Alibi

by Sydney Bauer

  “Objection,” yelled David now on his feet.

  “Sit down, Mr. Cavanaugh,” yelled Stein before nodding for Katz to go on.

  “Mr. Jones,” said the ADA. “This court is in debt to you for revealing the defendant as a liar, for it was you who confirmed their relationship in the first place. But I fear that beyond that you have done this court a serious disservice.

  “In fact, Your Honor,” added Katz, turning to Stein, “I move that this witness’s entire testimony be stricken from the record. Mr. Matheson has acknowledged he lied about his relationship, so in retrospect we do not require this witness to confirm the falsehood after all.”

  “You were the one who called him, Mr. Katz,” said Stein.

  “Yes, my mistake. I apologize for wasting the court’s precious time, Your Honor.”

  “Judge,” David was up again. “Can’t you see what he is doing?”

  “Shut up, Mr. Cavanaugh,” yelled the judge without even gracing the defense table with a look. “Your request is granted, Mr. Katz. The jury will disregard the witness’ entire testimony. Is that clear?” To which the jury nodded in obedience.

  “You may step down, Mr. Jones, and in doing so promise me to never grace my courtroom again.”

  It was a stroke of brilliance. Katz had effectively used Sawyer to get the aquarium tape into evidence and catch the defendant in his lie. It gave the jury a chance to see the living, breathing, strikingly beautiful Jessica on the arm of the young man accused of killing her—a vision Katz would soon juxtapose with the brutal pictures of her death when ME Gus Svenson took the stand.

  It did not matter that Sawyer’s testimony was struck. None of the twelve could forget Jessica’s flawless, smiling face, no matter how hard they tried. Sawyer was in tears. In fact, he was sobbing openly, as he half walked, half ran toward the back of the courtroom like a child. David felt responsible, and he knew Sara felt even more so, as they looked at their ashen-faced client beside them and the image of the boy named Sawyer fleeing the room in complete humiliation.

  And so last night’s jubilation at the news of James’ Australian friends, and Sawyer’s findings regarding Simpson’s sexuality, and finally David’s report on John Nagoshi which had, in the very least, allowed them to narrow their suspects to one, was now long forgotten. The only solace they had was in the fact that Gus Svenson was next on the stand, giving David his one real chance to absolve his client before the Kat could pull him down for good.

  77

  They had no time to regroup, for as Sawyer’s testimony ran shorter than expected, Stein allowed for only a quick ten minute recess so that they might hear Svenson’s testimony before lunch.

  David was worried about James. The emotional rollercoaster he had been riding for months was now obviously taking its toll. He looked tired and despondent, and, as Sara had pointed out, his right hand had started to twitch again—a nervous tic that he tried to control by covering his right hand with his left and squeezing until it stopped.

  They had had no time to tell him about his Australian friends’ statements, and David prayed these would give him a desperately needed lift. They also hoped that David’s all-important cross examination of ME Svenson, a pivotal turning point for the defense, would provide both the jury with the much needed “reasonable doubt,” and their client with the courage to take the stand at the end of this trial and inevitably see this thing through.

  Once again Katz stuck to the routine. He began by asking the medical examiner to state his name and position and describe his duties as the highest ranking coroner in the county. He then went on to ask Svenson to give a detailed description of the victim’s injuries, beginning with that notorious “double blow to the head.”

  “The blunt force trauma to the victim’s forehead suggests two consecutive blows from a moving object at a time when the victim was relatively stationary,” Svenson began. “The high degree of force and small area over which it was applied suggest the victim fell almost instantly.

  “The pattern of blood leakage from the ruptured vessels on the front of the forehead suggest the instrument used was heavy and the skin breakage suggest direct vertical impact with the causative object, leaving its impression in the skull.”

  The jury winced. David saw it, and he knew the Kat saw it too. David guessed the ADA would see this as his cue to “start the show,” and unfortunately he was right.

