“There’s nothing for the press to get hold of,” said Karp calmly. “There’s one investigation. Roland Hrcany is in charge of it. We have an indictment and a defendant in custody.”
“And he’ll go for it? You can promise that?”
“No, as a matter of fact, I can’t.”
“Why not? Is there something wrong with the case?”
“No,” said Karp after a brief pause. “It’s a good case.” He was about to add that the only problem with the case was that the defendant hadn’t done the crime, but decided against it. The D.A. wouldn’t be interested in stuff like that. What he said was: “It could be better. We’re working on it.”
“Do that!” the D.A. said, and moved on briskly to other business.
Karp went back to his office and worked on the Russell case. He wanted to move it swiftly through the courts and, for a wonder, it was moving swiftly. They had opened up a new Supreme Court part a few weeks ago, and its calendar was not loaded yet. Theoretically, it was possible to dispose of a murder case in two months from arrest to sentencing, if you had the right court and it was not to the defense’s advantage to slow things down.
Unfortunately, it usually was. Witnesses forgot or died. Pleas were more acceptable after a decent interval in jail. But this time Freeland seemed almost eager to rush things along, as if he could not wait for the personal confrontation with Karp. That suited Karp just fine. Pretrial was set for the morrow, and he was busy researching arguments for the motions the defense was likely to bring when his wife walked in.
“It’s conventional to knock,” he said.
“In an office, yeah,” said Marlene, “but this is your bedroom and I’m your wife. I have conjugal rights.”
“Which you intend to exercise now?”
“Dream on.” She looked around the office. Karp had set up a steel folding bed he had snitched from the jail infirmary. A steel clothes rack on casters from one of the courtrooms was hung with his suits. There was a suitcase standing nearby with shirts and other necessaries.
“I still can’t believe you’re doing this,” she added. “Nobody lives in their office.”
“It’s only for six weeks, Marlene, maybe less. We’ve been through all this. I have to be here for Russell, and I can’t get up and down from the loft, and we can’t afford a hotel right now.”
Marlene slumped down in a visitors’ chair and lit a cigarette she didn’t really want. She smoked in silence for a while. Karp went back to his reading. She stood up abruptly. “Well, so much for domestic felicity. I’m going to pick up Lucy. What do you want for dinner?”
“Chinese?”
“Good choice. MSG helps build strong bones. See you.”
She left. Karp worked until his eyes burned and then lay down on his bed of pain. He drifted off and was awakened by his daughter’s tiny fingers probing his facial orifices.
“She misses you,” said Marlene, setting out white cardboard containers on the conference table. “She’s been whiny all week. Her little schedule is all disturbed.”
“I’m sorry,” said Karp lamely, kissing the child.
They ate, Lucy sitting on his lap, grabbing for indigestible morsels and making a mess.
“What’s going on in the big world?” he asked to break the silence.
“Um, the usual. I saw Geri Stone again today down in the lobby. She’s stalking the halls, dressed in black and buttonholing strangers and trying to convince them it wasn’t her fault the guy she sprang whacked her sister. She’s become one of the Centre Street characters, like the Walking Booger and Dirty Warren. Everybody calls her The Sister. I think she’s deteriorating.
“What other news? I’m following up on what we learned from the Turks and at that art gallery. V.T is working the banks, trying to get a line on whether Ersoy had moved any serious money out of the U.S. before he got shot.
“Harry located Gabrielle Avanian’s parents today. The father says he hasn’t got a daughter and hung up on him. He spoke to an older brother later. Apparently the father disowned her when she moved out and started shacking with Tomasian. The brother is supposed to come down to the hospital tomorrow and give us an ID on her. She’s still out of it.
“Harry also did a repeat canvass of the buildings across from the murder scene on Fifth Street. No luck, so we’re still looking for a witness that’ll tie those mutts in the motorcycle gang to the Jane Doe killing.”
“Something is jelling in my brain about all this,” said Karp, “but I can’t quite get it to come clear.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean, me too. Here’s a thought. The U.N. guy, Kilic, said that Ersoy’s money was for buying art. I don’t think so. But maybe he was selling art.”
