Prosecution: A Legal Thriller

by Buffa, D. W.

  "Well, your Honor," he drawled. "It's getting a little late and, with the court's permission, I would just as soon begin tomorrow morning." He paused and looked around the packed courtroom. "I'm going to put Marshall Goodwin on the stand," he announced, as if he had just accepted a dare, "and his testimony is certainly going to take a lot longer than the time we have left today." After he had given everyone a chance to take in the significance of what he had just said, he added, "And there is a matter for the court, your Honor."

  It was nearly four o'clock. With the usual admonitions against discussing the case, Holloway sent the jury home. In front of their twelve vacant chairs and a courtroom still jammed with spectators and reporters, Jones moved to have the case against his client thrown out. There is a formula for this as well, repeated in every criminal trial in which I have ever been involved. This was the first time I had not recited it myself.

  "Your Honor, the defense moves for a judgment of acquittal on the ground and for the reason that, based on the evidence provided by the prosecution, no rational trier of fact could possibly find the defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt."

  In plain English, this means a jury would have to be crazy to convict. Every defense lawyer makes this same motion at the end of the prosecution's case. It has to be made. It is the only way to preserve for appeal the possibility that the case against the defendant was not legally sufficient. There are even times when you actually believe it. Jones seemed to believe it now.

  "No one can be convicted on the testimony of a coconspirator alone, your Honor!" he cried. "The testimony of Travis Quentin by itself has no weight whatsoever. Even if he had never committed another crime in his life—even if he was not a savage assassin who kills for the pure fun of it but had never before been in trouble with the law, his testimony could not be used to convict the defendant. There has to be independent proof that the crime in question occurred and that the defendant committed that crime. And what the State has provided beyond the testimony of Travis Quentin has been nothing more than a long exercise in futility. They haven't produced a single witness to verify what Quentin did. Not one. There is no evidence. There is no case. There is nothing to take to the jury."

  His face flushed and dank with perspiration, Richard Lee Jones looked up at the bench. "This court has no choice but to grant this motion and enter a judgment of acquittal," he told her.

  Irma Holloway's lips were pressed together, drawing the skin over her sharp cheekbones and lending her an expression of impartial severity. When Jones finished and she looked at me, her eyes, cold and aloof, shielded whatever was going on in her mind. I thought I might lose.

  "Your Honor," I began, clearing my throat, "Mr. Jones is right. No one can he convicted on the uncorroborated testimony of a co-conspirator. The testimony of Travis Quentin, however, has been corroborated, not just once but in several important particulars. Quentin testified he was paid ten thousand dollars in hundred-dollar bills. The manager of the bank where the defendant had his account testified that Mr. Goodwin withdrew that precise amount in hundred-dollar bills just days before Quentin received it. Now," I went on quickly, "the defendant may be able to show that the money was used for an entirely different purpose, an innocent purpose, and that all this was just an unfortunate coincidence. But the question now is whether the State's evidence, if uncontradicted, is sufficient to take to the jury. The State believes it is."

  In quick, abrupt movements, Holloway checked to see if either of us had anything more to add."The State has met its burden to put on a prima facie case," she announced. "Motion denied. We begin again in the morning." She rose from her place on the bench, gazed for a moment at the faceless courtroom crowd, and then turned toward the door behind her and vanished from view.

  Chapter Fifteen

  As I stood across the street from my office, waiting for the light to change, three shirtless men, chiding one another for falling behind, shoveled molten black asphalt into a pothole a few feet from the curb. July had given way to August, and even in the late afternoon the sidewalk burned with the reflected glare of the sun.

  Inside the air-conditioned building, the perspiration began to cool on my face, leaving a thin, dry film on my skin. Helen looked at me and then glanced toward the open door to my office.

  "I didn't know what else to do with her," she whispered, "so I put her in there."

  I dropped the overstuffed case file on her neat desk and headed for the men's room. "If she asks, tell her I'll be back in a few minutes."

  Cupping my hands under the basin faucet, I threw cold water on my face and slapped it against the back of my neck. I unfastened my trousers, rearranged the tails of my shirt, combed my wet hair, and tightened my tie. After adjusting my suit coat, I moved the heels of my hands over my eyes and past my temples, trying to draw away the fatigue on my face.

  In the shadows of the lowered blinds, her eyes followed me as I entered the office and walked over to sit in the chair behind my desk. I looked at her steadily and said nothing. With my elbows on the arms of the chair, I crossed one leg over the other, pressed my fingertips together, and began to rock slowly back and forth.

  "Are you angry with me?" she asked.

