Judgement Calls

by Alafair Burke

  "Not until someone asked her. That's how everything worked with her.

  She said she saw the earrings listed on her copy of the warrant when

  the police went to the house to execute it, and she happened to have a

  pair of earrings that fit the description, so she snuck into Taylor's

  toolbox and put them there. We knew it was bullshit right off the bat.

  First of all, the list of potential evidence in that case was long,

  like it is in any homicide. The earrings were mentioned on one line

  six pages back.

  "Second, the only description in the warrant was for gold hoop

  earrings. If Landry had planted real ones, we never would've known

  they weren't Jamie's. The mom says they were identical same diameter,

  same width of the metal.

  "And finally, I was there when the police executed the warrant. Don't

  get me wrong, here. Those MCT guys are as dim-witted as any other

  Keystone Kop, but I was there and they at least know how to execute a

  fucking warrant. Margaret Landry was not wandering around the house

  planting evidence while we were there."

  I'll never understand why some people have to temper any comment that

  could possibly be construed as a compliment with an insult. I suspect

  they think it makes them look knowledgeable. I think it makes them

  look mean. If I was lucky, O'Donnell would never feel compelled to

  rise to my defense.

  "So the only way she could've known to plant those particular earrings

  would be if she had seen them," I said.

  "Exactly. In fact, of all the details Margaret provided that

  corroborated her confession, it was the earrings that most convinced me

  of her guilt. On a lot of the other facts, she tried to say at trial

  that Forbes had coached her. But the earrings were such a perfect

  match, she couldn't explain how Forbes could've coached her about a

  pair of earrings in that kind of detail. And she admitted planting

  them. I hammered on that in my closing argument, and I'm convinced

  that the jury agreed there was no way for Landry to get around those

  earrings."

  "So what happened when you found out the earrings weren't Jamie's?" I

  asked.

  "That's when this whole thing changed. I made the call to send Forbes

  back in to talk to her. He was a rookie, but he'd developed a good

  rapport with her, and we needed to know what the hell was going on.

  Forbes told her that was it we were going to stop working with her. She

  started crying, saying that he had to believe her and she knew Taylor

  did the girl. Forbes did a good job, actually. Stayed tough, told her

  he didn't want to hear any more from her, you get the drift. So then

  Margaret blurts out that she knows Taylor did it, because she saw him.

  Gives the whole confession right there, so no one but Forbes was there

  to hear it."

  "How big of a problem was that for the case?" I asked.

  O'Donnell shrugged his shoulders. "Hell, in retrospect, it was a

  problem. He seemed like a kid, didn't have a lot of experience, and

  held too many pieces of the investigation together. The defense made

  it sound like Forbes was a climber using this case to become a star in

  the bureau. Fortunately, the defense didn't realize that Officer

  Forbes was none other than Charles Landon Forbes, Jr. I think the jury

  figured out that a governor's son doesn't need to manipulate an

  investigation to get where he wants to go in city government."

  "What about physical evidence? Anything to corroborate the

  confession?" I asked.

  O'Donnell shook his head. "Zilch. Zimmerman was missing for months

  before the body was found. No DNA, no hair, no fibers. We were lucky

  to have a firm ID and cause of death. Her license was in her pocket,

  and we used dental records to confirm it. ME called the strangulation

  based on damage to the small bones in her neck." O'Donnell looked at

  his watch. "Hey, I hope this has been helpful, but I really gotta

  run."

  "Shit, I was hoping you could tell me more about that confession. You

  around tomorrow?"

  "Nope."

  Asshole didn't even pretend to explain. The big boys around here take

  off on dry days for golf, and the DA pretends he doesn't know about it.

  I guess I'd gotten the maximum amount of help a person can get out of

  Tim O'Donnell in a day. Actually, this might be it for the month.

  "Alright, I can probably get the rest from Forbes. Thanks for the

  help."

  As I was walking out of his office, I heard O'Donnell mutter behind me,

  "Hey, you should thank me for not finishing the rest of the story. Now

  you've got an excuse to be alone with Chuck Forbes after hours."

  I spun around and glared at him. "What the hell is that supposed to

  mean?"

  "Hey, fire down, Kincaid. I thought you had a better sense of humor.

  The staff up here goes nuts over the guy every time he's in here. I

  was just having some fun with you thought it wouldn't hurt you to spend

  some time with the guy."

  I decided he was telling the truth. He didn't know anything. "That's

  something I don't joke around about. I don't date people at work,

  especially cops."

  "Alas, Kincaid. It's our loss."