“Huh? Why do we connect him with art at all? Why not dope or sex?”
“Because Kilic is covering up something, and he was the one who suggested that Ersoy was in the art business. He must have known that we’d look into it and wanted to be covered in case Ersoy’s name came up in connection with the art trade. And, of course, there’s the one man whose name shows up in both ends of this business-the Armenian nationalist and art collector, Sarkis the K. I’d like to have a chat with him.”
“I miss you,” said Karp.
She looked at him for a while, her face unreadable. “Yeah, well, me too. If I’d wanted to be a single mother I would’ve started at age sixteen and my kid would’ve been going to proms by now. This can’t go on.”
“What can we do?”
“I don’t know,” answered Marlene wearily. “I’ll think of something.”
11
Nothing improved Karp’s spirits like being in court. It was his gambling, his girls, his heroin. He glanced around at the courtroom. Milton Freeland was at the defense table, along with a young Legal Aid acolyte and the defendant, Hosie Russell. Russell had clipped his hair and was wearing glasses. He looked like a deacon.
The judge, a large, olive-skinned, beetle-browed man, was already seated at his presidium, peering over his half glasses and discussing some business with his clerk. His name was Martino, and Karp was very glad indeed to see him. He could not have asked for a better judge. Martino knew the law; he knew the difference between rights and legal trumpery; and he was ferociously impatient with lawyers who didn’t know what they were doing, into which class Karp thought that Milton Freeland very likely fell.
A pretrial hearing is like a dress rehearsal for a trial, a clearing of decks, a showing of cards, so that the trial proper may proceed expeditiously, if it proceeds at all.
No jury is present, of course. Karp was expected to expose his critical evidence and his official and police witnesses to demonstrate to the judge the veracity of the evidence and the probity of the identification of the defendant, all of which had been challenged by Freeland.
Motion to suppress the Bloomingdale’s VISA slip taken from Russell at the scene: the basis-no probable cause for a search. The judge heard Freeland out and decided that a police officer finding a man answering the description of a fugitive hiding under a boiler in a building where a dozen people had seen him go was probable enough cause. Motion denied.
Motion to suppress the blue shirt and the handbag and the knife. But the knife had human blood on it. The bag was the victim’s bag, the blue shirt had, according to several witnesses, been worn by the perpetrator; the defendant had, in fact, identified it as his own. Motion denied.
Here Freeland raised an objection. “Your Honor,” he said, “I must protest. The testimony that the blue shirt was the defendant’s was elicited after arraignment and in the absence of counsel. It was the product of an illegal interrogation.”
The judge said, “How was it an interrogation, Mr. Freeland? Both Captain Chelham and Detective Cimella have testified that the statement was voluntary on the part of the defendant. He asked about his shirt and they brought it to him and he identified it.”
“It’s still incriminatory,” Freeland shot back.
That was interesting, thought Karp. He’s n
ot reading the judge. He’s bugging him, but he doesn’t care; he’s getting objections on record, trying for a reversible error. Fat chance.
“How is it incriminatory?” asked Martino, his brows twitching. “He says, ‘It’s my blue shirt.’ I have a blue shirt too. You have a blue shirt. Admission that we have them is not incriminatory. Statement of the defendant was not in response to any interrogation connecting defendant with the crime or with any other statement of the defendant. Motion denied.”
Freeland did not seem flustered by this rebuke. Karp had to admit that he had a good courtroom demeanor. A strong voice, a snappy appearance.
Next motion. Move to suppress defendant’s priors under the Sandoval rule, which says that a defendant cannot be cross-examined on his criminal record unless those convictions speak to the credibility of the defendant as a witness. Karp struggled to his feet, and they went through Russell’s fifteen convictions, one by one. The judge allowed the burglaries, the larcenies. The jury can know that the guy steals things. On the assaults, Freeland began to argue from a parole report-the defendant was subject to uncontrollable rages-when Martino stopped him abruptly. “Is Counsel arguing mental incompetence here?”
