Stephen Penner - Presumption of Innocence

Yamata paused again, as the gravity of the impending description began to settle over the room.

"And she liked to help people."

Another pause, this time from an apparent lump in Yamata's throat.

"And that turned out to be death of her. Her innocence. Her openness. All the things we wish we could be. Good, kind, hopeful, selfless. Noble. The things that we all grew up and learned not to be. Because of people like Arpad Karpati. But Elizabeth was still too young, too pure, too good, to know what fate awaited her when she befriended a troubled girl named Holly Sandholm."

Yamata picked up a water cup from the spot she had purposefully selected on the prosecution table and took a sip.

"Holly was a troubled teenager. A young girl who'd had a rough life, made some bad choices, and hung with the wrong crowd. She ended up in juvenile hall. Theft and drugs mostly. Now, juvenile justice is all about rehabilitation. About attempting to save at least some of these kids. To turn them back onto a good path. Maybe not the straight and narrow, but at least away from the highway to prison so many of them are on.

"So along the way, one of the judges ordered Holly to do some community service work. She could pick any non-profit agency. She picked a church. Emily's church."

The jurors were all watching Yamata as she stepped again to the well. She wasn't pacing; that would have been distracting. But she took a single step toward the jury box as she started to bring the story together.

"Holly met Emily at the Westgate Christian Church one Sunday while she was doing her hours and Emily was staying after to help out. They were doing the same work, but for different reasons. Holly, because she had to. Emily, because she wanted to. Emily reached out to the new girl. They talked. Even across the gulf of their life experiences, they had things in common. They saw each other again over the next few weeks. And eventually they became friends.

"Or so Emily thought.

"What Emily Montgomery didn't know about- who she didn't know about-was Arpad Karpati. Because when fourteen-year-old Emily Montgomery went home to her pink-painted bedroom in her suburban home, fifteen-year-old Holly Sandholm went home to Arpad Karpati's bedroom in his downtown apartment."

Brunelle smiled. Perfectly delivered. Don't spell out the child rape allegation, they'll get it.

"He controlled Holly. Through promises and drugs, sex and fear. The same fear he tried to illicit in everyone else he met. Holly would do anything for him. Anything. And he needed her help to make sure the others in his life would be just as scared of him as she was."

Yamata had avoided looking at Karpati through this description, but she opened her shoulders just a notch in his direction as she continued.

"Arpad Karpati ran with a gang. A street gang. But not just any gang. Not Crips and Bloods and 'Gangland' TV specials on digital cable. He ran with a gang that claimed to be vampires."

This was the hard part. The jurors all either cocked a head, or leaned back, or crossed their arms-signs of disbelief. Signs that Yamata would lose them if she didn't play this just right.

"Yes, I said vampires. No one would believe that, right? And if no one believes it, no one is scared, right? So there's one thing to do: make them believe it. Drink the blood of a virgin. Drink the blood of Emily Montgomery."

A sob from Mrs. Montgomery punctuated Yamata's sentence and the crossed arms and cocked heads relaxed. The jury wanted more information. Yamata gave it to them. But not through the eyes of a lawyer, or even a cop. Through the eyes of a parent.

"When Janet and Roger Montgomery came home from dinner that night, their front door was unlocked. On it was a sticky note. It said, 'Don't go inside. Call 911 and wait for the police.'

"No parent in the world would have waited outside. But when they opened the door, their world shattered. Their daughter Emily had been murdered. Sweet, young, innocent Emily had been bound and trussed upside down-like a carcass in a meat locker-hanging from the stair railing, pale as the ghost she had become. Had become at the hands of Arpad Karpati."

She didn't look at him. She didn't have to.

"The only injury was a small slit to her throat, right into the carotid artery. She bled out, the way butchers kill animals. And like those butchers, Karpati the Butcher collected her blood in a bucket, which he took with him to prove he was who, and what, he said he was."

Yamata paused again. She sighed a deep, repulsed sigh.

"Emily Montgomery is dead because of one man. That man." She pointed but didn't look. "Arpad Karpati. And at the end of this trial, at the conclusion of the evidence, we are going to stand up again and ask for justice for Emily, ask for the only just verdict in this case: guilty.

"Thank you."

The room took a moment to relax from Yamata's grip. The spectators started breathing again and after a moment a few of the jurors shifted in their seats. It even took a moment for Judge Quinn to move to the next order of business.

"Mr. Welles." She looked down at him. "Does the defense wish to present its opening statement now, or reserve until the close of the State's case-in-chief?"

Welles stood up and smiled at the judge. "The jury will remember what the State promised here, Your Honor, and what they will inevitably fail to deliver by way of actual evidence. The defense will reserve its opening statement."

Quinn held her scowl in check in front of the jury, but Brunelle had more trouble. It wasn't just that Welles had managed to both reserve and give a micro-opening with his comment. It was that, damn him, he was right. Yamata had given a fantastic opening. Now they had better deliver.

"Call your first witness," Judge Quinn instructed Brunelle.

The first witness. This was always one of the most important decisions in trial practice. Who do you start with? The lead detective, to explain the investigation? The first cop who arrived, to describe the crime scene? The medical examiner, to explain the cause of death? Yamata had suggested all of those, but Brunelle shook his head each time. Every case is different and the facts of each case tell you who to call first. In this case, with these facts, there was really only one person to call first.

Mom.

Janet Montgomery looked up at the judge, raised her right hand, and swore to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Brunelle had everything ready. He made sure the box of tissues was not on the witness stand, but rather on his table, so he could get them for her in front of the jury. He had all the photos lined up on the counter in front of the court reporter. He started with the "in life" of a smiling Emily, hugging a puppy in the park on a sunny spring day. He left it up on the projector as Janet told the jury about her wonderful daughter.

Then a photo of the house. Not on a sunny spring day, though. That night. Dark, lit up by red and blue police car lights.

That's when he got to give her the tissues.

Then the photo of the note on the front door. Blown up, nice and big, on the screen. There wasn't a person in that jury box who wouldn't have been terrified to come home to that note on their door.

The only photo left to show was Emily hanging upside down just inside that door. Dead, thanks to Arpad Karpati.

Everybody knew that was the next photo.

And Brunelle didn't show it to her. Because you don't do that to a mom.

Mom told the jury who Emily had been. Let the cops tell them who she was now.

"Thank you, Mrs. Montgomery." Brunelle nodded to her, then looked up to the judge. "No further questions."

He sat down and got a "Great job" whisper from Yamata. It had gone perfectly. He'd extracted all the information he needed, and done so respectfully. His care and discretion just underlined for the jury how terrible the crime was, how unfathomable the loss. The smallest smile crept into the corner of his mouth furthest from the jury box.