by A. W. Gray
Having done all the damage that she could, Jerri folded her tent and rested her case, and Guthrie made a motion for an instructed verdict of acquittal. This motion is standard in all criminal trials, and the court’s denial is standard as well. In this instance, however, Creuzot pondered the defense’s request for many long minutes. The judge had serious matters to consider.
The burden on the state in their case-in-chief is to bring sufficient evidence so that it’s possible for the jury to convict on what the state has presented alone. Thus if a man is charged with armed robbery of a supermarket, and the state presents evidence only that the grocery store was robbed without showing anything on which the jury could conclude that the defendant was the robber, the court is required to instruct acquittal. This never happens, of course, because if the state didn’t have witnesses to identify the robber, they wouldn’t have brought the case to trial to begin with. In the case of Richard Lyon, though, the judge’s consideration was on a much higher level.
The charges against Richard were admittedly circumstantial. No one had placed arsenic in his hands, no one had seen him leave any wine or pills on Nancy’s doorstep—no one, in fact, had witnessed Richard doing anything other than purchase arsenic (with no evidence that he’d ever received the order), cheat on his wife, and lie to his lover. The question Judge Creuzot had to ponder, then, was whether Richard’s actions, statements, and behavior before and after Nancy’s death were sufficient for the jury to legally return a conviction. In the end, Creuzot denied Guthrie’s motion, but the judge could have made the call either way and escaped criticism. Jerri’s witnesses and admitted evidence had been barely enough.
The instructed verdict issue decided, Creuzot recessed for the day and told Guthrie to have his defense ready by early in the morning. It was the sixteenth of December. In relation to the trial’s beginning, it was over halfway to Christmas.
38
There was a death during the Lyon trial, and a period of mourning among the writers. After seventy years of spirited competition, the Dallas Times-Herald gave up the ghost and surrendered its mantle to the Morning News. The News bought a mere shell: desks, typewriters, printing presses. The spirit of the Herald was not for sale; Dallas, a city of two voices, simply woke up that morning with only one. The earnest young man who’d reported the Lyon trial for the Herald merely, poof, was no more.
Pete Slover does his thing for the News, and seemed even more lost than the rest of the writers. “It’s like a team with nobody to play,” he said. “It’s always been a challenge, me trying to scoop the other guy, find out something he doesn’t know. Now I’ve got nobody on the other side to keep me on my toes. Takes a lot of the fun out of it, you know?”
Writers bowed heads, suffered long moments of silence, then turned attention to Dan Guthrie’s defense of his client. It was as if concentration on the unfolding courtroom drama would keep minds off of a dear departed friend and hold back the unfallen tears.
Grandstand quarterbacks abound in the practice of criminal law, and those who go along with Guthrie’s strategy and those who would have done it differently are about equally divided. Half would have rested the case without putting on a single witness, and argued before the jury that the state’s evidence, lacking positive proof that Richard had ever possessed any arsenic to begin with, and further failing to show that he had sufficient motive, in itself produced reasonable doubt. In retrospect, the failure to offer any defense at all would have been preferable to the disasters ahead, but ability to predict the future is not a prerequisite to the securing of a law license. Richard’s entire defense hinged on his credibility. Guthrie placed his best foot grandly forward, and put his client on.
Richard rose from his seat at the defense table wearing a three-piece, I’m-from-Harvard pinstripe suit, stood erect, right hand raised, for his swearing-in, and mounted to the witness stand like a director at a board meeting. His olive complexion was clear, his manner confident. Jurors sat at rigid attention.
“I’ll ask you first,” Guthrie boomed, “did you poison your wife, Nancy Dillard Lyon?”
“No, I did not.” The words were perfect; the tone, however, was nasal, flat, emotionless, and tempered with what Texans call the impersonal damyankee way of saying things. Richard, alas, was in a far different culture from his roots. He was definitely a Connecticut Yankee in good-ole-boyland, and so he would remain.
