Once I establish her role in this case, I hand her one of the discovery documents. “These are the names of the people whose prints you identified?”
“Yes.”
“I direct you to the third name listed, E. Benjamin. Can you tell me what the E stands for?”
“Eric.”
“Are you familiar with Eric Benjamin?”
“Very.”
“Please tell the jury what you know about him.”
Scalari talks about Benjamin in some detail, describing his work as a state cop, and then his losing that job because of accusations of theft and assault.
“Was he ever convicted of any of those charges?”
“He was never tried,” she says. “The charges were dropped.”
“Do you know why?”
She nods. “The main witness against him, Orlando Guadalupe, turned up dead.”
I feign surprise. “Really? How? Pneumonia? Shot? Poisoned?”
“He was decapitated and dismembered.”
Out of the corner of my eye, I can see the jury react and recoil, which is exactly the reaction I wanted.
I ask Scalari if Benjamin was a suspect in the Guadalupe murder, but Carla objects and Avery sustains. Then I ask, “Where is Mr. Benjamin today?”
Carla jumps up to object so quickly it’s as if she saw a rattlesnake under her chair. Avery asks us to approach the bench.
Carla speaks first. “We just had a meeting about the possible negative effect of the awareness of Benjamin’s death on the jury, and now Mr. Carpenter is bringing it out in testimony?”
“Your Honor,” I say, “I have asked this witness to describe many aspects of Benjamin’s life. Now I am asking her about his death. Just because that death is recent, and took place at my house, doesn’t make it less relevant. In fact, Mr. Benjamin’s attempt to invade the home of one of the lawyers in this case makes it far more relevant. The jury absolutely should consider it along with the other facts of the case.”
“It could fatally prejudice the jury,” Carla says.
I shake my head. “Your Honor, you didn’t even think it was worth questioning the jurors to find out if they were aware of the events of last night. If you thought that awareness could ‘fatally prejudice’ them, you no doubt would have questioned them. I agreed with your ruling, and my bringing it out in testimony is completely consistent with that ruling.”
I feel like I’ve successfully backed Judge Avery into a corner, but I also know that corners are not something that judges traditionally like being backed into.
He rules in my favor, but not totally. I am prohibited from having the witness mention that the murder happened at my house. I think that ruling is unfair, but I’m stuck with it.
Scalari is thus allowed to answer the question, and she says that “he is deceased; he was shot and killed.”
“When?”
Again Carla objects, and again we approach. I explain that I am abiding by the judge’s ruling and not having the witness mention my involvement, but that the timing is essential. I don’t want the jury thinking Benjamin might have been killed before Zimmer.
My hope, of course, is that every member of the jury will disregard Judge Avery’s instructions and do an online search for news of what happened last night.
Avery lets the timing of Benjamin’s death in, and once Scalari says it, I turn her over to Carla.
Carla’s focus is on the fingerprint. “Sergeant Scalari, you found Mr. Benjamin’s print on the truck. When did he leave it there?”
“I have no idea.”
“It could have been six months ago?”
“Possibly.”
“Longer than that?”
“Could be.”
“Do you know the circumstances under which he left them?”
“No.”
“Thank you.”
We’re off to a decent start, in that the witnesses went pretty much according to plan. Unfortunately, the plan was not so great in the first place. The only significant fact brought in was Benjamin’s print being found on the truck, and that is not exactly proof positive of his guilt.
I head home, only to discover Pete sitting in the den with Laurie. “Are you here to complain that I beat you up in court?”
“I wiped the floor with you,” he says.
“Boys, boys…,” Laurie says.
“I didn’t see your car outside,” I say.
“I parked around the block and came in through the back.”
That gets my interest; if Pete did that, he must have a damn good reason. “Okay. Let’s hear it.”
“You know the name Victor Andreson?” he asks.
“The doughnut guy? He cost us money.”
“How?”
“Doesn’t matter, believe me. Go on,” I say.
“So you know the story? About how he beat up a hooker?”
I nod. “Yes. It was all over the news.”
“Well, it turns out he didn’t do it. He was with her, but someone else beat her up after he left. She agreed to it; she was paid fifty grand for letting it happen. Then she did what she was told and lied about Andreson.”
“Let me guess,” I say. “Benjamin beat her up.”
Pete turns to Laurie and points to me. “He’s not as dumb as he looks.” Then, to me, “How did you know?”
“Because I see the pattern. They bring down executives that are crucial to their companies and find a way to profit from it. It happened with John Craddock, and I’ll bet we find out it happened with Andreson.”
“Maybe you are as dumb as you look,” Pete says. “No matter how big a piece of garbage Benjamin was, Kramer killed Zimmer.”
“In self-defense,” I say.
“Yeah,” Pete says, showing as much scorn as he can manage.
“Then why are you here? Why are you telling me this?”
“Because an agreement was made with the DA to keep this quiet for a while. They’re afraid of Andreson and his lawyers. And I think Carla put her two cents in. They don’t want you to use this to your advantage.”
