Parish put her hands down and marched right back to the edge of the jury box. “Really.” She lowered her voice to just above a whisper, as if she were telling a secret to a close friend. “Do you think if he fired that gun, like the two other witnesses say he did, that he’d come here as a Crown witness and admit it?” She shook her head. Amazingly, two jurors did the same.
“Put it in reverse.” She was still whispering. Still shaking her head. “If he was firing, as you heard the other Crown witnesses say he was, do you really think he wouldn’t remember?”
She started walking up along in front of the jury box, one hand on the railing, comfortable, like a kid trailing her fingers on a fence walking to school.
“Mr. Dewey Booth,” Parish said when she got to the end of the rail. “I saved him for last.” She put her hands over her mouth but didn’t repeat her mumbling trick. Instead she removed them. “‘Speak no evil.’ The only witness who puts the gun in my client’s hand. You might believe that. Or you might believe Dewey had the gun. But there’s one thing about his testimony that is not in dispute. You’ve heard about it since the very first day of this trial. On the afternoon of November fourteenth the weather turned cold. It started to snow. And it was icy. Mr. Wilkinson told us his son slipped on the sidewalk. And remember, Officer Kennicott tumbled running over. All five of the Crown’s eyewitnesses agree with me about this. And that it was slippery is the only explanation that makes sense for this horrific tragedy.”
She was brave and smart, Greene thought, not to shy away from what had happened here—the death of four-year-old Kyle Wilkinson. She’d handled it with sincerity and compassion and still made her argument. He promised himself he wouldn’t peek at the jury again.
“Because here’s the point that has not been mentioned in this trial. Not by any of the Crown’s witnesses. Not by Mr. Armitage in his address to you this morning. The one thing that will make you realize that you not only should acquit my client, but you must find him not guilty.”
Parish took in a few deep gulps of air. It looked like she’d gotten so caught up in what she was saying that she’d forgotten to breathe.
She walked back away from the jury to the court clerk, who handed her a pair of plastic gloves and then the gun. Greene had seen her arrange this before the jury came in. She pivoted back toward the jury, gun in gloved hands. You sure couldn’t say this address was boring, he thought.
“If my client, or Dewey Booth, were trying to shoot Jet, why were no bullets fired at him or his car? Think of the place where Larkin and Jet were standing as being twelve on a clock face. We have evidence of shots fired at the top of the clock, behind them; to the left, hitting the building at nine o’clock; and to the right, striking Kyle at three o’clock. Not one stick of evidence a shot was directed at six o’clock. Where Jet was. No bullet holes in his car. No bullet holes in the concrete or the trees there. Nothing.”
She was right. This was the part of the case that Greene knew had never fit. Always bothered him.
“Ask yourself,” she was saying. “How many shots were fired? As many as nine. You’ve heard evidence that the gun found in my client’s aunt’s backyard had a clip that only took six bullets and there was room for one in the chamber. Only seven bullets maximum.”
She turned toward the jury, brandishing the gun. “There are no bullets in this weapon. Believe me, I’ve triple-checked. Still, I’m going to point it well above your heads.”
She’s putting the jurors in the place of someone about to be shot at, Greene thought.
“Picture this scenario. It is the only one that fits with all the evidence. Dewey and Larkin are back against the wall. The Cadillac pulls up. A shot goes over their head. More shots. In a hasty effort at self-defense, this gun is fired.”
Greene had to smile. Parish had been cagey enough with her words to not say who fired the gun. Since her client hadn’t testified, she couldn’t point the finger directly at Dewey. But this way she left it an open question for the jury.
She paused again. Greene knew where she was going with this. “Why in the world does this stray bullet go on such an odd angle and strike poor Kyle? There’s only one explanation that makes sense. The ice.”
Parish pretended to slip. Her outstretched arm and the gun in it turned a quarter of a clock face and aimed right at Ralph Armitage.
“That, I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is what happened. Tragic and horrible. Yes. But murder? No.”
