The Suspect

by John Lescroart

  For a long moment, time froze. No one moved. The television nearly masked the sound of the men’s heavy breathing.

  Finally, Stuart said, “You’re making a mistake.”

  “I don’t think so,” Juhle said. Then added, “Being a smart guy, you probably already figured this out. But you’re under arrest. You have the right to remain silent…”

  TWENTY-THREE

  AT 9:00 A.M. SHARP ON WEDNESDAY, September 28, nine business days after Stuart Gorman was arrested on a charge of first-degree murder, with a cheerful “Good morning,” his attorney walked into the reception area outside the office of San Francisco District Attorney Clarence Jackman. Gina, in high dudgeon at what she took to be Juhle’s lies and even betrayal, had scheduled this appointment on the morning after Stuart’s arrest. His preliminary hearing was scheduled for the next day in Judge Cecil Toynbee’s courtroom, Department 12.

  Jackman’s secretary was a large, handsome, light-mocha-skinned woman in her early forties named Treya Glitsky, whom Gina knew very well, both professionally and socially. Treya’s husband, Abe, was deputy chief of inspectors in the Police Department and also the best friend of Gina’s law partner, Dismas Hardy, so it was a tight circle.

  “And a good morning to you too.” Treya looked over from her computer and broke a welcoming smile, getting up out of her chair and coming around her desk to hug her visitor. “Clarence is expecting you,” she said, then added more quietly, “but I wanted to warn you that he had Gerry Abrams in here yesterday afternoon for a good while.”

  “To brief him?”

  “I’d assume. Or just bring him up to speed. This thing’s gotten big in a hurry, hasn’t it?”

  “It’s crazy,” Gina said. “You get a little celebrity buzz, you’d think the world revolves around it. But it’s also, between you and me, the reason Clarence has to step in and call this thing off. It’s going to be an embarrassment to him.”

  “Well,” Treya said, “Gerry’s been beating his own drum pretty hard too.”

  “Don’t I know it.”

  Indeed, it would have been hard for anyone to miss. Since the arrest, the media had been having a field day with the story of the new-age outdoor writer and his brilliant doctor wife. And Gina had no doubt about the source of the dozens of leaks that fueled the nearly endless recaps and updates. Over the past two weeks, Gerry Abrams had become almost a household name in San Francisco, as had Stuart Gorman. And of course, this had increased Gina’s profile as well, even if her mantra throughout it all had been that she had no comment except to say that her client was innocent, and would be acquitted if there was a trial.

  But still, she had to admit that the constant barrage of media analysis was taking its toll on her confidence. While it remained true that the physical evidence pointing to Stuart’s guilt was, in her opinion, light to nonexistent, nevertheless she found herself on several occasions over the last couple of weeks blindsided by one or another reporter’s fresh recapitulation of all the circumstantial evidence. And—she had no need to remind herself because it remained a truism throughout her entire career—circumstantial evidence was sufficient to convict.

  Gina had used her own spies in the Hall in the past couple of weeks to find out when Abrams was scheduled to appear in court, and she’d come down and sat in the gallery during two of his hearings. He had, to her mind, a scary amount of charisma and a persuasive style that, for all of its homespun sincerity, could not disguise the obvious intellect. She knew that a prosecutor such as Gerry Abrams could present his circumstantial case with such a strong narrative that it could quite literally trump a complete lack of physical evidence.

  In fact, the pervasive onslaught had actually brought her back to some significant doubt about Stuart’s factual guilt or innocence. By the time she’d come to the motel in San Mateo and talked him into turning himself in, she’d come to have faith in her client’s story. All of his explanations and actions, even including going out to interview Caryn’s business colleagues, had seemed convincing to her. But in the relentless prose of the print media and the endless analysis of the radio and TV pundits, the consistency of Stuart’s guilty scenario was viscerally so powerful that it had literally, several times, made her sick.

