“I’m one of those women who was too afraid to come forward.” She inhaled, trying to push down the volcano of emotion erupting inside. The last thing she wanted to do was cry.
“I am one of those women who was afraid to stand up. I was a young woman in college with a wonderful future ahead of me—until this happened. It devastated me and cut me to the very core of my being.” She paused. “The man who raped me was prominent in the community and held a very powerful position. He was much older than I was. I was young and scared. Really scared. I didn’t have any support and he made it very clear I had better not say a word. “She looked out at rows of people hanging on to her every word and felt her hands tremble. “I spent years carrying the shame of it all. I chose to prosecute sex crimes to help heal, not only other women, but myself. To see that justice was served for those women who are brave enough to come forward and make men accountable. “ She looked down at the podium.
“I’ve prosecuted hundreds of cases. As many of you know, it’s not always easy to get a guilty verdict in rape cases. I won more trials than other prosecutors, but I couldn’t win every one. Every time I lost I felt more terrible than I can say. But there was one loss in particular that has haunted me.” She shook her head and quickly wiped away a tear trickling down her face. She inhaled deeply, gathering her strength. “State versus Baker. Twelve years ago.” She looked down at the podium. “The victim, Lisa Garrett, was a young woman who was brutally attacked, an attack so vicious that it left her suicidal and hospitalized with extensive injuries. Lisa was a young mother raising a two-year-old child all alone. The father was nowhere to be found. He had made it clear he wanted nothing to do with Lisa’s little girl.” Megan paused. She breathed in deeply and exhaled trying to calm herself. The mere thought of that case upset her.
“Lisa worked nights at a convenience store trying to make ends meet. It was at this store that she met the man who raped her, an all-star athlete from a Big Ten university.” She swallowed. “It was my fault we lost the case. If I had done my job properly I would have found some background evidence on the defendant that I believe with all my heart would have insured a guilty verdict.” She stopped and looked out at the crowd. “You see, in my opinion . . . I didn’t do my research thoroughly. I was a prosecutor who had experienced great success and believed I could rest on my laurels.” She shook her head. “If I had done my research properly I would have learned that there was another victim who had been raped by the guy who raped Lisa. I didn’t find out about her until after the verdict. After Lisa Garrett’s life had been destroyed.”
Hearing these words spoken out loud was even harder than she had ever imagined they would be.
Lisa had gone steadily downhill after the not guilty verdict. She had gotten so depressed she couldn’t get out of bed, and then started drinking heavily, lost her job and then her little girl. She had hung herself a year after the trial. Megan didn’t tell the reporters any of that. What she had told the reporters was painful
“I let Lisa down,” she said simply, looking at the crowd. “And after that I quit prosecuting.”
Windfield walked up beside her, touched her gently on the shoulder, and handed her a glass of water. She thanked him and took a sip. She held the glass for a few moments, and then set it down on the podium.
“Lisa Garrett and her family never blamed me.” She shook her head. “They should have.” She glanced at the crowd and wiped at the tears slipping down her cheek. “So to answer your question, Mr. Hawkins, I have no ill will against Craig Tarkington or his family’s law firm. I am doing this for Lucy, Lisa, and myself. For all the women whose lives have been torn apart by sexual violence. I wasn’t as brave as Lucy is and Lisa was. I was too afraid to come forward to say my truth and try to keep the man who raped me from raping someone else.”
Megan stood for a moment looking out at the crowd.
“I’ve been a coward in another way since I lost Lisa Garrett’s case too. I’ve been afraid to face my failure with Lisa and go back to court to bring other rapists to justice. So, to repeat: This case is about Lucy, Lisa, me, and every woman who has been a victim. Every woman I help also helps heal me as a woman and as a lawyer.”
The room was completely silent.
“And what if you lose again, Ms. O’Reilly,” Jeff Hawkins asked.
Megan looked straight at him. “I won’t.”
