Michael Benson's True Crime Bundle

by Michael Benson

  At one point during the playing of the tape, the defendant coolly examined her nails. At another she used a tissue to wipe away invisible tears.

  When the tape finished, Hanewicz started in again: “You just testified that you never saw a knife. You heard that tape. You did see a knife, didn’t you?”

  Javier replied, “They asked me what happened. Dustin told me she had the knife, so I told them she had the knife.”

  “‘She pulled out a pocketknife! She pulled out a pocketknife!’” Hanewicz held up the murder weapon. “Does that look like a pocketknife to you?”

  “That’s what I heard.”

  “That’s what you heard? That’s not what you told her!”

  Hanewicz was yelling, and her questions, if you could call them questions, were losing their focus. For example, she ignored the obvious conclusion that if the witness gave a faulty description of the knife, it was a further indication that he’d never seen it. Hebert objected to this “question” on the grounds that it was argumentative and Judge Bulone sustained.

  Hanewicz used that break in her rhythm to her advantage and freshly attacked the witness’s credibility.

  “You are here because you have feelings for Rachel and you don’t want to see her get in trouble, right? You are lying for her.”

  “I am not lying for her,” the witness replied firmly.

  “You’re not lying for her? You admitted that you lied about your relationship with her. You lied about the knife….” Hanewicz paused, but the witness just stared at her. “Is there an answer?” she asked.

  “Could you repeat the question?”

  “Didn’t you just lie about the knife?”

  “No. You asked me if I saw the knife. I never saw the knife. Dustin told me she still had the knife.”

  Frustrated that she had not won this point, Hanewicz began yelling her next question before Javier could finish his answer, so she was shouting over him.

  Judge Bulone decided he’d had enough.

  “All right. Let’s just calm down,” the judge said in a soothing tone. “Let’s ask nice, calm questions and nice, calm answers.”

  Hanewicz was quieter, but she wasn’t happy about it. And, instead of moving on to a point she might win, she continued to beat the dead horse, just more softly: “You heard on the 911 call that you said the knife was in her hand. Yes?”

  The witness stared at her.

  “You want me to play it again?” the prosecutor asked.

  “No, I was just waiting for more of a question,” Javier said.

  “Is that a yes?”

  “Yes, that is what I said.”

  Despite the fact that the jury had twice heard Javier give his explanation for why he mentioned the knife during the 911 call—even though he hadn’t actually seen it—and the reason why he called it a pocketknife, when it was actually a kitchen knife, Hanewicz’s next question was “How can we believe anything you say? You lied!”

  “Objection.”

  “Sustained.”

  Finally the prosecutor got the idea. She’d lost. So she quickly tried to change the subject, although it wasn’t clear what the new subject was. Hanewicz asked, “You said that she took a step back?”

  This presumably referred to Rachel stepping back, but who could be certain? It was also uncertain when “she” stepped back, or when the witness was supposed to have said “she” stepped back.

  Javier gave the prosecutor a big break when he simply replied, “Yes.”

  “Did you tell that to the detective?”

  “I honestly don’t remember.”

  Again frustrated, Hanewicz resorted to a hypothetical question: “Is that something you would have told the detective when you met with the detective that night, that she took a step back?”

  Javier said he didn’t remember. It had been a hectic night and he had no clue what he told the detective.

  Hanewicz put the “step back” line of questioning behind her. She finally moved to a subject where she had a shot at scoring points.

  “Isn’t it true that you testified earlier that Janet was still in the van when the incident happened between Sarah and Rachel?”

  “Yes.”

  “And when they separated, that was the point when Janet got out of the van?”

  “No, she got out before that. I’m going to try to explain it, to make it more clear. Sarah came up from the side and grabbed Rachel by the hair. As soon as she grabbed the hair, the other two girls came out, and as soon as Rachel and Sarah separated, Janet came in contact with Rachel.”

  “Do you remember your deposition on October 27, 2009?”

  “Somewhat, yes.”

  “Somewhat? All right. I am going to show you page twenty-nine of the deposition and see if this refreshes your memory. Start reading from line eight through fourteen…. Does that refresh your memory?”

  “Yes.”

  “The question was where was Janet at that point in time, and you said she was still in the passenger side of the vehicle, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you went on to say she got out after they began to separate a bit. That was when she got out.”

  “Yes, after they separated a bit, after she started hitting her, after they started flailing around.”

  On redirect Jay Hebert freshly established that the witness and defendant were not currently dating; the witness was in a relationship, but not with the defendant; and from the time of the deposition until the present, Rachel Wade had been in custody. The implication was that a relationship with a woman who was in jail was a lot like no relationship at all.

  As Rachel listened, she leaned her head on her hand, her eyelids heavy.

  “You have not been physically with Rachel, face-to-face, since April 14, 2009, have you?”

  “Correct.”

  Hebert asked Javier to explain for the jury what he was trying to say earlier about the tape of the 911 call.

  “Everything was so crazy. The operator was asking me questions. I was asking Dustin, and anybody else who was listening, questions, trying to answer the operator’s questions. Dustin told me she still had the knife in her hand, and that was what I told the operator.”

