MD02 - Incriminating Evidence

by Sheldon Siegel

  Skipper folds his hands in front of his face, deep in thought. Finally, he says in a measured tone, “Natalie has been protecting me for four decades. She is the mother of my child and one of the most caring members of our community. She respects human life more than anybody else I know. She would never get involved with anything like this. She would never do something that might cause her such embarrassment and humiliation. And she would never—ever—kill anybody.”

  His raw emotions are exposed. I don’t think there’s a chance that he’s lying. Nor do I think he’s trying to cover for her.

  “What about Turner?” Ed asks.

  His expression changes instantaneously to one of scorn. “That’s an entirely different story,” he says. “We’ve been friends since we were kids, and we always will be. But that doesn’t mean I don’t know the kind of man he is. He’s the consummate user. He always has been. He’ll do anything to get what he wants. That’s why he’s such a successful political consultant. That’s why he’s the best juice lawyer in town. If people are hurt along the way, so be it.”

  I get a quick glance from Molinari that suggests he’s thinking exactly the same thing that I am: This is also a self-portrait of Skipper. “Do you think he set you up?” I ask.

  He ponders for a moment and says, “After all these years, nothing would surprise me about Turner. On the other hand, I can’t see any motive he would have.”

  “Except Natalie.”

  Skipper swallows and says, “He seems to have had that already.”

  True enough. “Did Turner know about your arrangements with Andy Holton and Johnny Garcia?” I ask.

  “Of course. He put me in touch with Holton in the first place.”

  So Turner lied. He really did know what was going on with Skipper. I stop to think for a moment. How would he have known a pimp like Holton? Then the answer becomes obvious. “He represents Martinez and Anderson,” I say. “There must be a connection.”

  “Maybe, but if Martinez is involved, you’ll never find any hard evidence that leads to him.”

  We stare at the walls for a few minutes. I’m certain there are more pieces to the puzzle, but I can’t find them. Finally, Molinari says to Skipper, “It would help our case if we could call Natalie and Turner as witnesses and deflect suspicion over to them.”

  Skipper is indignant. “I realize that you are just doing your job,” he says with an edge in his voice. “And I appreciate the fact that the correct legal strategy is to put Natalie on the stand. Nevertheless, I want to make something absolutely clear to you: Natalie didn’t do anything and I will not let her testify. She’s suffered enough humiliation.”

  “Can we talk about this for a moment?” I ask.

  He sits up ramrod straight. “I’m the client. Natalie will not testify. That’s final.” Molinari and I exchange glances, and Skipper adds, “Do whatever you want with Turner. Take him apart on the stand if you have to. But I don’t want Natalie in the courtroom.”

  Sensitive guy. “What do you want me to tell Natalie?”

  “The truth. That we know about their relationship.”

  “She’ll tell Turner.”

  He ponders this. “Don’t say anything to her yet,” he decides, “and be sure to get her out of the courtroom before Turner takes the stand. Then she can be told.”

  “How?”

  “You figure out a way.”

  The deputy knocks on the door to take Skipper to the courtroom. Molinari and I stay behind for a moment. After the door closes, he asks, “How do we handle this?”

  “Rosie?” I say. Who else?

  When I huddle with her moments later just outside the courtroom, she asks me in a whisper what she’s supposed to do. “Take Natalie home when we break for lunch,” I say.

  “And tell her what?”

  “The truth. That we know about her affair with Turner. It won’t be easy and I don’t know how she’ll take it, but we have to get it over with. I guess you’d better tell Ann, too—she’s got to know.”

  “Christ—that’ll make my day complete,” Rosie says.

  “My name is Jason Parnelli. I’m a political consultant.”

  The reporters in the gallery are settling in. The courtroom artists are holding their sketch pads. This morning, we’ve decided to put Jason Parnelli, Dan Morris’s little toad on the stand before his boss so Morris won’t have a chance to brief Parnelli on what he testified. I’m sure they’ve already compared notes on how to proceed.

