Murder in the Courthouse

by Nancy Grace

  Hailey watched and absorbed the interaction between Adams and his parents, his mom in particular. The two held a long gaze. Looking at Mrs. Adams, it was clear: She adored him, loved him, and, most important, believed him.

  A rush of papers and sudden movement at the front of the courtroom was followed by a half a dozen minions rushing in. Then, in came the judge. Sharp-faced and gray-headed, Luther Alverson insisted on presiding over more jury trials than any other judge in the courthouse.

  At eighty-four, he was also the oldest judge in the courthouse. So old in fact, he predated the state regulations on mandatory retirement. In order to prove himself still up to the task, he demanded that any and all Chatham assistant district attorneys and public defenders assigned to his court must go on trial every other week. His calendar was rarely backed up, and when a case went on his trial calendar, there would be no last-minute haggling, no eleventh-hour guilty pleas, no cheap deals.

  Everyone stood as the judge seated himself with the simultaneous pounding of his gavel with three loud strikes. “Court’s in session. The Honorable Luther Alverson presiding.”

  Like in a church at the end of a hymn, everyone sat back down in their seats in unison. The calendar clerk’s seat was positioned directly beside the judge’s bench. The clerk stood to read directly from the grand jury indictment, calling out the indictment number, a series of letters and numbers that had significance only to court employees, followed by the announcement “State v. Todd Adams.”

  As her son’s name was read out loud, Tish Adams burst into tears, drawing every eye in the courtroom off her son and onto herself. Hailey immediately checked Julie Love’s mother, also seated in the front row but on the other side of the courtroom.

  The look Dana Love shot at Adams’s mother could have cut stone. It was a look of pure hatred. It was clearly borne of resentment at the long years Adams was coddled by his mom, at the numerous excuses for Adams’s bad behavior she made, culminating in a final act of violence.

  Adams’s defense team made a big stir at their table, scrambling among themselves, as it turned out, for a handkerchief the lead defense lawyer dramatically pulled from his lapel and handed back to Tish Adams. Immediately, prosecutors stood, and striding quickly toward the judge’s bench, barked out the word “Sidebar!”

  “Counsel, approach the bench! Including you, Mr. DelVecchio.”

  Hailey knew enough from all her years prosecuting in court that Alverson was already on to the defense ploy of having the jury focus on the grieving mother of the defendant, not the grieving mother of the victim, Julie Love. Thankfully, the prosecutor was on to it too, but Hailey hoped he could cut off DelVecchio next time before the play was made.

  As it was, all twelve jurors were still staring sympathetically at Tish Adams, who was now breathing deeply into a clear plastic breathing mask attached to a portable cylinder of pure oxygen.

  Ugh. This was going to be a long trial.

  Hailey couldn’t stop staring either, even though she suspected all the sobbing was a preplanned charade, the defense and Tish Adams clearly in cahoots. As Hailey watched the judge’s stern face framed by the suited backs of all the attorneys, they turned and strode back to their counsel table.

  To see DelVecchio’s face, smiling and preening toward the jury, you’d think he had just won an argument in the U.S. Supreme Court when, in fact, he’d just gotten his first dressing down from the judge. The whole game was new to the jurors, but Hailey knew that soon enough, most of them would catch on to the game Adams’s defense was playing.

  After the reading of the indictment in which the accusations and a partial description of the deaths of Julie Love and baby Lily were laid out, the jurors repeatedly glanced at Todd Adams as if trying to reconcile the two brutal murders with the good-looking, athletic young man sitting behind the defense table. His mother was still overtly crying, but now silently into DelVecchio’s hanky, following the judge’s admonition.

  The judge turned toward the jurors and launched into a set of typed, pretrial jury instructions to provide somewhat of a road map as to how the trial would go.