“Ah … no, Your Honor, it speaks to circumstances mitigating the effect of the convictions on the credibility of the witness.”
The judge lowered his head for a moment as if to clear his throat, and the court clerk thought she heard him say, “What total horseshit,” which was impossible, and then the judge said, out loud, “Either argue it or don’t! I will strike four of these convictions: two narcotics possessions, the carrying a deadly weapon, and this receiving stolen property. The rest stand.”
It suddenly struck Karp, and the thought inspired a vague queasiness, that the parole reports that Freeland had just used had been written by the dead woman’s sister.
Next, Freeland turned to the witnesses, arguing from Ward that the lineup was so unnecessarily suggestive as to be unfair. The point of this was to throw out the identifications made by the Digbys and Jerry Shelton. The judge studied the photographs. All the people in the lineup were black men of about the same height and build. Motion denied. The same thing happened to Freeland’s motion to suppress the spontaneous identification made by the leather-shop owner, James Turnbull.
Freeland objected. “Judge, if you’re going to allow this eyewitness testimony, defense should have the opportunity to examine the People’s witnesses at this time. Also, I move that the prosecution should be required to supply us with the names and addresses of all witnesses they intend to call.”
Karp rose. “Your Honor, the People have no obligation to provide names and addresses of civilian witnesses. Statements of potential witnesses are not discoverable under New York law, Section 240.20, Criminal Procedure Law.”
“Thank you, Mr. Karp,” said the judge. “I am familiar with the statute, but it is also true that New York precedent gives the trial judge broad discretion to compel disclosure, although People’s witnesses should be compelled only on a showing of most unusual and exceptional circumstances. Are you prepared to make such a showing, Mr. Freeland?”
“Your Honor, since the physical evidence in this case has no direct or obvious connection with the defendant, the testimony of the identifying witnesses is of extreme importance. Also the nature of this case-the murder of a white girl, this incredible rush to select a black indigent as the murderer. I would construe that as unusual and exceptional, certainly.”
“Would you?” asked Martino. “Well, I would not, within the guidelines suggested by People v. Hvizd. Denied as to the discovery.”
Karp saw an odd look come across Freeland’s face, a nervous look but touched with something mischievous, as when a boy is deciding whether to heave a snowball at a cop. Freeland spoke again, confidently, “Your Honor, citing People v. Blue, Appellate Division, 1973. The court found that the pretrial hearing was inadequately and improperly conducted in that the identification witnesses were not called by the prosecution to testify at it and that the hearing court would not permit the defense counsel to examine the witnesses as to their original testimony to the police.”
Blue? thought Karp, suddenly asweat. What in hell was Blue? He should know all about any cases that bore on prosecution witnesses. Protection of witnesses was essential to winning trials-if Freeland could get all Karp’s civilian witnesses up on the stand now, he could probe for weaknesses, confuse them, establish a record of contradictory testimony, alienate them-it would be much worse than simply getting their names and addresses.
But Blue was a mystery. Unless … He looked again at Freeland, and all at once he was sure.
“Shit! He’s trying it again!” The words appeared in his mouth before he could stop them.
“Excuse me, Mr. Karp, I didn’t get that,” said the judge inquiringly.
“Oh, sorry, Judge. I meant to say, I believe the Appellate Division ruling in Blue was reversed by the Court of Appeals.”
“Mr. Freeland, were you reading from an Appellate memorandum?” asked Martino, frowning. “Yes? Okay, five-minute recess. Get the law.”
The look on Milton Freeland’s face was worth a month’s salary.
In front of 525 East 5th, the street and sidewalk were full of tattooed men in sleeveless T-shirts and leather pants, sitting on big, shiny, customized Harleys, drinking beer and wine from bottles, looking corpselike under the glare of the sodium lights. They were shouting and scuffling, grabbing and kissing similarly attired tattooed women and each other, and doing all the other things that outlaw motorcycle clubs do to make themselves loved and admired by the general population, all this to the sound of music that seemed to be largely composed of guitar feedback played at the max.
