From the Eyes of a Juror

by Frank Terranova

  Chapter 73 – Learning to Let Go (A Mother’s Love)

  Tuesday morning June 17, 2008 – 7:45 AM

  Despite draining down a half a bottle of whiskey, Frank Newlan was up at the crack of dawn and out the door like clockwork after completing his usual morning routine; and not even the specter of Saeed Kahn could slow him down to a trot on this fine sunny day.

  Kahn was busy interrogating a guest who had the audacity to try to sneak by him without signing in, which allowed Newlan himself to shuffle past the preoccupied doorman unnoticed for a change.

  Newlan was vaguely aware of a foul nightmare which had disturbed his sleep all night, and of course, he hadn’t forgotten about Marianne Plante’s suspicions regarding her husband, but he wasn’t going to let anything dampen his spirit on this bright, beautiful morning.

  Newlan had pretty much convinced himself that there was no way Plante’s husband could have known about their lusty tryst, and even if he did somehow find out, what was he going to do, kill him? What were the odds? After all, he was intimately familiar with the sordid details behind the extramarital affairs of countless friends and co-workers, not to mention his own bygone indiscretions, and none of them ever ended up in the mess that was the John Breslin murder trial.

  And so with these positive thought in mind, Newlan hustled down to his car, fully prepare to take on another tricky day. However, as soon as he put the key into the ignition and reached for the stereo knobs, he realized that he had forgotten to pick out a CD for the ride, and he kicked himself over his absentmindedness. But at this point in the morning, seeing as how he was already buckled up into the driver’s seat of his red Mercury, he was much too lazy to make his way back upstairs again; not to mention the fact that he would have had to pass by Saeed Kahn again and run the risk of agitating the shady concierge, so he decided to leave well enough alone and listen to the radio instead.

  Newlan expertly puffed on a joint and fiddled with the channel frequency dials, all while merging onto the highway at 70 miles per hour…and when his search for a half decent song came up empty, he ended up back on the classic rock station, WXLZ, waiting for the advertisement cycle to end.

  While Newlan bided his time in anticipation of the DJ playing some old school rock & roll after the commercial break, a soft, soothing, sensual voice came rustling out over the airwaves, asking an age old question…and offering some answers to boot.

  “Are you one of the many millions of unhappily married people, living a life of quiet desperation?” wondered the stimulating pitch-woman. “Well we at the Ashton Madson Agency can help. Since 1997 we’ve specialized in matching up people just like you for an affair of a lifetime, guaranteed or your money back. So if you’re a married person looking for an affair, please call or visit our website today. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. We’re secure, discrete and absolutely risk free…so what are you waiting for?”

  At the outset, Newlan assumed that the endorsement was just a hoax being perpetrated by the shock-jock morning DJs; just a couple of tricksters having some fun with their listeners; just a couple of jokesters have a few laughs with the morning commuter audience. But as the commercial played on and he realized that it was no joke, he was aghast to learn that a borderline illicit service such as this, arranging hook-ups for desperate housewives and straying husbands, was allowed to air on the radio.

  “I can’t believe they’re actually advertizing this crap on the airwaves. Absolutely risk free my ass...you’d have to be soft as a grape to sign up for something like this…you’d just be asking for a world of trouble…big-time trouble,” groaned Newlan, and as he pondered the implications of this newfangled 21st century dating service, he continued to carry on his conversation with the sexy voice which was wafting out of his car’s stereo speakers like a flirtatious tease.

  “What about the risk of a jealous husband blasting a bullet hole through your head?” incredulously wondered Newlan.

  “And besides, I guess I don’t need this type of service, since I’ve been getting my affairs for free,” muttered Newlan…and then it hit him; the irony of the advertisement hit him right on the crown of his big, fat, superstitious noggin.

  “What if this commercial is trying to tell me something?” whispered Newlan as a flare-up of his incurable anxiety attacks began to kick in.

  “But what is it trying to tell me? Could it have something to do with John Breslin’s fate? Or maybe it has something to do with Tracy Stone and her affair with Fred Miller? Or maybe, just maybe, it has something to do with Marianne Plante and Tom Willis and…and…and…me. Could it be possible? What the fuck is happening to me?” mumbled Newlan as all Hell began to break loose in the warzone of his mind.

  But regardless of what the advertisement may or may not have been trying to rely to Newlan, he would soon have to put his probing questions on hold for a while, because for the immediate future he needed to be on his toes so that he would have the wherewithal to play his small part in settling the cut-throat dispute between one Mr. John Breslin and the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.

  And with all of this turmoil swimming through Newlan’s head like a great white shark on the attack, the drive to the courthouse went by like a whooshing blur…and before he knew what hit him, he was seated in his swivel chair, pencil in hand, waiting on DA Lyons to call the next witness to the stand.

  Newlan had a faint recollection of his fellow jurors discussing the topics of the day in the deliberation room, but he was so preoccupied with his own issues that they could have been talking to the ghost of Fred Miller himself and he wouldn’t have noticed. However, now that he found himself in the courtroom, he was prepared to turn on the jets of his concentration stream and set them into high gear.

  “Your honor the prosecution calls Ms. Brenda O’Laughlin to the stand,” announced DA Lyons as a neatly dressed, middle-aged woman approached the bench.

  “Hmmm I wonder what she’s got to do with all of this?” thought Newlan as O’Laughlin nervously spelled out her name for the record.

  “Ms. O’Laughlin, are you familiar with phone number 978 211-6545?” asked Lyons as she got right to the point for a change.

  “Yes, my husband Jim and I subscribe to a cell phone plan which included five phones, so we took one phone each for Jim and me and our two kids…and then he kind of rented out the extra phone for a few bucks a month, first to his friend Tim Holder, and later to another friend, Sammy Fox,” explained O’Laughlin.

  “And Ms. O’Laughlin do you remember when Mr. Fox took over usage of the phone in question?” continued Lyons.

  “I believe it was around November 1st of 2005,” recalled O’Laughlin as Lyons volleyed for position with Gleason attempting to spike her every serve.

  It took an extended series of questions and objections just to establish the simple fact that O’Laughlin had become casually acquainted with Fox through her husband, and that her husband and Fox were old friends from way back when they were kids growing up together in the Northtown section of Boston. However, despite the momentum-breaking objections, Lyons wrapped things up nicely by inquiring about perhaps the most mysterious piece of evidence in the entire case.

  “Ms. O’Laughlin, did your husband sell a used car to Mr. Fox?”

  “Yes he did…it was a 1995 red Ford Taurus which we sold to Sammy for $1,500.00.”

  Lyons produced a photograph of the automobile in question, which she displayed on the overhead projector, and O’Laughlin went on to positively identified the car as the same vehicle that belonging to her husband before he sold it to Sammy Fox.

  Most of the jurors didn’t pay much mind to the rundown old Ford Taurus, which was even more beat-up that Newlan’s Mercury Mystique (not to mention the fact that they were an exact color match, which isn’t too remarkable of a coincidence when you consider that both vehicles were 1995 model automobiles, manufactured by Ford Motor Company).

  However, as soon as the snapshot
hit the big screen, Newlan began scanning the enlarged image of the Ford Taurus intently, looking for signs of the scratch marks on the front bumper which the many employees of the Barron Insurance Agency had testified to in such vivid detail. But much to his astonishment, Newlan didn’t observe anything close to resembling the damage that had been described by the dubious witnesses, and furthermore, he was freaked out by the color match with his own car, regardless of the fact that the two vehicles were built by the same automaker.

  Not surprisingly, at least to Newlan anyway, DA Lyons promptly removed the photo from the overhead projector as quickly as she could, and accordingly he jotted down a pertinent observation into his notepad:

  For some reason, I get the impression that DA Lyons doesn’t want us to get a good look at that photo of Fox’s car.

  “And do your remember the approximate date of the transaction Ms. O’Laughlin?” wondered Lyons while the photograph of the red Taurus sat on the desk of Court Reporter Jerry Montgomery, conveniently and conspicuously out of view of the jurors peering eyes.

  “Yes, it was the summer of 2005. I’d say around the beginning of August,” guesstimated O’Laughlin.

