A Criminal Defense

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A Criminal Defense Page 32

by William L. Myers Jr.


  Piper stops, looks at me, and I hang my head. Piper isn’t telling me anything that I hadn’t already figured out. Still, to hear her tell it cuts me to the quick.

  “I understand why you went to David. I really do. And I have no excuses. Any more than I have for what I’d done to Tommy. But it still hurts to hear it. God, it hurts.” I double over, my arms around my belly. But Piper has already delivered the blows.

  After a long while, I sit up, look at Piper. “So what now?” I ask. “Is there a chance? Can we get back to us, or is it over?”

  Piper stands. She leaves the room. I sit in the semidarkness, in fear. For all I know, she’s packing her bags. Or calling the police from the kitchen. After what seems like forever, she comes back. In her left hand is another bottle of wine, in her right two fresh glasses. She pours the wine and hands me a glass.

  “Us is all I’ve ever wanted, Mick. And us is more imperative now than ever, because of the most important mission of all.”

  I smile through my tears. “Gabby.”

  Piper nods. “Gabby.”

  We raise our classes, clink them, and drink.

  And then, with a self-possession that amazes me, Piper returns to her narrative.

  “When David got to the hotel, he was in a panic. He told me everything—about Jennifer Yamura, their arrangement. He said he’d gone to the house on Addison Street to give Jennifer something or pick something up, I can’t remember. He told me she was dead, that he’d found her on the cellar stairs. That her blood was everywhere. He said someone had obviously killed her.

  “I was furious when I found out I was just part of a larger harem. But I believed him, and I didn’t want his life to be ruined for something he didn’t do. So I decided to help him.” Piper pauses here, and I can tell she’s thinking about out how to finish the story. “So we worked out a plan. David agreed to go back to the house that night, try to clean it all up. Remove his fingerprints. Clear out all of his clothes and belongings. He said there was no way the house could be traced to him.”

  I watch Piper closely. Part of her story doesn’t ring true to me. If David “agreed” to go back to Yamura’s house, that means the suggestion had to come from Piper, and I just can’t see her suggesting something like that.

  Piper sees me studying her and looks away.

  I take a moment to gather my own thoughts. Then I continue recounting my side of the story. How I believed I had killed Jennifer until I received the prosecution’s evidence and learned that she hadn’t died from the fall down the stairs. That she’d crawled away from the steps and been found by someone else, who dragged her back to the stairs and left her to bleed out.

  I tell Piper all about Anna Groszek’s blackmail scheme and explain that the reason David was caught flying to Mexico and Grand Cayman was to fetch the money to pay the blackmail. “I didn’t know for sure whether it was David who dragged Jennifer back to the steps until I received the blackmailer’s surveillance tape and saw him entering the house after I left.” I let this last part hang in the air.

  Piper nods, her gaze distant. “There was blood on his shirtsleeves. He said he went down the stairs to where she was lying. He said he tried to rouse her, and that’s how he got the blood on him. But he was lying, wasn’t he? He really did kill her. And lied to me afterward.” Piper suddenly looks faint. “Jesus, what are we going to do?”

  I reach over and take her hands. “We’re going to finish the plan,” I say. Then I explain who, besides David and me, appears on the videotape. Last, I tell Piper the part she’ll have to play. How she must lie under oath and testify that David was with her at the time of the murder, not afterward.

  “But why can’t I just repeat the lie David told me when he came to the hotel about Jennifer being already dead when he found her? The jury would find him not guilty.”

  I shake my head. “The jury would hang him. Think about it. David came to the hotel room after Yamura was murdered, admitting that he’d just come from her house. Your testimony would place him at the scene of the murder precisely within the time frame fixed by the medical examiner. And the plan you two worked out to have him go back to the house to clean up the crime scene? That would make you an accessory after the fact.” I pause. “There’s only one way to get us all out of this. One way to make sure that David isn’t convicted so that he never needs to hire appellate counsel or tell them about the video.”

