Final Exam: A Legal Thriller

by Terry Huebner

  For her part, Megan expressed her support for Ben’s outburst and genuinely seemed moved and appreciative of his desire to fight so hard on her behalf. Ben noticed a sense of serenity in her on the eve of the defense opening, as though she had come to terms with her lot in this trial and was ready to accept her fate without hesitation. Ben and Mark spoke with Megan for a long time on Tuesday evening, with Ben’s opening scheduled for the following afternoon. They discussed the various aspects of the defense, which witnesses they intended to call, and even broached the possibility of calling Meg to testify. She seemed more willing to testify now, but Ben told her that he preferred to take a wait-and-see attitude and did not want to call her unless absolutely necessary.

  “There are too many pitfalls associated with cross-examination,” Ben insisted.

  Ben stayed around the office for awhile after Megan and Mark left, putting the finishing touches on his opening statement. Judge Wilson had a hearing he needed to attend to in the morning, so Court would not resume until one-thirty in the afternoon, giving Ben a little extra time in the morning to do some necessary polishing. He got home in time for a nice meal and some quality time with his kids.

  The following afternoon, Judge Wilson looked down at him and said, “Mr. Lohmeier, are you ready to proceed with your opening statement?”

  “Yes, I am,” Ben said coming to his feet. He stood behind his client, his hands on her shoulders and began. “Ladies and Gentlemen of the jury, as you know, my name is Benjamin Lohmeier, and I am proud to represent my friend and client, Megan Rand Cavallaro.” He patted her once more on the right shoulder and moved out from behind the counsel table and walked slowly to the center of the room. He carried no notes of any kind.

  “On or about December 28th, 2001, Daniel Greenfield drove downtown to finish grading the final exams taken by the students in the Criminal Procedure class he had taught for many years at the Chicago College of Law. He had meetings scheduled that day as well. We know this because there was a notation to that effect in his appointment book. Unfortunately, we don’t know who the meetings were with. As you might expect at a school of this type during the holidays, the Chicago College of Law was pretty empty on December 28th. There were very few people there, few people coming and going, and as far as we can tell, Daniel Greenfield’s floor was empty, save for Professor Greenfield working alone in his office grading those final exams.

  “Sometime on that fateful day, most likely in the afternoon, Daniel Greenfield had one or more of those meetings, probably with the person who murdered him. During the course of this meeting, while Professor Greenfield was bending over to put something in his briefcase or maybe pick something up off the floor, the killer picked up the Professor’s prized possession, an autographed Sammy Sosa Louisville Slugger and struck the Professor on the back of the skull, above and behind his left ear. The Professor collapsed to the ground. The killer struck him again, and again, and again, and again, as many as ten to twelve times, crushing the Professor’s skull and killing him. Bits of skull, tissue and bone painted the walls, the shelves, the desk, the floor and the filing cabinet of Professor Greenfield’s office. Blood was everywhere.”

  The jury sat transfixed as Ben described in calm, measured tones the death of Daniel Greenfield. He paused, eyeing the jurors carefully, then continued. “Then the killer left him there, carefully fled the scene, and probably escaped around the corner and through the door into the library. From there, the killer returned to the 9th floor and out through the front of the library, down the elevator to the first floor and out the back entrance, unseen by Charles Powell, the security guard on duty.

  “That Friday night, December 28th, the law school closed for the New Year’s holiday. It reopened five days later, on January 2nd, 2002. Professor Gordon Hyatt was one of the first people back in the building that morning, he too seeking to finish grading final exams. Sometime in mid-morning, Professor Hyatt stopped by Professor Greenfield’s office to drop something off, only to discover his colleague dead on the floor of his office. The police were summoned. The security cameras examined. They were useless. Their seventy-two-hour capacity, known only by a few, was too short to reach back to the time of the murder.

  “We are here today because the State believes my client, Megan Rand Cavallaro, a well-respected member of the legal community, a former Hearing Officer in child custody matters, a clerk for an Appellate Court Justice, committed this heinous act. Nothing could be further from the truth. The State’s case is based largely on a couple of drops of blood, a few strands of blond hair, two fingerprints and the story of a man who said one thing right after his best friend’s murder, then something altogether different the other day in this courtroom.”

  Ben shook his head slowly as though the mere thought of it sickened him. “All of these elements, the fragile underpinnings of a faltering case, are easily explained.” Then Ben briefly laid out a simple outline of the defense case before concluding, “In this country, in courtrooms just like this one,” he said looking around the ornate courtroom and gesturing at its wide expanse, “courtrooms large and grand and courtrooms simple and small, juries make promises. You made promises when we selected you. You said you’d wait until you heard all the evidence, all the testimony, before you made up your minds. You said you’d make the State prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt.”

  He gestured in the direction of Bridget Fahey. “We chose you because you made those promises. We know you’ll keep them. That’s all Megan asks. That’s all she needs.”

  When he finished, Ben looked into the eyes of each juror, one by one, looking for the affirmation that this promise would be kept. Then he nodded once and sat down.

