by Allen Eskens
“Let's just say I have an interest in the life and times of Carl Iverson.”
“But why?” Collins asked with genuine sincerity. “There wasn't much to this case.”
“You know the case?”
“Yeah, I know it,” he said. “I clerked here that year; it was my third year of law school. Carl's lead attorney, John Peterson, brought me on to do his legal research.” Collins paused, looking past me to a blank spot on his wall, recollecting the details of Carl's case. “I met Carl in jail a few times and sat in the gallery during his trial. It was my first murder case. Yeah, I remember him. I remember the girl, too, Crystal something or other.”
“Hagen.”
“That's right, Crystal Hagen.” Collins's face grew cold. “I still see the pictures—the ones we had in the trial. I'd never seen crime-scene photos before. That was my first time. It's not peaceful like you see on TV with their eyes closed, looking like they simply fell asleep. No, it's not like that at all. Her photos were violent and gut-wrenching. To this day, I can still see her.” He shuddered slightly, then continued. “He could've gotten a deal you know.”
“A deal?”
“A plea bargain. They offered him second-degree murder. He could have been eligible for parole in eight years. He turned it down. The man's facing a mandatory life sentence if he's convicted of first-degree, and he turns down a second-degree plea offer.”
“That brings up a question that's been bugging me,” I said. “If he gets sentenced to life in prison, how can he ever get paroled?”
Collins leaned forward and rubbed the underside of his chin, scratching a day's worth of scruff. “Life doesn't necessarily mean until you die,” he said. “Back in 1980 life in prison meant that you had to do seventeen years before being eligible for parole. Later, they changed that to thirty years. They changed it again so that a murder committed during a kidnapping or a rape gets life without possibility of parole. Technically, they convicted Iverson under the old statute, so he was eligible for parole after seventeen years, but forget that. Once the legislature made it clear that they want murdering rapists locked up for good, Iverson's prospects for parole pretty much evaporated. To tell you the truth, when I got your call, I looked up Iverson's record on the Department of Corrections website and about fell on the floor when I saw that he was out.”
“He's dying of cancer,” I said.
“Well that explains it,” he said. “Prison hospice can be problematic.” The corners of his mouth tipped downward, his head nodding in understanding.
“What did Carl say happened on the night Crystal Hagen died?”
“Nothing,” he said. “He said he didn't do it—said he drank that afternoon until he passed out and couldn't remember a thing. Honestly, he didn't do much to help with his defense, just kind of sat there and watched the trial like he was watching television.”
“Did you believe him when he said he was innocent?”
“It didn't matter what I believed. I was just a law clerk. We put up a good fight. We said that Crystal's boyfriend did it. That was our theory. He was the last to see her alive. He had all the opportunity in the world, and it was a crime of passion. He wanted to screw her—she said no—things got out of hand. It was a decent theory: a silk purse from a sow's ear so to speak. But in the end, the jury didn't believe it, and that's all that matters.”
“There are some people who think he's innocent,” I said, thinking of Virgil.
Collins lowered his eyes and shook his head, dismissing my comment as if I were some gullible child. “If he didn't do it, then he's one sorry bastard. She was found dead in his shed,” he said. “They found one of her fingernails on the steps to his back porch.”
“He tore her fingernail off?” I said, shuddering at the thought.
“It was a fake fingernail, one of those acrylic things. She had her nails done up for her first homecoming dance a couple weeks earlier. The prosecutor argued that it broke off when he was dragging her dead body to his shed.”
“Do you believe Carl killed her?”
“There was no one else around,” Collins said. “Iverson simply said he didn't do it, but at the same time, he said he was too drunk to remember anything from that night. It's Occam's razor.”
“Occam's razor?”
“It's a principle that says that all things being equal, the simplest conclusion is usually the correct one. Crimes like murder are rarely tricky, and most murderers are far from clever. Have you met him yet?”
