Double Tap

by Steve Martini

  “In that capacity, did the defendant have access to Ms. Chapman’s home?”

  “Yes. He was assigned to sleep in a separate room in the house on occasion in order to provide twenty-four-hour protection.”

  “Did he have a key to Ms. Chapman’s house?”

  “He did.”

  “Before we leave that question, the question of the key, at some point in time, was Mr. Ruiz removed from Ms. Chapman’s personal security detail by your firm?”

  “He was.”

  “And to your knowledge were the locks changed at Ms. Chapman’s house shortly after he was relieved of these duties?”

  “Yes, they were.”

  Templeton does this neatly, answering the question why someone with a key would have to break into Chapman’s house through a window in order to kill her. At the same time he showers Emiliano with the damaging innuendo that the locks were changed because he was perceived as a threat. According to Ruiz, the locks were changed at his suggestion after Chapman approached him for some extra security, off the books, after the detail was dropped. Because of the elaborate security system, Chapman called Rufus’s firm to oversee the work on the new locks. This is the only reason Rufus knows the locks were changed.

  “In that regard, would Mr. Ruiz have been familiar with the security system installed in the victim’s home?”

  “Yes, he would.”

  “Would he know how to determine whether that system was on or off at any given time?”

  “Yes.”

  “And would he be familiar with the layout of the house?”

  “Certainly, from having stayed there. Overnight.” Rufus tries to put emphasis on the last word, hinting to the jury in an effort to fill in the blanks missing from Karen Rogan’s earlier testimony. There is little question that Templeton would have prepped him on this.

  “You stated earlier that at some point it became necessary to remove Mr. Ruiz from the personal security detail, the assignment involving executive protection for the victim, Madelyn Chapman. Is that correct?”

  “Yes, there was a problem, as I said.”

  Templeton nails down the time frame when this occurred and then steps out onto the ice. “And what was the nature of that problem?”

  “I was told that Mr. Ruiz had engaged in some unprofessional—”

  “Objection: hearsay.”

  “Sustained,” says Gilcrest.

  “At some point were you shown the contents of a security videotape involving Ms. Chapman and Emiliano—”

  “Objection.” I’m on my feet.

  “Sustained. Mr. Templeton!” Gilcrest gives him a stern look. “The jury is to disregard the question. Mr. Templeton, any more of this and. I will see you in chambers,” he says. “Now proceed.” If Templeton were closer, the judge would rap him with the gavel.

  “What was your understanding of what had happened regarding Mr. Ruiz at Isotenics?”

  “Objection: hearsay, calls for speculation.”

  “Sustained.” The judge is now looking down at the Death Dwarf with a cold stare.

  Templeton is having trouble getting at it. He stops for a moment, shuffling the papers on the podium in front of him until he finds the note he’s looking for.

  “On February twenty-fifth last year, did you receive a telephone call from Madelyn Chapman?”

  “I did.”

  Templeton nods. Back on track. “And during the course of that telephone call, what did Ms. Chapman tell you?”

  “She demanded that I terminate her personal security detail and specifically requested that Mr. Ruiz be removed from that detail immediately.”

  “Why? Did she say why she wanted this done?”

  “She said that Mr. Ruiz had become too familiar and that he had made inappropriate advances toward her, or words to that effect. I can’t recall exactly how she phrased it.”

  “And did you ask for details from Ms. Chapman during this telephone conversation?”

  “I did.”

  “And what did she say?”

  “She said that if I wanted details, I should look at the contents of a security videotape that was taken in her office the day before.”

  Templeton would go back to the videotape and ask Rufus what he saw on it, but he knows the judge would come off the bench and beat him to death with the gavel.

  “And did you remove Mr. Ruiz from the security detail?”

  “I did. Immediately,” he says. “I assigned him to other duties.”

  “Executive protection duties?” says Templeton.

  “No. Standard watch duties. Night watchman,” says Rufus. “While we conducted an investigation of Mr. Ruiz’s conduct.”

  “Did you participate in that investigation yourself?”

  “I did.”

  “And did you give any instructions to Mr. Ruiz at the time that you removed him from the security detail? I’m specifically referring to instructions regarding Ms. Chapman.”

  “Yes. I told him that he was not to go near her. He was to remain away from and off of the campus at Isotenics; he was not to go near her house, or to have any contact with her personally, in writing or by phone.”

  “And did you consider these instructions to Mr. Ruiz concerning the victim, Ms. Chapman, to be conditions of his continued employment with your firm? That any violation would lead to his immediate job termination?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  There is a lot of back-scratching going on here, questions that I suspect have been inserted by the insurance carrier as a condition of cooperation by Rufus with the prosecution.

  “Did you tell Mr. Ruiz that his refraining from any contact with Ms. Chapman was a strict condition of his continued employment?”

  “I did.”

  “Let me ask you a question. After Mr. Ruiz was removed from the Chapman security detail, did you have occasion, during the course of this investigation, to observe his activities both on and off duty, and did you take videotape recordings of some of that activity?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “And why did you do that?”

