William Bernhardt - Hate Crime

He looked at her warily. “It has?”

“Yeah. Apparently a larger room opened up when Judge Pennington finished a big rape trial. We’re going to take over his space.”

“And that’s?…”

“Top floor. End of the corridor.”

A slow smile spread across his face. “Vengeance is sweet, huh?”

“I don’t get you.”

“But he who laughs last, laughs best.”

“You’re just a bundle of clichés this morning, aren’t you?”

He laughed. “Nice try, Ms. McCall, but you’re not going to throw me for a loop on my own home court.”

“You don’t believe the court has been moved?”

“Oh, I can believe that easily enough. I was in the clerk’s office last night and heard them talking about a reassignment. But they were discussing the possibility of going to Judge Cantrell’s courtroom. In Building Three.”

“But there was-”

“So nice try, little lady, but it’ll take a better scam than this lame bit of business to make me late for Lacayo’s court.” He grabbed his briefcase and hurried merrily down the corridor.

Ben came up behind her. “We really are going to Judge Pennington’s courtroom, aren’t we?”

Christina nodded. “Cantrell’s has to be fumigated. Someone saw a rat.”

“And you knew Drabble wouldn’t believe you when you told him.”

“Which is why I met him at the door. Before he had a chance to hear it from someone he trusted.” She checked her watch. “He’s going to be fifteen minutes late. At the least.”

Ben whistled. “You know, Christina, you are just evil.”

She held up her hands. “I can’t help it if he’s a suspicious person.” She smiled. “Who needed to learn a lesson about the consequences of messing with me.”

Among the reasons Christina wasn’t looking forward to this cross was the fact that Amber Wilson seemed like a nice person who was, after all, only doing her job. But in this case, the coroner’s testimony was too important to give her a pass. She had to cross the lady as if she were a combination of Satan, Hitler, and Richard Nixon combined.

Once court finally got under way-and Judge Lacayo finished tongue-lashing Drabble and his entourage for being late-the DA began his direct examination.

“Dr. Wilson, would you please tell us when you became involved in the Tony Barovick case?”

Wilson twisted around to face the jury. “I arrived soon after the body was discovered.”

“And what did you find?”

“A severely damaged corpse. As was immediately apparent, the victim had a shattered jaw, two shattered legs, and numerous cuts and abrasions. The body was covered with blood.”

“He was dead?”

“Very.”

“Were you able to determine a cause of death?”

Wilson ran a hand through her brown hair. “Technically, the cause of death was cranial asphyxia-technically, that’s the cause of almost every death. What caused oxygen starvation of the brain is more difficult to say. In this case, the victim had been so mistreated, had been so… damaged in so many ways, it’s impossible for me to say exactly which blow killed him. It could have been the one to his neck and jaw causing a closure of the respiratory passages in the neck, or a compression of the major blood vessels in the neck-the carotid arteries and jugular veins. The blows to the legs could have caused shock, leading to heart failure.”

“Are there ways to determine which blow resulted in death?”

“Not reliably, not in this case. The body was too severely damaged. I did detect evidence of heart failure-but he had been beaten so severely that he had two cracked ribs. He’d been subjected to intense electric shock. Any of those things could have been lethal. It’s really just a matter of which one kicked in first.”

“And you can’t say for certain which did?”

“Not reliably.” She glanced at Christina. “And I feel certain the defense counsel wouldn’t want me to speculate. Bear in mind-contrary to what some people believe, the human body’s physiological and muscle systems do not immediately shut down at death.”

“But you can reliably say that the beating caused the death.”

“Absolutely. That was evident.”

Christina could see that Wilson had prepared carefully for this testimony. She also appeared to have anticipated Christina’s planned line of attack; she was very carefully delineating what she could be certain about and what she couldn’t. While at the same time making sure she gave Drabble what he needed to get a conviction.

“Dr. Wilson,” Drabble continued, “the defendant has raised some questions regarding when death occurred. Is it possible for a medical examiner to make a determination as to the time of death?”

“Yes, it is. There are several methods of doing it. Liver mortis-which is the discoloration of the skin to a pinkish color caused by the settling of blood cells in the small vessels of dependent skin and tissues-does not begin until one to two hours after death, and rigor mortis-the progressive stiffening of the body caused by chemical changes in the muscle tissues-does not begin until two to four hours after death. Since only a short period of time had passed, neither of those were very useful. Fortunately, there are other indicators of the stage of decomposition-body temperature, analysis of the stomach contents, and so forth. Immediately following death, the human body begins to decompose. The rate of decomposition is steady, predictable, and measurable, and barring extraordinary circumstances, will provide a reliable measure for at least the first two hours after death.”

Drabble nodded. “I see. Did you reach any conclusions regarding time of death in this case?”

“Absolutely.”

“So the time of death would be…”

“Eleven p.m. Eleven-fifteen at the latest.”

Drabble nodded thoughtfully. “The defendant has suggested that the beating took place at another location at around 9 P.M.-just after Tony Barovick left the club-and was over by 9:30.”

“No. Not possible. The beating might have begun then, but the killing stroke-the death of Tony Barovick-came later.” She was adamant, and with good reason, Christina knew. Johnny was with fraternity brothers who could alibi him from about 9:30 to 10:45. Wilson was placing the murder at a time when Johnny was alone, before he rejoined his friends at Remote Control.

Christina watched carefully as several of the jurors shifted around in their chairs. They’d been hoping medical science could tell them with certainty who was lying. And that was what they were getting now-or so they thought.

“And you’re sure of this?”

“Beyond a doubt. To a medical certainty.”

“Thank you, Doctor. Your witness, Ms. McCall.”

Christina slowly made her way to the podium. She hated experts. Cross was bad enough with normal people-it was all but unbearable with someone who was only on the stand because it was an accepted fact that she knew more about the matter at hand than you did.

“First, Dr. Wilson, I’d like to talk about the cause of death.”

“Very well,” she said, all forthright and chipper. Christina knew that wouldn’t last long.

“I appreciate your honesty in telling the jury that you really don’t have the slightest idea what the cause of death was. Very forthcoming of you.”

“Ye-ess,” Wilson said, waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“I was troubled, though, by your assertion that the death must’ve come as a result of the beating by Johnny Christensen and Brett Mathers. Since you don’t know what the cause of death was, how can you pretend to know who caused it?”

“I believe he has admitted beating the boy-”

“Yes, but not to killing him.”

“And I saw the results of the beating. Given the severe trauma of the body, it would be ridiculous to suggest that anything else could’ve caused the death.”