  “Did you ever see the knife?”

  “I did not. I thought it was a pocketknife until the detectives pulled it off the roof.”

  Javier emphasized that he was not lying to the operator. It was obvious when he called that Sarah had been stabbed, and he was describing to the operator what was going on in real time. Up until he heard the tape, moments before, however, he had not remembered telling the operator that Rachel was defending herself. Everything he’d said was the truth, and he wouldn’t lie to get Rachel out of trouble.

  “Defense calls Joshua Camacho to the stand.”

  Several jurors perked up. This was the guy all the girls loved. This was the guy at the center of all the fuss, the center of this violent and tragic solar system.

  If those jurors were anticipating a tall and handsome fellow, the man of every girl’s dreams, they were sadly disappointed. Joshua was not very big; he was kind of scrawny. Though he had what might be called a “pretty boy” face, he didn’t immediately strike anyone as God’s gift. He was sharply dressed, though, in black and white—white shirt, black vest, and tie—and wore a defiant expression on his face.

  “Mr. Camacho, are you working now?” Jay Hebert inquired.

  “No.” Javier had a surprisingly deep voice—gravelly, as if he’d just gargled with rocks.

  “Where do you reside, sir?”

  Joshua tilted his head to indicate that he either hadn’t heard the question or hadn’t understood it.

  “Where do you live?” Hebert quickly added.

  Joshua said he’d been living with his parents for the past few months. During that time, he hadn’t left Florida.

  Yes, he knew Rachel Wade, since elementary school. Yes, they had dated.

  Yes, he had dated Sarah.

  Yes, he’d had a ch
ild with a woman named Erin Slothower.

  No, he was not dating Sarah on April 14, 2009. Yes, he was sure.

  “How would you describe your relationship with Sarah Ludemann on that date?”

  “Friends with benefits.”

  It was the defense attorney’s turn to tilt his head. “I’m sorry. I didn’t hear that,” Hebert said.

  Joshua repeated the phrase, this time just a smidgen louder.

  “Could you explain what you mean by that?”

  “Not dating,” the witness explained impatiently. “They could see whoever they wanted to see.”

  Back to the one-word answers:

  Had he ever been friends with benefits with Erin Slothower? No.

  At some point in time, were he and Rachel Wade friends with benefits? Yes.

  “You asked your girlfriends to fight for you, didn’t you, sir?”

  “No, I did not.” He had never even talked about them fighting each other. Anyone who said he had was lying.

  Hebert asked Joshua what his phone number had been at the time of the incident. Joshua said he didn’t remember. Wasn’t it true that Sarah had Joshua’s phone when she was stabbed?

  Not true, Joshua replied.

  “Were you aware of all the drama that was going on between Rachel and Sarah?”

  “That night?”

  “For the entire previous six months.”

  “Yes.”

  “Tell me about that.”

  “They would go back and forth on Myspace or calling.”

  “What were they calling about?”

  “Arguing.”

  “What were they arguing about?”

  “About who was I going to be with.”

  The witness continued to insist that he had never encouraged those girls to fight. At the time of the incident, he wasn’t dating any of them.

  “You were playing the field, or you were having friends with benefits?”

  “Friends with benefits,” Joshua replied. His voice held a hint of pride. No, he had no idea how that made those girls feel. He didn’t think they were upset with him. Just each other.

  “They didn’t send you texts asking, ‘Why would you do this to me?’”

  “No.”

  “‘If you love me, why are you doing these things to me?’ You don’t remember any of these texts?”

  “No.”

  Hebert’s voice had been soothingly calm up until this point, but now there sounded an edge of frustration in it—perhaps annoyance: “You don’t remember stacks and stacks of texts and phone calls and drama, all about you and this relationship?”

  “No.”

  Hebert left the lectern and walked over to the defense table, where he whispered something to a colleague, then returned.

  “Getting back to that last question I asked you, your testimony today is that you don’t remember any texts whatsoever from the girls about the problem or the drama, or anything like that? You don’t remember anything like that?”

  “No.”

  “Let me ask you this. Do you remember anything about phone calls from any of these girls?”

  “No.”

  “Sarah called you and said she was upset by Rachel? Rachel called and said she was upset about Sarah? Anything like that?”

  “No.”

  Hebert gave up, moving on. “Let’s talk about that night. You do remember that night, right?”

  “A little bit.”

  “A little bit,” Hebert echoed. He leaned across the top of the lectern and rested his head on his hand. “Were ya drinkin’?”

  “Yes.”

  Hebert stood up straight again. “And where were you drinking?”

  Joshua said he was at his sister’s house. Just he and Janet and Sarah were there. He drank vodka. Maybe a “cup or two.”

  “Do you remember, maybe, five shots?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “Do you remember having your deposition taken in this matter?”

  Judge Bulone interrupted the examination to remind Hebert that since he was the one who called the witness, he could not use previous statements to impeach Joshua. He could, however, use the earlier statement to refresh the witness’s memory.

  “That is what I intend to do, Your Honor,” the defense attorney replied.

  “Proceed,” the judge said.

