Dead River

by Fredric M. Ham

  Think. Call Detective Wilkerson. He searched the top right drawer in the desk and fumbled through a pile of business cards. His hands were shaking, but he managed to find the card the detective had given him the day Sara Ann was kidnapped. He turned the card over and found Wilkerson’s home phone number.

  As he picked up the phone, he heard Valerie’s voice.

  “What on earth are you doing? Why are you running around the house?”

  “Go downstairs with Dawn,” Adam ordered. “I have to make a phone call, then I’ll explain.”

  Adam waited several rings for an answer. Could it have been a prank call? Maybe there was a chance the charges against Sikes would be dropped and the caller actually wanted to warn me of his release. But who? Was it Sikes himself calling?

  “Hello.”

  “Detective Wilkerson?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is Adam Riley. I just received a disturbing phone call from someone.”

  “Okay, slow down. What did they say?”

  “He said he had some information that would be of interest to me. That there’s a chance the man that killed Sara Ann would be set free.”

  “So you didn’t recognize his voice?”

  “No, but it was definitely a man’s voice, an older man. I thought it might have been a prank call. Maybe it was Sikes, you know, disguising his voice. Does he have access to a phone in jail?”

  “Yes, but limited use, and they can only make collect calls.”

  “Goddamn it, what’s going on? What the hell are you going to do about this?”

  “Settle down, Mr. Riley. I’ll check into it tomorrow.”

  Adam took the receiver and launched it in the direction of the phone cradle. It bounced twice on the desktop and ended up dangling off the edge of the desk. He stared at the empty cradle. What about Carillo’s other suggestion? Maybe he’s right. Maybe I do need a handgun.

  71

  THE MORNING of the preliminary hearing was refreshingly cool. October was Harley’s favorite time of the year. For now, the dog days of summer were gone.

  As Harley cruised on I-95 toward the Moore Justice Center in Viera, he went over what he would present in court, and the questions he would ask Mr. Slick’s witnesses. He parked his car and walked to the entrance. The Moore Justice Center was one of six relatively new buildings in the Brevard County government complex. The structures were allegedly pleasing to the eye, but Harley had never liked the sterile look of their modern architecture. Granted, the complex was clearly organized in a hierarchy of forms that were related by their functionality as well as design. However, he preferred the old courthouse in Titusville. There he felt a sense of excitement when he stepped inside the building; the smell alone was enough to feel like you could win any legal battle.

  As far as Harley was concerned, courthouses rested on hallowed ground. The courthouse itself should be a sacred edifice, constructed of brick and mortar and stone with rising Corinthian columns lined up like sentries standing guard over our laws, inside justice doled out by judges and juries. But old-fashioned courthouses were giving way to justice centers, those one-stop antiseptic judicial complexes with twelve courtrooms, a family courtroom, the clerk of courts, a family and civil mediation center, a law library, a public viewing area, a jury assembly room, and even a goddamn Subway sandwich shop.

  Harley had two character witnesses he would call for Sikes. He wasn’t trying to cast doubt on the validity of the charges against his client. Instead, he wanted to discredit the prosecution’s witnesses. At least raise some doubt. A plan worth trying.

  At eight forty-five the courtroom was casually busy with its usual players carrying out their usual activities. The judge’s assistant chatted with the court stenographer as she prepared her equipment for the proceedings, the court deputy rattled the key chain attached to his belt, a court assistant checked the paperwork on the state attorney’s table, and a maintenance worker unlocked the plastic case that secured the thermostat and made an adjustment.

  There was an overabundance of pecan wood in the courtroom, too much to suit Harley’s liking. Again, it seemed too modern and too sterile. But it was the overhead lighting that annoyed him the most. The closely-spaced, recessed halogens lit up the courtroom like a Hollywood movie set.

  Harley positioned himself at the defense table, strategically placing notes and documents from his thick, brown-leather briefcase. He checked his watch. It was ten minutes to nine. A door to the right of the judge’s bench opened, and a court deputy led Sikes into the brilliantly-lit courtroom. Harley greeted him with a nod. Sikes was lowered into the chair next to Harley, still handcuffed.

