[Jessie Black 01.0] Burnout

by Larry A Winters

  “Bob’s lab notebooks must have been in that briefcase, because they were not in his lab or in his house,” Rushford said. “Now, all that knowledge, all that progress, is lost.”

  “Didn’t Dr. Dillard keep backup files, copies, some record of his work?”

  “He was supposed to. But Bob had a mind that ran on a single track. Everything else, he let slip.”

  Leary studied the man’s face. His words sounded like bullshit—what kind of scientist doesn’t back up his notes?—but Rushford spoke with such genuine regret, it was hard to believe he was lying. “You said these were handwritten notebooks? He didn’t transcribe his work into digital form? That doesn’t make sense, unless he worked completely alone, with no interaction or aid—”

  “He preferred to work alone. Only a handful of high-ranking people at the Foundation even knew what he was doing.”

  “Okay. But what about the Foundation’s computers? Wouldn’t he need to enter the data to run scenarios or build theories?”

  Rushford shook his head. “I don’t know.”

  “But you knew what he was working on, right?”

  Rushford studied him, his expression turning wary. “Yes.”

  “I heard somewhere that human embryonic stem cells could be the key to treating ALS,” Leary said, holding the man’s gaze.

  “Somewhere?” Rushford grimaced. “I’ll have to remind Dr. Tiano of the dangers of wild speculation.”

  “You must be familiar with the studies done in China.”

  “I’m familiar with them. Unfortunately, such experiments have been outlawed in our country by narrow-minded religious zealots.”

  “That must be very frustrating for you.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  Leary leaned back in his chair as he imagined a secret lab—separate from the Foundation but funded by Rushford—where Dillard might have conducted his research. Rushford certainly had enough money. And might a man like Bob Dillard keep his notes handwritten and in one place, if he were performing that type of research? Research that could have saved lives, but that also could have put him and his patron in prison, and the Foundation out of business? It was a crazy idea. Wild speculation, to borrow Rushford’s phrase. But what if it was true? How close might Dillard have been to a breakthrough that might have extended—or even saved—Rushford’s life?

  “Are you investigating me, Detective?”

  The raspy voice broke Leary from his reverie. He looked at Rushford’s wasted body and shook his head. “No, I’m just trying to see the whole picture.”

  “You’re trying to make order out of chaos. I have that tendency as well.” The man smiled weakly. “It doesn’t work here. Believe me, I’ve tried. The Dillard murders were a random act of violence, completely unrelated to Bob Dillard’s work. And the loss of that work is....” Rushford’s voice choked off. “It’s tragic.” His gaze wandered to the doorway, where Natalie sat patiently staring into space. “Detective, my disease makes prolonged conversation difficult. My lungs don’t work like they should. I apologize, but I need to rest.”

  “Can we continue this conversation later?”

  “I think I’ve told you everything I know.”

  Leary nodded and rose from the antique chair. Across the room, Natalie also stood up. She was going to escort him out of the house, and he doubted he’d receive a second invitation. That was all right. His audience with Michael Rushford had been brief. But it had not been fruitless.

  28

  Amber lay on Elliot’s bed. The first week with him had been rough, sucking his cock and pretending to get off when he fucked her. But his apartment was beginning to seem less alien, and she felt comfortable enough to lay in a natural position, stomach on the bedspread, bare feet swinging in the air, and not worry about whether or not she looked seductive enough.

  She read the rough draft of Jessie Black’s opening statement, and was surprised by how easy it was to understand. When Woody had suggested she try to get her hands on some documents prepared for the upcoming trial, she had been afraid they would contain impenetrable legalese.

  “Wow. This is really well written.”

  Elliot snorted. “You think so?”

  “You don’t?” She pushed a sheet of blonde hair behind her shoulder and looked at him. She wasn’t the only one to become more comfortable—Elliot had, too. When she’d first met him at Dean’s, he’d been tolerable. Cute in a dorky, shy way she found endearing. But after getting used to the idea of having her around, he’d morphed into a strutting, arrogant, overbearing asshole. He reminded her of her stepfather, a boastful loser whose fatal heart attack she’d cheered.

