the Onion Field (1973)

by Wambaugh, Joseph

  "You are not suggesting that you are fasting because you are not receiving proper food from the county jail?"

  "No, I am not, your Honor. They have offered me food every meal every day as much as I want. I am doin this because of the condition of my folks. My aunt is seventy years old and she is a diabetic and I am doin this so that she won't get no sicker. She cannot do what she is tryin to do, and I feel if I pray in this matter that God will help us. You know? You know what I mean?"

  Jimmy Smith often mentioned prayer and fasting and God during the course of his many motions and complaints he was permitted out of the presence of the jury. Privately, however, he would review his looted life and conclude that if there is a God, He must be a burglar.

  The next hours involved a lengthy hearing to decide whether Jimmy Smith was in fact manhandled. The court after taking sworn testimony was satisfied he was not. Jimmy then made another motion to fire his attorney.

  "I asked him, your Honor, I said, 'Would you take my uncle with you to locate witnesses?' It is a predominantly Negro neighborhood, your Honor. I said, 'Will you take my uncle down with you, Mr. Smith?' Now he said no. He said, 'I'm gonna take my wife with me and I would rather not have him along with me and my wife.' Which I understood right away."

  "I can't force you to eat, Mr. Smith," said the judge. "And I can't force you to talk to your attorney. But I would suggest to you that, as Mr. Ray Smith just said, it is certainly to your best interests and for the best interests as far as your defense is concerned, that you do cooperate with your counsel. All right. Let's bring the jury down."

  "Take me to the nearest lamppost!" shouted Jimmy, eyes like torches. "And put the hood over my head and execute me, because this is what is happenin here in this courtroom now! This is all that is happenin."

  Jimmy sounded so brave and eloquent, he was surprised and rather pleased with himself.

  After reading a local editorial entitled "License to Kill" concerning easy paroles, Jimmy Smith decided to put his declaration in writing. The judge received a note:

  Seeing that you insist on giving me a Judas to represent me, why don't you first don your white sheet and pillowcases and hang me to the nearst lamppost which I am sure would be more in keeping with the local temperment.

  Another note from Jimmy Smith, in his always neat and formal hand, complained of "vermin infested cells built for II men which contain VI or VII "

  Karl Hettinger was excused from further testimony subject to being recalled. But he found that escape from the case would not be that easy.

  The crank letters had started to arrive when one Los Angeles newspaper printed his home address. Most of them were incoherent and general and hardly bothered him at all, even the vicious ones. There were others, however, that did trouble him, those which threatened his family and those which were very specific, written by a man he had all but forgotten-a burly young homosexual whom he had once fought as a vice officer, and who had fallen into a gully near Ferndale Number Nine, breaking his collarbone.

  At first the homosexual's letters merely reiterated earlier threats and complained that his arrest was unlawful, and that Hettinger and Calderwood had cost him a great deal of money and great pain. Then the letters from him began to get very specific:

  Dear Karl, I understand you were taken for a ride to some farm country near Bakersfield. They raise lots of chickens there. I understand you ran away and left your partner. That's where you should end up. On a chicken farm.

  One day between court appearances, Helen saw him standing on the porch at the time the postman usually arrived.

  "What're you waiting for, Karl?"

  "Oh nothing, Moms, nothing."

  "Expecting a letter or something?"

  "No, not particularly."

  But when those letters came, he would try to get them first. He gave the threatening ones to Pierce Brooks, and he double locked all doors at night, and kept the blinds always drawn in his baby's room. The ones which accused him he read again and again before he gave them up.

  For Karl Hettinger, the summer was unbearably long. It was almost as bad waiting in dismal courthouse corridors or at the police building as it was to be on the stand. It was estimated that the trial would last all summer.

  "Can you approximate about how soon death would occur as a result of that type of a wound?" Schulman asked the pathologist who did the autopsy on Ian Campbell.

  "Well, that's difficult to say, however I believe that the hemorrhage through this area would've been sufficiently severe that the mouth and the throat would fill with blood. This blood would get down into the air passages of the lung and death would probably result in fifteen minutes or thirty minutes, something like that."

  "Doctor, I believe you related that number four was a fatal wound?"

  "Yes, it was a fatal wound inasmuch as it was a through and through wound of the heart. It was just about as promptly fatal as any wound could be expected to be. I'm sure that unconsciousness would result quite promptly in a matter of seconds and death would result in a matter of no more than a few minutes, perhaps five minutes at the most."

  The prosecutor had in his hand photographs of the bullet torn, blood drenched body of Ian Campbell. The defense requested to approach the bench, where Ray Smith said: "Your Honor, the district attorney showed Mr. Moore and myself a photograph that I believe he is going to ask to be identified. I want to object on behalf of Jimmy Lee Smith on the ground that the photograph itself would be inflammatory, and it would certainly be an error to show it to the jury.

  "While Dr. Kade was testifying as to the course of one of the bullets, I noticed juror number one shuddered and looked at the man next to her. I don't blame her for that. It seems to me that this photograph is merely cumulative and can serve no useful purpose except to upset members of the jury."