Parish brought the gun back to the registrar and pulled off the gloves with a snap.
For the thousandth time in the last few months Greene had played out in his head the different scenarios of what actually happened in the Tim Hortons parking lot. He didn’t believe Parish had it right. But he thought she was closer than he’d ever come to the truth.
And that was what was the most frustrating thing about this case. With the civilian eyewitnesses not seeing much, everyone else lying, and Larkin St. Clair not talking, it meant the only one who knew the whole story was this Dragomir Ozera character. And he was nowhere to be found.
61
Five long, lousy days, and counting. Ralph Armitage was beginning to feel like a prisoner himself in the courthouse, waiting for the jury to come back. While the jury was deliberating, the trial lawyers were required to be on call, available to come back into court with just fifteen minutes’ notice. They could leave the building only when the jurors weren’t deliberating, meaning he and Greene were stuck here from nine in the morning until nine at night, with two hour-and-a-half breaks for lunch and dinner.
And every time he stepped out of their little courthouse office, a whole contingent of bored reporters, who were staked out in the hallway, desperate for any kind of a story, descended upon him. They peppered him with a barrage of questions and grew frustrated when he wouldn’t give them a quote they could use.
Sitting in the room, staring at the wall outside his window, Armitage played over and over again in his mind every move that he’d made in the case: his deal with Cutter, the pretrial with Judge Rothbart, his cross-examination of all the witnesses, his addresses to the jury. And most of all Jose Sanchez, aka Dragomir Ozera, aka the guy who could totally and forever fuck up his life. This waiting was a strange and tortuous purgatory.
But now, just after the lunch break, his phone was ringing and he could see by the call display the court registrar was calling. Greene, who’d spent most of his time looking at another file, the murder of Officer Kennicott’s brother Michael and the detective’s only unsolved case, looked up at him.
“It’s the registrar,” he said, eyeing the phone display.
Greene closed his file.
Armitage swallowed hard and picked up the phone. “Ralph Armitage,” he said. “What can I do for you, Mr. Registrar?”
“His Honor wants you back in court immediately.”
“Does the jury have a question, are they deadlocked, or do we have a verdict?” he asked. His heart was fluttering.
“Sounds like they’re still deadlocked,” the registrar said, “but you didn’t hear that from me.”
Armitage chuckled. “Mum’s the word. Thanks.”
“Still deadlocked,” he told Greene after he hung up.
“Rothbart’s not going to be happy,” Greene said.
That was for sure. Judges hated indecisive jurors and deadlocked juries.
This would be the third time they’d been called back to court. On day two the jury came back with a question: “Your Honor, could you please reread to us the definition of Parties to an Offence.”
This question wasn’t great for the Crown. It seemed to indicate the jury was thinking that Dewey was the shooter, not Larkin. He could still be convicted of first-degree murder, but it was tougher. Rothbart read them the law and explained, as he had done before, that being a party made St. Clair equally culpable.
Armitage had made the same point in his jury address: “You don’t have to find that Larkin St. Clair pulled t
he trigger to convict him of first-degree murder.” He thought it was one of his best lines. That was five days ago. Felt like five weeks.
Yesterday, a very unhappy Judge Rothbart called the lawyers back into court. The jury wasn’t there.
“This is a message I received ten minutes ago from the jury foreperson,” he said. “It reads: ‘Your Honor, we are deadlocked.’”
He called the jurors back in and admonished them in his best, deep, judge’s voice. Told them they were in a better position to find a verdict than any jury could be, that he was impressed at how hard they were working, how he was absolutely certain they could arrive at a just verdict, and how important it was that they, and not another jury, reach a decision. Blah, blah, blah.
“Rothbart’s going to want a verdict soon,” Greene said, as he packed up his file, tightened his tie, and pointed to a calendar on the wall. “He’s supposed to be in New York tomorrow for his annual trip to see his Broadway buddies.”