  And while this exchange of nonstop question and answer was taking place, an unexpected beeping tone suddenly began belching somewhere within the midst of the courtroom like a flatulent cow. And while it wasn’t an overpoweringly loud sound, it was still cacophonous enough that it filled the courtroom with a mesmerizing dissonance. And while it wasn’t an overly conspicuous chirp, it was still clamorous enough to momentarily distract the venerable DA. And finally, while it wasn’t an overwhelmingly shrill racket, it was still piercing enough for even the zoned-in Newlan to detect, which shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise considering the fact that the origins of the offending frequency was right there in the middle of jury box; one row down and four seats to his right to be exact.

  The jangling echo, faint though it may have been, was in fact resounding enough to provoke Judge Gershwin into sending a cross-eyed stare in Billy’s direction, and he in turn glared into the jury box. The chiming alert, indistinct though it may have been, was in fact strident enough to instinctively incite Newlan to gaze up at the clock on the wall in search of a cuckoo, only to observe instead, that it was exactly 10 o’clock. And furthermore, the gonging announcement, muffled though it may have been, was in fact disruptive enough for Newlan to gleefully surmise, “uh oh…it looks like someone is gonna be in big trouble with Billy.”

  Luckily, DA Lyons had just about completed her interrogation of Ms. Brenda O’Laughlin, so in basketball parlance it was “no harm no foul”. But unfortunately for the members of the jury, the damage had already been done, and as far as Billy the no-nonsense Court Officer was concerned, they were going to have to pay dearly for this egregious transgression.

  Similarly, the beeping clang had little to no affect on renowned Defense Attorney R. J. Gleason. And if anything, it appeared that the minor distraction may have somehow fired him up even more than he already was, because, for whatever reason, he came charging out of the gates like a bull in a china shop.

  “Ms. O’Laughlin was the front bumper of the vehicle your husband sold to Mr. Fox damaged in any way?” inquired Gleason while holding up the photo of the beat-up red Taurus.

  “It had a few scratches on it but no serious damage,” replied O’Laughlin. And while she elaborated, Gleason returned the photo back up onto the overhead, seemingly, as if he was reading Newlan’s mind.

  For his part, Newlan immediately launched back into his detailed note-taking and visual inspection of the snapshot, while at the same time Gleason requested that the picture be entered into evidence as the next exhibit.

  I’ll be dammed…where the hell is all of the peeling paint that supposedly stood out like a sore thumb on the front bumper of the unidentified red car? I’m gonna have to take a very close look at that photo once deliberations start (and I’m gonna make sure that the rest of the jurors take a good look at it as well), because I have some serious doubts as to whether this is the same car that was parked in the Newton garage the morning that Fred Miller was murdered!!

  “Ms. O’Laughlin, if I may change the subject, were you aware of whether Mr. Fox had undergone any medical procedures which required hospitalization in the fall of 2005?” continued Gleason while letting the photo of the much ballyhooed red automobile linger on the projection screen for a little while longer.

  “Yes, he had a full right knee replacement sometime around late October or early November of 2005, if that’s what you’re referring to,” replied O’Laughlin.

  “That’s exactly what I’m referring to,” exclaimed Gleason, and he presented O’Laughlin with an almost dementedly wide smile before continuing.

  “Now Ms. O’Laughlin, did you have occasion to see Mr. Fox after his surgery?”

  “Yes, he would stop by the house and visit my husband every once in a while,” explained a visible tense O’Laughlin.

  “And how would you describe his condition?” wondered Gleason.

  “Well, if I remember correctly, he was still on crutches up until around Thanksgiving, and after that he was getting around with the aid of a cane, albeit with a noticeable limp,” recollected O’Laughlin.

  “And Ms. O’Laughlin, do you remember the last time you saw Mr. Fox?” probed Gleason.

  “Yes, it was in early April of 2006, probably just days before he got arrested,” recalled O’Laughlin.

  “And what was his physical condition at that time?” exclaimed an obviously worked-up Gleason.

  “Well, he had definitely improved, but he was still making use of a cane, and he was still walking with a bit of a limp,” expounded O’Laughlin.

  “No further questions your honor,” announced Gleason, and, unlike the limping Sammy Fox, he practically skipped back to his desk while Ms. Brenda O’Laughlin slowly made her way down from the stand.

  Meanwhile, Newlan decided to utilize the transitory break in the action as an opportunity to take a hasty peek over at the DA’s table where he observed Elaina Lyons squirming uncomfortably in her seat as if someone had just put a match to her toes…and he went on to add even more fuel to the imaginary fire by jotting down the following commentary into his notepad:

  You gotta be kidding me! Fox supposedly snuck up on Miller, caught him off guard, shot him, limped back to his car and then made his getaway without anyone ever seeing him, either on the day of the murder or on any of the other days when he was allegedly scouting out the garage. This is starting to sound really farfetched to me! Man you can’t make this sh*t up!!

  When DA Lyons had finally regained her composure, the next witness she called to the stand was the aforementioned Tim Holder who explained that he had used a cell phone belonging to Jim O’Laughlin with the number 978 211-6545 from August through October of 2005, at which time he decided to return it due to cash flow issues.

  Holder, a 40 year old truck driver, was not on the witness stand for very long, and his testimony went uncontested by Gleason, but for the jurors he was a memorable witness nonetheless.

  Holder was short of stature but long on personality. He possessed a thick head of jet black hair, and he showed up in court wearing a pair of cut-off shorts, a white tee-shirt, and a pair of floppy sandals. And on top of all that, his rough-and-tumble mannerisms and streetwise vocal intonations reflected the tough guy attitude which one might expect from a truck driver; all of which left a lasting impression on the jurors who unanimously considered him to be quite the colorful character.

  The next witness, an attractive 43 year old woman by the name of Kathleen Ritz, was called upon to provide verification that Sammy Fox had dated her cousin, Nancy O’Brien, the oft mentioned co-worker of Breslin’s whom Newlan was very much looking forward to hearing from.

  Ms. Ritz also confirmed that she had called Fox on at least three or four occasions at phone number 978 211-6545, and that he was driving a red
Ford Taurus throughout the latter months of 2005 and into 2006.

  For his part, Gleason didn’t have too many questions for Ms. Ritz, but he did use the opportunity to have her reiterate that Sammy Fox was still hobbling around with a pronounced and obvious limp in his stride well after the murder took place in January of 2006.

  Up next on the witness stand was a gentleman in his late fifties by the name of Gerald Chaison. Mr. Chaison had been renting a room in his home to Sammy Fox for one hundred dollars a week from August of 2005 right up on through April of 2006 when Fox was arrested and held without bail.

  Among other things that the jurors learned from Mr. Chaison was that he met Sammy Fox through an ad he had placed in the “Roommates” section of the local newspaper, and that Fox was behind on his rent by a few hundred dollars.

  DA Lyons made sure to have Mr. Chaison point out that Fox’s room was on the second floor of his home; and that, even with his knee replacement surgery, he was able to maneuver up and down the stairs at the time of the murder.

  Mr. Chaison also confirmed that Fox drove a 1995 red Ford Taurus, and that he made frequent use of a cell phone even though there was a landline phone in the house which, per their rental agreement, was available for his usage to make local and toll-free calls, as long as he didn’t take advantage of the privilege.

  And finally DA Lyons had Mr. Chaison acknowledge that he was familiar with Nancy O’Brien, and that he knew her to be Sammy Fox’s former girlfriend.

  When it was Gleason’s turn at the plate, he continued to pound away at the implications regarding the aftereffects of Fox’s knee surgery, and he got Mr. Chaison to admit that Fox was still having trouble getting in and out of his car well into 2006. And as far as Fox’s financial situation was concerned, Gleason was able to get Chaison to reveal that Fox received a weekly VA check as a result of his military duty when he served the country so nobly in Vietnam.

  “One last question Mr. Chaison, are you familiar with a gentleman by the name of John Breslin?” politely asked Gleason as he neatly wrapped up his cross-examination, and Chaison uttered a simple “no” by way of firm reply; a reply which was met with a gentle smile and a “thank you Mr. Chaison…no further questions your honor” from the renowned defense attorney.

  After the morning break DA Lyons called upon a witness that, based on the murmur echoing throughout the courtroom, caught many people in attendance by surprise.

