Never Enough

by Joe McGinniss

  Sometimes I find myself in this dream state…“is he real…or am I dreaming”…I’m so scared, Michael…I’m sorry…I can’t stop crying I just can’t…I’m so fucking afraid of losing you…

  The trial was in recess on Thursday, August 25, as Peter Chapman and Alexander King prepared their closing arguments, but the line of would-be spectators formed early Friday morning. By the time the courtroom doors opened, well over a hundred people had been standing in the hallway for more than an hour. The clamor for standing room began the moment the seats were filled. The two crowd-control marshals were no match for the throng that pushed its way toward the doors. Dozens of the avid crowded inside as if boarding a Tokyo subway.

  Mr. Justice Lunn was not impressed. “I will tolerate no more than ten standees,” he said. Proceedings were delayed as marshals funneled the overflow back into the hall.

  Peter Chapman was in no hurry. In truth, he didn’t know if the case he’d presented was strong enough to overcome whatever innate sympathy the jury—especially its two women—might feel for a mother of three who had sobbed her way through the summer.

  “This was a cold-blooded killing,” he began. Making a rare gesture, he pointed his finger directly at Nancy Kissel. “The defendant struck five fatal blows with murderous intent. There is no basis for a claim of self-defense. The injuries sustained by Robert Kissel did not result from a life-and-death struggle. There was no shouting, screaming, yelling. There was no baseball bat. There was no provocation. This was a cold-blooded killing.”

  Dressed, as always, in black—newspapers had begun to call her “the Woman in Black,” never a good sign for a defendant—Nancy stared at the floor, expressionless.

  “These were not five fatal blows struck in self-defense. Any one of these blows would have been sufficient to kill. These were blows struck with murderous intent while Robert Kissel was unable to defend himself.

  “She didn’t want him alive anymore. Michael Del Priore was the man in her life. Her perspective and outlook in life had changed considerably when Michael Del Priore had entered it. The seed of murder was planted firmly on August twentieth, when she searched the Internet for ‘drug overdose,’ ‘sleeping pills,’ ‘medication causing heart attack.’ She decided to remove the obstacle in her life that Robert Kissel had become. And on November 2, 2003, Nancy Kissel would do exactly that. Nothing can possibly be clearer.”

  Chapman was speaking deliberately, not forgetting that English was a second language for the jurors.

  “She knew divorce was looming. Nancy Kissel, and perhaps Michael del Priore, felt somewhat vulnerable. She knew the messy divorce proceedings could last a long time. She wanted her children, yes, but above all, Michael was the man in her life. And Michael regarded Nancy as a gold mine—as a way out of his life in a trailer park. And so she planned—possibly with Michael del Priore’s tacit encouragement—to remove the obstacle in her life.

  “She acquired four drugs in seven days in her various visits to doctors in late October—Stilnox, Lorivan, amitriptyline, and Rohypnol. There was no possible medical reason for her to need them all. Whether the drugs were intended to kill Robert Kissel or to subdue him is an open question, but they were employed successfully.

  “Her show of normality, her suggestions of an abusive husband to counselors and doctors in the days leading up to the death of the victim, was evidence that she was attempting to lay the groundwork for the events that followed.

  “And afterward, she set about a cover-up in the most calculating and determined way possible. Her actions during those days speak so loudly and so incriminatingly that Nancy Kissel now claims to have no recollection of those events.”

  Chapman shook his head slowly.

  “This case is not about a battered wife doing away with an abusive husband. Her allegations that her husband was abusive are a self-serving act of deception and lies, part of an assassination of the character of Robert Kissel done solely in an attempt to avoid criminal responsibility for what she has done.

  “Acts of forced and injurious sodomy committed against the accused by her husband over many years are a similar fabrication. She claimed she was the victim of five years of humiliation, of raving sexual abuse and violence at the hands of Robert Kissel, who abused cocaine, sleeping pills, and painkillers.

  “But she never sought medical attention. Why not? It never happened. The years of physical and sexual abuse were invisible to friends and family, including those who guaranteed her bail, and her own father, Ira Keeshin. The reason for this? It never happened.”

  There was more. Chapman’s presentation lasted three hours. But in the end it came down to a single proposition. “The evidence of the prosecution case points conclusively to her guilt on the count of murder.”

  Chapman could have gone longer. But he was no slouch as a tactician. By wrapping things up at three thirty on a Friday afternoon, he placed his adversary in the most unenviable of positions. Sandy King could only argue for an hour. Then he’d have to pause until Monday. Notwithstanding that they knew more would follow, the jury would have the whole weekend to reflect on Chapman’s forceful and fully rounded statement, compared to which King’s preliminary remarks might well seem inadequate.

  “This is the worst time to start,” King began. Perhaps a juror or two would sympathize with his plight. “Before our very eyes, the summer has disappeared.” He asked the jury to consider his remarks as only a prologue to the argument he would deliver on Monday.

  “We say she is not guilty, because in the course of events Mrs. Kissel acted in lawful self-defense. Circumstantial evidence points conclusively in the direction of the defense. Like a rope, when you put all the strands together, it’s strong enough to rely upon. Common sense will show that there is no basis for the theory of premeditation. And when you look at the evidence carefully, you will see the prosecution has failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that she did not kill in self-defense. The only true verdict according to the evidence is ‘not guilty.’

