“Enough of this shit,” he said. “Ari, listen, and sorry to be blunt, but this is not a charity fund-raiser that we’re going to. It’s a blood sport. And right at this moment, the Crown has all the facts on their side. What I need is some fucking facts that refute their story.”
“Such as?” Greene asked.
All day Greene had watched DiPaulo take meticulous notes on a long pad of lined yellow paper. At some point he realized that DiPaulo had a second pad he wrote on occasionally. DiPaulo pulled that one out.
“Time,” he said, waving the pad in Greene’s direction. “Time.”
“Time?” Greene asked.
“People can say anything they want in court. But no one can bend time. I’ve been taking notes on this pad of every indication we have of when things happened that morning. If we can prove, and I mean prove objectively, factually, irrefutably, that Raglan was dead by the time you got to room 8 at the Maple Leaf Motel, then maybe at last we have something other than your word for what happened.”
He turned to Parish. She perked right up.
“Nancy, put up a new piece of Bristol board. We’re going to make a minute-by-minute chronology. Write three headings: ‘Time,’ ‘Person,’ and ‘Event.’ ” He pulled the pizza box back toward him, opened it, and retrieved his slice.
“Here’s what I have.” DiPaulo looked at his pad of paper. “Eight A.M. Howard Darnell leaves home saying he’s going to work. About 8:15 the three kids leave for school. Assume Raglan starts on her run about 8:30. We know from the cop’s notes it’s fifteen kilometres to the Coffee Time and she gets there at 9:49:52. At 9:56:12, she makes the phone call to Ari’s cell, which shows up on Ari’s invoice. They talk for a minute and thirty-two seconds.”
DiPaulo put his pad down. “Ari, that puts you at your house at 9:57 A.M. A few minutes after ten she’s in the room. At 10:39 someone makes a 911 call. You tell us you arrived at 10:41 and found her dead. At 10:44 the cavalry arrives: cop cars and the ambulance.”
“Wait,” Parish said, rummaging through one of the sets of files and pulling out a piece of artwork. “Sadura Sawney, her drawings. Look. There’s Ari from behind, about to call on his cell phone. But check out the background. The ambulance is rushing past at the same time.”
“I hadn’t notice that,” Greene said. “That puts me there at 10:44. I was in and out of that room in less than five minutes,” Greene said. “Felt like a lifetime.”
Parish stood back and looked at her chart. “In that approximately thirty-seven minutes between Raglan arriving in the room and the 911 call, she’s killed.”
“In his notes,” DiPaulo said, “Alpine shows he did a test drive from your house to the Maple Leaf Motel leaving at 9:58. Took him twenty-three minutes.”
“That puts Ari arriving at 10:21. Eighteen minutes before the 911 call,” Parish said.
“It’s tight, but they’re going to say that was all the time he needed to kill her,” DiPaulo said. “Ari, tell me how can I get rid of those seventeen minutes and we’re home free.”
Greene shook his head. “I parked the scooter about ten minutes’ walk from my house. On a normal day, it took me about twenty minutes to get to the motel strip. This motel was a bit farther than most of them. Twenty-three minutes sounds right. But that day the traffic on Kingston Road was terrible. Obviously on a scooter there’s no radio and I couldn’t get a traffic report. I really didn’t think much of it. What else can I tell you?”
DiPaulo frowned. “You didn’t stop anywhere for gas? Go to a florist that has a video camera and buy her some roses?”
“I wish,” Greene said.
DiPaulo strode up to the Bristol board and studied it. He took out a red marker and circled 10:41. “It only works, Ari, if we can prove you went into that room at 10:41. Two minutes after the 911 call. Right there. That is the fucking fact we need to prove.”
He turned to Parish. “Nancy, check with that media monitoring firm we use. Get the tape of the morning radio and TV traffic reports. The local traffic cops’ notes. Hourly weather report. Maybe there was a hailstorm farther up the road or a Martian landing we don’t know about.”