  “Your honor the prosecution calls Mrs. Sandra Breslin to the stand,” announced the staunch DA as John Breslin’s elderly mother limped into the courtroom, while at the same time Newlan was staggered by a sudden sense of unbearable grief.

  Mrs. Breslin reminded Newlan so much of his own mother that he almost went into a funk right then and there in the courtroom. He was already on the verge of tears when out of the corner of his eye he noticed Mrs. Breslin blow a kiss towards her son while she sat and waited for whatever it was that these ill-informed lawyers were going to try to do to her.

  And while DA Lyons did indeed try in vain to get Mrs. Breslin to cooperate with her, it was all to no avail, because although Breslin’s mom may have been long in the tooth, she had developed a hard-nosed stubbornness in her old age; a stubbornness born of wisdom; a stubbornness which more than matched DA Lyons’ resoluteness, and in fact raised her a few chips to boot.

  Meanwhile, even though Newlan could clearly detect Mrs. Breslin’s pallid, tranquilizing voice as she spoke directly to the jurors, she may as well have been speaking in Greek, because her words were a blur to him…and his mind was streaking off to another place and time.

  Newlan heartbroken memory banks were working overtime, recalling in great detail how he had sacrificed two years out of his life so that his mother wouldn’t have to live the rest of her days in a nursing home after she had suffered a fractured hip in a fall on her slippery kitchen floor.

  Luckily for the elderly Mrs. Newlan, her son just so happened to be paying a surprise visit to her on the fateful day that the unfortunate incident took place. Otherwise, she would have been laid out on the floor for God knows how long before someone heard her moaning cries for help.

  To this day, Newlan had never forgotten the fear in his mother’s eyes when he found her, helplessly sprawled out on the floor. And over the next twenty four months, he felt as if he himself were tumbling down into a bottomless pit as well. However, his descent from grace was not so much physical as it was mental, and he found himself falling into a deep well of depression as he watched his mother deteriorate; powerless to do anything about it. Over time, she, in turn, slowly transmuted into a helpless soul in her own right. And yet, as she became more reliant on others for assistance, she gained a childlike quality about her; a dependency borne of love; an unmistakable innocence of purity, as if she were aging in reverse.

  As the excruciating days went by, Newlan hoped for the best, but between old age and her many other ailments, his mother never fully recovered, and despite his beyond-the-call-of-duty efforts and his exhaustive dedication, two years later she was dead.

  Newlan still recalled the funeral as if it was yesterday. He still recalled how the elderly priest, Father Callahan, saw the distress in his eyes as he comforted his soul.

  “Don’t despair my son, for our faith teaches us that you’ll see your mother again one day,” preached Father Callahan, and Newlan was in fact duly impressed by his ecclesiastic piety.

  But now as Newlan sat in the courtroom and bore witness to the manner in which DA Lyons verbally assaulted the frail Mrs. Breslin, it was almost too much for him to take. He couldn’t help but to fixate on his own mother, and then just as suddenly he flashed back to his father, lying in bed, dying of cancer. He instantly recollected how his old man, with trembling fingers, attempted to call his daughter Rose on the telephone. He acutely remembered taking the phone out of his father’s hand only to realize that he had somehow randomly called the local funeral home. And while Newlan apologized to the undertaker on the other end of the line, he clearly recognized the providence of his father’s pending mortality. A mere two days later, his dear old dad was dead and he was left haunted by yet another in a never-ending series of inexplicably eerie incidents which had come to define his tumultuous life.

  Newlan was practically put into a dreamlike trance by the sight of Mrs. Breslin, and as he reflected unendingly on his own parents, he came to a sudden, nonnegotiable conclusion; sometimes people have to learn to let go. Mrs. Breslin had to learn to let go of her son. John Breslin had to learn to let go of his wife. Tracy Stone had to learn to let go of Fred Miller. And last but sure not least, Newlan felt an aching in his heart as he concluded that maybe, just maybe, he desperately needed to learn to let go of Marianne Plante.

  “But why does it have to be so hard? So painful,” whispered Newlan, while his closest neighbor in the jury box, Natalie, watched in horror; her colleague appeared to be trapped in some sort of a purple haze, obliviously talking to himself in the middle of a murder trial, and there was absolutely nothing whatsoever she could do in response to his insane ramblings except to nudge him ever so gently. And mercifully, thankfully, gratefully, her actions were just enough of a gesture to break Newlan out of his engrossing stupor.

  When he finally came back to his senses, Newlan scribbled down the words “THANK YOU” in big letters into his notepad and he nudged Natalie in return as he flashed the notebook in her direction.

  “DON’T MENTION IT…BEATIFUL SONG BY DIDO, BY THE WAY,” scribbled back Natalie, and along with the written message she offered Newlan a gentle smile. And as he acknowledged the twinkle in her eyes, her undeniable tenderness wasn’t lost on our mistrusting protagonist, not in the least.

  “She really is a wonderful person…and what a fool I am. Anyway, I’m sure as hell not gonna mention it to her or to anyone else for that matter, and I hope that she doesn’t either. But I must admit, I never made the connection to the Dido song…and I sure would l
ike to pick her brain about what made her think of that,” contemplated Newlan as, bit by bit, he began to regain his composure. And yet a lump remained lodged in his throat for the remainder of the morning, in loving memory of his departed parents.

  And while the general population of the courtroom may not have been cognizant as to what was going on in the far corner of the jury box, that didn’t stop DA Lyons from working herself up into a lather as she attempted to persuade Mrs. Breslin to discuss the various financial transactions which she deemed relevant to the case, such as a tax return check that Mrs. Breslin had cashed on behalf of her son in September of 2005.

  However, much to DA Lyons’ dismay, Mrs. Breslin consistently replied to each and every one of her questions with the same puzzled words, not to mention the same puzzled expression etched upon her face.

  “I’m sorry Elaina, but I don’t understand what you’re asking me.”

  DA Lyons was none too happy with what she believed to be Mrs. Breslin’s feigned state of confusion, and furthermore, she was stunned that Mrs. Breslin would refer to her by her first name, in a court of law no less.

  However, although Lyons was appalled by Mrs. Breslin’s lack of etiquette, she was also well aware of the fact that coming across as heavy-handed with a senior citizen, even if the senior citizen in question was the mother of a murderer, would not go over very well with the jurors, so she looked the other way as far as this transgression was concerned.

  After getting nowhere with the money trail, the tenacious DA attempted to get Mrs. Breslin to go over her version of the events leading up to the murder of Fred Miller and the subsequent police investigation, but the shrewd senior citizen continued to play dumb.

  Mrs. Breslin was even unwilling to intelligently discuss the curious “squirrel in the basement story” which had been baked into Breslin’s alibi…and after close to an hour, DA Lyons gave up, leaving Newlan to note:

  Not sure what DA Lyons gained by calling Mrs. Breslin to the stand, other than to show that she cashed her son’s IRS refund check on September 24th, 2005, which could have been proven just as easily by subpoenaing the bank’s records of the transaction.

  Had she known what he was thinking, DA Lyons would have respectfully disagreed with Newlan’s opinion, but after witnessing the spectacle that R. J. Gleason was about to put on, she would soon change her tune.

  Not surprisingly, Mrs. Breslin was quite a bit more lucid when her son’s attorney was doing the talking, and if Newlan didn’t know better, he would have sworn that he was watching an Academy Award winning actress in action.

  “Mrs. Breslin did your son ask if he could come live with you after he was served with his divorce papers?” wondered Gleason as he gently tested the waters of the elderly woman’s mental capacity.

  “Yes he did, and of course I told him that he was welcome to stay with me for as long as he wanted to,” confirmed Mrs. Breslin in a tone that seemed to say that to do otherwise would have been nothing short of heretical.

  And now that Gleason felt comfortable about Mrs. Breslin’s ability to coherently elucidate her thoughts in front of a packed courtroom, he waded even deeper into the ocean of potential strife.

  “Mrs. Breslin, how did you feel about Tracy’s divorce request?”

  “Why I cried for days when I heard the news. I was shocked and surprised. I loved Tracy like a daughter, and I thought that she loved me…and I adore the kids more than you could ever imagine,” explained an appalled Mrs. Breslin, while at the same time her revelations had more than a few jurors joining Newlan as he sat on the verge of tears.