  “The prosecution case has been flawed since November 6, 2003, when police went to the Kissel residence. At that time, they thought there was nothing to investigate, because they were already convinced of her guilt. Since then, flaws in the prosecution case have continued. The question to ask yourselves is, ‘Was the prosecution done to a standard that I can be sure of?’ The answer is no.”

  King said he would elaborate on Monday. For now, he only wished to warn the jurors to “resist the temptation to come to a collective decision. It is the individual view that matters.” He also cautioned against forming a prejudice against Nancy “because of her lifestyle.”

  Mr. Justice Lunn declared the court in recess until 10:00 a.m. Monday.

  Just got back from court…wow…what a day…Chapman’s closing took only 3 hours…pretty pathetic…75% of his closing was about you!…he based his entire closing on you and I premeditating to do…well…you know…I can’t even write it it’s so absurd…

  Then Sandy started…I wish you were here to listen to him…the way he speaks to the jury…he’s captivating…

  On Sunday, August 28, Nancy wrote:

  I just came back from seeing Simon—the prosecution is so weak…and the defense is so strong…the only obstacle is the Judge in providing provocation for an out for the jury—a murder conviction is not at all in the cards—way too many holes in the prosecution case.

  And before leaving for court on Monday morning, she wrote again:

  Good morning Beautiful how was your night…mine was wonderful with you by my side…my stomach is in knots…even if the jury comes back with what I want…my fear is this prejudicial judge will overrule their decision…he’s the absolute worst judge in all of Hong Kong…

  Because Alexander King had chosen not to make an opening statement, Monday marked the jury’s first sustained exposure to his rhetoric. And it was sustained. He spoke from dawn to dusk and said he’d be back in the morning for more. He pursued three lines of argument: R
ob was such a perverted, reprehensible control freak that he deserved to die; the police had investigated like Scotty the Clown; and if she had murdered Rob, Nancy would never have behaved so stupidly.

  “The truth about Robert Kissel’s character is unpleasant, is brutal,” King said. “He was a paranoid, suspicious, manipulative man, who abused his wife sexually and wanted to be in total control at all times. His ruthless competitiveness in work and play, his detailed supervision of household finances, his installation of spyware and hiring of private detectives: these are all evidence of the paranoid, controlling nature of a violently abusive husband.

  “When he suspected that their marriage might be in trouble, did he use his usual energy to say, ‘Right, let’s go to marriage counselors and sort it out’? No. What did he do? He installed spyware, so that six times a day, he could check on his wife. And that was even before her relationship with Michael Del Priore had begun.

  “What kind of man, in advance of traveling to destinations, is looking to procure gay sexual services? What kind of husband, when his wife is away, starts searching out for male prostitutes?”

  That was enough for Bill Kissel. He hadn’t listened to the testimony about Rob’s search for gay anal sex Web sites and he wasn’t going to listen to arguments derived from it. He strode angrily out of the courtroom.

  “Records show that his first search term on Google in April 2003 was ‘my wife is a bitch.’ He would refer to his wife in that way again, on November 2, 2003. That was payback time. He was going to finally tell her that he was divorcing her, not her divorcing him. He had controlled every other aspect of her life. The one thing left in her life was her children. When he realized that she had hit him, he was enraged. Robert Kissel had never been hit before by his wife. It’s always been him doing the beating. So he lost his temper. He said: ‘I am going to fucking kill you…you fucking bitch!’”

  What had happened after that? Because of the bungling of the Hong Kong police, King said, no one would ever know.

  “A chief inspector, a senior inspector, and a superintendent, along with a large team of officers, descended upon Parkview and told the stupid and ridiculous story about investigating a missing person. That was rubbish. That simply doesn’t make sense. Could it be any clearer that their intention was to investigate murder, not a missing person or an assault?

  “There was a six-minute period in the master bedroom when Nancy Kissel described to police how she had been assaulted by her husband. But the most senior officer at the scene, who says he is investigating an assault or missing person, can’t remember a single thing she said. They thought this was an open-and-shut case. They made only cursory glances around the apartment. The result is that the jury has been deprived of a confirmatory record of the true events.

  “If it just stopped there it would be bad enough. But it doesn’t stop there, it gets a whole lot worse. When the police were notified on November 8 that they had missed a black bag of bloodied items in their initial search, they should have thought ‘We better search every room.’ But they didn’t. As a matter of fact, if it were not for the accused’s solicitor, there would not even be a baseball bat available for examination in this trial.”

  Whether or not the baseball bat was relevant was, of course, open to question. Only the jury could decide.

  “The prosecution theory of this case is like something out of a movie script—a colliding of the universes. The prosecution would have you believe that the cheating, ungrateful, plotting, scheming wife links up with a lover who lives in a trailer park in the New England state of Vermont—someone living a wretched life, eyeing up wealthy people, and then tacitly encouraging a premeditated plan to kill. The motive? A classic: money, love, lust, and sex. That is pure speculation. It simply defies common sense.