“Holy shit,” Armitage said. “I forgot all about that.”
“I bet our honorable high court justice remembered,” Greene said.
Out in the hall the gang of reporters was thicker than ever. “Why do you think it’s taking the jury so long?” Zachery Stone asked, perching himself right under Armitage’s elbow.
“Maybe they like the free food,” he said.
“Great quote,” Stone said.
“No, no, Zack, that’s off the record.”
Everyone laughed.
Rothbart was already seated when they came into court. He was scowling. Nancy Parish rushed in, yanking on her robes, and took her seat. Rothbart drummed his fingers impatiently while Larkin St. Clair was led back in and his handcuffs were undone. He looked pale and distracted.
Rothbart unfolded a piece of paper that was the only thing on his desk. “I have another note from the jury. It says: ‘Your Honor, we are hopelessly deadlocked.’ The word ‘hopelessly’ is underlined.” He threw up his hands. “What do counsel suggest?” he asked both lawyers.
“I think you send them back out to try again,” Armitage said. As much as he feared losing the trial, the thought of having to do it all over again was even worse. Especially with Ozera still out there. God, he just wanted this to be over.
“I agree,” Parish said. She looked exhausted too.
The unwritten rule with hung juries was “three strikes you’re out.” In other words, usually judges didn’t let them off the hook and declare a mistrial until they’d complained at least three times that they couldn’t reach a verdict. More often than not, the last go-round seemed to work.
But judges, who lived in fear of being overturned by a higher court, all knew that declaring a mistrial was the one thing they could do that could never be appealed. They could do it with impunity at any time.
“I disagree,” Rothbart said, slapping his hand down on his desk. “Enough is enough. Bailiff, bring back my jury, I’m going to declare a mistrial. I’ve already got a new trial date lined up a month from now.”
This nightmare’s never going to end, Armitage thought, exchanging despondent glances with Parish. They had to do this all over again just so Ollie Rothbart could go down to New York for his little theater tour.
62
“Ms. Parish, how does your client feel about the hung jury?”
“Ms. Parish, is there any chance of a plea bargain now?”
“Ms. Parish, are you surprised Judge Rothbart didn’t make the jurors keep deliberating? At least for a third time?”
“Ms. Parish.”
“Ms. Parish.”
“Ms. Parish.”
Nancy Parish stood on the courthouse steps and looked across the sea of reporters in front of her. Others were on both sides of her, pushing in, shoving microphones in her face. The press called it a scrum, and their close proximity reminded her of her days playing rugby at her all-girls high school. A few weeks ago when the trial had started, she’d been shocked to have her personal space invaded in this way. Late at night, when she’d finally get home from the office and watched herself on the TV news, she’d looked like the proverbial deer caught in the headlights.
Fortunately, Ted DiPaulo and Awotwe Amankwah had been giving her some useful tips for handling the media: look directly at one camera at a time, keep her answers short, and always have one good quote. Give the reporters a six-second clip and they were happy. Her favorite trick was Awotwe’s suggestions of how to handle a question she didn’t want to answer. “Look the reporter straight in the eye and say nothing. Nothing is never news.” So far today, she hadn’t said a word.
“Ms. Parish, will you change your trial strategy next time?”
“Ms. Parish, will your client now apply for bail?”
“Ms. Parish, will you do the retrial or hand it off to another lawyer?”
Oh, how I’d love to get rid of this case, she thought. Be able to spend just one night at home. And in theory it would be a good idea to let another lawyer take a fresh look at everything. But Rothbart had set the trial date too soon. Besides, there was no way St. Clair would let her pass his file to another lawyer. A half an hour before, down in the jail cell minutes after the mistrial had been declared, he’d been in high spirits. “Hey, Nancy, look, we didn’t lose,” he told her. “We’re still in the game.”
“Ms. Parish, what do you think swayed the jurors either way?”
“Ms. Parish, how surprised are you that the jury was hung?”
