Life Sentence

by David Ellis

  “Cosgrove wanted to know if you could still be prosecuted for murder,” says Ben, commenting as he reads along.

  “And he learned I could,” I add.

  You never openly stated your intentions, or why you requested this knowledge, and it wasn’t my place to ask. But our discussions about the long-ago past make me curious about what you plan to do with this information. Let me advise you, very strongly, that you should not attempt to dig up something from over twenty years ago. You stated to me then, and I believed you, that Jon Soliday did not force sex on that young woman and that she was alive when he left her house. I believed you when you told me, and you swore to that fact under oath. The prosecutors accepted your sworn testimony, and other evidence corroborated that testimony.

  “Christ,” Ben mumbles. “He’s trying to keep Cosgrove tied to his testimony back then. He’s telling Cosgrove that nobody would believe him if he implicated you.”

  “Right,” I agree. “Because he swore otherwise under oath in 1979, and because ‘other evidence’ backed up that testimony.”

  If you attempt to swear differently now, you may be open to prosecution for any number of crimes, including perjury, obstruction of justice, and tampering with evidence. You should also be advised that juvenile proceedings are confidential, and the disclosure of anything related to them could lead to a criminal charge as well. I have not reviewed the relevant laws on this subject, but I must advise you of the possibility.

  “Threatening Cosgrove,” Ben continues.

  “With bullshit,” I answer. “Cosgrove couldn’t be prosecuted for any of those crimes now. The statute of limitations is long gone on perjury and obstruction.”

  “Yeah, Dale’s bluffing, all right. But he’s right about the juvenile stuff being sealed. You can get in trouble for messing with that.”

  Let me say again what I said in my office today: that while our discussions were protected by attorney-client privilege, this privilege does not attach to discussions between attorney and client regarding future crimes. If I were to learn that you are attempting any crime related to the events of 1979, I would be required to revisit our conversation and determine that we were discussing a future crime in my office today. In that event, I would be compelled to disclose the substance of our conversation. At this point, however, it does not appear to me that you are planning any future misconduct, so unless something happens to change my mind, I am bound by the attorney-client privilege to keep our discussion confidential.

  Ben nods along as he reads. “No one ever accused Dale of being dumb. He’s right, too. The privilege doesn’t extend to discussion of future crimes. Dale’s saying, If you try to blackmail Jon Soliday, I’ll tell the police.”

  “Dale did his best for me. And look what he got for it.”

  Ben places the letter on his desk. “Now can I ask you where you got this?”

  I avoid eye contact. “What if I told you I found it in Dale’s files—what the prosecution gave us?”

  “Then I’d say you’re wrong. There’s no number stamp.” At the bottom of each page the prosecution turned over to us was a number made with a stamp, so that each page has an identifiable number. A standard practice when parties share documents. “Plus, this is an original, not a copy.”

  “Right.”

  “So, Jon. Where’d you get this?”

  “What if, in the midst of copying the documents for us, this one slipped through the cracks and they ended up dropping the original in our files?”

  “Jon.” Bennett shakes his head. “This letter was folded. It came from an envelope. This would never be in Dale’s office. This was the one he mailed to—” Bennett’s head rocks back. A long, quiet moan escapes from his throat.

  My expression softens, not to be glib, but to indicate that he’s on the right track.

  “You got this from Cosgrove,” he says.

  “Landlord’ll let in anyone who mentions ‘DOC.’”

  “Oh, no. Jon—I wasn’t trying to give you advice on how to—”

  “I know that. I know. I just needed to see where this all adds up.”

  “So you broke into Cosgrove’s house and”—he picks up the letter and waves it—“you stole this from his place?”

  I shrug. “I needed to know if he was blackmailing me.”

  Ben flails his arms, leaves his chair. “I mean—you realize this evidence can’t be introduced at trial. Right? We can’t admit this.”

  “Yeah, I sort of figured that,” I say. “At the time, it seemed like a good idea. I was a little panicky.”

  “For good reason.”

