William Bernhardt - Capitol Offense

“Did you remain with Dennis when he was taken to the hospital?”

“Yes.”

“Were the medical experts able to get a reaction out of him?”

“Not for about two hours. Then he came around.”

“Did you question him?”

“Yes.”

“What did he say?”

“Not much. He claimed he couldn’t remember what happened after he got to the hotel.”

“Thank you, Officer. No more questions.”

After court recessed for the day, Ben huddled with Christina.

“How did you think that went?” he asked.

“About as well as possible.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means you’ve got an impossible case. You can’t expect to be winning, especially not while the prosecution is still putting on their evidence.”

“You think we’re losing?”

She dodged the question. “I’m hoping your expert is really good.”

“He’s written a book.”

“Well, that makes him an expert. I wonder if that’s why Dennis chose to see him in the first place.”

“Christina…”

“Dennis is going to have to be good, too.”

Ben glanced back at his client. He had been well behaved during these first two days of trial. No overt reactions. No overt scheming. No meddling in the case. But he was still a cause for concern. “You think we should put Dennis on the stand?”

“Only if you have to. But…”

“You think we’ll have to.”

She gave his shoulder a squeeze. “We’ll make that decision when the time comes. After this next witness.”

“You think this witness will be important.”

She nodded. “I think if this goes badly for us, we’ll need a lot more than Dennis Thomas on the stand to make it right again.”

As soon as Dennis entered the courtroom the next day, Ben could tell he was worried.

“Do you think we’re winning?”

“I have no idea. And unless you’re a psychic, neither do you.”

“I don’t like that woman at the end of the front row of the jury box. The young one. She keeps staring at me like I remind her of her old boyfriend. The one who had an affair with her best friend and then dumped her.”

Ben smiled a little. “Maybe you do. But she won’t convict you for that.”

“You’re sure of that?”

“Yes.” He was sure she would have much better reasons to convict him if she was so inclined. “Just keep doing what you’re doing. The jurors are watching. They’ll see that you’re a good person. That will go a long way.”

Dennis looked down at the table. “Ben… I know we kind of got off to a rocky start, but I appreciate what you’ve done for me.”

“I know. You’ve said that.”

“And I hope you also know that even if I come off a little… cold, or… calculating, it’s just my way. I can’t show what I’m really feeling inside. If I did, it would destroy me. I’d fall apart. Totally.”

“Please don’t. We need you here. One hundred percent.”

“Did I ever tell you Joslyn could sing? Like an angel. She studied opera in school. Thought about doing it professionally, then decided to go into medicine. But sometimes, late at night, just for me, she’d sing.” His voice caught. “Sweetest thing you ever heard.”

Ben saw that his client’s eyes were watering.

“I loved my wife so much.”

Ben laid his hand gently on his back. “I know you did. Do.”

Ben expected Guillerman to rest his case soon, but before they could get to that blessed moment, he knew they would have to endure the man Guillerman considered his smoking gun-the “death threat” witness. Ben had interviewed him before trial and wasn’t all that impressed, but it was impossible to know how something would play at trial until you observed the expressions on the jurors’ faces when they heard it. Ben had no doubt the man had been woodshedded for days, rehearsed over and over again until he was just where Guillerman needed him to be.

Officer Oliver Conway was dressed in a sports coat and a bolo tie-Oklahoma chic. He worked at the downtown police station. He was what they called a triage officer; after the front desk clerk took the preliminary information, Conway helped decide whom, if anyone, the complainant would see. Consequently, he was on duty and watching most of the times Dennis had come to the station, pleading for help.

“Unfortunately, we couldn’t assist him. It wasn’t just Detective Sentz. We all knew the rules. We get too many of these complaints that turn out to be some kid who went over to a friend’s house or a wife who got mad and moved in with her mother. We all felt sorry for him-me, Detective Sentz, Shaw, Officer Torres at the front desk. But there was nothing we could do.”

Something he said triggered a lightbulb over Ben’s head. He rustled through some papers to confirm what he already knew. There was no Officer Torres on the prosecution witness list.

Why not? If this man had seen it all, including everything Conway was about to describe, why wasn’t he on the list?

Ben didn’t have any problem with most of Conway’s testimony. In fact, he thought it helped his case, letting the jury hear once again the story of this desperate man begging the police to act while they refused. Even the hardest heart would have difficulty not sympathizing after hearing that woeful tale.

Unfortunately, Officer Conway was also part of the team that was finally dispatched on the seventh day to find Joslyn Thomas.

“She must have been traveling at an extreme speed on those winding country roads,” Conway explained, “because she didn’t just go off the side. She plummeted down a steep ravine and then careened through some thick blackberry bushes. As a result, her car was entirely invisible from the road.”

Guillerman nodded. “But you still managed to find her?”

“Yes. One of the officers suggested that we try to trace her cell phone. We got lucky. Her phone was on-it’s a miracle the battery hadn’t gone dead-and her position was only a few miles from the nearest signal tower. We were able to narrow her location down to a relatively confined area. We deployed several cars and a helicopter to get an aerial view. As a result, we were able to locate her in just over three hours.”

Like all police officers, Conway had been trained to make his testimony precise and unadorned. Tell the facts and be quiet-don’t leave the defense attorney any ammunition to use against you. Still, it was impossible not to notice that he was trying to portray the police department as making a heroic effort to find Joslyn Thomas-perhaps to compensate for the fact that they did nothing for so long.

“Unfortunately, she was almost dead when we found her. We had medics with us, but there was not much they could do. They eased her pain, primarily. And we allowed her to see her husband one last time. I’m glad for that.”

“How did Mr. Thomas react?”

“He was angry. Very angry.”

“Irrational? Crazed?”

“No, he was as rational as anyone. Just mad. Furious. He blamed Detective Sentz. I couldn’t figure out why. Sentz didn’t write the regulations. All he did was enforce them.”

“Objection,” Ben said quietly.

“Sustained,” Judge McPartland replied. “The witness will avoid editorializing. Just testify about what you saw and heard.”

“Sure,” Conway said, with apparent aw-shucks good nature. “Anyway, Mr. Thomas was angry. He threw himself at Detective Sentz, shouting mean, threatening words. Sentz didn’t know what to do. He tried not to hurt the man, but Thomas just kept coming. Finally, Sentz was forced to physically push him away. That’s when his face was scraped up.”

Guillerman showed the jury a photo of Dennis with the right side of his face bloodied and scabbed. Of course, the photo he chose was the mug shot taken after Dennis was arrested. Because no one looks good in a mug shot.