  “Despite all the evidence that has been based upon e-mail correspondence captured by eBlaster spyware, nothing suggests that she was planning a future with Del Priore. Where is the e-mail that says, ‘Oh my darling, we will soon be together?’ She had already set up a home with her three children in a lovely house in Vermont. She could have said, ‘Sorry, Robert, I’m not coming home, I’m filing for divorce.’ Instead, when he called her, she quickly packed up to go home.

  “And it simply does not make sense that she would choose to kill her husband on a busy Sunday afternoon, when their three children and maids would be going in and out of the flat. She’s planning to kill her husband and get away with it? Where was the planning? Nothing shows any planning. The theory of premeditation goes out the window.

  “All the evidence in this case shows that Nancy Kissel was a very good organizer. Where was the organization for the disposal of the body before November 2? There simply is none. She must have spent at least two nights in the bedroom with the body of her dead husband. If she had a premeditated scheme, she certainly did not rely upon it. What happened afterward is she melted down. Isn’t it clear that Nancy Kissel suffered from dissociative amnesia after the killing? Her behavior could almost be described as bizarre. She almost went on living as if nothing had happened.”

  King proposed an alternate scenario. “Robert Kissel had been searching for an excuse to have divorce proceedings go in his favor, hence his obsessive spying on his wife. He knew that if Nancy Kissel filed for divorce on the grounds of spousal abuse and sexual violence, the ensuing proceedings, as with all divorce suits, would be ugly, dirty, and messy. His whole world—and career—would come crashing down.

  “Given the solid evidence of Robert Kissel’s controlling nature, the true scenario is one where the husband confronts his wife with the threat of removing the children from her care, and it escalates into a furious struggle in which she fears for her life. The alleged murder weapon is a family heirloom. What’s more likely? That being chosen as the murder weapon, or that being picked up in self-defense?

  “Too much force? In the middle of a fight, how could someone of Mrs. Kissel’s size turn around and decide how many blows are necessary to make sure her husband didn’t get up again? Adrenaline and fear take over and you do what you can to defend yourself.”

  King said he would finish the next morning.

  My body is so exhausted but my mind is racing…are you alright? I ask Simon every day if he’s heard from you and the answer remains the same: no. I hate that…it worries me so much…

  I’m not at all looking forward to this weekend…it’ll be the longest most painful weekend of my life…

  Let’s go for a drive…we’ll pack some blankets and a nice lunch…find a nice spot somewhere to spread the blanket…I’ll lay my head in your lap…looking up at you…your hand is stroking my head…playing with my hair…your telling me your version of seeing me in my “those ain’t goodbye pants!”…and we both laugh…I get up…I need to get closer to you…so I sit on your lap…facing you…my legs wrapped around you…I need to kiss you…I feel your hands under my shirt…you’ve placed them both on my back…we’ve never made love outside before…on a blanket…on a cloudy day…maybe it’ll start to rain…but neither one of us will care…

  The usual crowd tried to pile into the courtroom on Tuesday, August 30, for the conclusion of Sandy King’s argument. A steady rain fell. It was the nineteenth rainy day in three weeks. Almost forty inches of rain had fallen during August, compared to the norm of fifteen inches. For the year, rainfall was almost 50 percent above normal: perfect weather for Nancy’s romantic fantasies.

  King hammered away again at the alleged incompetence of the police investigation: “This evidence is put before you as expert evidence, and the reality is that there is nothing expert about it at all…. You should be very concerned why a proper investigation was not done and why the full picture was not put before you.”

  But his primary goal was to leave the jury feeling that Nancy was incapable of having committed such a heinous crime. “She was trying everything she could to make the marriage better,” King said. He told the jurors that in determining whether Nancy had
the “propensity” to commit murder, they should rely on character testimony such as that given by Gabriel Ip, former bus director of Hong Kong International School. In testimony that was “straightforward, honest, truthful, and heartfelt,” Ip had said he’d always found Nancy to be “very kind, pleasant, always helpful to kids.”

  Nancy sobbed her way through King’s comments, and during the morning recess she became so upset that both her mother and King were needed to calm her down.

  In conclusion, King said, “Is Nancy Kissel the sort of person who would commit the type of crime the prosecution alleges? Was she someone who was shown to be violent? Does she have it in her to shop for drugs, serve them in a milk shake to her husband, and then bludgeon him to death while he lies defenseless, with five lacerations to the head, each one of them fatal? The answer is no.”

  In the United States, a judge instructs the jury on relevant points of law before sending them to deliberate. In Hong Kong, in addition, the judge summarizes the evidence, offering the jurors a presumably more objective and authoritative view than that presented by counsel from either side during closing argument. Obviously, the judge’s summation carries great weight.

  Mr. Justice Lunn wasted no time starting his. Although Sandy King had taken up almost the full morning, the judge launched into his summary even before breaking for lunch.

  He told the jury they had three options: guilty of murder, guilty of manslaughter due to provocation, not guilty. He explained that they could find provocation if they believed that Rob’s conduct had provoked in Nancy a “sudden and temporary loss of self-control.”