  “But so what if he does tell some other lawyers about the video? You only showed him the part with him on it. He has no idea you were in the house before him, that it was you who pushed Jennifer down the steps.”

  I explain to Piper that David and his blue-chip appellate team would have no problem finding out who lived in the house behind Yamura’s, and little difficulty tracking down Anna Groszek. Once they found her, they’d pressure her—or, more likely, bribe her—to turn over the original copy of the video. Once they had it, I’d be done for.

  “Your alibi testimony ends the trial,” I say. “It’s our only hope.”

  Piper sits quietly for a moment, then asks, “What if I hadn’t caved? What if I hadn’t admitted to you that it was me who was with David? What would you have done?”

  I don’t answer. I don’t know. Instead, I stand and pull Piper up with me. I put my arms around her and hug her as tightly as I can. “I love you,” I say quietly. “And I’m sorry I left you and Gabby like I did. I’m never going to do that again.” I loosen my grip, kiss Piper on the lips, and tell her to go upstairs. “I’ll be up in a few minutes.”

  After she leaves, I move to my desk and mull over what has happened. My mind fixes on Piper’s statement about perjuring herself. And just that fast, it hits me. I’d been wondering why David Hanson chose me to be the lawyer to defend him, given that he was having an affair with my wife. That’s a lot of power to give someone who, sooner or later, will find out he has good reason to hate you. To justify taking such a risk, there had to be a reason. And now I get it. As distraught as David was when he was first arrested, he realized that Piper was the key to his salvation. He knew that Piper would have to lie for him, have to swear under oath that she was with him while Jennifer Yamura was being murdered, not only afterward. And David knew there was only one person in the world who could persuade Piper to perjure herself for him: me.

  That’s why David hired me. He had it all figured out from the get-go. He knew my endgame long before I puzzled it out myself. And he also knew that the timing of the disclosure of Piper as his faux alibi would be critical. Piper’s claim to have been with David from the time she checked into the hotel could be undermined by her receipts from the cigar store and Lululemon. So, the disclosure of her as David’s alibi was something that had to be sprung on the prosecution at the last moment, during the trial itself, before Devlin and his detectives could vet Piper’s story.

  All of this means that I never had to hire Alexander Ginsberg to sit with our team at trial to lament how poorly it was going for us in order to frighten Piper into admitting her affair with David, and scare David and Marcie into putting pressure on Piper to do so. David had been planning to strong-arm Piper into coming clean all along; he was just waiting for the right time.

  Still, David was taking a monumental risk. His entire strategy depended on my being motivated to persuade Piper to perjure herself for him. Given that I would be livid over the affair, there could only be one reason I’d ever agree to suborn perjury to help David: if I was convinced of his innocence. But why would David think I’d believe he didn’t do it? He was, after all, caught trying to clean up the murder scene. He ran when the police came. Then he lied to the police and to me. Many times. And he certainly didn’t know I was the one who pushed Jennifer down the stairs, so he couldn’t have held that over my head. Unless . . . Jesus. Did Jennifer tell him, injured on the basement floor, that I pushed her? Had David known all along? If so, why not threaten me directly, from the outset? Order me to have Piper lie to the police, tell them she was with him at the t
ime of the murder? Why wait until Piper disclosed the affair and take the chance I’d have her lie for him on my own? The questions make my head spin.

  I turn my chair around to look out the big bay window behind me. It’s a clear night. The moon is almost full. The stars are shining. But I still feel like a blind man walking in the dark.

  After a while, I turn off the desk lamp, leave the darkened office, and walk upstairs. I enter Gabby’s room, sit on her bed, and watch her breathe. The sleep of the innocent. I look to the nightstand and pick up the book I’ve been reading to her at night. Another Dr. Seuss book: Oh, the Places You’ll Go!

