The Fifth Witness: A Novel

by Michael Connelly

  “How familiar are you personally with the threat file?”

  “Very familiar. I study it. It’s my job.”

  “How many names were in that file on the morning of Mitchell Bondurant’s murder?”

  “I didn’t count but I would say a couple dozen.”

  “And these were all considered legitimate threats to the bank and its employees?”

  “No, our rule is that if we get a threat it goes into the file. Doesn’t matter how legitimate it is. It goes into the file. So most of them are not considered serious, just somebody blowing off steam or a little frustration.”

  “In the file that morning, what name was on the top of the list in terms of seriousness of the threat?”

  “The defendant, Lisa Trammel.”

  Freeman paused for effect. I studied the jury. Almost all eyes looked toward my client.

  “Why is that, Mr. Modesto? Did she make a specific threat against the bank or any bank employee?”

  “No, she didn’t. But she was engaged in a foreclosure fight with the bank and had a history of protesting outside the bank until our lawyers got a temporary restraining order keeping her away. It was her actions that were perceived as a threat and it looks like we were right about that.”

  I jumped up and objected, asking the judge to strike the end of Modesto’s answer as being inflammatory and prejudicial. The judge agreed and admonished Modesto to keep such opinions to himself.

  “Do you know, Mr. Modesto,” Freeman said, “whether Lisa Trammel had made a direct threat against anyone at the bank, including Mitchell Bondurant?”

  Rule number one was to turn all weaknesses into advantages. Freeman was asking my questions now, robbing me of the chance to inflect them with my own outrage.

  “No, not specifically. But it was our feeling in terms of threat assessment that she was someone we should keep an eye out for.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Modesto. Who did you give this file to within the LAPD?”

  “Detective Kurlen, who was heading up the investigation. I went directly to him with it.”

  “And did you have occasion to speak to Detective Kurlen again later in the day?”

  “Well, we spoke a few times as the investigation was progressing. He had questions about the surveillance cameras in the garage and other things.”

  “Was there a second time when you contacted him?”

  “Yes, when it came to my attention that one of our employees, a teller, had reported to her supervisor that she believed she had seen Lisa Trammel either near or on the bank property that morning. I thought that was information the police needed to have so I called Detective Kurlen and set up an interview for him with the teller.”

  “And was that Margo Schafer?”

  “Yes, it was.”

  Freeman ended her direct examination there and turned the witness over to me. I decided it would be best to get in and out, sow a few seeds and come back to harvest later.

  “Mr. Modesto, as chief of corporate security at WestLand, did you have access to the foreclosure action the bank was taking against Lisa Trammel?”

  Modesto emphatically shook his head.

  “No, that was a legal case and as such I was not privy to it.”

  “So when you gave Detective Kurlen that file with Lisa Trammel’s name at the top of the list, you wouldn’t have known if she was about to lose her house or not, correct?”

  “That is correct.”

  “You wouldn’t have known if the bank was in the process of backing off her foreclosure because it had employed a company engaged in fraudulent activities, am I—”

  “Objection!” Freeman shrieked. “Assumes facts not in evidence.”

  “Sustained,” Perry said. “Mr. Haller, be careful here.”

  “Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Modesto, at the time you gave the threat file to Detective Kurlen, did you mention Lisa Trammel specifically or did you just hand him the file and let him go through it on his own?”

  “I told him she was on the top of our list.”

  “Did he ask you why?”

  “I don’t really recall. I just remember telling him about her but I can’t say for sure whether that was volunteered by me or whether he asked me specifically.”

  “And at the time you spoke to Detective Kurlen about Lisa Trammel as being a threat, you had no idea what the status of her foreclosure case was, correct?”

  “Yes, that is correct.”

  “So Detective Kurlen didn’t have that information either, am I right?”

  “I can’t speak for Detective Kurlen. You would have to ask him.”

  “Don’t worry, I will. I have no further questions at this time.”

  I checked the back wall as I returned to my seat. It was five minutes before five and I knew we were finished for the day. There was always so much that went into prepping for a trial. The end of the first day usually was accompanied by a wave of fatigue. I was just feeling it start to hit me.

  The judge admonished the jurors to keep an open mind about what they had heard and seen during the day. He told them to avoid media reports on the trial and not to discuss the case among themselves or with others. He then sent them home.

  My client went off with Herb Dahl, who had returned to the courthouse, and I followed Freeman through the gate.

  “Nice start,” I said to her.

  “Not bad yourself.”

  “Well, we both know you get to pick off the low-hanging fruit at the beginning of a trial. Then it’s gone and it gets tough.”

  “Yes, it’s going to get tough. Good luck, Haller.”

  Once in the hallway we went our separate ways. Freeman down the stairs to the DA’s office and me to the elevator and then back to my office. It didn’t matter how tired I was. I still had work to do. Kurlen would likely be on the stand all day the next day. I was going to be ready.

  Twenty-six

  The People call Detective Howard Kurlen.”