  As I started to walk out of his office, I stepped back and asked, "Oh,

  by the way, do they have anything yet on that letter? It would help

  shut Lopez down if I could show that we got the right bad guys in the

  Zimmerman case."

  Looking down at his desk, he studied an open magazine. "Letter's still

  at the crime lab. If we find out who sent it, I'll let you know."

  I imagined myself saying, At the lab, my ass. I hear the lab got

  diddly. Instead, I nodded. "I'd appreciate it."

  "Now get back to your trial," he said. "Let me know how it turns out.

  Bad enough that you took it to begin with. You better not crash and

  burn."

  I tried not to let his gloating piss me off, since he did stay past his

  normal five o'clock punch-out to help me. But his help was something

  of a mixed blessing. Now if my case went down in flames, he could say

  he filled me in on what I needed to know about the Zimmerman case and

  had warned me from the start. No pressure.

  Eleven.

  Lisa was giving a statement to Dan Manning outside the courthouse when

  I walked out of the building. I wished I'd gotten to him first. No

  doubt he was already envisioning this case as his first Pulitzer, or at

  least a true-crime paperback and a made-for-TV Sunday-night movie.

  While Lisa spun a story involving sex, double crosses, and justice

  delayed, I was left to make a lame and predictable statement that the

  defense was reaching for tall tales out of desperation and that I

  trusted the jury to weigh the evidence impartially and ascertain the

  truth. Not exactly headline material.

  Grace met me at the door of her loft apartment in the Pearl District

  with a big hug and an even bigger glass of cabernet. I had called

  ahead from the office, so she knew I was in a bad way.

  When she was quiet after I finished relating the events of the past few

  days, I looked at her with exaggerated dis
appointment. "Grace, as my

  lifelong best friend, you are under a standing obligation to feed my

  outrage. Right now, for example, you should be stringing together a

  litany of insulting names for my archenemy, Lisa Lopez." Nothing.

  "Here, I'll get you started: Snake. Slime. Skunk. Skank. I'm only

  on 5. You want to start with the t's?" Still nothing. "Grace?"

  She woke up from her daze and looked me in the eye. "Before I say

  anything about your case, I just want to clarify something. You're

  back with Chuck?"

  I rolled my eyes and did my best to voice exasperation. I sounded like

  Kendra. "You don't have to say it in that tone, Grace."

  "Well, Sam, it's pretty much the tone you seem to reserve for him."

  "And that's usually after a couple of martinis when I'm angry at him

  for breaking my heart. This time feels different, Grace. We've both

  grown up a little, and he's doing more than just trying to flirt his

  way into bed with me. He's really opened up to me about this trial and

  the Zimmerman case, and he's great with Kendra "

  She interrupted me. "What? You think because he brings CDs and Happy

  Meals to your witness that you're going to have little babies together

  and live happily ever after? Jesus, Sam, Chuck's a nice guy, but look

  at the twits he goes for. Not to mention the fact that he makes your

  life chaotic, and you hate chaos."

  "Maybe some chaos would be good for me."

  That made her laugh. "You're kidding, right?"

  When I didn't smile at that, she rubbed my forearm, which was resting

  on the table. "Oh, Sam, I'm sorry. You do what's right for you, and

  I'll support whatever that is. Just be careful. I'm worried about

  you."

  "Yeah, me too, but I want to do this." I changed the subject. "So,

  can we move on to the trashing of my nemesis now?

  She smiled, but I could tell she was feeling serious. "It just seems

  strange," she said.

  "There's nothing strange about it, Grace. Lisa Lopez is completely

  scummy slime and has absolutely no ethics. She'll do anything to win,

  even for a dirtbag like Derringer."

  "But you said yourself that she sat there passively through your entire

  case."

  I tried not to reveal my impatience. "Right," I said slowly, "but now

  it turns out she was doing that so she could hide her ridiculous theory

  until the last minute, when I'd be caught off guard."

  "But, Sam, look at the big picture. When did she think of this? The

  anonymous letter to the Oregonian wasn't printed until the middle of

  your case. If she got the idea from the letter, what was her plan

  before then? It seems too coincidental that she just happened to be

  putting on a lame defense and then decided in the middle of the trial

  to capitalize on this anonymous letter thing."

  I could see where she was headed. "Right," I said. "I've thought

  about that too. It explains why she seemed up to no good ever since

  the start of the trial: she was planning to tie the case to the

  Zimmerman murder all along, and the anonymous letter happened to come

  up right before her opening."

  "Which is also a major coincidence," she said.