  “Look, Ben. I know it was wrong. But I’m on trial for murder here. All things being equal, I’m not losing sleep over invading Lyle Cosgrove’s privacy.”

  My lawyer studies me for a long moment. All things considered, rebuking me for this is not at the top of his list. He has plenty to occupy himself before the trial starts. “So Cosgrove had to kill Dale to blackmail you. Otherwise, if Dale heard about it, he’d turn Lyle in.”

  “Right,” I say. “I don’t think Dale ever would have reported it, because he wouldn’t want this made public any more than I would.”

  “But Cosgrove didn’t know that.”

  “So now you know, Ben. Cosgrove’s the bad guy.”

  “Yeah. Wow.”

  “So maybe we should get to your questions and comments,” I suggest.

  Ben nods. There’s no time for bemoaning our fate now. “Fair enough.” He looks at his notepad. “Let’s talk about this hearing they had back then. Lyle Cosgrove testified, you said. He testified that you went to this young lady’s house—”

  “Gina,” I say. “Gina Mason.”

  “All right, you went to Gina’s home and then when he came to get you later, she was kissing you goodbye. Right?”

  “Right.”

  “Did you testify, Jon?” Bennett seems to be holding his breath. His client on record is probably not something he wants. Especially when I confessed to him earlier today that I don’t remember a thing.

  “Yes, I did. And yes, I testified that I kissed her goodbye, to answer your next question. I testified that she was alive and well and smiling and waving goodbye.”

  Bennett makes a small “o” with his mouth. Wow. Quite the conundrum, his client has.

  “You lied under oath.”

  “It’s perjury if it was a lie. It might have been true.” I wince as I make the rationalization. Bennett does not rush to soothe me. His estimation of me continues to deteriorate.

  “I need to look at that file,” he says.

  “You’re in luck,” I answer. I reach into my briefcase and remove the copies of the three pages, the only three pages left in my file from 1979. I note the look on Bennett’s face. “I had Cal dig it up.”

  “Of course you did.” The surprises never end.

  “The first two pages aren’t much.” I hand them to him. “My testimony. Not pretty.”

  He reads the questions and answers from the juvenile inquiry with an ascending expression of horror. His hand comes to his mouth. “Oral sex,” he mumbles. “Gina was on top. You fell.” He swallows. “‘Fuck me harder’?”

  “That’s what I said. And you’d be correct that I didn’t remember any of that.”

  “You—made up a whole story about this.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You were coached well.” He says it without rebuke. Time is short, deal with what you got, which includes an asshole of a client who held back material information until the last minute. Bennett drops the papers.

  “Here’s the one you’re really gonna love,” I say, handing the final page to my lawyer. “The investigator on the file wrote this, stuffed it into the record after it had been compiled. Seems he was seeing through the whole thing.”

  Bennett takes it and reads to himself.

  I have grave reservations about the conclusions being reached in this investigation. I believe that the autopsy results have been interpreted in an ov
erly generous fashion. I further believe that the deceased could not have consented to sex under any circumstances given her intoxication, even if I were to accept the version of events advanced by Mr. Soliday, which I do not. I believe that Mr. Soliday and Mr. Cosgrove have rehearsed their stories and relied on the absence of any further witnesses to escape a criminal charge. I believe that Jon Soliday should be arrested and charged with criminal sexual assault, at a minimum. This statement should have been made part of the record. I am inserting this into the file, despite the prosecutor’s refusal to include it.

  “He’s right,” says Ben. “Someone heavily intoxicated can’t consent to sex.”

  “That’s the law?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t back then. Back in the late seventies, a lot of evidence about a rape victim could come in that can’t now.” I know this from my work in the legislature. We have amended the “rape-shield” law twice since I’ve been there. Used to be, when someone claimed rape and the accused claimed she consented, the jury was allowed to hear all about the sexual history of the victim. The theory was, someone who was so unchaste as to have premarital sex in the past was more likely to have consented to it with the accused. It reminds me of the juvenile inquiry, when the prosecutor read through several affidavits of people who had slept with Gina Mason. Nowadays, in our updated way of thinking, most of that evidence is inadmissible.