  He paced in front of the bed, holding forth like he was one of the O.J. lawyers or something. “It’s a little overly dramatic, don’t you think? If I was on the jury I think I’d bust out laughing.”

  Amber didn’t see any humor in the account of the Dillard family’s last night together—she couldn’t imagine experiencing anything so terrible—but Elliot had been through college and law school, so she supposed he knew what he was talking about. “It’s kind of overdone, I guess.”

  “Kind of?” He laughed.

  She didn’t like the way his eyes started to roam her body. The last thing she wanted was to have to fuck him again. “I bet you could write a better one,” she said.

  He stopped pacing, dropped into a chair in a corner of the studio apartment. “I told you, it’s not my case. I worked on the PCRA hearing, but now that Ramsey’s getting a new trial, it goes straight to the Homicide Unit.”

  “To Jessie Black.”

  “Right.”

  She made herself perk up as if a new idea had just occurred to her. “But she stole the case from you, right? Can’t you steal it back?”

  He smiled, shook his head as if at a child. “It’s not that simple.”

  “But it would be so cool to watch you in court.” She showed him her best princess pout, the one she used whenever a patron at the club hesitated about buying a thirty dollar lap dance.

  “I might be able to force my way into the case. I’d have to go to my uncle, convince him to force Jessie to let me assist her. If I could make him feel guilty about how she screwed me over the first time....” Elliot thought about it, then shook his head. “But Warren won’t feel guilty. I know him.”

  “Might as well try, right?”

  He got up from the chair and climbed onto the bed with her. Inwardly she groaned. Something she’d said or done had accidentally turned him on, and now she’d have to pay the price. He cupped her cheek and turned her face to his, closed in for the kiss. His other hand squeezed her ass, then her left breast.

  “Elliot, I’m not in the mood.”

  He kissed her one more time before giving her room to breathe. “Why? Is something wrong?”

  “No. I just don’t feel like it.” And never do. Not with him. Woody had been a different story. With Woody, she’d always been in the mood. But she had loved him. And had thought that he loved her. What a joke.

  “Do you have a headache?” Elliot rolled off the bed and headed for the kitchen area of the small apartment. “I have Excedrin.”

  “I’m fine. I was just ... into our conversation. I want to hear more about the Ramsey case.”

  Elliot turned from the kitchen cabinet, his swagger returning. If there was one thing he liked almost as much as fucking her, it was talking about himself. And unlike fucking, he could talk for hours.

  Amber wasn’t sure which was harder to endure.

  29

  Unlike the PCRA hearing, which had attracted little media attention, Judge Spatt’s courtroom was packed on the first day of Ramsey’s new trial. Reporters from newspapers, television stations, radio, and Internet news sites filled the benches of the gallery and spilled out into the hallway, where they milled about impatiently, descending like vultures on anyone who looked like interview fodder. Jessie, who would be considered excellent interview fodder, kept her head down when she walked past them,
ignored the questions launched in her direction, and made it to the prosecution table unscathed.

  Goldhammer and Ramsey were already seated at the defense table. Goldhammer turned and nodded to her as she unpacked her bag, his puffy face exuding cocky self-assurance. Ramsey, his neutral expression already fixed in place, didn’t acknowledge her.

  She sat down. In spite of all of her preparation, her heart raced. The courtroom triggered an adrenaline rush in her body. This morning, as always, she was thankful for it. Soon the jury would file in and the trial—one of the most important of her career—would start. She needed every advantage she could get.

  She began her opening statement to the jury, as always, by introducing herself as an assistant District Attorney with the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office, and thanking them for their important contribution to the criminal justice system. The jurors watched her from their seats—twelve of them, plus two alternates, an audience of fourteen.

  Emphasizing her position of authority and role as the lawyer representing the state—while by implication reminding the jury that the defense attorney, a man not affiliated with the government, served only the accused—had been shown to foster additional trust in jurors.

