Echoes of My Soul

by Robert K. Tanenbaum

  Robles started to say something, but then he closed his mouth. Suddenly Mack Dollinger hurried into the squad room. The suspect nodded toward him. “I want to speak to my lawyer first.”

  Glass glanced over his shoulder at the defense attorney. “I’ll go get him,” he said.

  Detective David Downes arrived at the Twenty-third Precinct about the same time after receiving a call from Mel Glass, who’d let him know about the arrest. He’d hurried out of his house in Yonkers and drove into Manhattan. Reaching the Two-Three—which was abuzz with news about the Robles bust, with brass hurrying every which way—he quietly made his way to the detective squad room on the second floor. He spotted Glass standing with Dollinger, a tall, handsome Clark Kent type. Downes walked over.

  Glass looked at him and asked him to take Robles over to the clerical office so that the defendant could speak to his lawyer, Dollinger. The defense attorney remained in the office with Robles for about a half hour and then emerged. “Detective, would you mind staying with him while I go talk to Mel?”

  Downes watched as Dollinger and Glass engaged in an animated conversation, and then Downes walked into the office where Robles sat. The suspect looked terrible. His eyes were feverish and haunted; his face and trembling hands were a sickly pallor. He scratched at his arms as though every inch itched. The detective thought about the first time he’d seen him in 1960—a nice-looking sixteen-year-old, but already a drug addict and career criminal.

  “How ya doin’, Ricky?” Downes asked.

  Robles grimaced. “I need a fix,” he said. “The last time I shot up was two in the morning. I’m jonesing for a hit, man.”

  Ignoring the comment, Downes shook his head. “Boy, Ricky, did you ever think it would end up like this? You’re twenty-one years old and you’ve made a real mess of your life. What really happened?”

  Robles dropped his head and then began to nod. He looked up with tears welling in his eyes. “I don’t know, Downes. I went to pull a lousy burglary and I wound up killing two girls.”

  CHAPTER 16

  October 18, 1965

  “All rise! Put down your papers in the back.” At the command of the portly, bespectacled court clerk, a wide array of attorneys, the defendant, clerks, cops, reporters, media sketch artists, photographers, court buffs and gawkers jumped up from their seats as a burly, round-faced, black-robed judge swept into the courtroom. They remained at near attention as he climbed the dais and took his seat. His stern gaze swept over the assembly.

  “Oyez, oyez, oyez!” the clerk continued a bit pompously, as fitting the occasion of this particular trial. “All those who having business before Part thirty-nine of the Supreme Court, State of New York, New York County, draw near and ye shall be heard. The Honorable Supreme Court justice Irwin D. Davidson presiding. The case on trial, the People of the State of New York versus the Defendant, Richard Robles, ready to proceed.”

  The clerk paused for a moment and scanned from one side of the courtroom to the other to make sure everyone was paying attention. Satisfied, he continued, “Representing the People, the Honorable Assistant District Attorney John Keenan and Assistant District Attorney Melvin Glass. Representing the defendant, Mr. Mack Dollinger and Mr. Frank Backer. Your Honor, all counsel, the jury and the defendant are present.”

  Having delivered his traditional introductions with the finesse of a Shakespearean actor on Broadway, the clerk turned to the judge and nodded once. Judge Davidson, a seasoned jurist who had presided over some of the most horrendous cases in the city, smiled briefly at his longtime clerk’s added flair before his face grew grave again.

  “Be seated,” the judge instructed.

  As the jurors somberly filed into the jury box, Mel Glass looked around the courtroom, a large, bleak chamber devoid of any adornments other than the flags of the United States and New York State in one corner. The well of the courtroom was covered with a worn red carpet upon which sat the judge’s dais at the far end in the middle, with the witness stand and jury box on the judge’s left. Also in the “well,” the prosecution table adjacent to the jury box, where Glass sat, was to the judge’s left; the defense table was across the aisle on Davidson’s right.