  The two large doors at the back of the courtroom groaned as they swung open. Harley turned and saw a horde of reporters invading the courtroom. Within a few minutes, the once-vacant rows of pews were crammed with bustling bodies. It was a full house. Harley had his audience.

  Owen Jacobson finally made his grand entrance, his familiar march to the prosecutor’s table, glancing several times toward the back of the courtroom to make sure he was spotted by the press. As he passed by the defense table, his head turned, sneering in Harley’s direction. Harley simply smiled back.

  “All rise,” the court deputy barked. “The Circuit Court of the Eighteenth Judicial Circuit of Florida is now in session, the Honorable Judge Warren Vetter presiding. You may be seated.”

  Harley watched Vetter’s beady eyes dart around the courtroom. The judge’s hands lay flat on the bench.

  “Everyone in this courtroom must understand this is a preliminary hearing, not some wailing TV court show. I will not tolerate any outbursts in my courtroom.”

  Jacobson had three witnesses; the first was Detective Glenn Wilkerson. He questioned Wilkerson about the letter that was recovered from the Cocoa Beach post office early Tuesday morning, August 21. Jacobson wanted to know how the letter was handled, what postmark it bore, who had verified the handwriting, and how the paper had been analyzed at the FBI labs in Quantico. The testimony was slow, boring, and devoid of any new information.

  Mr. Slick took advantage of every opportunity to bring up the name of FBI Special Agent Douglas Goldman. He praised Goldman for his work on the case and mentioned several times that the defendant would have never been apprehended without Goldman’s assistance.

  Judge Vetter sat on his pecan-wood throne, leaning his chin on his right hand. A large stainless-steel pitcher of ice water was at his left side with a full glass sitting beside it. He reached for the glass and took a sip. Then he leaned back in his chair and pawed at his uncombed and knotted hair. Harley could see the proceedings were already weighing heavily on the judge’s patience.

  Jacobson finally wrapped up his questioning of Wilkerson.

  “Would you care to cross-examine the witness, Mr. Buckwald?” Vetter asked.

  “No, Your Honor, the defense has no questions for the witness,” Harley said as he stood and buttoned his suit coat. Then he unbuttoned his coat and slowly sat back down.

  Harley glanced at his client, and Sikes looked back at him in disbelief. His rubbery cheeks bounced on his face as he shook his head.

  “Keep calm, son,” Harley whispered, as he leaned in close to Sikes. “Remember, no outbursts.”

  72

  THE NEXT WITNESS called by Jacobson was Todd Zeller, the deputy sheriff who was in charge at the McCarthy house while the forensics team had gathered evidence. Jacobson walked him through each bit of evidence taken at the McCarthy’s, spending several minutes going over the hair samples that were found in the bedroom where Sikes had stayed. Again, slow, boring, but this time informative.

  “That’s all the questions I have for the witness, Your Honor,” Jacobson said, staying in his usual droning voice.

  “Mr. Buckwald, would you care to cross-examine?” asked the judge.

  “Yes, Your Honor, I would. May I approach the witness?”

  “Yes, you may.”

  Harley stood and buttoned his suit coat
. He swaggered toward the witness stand and stopped two feet short.

  “Deputy Zeller.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I would like to know more about the gathering of the evidence at the McCarthy house.”

  “Okay.”

  “Were there any members of the sheriff’s criminalistics forensic team that gathered evidence at the McCarthy house that were also at the Riley residence on August 18?”

  “Actually, it was the same team of individuals, sir.”

  Harley slowly spun around to look at everyone in the courtroom. He continued his rotation until he faced the witness again. “I see, it was the same team. And didn’t at least one of the individuals examine Miss Sara Ann Riley’s car in the driveway at her residence?”

  “I wasn’t there, but I guess one of them did. It was in the report.”

  “Yes, it certainly was in the report.”