  “Mrs. Breslin, after your son moved in with you, he had his children, your grandchildren, over to your home often during his visitations, didn’t he?” added Gleason.

  “Oh yes it was wonderful…we’d have so much fun. We’d play this game where Johnny would take the kids up the hill and they’d look for grandma with their binoculars…and I’d be waving to them from my front porch,” reminisced Mrs. Breslin with pride, just as any loving grandmother would do.

  Things were going quite swimmingly at the moment as far as R. J. Gleason could ascertain, but of course, at the other end of the pool DA Lyons launched up out of her seat at the first peep of the word binoculars, and she vehemently objected, again and again, only to be shot down by Judge Gershwin, who repeatedly replied “He may have it,” as fast as Lyons could spit out her objections.

  DA Lyons was uttered repulsed by the charade that R. J. Gleason and Mrs. Breslin were putting on; using her grandchildren to explain away the binoculars was despicable as far as she was concerned, and she was sure that the councilor for the defense had put the not-so-senile witness up to it. But in the end, she was forced to concede that there really wasn’t much she could object about.

  Newlan, on the other hand, found the episode to be rather comical, and he sort of felt as if he were witnessing a Saturday Night Live spoof of a game show, not a murder trial, while at the same time Gleason’s lips had contorted into a slight smirk as he watched his adversary struggle with the judge for a change.

  “Now Mrs. Breslin, regarding your son’s IRS tax return, could you please tell the jurors what you did with the check?” asked Gleason once the commotion from the binocular testimony had calmed down.

  “Why yes, Johnny asked me to cash the check for him while I was at the supermarket…and so, that’s what I did,” innocently replied Mrs. Breslin.

  “And what happened to the money?” wondered Gleason.

  “Well, the check was for four thousand and four hundred dollars, so Johnny gave me four hundred dollars to help pay some of the bills, and he asked me hold on to the rest of the money for him,” explained Mrs. Breslin (very articulately we might add).

  “And where is that money, Mrs. Breslin?” continued Gleason in a patient tone.

  “Why, as I’ve told you before Mr. Gleason, the money is in an envelope in my strongbox, which is hidden in my closet,” answered Mrs. Breslin as her eyes wrinkled up in apparent bewilderment.

  “And did you ever tell anyone about this money?” calmly asked Gleason.

  “Yes, I told my attorney Maria about it,” replied Mrs. Breslin with a puzzled look on her face which seemed to be saying “Why are you asking me all of these stupid questions?”

  “You’re referring to Maria Durran aren’t you?” patiently prodded Gleason.

  “Yes, of course,” replied Mrs. Breslin in a tone that seemed to be wondering why she was being asked to state the obvious.

  “And is Ms. Durran in the courtroom today?” continued Gleason.

  “Yes, she’s right there,” replied an exasperated Mrs. Breslin as she pointed out into the audience.

  “And if I were to ask you to produce this lockbox, would you be able to do that, Mrs. Breslin?” wondered Gleason.

  “Why yes” replied an utterly baffled Mrs. Breslin. But then again, her perplexed state probably shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise when you consider the fact that DA Lyons was objecting to just about every word that came spewing forth out of Gleason mouth until she was blue in the face.

  Naturally, the objections led to another heated sidebar discussion, which in turn led to the jurors being excused for lunch while the parties attempted to hash out their differences.

  Meanwhile back in the deliberation room, unfortunately for the jurors, their lunch break started off on a sour note…and it just got worse as it went along. For no sooner had the they sat down to their sandwiches when Billy came marching into the room, furious over the clearly audible ringing sound that had escaped from the jury box earlier in the morning…and once again he soon discovered that the guilty party was none other than Peter, the absentminded software engineer in seat number 12.

  However, in Peter’s defense, this time he immediately raised his hand and took full responsibility for the crime without the least bit of prodding.

  “I’m sorry, it was me. Somehow the alarm on my wristwatch go
t turned on, but I swear it will never happen again,” vowed a grimacing Peter.

  “Damned straight it will never happen again because from now on I want all cell phones and all watches checked in with me every morning, no questions asked,” demanded Billy, and not surprisingly, his marching orders set off another barrage of complaints. But this time however, Billy wasn’t about to change his mind, and the mood in the deliberation room turned from sour to bitter in a hurry.

  A handful of jurors even took out their frustrations by glaring angrily at Peter as they ate their lunches in silence. But conversely, Newlan, who didn’t wear a watch or own a cell phone, was deriving quite the kick from their ordeal.

  Newlan was hoping that somebody would bring up the trial since he was itching to get in his two cents regarding the red car photograph and Sammy Fox’s knee surgery, but alas, no one took up the campaign which was probably just as well, considering the foul mood that most of the jurors were in.

  After lunch, Annie requested that Donny, the elderly Court Officer, escort her on her daily cigarette break expedition, and more than half the jurors joined in on the chance to nab a bit of fresh air. Per usual, Newlan declined to partake in the lunchtime exercise, but when his colleagues returned, Annie broke out into a hacking fit of a cough, as if on cue, which alarmed her fellow jurors. Of course, she insisted that she was OK (although her words hinted otherwise).

  “Relax, I’m fine, so don’t worry about me…and before anyone goes making any wisecracks, I’ll tell you straight out that I know these damned cigarettes are gonna be the death of me someday, but I’m not quite ready to kick the bucket just yet,” unconvincingly declared Annie (although she did manage to get at least one sympathetic juror on her side, even if the rationale behind the support was rather twisted).

  “I know how you feel Annie. I’m a bit of a hypochondriac myself. It seems like every time I get a little ache or pain, I’m immediately checking for symptoms on WebMD, and the next thing you know…I think I’m dying,” wryly explained Newlan, while at the same time his latest revelation regarding what was but just one of his many personality quirks drew more than a few chuckles, particularly from the usually reserved car salesman Mike.

  “You’re a funny guy Frank,” complimented Mike. And in return, with the hint of a smile on his face which made it difficult to determine whether he was joking or not, Newlan reiterated his lack of frivolity regard his health-related obsessions; “No really, I’m serious.”

  Whether he intended to be humorous or not, Newlan’s aside brought to mind his many visits to Dr Clay’s office, and he ruefully reflected on the good doctor’s telling note which, like Fred Miller, was now nothing but ashes. However, at the very least he figured that maybe his self-deprecating anecdote provided a bit of comic relief for his stressed-out colleagues, many who were still grumpy over the loss of their cell phones, and so he felt as if he had done his good deed for the day.

  Meanwhile, as the jurors were impatiently waiting to be returned to the courtroom, a spirited discussion was taking place between Judge Gershwin and the attorneys, including Mrs. Breslin’s lawyer, Maria Durran.

  During the lunch break, Durran had driven Mrs. Breslin back to her home, and when they returned to the courtroom they were in possession of a small metal lockbox; it was in fact the same strongbox that Mrs. Breslin had described to Gleason, and apparently there was a question as to whether this particular item should be allowed into evidence.

  At one point during the debate, attorney Durran got up from her seat in the gallery and attempted to speak, only to be sternly reprimanded by Judge Gershwin, who shouted her down thusly; “Ms. Durran, please remain seated, and I don’t want to hear another word from you. Your client is not on trial here so I consider your actions to be inappropriate, and I will not hesitate to have you removed from this courtroom. Do I make myself clear?”

  And while Judge Gershwin’s fit of anger was never witnessed by the jurors, Ms. Durran’s tongue-lashing shocked the rest of the courtroom into submission, and the misbehaving attorney bowed her head and put on a face which appeared to be asking for leniency as she whispered, “yes your honor.”

  When the jurors finally did return from lunch they found Mrs. Breslin still on the witness stand, and the first thing R. J. Gleason asked of her was to hold up the object which she had sitting on her lap, high enough so that the jurors could see it. And of course, Gleason’s request signaled that, in the end, despite Judge Gershwin’s admonishment, he and Durran had won their argument, because what was obviously sitting in Mrs. Breslin’s lap was the much disputed strongbox which contained, among other things, an envelope stuffed with four thousand dollars worth of one hundred dollar bills.