  Andrea Freeman turned from the prosecution table where she stood and smiled at the detective as he walked down the aisle, two impressively thick blue binders known as murder books under his arm. He came through the gate and headed toward the witness stand. He looked at ease. This was routine for him. He put the murder books down on the shelf in front of the witness chair and raised his hand to take the oath. He shot me a sideways look at that point. Outwardly, Kurlen looked cool, calm and collected, but we had done this dance before and he had to be wondering what I would be bringing this time.

  Kurlen wore a sharply cut navy blue suit with a bright orange tie. Detectives always put on their best look to testify. Then I realized something. There was no gray in Kurlen’s hair. He was closing in on sixty and had no gray. He had dyed it for the TV cameras.

  Vanity. I wondered if it was something I could use as an edge when it was my turn to ask him questions.

  After Kurlen was sworn in, he took the witness seat and made himself comfortable. He’d probably be there the whole day and maybe longer. He poured himself a glass of water from the pitcher set up by the judge’s clerk, took a sip and looked at Freeman. He was ready to go.

  “Good morning, Detective Kurlen. I would like to start this morning with you telling the jury a little bit about your experience and history.”

  “I’d be glad to,” Kurlen said with a warm smile. “I am fifty-six years old and I joined the LAPD twenty-four years ago after spending ten years in the marines. I have been a homicide detective assigned to the Van Nuys Division for the past nine years. Before that I spent three years working homicides at the Foothill Division.”

  “How many homicide investigations have you worked?”

  “This case is my sixty-first homicide. I was a detective assigned to investigations of other crimes—robbery, burglary and auto theft—for six years before moving to homicide.”

  Freeman was standing at the lectern. She flipped back a page on a legal pad, ready to move on to what mattered.

  “Detective, let’s begin on the morni
ng of the murder of Mitchell Bondurant. Can you walk us through the initial stages of the case?”

  Smart move saying “us,” implying that the jury and prosecutor were part of the same team. I had no doubts about Freeman’s skills and she would be at her sharpest with her lead detective on the stand. She knew that if I could damage Kurlen, the whole thing might come tumbling down.

  “I was at my desk at about nine fifteen when the detective lieutenant came to me and my partner, Detective Cynthia Longstreth, and said a homicide had occurred in the parking garage of the WestLand National headquarters on Ventura Boulevard. Detective Longstreth and I immediately rolled on it.”

  “You went to the scene?”

  “Yes, immediately. We arrived at nine thirty and took control of the scene.”

  “What did that entail?”

  “Well, the first priority is to preserve and collect the evidence from the crime scene. The patrol officers had already taped off the area and were keeping people away. Once we were satisfied that everything was covered there, we divvied up responsibilities. I left my partner in charge of overseeing the crime scene investigation and I would conduct preliminary interviews of the witnesses the patrol officers were holding for questioning.”

  “Detective Longstreth is a less experienced detective than you, correct?”

  “Yes, she has been working homicide investigations with me for three years.”

  “Why did you give the junior member of your team the very important job of overseeing the crime scene investigation?”

  “I did it that way because I knew that the crime scene people and the coroner’s investigator who were on scene were all veterans with many years on the job and that Cynthia would be with good experienced hands.”

  Freeman then led Kurlen through a series of questions about his interviews with the gathered witnesses, starting with Riki Sanchez, who had discovered the body and called 911. Kurlen was at ease on the stand and almost folksy in his delivery. The word that came to mind was charming.

  I didn’t like charming but I had to bide my time. I knew it might be the end of the day before I got the chance to go after Kurlen. In the meantime I had to hope that by then the jury hadn’t fallen completely in love with him.

  Freeman was smart enough to know you can’t keep a jury’s attention with charm alone. Eventually, she moved out of the scene-setting preliminaries and started to deliver the case against Lisa Trammel.

  “Detective, was there a time during the investigation when the defendant’s name became known to you?”

  “Yes, there was. The bank’s head of security came to the garage and asked to see me or my partner. I spoke to him briefly and then accompanied him to his office, where we reviewed video from the cameras located at the vehicle entrance and exits to the garage and in the elevators.”

  “And did the review of those videos provide you with any investigative leads?”

  “Nothing initially. I saw no one carrying a weapon or acting in a suspicious way before or after the approximate time of the murder. Nobody running from the garage. There was nothing suspicious about the vehicles going in and out. Of course, we would run every license plate. But there was nothing on video upon that initial viewing that helped us and, of course, the actual murder itself was not captured by any camera. That was another detail that the perpetrator of the crime seemed to be aware of.”

  I rose and objected to Kurlen’s last line and the judge struck it from the record and told the jury to ignore it.

  “Detective,” Freeman prompted, “I believe you were going to tell us how Lisa Trammel’s name first came up in the investigation.”

  “Yes, right. Well, Mr. Modesto, the bank security chief, also provided me with a file. What he called the threat-assessment file. He turned that over to me and it contained several names, including the name of the defendant. Then, just a short while later, Mr. Modesto called me and informed me that Lisa Trammel, one of the people listed in the file, happened to be seen that morning in close proximity to the bank.”