  Now Harley backed away from the witness stand and addressed the entire courtroom. His hands were in the air, like he was conducting an orchestra. “So here you have a person inside the Riley girl’s car, gathering evidence, and a few days later the same person is at the McCarthy house.” Here it comes, raise doubt. “Don’t you think there’s a possibility that the person gathering evidence inside the Riley girl’s car could have ended up with some of her hair strands on his shoes, and then a few days later, while at the McCarthy house, that same hair could come off his shoes and end up on the carpet in the bedroom where the hair was found?”

  Jacobson shot up out of his chair. “Objection! Speculative, Your Honor, the witness would be drawing his own conclusions,” he growled.

  “Sustained.”

  “Yes, Your Honor,” Harley submitted.

  Harley paused a moment for effect. Then he turned and again faced the witness. “Okay then, Deputy Zeller. Can you tell the court the procedures used by the criminalistics team members after leaving a crime scene?”

  “I don’t understand the question. What procedures are you referring to?”

  “Okay, let me be more specific. When the evidence is taken back and cataloged are the individuals that gathered the evidence required to clean their shoes?”

  This time Jacobson was out of his chair even faster. “Your Honor, I object! If Mr. Buckwald is leading us back to his previous outrageous assumption of transference of evidence, I—object!” Jacobson’s face was glowing red.

  “Sustained. Sit down, Mr. Jacobson,” ordered the judge.

  Jacobson sat down hard in his chair. He glared at Harley, but Harley only glanced in his direction for a second.

  “Mr. Buckwald, stop this line of questioning,” ordered Vetter. “This case is not being tried here today. Do you understand?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.” Harley looked at the judge. Vetter’s hair seemed to have sprouted an additional two inches since nine o’clock. “I have no more questions for the witness, Your Honor.”

  Jacobson’s final witness was Sam Weber. Yet again, the testimony was long and monotonous. Even the court deputy was beginning to fidget in the corner.

  “Mr. Buckwald, would you like to cross-examine?”

  Harley stood and buttoned his coat. He picked up his legal pad and thumbed his way through the sheets until he arrived at the page he needed. He looked in Vetter’s direction.

  “May I approach the witness, Your Honor.”

  “Yes, you may,” the judge said, taking a sip from his glass of water.

  Harley turned his attention to the witness. “Mr. Weber.”

  “Yes.”

  “How are you this morning?”

  “Ah, I’m all right.”

  Harley scanned the page in his legal pad once more and then placed it on the table. He walked toward the witness stand, stopping only inches from Weber.

  “So let’s see, Mr. Weber, you met Special Agent Goldman and Detective Wilkerson at approximately 11:55 pm the night you performed the analysis on the hair samples. Is that correct?”

  “That sounds about right.”

  “That seems pretty late to perform such an important task. Weren’t you tired?”

  Jacobson stood and firmly planted his hands on the table. “Objection, Your Honor,” he barked.

  “What’s your objection, counselor?” asked Vetter.

  “Relevance, Your Honor. It’s not clear where this line of questioning is going.”

  “Overruled. Answer the question, Mr. Weber,” Vetter ordered.

  Jacobson slowly sat down in his chair.

  Weber cleared his throat. “Naw, I wasn’t tired.”

  “You can remember back to that specific night?”

  “Sure, got a great memory. Look, I’m up at all hours of the night at home sometimes. I’m used to being up late.”

  “So you don’t think working late that night had any affect on your ability to properly analyze the hair samples?”

  “Nope, none at all.”

  “Can you give the court a quick synopsis of what you do in the lab? I mean in general.”

  “Sure.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Weber.”

  Weber nodded his head and wrapped his long, tentacle-like fingers around the arms on the chair in the witness stand. “As I mentioned before, I work for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in the regional office in Orlando. I’m one of two forensic examiners of hair and fibers. We examine hair and fiber using a microscope and look for certain characteristics.”

  That was enough for Harley to get Weber going. “So let’s talk about hair samples,” Harley interrupted.