  Parnelli has abandoned the business-casual look in favor of a traditional pin-striped suit. He looks uncomfortable in the witness chair. He’s never done this before. People with his connections are generally not subjected to this sort of thing. He looks toward Payne for moral support.

  I stand at the lectern for a few extra moments and shuffle paper. I want to give him plenty of time to sweat. “Mr. Parnelli,” I begin, “you were at a meeting in Room 1504 in the Fairmont tower on the night of September sixth of this year, weren’t you?” I try for a tone that gives the jury the impression that he’s committed a felony just by being in the hotel that night.

  “Yes,” he replies.

  “And the meeting ended at twelve-thirty in the morning on Tuesday, September seventh, correct?”

  “Yes.”

  I walk toward him and point my index finger at him. “But you didn’t leave the hotel at twelve-thirty, did you, Mr. Parnelli?”

  “No.” He’s been told to keep his answers short.

  “In fact, Mr. Parnelli, you stayed for quite some time after the meeting ended, didn’t you?”

  “I stayed until about one-thirty.”

  “One-thirty?” I say. I’m tempted to ask him why he stayed for so long, but that would be a mistake. I don’t want to ask open-ended questions. I want to keep him on the defensive by eliciting brief answers. “Who was with you until one-thirty?”

  He glances around the courtroom. “I was with my boss, Mr. Dan Morris, in Room 1502.”

  “Anybody else?”

  “No.”

  I go back to the lectern and leaf through my notes. It’s an act. I’m trying to make him nervous. It’s sort of like calling a time-out right before a basketball player is about to shoot a free throw. “Mr. Parnelli,” I say, “you met someone in the hallway around one o’clock in the morning, didn’t you?”

  His eyes dart. “Yes. As we were leaving, we saw Mr. Nicholas Hanson in the hallway.” He acknowledges that Nick the Dick gave them the videotape, after which they returned to the room.

  “In fact,” I say, “you hired Mr. Hanson to try to dig up some dirt on the defendant, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And Mr. Hanson did just that, didn’t he?”

  “Yes.”

  “And did you and Mr. Morris have an opportunity to view the videotape in Room 1502 that night?”

  “Mr. Hanson left as soon as he delivered the information and the tape.”

  Not exactly responsive. I ask him again whether he and Morris watched the videotape in Room 1502 that night.

  He gulps water. “Yes.”

  Good. “There was a problem with the tape, wasn’t there, Mr. Parnelli?”

  “Objection. The witness is not qualified as an expert on videotaping techniques.”

  “Your Honor,” I say, “I am not attempting to elicit a film review. I’m trying to determine whether the videotape contained the information that Mr. Parnelli and Mr. Morris hoped it would.”

  Judge Kelly gives me some leeway. “Perhaps you could rephrase the question?”

  “Of course.” I ask him whether the tape contained uncontroverted evidence that a prostitute had entered Skipper’s room that night.

  “There was a problem with the tape, Mr. Daley,” he says.

  Yes.

  “The problem,” he continues, “is that the tape did not clearly show who opened the door.”

  “You mean you couldn’t tell whether it was Mr. Gates?”

  “That’s correct.”r />
  He’s far too honest for his own good. He keeps letting the truth get in the way of an effective story. He’ll never work for Dan Morris again. “And you couldn’t see the face of the individual who entered the room, could you?”

  “It was the victim, Johnny Garcia.”

  “But you couldn’t tell that for sure from the tape, could you?”

  “We were sure.”

  I try once more. “But you couldn’t see his face, could you, Mr. Parnelli?”

  “Objection. Asked and answered.”

  “Sustained.”

  “You knew Mr. Gates was going to see a male prostitute that night, didn’t you?”

  “No.”

  “You must have been pretty sure.”

  “We didn’t know.”

  “Then why did you hire Mr. Hanson to spy on him?”

  He’s flustered. “It’s standard procedure in our line of work to hire a private investigator to keep your opponent under surveillance.”