He looked back at Greene. “The one thing I know for sure is that there is never a Perry Mason moment when someone stands up in court and says, ‘I did it!’ or runs in from the hallway and says, ‘Detective Greene is innocent, I saw the murder and it was Colonel Mustard, with a candlestick, in the library.’ ”
They all laughed. DiPaulo was good at defusing tension with humour.
DiPaulo turned serious. “Ari. Anything else you can think of?”
“I know I got there at 10:41. I hate being late and I know I checked my watch before I walked into the room.”
“You’re sure it was 10:41.”
“One hundred percent.”
“And no jury in the world is going to believe that, unless we come up with some solid proof. Why don’t you stop thinking like a defendant, or like a man who’s lost the love of his life, and start thinking like a detective?” DiPaulo spread his arms. “Look at all of this. Four boxes of evidence. What am I missing? Be a homicide cop.”
Greene felt he’d been slapped hard across the face. Twenty-five years of his life were on the line and he was drawing a blank.
And then it came to him.
Of course.
If things don’t work in one direction, look at them the other way.
“Ted, you’re right,” he said.
“About what?” DiPaulo said.
“I haven’t been thinking like a cop.”
“Meaning?”
“Meaning, I can’t believe I didn’t see this before.” He reached into his wallet, took out fifty dollars, and slapped the bills on the table.
“Here take this,” he said to DiPaulo.
“What for?”
“We need to rent room 8 at the Maple Leaf Motel.”
58
FOR YEARS AWOTWE AMANKWAH HAD BEEN AMUSED BY THE LEVEL OF CORRUPTION IN STORIES that made the headlines in Canada. Coming from a country, and a continent, where bribery, nepotism, electoral fraud, to say nothing of rape, murder, and continual warfare, were as ingrained into the culture as the monsoons in rainy season, he found it hard to get too worked up about what passed for scandals here: government-hired consultants who had lattes and muffins, protesters at the G8 summit in Toronto who had to go half a day without their vegan meals, and, imagine this one, a federal cabinet minister on a foreign trip to London who spent sixteen bucks for a glass of orange juice. Soon after this stunning revelation, she’d resigned.
Last spring, when Barclay Church had arrived at the Star, determined to find dirt in squeaky-clean Toronto, reporters in the newsroom had rolled their eyes. “Dig, dig, dig” was his mantra. And to everyone’s surprise, soon there were front-page stories with screaming headlines about filthy restaurants that had been badly inspected, private schools where kids bought good grades, public-school repair bills that were as inflated as the Pentagon’s budget, and aquatic theme parks that abused their cuddly dolphins.
Church had breathed life into the newsroom, but no one had cracked anything as big as a major police corruption scandal. A story like that could make Amankwah’s career.
For the last week he had been busy doing his own version of the Big Dig. It took him a couple of days to enter all the information from Carmichael’s files in an Excel spreadsheet, and even longer to figure out what it all meant. But, like a jigsaw puzzle, the pieces eventually started to fit together.
Two years earlier, in anticipation of the G8 summit that was going to bring the world leaders to Toronto, the police had put together a number of three-officer units to clean up the streets. Their main task was to make sure no problems occurred between prostitutes and politicians while the whole world was watching Toronto.
Amankwah noticed that the names of three cops kept coming up in case after case. Then he realized they were working together in the same unit. Through persistent access-to-information reques
ts, he was able to profile them.
Colin Kimber, a twelve-year veteran, had faced internal disciplinary hearings three times and had two reprimands on his record. Plus a female colleague had filed a sexual harassment complaint against him that she later withdrew.
George Noguchi had been on the force for twenty-one years, much of his early years on the holdup squad, and was still there when it was investigated for “alleged” violent interrogation techniques. Five years earlier he’d been charged with assault by the Special Investigations Unit for stopping and beating up a black man who was walking home from work. The guy wore baggy jeans and a do-rag on his head. Noguchi thought he was a teenager, but in fact he was a thirty-six-year-old nurse. It was a high-profile case. Noguchi was acquitted, but the judge made it clear he was not impressed with the officer’s testimony, even though he was not quite persuaded of his guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.
