Against the Law

by Jay Brandon

  Oh, Edward could imagine this prosecution’s view of the evidence playing well both with the jury and all those people on the other end of that television feed: When it comes right down to it, the rich and powerful are just like the rest of us, down in the dirt like everyone else.

  ‘A classically simple case,’ David continued, ‘when you strip it right down. What I think you will hear is that, on a day when Paul was going to have a major professional triumph and definitively separate himself from his wife forever, she appeared and shot him dead. Period. In the end, this will be a very easy guilty verdict for you. Thank you.’

  Edward stood quickly and started talking while advancing toward the jurors. ‘Well, yes. That’s what the prosecution usually wants, for you to believe the simplest version of events, because that’s what police usually seize on.’

  ‘Objection, Your Honor.’ David Galindo hadn’t even sat back down. ‘This isn’t an opening statement, this is argument.’

  ‘Sustained. Mr Hall—’

  ‘Yes, Your Honor. I understand.’ He turned his back on her, his eyes on the jurors. ‘The evidence will show that the police found Amy bending over her dying husband’s body, because she was trying to save his life. That she had called 911. That even though, yes, she was on his front porch when the gun was fired, it wasn’t her gun. She didn’t bring a gun. The evidence will show that police could not take the trouble to investigate thoroughly enough to come up with other suspects – of whom there are many – so they arrested the easy one: the estranged wife, with blood on her hands.

  ‘You will also hear, and this is not bragging about my little sister, this is the simple truth, that Dr Amy Shilling is a very smart person, graduating with honors from both college and medical school. You will hear that she is not the kind of person to commit so stupid a crime. To let herself be seen entering the house, leaving her car plainly visible in the driveway, knowing what attention it would draw immediately after a gun was fired, and then remain at the scene just waiting to be arrested. No. I believe the evidence will show a much murkier world than the prosecution wants to present, with several suspects who have reason to dislike Dr Paul Shilling extremely, to the point of murder.’

  He ran his gaze down the two rows of eyes again, then turned and walked back to his table.

  ‘State, call your first witness,’ Judge Miles blandly intoned. She would not return Edward’s look. Hanging over the trial was still that DVD of Paul accusing Amy of his murder, and the fact Cynthia hadn’t ruled on its admissibility yet. If she let it come into evidence, this trial would become what the prosecution had predicted, very simple.

  Edward almost felt as if he were being blackmailed. But for what? What did the judge want from him?

  The theory of trying a case that Edward had been taught as a young prosecutor was that you started a trial dramatically, with your second strongest witness, and saved the best one for a big finish.

  David instead started slowly, with a patrol officer who testified to being dispatched to the house at nearly 6 p.m. on Saturday and what he’d found there. The same things he’d found at other locations, in similar circumstances: a bleeding body on the floor, a distraught family member bending over him, blood on the floor, a gun nearby, within reach. Then he had escorted Amy out but detained her, started putting up crime scene tape, waited for the paramedics and cleared a space for them to remove the victim.

  The officer was an African-American man in his early twenties, with only a couple of years on the force. His uniform was crisp, his hair cut neatly and his eyes alert.

  When Edward’s turn came to question him, Edward frowned and said, ‘Let’s clarify a couple of key points, officer. You were the first officer through the bedroom door, correct?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘What was Amy doing when you first walked in?’ Normally Edward would refer to the person next to him as ‘my client,’ or ‘the defendant,’ but he had decided that in this trial Amy would be called by her own name.

  ‘She was down on the floor, sir, doing chest compressions on the victim.’

  ‘Have you been trained in CPR, officer?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Of course, sir.’

  ‘Did she appear to be doing it correctly?’

  ‘Yes, sir, she did. She was compressing the victim’s chest with both hands instead of the old-fashioned mouth-to-mouth, which is considered outmoded now.’

  ‘Yes. Did you take over for her?’

  ‘No, sir. I put a hand on her shoulder and she said quickly, “I’m a doctor. This is my husband.” And since, as I said, she appeared to be doing it well, I just let her continue.’

  ‘Could you tell if Paul was still alive? I’m referring to the injured man.’

  ‘It’s hard for me to say, sir. I think so. His eyes were open. He was gasping air in and out as she compressed his chest, so I would have to say yes.’

  ‘Did he say anything?’

  ‘No, nothing.’ The officer shook his head for emphasis.

  ‘All right, officer, so Amy was down on her knees on the hardwood floor doing chest compressions on her husband. Did it appear to you she was trying to save his life?’

