by Jane Corry
Tony Gordon pauses, to allow the full force of his words to sink in. I have to hand it to him. He’s quite the defender of justice, striding around, waving his hands and eyeballing each member of the jury in turn. I’d be convinced if I was them. What would it be like to be married to a man like Tony? I get the feeling that our barrister is quite capable of making the truth suit him – and convincing himself that he has the perfect right to do so.
The prosecution has already had its say. The opposition put forward a strong case against Joe, claiming he was a controlling abuser and a cold-blooded killer. But it ran out of luck when it came to the ex-girlfriend who had once accused Joe of stalking her. Turns out she had died a year ago from lung cancer. So young! I’m shocked to feel relief. But that’s the law for you. Someone else’s misfortune can strengthen your case.
‘It should also be stated at the beginning,’ continues Tony, ‘that although the matter of the harassment of a member of my team is serious, it seems to have no relevance to the issues in the case. But if that should change, I shall be making an application to introduce it in evidence before the jury.’
I find myself going beetroot. Tony hasn’t prepared me for this.
Despite his point about ‘no relevance’, Tony continues to spell it out. Is this part of his stragegy?
‘Threatening letters have been sent. A bag, containing vital documents, was grabbed in the street. But, worst of all, a horse belonging to one of my colleagues was poisoned in an attempt to make us drop the case.’
My name isn’t mentioned – neither is the fact that the first letter came from Sarah’s uncle – but it’s clear who the ‘colleague’ is from my red face and Tony’s swift but meaningful glance in my direction.
There’s a collective gasp. From the dock, Joe Thomas’s eyes swoop down to catch mine. There’s a compassion which I have not seen before, not even when he was talking about poor Sarah.
How dare Tony flag me up in this way? Then I realize he has done this on purpose. He wants to show the jury the tears in my eyes. Wants them to see the hurt that’s been caused by the unseen powers who don’t want this case to come to court. The jury might not be swayed by Joe Thomas with his haughty manner. But their sympathies might well be aroused by a young woman. Like me.
For a while, my attention is concentrated on making myself act professionally. This is Joe Thomas’s future we are talking about. A man with habits that might seem weird to anyone else. A man who is the victim of a national scandal.
As my embarrassment dies down, I find myself looking round the court. I haven’t been in this one before. Until now, my work for the firm has been in the tribunal courts. This is different. It’s bigger. Almost church-like. The wood is mahogany. Joe Thomas is above us in a glass cage. His hands are gripping the shelf in front of him. It’s hot in here, even though there’s frost on the ground which almost made me slip when I got here at 8.30 this morning. It strikes me that from the outside, this court, like many others, looks like an ordinary large municipal building, with its grubby white facade and distant air. Yet its exterior appearance belies the circus – and theatre – that is going on around us.
A man’s future is at stake.
Such responsibility!
I begin to sweat.
Joe Thomas is doing the same.
We watch Tony and the prosecution examine and then cross-examine boiler experts, statisticians, health and safety officers, the attending policemen and -women from the night of the murder. Then he throws a grenade. Another one he hasn’t prepared me for. He calls to the stand the man who moved into Joe’s flat after Sarah’s death. After asking a series of innocuous opening questions, he gets to the point.
‘Can you describe your new neighbours, Mr and Mrs Jones?’ Tony asks.
The young man sighs audibly. ‘Difficult. We complained about the noise of their television. First to them, but when they ignored us, we wrote to the council, but nothing’s changed. It’s become completely unbearable. We’ve put in for another place.’
‘Would you believe their claims of hearing screaming from the deceased’s home?’
‘Frankly, I’d be surprised if they could hear anything above the sound of their television.’
I knew Tony was good. But not this good.
Then Sarah’s old boss takes the stand. She hadn’t wanted to give evidence, because she’d been a ‘mate’. But under oath, she admits that Sarah had a ‘drinking problem’. It turns out that Sarah had been given a final warning for being drunk while at work.
It all helps to build up a bigger picture in which Joe isn’t the demon he was portrayed as in the first trial.
Then comes another medical expert. Yes, she confirms, it’s quite possible that someone who had ‘excess drink in their system’ might get into a hot bath without realizing and then might be too drunk to climb out. And yes, the resulting self-inflicted bruises from falling and then trying to escape might be difficult to distinguish from bruises inflicted by someone else.
Why weren’t such experts called up during the first trial? Like I said before, there are good lawyers. And some not so good. And of course it takes time (which equals money) and resourcefulness to get the right experts.
A second set of neighbours are called in too. A pair of elderly sisters. Clever move on Tony’s part. These two testify, one after the other, that they often saw Joe ‘acting in a very gentlemanly manner’ towards Sarah. Always opening the car door for her. Carrying the shopping. That sort of thing. ‘We often thought she was a very lucky young lady,’ simpers the older sister.
A friend of Sarah’s is then called. She’s what we call a ‘hostile witness’. Someone who doesn’t want to give evidence but is compelled to by court order. Yes, she admits. Sarah did have a drinking problem and it made her do stupid things. Could she give an example? How about the Friday before she died? Her friend reluctantly reveals that Sarah had nearly been run over by a car when drunk on a work night out. Another colleague must have reported it. And was it possible Sarah might have fallen into a too-hot bath when drunk? Another unwilling yes.
