Nancy Grace: Murder in the Courthouse

Suddenly, Fincher jerked the wheel to the right, steering the car at the last second across two lanes of speeding cars and up an exit ramp off the interstate.

“What are you doing, Finch?”

“I know that street. I know that address. I’ve been there. My army buddy’s off Randolph. We were in Iraq together.”

“And?” Hailey didn’t need to finish the sentence.

“And we’re going over there.”

“Fincher, you just got back from Iraq. Vickie will kill you if she finds out you headed to an active homicide scene you didn’t have to go to. Forget you, she’ll kill me for letting you go!”

“We have to go. I’m not standing by. It’s a cop down. But I’ll let you out. I don’t want you to be there. You’re not even armed.”

Hailey unbuckled her seat belt.

“Hey! I’m doing eighty miles an hour! Put your belt back on!” He shouted it across the three feet between them. Ignoring him, Hailey bent over the front seat and reached into the back of the car, and leaning lower, unzipped her roller board.

Fincher took a sharp right turn and Hailey slid backward, her head nearly slamming into the back seat. Reaching deep into her bag, between layers of folded clothes, she yanked out a single item. Not bothering to re-zip the bag, she turned face forward and belted herself back into the passenger’s seat. Finch spotted her black Lycra shoulder holster, special-made for Hailey, clenched in her hand.

“Hailey, you can’t go unarmed. You don’t have a gun for that, do you?”

“I know you, Fincher. You’re packing hip, shoulder, and ankle. So don’t waste time.”

Keeping one hand firmly on the wheel, he reached down to his ankle and with one quick snap of Velcro, handed her a.38.

“You still hate guns, Hailey?”

“I don’t know what you mean by that.” Hailey tensed, keeping her eyes fixed on the road ahead.

“Every time you see a gun, you think about Will. Just like in the courtroom. The sight of a gun still makes you sick… right? I bet you haven’t dated one guy more than five times up in Manhattan. Have you? I knew moving to New York and getting out of the business wouldn’t change anything. Different place, same Hailey Dean…”

She didn’t answer, raising her window, looking out as the houses passed, watching street signs knowing Randolph would pop up at any minute.

“This is it. 3443 Randolph.”

He was right. Hailey clicked the safety belt and, bending forward at the waist, slipped on the holster made especially for her. Adjusting it over and around quickly, sliding the.38 into place, Hailey unlocked the car door and stepped out into waves of heat.

Hailey felt the old, odd energy in her right hand… her gun hand. It felt like a snake inside her was coiled and ready to strike.

Where was the dead body?

Passing a WSAV news crew pressing a microphone toward a redhead dressed in spandex, Finch and Hailey walked steadily up the driveway. They found a lone officer bent down on his knees, inspecting two legs protruding from underneath the garage door. For one bizarre moment, Hailey felt like Dorothy inspecting an anonymous set of legs so totally out of place, neatly peeking out.

Pushing all thoughts of Oz aside, she stepped forward. This was no movie in Technicolor. This was the real thing, a dead body. And that body was decomposing literally by the minute in the Savannah heat.

The officer walked over to the corner of the door and started fiddling with a handle. Apparently, nothing was budging.

“Hi, officer.” Finch held out his right hand to one of the officers standing on the driveway. “I’m Garland Fincher from the Fulton District Attorney’s Office here for the Todd Adams trial. We were driving in from the airport and we heard the call. Came to see if you needed any help.”

Finch spotted the other cop glance at Hailey. “And this is a former ADA, Hailey Dean.”

But the three turned quickly at the sound of another two squad cars careening into the front yard, one after the next. Hailey actually thought for a moment they’d have a pileup right there on the front lawn.

A third car, unmarked but also sporting a quickly rotating blue light popped onto the front dash, arrived just behind them. Plainclothes detectives emerged.

“Hi, everybody.” One of the sheriffs approached and said it calmly, like he was reading a quasi-interesting story out of the Savannah paper over the breakfast table. He didn’t seem to be the least bit ruffled by the pair of human legs on the paved driveway two feet from his own.

“You guys don’t seem in too much of a hurry to get him out from under there.” Fincher said it in a casual way, not at all accusatory.

“Well. He’s dead. Plain and simple. No two ways about it. First thing I did after securing the scene was feel his ankle. Cold as a brick. So, no rush. No rush at all. Plus, I can’t get the darn door up. Probably need some sort of a tool. Maybe if I jam some hedge clippers in the lift, that’ll do it.” This guy made Hailey think of Barney Fife. And not in a good way.

Hailey stepped back off the neat cement drive and onto the manicured grass, perfectly edged. She looked not down at the pair of legs, but higher up the garage door.

“Hey, guys. What’s this?” Hailey stepped over the legs, careful to avoid the pool of blood in which they were lying, and pointed to a hole in the garage door.

“I don’t know. Oh yeah, Trimble’s the name.” Barney Fife stuck out his right hand to Fincher first, then Hailey.

“Well, don’t get the hedge clippers just yet. You may not need them. I don’t have a garage door where I live, but I think this is one of those emergency-release mechanisms.”

“Huh? I never heard of that.” Trimble looked stumped. Fincher was quiet, likely because he hadn’t either, but didn’t want to admit it to Hailey.

“I don’t get it. What’s your point? What does it mean to us?” Trimble seemed good-natured, but obviously felt Hailey’s observation was a waste of time.

“A lot of people get them for these door openers just in case the electricity goes out, so they’ll always be able to get in or out of the garage. It’s kind of a lock you install directly onto the door.” Hailey pointed up as she talked.

“Maybe I’m crazy, but I still don’t get it. This baby’s as tight as a drum.” Trimble stared up at the garage door.

“If we can make it work… I think the way it functions is that a cable, a cord, is attached to the door opener emergency-release lever, and when you unlock this thing, you can pull the cable and it releases the drivetrain belt.”

“I’m game.” Trimble looked at Fincher, clearly expecting him and Hailey to give it a try. He looked over at the EMTs. “Hey guys, no need for a saw, I got it all figured out. No rush. It’s Alton Turner and he’s DOA anyway.”

Trimble obviously wasn’t the oversensitive type.

None of the cops made a move, so Fincher stepped up. “OK. Here we go.” Picking up one of the bricks edging the driveway, he gave a mighty heave and knocked the lock off the door. Hailey was right. When Finch grabbed the lock mechanism itself and pulled, the door released.

And there he was, lying there… Alton Turner… the other half, finally revealed. After an initial, instinctive recoil upon seeing a dead human body, the detectives immediately started to circle it, staying a guarded few feet away. A camera started flashing.

A black standard-issue Saturn pulled into the driveway. When the driver’s door opened, out stepped what was obviously an undercover detective. He was definitely a cop. No question about it. He had that look, easily identifiable by fellow cops and, ironically, criminals alike. To a trained eye, undercover cops stood out. The younger officers were buff and muscled from beating the streets day and night. The older cops were pale and soft, parked at desk jobs and counting the days until retirement.