CHAPTER THIRTY FOUR
Megan rubbed her eyes and looked at the clock. It was 4 a.m. and she was still wide awake. No matter how hard she tried she couldn’t go to sleep. Her mind continued to churn through all the things she needed to do to prepare for Tarkington’s trial. Finally she gave in at around 4:30 and got up. Three cups of coffee and half of a very large danish later, she was still stuck. What was bothering her was the fact that the whole case still came down to credibility contest between Lucy and Tarkington. Who would the jury believe?
The Lisa Garrett trial came back to her for the hundredth time since she tried to go to sleep last night. The jury had returned a verdict after only a couple of hours of deliberation—not guilty. She remembered Lisa’s family bursting into tears when the jury foreman announced the verdict. She could still see Lisa’s face—ashen and awash with complete disbelief. Megan herself had felt more devastated than she ever had in the courtroom. Now she would be back in the courtroom fighting to help another woman who had been sexually assaulted. She had to convince all twelve members of the jury that Tarkington was guilty. Right now, 45 days from the trial date, she had nothing but the rape kit and Lucy’s testimony.
On the other hand, since the press conference the public had changed its perception of the prosecutor’s office. She had received emails from women all over the country telling her how much they respected her for what she’d admitted at the press conference and for taking Lucy’s case. She’d also received numerous requests for interviews from newspapers and TV shows. Overnight she, and the Washington, D.C. prosecutor’s office along with her, had gone from having a questionable motive to being the champion of women everywhere. Windfield loved it and of course Mattingly and Tarkington didn’t. Since the press conference they had both laid low, no doubt licking their wounds.
In some ways all the media attention had just increased the pressure on her. She tapped her pen on the desk. She had the complete burden to prove the allegations against Tarkington beyond a reasonable doubt—and that was no small measure.
She rubbed her temples. Her head was beginning to ache and her neck and shoulders felt so tight they hurt when she moved even slightly. She remembered again why she’d quit prosecuting rape cases. There was way too much stress involved in preparing and trying a case and the stakes were too high—all that on top of her own personal history made it almost unbearable at times.
She leaned back in the chair and looked out the window into the inky blackness. Daylight was still an hour away. The dark stillness made things seem worse to her. She thought about the woman she and Eric had talked to in New Mexico. That woman had made it very clear she wanted nothing to do with the case. And the other potential witness had been killed in a car accident. All she had was Lucy. And what if that wasn’t enough? She felt her stomach tighten.
She grabbed a notepad and wrote down everything Lucy had told her about the rape. Lucy had said that it happened at his apartment. What time of day was it? She made a note to find out. Lucy had gone to help tutor him for the final law school exam. He asked her to meet him at his apartment and not their usual place at the library. Lucy had hesitated but agreed. Megan looked up from her notes. Eric Covington popped into her mind. She wrote a note to herself to call him. There were several things she wanted to talk with him about. She tapped the pen on the pad. Her mind continued churning through everything she remembered about the case. She couldn’t recall the name of the apartment building Tarkington lived in. She made a note to find that out. She got up from the table and headed to the kitchen, taking her notes with her.
She put on a pot of
coffee, grabbed a bowl, some milk, and a box of Cheerios and sat at the kitchen table. There had to be more to Lucy’s case. Some way to help support what Lucy was saying about what had happened. Some piece of evidence. She needed to talk to Lucy again and make sure nothing had been missed.
CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE
The conference room at the prosecutor’s office was bare and impersonal. It had one long rectangular table in the center lined with six chairs—three on each side—and rows of bookcases holding law books along the back wall. Most, if not all, of the law books were now available online and these were largely a decorative addition. A large artificial tree stood in one corner next to a small table holding a Keurig coffee maker. Next to that was a free-standing water cooler.
Megan had chosen to meet Lucy here instead of in her office because it was quieter on this end of the hall. Lately there seemed to be constant noise and activity outside her office and too many interruptions, too many people popping in, too many “only take a second” questions.