  The case commenced. The lead prosecutor stood up, pushing his chair back from counsel table, approaching a podium directly centered before the judge. He laid out a stack of paper on which he had handwritten pretrial motions to the judge. He began in a conversational tone, but as the intensity of the story increased, he picked up the pace and pitch. By the time he showed the jury a photo of Julie Love—the one at Christmas time, decked out in her Christmas-red satin pantsuit, her tummy bulging with baby Lily—all twelve jurors plus the alternates were at the edge of their seats. And this was just for motions, openings hadn’t started!

  But just before the prosecutor, Herman Grant, punched the slide projector button to proceed to the next image up on a slide screen on the other side of the courtroom, DelVecchio stood and loudly shouted out.

  “Objection! The state is trying to poison us all against Todd Adams, and I won’t have it, Judge! This is so cruel and unfair, to use the life of Julie Love in this manner . . . just to get a conviction!”

  Hailey cringed as Grant turned, his face in a rage, and then Julie Love’s mother put her head in her hands, leaning on her husband’s shoulder.

  “Send out the jury!” Alverson said it calmly but Hailey could tell the judge was angry. He couldn’t afford to show emotion and jeopardize a death penalty case, but there was no way Alverson was going to let DelVecchio run roughshod over the court with his flamboyant behavior.

  “Careful, careful . . .” Hailey muttered to herself. If the judge came down too hard on DelVecchio, it could later be argued that he, the judge, was biased against the defense, even at this early stage of the trial.

  The judge’s law clerk, hooked up to an audio flow of the court proceedings in his own office next to the judge’s, came rushing into the courtroom, up to the bench, and began whispering into Alverson’s ear.

  The judge visibly controlled himself as the jury headed into the jury room, directly adjoining the courtroom. The judge launched into a reprimand of the defense, but Hailey couldn’t help but notice the pleased look on DelVecchio’s face. Was he happy the judge was reprimanding him? Or happy he had already gotten the jury to view his client, not Julie Love and Lily, as the victim?

  Hailey stood up and slipped out of the courtroom. She took the stairs located at the end of the corridor outside swinging doors to the court. Quickly heading down five flights to the courthouse lobby, past the lines waiting at metal detectors, she pushed through the gigantic front doors of the Chatham County Courthouse, and out into the fresh, salty air.

  Hailey breathed it in in big gulps. She hadn’t realized the mental images, much less the feelings . . . the raw emotions, being in a criminal court would bring back.

  Instead of homing in on exactly what was being said with a razor-sharp focus, her mind had drifted . . . back . . . back to her days in countless felony courtrooms where she had prosecuted the worst of the worst. Fleeting moments of trials, courtroom arguments, crying victims, and blood-spattered crime scenes gave way to other memories.

  Memories of Will’s murder . . . the trial at which she was a witness . . . the sound of her boots as she stepped down several steps from the witness stand to leave following her testimony . . . the sad look in the jurors’ eyes as they watched her . . . passing the defense table where she saw Will’s bloody denim shirt lying there. She recognized it and in a blur . . . a numb blur . . . she looked into the face of the defense attorney, seated there beside his client . . . Will’s killer.

  They both immediately looked down into their laps. They couldn’t even look her in the face.

  Even now . . . years later . . . she wanted to go back to that courtroom. She wanted to grab Will’s denim shirt and run away with it . . . to save it from the defense team . . . to keep them from touching it . . . ever.

  Looking out blankly at traffic in front of the courthouse . . . it all came flooding back. Her fac
e was hot. Tears sprang up in her eyes. She clutched the wrought iron handrail flanking the stone steps leading to the courthouse entrance.

  Why would I want Will’s bloody shirt? She almost said it out loud. It didn’t make sense. And how was she going to sit through another murder trial if she’d be affected like this?

  Just then, Hailey felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned.

  It was Fincher.

  “I saw you leave the courtroom.”

  “Shouldn’t you be up there? They may call you as a witness.”

  “Ha. With the show DelVecchio’s putting on, it’ll be days before they call me. Plus, I overheard one of the bailiffs tell the prosecutor that the judge was recessing for the day. He’s so mad at DelVecchio, he thinks it’s best to start opening statements in the morning when things cool down a little. If there is a conviction, and that’s a big if, nobody wants a reversal because of angry words from the bench. So we’re done. For today, anyway.”