  And now on Stuart’s behalf she was about to take another huge professional and personal risk. She hadn’t been lying or making any kind of false threat to Devin Juhle when she’d referred to the DA as her close, personal friend. In fact, she’d been a member of Jackman’s informal “kitchen cabinet,” meeting regularly on Tuesdays for lunch at Lou the Greek’s, for most of his administration. She considered him a fair, just, good man, and one with whom she shared a real friendship. The fact that he had apparently gone along with this prosecution, even to this point, filled her with a deep sense of foreboding. If he had serious misgivings about this case, he was keeping them private. But she knew that this wasn’t Jackman’s style. If he didn’t believe in the case, he would have counseled—or ordered—Abrams to abandon it.

  When she’d all but demanded this appointment after Stuart’s arrest, Jackman had been uncharacteristically impatient, as though he found Gina’s position—that her client was truly innocent—somehow distasteful. He’d granted the meeting, she felt, as a personal favor, rather than a professional courtesy. And this was another source of real discomfort.

  Now she heard the door open behind her and turned to see her old friend, the city’s chief prosecutor—all six feet four, two hundred and fifty pounds of him—standing in the entrance to his office. As always, Jackman wore a perfectly tailored suit, today in a dark blue, with a light pink shirt and muted blue tie. His face, though smiling in greeting, was a slab of jet-black granite under a tight gray buzz cut. He tended to speak very quietly, but the pitch of his voice was so deep, it seemed to resonate in her bones when he said, “Aha! And here’s my favorite defense attorney now.”

  If Gina was Jackman’s favorite, she would not like to imagine how the scene would feel to someone he liked a little less.

  It was all low-key and ostensibly cordial, of course. Clarence didn’t go to his power position behind his desk, but he made sure Gina was comfortably seated in the upholstered chair out in the living room section of his office, that she had a fresh cup of good coffee, that business and her health were both good. Preliminaries out of the way, he got himself situated on the leather couch across from her, coming forward with an open expression, elbows on his knees. “Now, Gina,” he began with the voice of God, “how may I help you?”

  “I guess the best thing you could do, Clarence—for me, for my client Mr. Gorman, and maybe for you yourself—would be to drop this insane prosecution, at least until Gerry Abrams gets some evidence that might tie my client to the crime of killing his wife.”

  Jackman’s face was set in a patient neutrality. “I take it you’re convinced of Mr. Gorman’s innocence.”

  “That’s not the point, sir. The point is that Mr. Abrams and Inspector Juhle have worked this case from the beginning with a presumption of Mr. Gorman’s guilt, and not his innocence. And without that presumption, that illegal and unethical presumption of guilt, there is simply no case against him.”

  Jackman, nodding thoughtfully, said, “What about the neighbor girl who saw his car?”

  “Excuse me, sir, but she allegedly saw his car. She never saw him, Clarence, because he wasn’t there. The People have to prove he was there. I don’t have to prove he wasn’t. That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

  “And your client’s threats to her?”

  “He never made threats, Clarence.”

  “That’s not what she said. It’s not how she felt.”

  “He never saw her.”

  “I hope you’re not denying that his daughter did see her. Twice.”

  “To find out what she really saw. That was all.”

  The DA appeared to be considering her words. “All right. Let’s even, between you and me, grant that. How do you explain the attempt at CPR
?”

  The question was unnerving. Jackman had apparently been thoroughly briefed on the details of the case. He’d been prepped by Gerry Abrams and looked like he was going to be ready for her objections. But she wasn’t going to roll over without a fight. “Frankly, I don’t know what made him do that. Panic, frustration, a last-ditch hope? Her body was still warm, remember. He just couldn’t give up without trying something.”

  “And the domestic violence? His arrest some years before? What about those? Inadmissible? Irrevelant?”

  “Maybe both, really. But the truth about those, Clarence, is that both times the police were called out to their house, it was because of fights they were having with their daughter.”

  “Says he.”

  “Well…yes.”

