by Paul Batista
“I don’t understand.”
And then Margaret Harding made the question simpler. “Is that your husband’s body?”
“It is.”
Using a laser beam from a wand no larger than a pen, Margaret moved the beam to the area where the dogs lay.
“And those are the dogs, correct?”
“Yes, they are.”
The scene faded and then ended. The courtroom lights were restored. “When did you see this carnage?”
“Objection,” Raquel Rematti, standing, said.
Judge Conley touched the black frame of her unstylish glasses. “Rephrase the question, Ms. Harding.”
“When did you see this?”
“When it happened.” Her voice wavered. “I mean, it was what I saw when the police showed me the room where Brad was and where the dogs were.”
“Mrs. Richardson,” Margaret Harding asked, “what time did you get to your house?”
“It was late, probably the next day, the very early morning of the next day.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t really do anything. I was stunned. When I got out of the car I stood there for a second, or maybe more than a second, and then I saw Detective Halsey.
“Who is Detective Halsey?”
“He was the man who told me my husband was dead.”
“What happened next?”
“We walked to the house. I had no idea what was happening, Ms. Harding. I knew he was dead. That my husband was dead. It was like a moonwalk.”
As Raquel recognized, Margaret Harding was a very smart trial lawyer. Margaret had carefully prepared Joan Richardson for her testimony and wasn’t going to let her wander off the script. She was beginning to wander.
“Listen to me, Mrs. Richardson: what happened next?”
Joan Richardson, her blonde hair tautly drawn to the back of her head, looked at the jurors for the first time, as if understanding that Margaret Harding was trying to give her direction. “I went into the house.”
“What happened then?”
“I asked Detective Halsey where Brad was.”
“You were still with the Detective, is that right?”
“Yes.
“And then?”
“He took me to Brad’s office.”
“What happened there?”
“Nothing happened there, Ms. Harding. My husband’s body was in that room, under a sheet. And the dogs were there, too. Dead, too.”
“Were those dogs that you and Mr. Richardson owned?”
“They were our dogs. They were wonderful Borzois.”
Margaret Harding paused, trying to convey a signal to Joan that she was not to refer to the dogs’ rare breed. The jurors were middle-aged men and women who had probably never heard of Borzois or, if they had, associated them with aristocratic European owners. “Mrs. Richardson, who was the person who spent the most time caring for the dogs in the six months before your husband was killed?”
“Juan Suarez.”
“Do you see Juan Suarez in the courtroom today?”
Without looking directly at Juan, Joan Richardson said, “He’s at that table, with Ms. Rematti.”
“Why was it that Suarez had contact with the dogs?”
“It was part of his job.”
“He was paid to do that, is that right?”
“He was.”
Raquel Rematti, who rarely took notes when a witness she had to cross-examine was on the stand, made a mental note that she had to ask Joan Richardson: “Isn’t it true that Juan took care of the dogs because he loved them?” If she answered, as she certainly would, that she had no idea whether Juan loved the dogs, Raquel could then ask whether she had ever seen Juan play with the animals, feed them, wash them, walk them. Why would Juan, Raquel planned to ask the jury during her summation, kill these beloved dogs?
“Did you tell the police that taking care of the dogs was part of Suarez’s job?”
“I did. Detective Halsey seemed to want to know about the dogs.”
“Listen to me again: Was that the first time you mentioned Juan Suarez’s name?”
“I didn’t mention any name just then. I said our handyman took care of the dogs.”
“And then you were asked his name, isn’t that right?”
“I was.”
“And you said Juan Suarez, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Were you asked anything else about Juan Suarez?”
“That night? I don’t remember very much about that night, I’m sorry.”
“Stay with me, Mrs. Richardson, I know this is difficult.”
“Objection.” Raquel knew she had to break up Harding’s gambit of trying to establish some sort of sympathy for Joan Richardson as the bereaved widow, the victim, the lady in distress. Raquel saw her more as the dragon lady, as Imelda Marcos or Leona Helmsley, than the grieving Coretta Scott King.
“Overruled.”
“Let me ask you again: Did you give the police the name of Juan Suarez?”
“I did.”
“What did you say?”
“They asked who had access to the house.”
“And you told them?”
“Yes, I mentioned Juan Suarez, the handyman.”
“Did the police ask how much access Juan Suarez had to the house?”
“Yes. He had the run of the house.”
“Why was that?”
“Brad liked him, Brad trusted him, Juan worked hard, Juan had many talents—gardening, carpenter, electrician, sometimes almost a personal assistant to Brad.”
“How long did Juan Suarez work for Brad?”
“Six or seven months.”
“Did he work for you as well?”
“Not really. We had maids who worked inside the house. Juan was basically a superintendent of the work that went on outside. I knew what he did for Brad but I didn’t direct him or supervise him.”
“You said that Juan Suarez had the run of the house, correct?”
“He could come and go as he pleased.”
“Did anyone else have the same access to the house? Did anyone else have the run of the house?”
“Just Juan.”
“Was there a security system?”
“There was. It was recently installed. It relied, I was told, on heat sensors and other technologies.”