The man who’d put this ragged group together, nicknamed “Trio,” was its leader, Clyde Newbridge. A big, fat, intimidating cop, Amankwah had often seen him swagger through the halls of the Old City Hall courthouse. Newbridge had been on the force for thirty years. No official complaint had ever been filed against him, and he’d never been subject to any disciplinary hearings. But his reputation was that he was “old school,” meaning he was not afraid to lay on the lumber if need be to force a confession. He certainly was a curious choice for such a sensitive job. This looked like his reward for sucking up to Charlton for all those years.
Amankwah dug deeper. He got the court records of the other special units working at the same time. Most of them had pretty good conviction rates, ranging from 40 to 60 percent. On average, 20 percent of their cases were withdrawn. But with Trio, an amazing 84 percent of their cases had been tossed out. The contrast was startling.
He focused on Newbridge. And that’s where he hit a wall. Every access-to-information request was either denied or so redacted it was useless. All he could find was a meager biographical sketch. A high-school graduate, he’d joined the force when he was nineteen. Spent his career moving from division to division, doing a bit of everything. Knew everyone. Divorced twice, both ex-wives alleging mental cruelty. Pretty standard stuff for a veteran Toronto cop.
But Amankwah knew it was only the tip of the iceberg. Newbridge was a big player in the combative police union and a buddy of Hap Charlton. Always popping up at the chief’s side at important events. And these days a constant figure on the campaign trail.
But how to find out more? Amankwah needed to get someone to talk to him, and that’s why he was standing on University Avenue at 6:45 A.M., watching the parking lot to the north of the courthouse. He had finished reading the lead story in the newspaper about how Hap Charlton was pulling way ahead in the polls when he saw Albert Fernandez drive his car into the lot.
He waited until the young Crown attorney collected his briefcase from his trunk before approaching. This was going to be tricky. Unlike defence lawyers, many of whom were very adept at dealing with the media, most Crown attorneys were very bad at it and simply chose to avoid all contact.
“Good morning, Mr. Fernandez,” Amankwah said when he was a few steps away.
“Hello,” Fernandez said, surprised, his eyes wary. “What brings such a well-known newspaper reporter here this early in the morning?” He tried to smile but it was obvious he was nervous. He glanced at the envelope in Amankwah’s hand.
“There’s something I’d like to chat with you about privately,” Amankwah said. “I have a hunch you have a pretty good idea what I’m interested in.”
Fernandez looked around the near-empty lot. “We both know that the ministry advises us to not talk to the media.”
“I’m only looking for background. You have my word, I’d never quote you without your express permission.”
Fernandez checked his watch. He bit his lip.
Amankwah could read the emotions on his face. Fernandez was a good lawyer and played by the rules. If he found out about some rogue cops, he wouldn’t turn a blind eye. On the other hand, ever since Charlton had made a show of calling for an investigation into allegations of police corruption, all the Crowns were under a strict gag order.
“I appreciate your being discreet,” Fernandez said. “But this isn’t a good time – or place, for that matter.”
Amankwah handed him the sealed envelope. “I did a spreadsheet of all the charges involving prostitutes that have been withdrawn in the last three years. The rest of this is the court papers that I used for my research. One group of officers stands out like a sore thumb.”
Fernandez stared at the envelope, not moving to take it.
They locked eyes.
“Trio,” Amankwah said.
Fernandez’s face flushed and his arm twitched. He wouldn’t make a good poker player, Amankwah thought.
“Take it, Albert,” Amankwah said.
Fernandez grabbed the envelope and slipped it into his briefcase.
“I need to know where to look next,” Amankwah said.
Fernandez’s eyes travelled around the parking lot. “Ten minutes,” he said. “Now, before other Crowns arrive.”
Traffic in the city was starting to pick up. Fernandez led him quickly up Centre Street for two blocks and down an alley beside the University of Toronto Dentistry Faculty building. Behind a big tree, there was an old wood bench that faced north, tucked out of view of the street. Fernandez opened the envelope and took a fast look at Amankwah’s chart. Then he scanned the court papers.