  “Congratulations! Today is your day. You’re off to Great Places! You’re off and away!” I lean in to Gabby and whisper the words. She stirs a little. Good; she can hear me at some level. Maybe she’s even dreaming the story as I read it. Dreaming she’s in the story. I hope so. I read slowly, with the same emphasis I use when Gabby’s awake. It’s not long before I hear paws on the hardwood floor. Franklin has shown up. He watches me finish the book, return it to the nightstand, and gently ruffle Gabby’s hair. He watches me lower my head as I remember that somewhere in Center City, in a hotel room, are the loving parents of another girl, a girl who will never again go to great places, never look up and down streets, look them over with care, her shoes full of feet.

  “My God.” The tears slide down my face. I shake my head slowly. I can’t believe it. What I did. What I’m doing.

  What am I? What have I become?

  A shiver runs through me. I wipe my face, sit up straight, then stand. I look down at Gabby, tell myself to carry on. Just get through this! Get it done. For her sake. For Piper’s. For . . .

  I don’t let myself finish the thought.

  34

  FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 16

  It’s 5:30 in the morning, and I’m at the office. I reach over my desk, pick up the phone. I call Devlin Walker. As early as it is, I know he’ll be working.

  “It’s Mick,” I say, my voice flat. “I need you in my office in twenty minutes.”

  Devlin snorts. “The time for your client to plead has come and gone. I was very clear the last time we spoke. So I won’t be coming to your office today—or any other time. Now, if you don’t mind, I have a lot of work to—”

  “There’s a video,” I say, interrupting him. “It shows the back of Jennifer Yamura’s house on the day she was murdered. It shows who went in and out of the house, just before and after she was killed.” I let the news hang, and start counting. A thousand one, a thousand two, a thousand three, a thousand four . . . But no sound comes from the other end of the line. So I say, “Twenty minutes.” Then I hang up.

  At six o’clock, the guard rings me, says there’s someone here to see me. I tell the guard to send him up. I’m standing by the front door to our suite when I hear the ding as the elevator doors open. After a minute, Devlin Walker turns the corner and moves toward me down the hallway. Even from a distance, I can see that he hasn’t slept a wink. When Devlin approaches, I hold open the door for him, then lock it behind us. Neither of us says a word as I lead Devlin to my office, nod to one of the visitors’ chairs, which I’ve faced toward the TV. As soon as he’s seated and I’m behind my desk, I press the “Play” button, and the image of Jennifer’s back door appears on the screen.

  The clock at the bottom right-hand corner of the screen reads 11:50 a.m. when someone appears on the screen: Devlin Walker, the first of the three men who visited Jennifer Yamura that day. He moves around Jennifer’s car, approaches the door, and knocks. Jennifer opens the door and lets him in. After a few seconds, the screen turns to fuzz. In another second, the image of Jennifer’s backyard reappears. Devlin is halfway through the back door on his way out of the house, the motion of the door opening having triggered the camera to begin recording again. The clock reads 12:25 p.m., meaning that thirty-five minutes have elapsed between Devlin’s entering and leaving the house. Devlin walks away, and a few seconds later, the camera turns to fuzz, then black. Thirty-two minutes later, the camera captured me appearing at Jennifer’s back door, but of course I don’t show that part of the video to Devlin. Nor do I show Devlin the portions of the video showing David Hanson arriving thirty minutes after I left.

  “The rest of the tape shows what everyone in the courtroom already knows happened,” I say. “It shows David arriving that night. After about an hour, he runs out the back door. From that point on, the tape plays almost without a break until sunrise, what with all the patrolmen and CSU guys.”

  Devlin stares at me, his eyes betraying a mind in the grip of panic.

  I wait a moment, then lean across my desk. “You prick. You murdered that poor girl. And then you did everything in your power to frame an innocent man.”

  “No,” Devlin says, his voice almost a whisper.