The stage thus set, Guthrie began with a series of photos. Pictures of buildings. Multimillion-dollar skyscrapers whose construction Richard had supervised, the message apparently being that a man involved in such high finance had too much on his mind to plot the murder of his wife. A jury of weekly paycheck recipients squirmed and fidgeted. For those who had seen the Richard and Dan Show on television, the live act wasn’t nearly as mesmerizing.
Guthrie then led his client through his Harvard years, his meeting of Nancy during the warm fall of ’79, their growing romance, their close relationship as both sought their respective master’s degrees. Richard touched on the couple’s marriage, their move to Dallas, their purchase of the two M-Street duplexes, their eventual migration into the Park Cities. He spoke of his and Nancy’s separate careers. Not surprisingly, he downplayed Big Daddy’s role. To hear Richard tell it, the couple had done it on their own. The jury had already heard the same story from Big Daddy’s standpoint, and the rerun didn’t seem to catch their attention. With the jury steadfastly on nap alert, Richard droned through the financial details of the deal on the Shenandoah duplex as if his mortgage and second lien bore heavily on Nancy’s death. Just as the courtroom seemed ready to doze, however, Dan Guthrie changed directions with a grinding clash of gears.
“In the spring of ’89,” Guthrie said, “did you and Nancy attend a Dillard family meeting at Sierra Tucson, in Arizona?”
Throughout the room, heads shot to attention. The audience was to receive another dose of the incest deal. Hallelujah.
“Yes, I did. We drove out, Nancy and I, and took the baby.”
“What was the occasion of the meeting?” Guthrie said.
“Bill Jr., my brother-in-law, was there in alcohol rehab. It was family week.”
“Where the family receives counseling on how to deal with alcoholic recovery? Codependency?”
“Yes.”
“Richard, did you and Nancy meet with a counselor?”
“We did,” Richard said, deadpan.
“What did you learn during that session that you hadn’t known before?”
Jerri Sims sat motionless at the prosecution table, back straight, hair billowing out over her chair back and almost touching the floor, offering no objection. Give them enough rope …
“I learned that my wife and brother-in-law had engaged in incest when they were teenagers,” Richard said. “Nancy took it up with the counselor.”
“Richard.” Guthrie here assumed a tone of male-bonding sympathy. “During your entire marriage, had you ever been aware of the incest?”
“Never.”
“Nancy had never told you about it?”
“Not once. I couldn’t believe my ears.”
“And Richard, if you remember,” Guthrie said, “what was your reaction?”
Richard paused. He licked his lips. “The idea disgusted me,” he finally said.
Throughout the courtroom and in the jury box, women stiffened. They understood. Richard, on learning of his wife’s problem, hadn’t been understanding. He hadn’t been caring, he hadn’t been gentle. He had been disgusted. When the women left the courtroom and returned home that evening, there were some husbands who were going to be in for it.
Guthrie led Richard through the family meeting where Big Daddy’s reaction to the incest was somewhat less than one would have expected—and where Richard continued to be disgusted by it all—then went through the arguments with Nancy on the way home, through her alleged frigidity once she sta
rted counseling, through the beginnings of the affair with Denise Woods. From Richard’s lips, jurors and spectators learned of the events of that fall, of Richard’s secret trysts with Denise both in Dallas and points east and west, his continued worry over Nancy’s coldness to him, his agreement to accept sex-addiction treatment at Sierra Tucson and ultimate defection from same. They learned of his leaving home after New Year’s, and his setting up residence in the Springbrook condo.
“Richard,” Guthrie said, “during January of 1990, did you have occasion to buy chemicals in Houston, from General Laboratory Supply?”
“Yes, I did.”
“And what were those chemicals for?”
“Mercury, for a battery I was building. Barium carbonate, to use as fire ant poison. Sodium nitroferrocyanide, to use as an agent to color the poison red.”
Guthrie now spoke to Judge Creuzot. “Your Honor, may I approach the witness?”
Permission granted, Guthrie showed Jerri a piece of paper—which she handed back with barely a glance—then had the page marked for evidence, gave it to the judge, and had the page admitted. He asked Richard to identify the piece of paper.
