Lisa Ballantyne - Guilty One

‘Did I do OK?’ asked Sebastian, eyes blinking up at Daniel.

Daniel put his hands in his pockets. ‘You did fine.’

Upstairs, Daniel called Cunningham.

‘You’ll be relieved this is all over,’ Cunningham said. ‘I know you thought it would take ages to sell, but this is quicker than I ever thought it would be. Will you come up, or do you want me to handle it?’

‘You handle it,’ said Daniel quickly. He ran a hand through his hair and turned in the corridor. ‘Or … can you wait? I might come up at the weekend. I want to see the place one more time – I just … Can you just wait, actually?’

‘Of course. I’m sorry this has happened at a … difficult time for you.’

‘What d’you mean?’

‘I saw you on TV. The Angel Killer. You’re on the case.’

Daniel took a breath. Everyone else had made up their mind about Sebastian. He wondered what the jury would decide.

30

Jones looked triumphant as he glanced over his notes. Closing speeches were scheduled for the morning, with the judge’s summing up to follow that afternoon. The judge arrived and the gallery filled up. Daniel tried not to look up into the journalists’ faces.

Jones placed his papers on the podium and turned towards the jury, hands in his pockets, rocking back on his heels. Daniel thought he looked pleased with himself.

‘Cast your mind back to everything you have heard relating to the events of 8 August this year … You have heard the defendant admit that he was playing with little Ben Stokes on that day. A witness saw the defendant fighting with Ben in the open park and then later identified him fighting in the adventure playground where Ben was found dead.

‘The type of injury which Ben sustained means that we cannot pinpoint the time of the attack, only the time of death, around six in the evening. This means that Ben could have sustained his fatal wounds at any point that afternoon and evening, since he was last seen alive about 2 p.m. The defendant claims to have an alibi – his mother – from 3 p.m. onwards, but you have heard the cocktail of drugs which the boy’s mother ingested that day and you are therefore correct to wonder if she is reliable.

‘You have heard from forensic scientists who explained to you how the victim’s blood was transferred on to his attacker’s clothing. I remind you that the defendant had defensive scratches on his arms and also fibres from the victim’s clothes on his jeans, suggesting that he had straddled the victim. From this position, it would have been possible for the defendant to use the force of gravity to help him cause the significant, brutal facial injuries which resulted in young Ben literally bleeding to death.

‘You heard the forensic expert attest to the fact that the bloodstains on the defendant’s clothes were a result of a “violent assault to the face or nose, with the victim then blowing blood on to the attacker”.

‘Make no mistake.’ Jones paused and stabbed the lectern with his forefinger. He leaned forward on to his finger for emphasis, staring unblinking at the jury. ‘This was not an easy murder to carry out. There was no accident here, no sleight of hand or loss of footing. This was violent bloody murder, carried out face to face.

‘You have heard the defendant himself tell of his fascination for murder and death. You have heard experts testify that the defendant has a mild disorder on the Asperger’s spectrum: a disorder which makes him prone to violence, which makes it difficult for him to form friendships, but a disorder which would not prevent him from lying about his actions. And lie he has done, when, testifying, he told you that he did not murder the defendant. We have heard from neighbours of the victim, whose children were terrorised by the defendant before he took this one stage further, when he brutally murdered Benjamin Stokes. The defendant threatened neighbours’ children with broken glass, and indeed bullied and physically injured the victim before he finally murdered him on 8 August.

‘Boys may be boys, but this boy was a known danger in the neighbourhood. He is proven to be capable of this ghastly crime. Forensic evidence puts him at the scene of the crime. We know that the defendant and the victim fought, and the victim’s blood was transferred on to the defendant’s clothing.

‘Sebastian Croll is a proven bully with a sick interest in murder, and murder he did on 8 August this year.

‘I know that when you stop to consider the facts of the case, you will find the defendant, Sebastian Croll … guilty.’

Daniel could see the headlines already: A BULLY WITH A SICK INTEREST IN MURDER. He thought of Tyrel’s trial and how the verdict had seemed another violence.

At the break Daniel followed the Crolls out of the courtroom. Even the skin on Charlotte’s face was trembling. He accompanied the family to the public waiting room. Kenneth Croll manoeuvred his wife by her elbow into the room. He demanded coffee but Charlotte was shaking too much to get the coins into the slot. Daniel helped her and carried the cups over to where Kenneth was reclining in a chair, legs akimbo and hands clasped behind his head.

‘We can appeal?’ said Kenneth.

‘We talk about appeals if he’s found guilty,’ returned Daniel.

Croll’s eyes seemed to flash with anger. Daniel met his gaze.

*

Back in court, Daniel thought that Irene looked nervous. He had never seen her nervous before. She was fidgety, twirling her watch on her wrist. He had not had a chance to speak to her, but she looked over at him. Daniel mouthed good luck. She smiled and looked away.

When called, Irene stood up and rested her open notebook on the lectern. There was silence as she glanced at her notes and reminded herself of her arguments. When they were defending Tyrel, Irene had rehearsed her closing speech to Daniel the night before. He remembered her pacing back and forth before him, in her stocking feet.

Now she turned to face the jury.

‘Sebastian … is a little boy,’ she began. She no longer looked nervous: shoulders back, chin raised. ‘Sebastian … is eleven years old. If he were eighteen months younger, he would not be before you today. Sebastian is a child on trial for murder. He is accused of killing another little boy, a child even younger than he is now.

‘That Ben was murdered is a tragedy and something that we should all feel devastated by … but we won’t get justice for little Ben by convicting the wrong person, and certainly not by convicting another innocent little boy.

‘The papers all love a good story, and I know you read about this case in the newspapers, before you even got to court, before you knew that you would sit on this jury. The papers have talked about societal decay, about the failure of the family … The papers have used words like evil, wicked and depraved.

‘But, ladies and gentlemen, I have to remind you that this … is not a story. This trial is not about societal decay and it is not your task to address it. It is your job to consider the facts, as they have been presented to you in this courtroom, and not in the press. It is your job to consider the evidence and only the evidence before you decide if the defendant is guilty or not guilty.

‘You’ve seen some terrible images and heard some disturbing evidence during this trial. It’s natural when presented with shocking acts of violence to want to blame, to want to find … someone responsible. But this little boy is not responsible for the violence that you have had described to you in the course of this trial.

‘So what is the evidence?

‘There were no witnesses to this terrible crime. No one saw Ben being harmed. A witness did claim to see Sebastian and Ben fighting late on the afternoon of the murder but the witness’s account was unreliable. There is a murder weapon in evidence; but it cannot be tied to any one suspect. No fingerprint or DNA was found on the brick which was used to kill little Ben Stokes. He suffered a cerebral haematoma, which means that we know approximately what time he died – around six o’clock in the evening – but we don’t know when he was attacked and suffered the fatal blow. Sebastian was home in his house from three o’clock in the afternoon, well before Ben was reported missing.