  “Okay.”

  “So you can take two separate hair samples from the scalp of a human, collected from two different locations, and then try to match them by comparing their characteristics under the microscope. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “Okay. And is that what you did the night you analyzed the Riley girl’s hair?”

  “Yes.”

  “And they matched?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you find any characteristics of the hair that were unusual?”

  “Nope, none at all. Her hair was blond, but natural blond. It wasn’t bleached. A lot of women like to bleach their hair, and we can tell when we analyze it.”

  Weber looked around the courtroom for a response. Only the court deputy snickered.

  Harley smoothed his hair back with his right hand and continued his questioning. “You just told the court that you didn’t find anything unusual about the Riley girl’s hair, is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, I’m sure.” Weber’s face began to flush.

  “Okay, Mr. Weber.” Harley looked down at his shoes and then at the witness again. “So you determined that the two different hair samples matched, but you didn’t find anything unusual with one of the samples?

  “What?” asked Weber, now wearing a puzzled look. “I already said I found nothing unusual about the victim’s hair.”

  Harley ignored the witness’s response. “You also told the court that the victim’s hair was not bleached, is that correct?”

  “Yes—yes, I did.”

  “So any damage to the hair wouldn’t be a result of chemical bleaching, but it could be a result of some other abuse, say from a shoe that repeatedly stepped on it.”

  Mr. Slick bolted from his chair with his hands high in the air. “Objection, Your Honor! I demand that you stop this line of questioning.”

  “Sustained!” Vetter’s forehead wrinkled, and his eyes narrowed as he stared at the prosecutor. “Sit down, counselor. I make the demands in this courtroom.”

  “Yes, Your Honor.” Jacobson said, crumbling back into his chair.

  Vetter then directed his attention to Harley with his finger aimed and ready to fire. “Mr. Buckwald, that’s it. If you continue this line of questioning, you’ll be held in contempt. Do I make myself clear?”

  “Yes, Your Honor. I have no further questions for the witness.”


  Harley walked back to the defense table. Mr. Slick gave him a burning glare. This time Harley shot a smile in Mr. Slick’s direction. Vetter announced a fifteen-minute recess. Harley figured Jacobson needed the break more than anyone in the courtroom.

  Harley had two character witnesses, Chester Manley and Dallas DuPont. They were both electricians who worked with Sikes at McCarthy Electrical Contracting. Jacobson cross-examined the first witness, Chester, in his usual boring monotone that put the court deputy in a constant fidgeting frenzy, to fight nodding off. Dallas Dupont was another story. Less than one minute into Jacobson’s cross-examination, Dupont became so flustered he broke wind. This sent the entire courtroom into a fit of laughter, with the exception of Judge Vetter and Mr. Slick. After several raps of the gavel, Vetter regained control of his precious courtroom.

  When it was finally over, Harley sat coolly next to his client, and Mr. Slick consulted with his assistant. The courtroom buzzed as Vetter rustled papers he had spread before him. He occasionally sipped out of his glass of water. He read some of the documents and scanned others. He tugged on his stringy gray hair and mumbled to himself as he made notes, consulting with his assistant three times. Then he finally nodded to the court deputy, who quieted the courtroom.

  “I’ll make this short,” announced Vetter, adjusting his wire-rim glasses. He glanced around the courtroom and then continued. “After hearing the testimony this morning, it’s my determination that there is probable cause to continue holding the defendant, Mr. David Allen Sikes, without bond, until such time that this case is brought before the grand jury.”

  There was a current of whispers and murmurs from the back of the courtroom. Harley stared straight ahead in the direction of Vetter, who was again fumbling around in his stacks of notes. Vetter stopped his search and looked up. His face was drawn tight, and every hair on his head seemed to stand at attention. The overhead halogens reflected off his shiny skin.

  The judge’s gavel hit the hardwood block with a crack. “Order in the court. Last warning. If I hear anything but silence in here, I will ask the court deputy to clear the courtroom.”