Full Disclosure

by Beverley McLachlin

  It’s late morning by the time the grocer takes the final oath. Justice Moulton looks at the clock, then at the jury in their box. “I will now ask you to retire, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, and to choose one among you as your foreperson.”

  When they return after a fifteen-minute break—true to his word, Justice Moulton runs the trial precisely to time—Janus Kasmirsky, the woodworking artist, stands up and announces that the jurors have chosen him as their leader.

  Good, I think, nodding at Jeff.

  Janus Kasmirsky, angular of face and gaunt of body. He emigrated from Latvia to Montreal with his mother when his parents separated. Immigrant roots, artistic, just like Vincent Trussardi. I scan the research Damon compiled, and my initial enthusiasm sags. Further investigation shows a Jewish father who ranked high in the Communist Party in postwar Poland.

  At two o’clock, we return to face the tedium of Justice Moulton’s opening instructions to the jury. The press that occupied the backbenches in the morning has fled, having better things to do than listen to judicial boilerplate. Moulton advises the jurors of their duties, reminds them of their oath.

  “The onus is on the prosecution to prove that Vincent Trussardi is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt,” he tells them. “Any doubt must be resolved in favor of the accused.”

  Reasonable doubt, our best and only hope.

  CHAPTER 36

  IT’S 9:00 A.M. ON TUESDAY, day two of the trial of Vincent Trussardi, and we’re in the empty courtroom for preliminary motions on evidence. We need to settle what goes in and what stays out. Cy and I both know that the outcome of this case may well depend on what the jury gets to hear. The process is governed by a complicated and sometimes opaque area of the law known simply as Evidence, the bane of every second-year law student. In his old mentoring mode, Cy taught me to fight hard to keep damaging evidence out; I’ve learned the lesson well.

  At stake are two critical pieces of evidence—the motel clerk Emond Gates’s identification of Laura Trussardi from the photo lineup, and whether Cy can ask Carmelina if she slept with Vincent Trussardi after the murder. Justice Moulton listens as I talk, interjecting here and there to interrupt my submissions. Then, just when I think all is lost, he surprises us by announcing that he will reserve his decisions until tomorrow morning.

  “That’s a good sign,” I tell Jeff as we organize our papers.

  “He’s just scared of botching the trial. He’s not on our side, this judge.”

  Precisely at ten o’clock, the door to the inside corridor opens, Marion calls for order, and Justice Moulton strides up the steps to his chair, flips open his bench book, and runs the heel of his hand down the pristine page.

  “Mr. Kenge,” he says, raising his square jaw. “Let this trial begin.”

  The press, back in full force, hushes. The jurors, arrayed in their box, shift expectantly. Vincent Trussardi straightens in his seat. The real action is about to start. Cy pushes himself up from his chair and moves toward the jury, leg swinging wide, head lowered as though in pain—which he may well be. I see the jury’s wonderment at this strange hulk of a man, watch sympathy pass over their faces. Cy hasn’t uttered a word yet, and he has them in the palm of his hand. I know all his tricks from friendlier days. Now I can only sit back and admire.

  It doesn’t get better for Trussardi as Cy works his way through his opening address. Cy is sad; Cy is grieved; Cy is overcome by the horror of the crime that will occupy us for the next ten days or so. He tells the jurors they are in for terrible shocks and difficult experiences. The testimony they will hear will disturb them; the photographs of the crime scene will expose them to more brutality than they have ever imagined. Yet it is their duty as citizens to study the evidence, consider what kind of a person could have done this.

  So far, so good, I think. Vincent Trussardi, a civilized man with no history of violence, could not have committed this crime in the way it was committed.

  But Cy moves on. “You will hear evidence that the deceased, Laura St. John Trussardi, was having an affair with the architect who had designed the Trussardi residence and that she was pregnant.” The jurors take note. A baby, a life unborn. The ante is upped. “Indeed, the Crown will prove that Laura visited her lover the day before the murder. It is the Crown’s contention that the accused, enraged at learning that the affair was not over and that his wife was carrying another man’s child, killed his wife—and did so intentionally and in the most punitive fashion imaginable. Sadly,” he tells the jurors, “you will not hear from the architect, who was killed under mysterious circumstances after fleeing to Brazil.”