  52

  Ben and Mark sat in the garage trying to convince themselves they hadn’t forgotten anything. Brad Funk had left about half an hour earlier and Dan Conlon was on his way out the door now, so it was just the two of them amidst a sea of paper, scattered files and a couple of empty pizza boxes. Ben leaned back in his chair and plopped his feet up on the conference room table while sipping the last remnants of his watered-down root beer. He looked across the room. There, in front of the bookshelves, stood the easel with the poster paper and Ben’s notes scrawled all over it. Some of the notes dated back to that night a couple of months earlier when Ben had hoped that seeing the pieces in front of him could help him assemble the true picture of Daniel Greenfield’s death.

  Over the following weeks, additional notes, ideas and thoughts had been added, but the picture didn’t seem any clearer now than it had been then, or even clearer than it was on the day Daniel Greenfield was found laying dead in his office. Still, Ben thought that most of the pieces were there and hoped that something would click in his head and allow him to see what really happened.

  Mark stuffed some papers into a file and looked up to see Ben studying the easel on the other side of the room. “What?” he said.

  Ben shook his head. “I don’t know … nothing.” He paused, then said, “Do you ever think we’ll really know what happened?”

  Mark didn’t hesitate. “No, I don’t. And to tell you the truth, if we get a not guilty, I don’t give a shit if we ever know.”

  “Yeah, I guess,” Ben reluctantly agreed. “I’d still kind of like to know though. I’d like to know who did it and why.” He paused. “I’d also like to know who had me beaten up.”

  Mark stood and hitched up his pants. Unlike Ben, who had lost weight during the previous several months, Mark seemed to be putting it on with astonishing ease. He was one of those guys who handled stress by eating. Mark turned and looked at the easel. “What I’d like to know,” he said, “is what Bridget Fahey has up her sleeve for rebuttal.”

  Ben stood and nodded. “That would be worth knowing,” he said.

  Mark laughed. “My view is arguing last is worth everything, or at least almost everything. I’ve heard some big-time criminal defense lawyers say they would give up reasonable doubt if they could just argue last. An
ybody who has ever been married knows that arguing last is the key.”

  “Yep,” Ben said.

  “That’s why wives never give it up,” Mark added.

  Ten minutes later, after clearing away the remnants of their dinner and packing up for Court, Ben and Mark headed home. Since the attack on Ben, they tried not to leave one person alone at the office at the end of the day. The last two guys would typically leave together, and they’d call ahead of time to let the Ithaca Police know they were leaving. That way, an Ithaca squad car cruised the parking lot as the last of them left for the night. The police also helped keep the media away.

  Libby was surprised to see him when he got home. “You’re home kind of early,” she said. “Just in time for bath.”

  Ben heard feet on the stairs and then his daughter, clad only in her underwear, turned the corner and ran straight toward him and jumped into his arms. Ben scooped her up and gave her a big hug and several kisses on the head. Then he carried her upstairs for the bath and bedtime ritual that he had missed so many times in the previous weeks. It was ten-fifteen before Ben got back downstairs, grabbed a beer from the refrigerator and ambled into the family room where Libby was watching television.

  Libby clicked the pause button on the Tivo and tossed Ben the remote. “How far did you get today?” she asked. “I’ve been busy and I haven’t been watching the news shows.”

  “The opening and we did the blood splatter guy.”

  “How’d that go?”

  “The opening was good. It was shorter than Fahey’s, but I thought it was pretty good. Mark said it was good, so we were pretty happy with it. The blood splatter guy did okay. He testified that there was a big mess and whoever did the whacking probably got quite a bit of blood and other shit on him. Of course, we knew all that. Bridget Fahey didn’t do too much with it, probably because he really didn’t disagree with her guy. We’re trying to undercut the idea that Meg could have done it and only gotten two drops of blood on the scarf.”

  “Unless, of course, the scarf was wrapped all the way around her neck,” Libby said.

  “Shh,” Ben said. “Thank God you’re not on the jury. Don’t even suggest ideas like that. Somebody may be listening.”

  They watched TV for awhile, and Ben even checked out a few minutes of Geraldo talking about the trial. Good reviews on his opening statement. That felt good. Libby went upstairs about midnight and Ben clicked off the lights and the television and plopped back down on the couch for a few minutes. The only light in the room came from the small fish tank on the table in the corner. Ben watched the two goldfish float lazily in the water. He thought back to what Mark said in the garage about not ever finding out who killed Greenfield. He hoped that wouldn’t be the case, but figured that it was probably true.

  The hardest part about criminal trials is the unknown and the unknowable because they planted the seeds of doubt that could eat you alive. Maybe Mark was right, Ben thought, maybe a not guilty would be good enough. Ben thought about Bridget Fahey’s rebuttal case. He knew she must be keeping something in reserve to hammer him with in rebuttal. Give up reasonable doubt to argue last? There might be something to that. Ben got up, walked over to the fish tank, said, “Goodnight fish,” clicked off the light on the tank and went upstairs to bed.

  The following morning, as Ben entered the courtroom, Stanley Disko caught up with Jason Hahn in the locker area at the law school. “You have now been served,” he said after Hahn took the trial subpoena from his hand.