  Gleason had Mrs. Breslin display the envelope, which contained the words “IRS REFUND CHECK” neatly written across it, in the direction of the jury box, and he went on to have her verify that she had never touched any of the money since the day she cashed the check for her son. Gleason then asked Mrs. Breslin what else was in the metal storage container, and she proudly showcased an endless array of birth certificates, report cards, baby pictures, insurance policies, bank statements and a vast assortment of miscellaneous trinkets.

  The number of items that Mrs. Breslin was able to fit into the small lockbox seemed to be a downright impossible accomplishment as far as Newlan was concerned, but then he thought about the amount of junk he had stuffed into his own cluttered file cabinet and he smiled ruefully at his private, personal joke.

  It took a while for Mrs. Breslin to get through her story, and by the time Gleason had completed his cross-examination, DA Lyons was completely incensed, or “ready to blow a gasket” as Newlan put it in his notepad.

  When it came time for Lyons to rebut Mrs. Breslin’s testimony, she came across as cold and impatient towards the delicate senior. In fact, in her own mind, Lyons had resolved to wage an all out war against Mrs. Breslin, regardless of her advanced age, or as Newlan recorded it for posterity in his notepad:

  …it looks like DA Lyons just took off the kid gloves.

  DA Lyons was so upset with what she believed was an absolute farce being perpetuated by R. J. Gleason that she leaned over to her assistant in training, associate DA Paul Gentili, and whispered, “I don’t care how cute and cuddly Mrs. Breslin is, she’s obviously fibbing, and I’m not going to let her off that stand without a challenge.”

  But unfortunately for DA Lyons, she was unable to frazzle Mrs. Breslin in the least, and she finally realized that she was dealing with one cool customer disguised as a little old lady so she cut her losses and called off the assault.

  However, Lyons had a backup plan in mind to deal with Mrs. Breslin, and as she announced that she had no further questions, she snatched the four thousand dollar envelope out of the arthritic hands of the grandmotherly witness and she requested that it be entered into evidence as the next exhibit; all of which sent a jolt of electricity charging through the courtroom.

  As a matter of fact, the shock on Mrs. Breslin’s face was so pronounced that it might have almost been measurable on a voltage meter, and Newlan noticed that the sprite octogenarian even made a feeble attempt to lunge for the money as it was being removed from her grip. For good measures, the coldhearted Lyons then took the lockbox, along with everything in it, and she went on to introduce that precious item into evidence as well.

  And so ends Mrs. Sandra Breslin’s small but potentially important part in our tale. But regardless of importance, her stunning testimony weighed heavily on the mind of Frank Newlan, and his ponderings led him to believe that she was either a critical witness in the case, or perhaps she was just a desperate mom who would do anything, including commit perjury, for the sake of her son. And although Newlan still wasn’t quite sure which end of the spectrum he was leaning towards, he was positively certain that the majority of his colleagues would be favoring the latter of his two hypotheses.

  After the circuslike atmosphere that surr
ounded Mrs. Breslin’s testimony, the next set of witnesses greatly assisted DA Lyons as she attempted to restore some semblance of sanity to the proceedings; which isn’t too much of a surprise when you consider that they were all starch-collared, white-shirted, blue-suit-and-dark-tie wearing employees of the Waltham Savings Bank.

  Lyons went to great lengths to show that Sammy Fox had deposited one thousand dollars into his meager bank account on the exact same day that Mrs. Breslin cashed her son’s IRS refund check. But was it merely a coincidence…or was the timing of the transaction more than slightly suspicious? Even Newlan had to admit that it could have been the latter. Then again, he wondered whether the jurors were ever going to see something more in the way of definitive proof that this money, along with the rest of the alleged payoff loot, made its way into Sammy Fox’s pocket.

  The next witness to take the stand was a detective from the Newton Police Department by the name of Steve Fontaine, and he capably described his duties on the day of the murder, such as searching for evidence at the scene of the crime, and inspecting the dumpster which was located behind the garage; all of which turned up nothing of significance.

  Based on the tip that the police had received from Tracy Stone, Fontaine also took a ride up to Tex-Ray Defense Systems at about 12:30 PM day of the murder, but when he was unable to locate John Breslin, he promptly left the premises and returned to the scene of the crime.

  Besides the crime scene details, the bulk of Fontaine’s testimony revolved around the execution of the search warrant on Mrs. Breslin’s home; a task that he helped to coordinate in the spring of 2006 just before Breslin was finally arrested.

  Detective Fontaine testified that he and his team scoured the house, and in so doing they retrieved items such as financial documents, address books, cameras, a laptop, and last but not least, a pair of binoculars. He them produced a photograph of the various items that were seized in the raid, all of which were laid out neatly on Mrs. Breslin’s dining room table, and DA Lyons briefly displayed the photo on the overhead projector before having it entered as evidence.

  In Newlan’s eyes, the binoculars, while not a child’s toy, looked to be a fairly cheap department store set, and he couldn’t understand what all the fuss was about.

  “What are they trying to prove…that Breslin spied on Tracy and Fred with those binoculars? Unlikely, and probably irrelevant anyway,” thought the suddenly lawyerly Newlan, and he wrote as much into his notes.

  When it was Gleason’s turn to address Detective Fontaine, he wanted to know firsthand how many officers were involved in the execution of the search warrant. And while Fontaine couldn’t remember exactly, he estimated that it was anywhere from 5 to 7 officers.

  At this juncture of the day, Newlan was listening intently to every word from every witness, and he felt as if Fontaine had given a reasonable answer to Gleason’s last question, but that was before he noticed that the detective’s response set off Gleason something fierce.

  “Detective Fontaine are you saying that you don’t have a written record of the search?” demanded Gleason in a raised voice.

  “No sir,” replied Fontaine in rather matter-of-fact tone.

  “Very well, then based on your answer I would assume that you don’t have a complete listing of the areas of the house that you searched,” deduced Gleason.

  “I don’t have a written list, but I can tell you that we pretty much searched the house from top to bottom and that we turned the whole place upside down,” cheerfully replied Fontaine in a tone which implied that he enjoying the job of ransacking people’s homes.

  Not to be outdone, Gleason broke into a broad smile, as if to say that he was enjoying himself immensely as well, and he slowly paced over to the court reporter’s table and lifted up Mrs. Breslin’s lockbox as he asked a rather obvious question.

  “Detective Fontaine does this item look familiar to you?”

  “No sir it doesn’t,” replied Fontaine.

  “Mr. Fontaine did you or anyone on your team search Mrs. Breslin’s bedroom closet?” wondered Gleason.

  “I assume we did,” answered Fontaine coldly. By now he had had enough of R. J. Gleason’s veiled insinuations, and luckily for the both of them, the renowned defense attorney had completed his cross-examination, otherwise who knows what sort of fireworks might have erupted.

  But nevertheless, Gleason’s connotations were clear, or at least they were clear to Frank Newlan who wrote in his notepad:

  A thorough search of the home by trained professionals should have certainly uncovered the lockbox which would have cleared up the money trail question once and for all. Obviously Gleason thinks that the detectives were negligent and I’m sure that this will be fodder for his closing arguments!

  As Detective Fontaine left the witness stand, Judge Gershwin announced “I believe this would be a good time to take a brief recess” and once again the jurors were marched back into the deliberation room for another respite.

  Newlan had a sneaking suspicion that Judge Gershwin desired to discuss the next witness with the attorneys before that person took the stand, and as we have already observed many times before, the prophetically inclined Newlan was right on the money.

  By this time of the day, the jurors were reaching the point of exhaustion so they were relatively sedate as they waited to be called back into the courtroom, but then, out of the blue, Jim, the roguish telecom employee, broke the calm in a big way.

  “Can you believe this crap about the money? I’m not buying it for a minute. And then we have to put up with, ‘here’s little Johnny’s report card, and here’s little Johnny’s first grade picture’,” mocked Jim in an old lady’s voice.

  Jim was going for a comic-relief moment, but much to his chagrin, his mimicry, however unintended, caused Newlan, who was still stuck in a rather fragile state over the unleashed recollections of his own elderly parents, to go absolutely ballistics.

  Newlan shot up from his chair and pointed a finger in Jim’s direction as he roared out his condemnation.