  Katz asked for Svenson’s patience as he called for a number of easels to be dragged from the side of the room. He took his time, walking to his desk to pick up a series of poster-sized placards from the floor, holding them face inward to his body so that each one would have its own drum roll reveal. He turned them slowly, toward the jury, placing them on their stands and angling them so that Svenson would have to crane his neck, but the jury, and the courtroom beyond, got a perfect view of the horrific representations before them.

  Jessica Nagoshi was the picture of torment—her skin gray, her eyes half open, her forehead mutilated by a crisscross indentation that had crushed her otherwise smooth young brow to a pulp. Her neck was covered in deep purple bruises, her chin yanked up and across like that of some disfigured doll, her hair matted, her lips blue, and her entire silent image cried terror and agony in death.

  James seemed to sink in his seat as if trying to recoil from the image before him as juror number three, Sharon Kelly, a twenty-nine-year-old child-care worker from Dorchester, covered her eyes with her hands and juror number five, Ilda de Souza, a fifty-year-old mother of four, blessed herself.

  “Dr. Svenson,” said Katz at last, allowing just enough time for the jury to settle, their eyes still transfixed on the heinous images before them. “The impressions you spoke of,” said Katz, pointing to the two strokes of the large purple “X” on Jessica Nagoshi’s forehead. “Here and here. You found the causative object that left these indentations in the young girl’s skull?”

  “Yes. A garden hoe found nearby on the greenhouse floor. The impressions suggest the offender use both ends of the hoe, the handle and the metallic edge, in a swinging motion bringing each end down consecutively, resulting in the cross-patterned bruise you see here,” said Gus, pointing to the image to his far right.

  “Not unlike the movement a kayaker uses with his oar,” added Katz.

  “Objection,” said David. “Leading the witness. The movement may mimic those of many activities, or may simply be one the offender applied at the time. The mention of the kayak is a blatant attempt to link my client to the crime.”

  “I see your point, Mr. Cavanaugh,” said Stein. “But the witness was not asked about your client, merely about the nature of the motion. I will allow it. You may answer the question, Doctor.”

  Svenson nodded. “Like a kayaker, yes,” said Gus, and David took a breath.

  “Or like an abseiler, hand over hand, or perhaps a window cleaner or a master of any number of martial arts. The motion is an easy one to mimic, and I am afraid does not allow us to limit our conclusion as to the nature of the offender’s activities.”

  And David let out a sigh of relief—and of gratitude.

  Katz, obviously realizing he had lost that round, encouraged the ME to move on. “And the impact of the weapon itself, does this tell you something about the nature of the offender?”

  Svenson nodded, pointing at the picture once again. “We call this a ‘Tangential Impact,’ the direction of which was determined by the beveled edge of the starting descent and the heaped epidermis on the finishing edge.”

  “And in layman’s terms?”

  “Miss Nagoshi was struck twice by each end of the same instrument. The impact causing a double fracture to the skull.”

  “Leading you to conclude the offender was athletic, strong?”

  “Strong, yes.”

  Katz ticked a box and moved on. “Tell us, Doctor, what did these initial blows do to the victim—outwardly, internally?”

  “Well,” said Gus, “the victim mostly likely fell immediatel
y. Perhaps unconscious, perhaps not.”

  “Right,” said Katz. “I’ll come back to that point in a minute, Doctor, but first, internally . . . ?”

  “Yes,” said Gus. “First you must understand that the head is heavy, mobile, unstable. In the victim’s case her skull was deformed by the impact—depressed. Injury to blood vessels was significant and triggered intracranial hemorrhage and subsequent pressure on the brain.”

  David wanted to object but couldn’t; he dared not question Svenson’s medical authority as it was the ME’s expert opinion he would be relying on to legitimize his all-important “bruising on the neck” theory on cross. But his incredibly descriptive testimony was hurting, there was no doubt about it. The jury were practically gray with distress and worse still, David noted, now diverting their eyes back and forth from the monstrous images before them to the defendant at his side.