  Cy swivels his massive head and stares at Vincent Trussardi, who sits stonelike in the prisoner’s box. He does not say the words, nothing on the record for an appeal court to see, but the invitation is clear—Draw your own inferences as to who might have benefited from the architect’s death. The power of silent suggestion, another thing Cy taught me.

  “What you will hear,” Cy picks up a new theme, “is that the deceased was killed by a bullet fired by a gun registered to the accused, Vincent Trussardi. You will hear evidence that the gun was required by law to be kept locked in a safe in Mr. Trussardi’s residence and that the police found the safe locked. And you will hear”—Cy pauses for effect—“that the revolver was missing and that despite a minute search of the property, it has never been found.”

  Cy moves on. “You may find yourselves wondering, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, how a civilized man with no formal record of violence could commit this crime in such a brutal and sadistic manner.”

  So that’s how he’s going to play this. Seize the weakest link in the chain that leads to guilt and forge it into iron.

  “I would only urge this caution upon you—do not be too quick to conclude that only a man with a history of violence is capable of the evil you will see revealed in the evidence of this case. Evil wears many faces.”

  I stand. The judge sees me and jumps in. “Mr. Kenge, some latitude may be allowed in addresses to the jury, but please confine yourself to the evidence and avoid speculation about the accused’s character.”

  “Yes, my Lord.” But the seed has been planted. He turns back to the jury. “Ladies and gentlemen, the state has placed a profound responsibility on your collective shoulders—to do justice in the matter of the brutal killing of a beautiful and vibrant woman, Laura St. John Trussardi. I am confident you will not fail in your duty to the state and the people of Canada.”

  The librarian nods, the nurse leans sympathetically forward. From my place at the counsel table I look across to the prisoner’s box to see how the client is wearing the proceedings. If he’s concerned, he’s hiding it well; Vincent Trussardi surveys courtroom twenty with equanimity. He inclines his head as I take my seat and our eyes briefly meet. He smiles, or maybe he doesn’t. Then he resumes his remote and distant pose.

  “I call Constable Burns,” Cy says, and a stout man in a black suit that bulges at the buttons strides to the box. “Please state your role in the murder investigation, Constable.”

  “I was in charge of the CSU,” Burns replies proudly.

  “Can you tell the jury what CSU stands for?”

  “Crime Scene Unit, the house, the room, the body.”

  “Carry on please.”

  In the passionless voice of an airport security guard unpacking a traveler’s bag—messy maybe, but all in a day’s work—Burns gives us the details with scientific precision.

  “The body showed signs of multiple assaults,” he says, absently stroking his clipped orange beard. “A bruise to the face, beneath the left eye, bruises on both forearms, and a large bruise to the right buttock. Note the lesion below the left breast, and the lesions at the wrists and ankles caused by the bonds.” He goes on in excruciating detail—death reduced to horrific data.

  Forty-eight graphic photos—each described, stamped, and placed in the record—deliver the final punch. Forty-eight times, I watch the jurors’ eyes widen
in shock, close in horror. The modern murder trial is a technical affair. Fingernail scrapings, hair, blood, blood, and more blood—all must be collected, stored, analyzed, and then, when the trial finally arrives, explained in meticulous detail to yawning jurors. Chemists to explain the composition of blood, and ballistics experts to link gun to bullet. Usually, the process takes weeks, but in this case we’ve consented to the experts’ reports going into the evidence immediately.

  “Maybe I taught you something after all,” Cy had grudgingly chuffed as we’d tied up the arrangements a week earlier.

  “Maybe, or maybe I figured that one out on my own.” Prosecutors like to wallow in bad facts; defense lawyers need to shut them down.

  Despite our concessions, the process of identifying, marking, and explaining the reports to the jury consumes the rest of the day. In the late afternoon, I watch the jurors file out, exhausted from a day of yawing between shock and tedium. We will have only a few questions for Constable Burns when the time comes tomorrow—the evidence speaks for itself, and our defense, such as it is, lies elsewhere—but I have listened to his testimony with growing apprehension.