“Was it operated by codes?”
“Yes, keypads in different areas of the house.”
“Did Juan know the codes?”
“He did, he is a very smart man.”
“He had the ability to shut down all or parts of the system, correct?”
“He did.”
“How do you know that?”
“I saw him do it. In fact, I saw him giving instructions to Brad on how to do it.”
When Margaret Harding paused the steady volleying of the questions and answers—it was exactly the right pace, Raquel knew, for leaving vivid tracks on the jurors’ minds—Judge Conley unexpectedly said, “Let’s take a ten minute recess. Ladies and gentlemen, I repeat the admonitions I’ve given you before. Don’t discuss the case with one another, don’t attempt to independently investigate the facts by going on Google or looking at any kind of media, and keep an open mind until all the evidence has been presented. For those of you taking notes, leave your notepads face down on your seats. See you in ten minutes.”
During the break Raquel followed Juan, who was dressed in the sport jacket, white shirt, tie, and slacks that she bought for him, into the holding pen outside one of the rear doors to the courtroom. Juan was put in handcuffs as soon as all the jurors left the courtroom.
“We may not have much time, Juan. Harding doesn’t have to tell us when she plans to stop asking questions. She could be finished soon after we walk back in there.”
Juan, staring at Raquel and Theresa with an expression that conveyed complete calm, said, “And then you ask her questions?”
“That’s right,” Raquel said, feeling tense and
impatient. “But I need you to tell me more than you have about what happened between you and Joan. All you’ve told me was that you were her boyfriend.”
“I was.”
“I need to know more about that. Understand me: there is no time left. I can’t get her to come back two days from now, or a week from now. I can’t ask her many questions now unless I know more about what happened. I need to destroy her.”
“All that happened was that we did what men and women do. Mr. Richardson was away, always away.”
Although they were separated by bars, they were so close to each other that Raquel could smell his breath, and it was in the odor of his fetid breath that for the first time Raquel detected Juan’s fear. She needed to exploit that fear. “Joan Richardson is trying to keep you in jail for the rest of your life, Juan. She told the police that you killed Brad. She said you killed the dogs. She told them where you lived. She is not your friend, Juan. Now she’s testifying against you. I don’t think she’s telling the truth. This is hard to understand, but Harding will ask Joan whether the two of you had sex, and Joan will say yes.”
There was a look of surprise in Juan’s eyes. “Why does she ask that?”
“Because Harding knows that I know. She had to give me the Grand Jury transcripts yesterday before Joan started testifying. I read that Joan at first denied knowing you as anything other than her yard worker. Then later Joan came and said you and she were lovers.”
“Why?”
“Joan is a cold-hearted bitch, Juan. She lies and then when she knows she’s been caught in a lie she pretends to tell the truth. That’s what liars do. And it’s good for Harding to bring out the fact that the two of you were lovers and ask her whether she regrets that and have her say she does and then move on.”
“Joan told people about me and her?”
“Listen to me, Juan. You’re smart, you’re smarter than I am.” She sounded exasperated. She recognized that she was more and more troubled by Juan and confused as to whether to believe he was Juan Suarez, Anibal Vaz, or someone else completely. She knew that to some extent she had been taken in by him, by his quiet demeanor, his patience, and his refusal to show any sign of fear. But she still believed, as she had believed from the morning she first saw him, that he hadn’t killed Brad Richardson and that he hadn’t beheaded the two dogs.
“I’m not smarter.”
“Pay attention to me, Juan. It is not good for you that the jury, probably in fifteen minutes, will know that you were fucking Joan Richardson. Do you understand? There’s no real evidence against you: no fingerprints, no bloody clothes, no knife, no one who saw what happened. You understand, Juan, don’t you?”
He said, “I do,” and she had no doubt that he understood.
“What they will have in a few minutes is a motive. No weapon, no witnesses, but a motive. And you’re going to hear about it again and again.”
Juan said, “I didn’t hurt Mr. Richardson. I didn’t hurt the dogs.”
“Get this, Juan: that doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter whether you did it or not. Juan Suarez, they’re going to say, had a motive to kill—he imagined himself in love with a very beautiful, very rich American woman, and he believed she was in love with him. Juan Suarez was a man with many troubles in the world: he had no money, he could be deported, the police in New York were after him. Immigration could arrest him. How does he solve his problems? They’ll tell the jury that he got it into his head that if he used his knowledge of the house, his knowledge of Brad Richardson’s habits, his knowledge of where Joan Richardson was going to be, his knowledge of when the house would be empty, and if he left no weapon and picked a time of the day when Brad was alone, then he could do the perfect killing. They’ll say Juan Suarez lived in a fantasy world where he believed that the fact he was having an affair with Joan Richardson meant that if Mr. Richardson was killed Juan Suarez and the beautiful Mrs. Richardson would live happily ever after.”
“I never thought that, Raquel.” And then, for the first time, Juan became as blunt as Raquel wanted him to be: “Joan Richardson liked to fuck, Raquel. I’m only 29, Raquel. I can fuck all day long. Anywhere, anytime. Joan liked that. I’m not stupid, Raquel. I had no plans with her. Just to fuck her.”