  “Shut your friggin’ mouth. That’s someone’s mother you’re talking about. I don’t give a crap what Breslin did or didn’t do…you don’t talk about someone’s elderly mother that way. That’s bullshit if you ask me.”

  The tension of the day was clearly getting the better of Newlan and he even surprised himself with his short fuse, while at the same time, his colleagues’ reactions ranged from awkward uneasiness to wide-eyed horror.

  Meanwhile, upon hearing the commotion that was coming from inside the deliberation room, Brandon barged through the door and demanded that the two men bury the hatchet.

  “Sorry Frank I didn’t know you felt so strongly about it,” offered Jim in a semi-sarcastic tone.

  “Well you should be sorry. Just leave his mother out of it OK,” angrily requested Newlan.

  “OK, relax, I get your point,” muttered a now contrite Jim as he extended his hand in friendship.

  And in response, Newlan, who was really just big old softie at heart, took Jim’s hand and replied in kind.

  “I apologize as well. I guess I overreacted. It’s just that this damned trial is bringing out the worst in me.”

  The remainder of the break found the jurors moping around in stunned silence, not daring to say anything that might set off one of the combatants, and before long they were mercifully dragged back into the courtroom for more tales of misery and woe.

  The announcement of DA Lyons’ next witness caused another stir from the gallery which almost rivaled Tracy Stone’s grand entrance; for into the courtroom came strolling none other than Ms. Nancy O’Brien, the prosecutions infamous star witness who Gleason had mocked so derisively in his opening statement.

  Throughout the gallery, necks were straining to get a glimpse of O’Brien as she made her way down the aisle and onto the witness stand, and what the audience saw for their troubles was a rather tall, big boned woman with stylish, s
houlder length brown hair.

  Newlan, who was expecting some sort of biker chick, was quite surprised by just how timid and frightened the conservative looking O’Brien appeared to be; even though, in the back of his mind, he had a sneaking suspicion that her demure mannerisms might all just be an elaborate act; a skillful ruse; a flat-out hoax.

  But conniving dupery or not, O’Brien was in fact shaking like a leaf as she took her seat on the witness stand and stared out into the packed courtroom.

  After DA Lyons got the preliminaries out of the way, such as the fact that O’Brien was divorced mother of two teenage sons, and that she lived in the suburb of Tewksbury Massachusetts, and that she had been employed at Tex-Ray Defense Systems for 25 years, she immediately went to work establishing O’Brien’s role as the vital link between John Breslin and Sammy Fox.

  O’Brien patiently explained how she met had Fox in the mid 90’s at a barroom in the south shore city of Quincy, and that they hit it off immediately, partly due to the fact they had both grown up in the Northtown section of Boston, although they didn’t know each other as kids.

  O’Brien went on to admit that she had dated Fox off-and-on from the time they met in the mid 90’s up until the time that he went to prison in 2002. She then confirmed that she had also been friends with John Breslin for many years as well, which wasn’t too surprising since they had both worked for the same company for over 20 years.

  “And how did Mr. Breslin and Mr. Fox eventually end up making each other’s acquaintance?” inquired Lyons.

  “Well Sammy would come by Tex-Ray and meet me for lunch once in a while, and one day a few of my co-workers, including Johnny, joined us. Johnny and Sammy were sitting next to each other at the table, and by the time lunch was over, you would have thought that they were old friends,” recalled O’Brien.

  “And did they in fact become close friends?” asked Lyons.

  “No, not really. They seemed to get along well, but other than our occasional lunchtime meetings, they didn’t really hang out together…although I do recall that Johnny seemed to be a bit obsessed with Sammy, and he would constantly ask me questions about him,” replied O’Brien.

  “What kinds of questions would he ask?” wondered Lyons.

  “Well, for one thing, he wanted to know about Sammy’s past…and he was especially intrigued by the fact that Sammy had done time for murder. He was also fascinated by the fact that Sammy somehow ended up getting out of prison. I guess he just assumed that if you got convicted for murder, you’d never see the light of day again,” explained O’Brien.

  DA Lyons then quickly rushed through the details of the three years that Fox was in prison from 2002 through early 2005, but she lingered on the topic long enough for the jurors to learn that during this time period, O’Brien grew tired of waiting for Fox, and she eventually stopped communicating with him while he was “in the can” as she put it.

  “So when Mr. Fox got out of prison did you resume dating?” continued Lyons.

  “No, he wanted to, but I just didn’t feel the same way about him anymore…and although I always thought that he was kind of misunderstood, I was worried that he might be a bad influence on my kids,” confessed O’Brien.

  “Well did you at least remain friends with Mr. Fox?” added Lyons.

  “Yes, we were still friends. He would call or stop by my house now and then. But it seemed like every time we talked, he would try to get me to take him back, which made me feel kind of uncomfortable around him at times,” admitted O’Brien.

  “And Ms. O’Brien, after Mr. Fox got out of prison wasn’t there an incident involving him and your ex-husband in September of 2005?” asked Lyons in a prying tone.

  “Well there was almost an incident, but I defused it. Basically I had an argument with my former husband, and I made the mistake of telling Sammy about it…and he got all upset and he offered to beat up my ex. But I told him in no uncertain terms that if he did that, I’d never talk to him again,” firmly explained O’Brien.

  “And was Mr. Breslin aware of this dispute?” wondered Lyons.

  “Yes, it seems that one day Sammy decided to call Johnny at work, and he asked him if I was dating anyone…and he asked Johnny to keep an eye on me. Well I eventually found out about it since Johnny couldn’t keep a secret to save his life, and naturally I got very upset. And I guess at some point I told Johnny about how Sammy was continually harassing me because he wanted us to start dating again…and then in the same conversation, I told Johnny how Sammy had threatened to beat up my ex,” revealed O’Brien.

  “And what was Mr. Breslin’s response to the information you divulged?” continued Lyons.

  “I don’t really remembering him saying too much about it, but shortly thereafter he started to confide in me about his own marital problems, and how he wished that Fred Miller would have an accident on his motorcycle. And then one day, out of the blue, he asked me for Sammy’s phone number,” recalled O’Brien.

  During this exchange, Gleason unsuccessfully objected a number of times which eventually led to the inevitable prolonged sidebar. And after this latest private discussion amongst judge and lawyers finally wound down, Judge Gershwin informed the jurors that they could only use O’Brien’s third person revelation that Sammy Fox wanted to beat up her ex-husband as it may or may not have related to Breslin’s state of mind. However, despite the honorable judge’s good intentions, Newlan wondered why she was mentioning all of this now, when O’Brien made that comment three questions ago, and as far as he was concerned it was all just legal mumbo-jumbo anyway.

  In any event, DA Lyons forged ahead undaunted.

  “Ms. O’Brien, so did you end up giving Mr. Fox’s phone number to Mr. Breslin?”

  “Yes, I gave it to him, without really thinking about what I was doing…but then afterwards I was curious, so I stopped by Johnny’s office and I asked him why he wanted Sammy’s number, and…” began to explain O’Brien, but then she paused momentarily while Lyons urged her to go on.

  “So what did Mr. Breslin tell you?”

  “Um, at first he avoided my question, and then he changed the subject and started telling me about his own marital problems again. He mentioned that his wife’s boyfriend was hanging around their kids and that he was a drug addict. He said something to the affect that he didn’t want this druggie anywhere near his kids. Well, as you can imagine, that got my suspicions going, and I ask Johnny again why he wanted Sammy’s phone number. I said to him flat out, ‘I hope this doesn’t have anything to do with your wife’s boyfriend.’ And when he didn’t say anything, I said to him, ‘well does it?’ And eventually he said, ‘maybe.’ At that point, his callous attitude was beginning to make me furious, and so I angrily said to him, ‘maybe, what do you mean maybe?’ And that’s when he said, ‘well maybe I want Sammy to help me have something taken care of’,” recalled O’Brien.

  “And what was your reaction to Mr. Breslin’s admission?” wondered Lyons.

  “Well I was very concerned, as you can imagine, and I plead with Johnny not to get Sammy involved in his problems. I told him that he needed to try to work things out with his wife rather than relying on any strong-arm tactics,” recounted O’Brien.