  “Here’s my guess. You slept with her, maybe even had a full-blown affair. You let it slip about the grand-jury investigation. You tipped off a young reporter to a story that could make her career. Somehow, she got on your computer, copied your files to her laptop. That’s how she knew so many of the details—which cops had spilled the beans, and what they’d said. Then one morning you open the paper and there it is, laid out in black and white—details that only someone close to the investigation could know.”

  Devlin’s head is down now, his eyes closed, his jaw clenched. His arms are wrapped around his chest. My words are body blows, and he knows there’s nothing he can do to deflect them.

  I go on. “Now comes the ironic part. As the DA running the grand jury, you’re professionally obligated to subpoena Yamura to appear and testify, disclose her source—you—and testify to what else she knows. But her doing so would ruin you. So you’re caught between a rock and a hard place. You issue the subpoena, and you know that, sooner or later, she’s going to have to show up or face a contempt charge. So you go to her house and beg her to lie under oath and not reveal you as her source. She laughs in your face, tells you that she won’t go to prison to protect you. It’s all too much for you, so you throw her down the stairs. When you see she isn’t dead, that she’s able to crawl off the steps, you follow her down, carry her back to the stairs to bleed out and die. Then you search the house for the laptop but can’t find it. So you take a few minutes, try to clear your head, figure out what to do. That’s when you come up with the idea of taking the money out of her wallet and her jewelry and phone, to make it look like a burglary gone bad. I have to hand it to you, Devlin, you were always good on your feet.”

  Devlin shakes his head. “No, no, no,” he moans.

  “You left the house without the laptop, but you knew you had to get it somehow. With Jennifer dead, the copies of your files on her computer were the only things that could link you to her story. That’s why you pressed me again and again for the laptop. Why you stressed that my turning it over was a condition of David’s getting a plea deal. It’s also why you warned me not to open the files on the computer.”

  Devlin puts up his hands to stop me. “What you’re saying doesn’t make sense. Why would I think David Hanson had the computer, if I, not he, was the one who killed Jennifer?”

  “Because during your affair, Jennifer told you that David owned the house. You figured there was a hiding place in the house, maybe a secret safe that the police didn’t find, and that’s where Jennifer had put the laptop. You decided that David opened the safe and took it after you murdered Yamura.”

  Devlin closes his eyes.

  “Tell me, Devlin, was she crying like the medical examiner said? Did she beg you for her life as she crawled away—like you insinuated to the jury? Is that how you came up with that question—because you saw it play out in real life?”

  “I didn’t kill her.”

  “How did you hold yourself together all these months? Did you lock it away in some remote dungeon in your brain? Did the memory of it all fade over time until it all seemed like just a bad dream? They could write whole psychology books on you, m
an.”

  Now it’s Devlin’s turn to lean across the desk. “I did not kill that woman! I did not!”

  I return Devlin’s stare, my eyes cold with accusation and contempt. “You were going to take everything from David. His reputation, his life’s work. His freedom. Well, now I’m going to take everything from you. This morning, when the judge asks me to call my first witness, guess who I’m going to name? You. And when Bill Henry calls us both up to sidebar, I’m going to tell him I have a videotape that shows you were the one who killed Jennifer Yamura. And just like that, your career will be over. Your marriage will be over. You will be over.” I sit back and wait.

  Devlin shrinks in his seat. After a minute, he lays it all out. “It was months ago, and only a few times,” he starts. “She came on to me at some political function when my wife was out of town. She was so good-looking, and I was long past sober. So I followed her back from the hotel, the Warwick, to her house. An hour of drunken, sloppy sex, then I was out of there and swearing I’d never go back. But the next day, I couldn’t stop thinking about her. And the day after that and the day after that. I called her one morning, asked if she wanted to meet me for a cup of coffee. I was thinking Starbucks. But she suggested I come to her place, said she’d make a fresh pot. That was the second time. After we were done, lying in bed, we got to talking. I asked her about her family, where she came from, what her goals were. She asked me what I was working on. And like an idiot, I told her. The grand jury, the police drug ring. I made her promise not to share it with anyone, and she did.”

 

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