Megan took a seat at the conference table and opened the file. It seemed like the file of State vs. Tarkington had taken on a life of its own. What had once been a relatively small file was now bulging with papers. The other night when she couldn’t sleep she had extracted each document, read it, and put it back in the file in its proper place.
Megan heard the door open and looked up. “Lucy, come in.”
Lucy took off her jacket, rested it over the back of a chair, and looked at the clock on the wall. “I’m a little late. Sorry.”
“No problem. I’m just reviewing your ever-growing file.” Megan gestured toward the paperwork strewn across the tabletop and the bulging file lying on the table looking like a beached whale.
Lucy glanced at the lake of paper. “I saw Windfield when I came off the elevator. He said that you were deep into trial preparation.”
Megan leaned back in the chair and rubbed her eyes. “I need to go over all this with you.” She sighed and tipped the chair back to an upright position. “I want to ask you about some things.”
Confusion washed over Lucy’s face. “Is there a problem?” she asked.
Megan shook her head. “No. I just want to make sure the case is as tight as it can be. Just being cautious.” As she said the words Lisa Garrett popped into her mind and she felt her stomach tighten. “I’ve made some notes.” She picked up the legal pad. “The day of the rape, what time did you go to Tarkington’s apartment to tutor him?”
Lucy’s expression darkened. Megan could tell that just hearing Tarkington’s name upset her. Every time she talked to Lucy about the attack Lucy emotionally shut down. She always recounted the nightmare in a matter-of-fact way as if she was trying to control her feelings. Megan wondered how she would do at trial. She didn’t want Lucy to be an emotional wreck that a jury might write off as an unstable woman, but she also didn’t want her to appear cold and indifferent, which could make the jury question her truthfulness or not like her. Megan knew how juries could be. You never knew what they might do, and sometimes they would take a dislike to a victim.
Megan knew she had to have Lucy tell her story the way she had originally told it to Megan and then to Windfield, in a truthful and sincere way.
“It was around nine p.m. I wanted to go to his place earlier but he said he couldn’t. He had a meeting or something.” Lucy looked down at the table.
Megan scribbled some notes. “Where exactly was his apartment? You said he lived off campus.” She’d found the name and location of Tarkington’s building in the file but she wanted to hear where he lived at the time of the rape from Lucy.
“It was on Menlo Avenue. The apartment building there by the park. The Lakeworth.”
“Pretty fancy place. What floor did he live on? “
Megan saw a flash of frustration in Lucy’s eyes.
“Why does that matter?”
Megan put down the pen. She had barely started questioning Lucy and Lucy was already upset. “Everything matters. You know that. Something that may seem trivial can lead to evidence that helps the case.”
Of course Lucy knew that every detail mattered when it came to trial preparation—she was essentially a lawyer herself, had a law degree and had been a legal assistant. But it was a familiar joke in the law business that lawyers made the worst clients and witnesses. They violated all the rules they set for clients and forgot what was involved in preparing a case.
Lucy sighed. “The12th floor.”
Megan asked her whether she had seen anyone the night she was there. Lucy told her she had seen no one. She said that when she got there Tarkington was waiting on her. He said he had gotten out of his meeting early. She didn’t know where he had been or what his meeting was about.
Megan started going through what Lucy had told her about the attack itself, what Tarkington had done to her. She stopped when she saw Lucy trembling. She could tell it was taking everything Lucy had to keep herself pulled together and that her frozen emotions were breaking free. Lucy began to cry, first tears and then sobs, as if she was reliving the whole nightmare.
Megan got up, got a box of tissues sitting on a table in the corner, and set them in front of Lucy.
Lucy stopped crying, grabbed a fistful of tissues, and wiped her face. “This whole thing is killing me,” she said. “The closer it gets to trial the worse I feel. My doctor gave me sleeping pills. I’ve never taken sleeping pills in my life.” She looked down at the table. The women sat in silence for several moments.