Tomorrow we’ll hear from some medical specialists in autism spectrum disorders. Joe will hate every bit of it, but he knows he needs it for his defence. Apparently, one in a hundred people is affected. So hopefully there’ll be someone in court who will be sympathetic.
And finally, we’ll bring to the stand those families whose loved ones were also scalded but survived. ‘Save the best for last,’ as Tony so tactfully puts it.
Yet the joy of all this is that ever since the hearing started, I haven’t once thought about Ed.
After the case. After the case. The most difficult decision of my life is looming.
But deep down, I already know what I have to do.
‘The jury was only out for fifty-five minutes! You reckoned it would be several hours!’
Joe’s face is different from the one he wore inside prison. It is lit up. Exalted. Exhausted too.
Tony and I feel the same.
‘They knew I was innocent.’ Joe’s upper lip bears a froth of beer. It was, he said, the first thing he wanted. A pint in a pub ‘with freedom for company and the two people who made it happen’.
I’ve never heard him sound so emotional before. But he was looking at me when he said it. Right now I feel drunk with the thrill of innocence as surely as if I have been acquitted myself. Tony feels the same. I can see from the flush on his face that says, ‘We won.’
‘Law is a game,’ he had told me at the beginning. ‘If you win, you’re king. If you don’t, you’re a loser. You can’t afford to be the latter. That’s why it’s addictive. It’s why you’re in the dock alongside your client.’
That’s why, I could now add, a lawyer feels the need to win arguments in his or her private life too. Because if you can’t do that, there’s an implication (rightly or wrongly) that you can’t be any good at your job. Does Tony win arguments at home? I suspect that he does. I don’t want to think about my own
situation.
The crowds outside the court were thick with cameras, shouting and flashing lights, a wave of journalists pushing microphones in front of us. Tony made a short speech: ‘This is a day of reckoning not just for Joe Thomas, who has finally been proved innocent, but for all the other victims too. We expect more developments shortly.’ Then he steered us with practised ease into a waiting car and took us to this pub in Highgate where the locals are well-heeled members of the public rather than the press. I looked for Ed in the crowds, but he was nowhere to be seen.
Time to think about him later. Right now, this is our moment.
Thanks for everything. That’s what you might expect Joe to say. That’s what a normal person would say. But Daniel hadn’t done ‘thank yous’ either.
‘What next for you then?’ asks Tony now, draining his glass and glancing at his watch. I can tell from the way he speaks that he’s hacked off at not being thanked, and also – tellingly – that he doesn’t really care for our client, who technically isn’t our client any more.
Joe Thomas shrugs. ‘I’ll use the money to start again somewhere else.’
He’s referring, of course, to the supportive donations that came in during the case when Joe declared he didn’t want any compensation – only his name to be cleared. As one well-wisher wrote to The Times: ‘It is a vindication of society today that there are decent people still around – even though their actions have been misinterpreted in the past.’
‘I rather fancy a different kind of job too,’ he adds.
My mind flicks back to the client profile I read on the train all those months ago. It seems like another life away.
Joe Thomas, 30, insurance salesman. Convicted in 1998 of murdering Sarah Evans, 26, fashion sales assistant and girlfriend of the accused …
‘Do you know where you’ll go next?’ As I speak, Tony sends me a warning look. Don’t get too personal. We’ve done our job.
‘To a hotel, I suppose. Or a bed and breakfast. It’s not as though I’ve got a home to go to tonight.’
Once more, I am struck by the literal way in which he perceives my question.
‘What about the future, in general?’ I ask gently.
‘I’m still thinking about it.’ Joe’s eyes are steady, looking into mine. ‘Any suggestions?’
My throat is tight. ‘If it was me, I would probably go and live abroad. Italy maybe.’ Goodness knows why my honeymoon location comes into my head.
Joe wipes his mouth clear of the froth with his sleeve. ‘Wouldn’t that look as if I was running away?’
Tony rises to his feet. ‘I don’t want you to think I’m doing the same, but I’ve got to be somewhere.’ He shakes my hand. ‘It’s been good working with you, Lily. You’ll go far.’ Then he looks at Joe and seems to hesitate. I hold my breath.
At times, I wonder if Tony actually believes Joe is innocent. Or whether it matters to him.
It’s the kudos he wants. The winning of an important case which hits the headlines. I saw the pleasure on his face in front of those cameras when we left the court. And I am sharing it. We’ve made history. It feels wonderful.
‘Good luck for the future.’
Inwardly, I breathe out a sigh of relief as Tony finally shakes Joe’s hand then walks away. But our client has noticed the delay.
‘He doesn’t like me.’ Joe states it as a fact rather than in expectation of denial.
I stay silent.
‘But you understand me.’ Joe looks at me again before glancing down at the bag of possessions he’s been given – his belongings from prison. I wonder if they contain Daniel’s sticker albums. I don’t want them back. Too many memories.