  “So did anything ever come of this conversation,” asked Lyons in an annoyingly fake inquisitive tone (or at least it was annoying to Newlan).

  “Yes, a few days later, Sammy came by my house and he was very upset. He said that he got a call from Johnny about beating up some guy, and he went on and on about how he was trying to straighten out his life. He said he didn’t do stuff like that anymore, and he wanted to know why I was sending Johnny to him,” recollected O’Brien, and her answer triggered yet another objection from Gleason. When Judge Gershwin nodded her head in the negative, he asked to approach the bench, which of course led to yet another lengthy sidebar discussion.

  After the latest sidebar huddle had been dissipated, Judge Gershwi
n took it upon herself to provide the jurors with a detailed explanation regarding statements made during a joint venture, and she made it clear that additional evidence which backed up the alleged statements was required to prove a joint venture; all of which led Newlan to once again tune out the protracted legalese.

  Judge Gershwin’s instructions may or may not have been informative to the jurors, but either way, as soon as she gave Lyons the go ahead to continue, the unyielding district attorney picked up right where she left off.

  “Ms. O’Brien, how did you respond to Mr. Fox after he confronted you about his conversation with John Breslin?”

  “Well, first of all, I told him that I had nothing to do with Johnny asking him to beat up anybody. And second of all, I told him that if he volunteered to beat up my ex-husband who’s to say that he wouldn’t beat up someone else for a few bucks, so don’t go giving me that holier-than-thou act,” replied an animated O’Brien.

  “Now Ms. O’Brien, moving on to the month of October 2005, where you aware of any contact that occurred between Mr. Fox and Mr. Breslin during this time period?”

  “Yes, Sammy was in the VA hospital for his knee replacement surgery, and Johnny told me that he had gone to visit him a couple of times…and then after Sammy got out of the hospital, he told me that Johnny had stopped by to visit him at his place.”

  “And do you recall any other unusual behavior on the part of Mr. Breslin around this same time period?” wondered DA Lyons, while at the same time Newlan wondered what was so unusual about visiting a friend who was in the hospital.

  “Yes,” replied O’Brien, who then paused before adding, “We use to go out to lunch a few times a week…sometimes with a few co-workers…sometimes just me and Johnny…and all of a sudden, he always seemed to be looking around for payphones.”

  “Why did you think that was so unusual?” wondered Lyons, once again with the same exaggerated, inquisitive tone.

  “Well because Johnny owned a cell phone…and besides who uses payphones anymore?” replied O’Brien.

  “So did you ask him about the payphone calls?” continued Lyons in an insistent tone.

  “Of course I asked him, and at first he just shrugged his shoulders and said that it was none of my business. But I was persistent, and finally he told that he was calling Sammy. He admitted that he was using payphones so that his calls couldn’t be traced, and naturally I wanted to know what they were up to. After a little bit of prodding, Johnny eventually blurted out that he had hired Sammy to have his wife’s boyfriend, Fred Miller taken care of. He said he was sick and tired of Miller hanging around his kids, and I think his exact words were that he wanted him taken care of once and for all and out of the picture for good,” recalled O’Brien.

  “And what was your reaction to this news?” asked Lyons.

  “I was horrified. I was just sick to my stomach about the whole thing. I was worried that Sammy would end up back in prison…and I didn’t want to see anyone get hurt, let alone killed, so of course I pleaded with Johnny not to go through with it,” exclaimed O’Brien.

  At this point in O’Brien’s testimony, Newlan scribbled down a common sense question into his notepad; it was an assessment that probably had occurred to just about everyone in the courtroom; what he wrote to himself, in large capital letters, was this:

  IF WHAT O’BRIEN SAYS IS TRUE, THEN WHY THE HELL DIDN’T SHE CALL THE POLICE???!!! WHY THE HELL DIDN’T SHE TELL SOMEBODY…ANYBODY, ABOUT THIS???!!!

  Lyons herself was actually wondering the same thing that Newlan was in the process of jotting down for prosperity, but since she was well aware of the fact that Gleason would surely cover this ground when it was his turn to interrogate the witness, she continued on with her own list of questions.

  “Ms. O’Brien, did Mr. Breslin ever say anything about how he intended to pay Mr. Fox for this service?”

  “Yes, as a matter of fact he did. He said something about an IRS check. He said he was going to give Sammy half of the money up front, and that he’d get the rest of the cash after…he did the deed,” explained O’Brien, and her voice trailed off considerably as she muttered the words “He did the deed.”

  “So what happened in the weeks immediately following this exchange?” added Lyons.

  “Well, nothing really, and for a while I thought it was a dead issue…” replied O’Brien, but then she paused momentarily before continuing when she realized that referring to the matter as a “dead issue” was probably a poor choice of words.

  “…because for one thing, Sammy was recovering from surgery, and he could hardly walk, never mind beat someone up. But as the days went by, I could tell that Johnny was getting more and more frustrated with his situation…and I recall that on the Monday after the Thanksgiving holiday, Johnny came into work in a really bad mood. He said that he wanted to resolve the situation in the worst way, but he told me that Sammy’s advice was for him to just be patient.”

  “Were you surprised to find out that Mr. Breslin and Mr. Fox still intended to pursue their course of action?” wondered Lyons.

  “Yes, and as a matter of fact I called Sammy out on it, but he told me to calm down, and that he had no intentions of beating anyone up. He said that he was just playing Johnny for a sucker. He said he was going take him for as much money as he could, and then tell him to scram or he’d report him to the police,” relayed O’Brien, while at the same time, most of the jurors were eating up her story, hook, line and sinker. But of course there was at least one juror who thought the whole production seemed a bit too well rehearsed.

  DA Lyons, on the other hand, knew for a fact that O’Brien’s story was well rehearsed, because she was the one who had helped coach her, but that never stopped her before, and it wasn’t about to stop her now.

  “Ms. O’Brien if we could proceed onto the first week of 2006, what, if any, conversations did you have with Mr. Breslin during this time period?” continued Lyons.

  But instead of responding, O’Brien eyeballed Lyons warily, as if to say that she was looking for a bit of guidance, and after a slight nod of the head by the DA, the prosecution’s star witness proceeded on with her performance.

  “Johnny had been on vacation around the Christmas holidays, and when he came back to work he was in a great spirits. I hadn’t seen him that happy in ages, and he said that he had spent most of the last two weeks living with his wife and kids,” recalled O’Brien.

  “And did you in turn mention anything about your holidays to Mr. Breslin?” added Lyons.

  “Yes, I told Johnny that Sammy had given my kids some expensive gifts, and Johnny jokingly said, ‘so I guess that’s where my money went.’ But he was in such a good mood, that I don’t think he even cared about the money anymore,” reminisced O’Brien.

  “So you assumed that everything was OK?” interjected Lyons.

  “Yes, but within a week Johnny was back to being his moody self again. He told me that Tracy was still going to go through with the divorce, and that although the holidays had been pleasant, it still didn’t change anything for her,” recalled O’Brien.

  “Now directing your attention to January 13th, 2006 Ms. O’Brien, were you aware of anything being amiss on that day?” trudged on Lyons.

  “No, not really…I had gotten an email from Johnny first thing that the morning asking me if I wanted to go to lunch, and then I never heard back from him…but I didn’t think anything of it. I just assumed he got tied up with some work-related stuff. And then later that morning I got a call from Sammy saying that he hoped Johnny didn’t get someone else to take care of his problem…but then he hung up before I could ask him what he was talking about, and at the time I really hadn’t put two and two together yet,” explained O’Brien.

  “And did you know that the police had paid a visit to the Tex-Ray offices later on that same day?” added Lyons.

  “No, when I left work to go home that night I had no idea what was going on,�
� insisted O’Brien.

  “So when did you first find out about Mr. Miller’s death?” wondered Lyons.

  “Well, the next morning Johnny called me at home and he was literally begging me to meet him for a cup of coffee. He said it was really important, so I met up with him, and I noticed right off the bat that he had this frightened look on his face…a look that I had never seen before. He looked like he was in some sort of a daze, and he kept repeating, ‘something bad happened, something bad happened’ over and over and over again,” recounted O’Brien, while at the same time Newlan almost keeled over in disbelief.