  ‘Yes, sir, that’s how it seemed to me, sir.’

  Edward passed the witness, with satisfaction that he had wrung as much as possible from this State’s witness with minimal knowledge of the facts.

  David Galindo said, ‘Officer, had you been dispatched to other murder scenes prior to this one?’

  Edward was almost on his feet, but the witness was too fast for him. ‘Yes, sir. A few.’

  ‘Have you seen other instances where someone, who later turned out to be the murderer, was apparently trying to save the victim’s life when you got there?’

  This time Edward was faster. ‘Objection, Your Honor. What he may have observed in other cases is irrelevant to this one.’

  ‘It’s about his observations based on experience, Judge, just like the defense asked about.’

  Edward frowned at Cynthia’s hesitation, and said, ‘Your Honor, there are a great many appellate opinions saying what happened in other cases is not relevant to the case on trial.’

  The only effect of his expanded objection was that it had given Cynthia time to make up her mind.

  ‘That objection is overruled.’

  Edward remained on his feet a moment longer, staring at the judge. His objection had been perfectly valid, in fact, so well-established it should have been sustained without a thought. Cynthia became aware of Edward’s stare and turned her dark eyes back to his. Hers gave nothing away, didn’t even reflect back the light.

  David Galindo was asking, ‘Do you remember the question, officer?’

  ‘Yes, sir. Yes, I’ve been to other crime scenes where the murderer appeared remorseful and was trying to revive the deceased.’

  That completely ruined the tiny advantage Edward had won during his cross-examination. He sat slumped, glaring at the judge.

  David continued, ‘Officer, you’re the one who found the gun, correct?’

  ‘Yes sir. The victim obviously had a gunshot wound, so for officer safety I wanted to make sure the suspect wasn’t still armed.’

  ‘Where did you find it?’

  ‘Under the bed, maybe five feet from the defendant.’

  When the officer was passed back to him, Edward asked, ‘Was that the first place you looked?’

  ‘After visually inspecting the flooring that was visible, yes, I checked under the bed next.’

  ‘So the gun was in the place most likely for someone to find it?’

  ‘Objection, Your Honor. Again, that calls for speculation.’

  Edward said crisply, ‘No, it’s a question of fact, Your Honor. This officer was looking, so he knows the most obvious places he’d look.’

  Cynthia actually answered him. ‘To which he’s already testified. He can’t know where another searcher might have looked first. Sustained.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ Amy whispered,
after her brother passed the witness and sat glaring at the judge. Edward only shrugged.

  The next witness was Paul’s next-door neighbor Valerie Linnett. She wore a nondescript pastel dress, loose enough to give no indication of her figure. Her gray hair, shot with a few strands of brown, hung straight and she wore no makeup. She wore small, round glasses from another era. Edward frowned. Valerie so obviously didn’t want to be here she’d apparently tried to make herself invisible. She looked around as if surprised to find the courtroom so crowded.

  David quickly established who she was, what she did for a living, and her house’s immediate proximity to Paul’s.

  ‘Had you met the deceased?’

  ‘Yes, several times. He’d only lived there a few months, but I made a point of going over and welcoming him to the neighborhood. So did other neighbors, I think and we visited back and forth a few times early on.’

  ‘But that stopped?’

  ‘We didn’t have a disagreement or anything like that. It just seemed clear we weren’t going to become great friends and we were both busy with our own lives.’

  ‘Let’s go to the day of the shooting,’ the prosecutor continued. ‘Do you remember that day?’

  ‘Of course. It was a Saturday, late in the afternoon.’

  ‘Do you remember what you were doing?’

  ‘Yes. I’d been working in the yard and I was about to take a shower, but I decided to have a drink first.’

  ‘Do you know the defendant, Dr Amy Shilling?’

  ‘We’ve met once, now.’ Valerie bobbed her head in Amy’s direction.

  ‘Did you know her that day?’

  ‘No, I’d never seen her before.’

  Edward frowned. Was that what she’d told him, or Mike? It seemed to him she’d said she had seen Amy once or twice at the house.

  ‘Did you see her that day?’

  ‘Yes. I happened to be looking out my window and I saw her car pull into the driveway and saw her go up on the porch.’

  ‘Did she enter the house?’

  ‘Yes. She knocked and then it looked like she just went in without waiting for an answer.’

  Now Edward sat up. Was that what she’d said? He looked through his witness notes as the questioning continued.

