A Death in Live Oak

by James Grippando

  “Daddy, what’s suey side?”

  It was another one of those “boy, do I miss Andie” moments. “We’ll talk about that later, sweetie,” Jack said.

  The waitress filled their coffee mugs and brought menus. Righley’s came with crayons and a paper place mat, and she went to work coloring rabbits yellow and raccoons purple. The grown-ups didn’t want to discuss the apparent “suey side” in front of her, but it was impossible not to ponder the implications. A lynching, a possible abduction, and now an apparent suicide. Linking the first two was no cause for brain strain. Mrs. Porter was more puzzling.

  Shelly looked up from the latest news on her iPad. “This story is going national in a hurry,” she said.

  The waitress returned and took their orders. Righley was trying to decide between blueberries or bananas in her stack of pancakes when Jack’s cell rang. It was from “Jack Swyteck, P.A.” A finger to one ear silenced the noisy restaurant as he took the call. His assistant, Bonnie, was on the line.

  “Did you hear about the suicide on the Suwannee?” she asked. Bonnie had an urgency in her voice even when there was no urgency, so the question came with all the excitement of “Did you hear that aliens landed on Miami Beach?”

  “I did,” said Jack. “Why are you in the office on a Saturday morning?”

  “I was up early and watching the news at home. When I heard the woman’s name on TV, I thought, ‘Hmm. That sounds familiar.’”

  “You’ve heard of Cynthia Porter?”

  “I was sure I had, but I couldn’t remember how. Then it hit me. So I came into the office and went through the stack of letters you’ve received from people about this case. I’m saving them in a box. More than a hundred already, and most of them—well, you don’t want to know what most of them say.”

  “I can only imagine.”

  “This one I hadn’t read yet. It just came in yesterday’s mail. But I remembered it because it was such a nice-quality envelope. Like a wedding invitation, almost. Anyway, I double-checked the return address when I came in this morning, and sure enough: Cynthia Porter, Live Oak, Florida.”

  Jack felt a chill. “Did you open it?”

  “I just did.”

  “What does it say?”

  “A lot, actually. Have you ever heard the name Willie James Howard?”

  Jack searched his mind. “No.”

  “You’re about to,” said Bonnie.

  Leroy Highsmith’s jet landed in Gainesville before noon. His meeting with Brandon Wall was at the Alpha house.

  After Friday’s court hearing in Live Oak, the directive from Oliver Boalt was “be prepared to testify next week.” Brandon wasn’t sure what that meant. He took up Highsmith on the offer he’d made on his last visit to the Alpha House: “You call me if you need anything, Brandon.”

  “I’m pretty nervous about this hearing,” said Brandon.

  They were in the fraternity’s study room, seated at the center table. Between them were two cups of coffee and the transcript of Brandon’s grand jury testimony.

  “Don’t be,” said Highsmith. “You’ve already got the grand jury experience under your belt. That’s a pretty good blueprint as to how Oliver Boalt will proceed.”

  “I’m not worried about him. The grand jury was no big deal. Neither was the student conduct hearing in the dean’s office. This is different. This time, Mr. Swyteck will be asking me questions.”

  “It’s totally normal to be apprehensive about that. A good criminal defense lawyer can make you look like a liar even when you’re telling the truth.”

  “I’m sure,” said Brandon. “And a good lawyer can also bring out the truth.”

  Brandon was all but wringing his hands, and Highsmith could hear the anxiety in his voice. “Tell me what’s bothering you, Brandon.”

  “Right before Percy Donovan disappeared we met with Mr. Boalt in Live Oak. Percy and I talked afterward. He told me that maybe Mark Towson wasn’t the right guy. Maybe Towson didn’t kill Jamal Cousin. He thinks it might have been someone else.”

  “Who?”

  “The night the Theta house burned down, Percy was part of the demonstration. You know he got hurt, right?”

  “Yes. One of his friends was stabbed.”

  “Percy ended up with a concussion. Right before one of the skinheads shoved him into the wall, he told Percy, ‘You’re next.’”