  “Well.” Bennett stretches his arms, showing me the palms of his hands. “This is not good, Jon.”

  “I know.”

  “They’ll find this. The prosecutors.”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good God.” He collapses, brooding a moment, collecting and filing the information. His brow furrows. “Two questions. One, how could a twenty-year-old case that never went to prosecution still be lying around?”

  “The way Cal explained it was, they toss stuff over fifteen years old unless someone orders it kept around.”

  That catches my attorney’s attention.

  “Someone put a ‘hold’ order on this box,” I add.

  “Who? Who?” Bennett is plaintive.

  “Someone scribbled a signature. Cal couldn’t make it out. But he said it was five years ago. I was thinking it was irrelevant.”

  “Irrelevant,” Bennett repeats with a harrumph.

  “You had a second question.”

  “Yeah.” He directs a finger at the document. “Why just these three pages?”

  “Well, they fell out of the transcript.”

  “Okay, fine. But then where’s the rest of the transcript?”

  “Oh.” I play with my earlobe, a nervous habit. “Hadn’t thought about that.”

  “It was pulled. Someone pulled it.”

  “I think you’re being too dramatic here, Ben. Yeah, it’s possible. But that thing could be anywhere now. It’s probably buried somewhere in a garbage heap.”

  Ben allows for that with a sweep of the hand.

  “So here it is, Bennett. You’ve got the picture now. And the picture is that I’m pretty much screwed.”

  “I don’t agree with that.”

  “No? Then let me spell it out for you. There is definitely someone I can point the finger at for Dale’s murder. Lyle did it. We’ve got him stealing the cell phone that was used to bring me back to the office. We’ve got him holding a grudge against Garrison for screwing up his defense twelve years ago. He complained on appeal that Dale was ineffective, right?”

  “Right.”

  “And now we know that he wanted to blackmail me, but that Dale was threatening to expose him if we did.”

  “All true,” Ben agrees.

  “But here’s the catch. If I implicate Lyle, what happened in 1979 comes up.”

  “Yes, it will.”

  “And I can still be on the hook for the murder,” I say. “I beat one murder rap and buy myself another one.”

  “Not likely, Jon.” Bennett runs his hand over the table. “They couldn’t prove it then, they won’t now.”

  “Don’t be so sure about that. Look, back then—I kept my head in the sand, but I’m pretty sure the Tullys pulled quite a few strings. I think they got to the coroner. I think they got to the prosecutor.”

  “You think,” Ben summarizes, “that if someone were to revisit the evidence, they might think again about prosecuting you.”

  “Yes, I do. And think about who our county attorney is. Elliot Raycroft? Lang Trotter’s boy? He’d love to lend whatever help he could to Summit County. He absolutely ruins me, if I’m not already ruined. And whatever chance Grant had in this election—over, done. Because Grant helped me out. Or at least, he was there.”

  Bennett settles back in his chair, in professorial mode. “One thing at a time. First, yes, they could re-open the investigation, but they wouldn’t convict. Second, I hate to say it, but Grant Tully isn’t going to win this election, Jon. You hear the poll he just ran?”

  “No,” I’m embarrassed to admit. Normally, I’d be the first one to know. What a difference a couple of months make.

  “He’s down twenty with five weeks left,” Ben tells me. “That’ll close a little before the end, but he’s not gonna beat Lang Trotter. He’s done.”

  “I’m not willing to concede that. And I’m not as confident as you that I won’t be convicted of murder from 1979.”

  “Jon, you have to realize something. The blackmail note, this letter from Garrison to Cosgrove—this only proves that something ugly happened in 1979. Ugly enough for you that you don’t want it brought up. That’s reason enough for blackmail. It doesn’t mean you killed that woman.”

  He sounds just like Grant. “You give me too much credit.” I run a hand through my hair. “I’m not sure you’re getting the proper flavor here, Bennett.”

  “Then help me.”