  Although no one would ever become aware of Newlan’s latest crisis of confidence, it was at that exact moment, as the sound of the words, “something bad happened” made their way out of Nancy O’Brien’s mouth, that his entire body went numb. It was at that exact moment that he instantly recalled how he had informed his friends Bruce Reardon and Pat Horn, as well as Dr. Clay, about his premonition that “something bad” was going to happen to him…and now his irrational fears were being further reinforced in the most aberrant of ways.

  “Man you can’t make this shit up,” whispered Newlan to himself as he massaged his aching temples. DA Lyons, of course, was totally unaware of his frivolous concerns as she proceeded to nudge O’Brien along, and for that matter she would have been completely unconcerned had she been made aware of Newlan’s foolish word-association games anyway.

  “And did Mr. Breslin eventually provide you with any details as to what he was referring to when he stated that something bad had happened?” wondered Lyons.

  “Yes, I asked him what the heck was going on, and finally he told me that Fred Miller had been murdered. He told me that the police had questioned him, but he insisted he had nothing to do with it,” explained O’Brien.

  “So how did you leave things with Mr. Breslin?” followed up the persistent DA.

  “Well, the whole situation was eating away at me for the rest of the weekend, and I ended up having a run-in with Johnny on Monday morning. But later that day, he took me aside and said, ‘look Nancy I swear I had nothing to do with it. Sure, Miller was a druggie and a dirt-bag, and I didn’t want him around my kids, but no way was I involved in this.’ And I guess I believed him,” shrugged O’Brien.

  “And how about Mr. Fox, did you have any discussions with him regarding Fred Miller’s murder?” continued Lyons.

  “Yes, as soon as Johnny told me what happened, I called Sammy and confronted him. But he also insisted that he had nothing to do with it…and then maybe a month later he called me up out of the blue, and he said that he had talked to some of his pals down in Northtown and they told him that Fred Miller was murdered over a drug deal,” recited O’Brien.

  “Well, did you believe him?” pressed on Lyons.

  “Truthfully, I didn’t know what to believe,” conceded O’Brien.

  “So did things eventually get back to normal?” replied Lyons.

  “Well things were a little tense that first week after the murder, what with the police interviewing everyone at work, but after that I guess you could say that things slowly got back to normal…until sometime in March that is,” explained O’Brien.

  “And what happened in March?” inquired Lyons.

  “Johnny came barging into my office one the morning, and he was very agitated. He said that the police might want to question me again, and that I should answer all of their questions with just a yes or a no. He said that I shouldn’t tell them anything about how I gave him Sammy’s phone number…and as it all began to sink in…I suppose you could say that I started freaking out. I remember that I was yelling at him, ‘what do you mean they want to talk to me? I have nothing to do with this.’ And then he angrily replied, ‘Well I guess they figured it out.” And then he stormed out of my office,” recalled O’Brien in an animated tone.

  “I see, so what happened after that?” asked Lyons, once again in her mock inquisitive tone.

  “Well later that same day, the police came to Tex-Ray, and just as Johnny had predicted they said that they wanted to talk to me. And then about a week after that meeting, they came to my house two days in a row, the second time unannounced. Then they interviewed me a few more times after that, and at some point they asked me to write down all of my thoughts into a notebook, and they gave me a calendar so that I could try to cross-reference the dates when specific events occurred,” recounted O’Brien.

  “So did you produce the notes as requested?” continued Lyons.

  “Yes, I stayed up half the night and I filled out about twenty pages of notes. And the next day I turned my notes over to the detectives…and after they had a chance to read my story, they asked me a lot of follow-up questions about what I had written down,” revealed O’Brien.

  “And what happened next?” wondered Lyons.

  “A few days later I got subpoenaed to testify before a grand jury,” sadly confirmed O’Brien.

  “And isn’t that when you sought the services of an attorney?” knowingly asked Lyons.

  “Yes, I hired attorney Kevin Jones,” admitted O’Brien.

  “And with the help of your attorney you were granted immunity from prosecution. But in return for your immunity, you promised to tell the authorities everything you knew about the murder of Fred Miller. You promised that you would testify at the trials of Mr. Breslin and Mr. Fox, isn’t that true, Ms. O’Brien?” demanded Lyons.

  “Yes,” whispered O’Brien, and Lyons then ripped off a series of questions in a raised voice.

  “And at that point didn’t you flat out tell the detectives what Mr. Breslin had told you?”

  “Mr. Breslin told you that Fred Miller had to be eliminated, didn’t he Ms. O’Brien?”

  “Mr. Breslin told you that a beating wasn’t enough because he didn’t want Fred Miller to be able to report anything to the police, didn’t he Ms. O’Brien?”

  “Mr. Breslin told you that he was working with Mr. Fox to accomplish this task, didn’t he Ms. O’Brien?”

  “Mr. Breslin told you that he was going to pay Mr. Fox ten thousand dollars for his services, half the money up front, and the other half after the job was completed, didn’t he Ms. O’Brien?”

  And not surprisingly, O’Brien softly answered, “yes” to each and every one of DA Lyons inquiries.

  “No further questions your honor,” announced Lyons, while at the same time Newlan whispered, “thank God,” as he locked up at the clock and realized that it was almost 5 PM.

  Judge Gershwin released the jurors for the day with the now customary warnings not to discuss the case, and she informed O’Brien that she was required to return to court tomorrow morning for cross-examination.

  The jurors were then summarily marched into the deliberation room, and as they waited to be escorted out to their cars, the feisty Annie wasn’t the least bit shy about making her feelings known.

  “Can you believe this O’Brien woman? If she knew all this crap was going on, then why the hell didn’t she go to the police?” exclaimed Annie.

  “My thoughts exactly,” seconded Newlan.

  “I’m sorry, but I think they should put her and Tracy Stone in jail for a while, and then maybe they’ll tell us what they really know,” growled Annie. And at that moment Newlan realized that he still might have an ally amongst the jurors; at that moment it hit him that he still might have a companion on the ‘not guilty’ side of the aisle; at that moment he came to believe that, despite Nancy O’Brien’s damning testimony, Breslin’s fate was not quite sealed just yet.

  Newlan turned his head slightly in a covert attempt to make subtle eye-contact with Annie, who was sitting diagonally across from him, and she returned his gaze with a clandestine wink and a wry facial expression which clearly confirmed what he was thinking.

  And as far as Newlan was concerned, what may have been even more amazing than Annie’s proclamation was the fact that not one of the other jurors disput
ed her words in any way.

  It was unclear to Newlan whether this sudden lack of vigor was due to the fatigue that had been brought on by another long day of testimony, or perhaps it was out of respect for the elderly, or perhaps he and Annie weren’t the only jurors who were skeptical of O’Brien’s story. But whatever the reason, everyone in the room was unanimously happy that the day didn’t end in another argument. And just to make sure, Ron the banker changed the subject as was his wont to do.

  “Hey, by the way, did any of you guys see that big, biker-looking dude who escorted O’Brien into the courtroom?” wondered Ron, and in return, all of the jurors reacted with a roar or recognition; all of the jurors, except for Frank Newlan that is; because he, of course, kept to his dedicated practice of not looking out into the audience for any reason whatsoever.

  But nevertheless, Newlan wondered out loud what this “biker dude” looked like, and Ron smiled that mischievous smile of his as he happily described O’Brien’s unofficial bodyguard in great detail.

  “Huge guy, shaved head, goatee beard, leather biker’s jacket, sunglasses…I’m telling you the guy looked like he was right out of central casting for some biker movie,” exclaimed Ron.

  “Interesting,” replied an outwardly fearless Newlan, but inside he wondered whether he and his fellow jurors could, in any way, shape, or form, be in some sort of danger.

  This latest turn of events left Newlan feeling a bit queasy as they ended their day. But more importantly, he had a funny feeling that his first impression regarding Nancy O’Brien was right on the money. He had a feeling that O’Brien’s guarded comportment was actually a well-rehearsed persona invented specifically for her court appearance.

  Like Annie before him, Newlan had a feeling that Nancy O’Brien was not the little miss innocent she was making herself out to be…and as was the case more often than not, his first impression turned out to be…one hundred percent…correct.