  "I object," said Moore, "to the introduction of the two photographs at this time based upon an illegal search and seizure caused by the illegal stopping of the Ford vehicle in Hollywood by Officer Hettinger and Officer Campbell. I also move at this time to strike all of Officer Hettinger's testimony. That is, any testimony after he stopped the automobile, on the basis that he did so without probable cause."

  "The objections and each of them are overruled."

  Back at counsel table when a Kern County detective was testifying as to Gregory Powell's initial statements, John Moore said, "I object on the grounds it is a violation of this defendant's constitutional right to have the presence of an attorney or the advice of an attorney at any time."

  "Oh, that is a frivolous objection," said Schulman, but the prosecutor may never have been more wrong in his professional life.

  "I will cite the district attorney for misconduct," snapped Moore.

  "And I will cite you," said Schulman.

  "And move for a mistrial at this time," said Moore.

  "Ladies and gentlemen of the jury," said the judge patiently, "the jurors will disregard the specific statement of Mr. Schulman that the objection is a frivolous one. The citations for misconduct are denied."

  Among the long procession of prosecution witnesses was a Los Angeles robbery detective who had interviewed Jimmy Smith as to the armed robberies. He related Jimmy's apparently evasive response to his questions.

  "Defendant Smith said to me: 'Well, I can't help it, I just can't think.'

  "I said: 'Well, what is the problem?'

  "He said: 'I have nightmares. I can't sleep. I just keep seeing that officer's coat jumping.'

  "And at this time I had to admonish Mr. Smith because I told him again that we were only interested in robberies. That we could not overlap into the homicide investigation and we did not want to hear about it."

  And then the detective read the statements of Gregory Powell as to the robberies, including a confession to at least one Las Vegas robbery the detective still believed Greg's brother was actually responsible for:

  "Well sure, with the red hood on, I'll bet you there isn't a person down there
that would tell you within twenty pounds how much I weighed," Greg had told him. "I know they described me in the paper as at least six feet tall and weighing at least a hundred and ninety pounds. But I did that job too."

  When it was Pierce Brooks's turn to testify, Greg's attorney once again repeated the old objections.

  "We will object, your Honor, on the constitutional grounds, violation of due process, and not free and voluntary, not having been advised of his right to counsel, nor having the advice of counsel."

  "Well, if the court please," said Schulman in exasperation, "I don't know where the constitution says anyplace that a police officer . . ."

  "Pardon me. I made my objection," said Moore.

  "The objections and each of them are overruled," said the judge.

  The jury would hear the taped conversations of Brooks and Gregory Powell:

  "Greg, anytime you want to ask me a question, you go right ahead and ask me and I want to let you know now that I will never lie to you," said the taped voice of Brooks. "I will either answer your question truthfully or I will tell you that I cannot answer the question, that it would interfere with the investigation."

  Moore once again interrupted the proceedings.

  "I will make my objection on the constitutional grounds, violation of due process, without the benefit of consulting with an attorney, the advice of an attorney, or the presence of an attorney, and not free and voluntary."

  "Not free and voluntary?" asked the judge.

  "Yes."

  "All of the objections, with the exception of the objection 'not being free and voluntary,' are overruled. Do you desire to take the witness on voir dire examination as to any of the objections?"

  "Not at this time, your Honor."

  "All right. All of the objections are overruled. I say, knowing the thinking of our appellate courts, that we have to be very very careful, particularly in a homicide case with a death penalty, because it's a joint trial for the sake of convenience."

  On the morning of August 6, with the air conditioning broken, the judge entered a suffocating courtroom. All three lawyers were looking unhappy but still had their white shirts buttoned at the throat and their ties adjusted. The air conditioning was repaired before a decision was made to let them remove their coats.

  "Pursuant to the provisions of Section 1089 and 1123 of the Penal Code," the judge said that morning, "it appearing to the court that the alternate juror, Mrs. Jeans, is ill and unable to perform her duties as an alternate juror, and has, in addition, requested the court to be excused, she will be excused and discharged as an alternate juror."

  John Moore then said, "Defendant Powell will move a mistrial on the basis that there was not a sufficient showing for her excuse, your Honor."

  "All right. The motion is denied."

  When the next detective witness took the stand, Schulman said, "I am now going to ask you to relate the conversation that you had with the defendant Gregory Powell after the defendant Jimmy Smith left the room."

  "I will object on the grounds previously stated," said Moore.

  "If the court please," said Schulman, beside himself now, "I would like to find out just where the constitution says . . ."

  "We don't want to speak in front of the jurors!' said the judge.

  "Withdraw it," said Schulman.

  The jury then heard Gregory Powell's boast to the robbery detective: "Anytime you can find one where it's got Schenley's on it, it's me!"

  The hot summer days bled one into the other for Karl Hettinger, until August 9, when after a defense motion was granted, he found himself standing once more in a place he thought he would never see again. Now, though, the summer sun was in the cloudless sky over Bakersfield. It was hot and still and the lawyers were in shirtsleeves, as was the witness, who stood in the dust of the road near enough to the chairs where the jurors sat by the onion field. He looked at the stakes in the ground which had been placed to represent where four men stood exactly five months ago when the sky was black and bitter cold and the wind was howling.