  “The defendant. And so this was how her name came up in the investigation, correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “What did you do with this information, Detective?”

  “I first returned to the crime scene. I then sent my partner to interview the witness who said she saw Lisa Trammel near the bank. It was important that we confirm that sighting and get the details. I then began to go through the threat-assessment file to study all of the names and the details of the perceived threats.”

  “And did you draw any immediate conclusions?”

  “I didn’t believe there was any individual listed who would immediately jump to the level of a person of interest based solely on what was reported in the file about them and their disputes with the bank. Obviously, they would all have to be looked at carefully. However, Lisa Trammel did rise to the level of being a person of interest because I knew from Mr. Modesto that she had allegedly been seen in the vicinity of the bank at the time of the murder.”

  “So Lisa Trammel’s time and geographic proximity to the murder was key to your thinking at this point?”

  “Yes, because proximity could mean access. It appeared from the crime scene that someone had been waiting for the victim. He had an assigned parking space with his name on the wall. There was a large support column next to the space. Our initial theory was that the killer had hidden behind the column and waited for Mr. Bondurant to pull in and park. It appeared that he was struck the first time from behind, just as he left his car.”

  “Thank you, Detective.”

  Freeman led her witness through a few more of the steps taken at the crime scene before bringing the focus back to Lisa Trammel.

  “Did your partner return to the crime scene at some point to report back about her interview with the bank employee who claimed to have seen Lisa Trammel near the bank?”

  “Yes, she did. My partner and I felt that the identification made by the witness was solid. We then discussed Lisa Trammel and the need for us to speak to her quickly.”

  “But, Detective, you had a crime scene investigation under way and a file full of the names of people who had made threats against the bank or its employees. Why the urgency involving Lisa Trammel?”

  Kurlen leaned back in his witness chair and adopted the pose of a wise and wily old veteran.

  “Well, there were a couple things that gave us a sense of urgency in regard to Ms. Trammel. First of all, her dispute with the bank was over the foreclosure of her property. That put her dispute specifically in the home loan division. The victim, Mr. Bondurant, was a senior vice president directly in charge of the home loan division. So we were looking at that connection. Additionally, and more importantly—”

  “Let me interrupt you there, Detective. You called that a connection. Did you know if the victim and Lisa Trammel knew each other?”

  “Not at that point, no. What we knew was that Ms. Trammel had a history of protesting the foreclosure of her home and that the foreclosure action was initiated by Mr. Bondurant, the victim. But we did not know at that time whether these two people knew each other or had ever even met.”

  It was a smooth move, bringing out the deficiencies in her case to the jury before I did. It made it harder for the defense to make its case.

  “Okay, Detective,” Freeman said. “I interrupted you when you were going to tell us a second reason for having some urgency in regard to Ms. Trammel.”

  “What I wanted to explain is that a murder investigation is a fluid situation. You must move carefully and cautiously, but at the same time you must go where the case takes you. If you don’t, then evidence could be at risk—and possibly other victims. We felt there was a need to make contact with Lisa Trammel at this point in the investigation. We couldn’t wait. We could not give her time to destroy evidence or harm other persons. We had to move.”

  I checked the jury. Kurlen was giving one of his best performances ever. He held every eye in the jury box. If C
legg McReynolds ever made a movie, maybe Kurlen should play himself.

  “So what did you do, Detective?”

  “We ran a check on Lisa Trammel’s driver’s license, got her address in Woodland Hills and proceeded to her home.”

  “Who was left at the crime scene?”

  “Several people. Our coordinator and all the SID techs and the coroner’s people. They still had a lot to do and we were waiting on them anyway. Going to Lisa Trammel’s house in no way compromised the scene or the investigation.”

  “Your coordinator? Who’s that?”

  “The detective-three in charge of the homicide unit. Jack Newsome. He was the supervisor on scene.”

  “I see. So what happened when you got to Ms. Trammel’s home? Was she there?”

  “Yes, she was. We knocked and she answered.”

  “Can you take us through what happened next?”

  “We identified ourselves and said we were conducting an investigation of a crime. Didn’t say what it was, just said it was serious. We asked if we could come inside to ask her a few questions. She said yes, so we entered.”

  I felt a vibration in my pocket and knew I had received a text on my cell phone. I slipped it out of my pocket and held it down below the table so the judge would not see it. The message was from Cisco.

  Need to talk, show you something.

  I texted back and we had a quick digital conversation:

  You verify the letter?

  No, something else. Still working the letter.

  Then after court. Get me the letter.

  I put the phone away and went back to watching Freeman’s direct examination. The letter in question had come in the afternoon before in the mail to my P.O. box. It came anonymously but if its contents could be confirmed by Cisco I would have a new weapon. A powerful weapon.

  “What was Ms. Trammel’s demeanor when you met her?” Freeman asked.

  “She seemed pretty calm to me,” Kurlen said. “She didn’t seem particularly curious about why we wanted to talk to her or what the crime was. She was nonchalant about the whole thing.”