  Behind the prosecution and defense tables was the bar, a wooden rail separating the well from the gallery, where everyone else sat. There was room for eighty-four spectators in Part 39, the official designation of that particular courtroom on the thirteenth floor of the Criminal Courts Building. The first row behind the attorneys on either side was reserved for family of the defendant and defense team’s assistants, as well as the family of the victims and police personnel and press. The remaining seats were filled to capacity with spectators that morning.

  The first day of the trial for the “Career Girls Murders” had the feel of opening night on the Great White Way. Although muted now, before the judge came in, the gallery had been buzzing as reporters joked and argued among themselves; civilians, some of whom had brought bag lunches and reading material, gossiped with their neighbors and craned their necks to get a look at the defendant and the other actors in the real-life drama.

  Perched on the edge of his seat next to Glass, one of the most senior assistant district attorneys in the Homicide Bureau, John Keenan, pored one last time over the notes for his opening statement. Though not physically imposing—in fact, slight of stature with a receding hairline—Keenan was nevertheless intellectually intimidating in a courtroom, virtually magical in his ability to control the tempo and rhythm of a trial. He had a captivating presence, having a well-earned reputation as one of the best trial lawyers in the country. He would be lead counsel handling the presentation of the prosecution case, while Glass’s duties as second chair were to assist primarily with trial strategy and knowing in intricate detail the entire investigative process and factual underpinnings of the case.

  While Judge Davidson instructed the twelve jurors, plus four alternates, on what to expect in the trial and their responsibilities, Mel Glass reflected on the past year. As expected, the DAOs on both sides of the East River had been immediately engulfed by the maelstrom that followed the announcement of the Robles arrest, and the subsequent press barrage. The newspapers and television broadcasts reported that Robles had confessed, which suddenly put Whitmore’s contentions that he’d been coerced into making a false confession—and the justice system in New York—in a whole new light. One paper kept referring to the George Whitmore Jr. “snafu”; and that was one of the kinder editorial comments.

  An anonymous prosecutor was quoted in a newspaper shortly after the arrest of Richard Robles: “I am positive that the police prepared the confession for Whitmore. They gave Whitmore all the details of the killings.”

  The public was confused and angry—especially the black community, which was incensed that white police detectives might have framed an innocent young black man. The Brooklyn chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) asked Governor Nelson Rockefeller to intervene in the case and “use your good offices in the interest of justice.”

  The Brooklyn DA dug his head in the sand and responded by saying the New York DAO was free to make its own decisions, but his office was sure of the legitimacy of its cases. The Wylie-Hoffert case was a Manhattan headache, not Brooklyn’s. In the meantime, he noted, Whitmore had been found guilty of attempted rape and assault in the Alma Estrada trial by an impartial jury, which had looked at the evidence. His office would be going forward with Whitmore’s trial for the slaying of Minnie Edmonds.

  However, the Brooklyn DAO suffered a blow in March ’65 when Whitmore’s conviction for the Estrada mugging was overturned. It had come to the attention of the presiding judge that during deliberations some of the jurors had made racist remarks and, although warned not to, they had also discussed the fact that the defendant had been indicted for the Wylie-Hoffert murders. The jurors were questioned, after which the judge vacated the guilty verdict, writing, The hearing revealed that prejudice and racial
bias invaded the jury room. Bigotry in any of its sinister forms is reprehensible; it must be crushed.

  Again, the Brooklyn DA wasn’t caving in. He promptly declared that his office would retry Whitmore for the Estrada assault. And, as promised, George Whitmore Jr. went on trial for the Edmonds murder in April ’65, with the possibility of the death penalty hanging above his head.

  At George Whitmore Jr.’s trial, both sides would discuss the Wylie-Hoffert case, which had happened in Manhattan. In a pretrial hearing, defense attorney Harry Hart attempted to keep Whitmore’s confession to the Edmonds murder out of the trial. Arguing in front of the judge, he noted what had happened with the Wylie-Hoffert case across the river in Manhattan. But the prosecutors countered that even if Whitmore’s confession in the Wylie-Hoffert case was false—a point they were not conceding—that didn’t mean his confessions in the Estrada and Edmonds cases were as well.