  "Should I be?"

  "I could understand it, if you were." She pulled the hem of her skirt slightly higher as she shifted in the chair. Stretching her arm, locked straight, across the back corner of the chair, she tilted her head in the same direction.

  "Your testimony didn't hurt," I remarked with a shrug, as if nothing she could do would make any difference, one way or the other.

  "It didn't help," she insisted. She had a look I had seen before, the look on the face of the first girl you fell in love with when she told you she couldn't see you anymore, the look that told you she was not trying to hurt you but did not mind too much if she did.

  "It didn't help either one of us," I replied pointedly.

  She looked along the length of her arm until her eyes came to rest on her hand, where she spent a moment inspecting her nails. "Do you think I didn't consider that?" She moved her hand to the arm of the chair. "You knew it wasn't as simple as that," she remarked, searching my eyes. "You knew I couldn't just turn on him."

  "Perhaps I just assumed that under oath you'd tell the truth."

  "I told you I'd tell you the truth, and I did. You never said anything about having me tell it at trial."

  I sat perfectly still. "That's the kind of distinction only a lawyer would make."

  "That's the kind of distinction you and I understand."

  "It won't be a distinction anyone will care very much about in a perjury trial."

  "You think he's going to be convicted, don't you?" she asked. There was a touch of uncertainty in her voice, a hesitancy that seemed to point to something beyond what might happen to her husband.

  Raising my eyes, I said confidently, "I don't have any doubt about it."

  "You surprised me when you just let my answers go like that. Why didn't you ask me about what I'd said to you here, in this office, when we talked before?"

  "Maybe because I understood that you weren't going to tell the truth about anything so long as you thought there was still a chance that Marshall might get off."

  "I told you I couldn't just turn on him."

  I stood up. "Well, now that you've explained yourself," I said, rather impatiently, "perhaps you'll excuse me. I still have a great deal of work to do."

  She tried to conceal her surprise. "I thought you might want to talk about what comes next," she said.

  "There isn't anything to talk about," I assured her, as I walked around the desk and helped her out of the chair. "You were there. The defense begins its case tomorrow. I've finished with mine."

  In the outer office, Helen was putting the case file in order, as she always did. Opening the door to the hallway, I walked Kristin Maxfield to the elevator. "Tell me one thing," I said to her, as the elevator door opened. It was empty, and Kristin stepped inside. "Did you h
ave anything to do with the death of his wife?"

  She swore that she had not. "And until the trial," she added, her eyes fixed on mine, "I didn't think Marshall had either. I thought the envelope I gave to Quentin held papers about the drug case."

  I let go of the door and stepped back as it began to slide shut. "If you had told the truth at trial," I said, just before the two brass doors met, "I might be able to believe you now."

  * * *

  Late that night, with cool air drifting in through the open French doors, I put aside the voluminous case file and gazed at the library shelves, wondering where among all those books I could find anything as intriguing as the subtle duplicities of a wife worried that she might have missed her best chance to betray her husband. It was time to bring another player into the game. I picked up the telephone and called the hotel where Richard Lee Jones was staying. We agreed to meet a half hour before court convened the next morning.

  Two floors below the courtroom where we were trying the case, in a tiny conference room where the press would never find us, Jones listened while I made an offer. "We'll drop the charge to murder in the second degree. He saves his life and, more than that, he'll eventually be eligible for parole."

  He took it as a sign of weakness. Leaning across the small table, he tried to face me down. "When that jury comes back, he's going to walk out of there a free man."

  "Listen to me," I replied. "This is serious. The only reason I'm making this offer is because he isn't the only one I want. I want her, too. Your client agrees to testify against her... "

  "His wife?"

  "Who do you think I'm talking about?"

  Jones got to his feet and glared at me. "You just finished putting on your case, and now you make an offer? All of a sudden you don't want this case to go to the jury?" He could not help himself. "And you used to be so good with juries. What happened, lose your nerve?" He turned to go.

  "Please convey my offer to your client," I remarked, as if it was a matter of no great importance. "So there's no misunderstanding about this, the offer will stay open until you rest your case." His hand was on the door, turning the knob. "Unless I make a deal with his wife first. If that happens, there's no offer at all." The door had opened.

  "She's been to see me twice already," I remarked dryly. "But perhaps you already know that." And I went out in front of him.