“Talk to me now, Juan. Who started this?”
“She did.”
“Did she ever try to end it?”
“She didn’t. I wanted to but I didn’t want to. Why should I stop? She never said she wanted to stop. She liked what we did.”
“Did she ever talk to you about Brad?”
“What do you mean, Raquel?”
“I mean, Juan, did she describe their life, what their marriage was like?”
“She said Brad should just live with one of his boyfriends and that he would be happier.”
“Did she know he had boyfriends?”
“Sure, I knew, too. Once Joan was in bed with me. She said, Christ, that son of a bitch was just in here. She was talking about Mr. Richardson and another man, I don’t remember his name. And then we really fucked, Raquel. That’s what she wanted.”
“Did she say anything else to you about Brad?”
“Not to me.”
“To anyone else?”
“They argued, many times. She knows how to scream. I heard her say, You butt fucker, let’s break up.”
“What did he say?”
“I didn’t hear him. He never raises his voice.”
“What else did you hear her say?”
“She said that she was going to use pictures of Mr. Richardson buying drugs. She took them when he didn’t see it. She said she was going to give the pictures to television, newspapers, magazines.”
“Did Brad Richardson use drugs?”
“Never saw that.”
“Never?”
“Never.”
“Did you sell drugs to Brad Richardson?”
“Sell? No.”
“Give them to him?
“No.”
“Did Joan Richardson use drugs?”
Juan paused. “Yes, the cocaine.”
Suddenly the buzzer that signaled when Judge Conley was about to re-enter the courtroom sounded. One of the guards said, “It’s show time, ladies and gents.”
Juan stepped back while the guard opened the cell door and unlocked the handcuffs. Juan rubbed his own wrists. Raquel saw the deep indentations that the plastic handcuffs had made on his wrists in such a short time. She had one of those moments when she recognized that her client lived in a world of pain and fear unlike any she had ever known. Until that world-changing moment a year earlier when her doctor, a straightforward woman, said, “You’ve got cancer, Ms. Rematti.” Even in the horrible months of chemotherapy when fear ran her life, she had never been locked for months in a cell from which there was no exit.
27.
Margaret Harding had not lost any traction during the break. “Mrs. Richardson, was there cash in the house?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“In our bedroom, most of it. Brad wasn’t careful about where he put money.”
“Was any of the money in a safe?”
“Some of it. There was money in a safe. But Brad never locked the safe. In fact, he left the door open.”
“Did Juan Suarez know where the cash was?
“He did.”
“Where did the money come from?”
Puzzled, Joan asked, “Where did it come from?”
“There was cash in the house, Mrs. Richardson, wasn’t that what you just told the jury?”
“Yes. Brad always had a great deal of cash in the places where we lived. But he carried only small amounts when he walked around. He never carried a credit card. Sometimes in restaurants I paid the check.”
“Mrs. Richardson, I asked if you knew where the cash came from?”
“I don’t know, Ms. Harding. He never told me. I never asked. He had no reason to tell me, I had no reason to ask.”
“Who paid Juan S
uarez?”
“I did.”
“Why you?”
“Brad was an incredibly busy man. He ran a worldwide business, he wrote articles, he gave speeches. But he was terrible with cash. If he had paid Juan and the other workers, Brad would never have gotten the right amount. So I did it.”
“How often?”
“Every week.”
“In cash?”
“Yes.”
“How much?”
“It varied, Ms. Harding. Sometimes two thousand dollars a week, sometimes four, depending on whether he did extra work for us. And sometimes Brad just handed me money to give to Juan, almost as a gift. Brad was generous, and he very much liked Juan.”
“Why didn’t you pay Mr. Suarez in a check?”
“He didn’t have a bank account.”
“Was there any other reason he was paid in cash?”
“He was an illegal alien. He told us he didn’t have a Social Security number, he didn’t have a driver’s license, and he didn’t have a bank account.”
“You knew it was illegal to hire a person in his status?”
“I know that now. I didn’t think about it then. He said he had a wife and two children, or that he lived with a woman and she had two children. We weren’t trying to take advantage of anything. He was a hard worker. He was poor when he came to us. It just seemed natural to hire him and to pay him. Brad used to say he got paid for his work, so it seemed natural to pay Mr. Suarez for his work whether or not he was legal or illegal.”
“And how did you know he didn’t have a Social Security number or a driver’s license?”
“He told us. You have to understand, he is a charming man, he can talk an oyster out of its shell.”
As she was rising to her feet, Raquel said, “Move to strike that statement.”
Judge Conley glanced at the jurors. “I instruct you to disregard the last answer.”
Then Margaret Harding shifted the subject. “Did you know Mr. Suarez by any other name?”
Joan Richardson again glanced at the jurors. “Anibal.”
“What was that name again?”
“Anibal. For some reason, once during a break while he was cleaning the pool, he just mentioned that his name was Anibal. But he said I could go on calling him Juan if I wanted to.”
“Did he tell you his name was Anibal Vaz?”