He paused and looked from juror to juror. “You can send a message that the Big Lie stops here. You can send a message that you see through their banality that is represented by this evil man sitting right there,” he said as he walked over and stood facing Johnson, “and let the world know that he is not some heroic revolutionary the so-called system is trying to silence. He is a desperate, cold-blooded, and ruthless killer trying to escape justice. And every last one of you is more heroic than he could ever have imagined himself to be.”
And finally Karp said, returning to his place in front of the jury, “I’m not asking you to find the defendant, Anthony Johnson, guilty beyond a reasonable doubt for the crimes of murder and attempted murder.
“When this is all over, when you’ve deliberated and reached your verdict, I want you to be able to go home and, when your family, your friends, and your neighbors and co-workers, who have been reading and listening to the distortions and lies of the media and the demagogues, ask you how you reached your verdict, you will be able to say you know that Anthony Johnson, from all of the evidence, was guilty beyond any and all doubt. And with that you will send a message that will be heard from coast to coast across this great country of ours. Our shared traditional values remain inviolate.”
One last time, Karp paused to look each juror in the face, and then he nodded. “I thank you for your service.”
EPILOGUE
SOMETHING STARTLED PETE VANSAND FROM a deep sleep in the bedroom of his fourth-floor walk-up in the Village. He held his breath and lay completely still, listening, though all he could hear was the pounding of his heart through the comforter and the sounds of the city outside his window, which seemed unusually loud.
Then he noticed that the night-light in his bathroom down the hall must have burned out. He couldn’t see anything past the doorway, just an empty blackness like the maw of a cave. The only light in the bedroom came through the window from a weak streetlight down the block and was diffused by thin white curtains.
Letting his breath out, he wondered what had awakened him so abruptly. He inhaled, and that was when he noticed the odor. It was horrible . . . the stench of something rotten and putrid. Had a rat died in the wall? Or a bunch of rats, he thought as the odor grew nauseatingly stronger. Maybe the building manager put out a bunch of poison and now dozens of furry bodies were decaying on the other side of the paneling.
Casting about for the source of the stench, he noticed the curtains flutter slightly. Funny, I don’t remember leaving the window open, he thought. Then he realized the smell was wafting in on the breeze. Is there a garbage strike I haven’t heard about?
Then again, he hadn’t been paying much attention to the news lately. It had been two weeks since the jury in the Johnson case had come back with a verdict. Guilty on both counts. A cheer had gone up from the police officers and court personnel in the courtroom, while the defendant’s former supporters sat mute and disgusted. There weren’t many left. After Johnson’s meltdown on the witness stand and then Karp’s evisceration of the defense, most of those who hadn’t already jumped ship did so, he among them.
Really the only excitement left when Karp finished his summation was when Johnson attacked his defense attorney immediately after the verdict was read. He’d actually gotten her to the ground with his hands around her throat before the court security officers could pull him off.
Sentencing wouldn’t take place for another eight weeks, but no one doubted Johnson would get life for the murder of Officer Tony Cippio plus twenty-five years to life for the attempted murder of Officer Bryce Kim. And if that wasn’t enough to make sure he never got out of prison, he’d also been charged with the attempted murder of a police officer by the district attorney in San Francisco County for pointing a gun at NYPD Detective Clay Fulton and pulling the trigger.
Johnson and Nash weren’t the only ones disappointed by the verdict. The case had been Vansand’s ticket back to the big news programs, but only if the story line was wrongfully accused black activist won against the Nazi district attorney. A cop killer getting what he deserved was nowhere near as sexy.
The national news desk had stopped taking his calls. Adding insult to injury, the twentysomething news director at his station had called him into her office to tell him he was being reassigned to “soft features.” The Action News Team spot was being given to Eric Mason, the enterprising young reporter who’d responded to the police call when thugs attacked the prosecution witness Judy Pardo and the district attorney’s wife, Marlene Ciampi. It was the story of the year, and Vansand had been in the courtroom twiddling his thumbs when he knew the location of the shelter and that something was likely to happen.
Vansand felt a little guilty about passing that note to Johnson through his attorney about where to find Pardo. But he reasoned that he thought the accused killer just wanted to intimidate her, and if he had, the verdict—and Vansand’s future—might have taken a different turn. But apparently the two women had been more than three criminals could handle.
Nash was another person who wasn’t taking calls. But she was probably dealing with her own failures. This had been a big case—a real career maker if she’d pulled it off—and a lot of money had gone into making it happen. She’d heard that protesters and even the rioters had been paid in an attempt to influence the jury pool.