  “I had reason to believe that, notwithstanding the fact that I had specifically instructed Mr. Ruiz to avoid any contact with Ms. Chapman, he was in fact following and observing her at certain times. Again, after I had instructed him to stay away.”

  “And where did this information come from?”

  “An employee at Isotenics, Incorporated.”

  “Can you tell the jury the name of that employee?”

  “Victor Havlitz.”

  “And who is Victor Havlitz?”

  “He is currently the acting CEO of Isotenics, Incorporated. At the time he was vice president in charge of marketing.”

  “So, based on information that Mr. Havlitz had seen Mr. Ruiz observing Ms. Chapman, you conducted surveillance of Mr. Ruiz. Is that correct?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what did you observe during this surveillance?”

  “That in fact Mr. Ruiz, the defendant, was following Madelyn Chapman and watching her. That from what I could see and observe, he was stalking her.”

  “Objection, Your Honor! This is nothing but pure speculation on the part of the witness.”

  “Your Honor, the witness is testifying as to what he saw.”

  “I’ll allow it. Mr. Madriani, you’ll have your chance to cross-examine the witness.”

  I take my seat.

  “And did you take videotape and photographs of this activity involving Mr. Ruiz following and, as you say, stalking Madelyn Chapman?” Having been allowed through the toll-gate, Templeton jumps on the stalking charge and tries to ride it like a hobbyhorse.

  “I did.”

  Templeton has his detective rummage through the evidence box on their table and comes up with a small digital videotape and three sets of photographs. The photographic prints are selected frames from the video as well as still shots. One of these goes to the judge, one to us, and the third to the witness on the stand.

&nbs
p; “Do you recognize the photographs that have just been handed to you?”

  Rufus flips through them, six pages in all.

  “I do.”

  “Can you tell the court what these photographs depict?”

  “They are frames of the videotapes that I took along with some still photographs.”

  “Were these taken during the course of your investigation of Mr. Ruiz?”

  “They were.”

  Five of the frames show Ruiz standing, looking at Chapman in the distance, one of them while she is shopping at a boutique in the Village in La Jolla. Another shot, one of the more damaging pictures, shows him parked outside of her house half a block from the murder scene. He is sitting in his car, smoking a cigarette, as he watches the house.

  “Do you recognize the videocassette?” This has been handed to the witness.

  “Yes. The label shows my initials and the dates that it was recorded.”

  “Did you alter the contents of the videotape in any way?”

  “I did not.”

  “No editing?”

  “No.”

  “And was that tape in your possession the entire time before it was turned over to the police?”

  “It was.”

  “Your Honor, I would move the still shots of the individual frames and the photos as well as the videotape be entered into evidence and request that the videotape be played for the jury at this time.” Templeton wants to end the day on a high point so that the jury, having slept on it, will remember this well when it comes to deliberations. This puts me at a disadvantage, since I will have to wait until morning for my cross-examination of Rufus and an attempt to at least take some of the edge off of the stalking charge.

  “Any objection to the photographs and the video coming in, Mr. Madriani?” The judge is looking at me.

  “No, Your Honor.”

  Of course this has all been hammered out in chambers in pretrial motions. Harry and I tried a dozen ways to keep the tape out, all of them swatted down by the court. We have known for more than two months now that this tape would come in. We have viewed it repeatedly for hours in the conference room as well as on DVD on a laptop computer at the jail with Emiliano, trying to figure ways to defend it. The problem is that, without putting Ruiz on the stand, there is no way to explain his reason for following Madelyn Chapman or the fact that he was observed watching her house on three separate occasions, caught on film during two of them and shot with a long, low-light lens in the other.

  As one of the bailiffs inserts the cassette into the player, a checkerboard pattern of pixels flashes on the screen. A second later a clear picture of Emiliano, his hands stuffed into the pockets of a leather flight jacket, appears on the screen. In the background, slightly out of focus but easily recognizable, is a shot of Chapman talking to some people on the street in the Village. She is smiling, vital, and animated.

  Templeton has Rufus narrate the video as he works through the frames, going back and freezing them periodically to point out locations and clarify dates.

  As the video continues, there is the sound of sniffling from the front row. I take a quick glance, but I already know what is happening. Madelyn Chapman’s mother is crying; her only surviving daughter, who is wiping tears from her own eyes with Kleenex, attempts to comfort her.

  At one point Templeton freezes the video, adjusts it just a little for clarity, and leaves it up on the screen. In the shot Ruiz is clearly visible standing on the sandstone shelf over the Pacific, his back to the ocean and the view. He is looking south, toward the rear of Chapman’s house, through a pair of binoculars. In the distance is a blond figure. It is Chapman in the yard. She is stooping, clipping flowers or picking them. Behind her, no more than two feet away, is the screened window through which the killer entered her house.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  James Kaprosky is dying. He sits in an armchair next to the fireplace. This evening I visit him at his home out near Escondido.

  He has been reading about the trial in the papers and watching all the talk on the cable stations, the kibitzing by lawyers, almost all of them now taking bets that after the verdict Ruiz is going down. The emphasis is on whether or not the jury will give him the death penalty.