  “And you would have had an even better story to tell if somebody found Mr. Gates in a room with an unconscious prostitute, right? And you didn’t want to take a chance that the videotape might be inconclusive, right?”

  “Objection. Argumentative.”

  “Sustained.”

  “Come on, Mr. Parnelli. You’re under oath. Maybe it was your idea. Maybe Mr. Morris told you to do it. You found a way to spike the two glasses of champagne during the meeting in his room, didn’t you?”

  “Objection. Argumentative.”

  “Sustained.”

  It’s the right call. I’m testifying again. I say with disdain, “No further questions, Your Honor.”

  Dan Morris is next. He smiles at the jury as he adjusts the microphone. He states his name for the record. “I’m a political consultant,” he says. He confirms that he and Parnelli left around one-thirty A.M.

  I move right in front of him. “Mr. Morris,” I say, “you met with Nick Hanson at around one o’clock that morning, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.” He describes the handoff of the tape. He confirms that he and Parnelli viewed it. So far, his story jibes with Parnelli’s testimony.

  “There was a problem with the videotape, wasn’t there, Mr. Morris?”

  “Objection,” Payne says. “This issue has been addressed.”

  “On the contrary, Your Honor,” I say, “Mr. Morris’s analysis of this evidence is critical.”

  “Overruled.”

  I repeat the question.

  “There was no problem with the videotape.”

  Wrong answer. You just contradicted your flunky. If you had said there was a problem with the tape, I would have asked you to describe it and you could have spun it any way you wanted. Now you’re going to have to do a more intricate tap dance. “Would it surprise you, Mr. Morris, to find out that your colleague, Mr. Parnelli, has testified that there was, in fact, a problem with the tape?”

  He’s adamant. “There was no problem with the tape.”

  “Well, that’s not what your colleague said.”

  “My colleague must have been mistaken.”

  Perfect. He’s just undercut Parnelli’s credibility. At the same time, he’s undercutting his own. “Mr. Morris,” I say, “Mr. Parnelli was quite certain that there was a problem.” I tell him Parnelli said that they could not identify the person entering the room or the person who opened the door.

  Payne objects to my shameless recasting of Parnelli’s testimony. Judge Kelly overrules her.

  “You had a serious problem, didn’t you, Mr. Morris?”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “You had a tape that was supposed to show the defendant inviting a prostitute into his room. However, the tape didn’t show the defendant or the prostitute.”

  “That’s not true.”

  “And you couldn’t have Nick Hanson testify that he was in the room across the hall, because he wasn’t supposed to be there in the first place, right?”

  “Objection. Argumentative.”

  “Overruled.”

  “We hired Mr. Hanson to observe Mr. Gates.”

  “I understand. But if the world found out that you hired a PI to sit in the room across the hall and spy on him, there would have been serious fallout, right, Mr. Morris? Spying on your opponent is bad politics, isn’t it? It looks bad to the voters, doesn’t it? Maybe you could have just planted a hidden camera in the defendant’s room.”

  “Objection. Argumentative.”

  “Sustained.”

  “In fact, Mr. Morris, you had nothing to show for that night, did you? You had an inconclusive videotape and the testimony of a private investigator who wasn’t even supposed to be there. Isn’t that about it, Mr. Morris?”

  “Objection.”

  “Sustained.” Judge Kelly points her gavel at me. “Wrap it up, Mr. Daley.”

  Okay. Let’s plant one final seed. “Mr. Morris, you had access to Mr. Gates’s room during the entire summit conference, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you saw the waiter prepare a bottle of champagne and two flutes in Mr. Gates’s room, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Mr. Morris, you were among the very last people to leave Room 1504, weren’t you?”

  “That’s true.”

  “In fact, you and Mr. Parnelli were the last people to leave other than Mr. Stanford, right? And you then moved next door to Room 1502, correct?”

  “I believe that’s right.”

  “Mr. Morris, it’s possible that Mr. Gates and Mr. Stanford were not watching you at every instant that evening, right? Especially after everyone had left. Perhaps one or both of them went to the bathroom at one time or another.”