“It’s a diagram of my design to combat the fire ants.” A picture came to mind, Richard in a steel helmet and army fatigues, M-16 rifle held ready while ants the size of Shetland ponies thundered over the rim of his foxhole.
There was a wooden three-legged easel set up near the witness box, holding a giant sketch pad. Guthrie had already used the sketch pad numerous times during the trial to illustrate medicines (when cross-examining Dr. Bagheri), points in time, etc., and he now flipped over a page on the pad to reveal a professional-looking diagram. It consisted of a picture of a sidewalk, so marked, a colony of scurrying ants entrenched beneath the walk (marked, interestingly enough, “ants”), and a huge drawing in the lower right-hand corner that resembled an updated version of Buck Rogers’ ray gun. There were handwritten notations in many places on the diagram.
“For the record,” Guthrie said, “this merely is a blowup of the diagram we’ve just had marked as evidence. For the jury’s convenience.”
Creuzot leaned over the bench, squinted at the smaller diagram that lay before Richard, then peered at the sketch pad. “Looks the same to me,” the judge said. “Miss Sims?”
Jerri waved a hand. “No objection, Your Honor,” she said, but her expression and body language said, God, when will this be over with?
“And, Your Honor,” Guthrie said, “so that the jury may see, I ask the court’s permission for the witness to join me in front of the jury box.”
Creuzot did a double take and looked at the jurors. None of the panel members seemed particularly frightened at the prospect of having a murder suspect stand arm’s-length away. Creuzot shrugged. “Okay with me.” Jerri Sims sat back in her chair and folded her arms.
Richard climbed down, and he and Guthrie carried the easel, sketch pad and all, over to set up shop in front of the jury. As the two men stood on either side of the easel, Guthrie glanced toward the prosecution table. Jerri was bent urgently sideways in apparent danger of developing a crick in her neck in her effort to see the drawing. Guthrie slanted the easel at an angle so that the sketch pad was visible to both jury and prosecutor. Jerri relaxed.
“Now, Richard,” Guthrie said, “will you please identify the various items on this drawing for the jury?”
“This,” Richard said, using a pointer he’d lifted from the easel’s ledge, “is the sidewalk in the backyard of my Shenandoah Avenue duplex, and this” —moving the pointer—“shows where the fire ants had burrowed under the sidewalk to build their nest.”
In the writers’ section, two men winked at each other. Earlier one had remarked, “I didn’t think they allowed fire ants in Highland Park. I thought the bastards all came over to my house.”
“Richard, would you please read this notation to the jury?” Guthrie indicated handwriting in the upper left-hand corner of the drawing.
Richard fished in his pocket, produced wire-framed reading glasses, and put them on. “‘Maybe the sprayer could be connected to the drill,’” he read.
“And who made that notation?”
“It’s Nancy’s. We worked on this together.”
Suddenly, Jerri sat erect. “Objection. Hearsay.”
“Your Honor,” Guthrie said, “we will show through expert testimony that the handwriting on the drawing is indeed Nancy Lyon’s.”
“We’ll stipulate as to the contents of the note, Judge,” Jerri said. “With relation to who wrote it, our objection stands.”
“I’m going to …” Creuzot paused. “Mr. Guthrie, I’ll overrule the state’s objection with the understanding that they may raise it later on, if you fail to show the proof. Overruled, Miss Sims.”
“Thank you, Your Honor,” Guthrie said. Having gotten his point across, he now indicated the ray gun–like figure in the lower right-hand corner. “And what,” Guthrie said, “is this?”
Spectators and jurors alike sat forward. Christ, maybe they were about to see the murder weapon.
“It’s my electric drill,” Richard said.
Spectators and jurors sank back in disappointment.
“Thank you. Let’s return to the stand.” Guthrie, aided by Richard, moved the easel back to its position facing the audience. Richard ascended the one step and resumed his seat behind the witness railing. Guthrie sauntered in the direction of the defense table.