They were also dealing drugs fairly openly, despite the fact that Harry Bello was standing across the street, leaning against the stoop of number 528 and watching them. Or maybe they were doing it because Bello was there.
He didn’t mind. He had no intention of making a drug bust, but he wanted them to know he was there and watching.
Something swift and bright appeared in the corner of his vision. It was a thin girl of about ten, dressed outlandishly in a tattered bridal veil and a lacy pink party dress. She had come darting past the stoop to talk with a Puerto Rican woman. The woman had dyed blond-streaked hair and was wearing pink shorts, a sequined halter, and sandal spikes. She was leaning against a parked car, drinking with several similarly attired Puerto Rican women.
The little girl was arguing with the woman. Their voices grew shrill. Bello’s Spanish wasn’t that great, but he gathered that the two were mother and daughter and that the mother wanted the girl in the house, and the girl wanted some money to go down to Avenue A and get ice cream.
A smack sounded, a hard one: The girl shrieked like a vole in a trap. A flurry of blows. The bridal veil was torn loose. Sobbing, the child gathered it up and ran into the house. The woman in the sequins laughed and resumed her chat with her sister whores.
Bello stared at the woman. He recalled her; her apartment had a good view of 525, he had interviewed her twice. She was one of the tribe of din-see-nothins. Bello tried to think about how to make her some trouble.
He watched the gang across the street some more. A young woman in light green coverall and a head scarf, a woman going to a night shift somewhere, walked out of an adjoining building and started west on 5th. When she saw what was going on, she checked and crossed the street.
One of the bikers saw her cross and made a run at her, laughing. He threw a clumsy arm around her shoulder and tried to kiss her, but she shrugged off the arm and ran across the street. Harry tensed and put his hand on the butt of his revolver.
The man saw the gesture and snarled and shouted something and went back to his pals. His friends egged him on, attributing homosexual qualities to him in colorful language.
Bello walked behind the young woman down to Avenue A. In an all-night, he called Marlene.
She was used to
getting calls from Harry at odd hours. The baby had been so cranky these last days she wasn’t getting much sleep anyway.
“It’s not Avanian,” he said without preamble when she picked up the phone.
She nevertheless felt cranky. “Is that a new greeting, Harry? I like it. Let’s not say, ‘Hello, Marlene, sorry to disturb you.’ Let’s all start saying, ‘It’s not Avanian,’ when the other person answers.”
“The brother was by Beekman,” said Harry, ignoring this.
“I don’t get it, Harry. That’s the woman went to the coast and came back. I thought you checked with United.”
“It’s the woman who went, but the woman who went wasn’t Avanian.”
“Harry, what about the credit card? Where did Avanian’s plastic come from?”
“It was the tattoos. We should have figured. I’m slowing down.”
“What tattoos, Harry?”
“On the Beekman girl-woman. Avanian didn’t have any that her brother knew of. But the woman in Beekman had tattoos. Quite a few. So do the women who hang out with Vinnie and his friends.”
Marlene hated playing the straight man. She tried to kick her brain into gear. “Okay, so if she wasn’t Avanian, she was somebody who had at least one of Avanian’s possessions, or knew someone who had, and if she was also connected with the gang, that means …” What did it mean? Then it hit her, with a cold chill.
Before she could speak, Harry said, “The Jane Doe is Gabrielle Avanian. She lived in the neighborhood. She was walking down the street that night and they grabbed her. I almost saw it happen to a woman tonight.”
“Just at random?”
“Sure. The fuck do they care? Our Beekman woman must have boosted her stuff, her credit card, and her ticket, went off and had a little vacation. Disneyland, L.A. Vinnie and them were probably not too pleased about that. She must have blown five, six grand. Then she came back, like an asshole, and they found her and did her. We could confirm it was Avanian through dental records. I’ll get on that first thing.” He paused. “Still no witness. We could roust their place.”
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