  “Not good, not good at all,” I say to Jeff as we gather our things. “Horror breeds blame. Outrage needs its outlet, and the jurors are going to direct theirs against Vincent Trussardi.”

  “The judge will tell them to consider the evidence calmly,” Jeff assures me. “He’ll remind them they shouldn’t be swayed by emotion.”

  “Easier to say than do,” I say. “But I love your uncharacteristic optimism.”

  CHAPTER 37

  MY OFFICE DOOR IS SHUT; my screen is off. I’m going over Alicia’s draft for the examination in chief of Vincent Trussardi. In the next room, Jeff is working on questions for the mock cross-examination he will conduct to prepare Trussardi for the real thing. That’s if we call him. Outside the sky is darkening. So much for an early evening.

  I push Alicia’s notes aside. Words, words, words. Evil deeds dressed up in words. The trial’s barely started, but already I feel it spiraling toward disaster. Vincent Trussardi, who I have convinced myself is innocent, stands to be convicted. And all I can offer are words.

  Cy’s list of witnesses looms up at me. It’s what we expected, except he’s put in the possibility of calling a surprise witness, depending on circumstances, at the end. I stifle apprehension. Nice try, Cy, but sorry, we need the name.

  I’m relieved to find no mention of the occurrence report about Laura Trussardi crying in the street shortly before her murder. Maybe Lois was just babbling, drunk and confused.

  Jeff pokes his head in the door. “I’m off.”

  “Night, Jeff,” I call.

  Alone now, I realize how tired I am. It looks easy, what lawyers do—sitting in soft chairs, making notes and noises from time to time—but that’s an illusion. Tension, concentration, the uncertain interval between question and answer all take their toll.

  The static in the back of my mind doesn’t help either. The dark van is gone, but since my visit to Raquella, a beige Toyota has been popping up in my rearview mirror more often than I like. There are thousands of beige Toyotas in Vancouver, but it still bothers me. And I’m worried about Edith, who no longer answers her phone. I asked Richard to check on her townhouse. Her car was there, but she didn’t answer the door. Maybe I should send the police in.

  The red light on my desk phone blinks, my private line. I hesitate, pick it up.

  “Jilly Truitt speaking.”

  Silence. Five seconds pass on my big watch. I hear a click, then the buzz of a vacant line.

  Another crank call. The third this week. Don’t be crazy, my mind tells me, it’s just a wrong number. But my gut sends a different message: Someone’s out to get you. He’s here, she’s here, waiting, biding their time. My fingers grip the edge of my desk. My familiar chair, my glass worktop are suddenly foreign, unsafe. I need to go; I need to flee.

  The parking garage is deserted, except for my car, sitting exactly where I left it, shining, clean, no messages on the windshield. This time.

  On the way home, I assess the possibilities.

  One: I’m paranoid.

  Two: someone wants me to stop investigating.

  Three: someone is trying to mess up my mind so I lose the trial.

  If I’m paranoid, there’s nothing to worry about. If someone wants me to stop investigating, too bad, I won’t. If someone is trying to mess with my mind, I sure as hell won’t let them succeed.

  CHAPTER 38

  WEDNESDAY, DAY THREE OF THE Trussardi trial, eight fifty-six in the morning. Jeff and I are seated at the defense table. At the back of the room the usual audience—the press, the gawkers, Lois, Raquella—waits for the show to start. Across the aisle Cy and Emily confer in whispers. We’re all in our places, just in case Justice Moulton’s watch is fast and he comes in with his rulings on the evidence three minutes early.

  “You okay?” Jeff queries as I open my tablet.

  “Yeah, fine,” I say.

  It’s a lie, and Jeff senses it. He’s about to pursue the issue, but Cy leans over the aisle and says sotto voce, “You look tired, Jilly. Working too hard.” There’s an edge in his voice that belies the sympathetic words. Does Cy have something to do with those calls? No, he would never stoop to unprofessional gambits. Maybe the case really has gotten to me.

