“Yes, I was.”
“Have you testified truthfully?”
“To the best of my ability, yes.”
“I have no further questions of this witness. Mr. Ringel may cross-examine.”
The jurors sat straight up in their chairs as Abe Ringel walked toward the witness. Abe realized that jurors expected cross-examination to be dramatic—especially when the witness was an accomplice who has been given immunity. Abe noticed Jim Hamilton, the ex-Celtics employee, leaning forward in anticipation of the fireworks. Abe looked Danielle Grant straight in the eye and asked her one question: “I know you want to tell the whole truth, Ms. Grant. Is there anything that happened which was not brought out by Mr. Cox’s questions to you?”
“Sidebar, Your Honor,” Cox steamed, pushing his wheelchair to the bench. “Can’t you see what he’s doing, Your Honor? This is a fix. He’s helping her avoid prosecution by trying to give her an immunity shower on top of her bath. It’s wrong. It’s sneaky. And it stinks.”
“Look, Mr. Cox, I’m not going to tell Mr. Ringel how to try his case, any more than I’m telling you how to try yours. His question to Ms. Grant is proper—albeit unusual—cross-examination. I don’t care if he’s giving her an immunity shower or even a Jacuzzi. That’s your problem—and the problem of your pal over in China. Objection denied. Ms. Grant, you may answer Mr. Ringel’s question.”
Danielle used the opportunity to describe in detail the visit to the museum, the way she had taped and edited the video, and the role she had played in the kidnapping. After she completed her ten-minute answer, Abe announced, “I have no further questions for this witness.”
Cox called Dr. Albert Stone as his next witness. He put the psychiatrist through the usual process of establishing his credentials as an expert in grief-induced suicide. He asked him whether he had listened to Danielle Grant’s testimony and read the autopsy and forensic reports, and then he continued.
“On the basis of what you have heard and read about the cause of Marcelus Prandus’s death, do you have an opinion as to the cause of death?”
“Yes, I do, Mr. Cox.”
“And what is your opinion?”
“I am absolutely certain that Mr. Prandus took his own life.”
“On what is that opinion based?” “On two kinds of evidence, the first forensic, the second psychiatric.”
“Please explain.”
“The autopsy showed that the cause of death was cyanide poisoning. There was cyanide residue on his fingers. The note said it was suicide. That conclusion is corroborated by the psychiatric evidence of grief and motive to commit suicide. It was suicide induced by grief.”
“In what way did the grief induce the suicide?”
“Mr. Prandus believed that his entire family had been murdered and that his own actions, many years earlier, were the cause of his family’s death. He could not bear that responsibility and so he ended his life.”
“Have you reached that expert opinion with a high degree of medical certainty?”
“Yes, I have.”
“No further questions.”
Abe stood up and said to the judge, “Now, this witness I do wish to cross-examine.”
“Go ahead, Mr. Ringel.”
“Dr. Stone, have you examined other situations in which people took their lives because they felt responsible for the death of loved ones?”
“Yes, several such situations.”
“Would you please describe them.”
“Last year, a lawyer from Connecticut took his own life after his three-year-old child, whom he was supposed to be watching, drowned in a pool. In another case, a minister killed himself after he had caused an automobile accident killing his two children. He was drunk when the accident took place. In a third situation, a mechanic took his own life after he beat his wife to death. In yet another case, a young mother killed herself after she had shaken her baby and caused him to end up on a respirator, brain dead.”
“Is it fair to say that in each of the cases you described, the person who committed suicide was actually responsible for the deaths or injuries which precipitated the suicide?”
“I think that is fair, though it is not always the case.”
“When is it not the case?”
“Sometimes a mentally disturbed person will blame himself for something that he had little or nothing to do with.”
“But that kind of fantasy blaming is not characteristic of people without a prior history of mental illness who end up killing themselves, is it?”
“Not generally.”
“Do you know of any cases, within your experience, where a previously mentally healthy person fantasizes responsibility for something he did not do and kills himself because of that fantasy?”
“No, I do not.”
“Do you know anything about Marcelus Prandus that would suggest a preexisting mental illness?”
“No, there was nothing in his medical records or history to suspect mental illness.”
“Is it fair to conclude, therefore, that if Marcelus Prandus believed that what he did to the Menuchen family fifty years earlier was horrible enough to provoke the revenge killing of his entire family, he was not fantasizing?”
“This is outrageous, Your Honor!” Cox shouted, nearly rising from his wheelchair. “This witness has no idea what Mr. Prandus may or may not have believed or done. I move to strike.”
“He opened the door, Your Honor, by asking Dr. Stone about the cause of Prandus’s suicide. I should be allowed to probe his answer.”
Judge Tree fixed Abe with a stern look. “Very clever, Mr. Ringel. I see where you are going, but I’m not going to let you go there, certainly not with this witness. He doesn’t know enough about what happened fifty years ago to help you on that. Objection sustained. Question is to be disregarded. Now on to your next question.”
“I have no further questions, Your Honor,” Abe said, satisfied that he had planted a seed of curiosity in the minds of the jurors as well as the judge.