  “It’s got to be more painful to watch these idiots talk to themselves than the trial,” says Kaprosky. He is hooked up to an oxygen bottle and is sitting in a recliner in front of the fireplace, a blanket over his legs. “If I could get up out of this chair,” he says, “I would come down there. At least give moral support.” With each phrase he struggles to regain his breath.

  “No. No. You get better,” I tell him as I sit across from him on the couch, as though Kaprosky’s recovery were a possibility.

  He shakes his head. Kaprosky knows he hasn’t got much time.

  Jean is in the other room sewing, taking the time to get some chores done while I’m visiting. She has brought coffee and a tray of cookies. I offer to pour some coffee for Jim but he says no.

  At times he seems to ramble as his mind wanders through the legal hell that has been his life for the last decade or more.

  “I don’t know if you remember,” he says, “a few years ago. Chapman and her company. They were sued for antitrust.” He smiles a little. “One of the few … I wasn’t … wasn’t involved in.”

  I laugh.

  “Foolishness. Wasted years.”

  “I don’t think I remember the antitrust suit,” I tell him.

  “Two private companies,” he says. He coughs. “Tried to trim her wings. Competitors with Isotenics. After government contracts. My program,” he says. “What they took and gave to Chapman. What she called Primis. It was unique,” he says.

  “I know.”

  “No. No. That’s not what I mean,” he says. “My software was its own operating platform. Didn’t require any …” He stops to catch his breath. “No underlying software to operate,” he says.

  “I understand.”

  The small tank at the side of his chair away from the fireplace is feeding oxygen through a tube under his nose.

  “These other companies … had special applications … designed to run on top of mine. I shared the source code.” He smiles again. “They were small start-ups. A niche market. Here and overseas. I didn’t care. It was specialty software. I thought every little bit … adds something of use.” Then he shakes his head. “But Chapman crushed them.” He sits breathing heavily for a moment as he thinks. “She had to control everything. Dominated the market. She kept changing Primis. Every year. Tweaking it. Called it ‘updates.”’ He looks at the ceiling and smiles cynically now. “She was busy … developing applications to take over … crush them.”

  It is painful to listen to him struggle for breath, but it seems that I can’t stop him from talking.

  “She hid the changes … to Primis. Called them ‘trade secrets.”’ He looks at me. He’s been reading the newspapers about Sims and his motion to quash.

  “Cunning woman. Gave away upgrades, free,” he says. “No cost. But when you booted … when you booted the new one … the old piggyback application …”

  “Her competitor’s software?”

  He nods. “Didn’t work. Guess who had the only software replacements?”

  “Isotenics.”

  As I say the word he is nodding. “She crippled the industry. Brought it to its knees. Stifled innovation. Made unneeded changes. Primis is a digital Tower of Babel.”

  “You mean it’s unstable?”

  He smiles and nods as if this thought at least provides a little satisfaction. “Sold it to governments. All over the world,” he says. “All over the world.”

  “Maybe I should go. Let me get Jean.”

  “No.” He raises a palsied hand in a feeble gesture to stop me from leaving. “Stay.”

  “Just a few more minutes. I think you need to rest.”

  “Plenty of time. I’ll get a long rest. Your case … any chance?” he says.

  I tak
e a deep breath, offer up a long sigh. “The truth? It doesn’t look good.” Somehow divulging a confidence to a dead man doesn’t seem to be an ethical violation.

  His face is drawn. There are dark hollows and lines etched like canyons under his eyes. The loose flesh drooping from his chin and neck are a measure of the weight he has lost since just our last meeting in the office. I look at James sitting in his chair near the fireplace, with the hiss of the gas logs, a plaid wool blanket to keep him warm, and I know that I will not see him again.

  “What happened to the antitrust suit?” I ask.

  “Hmm?” Another tired smile crosses his face. “Government stepped in.”

  “Ah, of course. National security,” I say.

  He shakes his head slowly. “Brought their own suit,” he says. “Took it over.”

  He means the antitrust suit. “The government stepped in and took it over?”

  He nods. “Convinced the companies.” He is talking about the two competitors. “Wouldn’t be in their interest … to continue,” he says. “Year later it was settled. Out of court. The next year … Isotenics killed … three more companies. Same tactics.” There is a struggling rhythm of death in his words now as he fights for breath.

  “I think you should rest,” I tell him.

  “No. Need to talk to you. I think I know … how they’re doing it.”

  “What?”

  “Feeding Primis,” he says.

  He is talking about the raw data, the input of massive volumes of personal information needed to keep Primis and the supercomputers in Washington humming with private intelligence.

  “How?”

  “Looking glass,” he says. “Mirror software.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “Spyware,” he says. Until this moment I might have thought he was hallucinating. He swallows hard and tries to sit up in his chair.

  “No, Jim, sit back. Relax.”

  As he tries to lean forward, he stretches the clear plastic tube leading to his nose. I’m afraid he’s going to pull it free, or topple the small oxygen bottle on the floor.

  He settles up in his chair. “Man I know”—he tries to catch his breath—“says NSA … wrote the stuff. Two years ago. Invisible,” he says. “No way to see it. Plants itself on your machine. Spyware.”