  The judge presiding over the Edmonds trial sided with the prosecutors. He said that the confession could be read to the jurors, and it would be up to them to decide if it was trustworthy or not. After the judge announced his ruling, Hart cried out, “Your Honor, my client is doomed by this decision!”

  It was a momentous decision, however, for the Brooklyn DAO. What little the prosecutors had in physical evidence from the Edmonds murder scene couldn’t be tied to Whitmore. Their entire case rested on the confession and the testimony of Officer Micelli and Detectives Ayala and DiPrima, who took the stand and recounted the arrest and confession of the suspect. And, they maintained, there was no coercion, nor did they provide Whitmore with details of the case in order to make his confession appear to be true.

  On April 23, almost a year to the day since he was taken into custody, George Whitmore Jr. climbed up on the witness stand. Speaking slowly, but deliberately, he answered his attorney’s questions about the circumstances of his confession and why it was false. He said that the only information he had about the killings was what the detectives had told him. Then he spent two days sticking to his story while the prosecution tried to tear him down and trip him up, without much success.

  In his summation defense attorney Hart accused the police of a frame-up. “When Wylie-Hoffert blew up, it left them with a little egg on their face,” he complained to the jury. “There’s only one way to wipe it off, and that’s to convict him for something else.”

  In response the prosecutor’s summation argued that Whitmore confessed to the crime and there was no evidence to suggest that he’d been beaten or otherwise physically coerced into his admissions. There was also no evidence, according to the prosecutor, that the detectives fed Whitmore the details that “only the killer could have known.”

  The jury then deliberated for more than four days, without being able to reach a unanimous verdict. They were hopelessly deadlocked. The judge then declared a mistrial. Soon after, rumors began to circulate that rather than “doomed,” as his attorney had complained, the vote in the jury room had been ten to two for Whitmore’s acquittal.

  Glass heard about the verdict with a mixture of relief and regret. He’d attended parts of the trial to take notes when Micelli, Ayala and DiPrima testified. DiPrima had confronted him in a hallway outside the courtroom for taking sides against the Brooklyn police. Mel had responded, “You guys brought it on yourself.” He believed what he said to the detective, but that didn’t mean he welcomed the ramifications.

  Although there was no way of quantifying it, the trial seemed to represent a major shift in how the public, as represented by that jury, perceived the NYPD. After Whitmore’s arrest in April 1964, the public’s perception of New York’s finest was at a peak. Thanks to their dedication and skill, the “Brooklyn Psycho” was off the streets and young women were safe from his depredations. They had scoffed at Whitmore’s contentions that he’d been beaten and intimidated into confessing to crimes he didn’t commit. The police didn’t lie; they didn’t frame innocent young black men. The detectives had been hailed as heroes. They were lauded in print, on broadcasts and in public award ceremonies.

  However, a year later, the attitude had shifted dramatically. The case against Whitmore had been dissected in the press both locally and nationally—called a “frame job” and a “railroading.” The young black man was innocent, and the police were the bad guys. It was a shame, Glass had thought as he’d watched the events unfold. While he didn’t know it yet, this had helped to light a slow-burning fuse on a powder keg that would explode into a decade of unrest and violence in New York’s black community.

  All he knew at the time was that the anger expressed toward the NYPD in the Whitmore “snafu” fit the mood of the country. Civil rights marchers were clashing with the police and with white supremacists throughout the South, sometimes with deadly results. Elsewhere protests against the Vietnam War were erupting, including twenty-five thousand who marched on Washington, DC, where—for the first time—speakers referred to “the Establishment” of the government as though speaking about a foreign enemy. It seemed to Glass that the country was being torn apart by mistrust and even justifiable anger about government excesses.

  Yet, all of it seemed to fly above the head of the Brooklyn DA, who ignored the pernicious nature of prosecutorial abuse as one of the reasons that in May 1965, the New York State Legislature voted to abolish capital punishment. There was no doubt that they were aware that an innocent man could have been sentenced to death, or as one of the lawmakers told the press, “This is the year of Whitmore.”