  “Have you talked to the daughter about that? And even if you have, don’t you think that if it could have a bearing on saving her father from going to prison, she might decide it’s okay to lie about that? This is the same girl who went across the street and threatened her neighbor, right? I can’t see that a little perjury for her father’s sake would bother her much.” Jackman pushed himself back into the couch and straightened his back. “I am not prejudging your client, Gina, but you keep referring to the lack of evidence in this case, and I’m not at all certain I agree with you.”

  “I’m talking about physical evidence.”

  “I understand that. And of course that’s the strategy for your position. But it’s also one that either denies the existence of or willfully ignores a rather substantial circumstantial case.”

  “If it was so substantial, Clarence, why didn’t Abrams take it to the grand jury first?”

  Jackman raised his shoulders, then let them fall. “He didn’t want to wait to call them into special session. He was concerned about your client’s flight risk. He became convinced—because of the weight of circumstantial evidence that he and Inspector Juhle had amassed—that your client needed to be in jail.”

  Gina opened her mouth to respond, but Jackman cut her off before she could say a word. “And I must add that your client’s behavior after he found out about the warrant—harassing private citizens, carrying a loaded firearm…”

  “On that, Clarence, if Juhle hadn’t broken our deal, that gun would have been back in Stuart’s safe the next morning…”

  “Ah, but as it was, it turned out that your client had the gun with him at the precise time that you were telling Inspector Juhle he didn’t.” For the first time, Jackman’s tone grew firm. “You don’t lie to policemen, Gina. You’re an officer of the court. I don’t know what you were thinking. What if Juhle had gone to make his arrest and somehow acted on your assurance that Mr. Gorman was unarmed? Does the potential for disaster there escape you?”

  Chastised, and justly so, Gina still held her ground. “We made a deal, Clarence. If Juhle broke the deal, how is that my fault?”

  “Because his mandate is not to keep deals with defense attorneys. His mandate is to arrest murder suspects when a judge has seen fit to issue a warrant. If he can do that before the time you arranged, that’s what he needs to do. We don’t let suspected murderers go have a latte until it’s to their convenience to appear for their arrest. We arrest them. Surely this is obvious enough.”

  “Surely it’s equally obvious,” she retorted, “that with so little evidence, Gerry Abrams hurried this arrest so he could get his name in the paper, Clarence. That’s what that is about.”

  Jackman’s voice rumbled. “That allegation is beneath you, Gina. Mr. Abrams has never before been a hound for the press. He has a consistent and unified theory on this case. I talked to him at some length just yesterday and he is convinced that the—granted, heavily circumstantial—evidence allows for no other conclusion, beyond reasonable doubt in his mind, that your client killed his wife.”

  “That’s just a knee-jerk prosecutor’s reaction, Clarence. You know that.”

  If he did, he didn’t acknowledge it. “Well,” Jackman sighed. “If his evidence is flawed or inconclusive, it seems to me that it’s to your advantage. You pressed for an early preliminary hearing—tomorrow if I’m not mistaken, right?—and no doubt that request has hampered and will hamper the People’s ability to build an impregnable case.” He spread his hands out. “I don’t really know what you’d like me to do, Gina. Which is how we began here today. I’m not going to overrule Mr. Abrams. He’s built a case that will either fly or not on its merits. That’s how we do it.”

  “Stuart’s an innocent man, Clarence. Someone else killed his wife. Not him.”

  “That’s why we have trials, Gina. And hearings. Mr. Abrams has to prove that, and it’s your job to stop him if you can.”

  “Maybe, but it shouldn’t have even been allowed to get to this stage. They have nothing. This is just wrong, Clarence.”

  She realized at once that she’d gone too far. Jackman’s nostrils flared briefly, a tight-lipped smile came and went. “Well…” Rubbing his hands together, Jackman’s face cracked in a parody of a smile as he got to his feet. “Maybe mine is just another knee-jerk prosecutor’s reaction,” he said, “but I only see one suspect in this picture, Gina. And I also see a defense attorney who’s perhaps feeling the pressure of her first murder trial walking a very thin ethical line of her own.”