Then Megan touched Lucy’s arm. “I’m sorry to put you through all this. We just have to be prepared.” She picked up her legal pad and scanned her notes. “You went directly to the hospital after the attack, right?”
Lucy nodded “Yes.”
Megan rifled through the file until she found the paperwork from the hospital. It showed that Lucy had reported what had happened that night to the hospital staff, describing it just as she did today—word for word. Her story was solid. That would help some when Lucy was testifying. Unless Mattingly found some way to make Lucy look like she was lying, which he would no doubt try to do. Megan wondered what he could say to take apart Lucy’s story. Knowing Mattingly, he would probably try and make it all sound like it was Lucy’s idea to meet Tarkington at his place and that she was interested in him romantically.
Megan knew Tarkington’s DNA would be in the rape kit but nobody would know it was his without him agreeing to give a sample. He wouldn’t give a sample, for the obvious reasons. Even legally that would be inadmissible in court since it would be incriminating himself. “The clothing you had on that night was kept by the hospital and is part of the rape kit,” she said, thinking out loud. “Do you have anything of Tarkington’s? A book? Notes? Anything that he would have touched?”
Lucy thought for several moments and then shook her head. “I’m pretty sure I don’t.”
Megan wrote something down on her legal pad.
“After you left the hospital what happened?”
Lucy looked at the crumpled tissue in her hands. She told Megan she had gone home. She received a call from the Sheriff’s Department the next day. The department had obtained the rape kit from the hospital and wanted to talk to her. She told Megan she had gone and met with the main detective who handled sexual assault cases and gave him a statement.
“When I said it was Craig Tarkington I felt like he lost interest. He told me he would be back in touch. I never heard another word. “
Megan stopped writing. “Unbelievable. A woman gets attacked and they let the guy get away with it if he comes from a well-known family, a family with a member who is a Supreme Court justice. I thought things had gotten better with the MeToo era but I guess all that still lives on in D.C. “Megan scribbled something on the legal pad. “Did you try to follow up?”
“I did. I contacted the department two weeks after I filed the report and they said they were still processing it and if they had any questions or needed more information they’d be i
n touch. When I called them two weeks later they said the same thing. I called two more times and received the same story. After that I gave up and started thinking about who else I could contact for help. When I saw you in the coffee shop that day I recognized you as the prosecutor in the Judge Booth case and decided to try to talk to you.”
Lucy gave her a long serious look.
Once again Megan thought of Lisa Garrett and felt a twinge of anxiety. She pushed the outcome of Lisa’s trial out of her mind.
“Is there anything you can recall that you haven’t told me or the police about the attack? Anything at all.” Megan studied Lucy’s face hoping there was something else. Anything that might help the case or lead to more evidence against Tarkington.
Lucy shook her head. “There’s nothing else. That’s it.”
Megan heard the door open, turned around, and saw Windfield.
“Remember we have a meeting in five minutes,” he said. He nodded at Lucy. “Good seeing you. Things are on track and looking good.” Before Lucy could respond he was gone.
Lucy smiled, got up and gathered her coat. “I hope this helped. If I can think of anything else I’ll let you know.” She smiled apologetically as if she should have given Megan better information.
Megan thanked her and told her she’d be in touch. Once Lucy was gone Megan collapsed in the chair and sighed. “Nothing seems to help this case.”
CHAPTER THIRTY SIX
Megan’s eyes flew open and she shot straight up in the bed. She grabbed her robe, threw it on, and hurried down the stairs to her study. She looked at the clock. It was seven-forty a.m. She had spent another restless night tossing and turning, searching for something—anything—that could help bolster Lucy’s testimony. She had finally dozed off at around four a.m. But now she had it: the solution to the problem of the DNA. It had come to her when she was making the transition from sleeping to waking a few minutes ago. The gift certificate. Tarkington had given her a gift certificate from Tiffany’s to thank her for training him for his new job at the law firm. That would have his DNA on it that could be compared to the DNA in the rape kit to prove it was him that raped Lucy.
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