“So I repeat the question,” I say. “Why are you telling me this?”
“I guess I believe in an even playing field.”
“Wow. It took buying you about twenty thousand beers for you to turn decent on me. Now tell me what you’ve learned about why Benjamin tried to kill me.”
“Wish I could. The feds took it over.”
“When?”
“About thirty seconds after it happened. Givens was all over it. That’s supposed to be off the record,” he says. Then, “Like I give a shit.”
We talk for a few more minutes, and then Pete says, “By the way, did you have your FBI friend run one of Zimmer’s prints?” Laurie’s and my friend Cindy Spodek is the number-two agent in the Boston office of the FBI, and I lean on her for a lot of favors.
“No. Why?”
He shrugs. “I got a call from the federal lab about the print. They got confused and thought I ran the print, because I was handling the Zimmer case. When I said I hadn’t and asked who did, they clammed up.”
“Beats me,” I say.
Pete tells me he’s heading down to Charlie’s to listen to Vince complain about the Mets. I walk him to the back door, and as he’s about to go out, I grab his arm and stop him.
“Pete, thanks for this.”
“You’re not going to kiss me good night, are you?”
“Not in this lifetime,” I say. “But I do appreciate your doing this.”
“It’s the third time I helped you on this case.”
I nod. “I know.”
“If you tell anyone that I did, I will chop you up into little pieces and feed you to rabid coyotes.”
“That’s beautiful, Pete. I’ve never felt closer to you than I feel right now.”
Once Pete leaves, I place another call to Robbie Divine. I have no idea where he is; when one has his own private jet and pilot, one can be pretty mobile. It’s 8:00 P.M. here in New Jersey; where R
obbie is, it could be the middle of the night.
He answers the phone, sounding wide awake. But that’s how he sounded last time, and I reached him at two thirty in the morning. “Again?” he asks.
“Did I wake you?”
“Wake me?” he asks. “You think I’m a hundred years old? It’s mid-afternoon.”
“Where are you?”
“Hawaii. Can we get to the point?”
“You do get around,” I say.
“Rich people can do that. It’s why you’re always in New Jersey.” Then, “The point?”
“The subject of today’s call is Victor Andreson.”
“He’s a pig,” Robbie says.
“You sound like Laurie. When he got arrested, his company’s stock tanked. I lost a lot of money myself.”
“You looking for a loan?”
“No, here’s what I’m looking for. Suppose you knew, absolutely knew, that Andreson was going to be arrested and that his company’s stock was going to crash, all before it happened. What would you do to profit from it? Sell short?” I’m using Freddie’s terminology, even though I’m still unsure exactly what it means.
“No. Definitely not,” he says.
“Then what?”
“I’d buy put options. That’s by far the best way. But if you’re going to get into the company-tanking business, you’d be better off making it more than one.”
“Why?”
“Because everything is regulated and watched. If you suddenly loaded up on puts on a specific stock, and then it went way down, regulators would be up your ass.”
“I’d rather not have regulators up my ass,” I say.
“Smart man.”
“By the way, what exactly are put options?”
“Google it.”
“Thanks. I will.”
So I hang up and I google put options, and it doesn’t surprise me that Robbie is right.
At this point, I’m confident in my assessment of what is going on. Benjamin has been instrumental in bringing down two extraordinarily successful businessmen who were integral to their companies’ success.
When they were eliminated, Craddock murdered and Andreson arrested, their companies predictably took a nosedive. And I believe Benjamin and his coconspirators were there to profit from it.
If I’m correct, then Kramer was a bit player in all this. The conspirators must have been afraid that he was about to figure out their scheme while investigating the Craddock death. It feels like an overreaction; they had already made their profit by then. To pay Zimmer $75,000 and to go to all this trouble, there must be something more, something that I’m missing.
Something more to come.
I call Sam and tell him I have two daunting jobs for the Bubalah Brigade. One is to search the last six months and find every company that suffered a precipitous drop in stock price or value. Then try to determine if the cause of it was the loss of an executive who was integral to the company.
It’s a huge job, but fortunately one made a bit easier due to the fact that the stock market has had a mostly steady rise during that time. Therefore, there shouldn’t be that many companies that collapsed so completely.
Sam takes the task in stride, expressing confidence that they can handle it. The other assignment, however, is one he doesn’t think they can pull off. I’ve asked him to find out who held put options on Victor’s Donuts when Andreson was arrested.
“Andy, not only are the stock exchanges almost impossible to hack, but they wouldn’t even have the information. The names of the holders of the options would be at the brokerages that purchased them for their clients. We have no way of even knowing which brokerages are the ones we are looking for.
“And even if we did know, and if we could break into them, they could be held in the names of dummy companies set up for this purpose. I’m sorry; it’s just not going to happen.”
“I understand,” I say, and then just before I hang up, I think of one more thing to ask. “Sam, you told me that Hilda had done a deep dive on Benjamin. Did that include credit card records?”
“Of course.”