“Who? Carl? Yeah, he signed the release.”
“Oh, yeah,” Collins furrowed his eyebrows, displeased at missing that obvious conclusion. “What did he tell you? Did he tell you he's innocent?”
“We haven't talked about the case yet. I'm easing up to that.”
“I expect he will.” Collins ran his thick hands through his hair, scratching loose some dandruff that fell to his shoulders. “And when he does, you'll want to believe him.”
“But you don't believe him.”
“Maybe I did—back then. I'm not sure. It's hard to tell with guys like Carl.”
“Guys like Carl?”
“He's a pedophile, and nobody can tell a lie like a pedophile. They're the best. There's no con artist alive who can lie like a pedophile.”
I looked at Collins with a blank expression that urged him to explain.
“Pedophiles are the monsters walking among us. Murderers, burglars, thieves, drug dealers, they can always justify what they've done. Most crimes occur because of simple emotions like greed or rage or jealousy. People can understand those emotions. We don't condone it, but we understand it. Everybody's felt those feelings at one time or another. Hell, most people, if they're honest, would admit to planning a crime in their head, committing the perfect murder, getting away with it. Every person on a jury has felt angry or jealous. They understand the base emotion behind a crime like murder, and they'll punish a guy for not controlling that emotion.”
“I suppose so,” I said.
“Now think of a pedophile. He has a passion to have sex with children. Who's gonna understand that? You can't justify what you've done. There's no explanation for them; they're monsters, and they know it. Yet they can't admit it, not even to themselves. So they hide the truth, burying it so deep inside that they begin to believe their own lies.”
“But some can be innocent, right?” I asked.
“I had a guy once…” Collins leaned forward, plopping his elbows on his desk. “He was accused of perping on his ten-year-old kid. This guy had me convinced that his ex-wife planted the story in the kid's head. I mean I believed him completely. I'd prepared a scathing cross-examination to tear that kid up. Then, about a month before trial, the computer forensics came back. The prosecutor called me to his office to show me a video that this dumbass made of the whole thing, exactly what his kid said happened. When I showed the video to my client he cried his eyes out, bawled like a frigging baby, not because he raped his kid and got caught, but because he swore it wasn't him. The prosecutor had the son-of-a-bitch on tape, his face, his voice, his tattoos, and he wanted me to believe it was some lookalike.”
“So you assume all your clients charged with pedophilia are lying?”
“No, not all.”
“Did you assume Carl was lying?”
Collins paused to give my question some thought. “I wanted to believe Iverson at first. I suppose I wasn't as jaded back then as I am now. But the evidence said he killed that girl. The jury saw it, and that's why Iverson went to prison.”
“Is it true what they say about pedophiles in prison?” I asked. “That they get beat up and stuff?”
Collins pursed his lips and nodded. “Yeah, it's true. Prison has its own food chain. My drunk-driver clients will ask ‘why are they picking on me? It's not like I robbed somebody.’ The thieves and the burglars say ‘it's not like I killed somebody.’ The murderers will say ‘at least I'm not a pedophile; it's not like I raped a child.’ Guys like Iverson have nowhere
to go. There's no one worse than them, and that puts ’em on the bottom of that food chain. To make things worse, he did his time at Stillwater Prison. That's about as bad as it gets.”
I had given up trying to get comfortable in the piece-of-crap chair, realizing that the chair was probably uncomfortable by design—a way to encourage short office visits. I stood up and rubbed the back of my thighs. Collins also stood and walked around the desk. He picked two files out of the box and handed them to me. One was tagged jury selection and the other was labeled sentencing. “These are ready to go,” he said. “I guess I can let you have the trial transcripts, too.”
“Trial transcripts?”
“Yeah, first-degree-murder cases get an automatic appeal. The court reporter prepares a transcript of the trial, everything that was said, word for word. They'll have copies of that at the Supreme Court, so you can have our copy today.” Collins walked to the box and pulled out six softbound volumes, stacking them one-by-one in my arms, creating a pile of paper well over a foot thick. “That'll keep you busy for a while.”