As the defense attorney approached, Leila Thomas bent over and picked up something from under the table. The beautiful legal assistant stood with a common battery-operated Black & Decker electric drill and handed it to Guthrie. The drill had an unusual bit attachment, a steel rod with its end flattened into a wicked-looking rectangular point. Guthrie pulled the trigger. The point of the rod spun immediately into a blur, accompanied by a loud BZZZZZZZZZZT. Jurors and spectators now exchanged astonished glances. Christ, the thing was loaded.
Guthrie offered the drill to Jerri, who waved it away with her shoulder heaving in silent laughter, then went through the evidence admissions procedure. Creuzot held the drill between both hands, shot the bit attachment a puzzled look, admitted the evidence, and returned the drill to the defense lawyer.
As the entire throng in the courtroom jumped as if touched with live wires, Guthrie approached the witness, constantly pulling the trigger so that his initial question sounded something like this: “Richard”—BZZZZZZZT—“I show you”—BZZZZZT—“this admitted evidence”—BZZZZZT—“and ask if you can identify it”—BZZZZZZZT. He released the trigger, and the sudden silence was deafening.
“It’s my drill.”
“The same drill”—Guthrie pointed—“depicted in the drawing.”
“Yes.”
“Please tell the jury,” Guthrie said. “Precisely, what was your plan to get rid of the fire ants?”
“Normal poisons wouldn’t work, because the workers removed the queen to safety so quickly.” Richard sat forward and eyed his drawing as he spoke. “To get these ants you have to zap them in a hurry. I was going to use the drill to smash through the sidewalk and poison the bed before they knew what hit them.”
“And that was the purpose of the barium carbonate and the sodium nitroferrocyanide which you bought from General Laboratory Supply?”
“Well, the barium carbonate was the poison,” Richard said. “The sodium nitroferrocyanide was a coloring agent, so that the poison would be red and we could show the girls not to touch the red stuff.”
“To protect your daughters.”
“Yes.”
“And did your plan work?” Guthrie said.
“Not initially. The poison, in order to be effective, had to be in liquid form. The barium carbonate was insoluble. It wouldn’t dissolve.”
Outwardly comical—not to mention eardrum shattering—as the demonstrat
ion had been, the jurors were sitting up and taking notice. Richard certainly seemed to know what he was talking about.
“Did you later find the solution to the problem?” Guthrie said.
“Nancy did,” Richard said.
Jerri stiffened as if to object, then relaxed. Any action on Nancy’s part that Richard had personally observed wasn’t hearsay.
“While the two of you were separated?”
“All during the separation we continued to work together on problems that came up around the duplex. Nancy came up with a formula that included arsenic trioxide.”
Guthrie moved to the defense table, returned holding a piece of paper, had the paper admitted, and asked Richard to identify it.
“It’s an invoice,” Richard said. “I found it in some of Nancy’s things after she’d died.”
“An invoice,” Guthrie said, “from Chemical Engineering in Dallas?”
“Yes.”
“And does the signature in the receipt column look like Nancy’s?”
“Yes. I’d know her handwriting anywhere,” Richard said.
Guthrie then had Richard read the items on the invoice, which included, of course, arsenic trioxide. The quizzical grins that had showed around the courtroom when Guthrie had produced the drill were no longer there. The defendant was making sense. It was also at that moment when those present first began to sense a midstream change of direction in Richard’s defense. All the pretrial hoopla and TV drama, all the finger-pointing at Bill Jr. and David Bagwell, all of this was about to drift out of the courtroom in a puff of smoke. The defense now directed its entire game plan toward the theory that Nancy had committed suicide.
The suicide theory came into sharper focus during Jerri’s brief but aggressive cross-examination. “Mr. Lyon, is it your thought that Bill Jr. murdered Nancy, or that the killer was David Bagwell?” When she so desires, her soft and cultured tone can drip with sarcasm.
“Neither,” Richard said.
Even Jerri seemed taken aback. “Could you explain that?”