  Highsmith sat back, drank some coffee, and considered it. “Have you told Oliver Boalt about that conversation?”

  “Yes. He said he’s not going to ask me anything I talked to Percy about. The hearing is about Mark Towson and Jamal Cousin.”

  “He’s absolutely right.”

  “But what if Mr. Swyteck asks me?”

  “First of all, how would he even know to ask?”

  “I don’t know. Maybe he could just ask, ‘What did you and Percy talk about the last time you had a conversation?’”

  Highsmith looked at him with concern. Obviously Brandon had spent a lot of time worrying about this. A lot.

  “If the judge allows the question, you answer it to the best of your ability.”

  “But won’t Mr. Swyteck argue that ‘you’re next’ means that this skinhead lynched Jamal and then did the same thing to Percy Donovan?”

  “Swyteck can argue anything he wants. But it’s a lousy argument. To me, this whole incident simply demonstrates why people like Mark Towson should be punished severely. They inspire copycat racists. Hate begets hate.”

  “So, if the question is asked, I tell him what Percy said to me?”

  “Brandon, your only job is to answer the question and tell the truth. You can’t worry about how it’s going to play out. Just be truthful. It’s that simple. You think you can do that?”

  Brandon swallowed hard. “I do.”

  Jack read Cynthia Porter’s letter in the motel lobby.

  Bonnie had scanned and e-mailed him a copy after their phone call. Jack put Righley down for a nap with Shelly, and then he went downstairs to retrieve the letter on his iPhone. It was three pages long, written in the lost art of cursive, albeit in the unsteady hand of an old woman.

  Jack read it a second time. And then a third. The letter told the entire tragic story, from the Christmas card Willie James had given to his “sweetheart” at the dime store to the lie Cynthia Porter had lived with since her father sat her down at the kitchen table and explained the disappearance of Willie James.

  Theo joined him on the couch in the lobby. He didn’t read cursive, so Jack told him the story. He sat in silence for a minute, then finally reacted.

  “I can’t say I’m shocked,” said Theo. “We all know this sort of thing happened.”

  “Thousands of times.”

  “I just feel sick.”

  It was hard to say when Jack had last seen Theo like this. Probably his darkest days on death row.

  “I already called the Department of Law Enforcement,” said Jack. “They’re on the way to my office to pick up the original letter from Bonnie.”

  “What for? The fucking murderers who did this are dead by now. They gonna dig up their bodies and arrest them?”

  “It reads like a suicide note, so it’s pertinent to whatever investigation there is into how Cynthia Porter died.”

  “Is there any doubt she killed herself?”

  “Cynthia’s caretaker told a reporter that she jumped, so that’s the only reason the media has been talking about suicide all morning. This letter is the kind of evidence that law enforcement needs to make it official.”

  Two black housekeepers walked by on their way to the front desk. The white woman behind the counter told them which rooms to clean. Theo looked at Jack, as if to say, nothing really changes.

  “Why did this old woman write to you?” asked Theo.

  “I don’t know. Maybe she wrote to everyone involved in the Jamal Cousin case.”

  “What does Willie James have to do with Jamal?”

  “I don’t know that, either.�
��

  “Is there anyone you can ask?”

  “The letter says there’s only one other person alive who hasn’t forgotten about Willie James,” said Jack. “A man named Kelvin Cousin.”

  Theo did a double take. “Cousin? He related?”

  “According to Cynthia, he’s Jamal’s great-grandfather.”

  “Are you going to talk to him?”

  Jack looked off to the distance. “The question is, will he talk to me?”

  CHAPTER 65

  On Monday morning the Suwannee County Courthouse was again packed to capacity—plus one. Mark’s mother was out of the hospital and in the front row, seated between her husband and their daughter. Jack was beside his client at the defense table. Judge Teague picked up exactly where he’d left off on Friday and went straight at the prosecution.

  “Mr. Boalt, what is the status of the forensic tests on this recently discovered shoe?”

  The prosecutor rose. “Your Honor, the testing is not yet complete.”