“You can check all the court documents,” Amankwah said, “but I know I got it right.”
Fernandez ignored him. There were sixty-eight sets of charges, and he kept flipping back and forth through them. Obviously he was looking for something specific.
“I don’t want to keep this,” he said at last, putting the papers back in the envelope and handing it to Amankwah.
“Didn’t you understand the chart?” Amankwah asked. “This Trio unit kept arresting people and almost all the charges were thrown out.”
“I’m well aware of this,” Fernandez said.
“You are?”
“Yes.”
Amankwah smacked the envelope on his knee. “Then the only reasonable explanation has to be that they were shaking prostitutes and johns down. Arresting them then getting payoffs or favours to yank the charges. Don’t you see that?”
“You know I’m limited in what I can tell you,” Fernandez said.
“Okay,” Amankwah said. “Explain this, then. How could this go on without anyone in the Crown’s office being aware of it?”
Fernandez stood up. “I’ve got to get to the office,” he said. “They made me the temporary head Crown.”
“I heard. Congratulations,” Amankwah said, standing up with him. “But you didn’t answer my question.”
“I understood it. The answer’s right in your hand,” Fernandez said. “You were only looking at the cops involved. Why don’t you go back and see who the Crown was who was pulling all these charges.”
“The Crown?”
“It’s all in the documents,” Fernandez said. He walked off before Amankwah could say another word.
Amankwah sat back down on the bench and pulled out the papers. Fernandez was right. He had been focusing on the arresting officers. It had never occurred to him to check which Crown attorney was in court each time. He flipped to the first case. Then the second, the third. He stared at the pages in disbelief. But he kept going through all sixty-eight of them.
There it was. Every charge had been withdrawn by Jennifer Raglan.
59
AT PRECISELY 7:30 A.M. KREITINGER HEARD A KNOCK ON HER OFFICE DOOR. “COME IN,” SHE said.
“Morning,” Jo Summer said.
Kreitinger had told her she wanted to start early and so here was Little Miss Keener, right on time.
“I’m not sucking up or anything,” Summers said, “but I brought you a Starbucks coffee. Albert said you take it black.”
<
br /> Kreitinger reached for the cup. It was steaming hot. “Sounds like sucking up to me,” she said.
“Yeah. Okay. Guilty as charged.” Summers smiled. “I’ve got my top three problems for our case. It was hard to narrow it down to three.”
“It should be.” Kreitinger pulled out the little green stick that covered the opening in the lid. The coffee smelled very good. “Let’s go to our war room and see what you’ve got,” she said, jamming the stick back in place.
The hallways were empty. They passed a few Crown attorneys in their offices, heads down in final preparations for the day’s battle in court.
“Here are my choices,” Summers said, when they entered Fernandez’s former office. On the flip chart she’d already written out her three points.
1. Can we prove Greene was in room 8 without calling his father as a witness?
2. What proof do we have of Greene’s motive?
3. If Greene testifies that Jennifer was dead when he arrived, how do we counter that?
Kreitinger put her coffee down and rummaged through the markers, found a red one, crossed out number three, and said, “That’s not something tangible we can deal with right now.”
“Okay, I see that.” Summers nodded, her bound-up blond hair bouncing above her head.
Kreitinger renumbered “1” as “2” and “2” as “3” and drew a line from the top of the page to the blank space below and wrote a big “1?” She capped the marker and reached for her coffee, pulled out the stick, tossed it in the garbage, and took a generous sip.
“A trial is not only about facts,” she said. “It’s about perception, nuance, emotion, theatre. You missed our biggest problem. And it has nothing to do with the facts.”
“I don’t get it,” Summer said, looking perplexed.
Kreitinger smacked the marker into her open palm. “What’s the jury going to think of your friend Jennifer Raglan?”
“I think they’ll respect all the work she did as a Crown. Feel terrible for her children. And feel sorry for her husband.”
“What else?”
Stranglehold Page 24