  Karl looked across the field he had run through and he thought of the glasses he had lost and he wondered if they might be just on the other side of the wire fence where the tumbleweed was packed solid. But he did not go to the fence and look. Karl, like Ian Campbell, was frugal. He did not take the loss of a thirty-dollar pair of glasses lightly, and, in fact, he had still not replaced them. But he would not go into that field, nor near that fence. Even now in the light of day with so many others here. He stood where he must, looked where he must, answered what he must.

  Then he found himself testifying. Telling it again. Pointing to the exact places where it all happened.

  "Was there any talking at that point?" asked Schulman.

  "Yes, that's when he made the statement about the Little Lindbergh Law," said Karl, his soft husky voice disappearing in the open air.

  "I don't know if the jurors can hear you. What took place then?"

  "When Powell moved to that position of the stake, he had the gun pointed at about a forty-five degree angle and this is when he said, 'We told you we were going to let you go, but have you ever heard of the Little Lindbergh law?' "

  "What did Campbell say?"

  "He said yes."

  "What did Powell then do?"

  "Powell shot him."

  "How did he do that?"

  "He raised the pistol to shoulder height and he fired it."

  It was perhaps the sixth time Karl had testified to this and when it was the defense counsel's turn John Moore said, "Would you walk down to the spot where you looked back, sir, and look over your left shoulder in the way you did?"

  "Do you want him to run down the road, Mr. Moore?" asked Schulman sardonically.

  "If there is an objection, I would like to hear it," Moore snapped back. Then to Karl, "Just before you got out of the car, Officer, you were told to freeze, were you not?"

  "No. I may have been, but I don't recall it."

  "Well, you didn't go over your notes today?"

  "I would like the record to reflect, your Honor," interrupted Schulman, "that I have gone over the record fairly thoroughly and I don't recall this witness at any time testifying that Powell told him to freeze or anything of that nature."

  "At this time I cite the district attorney for misconduct for stating what he thinks the evidence shows."

  "I object to those remarks also," said Ray Smith.

  "This is in regard to a question by Mr. Moore in a sarcastic manner that Tou haven't looked at your notes today,' " Schulman retorted.

  "I will cite the district attorney a second time for misconduct for saying I asked the question in a sarcastic manner!" said Moore.

  "All right. The objections and each of them are sustained," said the judge, sitting in a folding chair at a folding table. "The jury is admonished to disregard the colloquy between all counsel."

  "When you ran twenty feet, you turned and looked back over your left shoulder, didn't you?" asked Attorney Smith on cross examination.

  "Yes."

  "You were going full force?"

  "I slowed some."

  "Now is it your testimony that Officer Campbell fell backward or forward when he received the first shot from Powell?"

  "He went down and he appeared to fall more backward. He went more backward than he went straight down."

  "And would you say that when he fell down, Officer Hettinger, that he was lying six feet two inches long on the ground? Or was he more or less fallen in a heap?"

  "I don't know, sir."

  "And before he hit the ground you were gone, isn't that right?"

  "I don't know."

  "I have no further questions."

  The judge was then to grant another defense motion: to see the onion field at night, the way it might have been on another night. So at 9:30 p. M. Karl Hettinger stood by the road with Pierce Brooks, beside the lighted county bus. He looked across the darkness toward Wheeler Ridge and then east and north towa
rd the mountains far far on the horizon. The wind was not howling and it was not cold this night, still he shivered, while the sweat trickled down his chest and back and ribs.

  He thought about his new daughter and thought about Helen and he thought about putting brake shoes on his car. He thought about anything but what was creeping into his mind. He beat it back and thought about the stomach cramps which had been plaguing him of late. But a thought stole into his mind, so he turned from the fields and looked into the crowded bus. The judge and jurors were sitting quietly. The defendants were in separate darkened cars, handcuffed, under heavy guard. Suddenly Karl began hurting badly, a twisting pounding hurt in the pit of the stomach. He feared a diarrhea attack. They waited several minutes in the quiet, lonely dark after the judge ordered the lights turned out on the bus.

  Finally, the judge said: "Let the record show that it is now about six minutes after ten. The jurors have remained in the bus and the lights have been out, and we are going to take our adjournment at this time until 9:30 a. M. on Monday, when we will reconvene in Department 104 of the Superior Court."

  When the trial resumed in Los Angeles after the sojourn to the onion field the defense tried new motions.

  "Your Honor," said John Moore that morning, "the evidence here would show that this witness, Sergeant Brooks, without the permission of the public defender has interviewed this defendant about this case, and has so destroyed this defendant's confidence in the public defender at least for a period of time, that he would not cooperate with the public defender. As long as there is an attorney on the record, I say, in my belief, the police officer should not be able to talk to him."

  "Mr. Moore, if the law required that I notify you, I would do so," Brooks would reply. "And if you or anybody from your office had ever called and asked me not to see Gregory Powell on any occasion I would not have done so. I did not force myself on him. He asked me to see him. Even in your presence he asked me and you did not object."

  Attorney Ray Smith once more offered his old motion.