  I work my jaw a moment. He’s my attorney, I might as well give all of it to him. It spills out quickly, a vomiting of the unthinkable. “Think about this—not as a friend, thinking the best of me, but think about it as a dispassionate attorney. If all Cosgrove wanted to do was blackmail me about the mere fact of this ugly incident, he could have. Hell, he could have gone straight to the senator with it. That would have made more sense. He wouldn’t focus exclusively on me like he did. And he wouldn’t have written the note the way he did.”

  “How did he write the note?”

  “Remember? He says he’s the ‘only one left’ who knows the secret. He says he ‘could always just talk to the senator.’ He’s not threatening to go public with his secret. He’s threatening to go to Grant. And why is he doing that, Bennett?”

  My lawyer opens his hands.

  “Because Grant thought I was innocent, that’s why. That’s what he told his dad, that’s what he told me, that’s probably what he told Lyle. But Lyle knows the truth, and he’s betting that I’ll pay him a quarter of a million dollars to make sure Grant doesn’t learn about it.”

  “He’s threatening to tell the senator that you killed that woman.” Ben says it softly.

  My lack of response is confirmation.

  “And who knows what evidence he might have to support that,” I add. “Maybe it’s my word against his, maybe not. I have no idea. If I point the finger at him, he could bite me in spades. I’m royally fucked, Ben. The only person who I can claim murdered Dale has immunity. Unless I’m just willing to roll the dice. Call his bluff.”

  My lawyer deflates, conceding the point. “Well—so where does that leave us?”

  “This is my question to you, Ben.” I settle in a moment. “Is there any way we can point the finger at Lyle without 1979 coming up?”

  “I—” Ben waves his hands helplessly. “I don’t see how.”

  “The ex-con-with-a-grudge theory? He had a motive—Dale messed up his trial. He stole the cell phone, which proves his involvement. He’s a violent felon. Isn’t that enough?”

  “Yeah, Jon, maybe, in a vacuum. But when we mention Lyle, they’ll dig up his criminal record
, and who knows? Maybe they connect him to you. Plus, don’t you think Lyle is going to bring it up himself when he’s hauled into court—by the prosecution, if not by us? He’ll say, Jon Soliday killed that woman in 1979. I lied about it because the lawyer the Tullys hired for me, Dale Garrison, made me. But Garrison and I both knew the truth—that Jon’s a killer. So Soliday killed Dale Garrison to cover up the ‘secret that nobody knows,’ and he framed me. He waited all this time I was in jail, and then when I got out, he killed Dale and set me up.”

  A moment of silence, as the blood rushes to my face. He’s right. I’m trapped, as long as Lyle Cosgrove is around to point the finger right back at me.

  Bennett suggests we think on the subject, but he’s just learning about it, I’ve been battling it for some time now. I keep coming to the same conclusion. Wherever I turn, I’m stuck. As long as Lyle Cosgrove is around.

  39

  ASSISTANT COUNTY ATTORNEY Daniel Morphew walks into the courtroom with a woman at his side. The clerk, sitting at her desk next to and below the judge’s seat, looks up and asks, “Is everyone here on Soliday?”

  Bennett and I stand. Morphew walks over and introduces us to his companion.

  “Bennett Carey, Jon Soliday”—he opens a hand to the woman—“Erica Johannsen.”

  We all shake hands. She seems to treat my handshake no differently than Ben’s. She is almost my height—close to six feet—with short dishwater hair, a strong face, and hazel eyes.

  “Erica’s going to run this thing,” says Morphew. “I can’t break free, it turns out.”

  Bennett nods matter-of-factly. Relief flows through me for some reason. Morphew is top brass, and even if he has less experience recently in the courtrooms, it says something that he will no longer handle the case. Not that I know a thing about Erica Johannsen.

  Today is Friday, September 29. My trial begins in three days. We are here to discuss the logistics, witness lists, and the like.

  “The judge will see you in chambers,” says the clerk, a diminutive redhead who peers over the glasses resting at the base of her nose.