  Hebert handed a transcript of the deposition to Joshua and told him which section to read silently. When the witness was finished, Hebert asked, “Does that refresh your memory as to what you had to drink that night?”

  “No, sir. I don’t remember.”

  He didn’t remember being asked how much vodka he had drunk. He didn’t remember saying he had five shots. In fact, he didn’t remember giving a deposition.

  “You don’t remember what you were drinking that night?” Hebert asked.

  “I said vodka. I don’t remember how much,” the witness replied, now himself impatient.

  Yes, he was smoking marijuana that night. Sarah was smoking, too. They smoked together.

  No, he didn’t talk to Rachel that night. No, he didn’t tell Rachel he wanted to spend the night with her. No, he didn’t tell Rachel he wanted to have sex with her and sleep with her that night.

  Charlie Ludemann had his glasses on his forehead and his eyes closed; his left hand gripped tightly at the handle of his metal cane. At his right, Gay was smiling, perhaps at what a piece of work Joshua was, perhaps at the notion that Rachel’s defense wasn’t getting what it wanted out of the “pretty boy” witness.

  “Did you observe Janet smoking marijuana?” Hebert asked.

  “I don’t remember,” Joshua replied. “Me and Sarah smoked it.”

  Hebert asked permission to approach the witness. He handed Joshua a page from his deposition transcript and asked the witness to read to himself a selected passage.

  “Does that refresh your memory?”

  “No, it does not.”

  Hebert took the transcript back and read aloud. Asked who was smoking, Joshua had said, in addition to himself and Sarah, his sister and a guy named Rob were also smoking.

  Did Joshua recall saying that? He did not.

  Yes, there were just the four of them in the house that night. Janet’s kids had been home during the day, but not that night.

  “After you found out about this incident, you threatened to kill Rachel Wade, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  Hebert said, “That’s all I have, Judge.”

  “Thank you,” Judge Bulone replied. “Cross-examination?”

  Lisett Hanewicz went right to work.

  No, he wasn’t there when the incident happened between Rachel and Sarah.

  No, he didn’t even know what was going on.

  Yes, he made that threat after he learned what happened to Sarah.

  No further questions.

  Hebert said that he had no redirect, but he wanted the witness to remain on standby, as he might want to recall him to the stand later in the day. Judge Bulone instructed Joshua to remain either in the witness room or right outside the courtroom until he was recalled.

  Some spectators wondered what Hebert had hoped to accomplish by calling Joshua Camacho. Was the witness supposed to corroborate parts of Rachel’s story? If so, he did not do a great job. He couldn’t remember any of the drama. He couldn’t even remember his own deposition.

  If the defense wanted Joshua to back up Rachel’s assertion that the insulting and threatening messages had gone both ways, Joshua was completely unhelpful—and Hebert couldn’t even establish the threats went both ways through phone records because, according to Hebert, Rachel used a “fly-by-night” phone company, which didn’t keep records.

  For her testimony, Rachel Wade wore a white shirt with a large collar over a black shirt and black pants. When she was called by the prosecution, she couldn’t just get up and move to the front of the room. Because of her prisoner status, she had to wait patiently for an armed escort to the witness stand.
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  She took the oath with her right pinky crooked outward. She said “I do” in a tiny voice.

  The full courtroom was silent, all spectators hanging on Rachel’s every word. It would have been easy to miss something. Rachel spoke quickly and softly; attentiveness was required.

  In many murder cases, the defendant does not testify on his or her own behalf. But in this case, Rachel Wade’s testimony was necessary. She was claiming self-defense and needed to describe the circumstances of Sarah Ludemann’s death.

  “Good afternoon, ma’am,” Judge Bulone said to the witness.

  “Good afternoon, Your Honor,” Rachel replied, still sounding meek and very couldn’t-hurt-a-fly.

  “Make sure your answers are good and loud so that everyone can hear,” Judge Bulone said.

  “Yes, Your Honor,” she replied, turning her head briefly toward the bench, then returning to face forward, poised for her lawyer’s first question.

  Hebert told her to turn toward the jury, state her name, and spell her last name. She obeyed.

  “Good afternoon, Miss Wade,” Hebert said, and she returned the greeting. “You, of course, know why you are here?”

  “Yes.”

  “You are here because you want to tell the jury your side to the story?”

  “Yes.”

  Jay Hebert established that his client was twenty years old, nineteen at the time of the incident. She was born in Largo, grew up in Pinellas Park, and went to Pinellas Park High School. She’d studied on her own and received her GED in 2008. She was also working as a kennel assistant at a pet facility and at Applebee’s. She had one sibling, an older brother who was twenty-four. Her mother and father were still alive.

  She met Joshua Camacho in first or second grade. They’d gone through elementary school, middle and high school together. They began dating in 2008. She had gotten her own apartment, and he moved in with her. During their cohabitation, there had been issues regarding Joshua’s relationships with other women.

  Rachel said, “I found out that he previously dated a girl named Erin Slothower and he had a child with her. And he dated a girl named Sarah Ludemann. And when me and him started to date, I began to get harassing phone calls, threats, made to me.”