  Marion’s cry—“Order in the court!”—saves me from further speculation. Justice Moulton mounts the stairs and opens his red leather bench book.

  “The first matter,” he starts, “concerns the exclusion of evidence that a certain Carmelina Cappelli and the accused had sexual relations after the murder.” He outlines my arguments, refers to Cy’s. But, as usual, all that matters is the bottom line. “Ms. Truitt submits that this evidence has no probative value. Mr. Kenge argues that post-crime conduct is always relevant and that any prejudice to the accused is negligible in an age when casual sex is common.”

  Cy shoots me a knowing smile, but I ignore it.

  “I accept Mr. Kenge’s argument,” Moulton finishes. “The evidence will be admitted.”

  We’re done, I think. As I feared, this judge is against us. An arcane piece of defense lore comes to mind: you can win over a skeptical jury, but if the judge is against you, you’re lost.

  “The second matter,” Justice Moulton drones on, “is the admissibility of the evidence of the motel clerk, Emond Gates, purporting to identify the woman who came to the Stay-A-While Motel the afternoon before the murder as the deceased, Laura St. John Trussardi. It is well-settled law that identification by photo lineup is inadmissible if the persons shown in the photos are unlike the person in question.” He digs out the photo lineup. “Here the witness was shown twelve photos of women. Three might be described as blond, like the victim. However, the two blond comparators are unlike the deceased—one has a plump round face, the other, while somewhat resembling the victim, shows signs of acne. None of the other photos remotely resemble the late Laura St. John Trussardi. It follows that the photo lineup is unfair and that the identification evidence based on it is inadmissible.”

  Cy shows no sign of dismay, but I see Emily’s lips part momentarily before she flattens her face back to impassivity. I survey Justice Moulton with new respect. It’s a gutsy ruling on important evidence. On balance, we’ve come out ahead.

  “We’ll take a short break,” he announces. “The trial will recommence promptly at ten o’clock.” He exits the courtroom in a swirl of red robe.

  * * *

  BY LUNCH, THE LAST OF the crime scene experts wraps up her description of the bed, the body, and the house. We sit and listen, no choice but to accept the evidence and what flows from it. It’s not good that the only blood in the room is Laura Trussardi’s, not good that there’s no sign of a struggle as she was being tied up—She consented to this, we’re meant to infer—not good that these indisputable facts point squarely to her husband. Jeff makes a few forays in cross-examination—even has a
go at the coincidence of two plates in the sink—but he can’t draw the connections and nothing comes of it. In due course, we will suggest alternative scenarios, but for now, we can only listen, taking care to keep our faces serenely unperturbed.

  In the afternoon, Cy moves on to Officer Kostash, who headed up the perimeter search team. Kostash is broad of beam and balding, smugly erect in a cheap suit that hangs like a smock. Beetle eyes dart beneath bushy brows as he explains the meticulous search he and his men (a phrase that includes two women) conducted. They searched the house and grounds inch by inch, he tells the jury, producing elaborate site plans marked with “X”s and lines to prove the point. They found a number of things—broken pottery, garden shears, three decaying condoms, but no gun. In subsequent days, they extended the search to neighboring properties—still no gun.

  Jeff leaves this evidence—more accurately lack of evidence—alone, but zones in on another tack. “Did you check for footprints in the garden or on the adjoining property, Officer?” he asks, rising from his seat, rearranging his gown across his shoulders.

  “It’s a matter of routine. If we had seen any footprints, we would have noted them.”

  “Would you check your notes, Officer, to see whether any are mentioned?”

  The officer’s beefy forehead wrinkles in a frown as he licks his fat thumb and applies it to the first of the sheets on the thick stack before him. Jeff rolls his eyes to the ceiling, all patience.

  “Officer, perhaps I can help you,” he says at last. “Could you go to the page numbered one twenty-six, near the bottom of the pile?”

  Laboriously, Kostash thumbs through the pages, finds 126.

  “Would you read the second-to-last paragraph to the jury, Officer?”

  Officer Kostash begins to read. “ ‘Approximately five feet to the west of the eastern boundary of the property.’ ”