“Ms. Parish, is it tougher to do a second trial?”
That was a good question, she thought. Usually the Crown did better on a retrial. They’d seen all the holes in their case and had time to fill them. But this time, the trial had exposed new and unexpected testimony, and now Dewey Booth’s evidence was fixed under oath. This was much better for the defense than just having his affidavit. If only they could prove that he’d lied on the stand in this first trial, then Armitage’s stupid deal with Cutter would be null and void and Booth could be charged with murder. That would change everything.
“Ms. Parish, will Ralph Armitage do the second trial for the Crown?”
“Ms. Parish, if you could ask one question of the jurors, what would it be?”
“Ms. Parish, how about you? How do you feel about doing this all again?”
She scanned the crowd and saw Awotwe’s smiling black face. The only one in the all-white press corp. His was the best question of all. How did she feel about this? She put her hand up and everyone grew silent. What power I have, she thought, chuckling to herself. Amazing how suddenly everyone wanted a piece of her.
Yesterday Brett, the young waiter from the Pravda Bar who’d been scared off when he found out she was on this case, had sent her a text wishing her good luck and wondering when she was free “for a drink.” Karl, the jerk from Cleveland, had left a message on her answering machine at the office, saying he’d been reading about her trial online and expected to be back in Toronto this summer. Even her ex-husband had e-mailed her while the jury was out and wished her “courage, mon ami.”
She picked a TV camera to stare into. “I feel very enthusiastic about doing this trail again.” It was a complete lie. She was exhausted. Dying to get back to a normal life. To stop living at the office. Find some new guy to go out with.
“My heart goes out to the Wilkinson family, who have to live through this all again. But I’m sure, like all of us, they don’t want to see the wrong person convicted of this terrible crime.”
There, she thought, that’s your six-second clip.
“Ms. Parish.”
“Ms. Parish.”
“Ms. Parish.”
“No more questions,” she said. “I’ve got to get back to work.” Actually Zelda had already texted her to meet at the Pravda and plan to take a cab home. Late.
She stepped forward and the reporters parted in front of her. It was quite remarkable how they fell away, like flies blown off by a strong wind.
By the time she got to the sidewalk, she wa
s standing with her briefcase. Alone.
PART FIVE
MAY
63
“Hello, Detective Greene,” Cedric Wilkinson said, standing in the doorway of his apartment, offering his hand to shake. “Nice of you to come over to say good-bye.”
Ari Greene hadn’t seen Wilkinson for a month, since the end of the trial. The man kept dropping pounds. It had been half a year since his son was murdered, and he looked as if he’d lost almost half his weight. “Least I could do.” He reached out and grasped Wilkinson with his free hand. In the other he held his briefcase.
Wilkinson ushered him inside. Most of the furniture had been removed. The Persian carpets were all rolled up and stacked along the living room wall, and their voices and footsteps made a hollow sound. Rows of plastic bins were piled high in the hallway. “Madeleine and Kieran left on Monday, so I’m on my own for a week. Movers come on Friday morning and I fly out later that night. There’s hardly any food here. Can I get you something to drink?”
“A glass of water’s fine.”
Greene followed him into the kitchen. All of the appliances were gone from the countertop, except a big coffeemaker that was almost full. The table had a setting for one.
Wilkinson opened the fridge. Inside were an unwrapped iceberg lettuce, brown around the edges; an opened packet of sliced salami; a bowl filled with precut mini carrots; half a loaf of bread; and a jar of peanut butter with no top on it. “I don’t think I have any bottled water,” he said.
“I prefer tap water.” Greene pulled a glass from the overhead cupboard. “Tap water and public education, the only two things I believe in.”
Wilkinson chuckled. “I wish. We were going to send Kyle to public school here, but back in California no way. I’m saving up for Kieran already.” He poured himself a full cup of coffee and drank about half of it. “Figure I might as well drink as much as I want, since I don’t sleep anyway.”
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