I looked at the books and files in my arms, feeling their weight, as Mr. Collins ushered me out. I turned at the door. “What am I going to find in these books?” I asked.
Collins sighed, rubbed his chin again, and shrugged. “Probably nothing you don't already know.”
On my bus ride home, I thumbed through the six volumes of transcripts and cursed under my breath. I had managed to create more reading for this one assignment than I had in all my other classes combined. It was too late to drop the class without screwing my GPA. My interview notes and opening chapter for Iverson's biography were due soon—this on top of all the other homework I had to do—and I could see no way to get through all this material in time.
After the long trek from the bus stop to my apartment, the transcripts in my backpack seemed as heavy as stone tablets. I pulled out my keys and started to unlock my door, but paused when I heard the silk of Spanish guitar music coming from Lila's apartment. The transcripts gave me an excuse to stop in and say hi. They were, after all, her contribution to this quixotic project. Besides, I really wanted to see her again. There was something about her leave-me-the-fuck-alone attitude that hooked me.
Lila answered her door, barefoot, wearing an oversized Twins jersey and shorts that barely showed below the tails of the shirt. I couldn't stop my eyes from going straight to her legs, just a quick glance, but enough that she noticed. She looked at me and raised an eyebrow. No “hello.” No “what's up.” Just a single raised eyebrow. That flustered the hell out of me.
“I…uh…went to the attorney's office today,” I stammered. “I have the transcripts from the trial.” I reached into the backpack and showed her proof of my deed.
She remained planted in her doorway, looking up at me, not inviting me in or responding beyond the raised eyebrow. Instead, she studied me as if to size up my intrusion, shrugged, and walked into her apartment, letting the door creak open behind her. I followed her into her apartment, which smelled faintly of baby powder and vanilla.
“Have you read them yet?” she asked.
“I just got ’em.” I dropped the first volume onto her table, letting it slam down to show its heft. “I have no idea where to begin reading these things.”
“Start with the opening statement,” she said.
“The what?”
“The opening statement.”
“That should probably be near the beginning, right?” I asked, grinning. She picked up one of the transcripts and began flipping pages. “How do you know about opening statements and stuff? Are you pre-law?”
“Maybe,” she said, in a matter-of-fact tone. “I was in mock trial in high school. The attorney who coached us said that the opening statement should tell the story of the case—tell it like you're sitting around the living room with friends.”
“You were in mock trial?”
“Yeah,” she muttered, licking her fingers and flipping more pages. “If all goes well, I wouldn't mind going to law school someday.”
“I haven't locked into a major yet, but I'm thinking journalism. It's just that—”
“Here it is.” She stood up, creasing the pages back so she could hold the transcript in one hand. “You be the jury. Sit on the couch, and I'll be the prosecutor.”
I sat in the middle of her couch, spreading my arms out to each side, placing them on the backrest. She stood in front of me and read a few lines to herself to get into character. Then she drew her chest up, pulled her shoulders back, and started to speak. And as she spoke, I watched the pixie in her disappear, and from its shadow stepped a woman with the confidence and poise to command a jury's attention.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the evidence in this case will show that on October 29, 1980, the defendant,” Lila waved her arm with the grace of a game-show model, pointing toward an empty chair in the corner, “Carl Iverson, raped and murdered a fourteen-year-old girl by the name of Crystal Marie Hagen.” Lila paced slowly in front of me as she read, looking up from her script as often as she could, making eye contact with me as if I were an actual juror.