  Hahn responded with a string of expletives in imaginative combinations that even Disko had to appreciate. “You kiss your mother with that mouth? If you have any questions about the subpoena, why don’t you call Professor Harper. She’s in the same boat as you,” Disko said over his shoulder as he left the locker area. He nodded to the onlookers on his way out. One more good story for his memoirs.

  Back in Court, Stanley Liu took the stand, a small Asian man whose parents emigrated from Taiwan in the mid-1950’s. Stanley was born two years later, and at age forty-five, was one of the foremost blood experts in the United States. He looked fidgety, a crooked grin crossing his face. He wore an ill-fitting tan suit and had a mop of uncontrollable black hair that flopped down in his face and he frequently pushed it away with one hand.

  Mark conducted the direct-examination and deftly led Liu through his background and considerable experience. Ben watched carefully as Mark questioned Dr. Liu about his evidence collection methods and data analysis techniques. He saw the jury paying careful attention to Dr. Liu’s testimony. From the defense table, he could get a better perspective on how the testimony was being viewed and processed by the individual jury members whom he could not watch and certainly not study while conducting an examination himself.

  Despite his somewhat quirky demeanor, Dr. Liu was an engaging witness and one to whom people seemed to instinctively want to listen. Mark turned his attention to the blood found on Megan’s scarf. “Dr. Liu,” Mark said, “did you ever have occasion to examine the gray cashmere scarf which has been introduced into evidence as Exhibit 15?”

  “Yes, I have, in some detail.”

  “As you know, two drops of blood were identified on that scarf, isn’t that correct?”

  “Yes, that’s correct.”

  “Were you able to identify anything else on that scarf?”

  “Yes, I was. There were two different types of hair on the scarf. First, there were several blond hairs.”

  “What about the other hairs?”

  “Those were hairs from a different subject, more coarse, some black, some gray. Our further analysis indicated that those hairs likely came from Joseph Cavallaro.”

  “What conclusions, if any, did you draw from that analysis?”

  Dr. Liu looked serious. “I concluded, of course, that both Ms. Cavallaro and her husband occasionally used that scarf. It is my understanding that there were two identical matching scarves, both gray cashmere.”

  “Did you find anything else on the scarf?”

  Dr. Liu nodded. “Other than the blood, we found traces of what we identified as women’s makeup, at least two different kinds of perfume and men’s cologne.”

  “Did you draw any conclusions from this?”

  “Yes. This confirmed our previous analysis that both the husband and the wife frequently used this scarf.”

  “Objection, your Honor,” Bridget Fahey said as she stood. “We object to the use of the word ‘frequently’.”

  Before the Court could rule, Dr. Liu turned and looked up at the Judge. He said, “Your Honor, sir, may I explain my use of the word ‘frequently’?”

  Judge Wilson looked startled, then said, “Sure, go ahead.”

  “When I say the word ‘frequently’, I use that word because of the quantity and different sizes of the male hairs found on the scarf. From that I conclude that not all of the hairs got on the scarf on one occasion. Furthermore, that quantity of hairs would be unusual for just one or two uses. Hence, I believe that the scarf was used by both parties on numerous occasions.”

  Judge Wilson nodded. “Objection overruled,” he said.

  Bridget Fahey frowned and sat down. Mark put his head down and shuffled toward the witness. He had kind of an “aw shucks” manner that didn’t always make him appear to be the smartest lawyer in the room, but juries found him appealing. Ben suppressed a smile. Mark continued. “Dr. Liu, did you ever have an occasion to perform any analysis of those drops of blood found on Exhibit 15?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “What sort of analysis did you conduct?”

  “Well, the first thing I did was test to confirm whether or not the blood actually came from the victim, Daniel Greenfield. I did this by checking the blood on the scarf against a known sample of Professor Greenfield’s blood.”

  “What did you determine?”

  Dr. Liu shrugged. “I determined that the blood on the scarf did, in fact, belong to Daniel Greenfield.”

  Ben saw seve
ral puzzled looks on the faces of the jury. They were apparently expecting something more explosive. Mark nodded several times and moved on. “Did you conduct any other tests on the scarf?”

  “Yes, I did. We looked at the blood samples themselves to determine whether there were any other elements or compounds present in the blood itself.”

  “And what did you determine?”

  “We determined that there were small quantities of an over-the-counter antihistamine, traces of marijuana and traces of cocaine contained in the blood.”

  Mark looked a little surprised. He scratched his head and asked, “Isn’t this similar to the conclusions drawn by the witnesses for the State?”

  “Yes. Similar, but not the same.”

  “What do you mean, not the same?”

  “In our analysis, the traces of antihistamine and marijuana found in the blood on the scarf were somewhat similar to the amounts found by the prosecution’s witnesses. However, our analysis turned up a much greater concentration of cocaine in the blood on the scarf than was found in the blood analysis done by the prosecution.”

  Now Bridget Fahey looked puzzled.

  “What conclusions, if any, Doctor, did you draw from these test results?”

  “We concluded that the blood on the scarf came from Professor Greenfield’s nose, not from his head wounds. In other words, the blood came from a nosebleed.”