  “Would the blows alone been enough to kill Miss Nagoshi?”

  “Yes, probably.” Gus nodded. “But not for some time. The pressure from intracranial hemorrhage takes time to accumulate.”

  “So it was the strangulation that is listed as the official cause of death?”

  “Yes.”

  “Even though, strictly speaking, the twofold violent blows would have been enough?”

  “Yes.”

  “So I suppose we could say the defendant killed the victim twice?”

  “No,” said Gus. His negative answer being the only reason David did not jump to his feet despite his intentions to reserve his objections. “No one is killed twice, Mr. Katz. In all my experience, once is always enough.”

  Moments later the ADA was on to the strangulation, once again encouraging his witness to give a vivid medical description of what happened when a person’s throat is squeezed until it breaks.

  Gus spoke of the finger pad bruises, signaling the strangulation was indeed manual, the compression on the neck that constricted the larynx and prevented the free flow of air down the respiratory passage, and the resultant hypoxic hypoxia.

  “There were injuries to the laryngeal cartilages and the hyoid bone. In fact, the hyoid bone was fractured, which is indicative of aggressive strangulation. Both carotid sinuses were compressed and there was also evidence of imminent cerebral hypoxia as a result of the restriction of the carotid arteries and jugular veins.”

  “And going back to my point earlier, Doctor, I assume the finger pad bruises, the nature of the aggression, the power of the force, also suggest the offender is someone of significant strength.”

  Gus hesitated, his eyes flicking quickly toward the defense. And David, who knew Gus could take this opportunity to elaborate on the bruises around Jessica’s neck and the size of the hands that made them, held his breath as the ME considered his answer.

  “Strong, yes,” he said, and gratefully left it at that.

  “Is it possible Miss Nagoshi was conscious during this strangulation, despite the fall mentioned earlier?”

  “Unlikely, as there were no signs of struggle.”

  “But she was strangled from behind—at least that is what the bruising pattern tells us. Is that correct, Doctor?”

  “Yes.”

  “So she could have been conscious but unable to fight, given her back was toward her assailant.”

  “Yes. It is possible.” The jury could visualize it now, and it was only getting worse.

  “And so,” said Katz, now clearing his throat as if to show the jury that he too found this extremely distressing. “How did she actually die then, Doctor Svenson?”

  “From reflex cardiac arrest as a result of the carotid sinus compression.”

  “She had a heart attack?”

  “Yes.”

  “At nineteen years?”

  “Yes.”

  “And her unborn child?”

  “Would have died within minutes. Without any oxygen circulating in the blood the fetus would have . . .”

  “Gone into cardiac arrest as well?”

  “Yes.”

  “A heart attack at thirteen weeks.”

  “Yes.”

  And Katz paused, allowing it all to sink in.

  “Thank you, Dr. Svenson. I have no further questions for this witness, Your Honor.”

  78

  The judge called for lunch—a full hour recess during which, David knew, the jury would be dwelling on the testimony they had just heard, those images no doubt turning them off their food and on to the possibility of returning a guilty verdict.

  Once James had been removed to a holding cell for lunch, David and Arthur headed to the court cafeteria where they could go over David’s questions for Svenson, while Sara tried to track down Sawyer who, the last time they saw him, was the picture of humiliation and defeat.

  “These are good, David,” said Arthur before taking a sip of the too bitter, too hot cafeteria coffee.

  “They’d better be,” said David. “Any word from Nora?” he added, hoping the efficient Mrs. Kelly might have called or left a message with news of any faxes from Australia.

  “Not yet. But it is now the early hours of the morning Down Under, and given they did not come in this morning, I wouldn’t expect them until tonight.”

  David looked at his watch; the lunch hour was almost up and he was really hoping for some progress on the Australian front before the day was out. The trial was moving quickly and there was every chance the defense would be starting their case before the end of the week.

