by Lee Cockburn
Findlay took the call from the Super. He had been summoned to his office first thing that morning, and these invites tended not to be for praise. Findlay banged his desk with force, cursing loudly at everyone apart from himself; he never saw any fault in any of his actions or lack of them, although they were clear for everyone else to see. He had failed as a leader and made several wrong decisions in the way he had handled the case from start to finish.
John’s body was zipped back into the bag after autopsy, the cause of death quite apparent to even the untrained eye. There was very little skull left to speak of and parts of his brain were exposed. Susan had made sure she had killed him and that he couldn’t hurt another person ever again. The marks unfortunately proved a different scenario from that of self-defence; they clearly showed intent to kill. The wounds had not been intended merely to injure, they had been ferociously inflicted, a definite intent to take a life. John would have been rendered defenceless after the first few blows and there must have been close to twenty five strikes to his head that could be proven as individual injuries. The pathologist finished writing his report and submitted it to the fiscal.
A couple of days had passed and Susan was starting to feel a little better; her progress was good and she would be discharged soon. The nurses left the room after telling her the good news. As they were leaving, officers appeared outside the ward and asked where Susan’s bed was. They had legal papers in their hands. Their heads were lowered with embarrassment at the system they had to follow to ensure justice was afforded to all parties, even those who didn’t deserve it. Any reasonable person looking at the circumstances of the case would feel that there had been no crime committed and that Brennan deserved every single blow he got and more. Unfortunately for Susan, she would have to stand trial. She would have to fight once more - this time to prove her innocence. She would have to make her case for self defence and the preservation of the lives of others, giving her justification for the level of violence she had used on that night. Her sanity would be called into question and she would have to relive the ordeal all over again.
Chapter 38: Justice or Not?
“All rise,” echoed through the court.
Susan stood up, her legs trembling as she looked over at Andrew. Taylor, Marcus, Fran, Andrew and Kay had all given their evidence and it was now Susan’s turn to take the stand.
“Can you please raise your right hand.” Susan’s hand quivered as she raised it. She took a deep breath.
The End.
Copyright
Published by Clink Street Publishing 2014
Copyright © Lee Cockburn 2014
First edition.
The author asserts the moral right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988 to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior consent of the author, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.
ISBN: 978–1–909477–26–1
Ebook: 978–1–909477–27–8