  However, even with a mistrial that had only narrowly missed acquitting Whitmore—by all reports—the Brooklyn DA announced that his office would retry George in the Edmonds case, too. And so, having already spent eighteen months in jail without being convicted of anything, George Whitmore Jr. was sent back behind bars to await his fate.

  Although believing it was a travesty of justice that Whitmore remained in jail, Glass knew that the only thing he could do about it was help convict the man who really had killed Janice Wylie and Emily Hoffert. Convicting Richard Robles, while demonstrating that Whitmore’s confession was a sham, would be another spotlight turned onto the unfairness of the Brooklyn DAO’s position.

  Leaning back a bit in his chair at the prosecution table, Glass glanced over at the three men occupying the defense table. Closest to him was Mack Dollinger, the tall, charming attorney who had also represented Robles back in 1960. He was familiar to the prosecutors because he’d been a former ADA, until leaving the office in the mid-1950s. He was clever, well-trained and pulled out all the stops to defend his client. Assisting Dollinger was Frank Backer, also a seasoned courtroom veteran.

  Between the defense attorneys, wearing a gray suit coat, green sweater vest and button-down white shirt, but no tie, Richard Robles sat looking at the jury with no expression on his face. Nine months in the Tombs without heroin had improved the clarity of his eyes and he’d put on some weight, but the junkie pallor had only been traded in for the pasty white skin of jail. Still, they’d cleaned him up, and had given him a shave and a haircut. With his dark, wavy hair, long on top and clipped on the sides, combined with his boyish good looks, he could have passed for an English major at Columbia University. Sitting behind him in the first row behind the defense table were his common-law wife, Dolly Ruiz, and their young daughter.

  As he looked at the defendant, in his head Glass could hear Robles’s voice from the night of January 26: “It wasn’t panic. Something went wrong.”

  “Something went wrong. Something went wrong.” That statement had echoed in Glass’s mind ever since. Something had indeed gone wrong, and now it was up to the prosecution to set it as right as possible.

  “Mr. Keenan, are the People ready with your opening statement?” Judge Davidson inquired.

  Keenan rose from his seat. “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “Then please proceed.”

  CHAPTER 17

  With all eyes fixed on him, John Keenan stood before the jury and opened the trial of Richard R
obles with a description of the building at 57 East Eighty-eighth Street, which he noted was “ten stories tall, with four apartments on each floor.” While most spectators, including the jurors, may have hardly noticed such a mundane beginning, Mel Glass smiled. Nothing Keenan did was without a reason—even if his motive wasn’t clear at the moment.

  A product of Jesuit schools, Keenan knew every fact of a case going in and used it to his best advantage. And in this trial, he’d relied on Glass both for his knowledge and his thoughts about how to go about prosecuting this most unusual case. They’d spent hours leading up to the trial discussing strategy, particularly how to combat the defense’s main weapon, George Whitmore Jr.’s confession.

  Keenan had begun implementing the strategy back during voir dire—the jury selection process that began on October 11. First he’d read the indictment to the prospective jurors, charging Robles with two counts of murder in the first degree: “The defendant in the County of New York, on or about August 28, 1963, willfully, feloniously and of malice aforethought struck and killed Janice Wylie and Emily Hoffert with a knife.”

  Then he gave a brief introduction of the case, including a small aside belittling the fact that expected “defense witness” George Whitmore Jr. had confessed to two crimes in Brooklyn “and then threw in this one, for good measure.” He didn’t dwell on the subject long, though; he had to be careful about casting doubt on all confessions as the prosecution case also would be relying on statements Robles made on January 26.

  After his description of the building in his opening, Keenan continued to pour the foundation for their plan as he spoke briefly about the three roommates in apartment 3C, and the morning of August 28, 1963. Almost offhandedly, he noted that Katherine Olsen took out the garbage before leaving for work, and “then closed and double-locked the service entrance door.”