  “Here comes Sara now,” said Arthur, interrupting David’s thoughts and pointing toward the café’s entranceway. They watched her weave her way around the irregularly placed metal tables before reaching them and falling into her seat.

  “He is not answering his cell,” she said. “And I called Deane to see if he was back in class, but apparently he didn’t make his last lecture.”

  They nodded, each of them feeling terrible for what had happened to their eager young apprentice at this morning’s mortifying setup.

  “Katz is an asshole,” said Arthur.

  “And we are even worse for getting the kid into this in the first place,” said David.

  Sara nodded. “There is some good news though,” she said, perhaps keen to lift their spirits. “I just spoke to Nora, the Australian boys’ statements have arrived.”

  A relieved David let out a sigh. “That is good news. Someone down there is super efficient, faxing at what must be about what? Three . . . four a.m.?”

  “No,” said Sara, grabbing the coffee Arthur had brought for her in advance. “The statements are originals. They arrived by courier about an hour ago and according to Nora they are glowing.”

  “That was fast,” said David.

  “Well,” said Sara, taking another long sip of the now lukewarm mud. “The main thing is that they are here, and we can enter them into evidence as an opener as planned.” But she must have noted the furrow in David’s brow.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Nothing, they must have . . . It was just fast, that’s all.”

  “Which is also what this lunch break has been,” said Arthur pointing to his watch. “It’s time for you to work your magic, David, my boy.”

  The walls of the courtroom moaned like an alley cat. The heating system had obviously started to cave under the pressure, letting out a series of long, low whines, which played like background music to the setting before them. The placards, which David had personally taken down before heading out for lunch, had been reassembled, a little tactic the Kat had no doubt orchestrated before anyone returned for the afternoon session.

  Judge Stein peered over his glasses at the defense table below him, obviously still angry at David after Sawyer’s testimony this morning. Katz was looking particularly cocky, the jury were looking accusatorily at their client, and the only comfort David took was from a small nod from John Nagoshi, who met his eye briefly before turning to face the front of the room once again.

  “Are you ready to cross-examine the wi
tness, Mr. Cavanaugh?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  And so David took to his feet and began.

  David knew the jury would be exhausted by this morning’s heavy and depressing medical data, and so chose to be short and direct. While Katz had done more than a stellar job in ascertaining what Svenson could conclude from his examinations, David wanted to begin by dwelling on what he couldn’t—including calculating the offender’s height or weight, or determining his actual identity from the finger impressions on Jessica’s neck. That done, he moved on to the perpetrator’s build and strength, and ultimately his hand size.

  “Dr. Svenson, you told the court earlier that the offender was most likely strong.”

  “Yes.”

  “But does that necessarily mean the man was large, or tall, or athletic?”

  “No.”

  David looked to the jury, the answer obviously caught them by surprise so he asked the witness to elaborate.

  “Strength comes in all forms, Mr. Cavanaugh. It is a fact that jockeys are some of the strongest athletes in the international sporting fraternity. The power of force does not just emanate from physical size or fitness, but also from core emotion such as anger, resulting in a physical assertion of rage.”

  “Objection,” yelled Katz. “While I have great respect for the doctor’s ability as a coroner, he is neither a sports physician nor a psychologist, and this testimony is beyond his medical expertise.”

  “Your Honor,” countered David, “Dr. Svenson has had years of experience in linking autopsies with perpetrators. I suggest his expertise lies in the very nature of his job, and the many murders he has worked on over the past decade.”

  “He’s right, Mr. Katz. Objection overruled, but I suggest you rephrase the question, Mr. Cavanaugh.”

  “Yes, Your Honor,” said David, turning quickly back to Svenson. “I’m sorry, Doctor, please allow me to clarify. I believe you are suggesting that in your experience you have seen numerous smaller men, who may appear outwardly fragile or weak even, capable of great strength in the perpetration of a violent crime such as this?”