“Who else are they going to call?” Max asked Abe in a whisper.
“Well, they can’t call you, and there are no other eyewitnesses. Maybe Paul Prandus—to generate some sympathy for his father.”
“Can they do that? It doesn’t sound fair. He doesn’t know what his father did.”
“They can, and they probably will.”
“I call Paul Prandus as my next witness,” Cox announced.
“Objection, Your Honor,” Abe said, knowing it would be denied.
“What’s the matter, Mr. Ringel, are you afraid of the truth coming out?” the judge replied with an edge. It was Judge Tree’s patented way of discouraging frivolous objections. Abe got the point and quickly sat down.
Paul Prandus looked directly into Max’s eyes as he took the oath. His hatred was palpable.
As Cox began his examination, Paul Prandus took a deep breath, clearly struggling to maintain control. His jaw clenched. He was a lawyer, and he knew what he had to say in order to see his father’s killer convicted. And Paul Prandus wanted Max Menuchen convicted and sentenced to spend the rest of his life in prison.
“When was the last time you saw your father alive?”
“At his birthday party, with his children and grandchildren. He was very happy.”
“When did you next see him?”
“I never saw him. Only his dead body on the floor of the shack where Freddy Burns and I found him. Then I saw him on the table in the morgue,” Paul said, holding back tears.
“Mr. Prandus, the official cause of death was suicide. Do you believe that?”
“Objection, Your Honor,” said Abe. “He is not an expert on cause of death. Let them call another expert if they want to dispute her findings.”
“I’ll allow his opinion as a son who knew his father. You may answer.”
“My father loved life. He would never have killed himself. That man,” Paul said, pointing to Max, “killed him by taking away the most important re
asons he had for living—his family.”
Judge Tree called a recess as Paul continued to glare at Max.
Chapter 39
FREDDY BURNS
“You’ve put on a couple of pounds, Freddy, my man. You’re beginning to look like my accountant,” Abe said, patting the private investigator on his expanding spare tire as they left the courtroom for the morning recess.
“Shows you how far I’m willing to go for my clients. Nobody’s gonna suspect I’m a PI with this pot. It’s a great cover,” Freddy laughed.
“It’s been, what, ten years since you took the bullet?”
“More like fifteen. Time flies when you have to limp through life.”
“Looks like it hasn’t slowed you down much. You still get the interesting cases.”
“Any case you’re on the other side of is interesting, Abe. Hey, why don’t you ever hire me so we can be on the same side for a change?”
“My wife’s a PI. We keep it in the family. And now my daughter is going to law school. I’ll be ready to retire soon.”
“Abe Ringel playing golf? No way. You’ll die in court. Me? I’ll die in some dark alley looking through binoculars at some married guy shtupping his secretary.”
“You guys did a nice job tracking my client—professionally speaking.”
“We got a little bit of unexpected help from the Office of Special Investigations. I’ll bet it’s the first time those guys blew the whistle on a Jewish victim. But they did the right thing. Your client had no right to do what he did.”
“The jury will decide that,” said Abe. “Did your guy have any idea what kind of a shit his father was?”
“No way. I knew the old man. Seemed harmless enough to me. It really destroyed Paul just to learn what his old man had done, and then to find him dead . . .”
“Does your guy know that it was my guy who called to tell him where the body was?”
“Didn’t take Perry Mason to figure that one out.”
“My guy really felt bad that the family would be hurt. His only grievance was against the old man. He didn’t want to cause any unnecessary pain.”
“Maybe he just wanted to rub it in. Wanted Paul to see the tape and think his own kid had taken a hit.”
“No way. The tape was left behind so that Paul would understand why his father had killed himself. Max knew he was taking a risk by leaving the tape. Maybe a part of him wanted to get caught and stand trial. If he hadn’t dropped a dime, your guy wouldn’t have found the body for months.”
“It sure was isolated out there. I’ll give you that. I don’t think you guys are gonna walk on this one, Abe. It seems open and shut on the law.”
“All I need is one sympathetic juror.”
“But if that’s all you get, we’ll just try it again. My guy is pretty pissed, and Cox is with him all the way.”
“Yeah. But are you with him all the way? I remember when you were lying on the gurney waiting to have your bullet removed and they took the shooter first. Remember what you said to me?”
“I was in pain and under medication.”
“You said it again a week later.”
“I was still in pain.”
“Don’t you think my guy was in pain when he did what he did?”
“I didn’t actually kill the guy who shot me. I just said I wanted to. Big difference, Counselor.”
“Still, I’m betting there’s a small part of you that understands what my guy did.”
“Hey, I’m not on the jury. Direct your advocacy at the one juror you think you can get. Leave me out of this. I’m just a working stiff trying to make an honest buck.”
As the recess ended and Abe walked back into the courtroom, he was thinking about which “one juror” would be most important to his client. He thought he knew.
Cox resumed his examination of Paul Prandus. “What was the reaction of your children to their grandfather’s disappearance?”