“Last year, Crystal Hagen was a happy, vivacious, fourteen-year-old girl, a beautiful child, loved by her family and excited to be on the cheerleading squad at Edison High School.” Lila paused and lowered her voice for effect. “But, ladies and gentlemen, you will learn that not everything was wonderful in Crystal Hagen's life. You will see excerpts from her diary where she writes about a man named Carl Iverson, a man who lived in the house next door to Crystal Hagen. You will see, in her diary, where she calls him ‘the pervert next door.’ She wrote that Carl Iverson would stare at her from his window and watch her as she practiced her cheerleading routines in her back yard.
“From that diary, she will tell you about an incident when she was with her boyfriend, a young man she met in her high-school typing class, a boy named Andy Fisher. One night she and Andy were parked in the alley that passed behind both Crystal's house and Carl Iverson's house. They were parked at the end of the alley, away from prying eyes, making out, as kids will do. That's when the defendant, Carl Iverson, walked up to the car like a monster in a slasher movie and glared into the window at them. He saw Crystal and Andy…well let's just say that they were experimenting…sexually. Just a couple of kids goofing around. And Carl Iverson saw them; he watched them.
“Now that may not seem all that bad, but for Crystal Hagen, it was like the end of the world. You see, Crystal had a stepfather, a devoutly religious man named Douglas Lockwood. He'll be testifying in this trial. Mr. Lockwood didn't approve of Crystal being a cheerleader. He didn't like the idea of her dating at the age of fourteen. So he set out some rules for Crystal—rules to protect the family's reputation and Crystal's modesty. He told her that if she did not live up to those rules, she would not be allowed to continue as a cheerleader. And if the infraction were serious enough, he would send her to a private, religious school.
“Ladies and Gentlemen, what she did in that car that night with Andy Fisher broke those rules.
“The evidence will show that Carl Iverson used what he saw in the alley that night to blackmail Crystal, to get her to…well…do his bidding. You see, shortly after that night in the alley, Crystal wrote in her diary that a man was forcing her to do stuff she didn't want to do—sexual stuff. He told her that if she did not do what he wanted, he was going to expose her secret. Now, Crystal doesn't expressly say that Carl Iverson was the man threatening her, but when you see her words in that diary, it'll leave no doubt in your mind who she's writing about.”
Lila slowed the cadence of her speech, lowering her voice to little more than a whisper, giving it a dramatic effect. My arms moved from the back of the couch to my knees as I leaned in to hear her.
“The afternoon of her murder, Andy Fisher drove her home after school. They kissed goodbye, and Andy left. Crystal was all alone in an empty house next door to Carl Iverson. After Andrew drove away, we know that Cryst
al ended up in Carl Iverson's house. Maybe she went there to confront him. You see, Crystal Hagen met with her school counselor that afternoon and learned that what Carl Iverson was doing to her would send him to prison. Or maybe she went there at the point of a gun because on the morning of Crystal's death, we know that Carl Iverson bought an army-surplus handgun. We're not sure of exactly how she came to be in Iverson's house, but we know that she was there because of evidence that I'll get to in a minute. And once she was there, we know that things went terribly wrong for Crystal Hagen. She had a plan to turn the tables on Iverson—send him to prison if he didn't stop the threats and the abuse. Carl Iverson, of course, had other plans.”
Lila stopped pacing, no longer pretending to be the prosecutor. She sat down on the couch beside me, her eyes fixed on the transcript. When she continued, she spoke as if she were struck by some profound sadness.
“Carl Iverson raped Crystal Hagen. And when he was finished with her—after he took everything else he could take from her—he took her life. He strangled her using an electrical cord. Ladies and gentlemen, it takes a long time to strangle a person to death. It is a slow, horrible way to die. Carl Iverson had to wrap that cord around Crystal Hagen's throat and pull it tight and hold it there for at least two minutes. And as every second passed, he had the ability to change his mind. Instead he continued to pull on that cord, keeping it tight around her throat until he was sure that she was not just unconscious, but dead.”
Lila stopped reading and looked at me with a pained expression, as though I were somehow an extension of Carl, as though some seed of his monstrous deed lived in me. I shook my head. She went back to reading.