with an air of indignation. “Your Honor, I object!” With a sweeping gesture toward the jury, he pronounced, “We’re entitled to an answer! Please order the witness!”
“Sustained,” the judge said quietly. “Answer the question, Officer.”
O’Bryan turned back and faced Abrams with a stern expression. “I’ll repeat it in case you don’t remember: you didn’t tell anyone, did you?”
The officer glared at O’Bryan, nostrils flaring. “No, Counsel. That’s right. I didn’t.”
A fast glance at the jury showed many of them had stricken looks. Juror Number Nine, who’d teared up when Officer Abrams read the diary, was looking from O’Bryan to the officer as if she weren’t sure who to believe. Worse still, Juror Number Four was studying Officer Abrams skeptically, one eyebrow raised. A lump formed in the pit of my stomach.
Meanwhile, Saul Hildegarde was nodding sanctimoniously—an “I told you so” expression on his face. I wanted to put my fist into it so badly I could feel my knuckles turn white.
We were screwed, and it was only going to get worse. I’d intended to close the case with the handwriting expert who’d say that the handwriting in the diary was consistent with Melissa’s. Since the last line of the diary helped the defense, I’d figured that was the one area O’Bryan wouldn’t want to mess with. But now I knew Ronnie O’Bryan would pull out all the stops to go after the handwriting expert to prove the diary entry could be a forgery. And that meant I’d be forced to end on the weakest note of all, because Morris Ivins wouldn’t be able to rule out the possibility that someone else had deliberately forged the last entry. I tried to salvage what I could from the wreckage of my case.
“Mr. Ivins, did Melissa Gibbons make this last entry in the diary?” I asked.
“Most likely, yes. Not only does the handwriting in this entry match the handwriting in the rest of the diary, but it also matches other known exemplars written by Melissa Gibbons.”
I sat down and slid another glance at the jury. Some looked disturbed, others confused, but there were at least two, one of them Juror Number Four, whose expressions were closed. A very bad sign. I sighed privately. There was nothing more I could do.
O’Bryan swaggered up to the podium. He took Ivins through all the weaknesses in handwriting identification for what felt like hours and then ended on a note that was predictable yet powerful:
“The truth is, Mr. Ivins, you can’t rule out the possibility that someone deliberately imitated Melissa’s handwriting, can you?”
“No, sir. I can’t.”
“And so you really can’t say for sure that the writing was done by Melissa, can you?”
“No, I cannot.”
“Nothing further, Your Honor.” O’Bryan obnoxiously turned to me with a flourish. “Your witness, Madame Prosecutor.”
I nodded and smiled serenely as I silently wished for him to perform an anatomically impossible act. Saul Hildegarde tilted his chin up and faced the jury with a self-righteous look. Before standing, I quickly leaned over to Bailey. “We could ask Officer Abrams to try and imitate the handwriting and then let Ivins show how hers is different from Melissa’s. But—”
“The defense will just say Abrams wasn’t really trying,” Bailey whispered back. “No, cut the cord. If the jury’s buying the defense bullshit, there’s nothing more we can do.”
It rankled to let go, and I badly wanted to wipe the supercilious smile off O’Bryan’s face, but I knew Bailey was right. If we started scrambling and making desperate moves now, it would only taint all the good evidence we’d presented.
“Ms. Knight, any redirect for Mr. Ivins?” the judge asked. I thought I heard a note of sympathy in his voice, but I could have been wrong.
“No, thank you, Your Honor. No redirect.” I stood, put on my game face, and said in as strong a voice as possible, “The prosecution rests.”
“Defense?” the judge said to O’Bryan.
“Your Honor, the defense chooses to rest on the state of the evidence. We believe the People have failed to make their case—”
“You can tell the jury what you believe in closing argument, Counsel,” the judge said, deliberately cutting off the grandstanding. “For now, I take it you don’t intend to present any additional evidence?”
“That is correct, Your Honor.”
“Then, seeing as it’s the noon hour, we’ll take our lunch break and commence with closing arguments at one thirty.”
After the jury filed out, the defendant gave O’Bryan a victory clap on the back. Feeling my eyes on him, Hildegarde shot me a sneering, triumphant grin. I wanted to yank Bailey’s gun out of her shoulder holster and blast the grin off his face.
Bailey saw my expression. “The only thing that’d make his getting off worse is for you to wind up in custody. Let it go, Rachel.”
Having no other choice, I did. Bailey and I picked up what was left of the sandwiches at the sna
ck bar. She scored a ham and cheese; I wound up with some rolled-and-pressed mystery meat. We took our “lunch” up to my office and ate in silence. Neither of us was in the mood to chat. As I stuffed the remainder of my sandwich into its wrapper and pitched it into the wastebasket, I heard the ki-koo of Toni’s heels clicking down the hall toward my office.
She stopped in my doorway. “Hey, where’s the funeral?”
“Right here, soon as I finish closing arguments and get a five-minute ‘not guilty.’ ”
“That bad?”
Bailey gave her a dark look. “Yeah.”
“Man, that’s a bitch. You guys put together a hell of a case. What happened?”
We told her. Then I noticed the clock on the Times Building. “We’ve gotta jump. Meet us for sympathy drinks?”
Toni nodded. “Your place?”
My place being the Biltmore Hotel, where I got to live full-time thanks to a case I’d won involving the murder of the CEO’s wife. I stood up and started to gather my legal pads and exhibit sheets.
“Hold on,” Toni said. “I’ll be right back.” She hurried out.
Twenty seconds later, Toni was back. She pressed a small plastic object into my hand. I looked down at it, puzzled.
“It’s my juju,” Toni said.
“It’s a friggin’ troll doll, Tone.”
“Just keep it close—”
I started to argue, but she grabbed my chin and got nose-to-nose.
“Do not argue with me about this, Knight. What can it hurt?”
I sighed and dropped the little thing into the pocket of my blazer. What the heck—who was I to argue at a time like this? I needed all the help I could get.
I tried to put a spring in my step as I entered the courtroom. Never let ’em see you sweat.
“Ready, Counsel?” the judge asked.
We both said yes.
“Let’s have the jury.”
The jury took their seats, and I stood up. For the next hour, I did my best to sound persuasive, convincing, and confident. But when O’Bryan stood up, the jury leaned forward, all ears. Short of their handing in the “not guilty” verdict right then and there, it couldn’t get much worse. He made the predictable argument that we’d utterly failed to prove Melissa was dead, that she had every reason to want to frame Saul Hildegarde for murder, that the jury had no choice but to return a verdict of “not guilty.” And then he made his grandstand move.