  “Clarence, I’m not—”

  “You’re not presuming upon our years of cooperation and friendship and making a personal appeal to the district attorney to subvert the system and dismiss charges that have been brought by this office in a timely and legitimate manner?”

  “No, I’m—”

  “Ah, good then. I must have been misunderstanding you. I hoped I was.” Somehow Gina was standing by now too, and Clarence was moving her, hand on her elbow, toward the door. Then he had his hand on the doorknob. “Show us what you’ve got at the hearing tomorrow. I’ll keep a close eye on the evidence. Your client will get a fair hearing, Gina. That’s what he’s entitled to, and that’s what he’ll get.”

  TWENTY-FOUR

  UNDERSTANDABLY, JUHLE’S BETRAYAL ON THE ARREST deal also knocked the bottom out of Gina’s well of credibility with Stuart. How in the world, he wondered aloud to her in angry terms at his very first opportunity before the arraignment and bail hearing, could she possibly have been ignorant of the fact that Juhle would trace her location by cell phone? Surely this was a standard police procedure, done every day? Surely she should have known about this, and avoided such a telephone call at all costs? And if she did know, why did she trust Juhle not to do it? Was she stupid or naïve? Because clearly she was one or the other.

  Then, she should absolutely have known that her assurance to him that he would be able to peacefully turn himself in on their timetable was chimerical at best and negligent at worst. Not only was his decision to surrender based on that faulty presumption, but his very life was immediately and directly threatened. If he’d had his wits about him enough to actually reach for the gun right at his tableside, there was no question either Juhle or one of his backup officers would have shot him dead. Surely, this was malpractice if ever there was such a thing.

  As if that wasn’t bad enough, she’d talked him into agreeing to something he desperately didn’t want to do, and also she’d done it in a way that had actually, and dramatically, hurt his case, and the perception of his guilt. In fact, although Stuart never used the gun, the mere fact of his possession of it created a sea change in the tone of reporting on the case. Why had she not warned him to get rid of the gun before she made the phone call?

  Before, the killing was newsworthy because of the personalities and profiles of the principals; Stuart’s marginal fame; the usual glamorous smorgasbord of money, complicated business issues, and sex. And although Stuart was clearly the front-running suspect, in most of the early stories, there was a sense of debate: Did he or didn’t he? What were the pros and cons? How much evidence, really, was there, and what did it matter?

  Since the arrest and its details—the
flight to a motel room, registering under a false name, the loaded gun within an arm’s reach on a table next to the bed—had become public, the presumption of innocence, or even the suggestion of possible innocence, was no longer in the mix. And this, of course, made it easier to believe in Stuart’s “threats” to Bethany, and even in his “threatening” visits to Fred Furth and Kelley Rusnak, in spite of these latter witnesses’ statements to the contrary. It didn’t matter if they had felt threatened during their talks with him; Stuart’s very presence was a threatening act. The talking heads and columnists got it right: an armed murder suspect with an all-points bulletin out on him calls on you while you’re working, there’s an element of threat.

  But beyond even that, the near-ubiquitous perception that Stuart was at the very least no better than every murder suspect the Hall had entertained over the years had other immediate and personal consequences.

  The first of these was bail. Normally there is no bail in a murder case, or at least no bail that anyone could reasonably be expected to make. But occasionally, especially when there may be issues of self-defense or of lofty community standing, a judge will grant bail of, say, a few hundred thousand dollars. Which of course in Stuart’s case would have been doable. But at the bail hearing, Gina could hardly argue with any credibility that her client wasn’t a flight risk. Everybody in the courtroom, and most certainly the judge, knew that he’d already tried that once.

  First, the judge simply denied bail. Then, when Gina quite correctly pointed out that some bail was required in a noncapital case, the court promptly set bail at $20 million.

  Secondly, and more upsetting especially to Kymberly than almost anything else, was the judge’s refusal to allow Stuart, even accompanied by armed sheriff’s deputies, to attend Caryn’s funeral. From Stuart’s perspective, this was pure spite, and an indication of how reviled he’d come to be among the regular denizens of the Hall.