  "It's really not, Grace. Think about it: the Supreme Court announced

  it was upholding Taylor's sentence right before my trial started. Lisa

  heard about it and saw a convenient defense. The anonymous letter was

  also a reaction to the court's decision, probably by some death penalty

  opponent or someone just looking for attention. Two totally unrelated

  decisions, but both pretty predictable in hindsight. Taylor's the

  first real test of Oregon's death penalty; it was bound to attract some

  nut jobs

  Grace nodded in agreement, and I moved on to bad-mouthing Lisa Lopez as

  we finished the bottle of wine. As usual when I visited Grace, I left

  feeling better than when I arrived.

  On the way home, my cell phone rang. The caller ID read private. Real

  helpful. Maybe if I hadn't answered, I would have at least had a

  recorded message to give the police.

  "Long dinner, Kincaid. Were you and that hot little friend of yours

  doing a little eating out up there? If I'd known, I might've followed

  you up."

  The voice was vaguely familiar, but too muffled to place. "Who is

  this?"

  He was already gone.

  I spent the weekend reviewing the Zimmerman file behind locked doors.

  Between checking out every sound, double-checking my alarm, and

  periodically turning off the lights to look out my windows, I didn't

  feel even half prepared when I headed back to court on Monday

  morning.

  One thing had become clear to me, though: There was no doubt that the

  entire case against Margaret Landry and Jesse Taylor turned on Landry's

  apparent inside knowledge. Either she had something to do with the

  murder or someone had told her these details. No wonder the defense

  had turned the focus to Chuck.

  As furious as I was about Lopez's dirty tricks, the fact remained that

  there was no evidence tying the assault on Ken-dra to the Zimmerman

  murder. I also had what is known in the legal world as a butt load of

  evidence against Derringer Kendra's ID, the shaved pubic hair, the

  detailing of his car a day after the assault, and the fingerprint. It

  would be harder work than it first appeared, but I still had a solid

  case.

  Also, the weekend media coverage was better than it might have been

  under the circumstances. Manning's piece appeared as a sidebar to a

  follow-up story on the Zimmerman case and anonymous letter. The

  feature story didn't contain any new information, just a summary of the

  case against Landry and Taylor and an update on their status in prison.

  She was a model prisoner who counseled young women; he was a head case

  who spent most of his time in solitary.

  Manning's sidebar couldn't add much. Just that a defendant was

  claiming during his trial that whoever killed Jamie Zimmerman had

  committed the crime of which he stood accused. Seeing the assertion in

  black and white, without any evidence to support it, made me see how

  truly lame it was.

  At 9:30 a.m. on Monday, when Lesh took us back on the record, I settled

  into my chair for what promised to be a long morning.

  Jake Fenninger was Lisa's next witness. Fenninger was the patrol

  officer who popped Kendra last Christmas when she was working up in Old

  Town. Kendra had already talked about the arrest on direct during my

  case-in-chief, but Lisa's hands were tied. She couldn't get into the

  Zimmerman case until she plowed through the witnesses she had included

  on her defense witness list, most of whom had nothing to say other than

  that Andrea Martin might be a trespasser. Compared to them, Fenninger

  was riveting.

  Lopez walked Fenninger through his background before he started to get

  hostile. Fenninger was another New York transplant. He'd worked in

  NYPD's infamous street crimes unit before joining PPB a few years ago.

  Considering where he got his training and the fact that his dad was

  reportedly a hard-line Irish detective from th
e throw-down school of

  the NYPD, Fenninger was a pretty good cop.

  I suspected he'd moved west to escape the pressures of being an old

  school cop and sincerely wanted to do the right thing on his beat.

  Unfortunately, I think he still bought into Giuliani's propaganda that

  a "zero tolerance" approach to street crime was for the good not only

  of the community but also of the suspect. It can be true in some

  instances, but Fenninger had gone too far with Kendra.

  Once Lopez had gone through Fenninger's background and current duties

  with PPB, she turned to Kendra's Christmas arrest.

  "In your role as a patrol officer in Old Town, did you have the

  opportunity to encounter Kendra Martin on Christmas of last year,

  Officer Fenninger?" Lisa asked.

  "Yes, ma'am, I did."

  Like most cops, Fenninger probably figured that using "ma'am" and "sir"

  in his testimony might counter the stereotypes some people have of

  police. They forget that anyone who's been stopped for speeding has

  heard the same polite tone and still wound up with a whopper of a

  ticket.

  "And how did she come to your attention that day?"

  "I was patrolling in my vehicle and noticed a girl on the corner of

  Fourth and Burnside. She came to my attention because, quite honestly,

  just about anyone walking around close to midnight in Old Town on

  Christmas is probably up to no good, but she looked like she was only

  fourteen years old or so. I figured she was probably a street kid out