  As she had told Jack, she did not believe the outcome of this trial would be determined by the makeup of the jury. Factors like race, age, and sex would not play significant roles. Nevertheless, she had studied the jurors’ questionnaires the night before in an attempt to identify those who might be problems. She had come up with three. Trent Slaney, a white, unmarried, fifty-two-year-old construction worker whose answers suggested a distrust of cops, lawyers, and the government. Malcolm Clonts, a black, married, thirty-year-old middle school janitor with ties to a militant church that condemned the white middle class. And Jenna Gottlieb, a white, single, twenty-year-old nursing student whom Jessie had noticed glancing in Ramsey’s direction, her gaze a little too admiring for Jessie’s comfort.

  Jessie made repeated eye contact with each of these problem jurors. The attempt at forced intimacy might seem obvious to an impartial observer, but in practice, it usually worked. Jurors did not like being silent spectators; they wanted to feel like real, integral participants in the trial. Even the most cynical of them—like Slaney, who had indicated on his questionnaire that he believed most cops lied in order to convict accused criminals—would bask in her attention without questioning its sincerity. As the enormously profitable industry of jury consulting demonstrated, human nature was remarkably consistent and predictable.

  She did not neglect the other nine jurors or the two alternates, however. During her opening statement, she met the eyes of every one of them at least once, gratified if they leaned forward as if physically pulled closer by her words. She kept her arms at her sides, paced as little as possible, smiled when appropriate and scowled when necessary. The opening statement was her first real opportunity to influence the jury. A good prosecutor took full advantage.

  “The road ahead is not going to be easy,” she said. “You have been selected to serve as jurors in a trial involving multiple stabbings, rapes, murders and attempted murder. You are going to see crime scene photographs that may haunt your nightmares for years to come. You are going to hear heart-wrenching testimony from one of the defendant’s victims. And you are going to be faced, eventually, with deciding the fate of the man you see sitting at the defense table. A sociopath with a mind like a reptile’s—no conscience, no mercy.

  “When police officers responded to a neighbor’s report of loud noises next door, they found nothing suspicious outside. The Dillard’s home looked secure and serene. No broken windows. No busted locks. They rang the doorbell and knocked, but received no response. They might have returned to the station had one of them not noticed, through the partly closed drapes, a dark red stain on the stairway carpet inside.

  “The lead detective assigned to the case, Mark Leary, will explain to you that the condition of the doors and windows lead to his conclusion that Mr. Ramsey gained access to the house simply by knocking on the door.

  “The Dillards had been sitting together in their family room, watching sitcoms. Why did they answer the door? I can’t answer that question. I suppose Robert Dillard, although a brilliant scientist, lacked street smarts. He did not believe the person at his door might be a vicious predator. He did not believe that a man he’d never met—Frank Ramsey—had come to his house with the sole purpose of torturing and killing his family.”

  She paused, let the jurors imagine the scenario. She knew that most if not all of them watched TV alone or with their families, that most if not all of them had experienced the unexpected ring of the doorbell. Maybe they had opened their doors to discover only a cookie-peddling Girl Scout or a Jehovah’s Witness.

  She noticed with satisfaction that several jurors turned to regard Ramsey with angry, frightened stares.

  Time to move on.

  “After exploring the first floor of the house, police found bodies upstairs in the master bedroom. Detective Leary will tell you that he believes Mr. Ramsey drove the family up there at knife point. Robert Dillard, a forty-three-year-old biochemist known to his friends and family as Bob, was found with gashes on his hands and legs. Defensive wounds. A deputy medical examiner will testify that these wounds indicate that Bob Dillard tried to fight. He tried to defend his family. But Mr. Ramsey, a professional firefighter, easily overpowered him. Eventually, Mr. Ramsey forced Bob Dillard’s hands behind his back—breaking his left wrist in the process—and bound them with the electrical cord of the alarm clock on the table next to the bed. Police found Bob Dillard’s wife, Erin Dillard, also with hands bound behind her back, hers with a phone cord. Their sixteen-year-old daughter Kristen’s hands had been tied with a cord torn from the base of a reading lamp. As photographs will show, the cord on Kristen’s wrists was tied so tightly that it sliced through her skin.