  The two headed across the street to the lot where the rental car Hailey got at the hotel was parked. “Want a ride? I’m heading over to Alton Turner’s place to check it out.”

  “Alton Turner? Are you back on that? Why? Does Billings know?” Finch didn’t sound as if he thought this was such a great idea.

  “I don’t know what you mean by ‘back on that,’ but whatever that means, I absolutely am ‘back on it.’ I don’t find a severed body and just forget about it. It doesn’t work that way with me.”

  “I’m afraid it doesn’t,” Finch fired back, rolling his eyes.

  “I’ve got a gut feeling if something doesn’t give, they’ll chalk it up as an accident. You know, take the path of least resistance. I really think a second look with fresh eyes might help. Know what I mean?”

  “Fresh eyes. Oh yeah, I think I do know what that means.” Risking her wrath, he went on, “You do know this is not your jurisdiction and it’s not your case, Hailey.”

  Hailey gave him a withering glare in response. He didn’t wither. Instead, he just looked right back at her.

  “Last I checked the Constitution, it’s still a free country, Fincher. I know it’s not my ‘jurisdiction’ and it’s not my ‘case.’ I’m like every other ordinary civilian going about my very own business. I just happen to be curious, that’s all.”

  No response from Finch.

  “Listen, I just want to go look at the back windows of the house, just to see if somebody could’ve gotten in that way. Maybe just look around the outside of the house, no harm in that. Maybe visit with a few neighbors . . . just to get the temperature. Know what I mean?”

  “Oh yes, I know what you mean. You’re investigating the case behind Billings’s back. That’s what you mean, Hailey. Don’t think I don’t know it.”

  She was silent for a few seconds, then spoke. “OK. Have it your way. I won’t butt in.”

  This was not at all what Fincher expected. “I’ve never known you to give in that easily. Are you sick?”

  “No, I’m not sick but as a matter of fact, I was up half the night studying the Adams case.”

  “Studying the Adams case? You’ve studied it for months, you’ve interviewed witnesses, the Chatham County Medical Examiner, visited the scene . . . and you’re still studying? What more is there to know? He had a girlfriend, he wanted out . . . so he killed her. There, case solved . . . you’re through studying.”

  “As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted—”

  “Are you still claiming I interrupt you? I hate to interrupt, but that’s absolutely not true.”

  They both started laughing.

  “That’s right, you would never be so rude. But yes, I stayed up late studying so I’m going to go crash for a couple of hours. I’ll call you in a few.”

  He gave her a long, hard look. “Promise? Because, in the history of Hailey Dean, I have never once known you to take a nap. You’re really going back to the hotel to rest? Because that’s just what you need to do, whether you ever do it or not.”

  “I absolutely am going back to the hotel. I promise I’ll call in a couple of hours.”

  He looked at her face, searching for any sign of obfuscation. There was none.

  “OK. I’ll see you on the flip side.”

  “OK. See you!”

  Hailey headed to her car. She’d promised, true. But what she’d promised was a different matter altogether. Choosing her words carefully, she’d promised specifically to call him later. She knew it was tricking him, but pulling out of the parking garage and heading into the sunshine, she knew full well he would end up laughing about it.

  She Google-mapped Alton Turner’s address and headed out of downtown Savannah. Hailey smiled to herself in the rearview mirror. He’d laugh all right. In the end.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  The neighborhood where Alton Turner lived looked almost deserted in the middle of the afternoon. Most of the residents of the sleepy little suburb were at work.

  Hailey retracked the route she and Finch had taken the first time she’d ever been there. She didn’t even need to consult her Google map. How could you forget the first time you ever saw a severed torso lying on a garage floor?

  Turning a corner, Hailey spotted Alton’s house. It was just as precisely neat as ever. Pulling her rental car into the driveway, Hailey got out and slammed the door just in time to spot a guy on foot with a ponytail walking away from Alton’s. He had a huge camera slung over his shoulder and was just turning the curve in the street. Had he just been here? Maybe a crime-scene tech . . . or the Savannah Morning News.