  If I had in any way shaken Jones's confidence, it did not show when he rose from behind the counsel table and, turning to the jury, called Marshall Goodwin to the stand. Goodwin moved to the end of the counsel table, cast an easy smile toward the jury, and then walked briskly across the front of the courtroom to the witness stand. With an open, almost cheerful countenance, he listened with one hand raised while the clerk rapidly recited the oath. Wearing a dark tie and a conservative suit, shiny black shoes, and a white long-collared shirt, Goodwin was a model of understated propriety and an eager self confident witness. He had an answer for everything.

  Jones began with the only question that mattered. "Mr. Goodwin, did you have anything—anything at all—to do with the death of your wife Nancy two years ago?"

  Goodwin bent slightly forward, grasped both arms of the chair, and, gazing directly across at the jury, said in a firm, clear voice, "No, I did not."

  I did not know if they believed him yet, but watching their eyes I knew they wanted to. Goodwin had the kind of boyish blue-eyed charm that always made people want to believe him. It had been his strength as a lawyer, and perhaps the source of his weakness as a man. Because everything always came easily, it made him believe he could have anything he wanted.

  Richard Lee Jones's voice seemed to become more compassionate, more understanding, with each question he asked. His eyes settled on his client in silent approval of each answer Marshall Goodwin gave. Hour after hour, with steady, clear-eyed Goodwin presented the autobiography of falsely accused. For the better part of two whole days, Jones led him through the story of his life and marriage and the tragic consequences of Nancy Goodwin's death.

  Asked about his reaction when he was first informed of his wife's murder, Goodwin broke down and cried.

  "Now you've had to sit here and listen while the prosecution tried to convince us to draw certain inferences about your conduct," Jones said, with a sidelong glance at me. "Why don't we just clear the air once and for all about this. Just tell us. When was the first time you ever slept with your present wife, Kristin Maxfield?" Stark and sensual, stunning in its raw simplicity, the question riveted the attention of the courtroom. The court reporter let her hands rest on the keys as she turned to look.

  "Three months before we were married," Goodwin answered, staring level-eyed at the jury.

  "And you were married a little less than a year after your first wife was killed?" Jones asked earnestly.

  "Yes." Goodwin sighed. "That's correct."

  Jones moved from sex to money. "Do you deny that you withdrew ten thousand dollars from your bank account?"

  Goodwin treated it as if that was the last thing he would ever want to do. "No, of course not."

  "But why would you do that when you apparently had to first transfer money—I believe it was something like thirty-five hundred dollars—from your savings account to cover a withdrawal of that size?"

  "We had decided, Nancy and I, to invest the money in a mutual fund. We started talking about it when she found out she was pregnant." With a faraway look, he added, "We decided we had to do everything we could to make sure we started saving money instead of spending it."

  Apparently still confused, Jones inquired, "Why didn't you just write a check?"

  "I couldn't remember the name of the brokerage firm," Goodwin replied, embarrassed. "It was downtown, near my office, and I had an appointment there later in the day."

  "And did you invest the money that day?"

  "No. Something came up and I had to be in court. I put the money in a safe in the office."

  "Did you ever invest it?"

  "There wasn't time. The next day I started a murder trial. The money was safe. I wasn't worried about it. And then... well, after my wife was killed, there were some expenses." He spoke quietly, his eyes drifting to the floor.

  "One last thing. Did you request that the money you withdrew be given you in hundred-dollar bills?"

  "No," he replied, glancing up. "The teller just gave it to me that way. It's easier to count and easier to handle."

  It was a few minutes past four when Jones finally finished. Judge Holloway asked if I wanted to wait until morning to begin cross-examination. Behind me I heard the rustling of people getting ready to leave.

  "No, your Honor," I said, glancing up at the clock. "I only have a few questions to ask this witness. It shouldn't take long."

  The fingertips of my left hand rested on the table. I shoved my other hand into my pocket and cocked my head."Tell me, Mr. Goodwin. If your present wife, Kristin Maxfield, wasn't sleeping with you until three months before your marriage, who was she sleeping with?"

  Before Jones was halfway out of his seat, Judge Holloway was hammering the courtroom back into submission and demanding to know what I thought I was doing. I was not in the mood to be apologetic.

  "I'm beginning my examination of this witness with questions about statements made by him during the direct examination conducted by his attorney," I said firmly, returning her gaze.

  She looked at me a moment longer; then, convinced I was serious, she nodded her head thoughtfully and allowed me to continue.

  Raising my chin, I looked hard at Goodwin."You testified that the first time you slept with Kristin Maxfield was three months before you married her. Is that correct?" I asked rapidly.

  With one hand on the arm of the witness chair, Goodwin shoved himself forward, as if he was more than willing to meet any challenge thrown his way."Yes, that's correct," he replied, his words sailing at me as fast as mine had come at him.