  “The deputy medical examiner will explain to you that Bob Dillard was killed first. Police found his body on the floor, near his bed, where the carpet was soaked with blood. There were seventeen stab wounds in his chest. The deputy medical examiner will testify that the weapon used to inflict these wounds had a blade at least eight inches long and one inch wide.”

  She demonstrated with her hands, first holding them up about eight inches apart, then measuring an inch with her thumb and index finger. The gestures had the same effect on this jury as it had on Ramsey’s first jury, driving home the sheer size of the weapon. They gasped, muttered, cursed. One woman brought her hands to her face and wiped her eyes. Jessie omitted a detail that Goldhammer would no doubt harp upon, when his turn came—the murder weapon had never been found.

  “Police found Erin Dillard with her own panties stuffed in her mouth as a gag. The deputy medical examiner will testify that Mr. Ramsey tore them off of her so hard he left a bruise on her hip. Mr. Ramsey then raped Erin Dillard in front of her terrified daughter.”

  But he had been careful to leave no trace evidence. The only foreign substance recovered from her vagina had been a lubricant common to several brands of condoms. Goldhammer would emphasize this fact as well—the evidence made clear that someone had raped Erin Dillard, but not that his client had done it. She silently forced herself not to dwell on the weaknesses in her case. She could not afford to project anything but total confidence.

  “Erin Dillard was stabbed to death, just like her husband. Eleven stab wounds to her chest and upper abdomen. One, the deputy medical examiner will tell you, severed the major artery from her heart. But what most horrified police at the scene was Bob and Erin’s daughter.

  “Kristen Dillard—now seventeen years old, but only sixteen on the night of Mr. Ramsey’s attack—is going to testify at this trial. You are going to see her bravely take the witness stand. She will tell you in her own words what happened that night. She will tell you that she watched Mr. Ramsey stab her father to death and then rape and stab her mother. And she will tell you what Mr. Ramsey did next.
That he raped her, then stabbed her. Three times in the chest. Once in the back. And once in the neck.

  “But Mr. Ramsey made a mistake. Assuming that Kristen Dillard was dead, he took off his ski mask for a breath of fresh air before leaving the scene of his crime. And Kristen Dillard—still very much alive—saw his face. And she managed to cling to life until emergency personnel called by the police rushed her to a hospital for treatment. And later, recovering from her multiple wounds, she identified Mr. Ramsey in a lineup.”

  Every juror stared at her, rapt, unblinking. If ordered by the judge to reach a decision right now, Jessie had no doubt that every one of them would find Ramsey guilty as charged.

  Of course, a real trial wasn’t that easy. The defense had its opportunity to speak, too. And the goal of every defense attorney worth his retainer was to sow seeds of doubt—plant them witness by witness, embed them within objections, emphasize them in opening and closing statements—until, in the jury’s confused minds, the factual foundations of the prosecution’s version of events had been eroded, making a judgment of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt impossible.

  “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, in addition to hearing from me, you are going to hear a lot from Mr. Ramsey’s lawyer. You may have heard of him. Mr. Goldhammer is a bit of a celebrity, famous for defending accused gangsters and drug dealers and murderers.” She inclined her body toward Goldhammer, who was staring studiously at his notes. “He’s spent as much time in cable news studios as he has in courtrooms, and he’s a very good speaker. He is going to tell you there is not enough evidence here to convict Mr. Ramsey for the crimes I just described. He is also going to introduce you to a witness—he will tell you she is a very respected psychologist—who will try to convince you that eyewitness identifications are worthless. I urge you to compare her theories with your own experiences, with your own common sense, and decide for yourselves whether Kristen Dillard’s testimony is reliable.”