  The judge was visibly disappointed. It wasn’t that he was rooting for either side. But the test results could have truncated the hearing, and he would have rather spent the day on other matters on his docket. Or perhaps fishing.

  “Your Honor,” said Jack, rising, “just so the record is clear. The state has no evidence to connect Mr. Towson to the shoe that was found near Jamal’s body, the burned Croc found at the Theta house, or this latest Croc found on the riverbank. Is that correct?”

  Boalt was plainly annoyed by the question, but the judge was waiting for an answer.

  “As of this time, that is correct,” said the prosecutor.

  “Noted,” said the judge. “Call your next witness, Mr. Boalt.”

  “The State of Florida calls Dr. Elena Ross.”

  Jack had read the medical examiner’s report and reviewed her grand jury testimony. He listened carefully, jotting down a few notes as the prosecutor elicited the main points through direct examination. Her qualifications were impeccable. Jack noted no inconsistencies between her testimony today and her testimony before the grand jury. It was her conclusion as to the cause of death that Jack would attack on cross. Jack launched straight into it upon the conclusion of Boalt’s examination.

  “Dr. Ross, your autopsy revealed ‘sand and other foreign particles’ in the mouth of the victim, correct?”

  “That’s correct. When a victim drowns in a river, his struggle or the current may stir up debris. That debris ends up in the mouth and throat as he ingests or inhales water.”

  “And that was one factor that led you to conclude that the cause of death in this case was drowning. Correct?”

  “Broadly speaking, the cause of death was asphyxia. The question was whether the mechanism of asphyxiation was drowning or strangulation by hanging. My conclusion was drowning.”

  “Which means that Jamal Cousin was dead before he was hanged. True?”

  “Dead or within moments of death.”

  “And the basis for that conclusion was the absence of bruising on his neck. Am I correct?”

  “Partly,” the doctor said. “With strangulation by hanging, there is typically a classic V-shaped bruise running up the neck and behind the ear. The body doesn’t bruise after the heart stops beating. The absence of bruising indicates that the hanging was postmortem.”

  Jack checked his notes, then continued. “Let’s take a closer look at death by drowning, Doctor. Generally speaking, when a victim drowns in a river, isn’t it true that sand and debris are often found in the lungs in addition to the mouth and throat?”

  “That can be the case.”

  “You didn’t find any sand or debris in Jamal Cousin’s lungs, did you?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “But you concluded that the cause of death was asphyxiation by drowning. True?”

  “Yes,” she said, her tone a bit defensive. “Not all drowning victims present with sand in the lungs. Here it was found only in the mouth.”

  “But sand in the mouth is not always a sign of drowning. Is it, Doctor?”

  “I’m not sure I understand the question.”

  “Let’s say a dead body is dumped in a river,” said Jack. “Isn’t it true that sand can lodge in the mouth as that body scrapes along the bottom, pushed by the current?”

  “Yes. It happens. But a trip down the river can be a violent experience, and those bodies typically exhibit postmortem trauma ranging from abrasions to bone fractures. That wasn’t the case here.”

  “Let’s consider something a little different,” said Jack. “Say a dead body was towed behind a boat to a disposal site, but it wasn’t dragged along the riverbed. You wouldn’t expect the body to be scraped and beat up in that situation, would you, Doctor?”

  “Objection,” said Boalt. “Mr. Swyteck is asking questions that simply have nothing to do with what happened in this case.”

  “Your Honor, we don’t know what happened in this case,” said Jack.

  “Sustained. Ask a different question, Mr. Swyteck.”

  It wasn’t the first time a judge had shut him down incorrectly. Jack regrouped. “True or false, Dr. Ross? Drowning cannot be proven by autopsy. It’s a conclusion a medical examiner reaches after ruling out other possible causes of death.”

  “That’s essentially true. Drowning is a diagnosis by exclusion.”

  “Your report does not rule out all possibility that Jamal Cousin was dead before his killers took him to the river. Does it?”

  “Objection.”

  “Overruled. The witness may answer.”

  “Could you repeat the question, please?”