“My son, Marc, was devastated. He was very close to Grandpa Chelli and visited him nearly every day. He couldn’t imagine why anyone would want to hurt him. He still can’t.” Paul’s voice was rising. “That man destroyed my father and tried to kill my son.”
“What about the rest of the family?”
“They were all very upset,” Paul said in an agitated voice. “The adults all knew that our father was dying. The children had been told that he was very sick. At first we thought maybe he had been taken to the hospital, but we checked. We were all quite distraught. It was awful.”
“Did you eventually find him?”
“No,” Paul replied with an edge to his voice. “I never found him. I found his body. I’m only glad my son was not with us when we found Papa’s body.”
“I have no further questions.”
Abe rose slowly, looking deeply into Paul Prandus’s blue eyes. He was not certain what tack to take with this witness. Ordinarily he did not cross-examine children of a victim, for fear of creating more sympathy. Abe had sensed something in Paul Prandus. He had not been able to test his instincts by talking to Paul directly before the trial, since Paul was a government witness and the prosecutor might make noise about trying to influence a prosecution witness. Nor had Abe wanted to conduct a full-fledged investigation of Paul Prandus. His brief conversation with Freddy Burns had given Abe some insights into the younger Prandus. He had also gotten Rendi to poke around just a little into Paul’s background—public record information and the like. Most important, Abe had observed Paul Prandus at every opportunity.
An interesting picture was beginning to emerge. The picture was of a tightly wound man who could be made either to break or to bend on cross-examination. Abe had a tough decision to make. He decided to go with his instincts and ignore the rule of cross-examination he had learned in law school that cautioned against asking any question to which he did not already know the answer. Abe had learned, through painful experience, that general principles always had exceptions, and he sensed the opportunity for an exception here.
“Mr. Prandus, please tell us about your family.” It was an open-ended question—a softball that Paul Prandus could hit out of the ballpark.
“Before my father’s death, we had a wonderful family life. We all lived within a mile of each other. My brother and his wife, his daughter, my wife and son. It all ended with Papa’s death.”
Unperturbed, Abe pitched him yet another softball. “Did your father have a good marriage?”
“He and Mama were deeply in love.”
“Did he treat his children well?”
“He could be a bit old-fashioned and stern, but he loved us very much and we loved him.”
Max was growing visibly upset at the line of questioning and Paul’s answers. He passed Abe a note that read: “You are creating sympathy for Marcelus Prandus, why?”
Abe glanced at the note, asked the judge for a moment to confer with his client, and whispered to Max, “Trust me, it’s a setup. You’ll see the payoff when we put on our case. I know what I’m doing.”
“I certainly hope so, because the jury is falling in love with the Prandus family.”
“Then my plan is working,” Abe said, resuming his gentle questioning of Paul Prandus.
“Since the time you can remember, did your father live a generally happy life?”
“My father was full of life, laughing, lots of friends, surrounded by family. He had his unhappy moments—when Mama died. When one of his grandchildren was hospitalized with a high fever. When he learned he had cancer. But in general, his life in America was very happy.”
Abe moved on to another subject, pausing for a moment for the previous testimony to sink in.
“What were your feelings toward Max Menuchen when you first learned that it was he who had kidnapped your father?” Abe asked.
“Rage, anger, fury. He had killed my father in cold blood. Those are still my feelings, but unlike your client, I have been able to control them,” Paul said, straining against the witness chair.
<
br /> “When you learned who killed your father, what did you do?”
“We called the authorities.”
“Did they come?”
“Yes, of course.”
“You say, ‘Of course.’ Can you imagine the police not coming in response to your call?”
“No, of course not. My father had been kidnapped and killed. It was a case for the police.”
“What if the police refused to come?”
“They couldn’t refuse.”
“Please, just imagine the situation where you called the police to report a kidnapping and killing, and they said they were too busy.”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Cox said. “It’s speculative and hypothetical. This man is not an expert witness. He’s the victim’s orphaned son. He shouldn’t be asked ridiculous hypothetical questions.”
“Please give me some latitude on cross, Your Honor. The prosecution asked this witness about his state of mind, and I should be able to test his answers with hypotheticals.”
“All right, Mr. Ringel. I’ll give you some latitude, but don’t abuse it. Get to the point quickly.”
“Thank you, Your Honor. Now, Mr. Prandus, please tell the jury, to the best of your ability, what you would have thought if the police had refused to respond to your call.”
“My anger would have increased.”
“What if the man who you believed killed your father was simply walking away as a free man and returning to his normal life?”
“Objection, Your Honor, he’s making his closing argument through this witness. It’s not fair. Stop him.”
“You are beginning to get a bit far afield, Mr. Ringel. Rein it in. Bring it home,” the judge admonished. “But you can answer, Mr. Prandus.”
“I would have become enraged.”
“To the point of trying to stop him from leaving?”
“Yes, probably.”
“Even if it were against the law?”
“Well, I would have tried to call the police—to invoke the law—but you asked me to imagine that they refused to come.”
“That’s right. Now I want you to imagine something even more extreme.”
Silence.
Just Revenge Page 18