“Can you tell me if he traveled anywhere? Airline tickets, rental cars? I’m thinking primarily the Caymans, but it could be anywhere. I just want as much information on him as I can get.”
“That’s an easy one; I’ll get back to you real soon. The companies whose stock crashed might take a little longer, maybe until tomorrow.”
“Thanks, Sam. And thank the brigade for me.”
My last call is to FBI agent Jeffrey Givens. We agreed to share information, and as long as nothing I say jeopardizes my client’s position, I want to keep the relationship going. He hasn’t provided any help so far, but you never know.
He gets on the phone right away, which is already a sign of worry, if not desperation. Usually FBI agents take longer to reach on the phone than a human at the DMV.
“What have you got, Andy?”
Calling me Andy is another sign of anxiety and need on his part. He’s trying to act like we’re buddies in the hope that maybe I’ll be more forthcoming. One thing we are not is buddies.
“I assume you are aware that Mr. Benjamin has left this earth?”
“Tell me something that’s not in the papers.”
“I will do that,” I say, “secure in the knowledge that you will reciprocate. I think you should lean on a guy named Greg Hepner. He’s the head of a company called Sky Robotics.”
“Why?”
“Because what I think Benjamin was doing, and probably Jeffries as well, was seeing to it that key executives at companies got eliminated, and then profiting when those companies collapsed. It happened with John Craddock, who they murdered, and Victor Andreson, who they framed.”
“Where does Hepner fit in?”
“His company is a direct competitor of Craddock’s company. He’s even poached some employees after Craddock died. And Sky Robotics then took off in an IPO. We’re talking more than a billion dollars.”
Givens pauses for a few moments and then says, “Interesting. Anything else?”
“You sure you want to go out on a limb like that?” I ask. “Now what have you got for me?”
“Nothing, I’m afraid.”
“Thus ends the Carpenter-Givens information pact.”
“What do you want?”
“Well, for one thing, I want to know what you’ve learned about Jeffries. For another, I want to know why you are unimpressed with the information I’ve just given you.”
“Fair enough,” he says. “We’ve learned very little about Jeffries. We know there were large sums of money going into and out of the Caymans, under his direction. We don’t know the details yet, other than that some went to procure the weapons I told you about. And while I think your theory is interesting, and maybe even accurate, what is going on is much bigger than that. And much more dangerous.”
“Okay,” I say. “The pact has been restored.”
“Good. I am reachable 24-7.”
Getting Benjamin’s name before the jury was a big step for us. The real key, however, would be getting them to hear my theory of the case. That is going to be up to Judge Avery, and it will have to wait until we are finished with the self-defense portion.
My next witness is William Shepherd, a phone company employee who manages the local billing department. We’ve subpoenaed our own client’s phone records, mainly because we’ve already seen them through the magic of Sam Willis and the Bubalah Brigade.
I use Shepherd to testify about the records and get him to say that there is no record of Kramer having called any number registered to Kenny Zimmer. Then I call his attention to the two calls made to Kramer from Little Rock and northern Virginia.
“Who owns the phone that made those calls?” I ask.
He shrugs. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that. It’s a phone purchased at a convenience store without a contract. It utilizes our service system, but as far as our company is concerned, the owner rema
ins anonymous.”
“So there were two calls from that phone, the first from Little Rock and then two days later from northern Virginia,” is how I recap it. “Is there any evidence that Mr. Kramer called that phone?”
“No,” Shepherd says. “He did not.”
Carla comes right to the point in her cross. “Mr. Shepherd, these calls from Little Rock and Virginia, do you have any idea who made them?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Do you know what was said in those calls?”
“I do not.”
“Thank you.”
Carla walks back to the prosecution table shaking her head slightly, as if disgusted with the nonsense she has to put up with.
Next, I call Betty Stuart, the elderly owner of the convenience store where the phone was purchased. We flew her up here, and Laurie took her to dinner last night. Laurie said she laughed all night and that Betty is hilarious and an all-around terrific lady.
That may be true, but once Betty is on the stand, she’s all business. She has brought records demonstrating that the phone was purchased in her store and that she remembers it well. She identifies Zimmer through a photograph and identifies the truck that he was driving, also through a photograph.
“He just pulled in and left that truck in the middle of the parking lot. No one could get in or out. When I told him that, he just said that he’d be gone as soon as he got the phone.”
“How did he pay for it?”
“Cash,” she says. “A hundred-dollar bill. I looked that bill over carefully, I can tell you that. He looked like the type to try to pass a fake.”
The final witness in the self-defense portion of our case is a recall of Pete Stanton. I indirectly promised the jury a great deal when I cross-examined him during the prosecution’s case, and I need to deliver on it. I had presented Pete a hypothetical of what might have happened that day at the rest stop, and he responded that it was not possible.
I need to show the opposite.
Pete takes the stand and says yes when Judge Avery asks him if he understands that he’s still under oath.
“Welcome back, Captain Stanton.”
He smiles. “My pleasure, Mr. Carpenter.”
Rescued Page 17