Maybe it’s the double gin and tonic Tony bought me, despite my asking for a single. Maybe it’s the relief that we’ve won. Maybe it’s because Joe reminds me so much of Daniel. Whatever it is, I find myself talking. ‘I had a brother once.’ My eyes wander out over the street – did I mention we are sitting outside? Even though it’s late afternoon, the weather is remarkably mild. Besides, by unspoken agreement we all needed some air after the courtroom. A couple walk past, arm in arm, and I can smell the woman’s expensive perfume. But then it turns to a different smell in my head. The smell of straw. And death.
I discovered Daniel was doing drugs when my mother sent me into his room to get him down for dinner, the week before his seventeenth birthday. He was chopping up white stuff with a kitchen knife.
‘That’s dangerous!’ I’d seen some of the sixth-form girls do something similar in the loos at school, though I’d never done drugs myself.
‘So what?’
‘What’s dangerous?’ Dad was behind us.
Swiftly Daniel shoved the evidence into his jeans pocket. Don’t say, his eyes pleaded. Don’t say.
‘Doing fifty miles per hour when you should be doing forty.’ I picked up the Learner Driver Handbook from the desk.
‘Of course you can’t, son. If you don’t understand that, you’ll never pass your driving test. Although frankly, I don’t think you should be taking it at all.’
‘Why not?’ Daniel’s dark eyes were glaring.
‘Because, as your instructor says, you drive too fast.’
‘At least I’m not doing what you are.’
A beat of silence. ‘What do you mean?’
Daniel’s eyes narrowed. ‘You know what I mean. I’ve heard you on the extension. More than once, in fact. And I’m going to tell Mum.’
Dad went very still. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’
Nor did I.
‘It’s nothing,’ said my brother when I questioned him.
One of Daniel’s lies, I told myself, to cover his own behaviour and move the spotlight on to someone else. It had happened enough before.
That night, Daniel refused to come down to dinner. Instead, he stayed in his room, playing loud music that reverberated through the ceiling and made our heads ring.
‘Turn that down!’ yelled Dad, hammering at the door.
Daniel didn’t bother to reply. As usual, he’d put the bed against the door so no one could get in.
Later, as I passed my parents’ closed bedroom door, I heard them having an almighty row. There’d been others of course. All about Daniel. What is wrong with that boy? How can we cope any more? That sort of thing.
But this one was different. This one sent a chill down my bones.
‘I heard Daniel. Who were you on the phone to? Who is she?’
This was my mother.
‘No one.’
‘You swear? On the children’s lives?’
There was a silence. Then a low voice, which meant I had to press my head against the door to hear the rest. ‘… your fault. Don’t you realize? … lavished all your attention on Daniel … looked elsewhere.’
Mum’s distressed voice was all too clear. ‘So it’s the truth? How could you? Do you love her? Are you going to leave us?’
I couldn’t hear the reply. Only the desperate sound of weeping. On the other side of the door, I was bent double. Almost sick. Dad had been having an affair?
Then I saw him. Daniel walking up the stairs. Daniel grinning as though there was nothing wrong. Daniel with huge black pupils.
I rushed up after him to the bedroom. ‘Mum and Dad are splitting up. And it’s all your fault.’
He shrugged. ‘She needed to know.’
His lack of concern made me boil. ‘If you weren’t so horrible, Mum and Dad would be all right.’
Daniel looked shocked, as well he might. Hadn’t I always protected him? Loved him. Looked after him, just as I’d been instructed from the day he entered our lives. Even though he tested us to the limits.
But the shock of my father’s affair had made me see red. And that’s when I said something else.
‘We should never have adopted you. Then you couldn’t have hurt me too. I hate you.’
Daniel’s face crumpled. Instantly I knew I’d hurt him. No. I’d destroyed him.
/>
I put out my hand to try to make up with him. He threw it off. Then he seemed to change his mind. He took my hand and squeezed it, crunching my knuckles with his fingers. The pain made me cry out. Then he pulled me towards him so that his eyes – mad with blackness – looked down on me.
I could smell his breath.
My heart pulsed in my throat. Words lay on the edge of my tongue, ready to be spoken. Words that would change our lives for ever.
‘You’re a bad person, Daniel. Everyone else says it, and they’re right. Really bad.’
Then he laughed. And I knew what that laugh meant.
I slapped him. Hard. First one cheek. Then the other.
‘You know what? I wish you had never been born.’
‘What happened then?’
Joe’s hand is on mine. Our heads are bowed together. Mine with grief. His with empathy. I can feel the same electric shock that passed through me in the prison when I gave him the sticker albums.
I’m certain he can feel it too.
That’s the thing about people like Joe and, up to a point, Daniel. They might not seem to show the ‘right’ kind of emotion at the appropriate time. But if you push them far enough, they bleed. Even cry. Just like the rest of us.
‘I went out,’ I mumble.
‘Where?’
‘I … don’t want to say.’
He nods. ‘OK.’
‘When I got back, Mum was frantic. Daniel had left a note just saying “Gone”. We searched everywhere. But it’s … well, it’s a big house. We have a few acres. And … and we have stables. That’s where I found him. He often went there. We often went there … But this time he was … hanging. From a rope wound round a beam.’