  Hailey turned from the guy who had now disappeared into the neighborhood and faced Alton’s house. She took one step and stopped. Something was wrong.

  She stood stock-still, just looking. After a few moments she realized what was out of place. There were pinecones and leaves scattered across the front lawn. Pinecones. Hailey’s mortal enemy as a child. The things were little, barbed grenades to the touch and when accidentally pressed against bare feet in summertime . . . oh, the scream that would follow. And Alton’s yard was covered with them, thanks to some tall pine trees at the edge of his lot.

  Pinecones on his otherwise immaculate lawn? That would’ve driven Alton Turner absolutely crazy.

  Instinctively, Hailey strode across the lawn and, bending over, picked up the ten or so prickly pinecones dotting the yard. There was a group of shrubs surrounding an ornamental willow off to the side of Alton’s house with a concrete birdbath and decorative swing nearby.

  It was a lovely setting. Hailey imagined Alton landscaping it and knew without being told that he and his mom had sat in that swing together many an evening. The shrubs and willow were positioned in a bed of pine straw . . . a pine straw island so to speak. The perfect place to ditch the pinecones.

  Hailey quickly dumped the sharp cones behind the bushes. Just to the rear of the island, she spotted three more cones.

  Ugh. Why was she doing this? Cleaning the yard of a dead man she’d never even met? Automatically, a voice answered in her head. Because I’d want someone to do the same for me.

  Truth be told, Hailey felt like she knew Alton and actually connected with him. Looking through his home, reading his emails, looking at so many photos of him, even looking in his fridge, for Pete’s sake, Hailey was convinced she knew Alton Turner . . . and she liked him.

  Maybe she was just projecting, but she could feel the pang of loss he’d felt when he lost his mom. Immediately, she recalled a small black-and-white photo she’d seen. It was framed and positioned beside his bed. It was an old shot of Alton and his mom when he was a boy. He was standing partially behind her. She had on a short-sleeved print dress with a white apron tied behind her, covering the front of the dress from the waist down. Alton was hugging the tops of her legs with both arms.

  He was smiling and so was she. Hailey paused and it struck her that throughout Alton’s home, she hadn’t seen a dad . . . anywhere. Not a single photo of him . . . not a trace. His mom was
all he ever had. Alton, aside from trying to fit in with the other sheriffs at work, was alone in this world.

  Hailey understood. She bent over to get the rest of the pinecones and spotted some trash as well. There was a cigarette butt barely edged with bright red lipstick and a piece of round black plastic, something about the size of a Gatorade bottle top.

  Did the Eleanor from the emails smoke? Had she been here with Alton? Hailey tossed the cones behind the bushes and carried the cigarette butt and the plastic back to her car to throw away.

  The bits of trash were minute, but Alton Turner would’ve flipped if he’d seen litter in his yard. Hailey smiled to herself and tossed it into the back floorboard of her car.

  Now, to get down to business. She wanted another look around Alton’s place. Alone. Without a fleet of crime-scene techs, and Fincher, God bless him, nagging at her with questions.

  Cell phone in pocket, Hailey clicked her car locked and headed along the white cement driveway toward the garage. The garage door was back in place and a tiny coil of yellow crime scene tape was curled like a fuzzy caterpillar on the drive at the edge of the garage door. That was all that was left, to the casual eye, of the discovery of a dead body.

  But as Hailey walked closer, she could see the dark stain on the concrete at the edge of the door. If a potential home buyer didn’t know better, they’d probably think it was an oil spill.

  But Hailey knew it was Alton’s blood. She was rooted to the spot, staring down at the concrete.

  A bird chirping overhead in the pines filtered through her thought process, and she looked up to the green branches and to the blue sky beyond. What really happened to Alton Turner?

  Hailey glanced toward the front door, but instead turned left and headed around the side of the house along a path of garden stepping-stones. The grass around and in between the smooth flagstone steps was lush and green.