  “I’m asking if it’s possible, Doctor. Consistent with your autopsy findings, is it possible that someone killed Jamal Cousin on dry land and then took his body to the river?”

  The prosecutor leaped from his chair. “Objection. Is Mr. Swyteck suggesting that Jamal Cousin was lynched somewhere else, taken to the river, and then lynched again? The question makes no sense.”

  “Makes sense to me,” the judge said. “Can you answer the question, Dr. Ross? Is that scenario possible, that Mr. Cousin was murdered somewhere else and then brought to the river?”

  “Theoretically,” said the doctor, “but I want to emphasize that Mr. Cousin wasn’t stabbed, shot, poisoned, or beaten over the head. There are numerous indicators of asphyxia noted in my report. If Mr. Cousin was dead before he was brought to the river, the cause of death was still asphyxiation.”

  “Fair enough,” said Jack. “Drowning and strangulation by hanging are not the only forms of asphyxia, are they, Doctor?”

  She paused, choosing her words carefully. “There are others. But most can be ruled out in this case. For example, Mr. Cousin’s death had nothing to do with carbon monoxide poisoning or choking on a foreign object.”

  “Let’s talk about the forms of asphyxia that are not as easily ruled out, Doctor.” Jack paused longer than necessary. Silence could be an effective tool—time to make the witness wait and wonder.

  “Is there a question?” asked Boalt.

  Jack stepped closer to the witness. “Doctor, asphyxia can be caused by smothering, can it not? By smothering I mean closing or covering the nose and mouth.”

  “Yes. That is a form of asphyxia.”

  “In this case, you can’t completely rule out smothering, can you?”

  “I noted in my report that the nasal and oral orifices were not obstructed.”

  It was exactly the answer Jack wanted. He retrieved the autopsy report and turned to the flagged page. “You also noted traces of adhesive over the victim’s mouth,” he said, handing her the report. “Right, Doctor?”

  She looked at it, but not for long. She knew it was there. “Yes.”

  “Which suggests that at some point during the trip to the river, tape covered Mr. Cousin’s mouth. Correct?”

  “It could have been on the trip to the river,” she said. “It also could have been after reaching the river.”

&n
bsp; Jack exaggerated his confusion. “But if tape covered his mouth while he was in the river, sand would not have been present in the victim’s mouth. Would it, Doctor?”

  Dr. Ross paused, as if debating how hard to push back. “In a drowning, it’s possible for sand to enter through the nose and lodge in the mouth.”

  “Okay. Let’s stick with that standard you just articulated: what’s possible. It’s also possible that his mouth was taped before reaching the river. Right?”

  Her search for wiggle room was obvious. Then she answered, “I—yes.”

  Jack retrieved the report and stepped away from the witness. “Let me ask you again, Doctor. Can you completely rule out smothering as the mechanism of asphyxiation?”

  Boalt could sit no longer. “Judge, this whole line of questioning is just silly. What’s next? Is Mr. Swyteck going to ask if Jamal Cousin was smothered by locking himself in an abandoned refrigerator?”

  The judge went pale, and the public’s reaction from behind the lawyers was palpable. The toothy grin drained from the prosecutor’s face as the realization set in: he’d made a bad joke in a situation that was anything but a laughing matter.

  “Overruled,” said the judge.

  “One more time,” Jack said in a serious tone. “Doctor, can you rule out smothering?”

  The witness could have jammed him and said, “Yes, to a reasonable degree of medical certainty,” relying on the time-honored amorphous standard that allowed doctors to reach virtually any conclusion that cut against the opposing counsel’s theory of the case. But Jack had already demonstrated that betraying her own professional integrity could prove to be embarrassing.

  “I would have to say no,” she answered.

  The response didn’t trigger the chorus of murmurs across the courtroom that trial lawyers dreamed about, but it was close. Jack could see that Boalt was dying to pop from his chair, but hearing an answer he didn’t want to hear was no basis to object.

  Jack returned to the defense table and stood beside his client. “Dr. Ross, in some cases a medical examiner is unable to determine a cause of death. Isn’t that true?”

  “It’s rare.”

  “But it happens?”