Mufti, too, had disappeared off the radar. The verdict seemed to take the wind out of his sails. His last statement to the press had been that he was going to take some time “for reflection before resuming my dedicated efforts on behalf of the black community.” Of course, his silence might have been more tied to rumors that he and other New York City Council members were being investigated by a federal grand jury for fraud and accepting bribes. So his treading lightly around the authorities might have been in the hopes that they’d go easy on him.
The stench filling his room prompted Vansand to get out of bed to close the window. But he’d taken only two steps when a large shadow passed across the light from the streetlamp. “Who’s there?” he called out in fear. The window led to the fire escape, but only residents of the building should have had access to it, and there was no good reason they’d be outside his room at that time of night.
When there was no answer, he wondered if maybe he’d imagined the shadow and started to move toward the window when the light was again blocked off by an enormous figure. This time a bear poked its furry head in through the window, parting the curtains.
“Who are you?” Vansand asked, backing away, his voice choking with fear.
“ ’ooger,” the bear said.
Vansand was too frightened to scream. This has to be a nightmare, he thought. There are no bears on fourth-story fire escapes in New York City. But he didn’t wake up as the bear began trying to fit his massive bulk through the window, bringing with him the foul odor.
“Go away,” Vansand pleaded, but ’ooger kept coming.
Then he heard a sound coming from behind him. He whirled and peered down the pitch-black hallway. “Who’s there?” he cried out.
“ ’at’s ’avid,” the bear said behind him.
A shadow separated itself from the black of the hallway and stepped toward him. A hooded and robed figure appeared, the light just illuminating his pale features and glittering in the eyes that burned in the darkness beneath the hood.
“Please, what do you want?” Vansand begged.
“Repent,” the ghoul whispered.
The scream died in Vansand’s throat.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
ROBERT K. TANENBAUM is the author of thirty-two books—twenty-nine novels and three nonfiction books: Badge of the Assassin, the true account of his investigation and trials of self-proclaimed members of the Black Liberation Army who assassinated two NYPD police officers; The Piano Teacher: The True Story of a Psychotic Killer; and Echoes of My Soul, the true story of a shocking double murder that resulted in the DA exonerating an innocent man while searching for the real killer. Th
e case was cited by Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren in the famous Miranda decision. He is one of the most successful prosecuting attorneys, having never lost a felony trial and convicting hundreds of violent criminals. He was a special prosecution consultant on the Hillside Strangler case in Los Angeles and defended Amy Grossberg in her sensationalized baby death case. He was Assistant District Attorney in New York County in the office of legendary District Attorney Frank Hogan, where he ran the Homicide Bureau, served as Chief of the Criminal Courts, and was in charge of the DA’s legal staff training program. He served as Deputy Chief Counsel for the Congressional Committee investigation into the assassinations of President John F. Kennedy and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He also served two terms as mayor of Beverly Hills and taught Advanced Criminal Procedure for four years at Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California, Berkeley, and has conducted continuing legal education (CLE) seminars for practicing lawyers in California, New York, and Pennsylvania. Born in Brooklyn, New York, Tanenbaum attended the University of California at Berkeley on a basketball scholarship, where he earned a BA. He received his law degree (JD) from Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley.
Visit RobertKTanenbaumBooks.com.
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ALSO BY ROBERT K. TANENBAUM
FICTION
Infamy
Trap
Fatal Conceit
Tragic
Bad Faith
Outrage
Betrayed
Capture
Escape
Malice
Counterplay
Fury
Hoax
Resolved
Absolute Rage
Enemy Within
True Justice
Act of Revenge
Reckless Endangerment
Irresistible Impulse
Falsely Accused
Corruption of Blood
Justice Denied
Material Witness
Reversible Error
Immoral Certainty
Depraved Indifference
No Lesser Plea
NONFICTION
Echoes of My Soul
The Piano Teacher: The True Story of a Psychotic Killer
Badge of the Assassin
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Gallery Books
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 by Robert K. Tanenbaum
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First Gallery Books hardcover edition August 2017
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Tanenbaum, Robert, author.
Title: Without fear or favor : a novel / Robert K. Tanenbaum.
Description: First Gallery Books hardcover edition. | New York : Gallery Books, 2017. | Series: A Butch Karp-Marlene Ciampi thriller ; 29 | Identifiers: LCCN 2017013580 (print) | LCCN 2017020319 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Karp, Butch (Fictitious character)—Fiction. | Ciampi, Marlene (Fictitious character)—Fiction. | Conspiracies—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Mystery & Detective / Police Procedural. | FICTION / Legal. FICTION / Thrillers. | GSAFD: Suspense fiction. | Legal stories.
Classification: LCC PS3570.A52 (ebook) | LCC PS3570.A52 W58 2017 (print) DDC 813/.54—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017013580
ISBN 978-1-4767-9322-1
ISBN 978-1-4767-9323-8 (ebook)
Without Fear or Favor Page 29