  “Objection. Speculative.”

  “Sustained.”

  “Mr. Morris, you had reason to believe that Mr. Gates might be meeting a prostitute that night, didn’t you?”

  “No.”

  “Then why did you hire a private investigator to sit in the room across the hall and spy on him? You must have known something was going on.”

  Gotcha. He stops. “It is true that we had been told that Mr. Gates might be engaging in some extracurricular activities that night.”

  “Mr. Morris, it certainly would have helped your candidate’s campaign if an unconscious prostitute was found in Mr. Gates’s room, right? In fact, you wanted to embarrass Mr. Gates so that your client would have a clear path to election as attorney general, didn’t you?”

  “That’s preposterous.”

  “And you had plenty of opportunity to slip some GHB into the champagne glasses that night, didn’t you?”

  “Absolutely not.”

  I pause and glance at the jury. No discernible reaction.

  “Anything further for this witness?” asks Judge Kelly.

  It’s as far as I can go short of accusing him of murder. That would strain credibility with the jury. “No, Your Honor.”

  After a brief consultation with McNasty, Hillary decides not to cross-examine Morris.

  Carolyn stops me in the hallway as we leave the courtroom for the lunch break. She hands me a thin manila envelope and says, “Remember El Camino Holdings—the owner of the domain name? This is a certified copy of the articles of incorporation.”

  “I trust that you obtained this information legally?”

  “Absolutely. I got it from the secretary of state. It’s a matter of public record. I didn’t even need to pull any strings.”

  “That’s great. Who signed the articles of incorporation?”

  She smiles. “Turner.”

  “Really? Did you get any other information?”

  “Not yet. There’s nothing else in the public records. It looks like he filed the papers with the secretary of state and has done nothing since then. The corporation is required to file a list of officers and directors but hasn’t done so yet.”

  “It’s a start.”

  “I want to testify,” Skipper
says at the lunch break. “The jury expects me to testify.”

  Molinari, Ann and I exchange glances. “We’ve been through this,” I say. “It’s a bad idea. I know you want to tell your story, but it’s too damn risky.”

  “The jury wants to hear me,” he says.

  “The jury doesn’t need to hear you,” I reply. I leave out the obvious argument that he’s already been caught spinning a web of lies. Payne will tear him apart if we give her the chance. “Let’s see how things go with Turner. Then we’ll decide.”

  “I’m not going to change my mind.”

  There’s a knock on the door. The deputy lets Rosie in. “Ann,” she says, “your mother isn’t feeling well. I’m going to take her home. Will you come with us? I think she’d like that.” As always, Rosie is playing her part in this ballet to perfection. They leave together.

  Skipper looks at me and says, “We haven’t finished our discussion of my testimony.”

  “They’ll tie you in knots,” I say.

  “No, they won’t.”

  Molinari points a finger right into Skipper’s face and says, “Yes, they will. Let me tell you something as your lawyer and as your friend. They absolutely, positively, one-hundred-percent will tie you in knots. And if you get up on that stand, you’re not just an idiot—you’re a stupid fucking asshole.”

  I couldn’t have said it any better myself.

  44

  “GOOD AFTERNOON, MR. STANFORD”

  “Defense attorneys for District Attorney Gates are expected to call their final witnesses this afternoon.”

  —SAN FRANCISCO DAILY LEGAL JOURNAL. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 26.

  Molinari and I walk past Turner Stanford in the corridor just outside the courtroom. If he’s nervous about his testimony this afternoon, he isn’t showing it.

  We take our seats at the defense table. Skipper is brought in. The seats in the gallery where Natalie and Ann were sitting are now occupied by reporters. The society columnist from the Chronicle is sitting in the next to last row. Somebody must have told her that the residents of Pacific Heights may be airing some dirty laundry this afternoon. Judge Kelly bangs her gavel once and calls for order. The bailiff brings in the jury.