  ‘Then what happened?’

  ‘Nothing for a few minutes. I was getting ready for my shower when I heard a gunshot.’

  ‘Were you sure that’s what it was?’

  ‘Oh yes. My father used to take us kids out into the woods to shoot. It’s a very distinctive sound. You don’t forget it.’

  ‘How much time would you say passed between when the defendant entered the house and you heard the gunshot?’

  ‘A few minutes, like I said. I wasn’t timing it. Maybe ten minutes tops?’

  Now Edward felt panic setting in. This wasn’t what she’d told him. He couldn’t be sure – he and Mike had questioned so many neighbors, and none of their stories matched up perfectly, of course – but then he found the statement Valerie Linnett had given Mike.

  When the witness was passed to him, Edward waited until he had her full attention. Her eyes widened slightly behind her small round frames, almost as if she was afraid of him. Her thin dress made her look very vulnerable, almost frail.

  ‘Good morning, Ms Linnett. I’m Edward Hall, Amy’s brother.’

  ‘Yes, I know, Mr Hall. Good morning.’

  ‘Yes, in fact, you and I have talked before this, right?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, hesitantly.

  ‘You also talked to my investigator.’ This time the witness only nodded. ‘And you told us a somewhat different version of this story, didn’t you?’

  ‘I guess somewhat. I wouldn’t use the same words every time.’ She looked puzzled.

  ‘No, this is a very significant detail that you’ve changed. You told me, and my investigator, that Amy was still on the front porch when you heard the gunshot. Isn’t that correct?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Maybe. I’m not sure what I said to him.’

  Edward held in his hand so the witness could see Mike’s summary of what she had told him. Edward said slowly, ‘Or in fact you said she was just going in when you heard the gunshot. Correct?’

  Valerie Linnett, a good-sized woman, had begun to shrink into herself, hunching her shoulders. ‘I think – yes, I do think that’s what I told you.’

  ‘Now you’re saying she went in and you didn’t hear the gunshot until “a few minutes” after that. Correct?’

  ‘Yes.’ Ms Linnett nodded her head vigorously.

  ‘What’s happened to make you change your mind?’

  ‘I’ve had time to think about it. Knowing this trial was coming up, that I’d be testifying, I thought very hard about what I actually saw and I realized it must have been longer than what I told you. Because I saw her on the porch, saw her go in, then I went and made my drink. That must have taken a few minutes.’ More slowly, thoughtfully, she said, ‘So looking back, I think more time must have passed than I originally thought.’

  That was an explanation, though not a good one. Edward wanted something more sinister. Leaning back, staring at the witness for a few seconds before he spoke, he said, ‘Did you talk to police before you changed your mind?’

  ‘Well, of course, police officers have questioned me a couple of times. Being the closest neighbor, I assume that’s natural. I even let them come in and see the view from my window.’

  ‘And did police suggest to you that you should change your story?’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head for emphasis.

  ‘They didn’t tell you your neighbors had said something different from you?’

  She started to shake her head again, then stopped and inclined her head thoughtfully. ‘Well, the second one did say another neighbor said your sister had been in the house a while before the gunshot.’

  ‘Did he ask you to think about it some more?’

  ‘He asked me to please be sure of what I’d seen.’

  ‘Do you realize that’s an interview technique designed to plant a different version of events in your mind?’

  ‘Objection,’ David Galindo said quickly. ‘This witness hasn’t been qualified as an expert in interviewing witnesses or any psychological—’

  ‘Sustained,’ Cynthia said. ‘Don’t answer the question,’ she instructed the witness, who nodded meekly.

  That was OK, Edward hadn’t expected an answer, he’d just wanted to ask the question, to plant the idea in the jurors’ minds.

  ‘Don’t you think you would have a better memory of what happened, when your memory of the event was fresher, right after it happened, rather than months later? Well after your memory’s been tainted by hearing what other people might or might not have said?’

  ‘No. When I saw the – your sister on the porch next door I didn’t attach any significance to it. I wasn’t concentrating. It was only later, after thinking about it, that I remembered more clearly what I saw. Right after it happened I was so confused I didn’t have time to sort out what had happened.’

  ‘Did you hear anything else between Amy’s appearance on the porch and the gunshot? A scream, the sound of raised voices, anything?’

  ‘No, nothing like that.’ Ms Linnett’s shoulders widened out a little. She stopped looking attacked.

  ‘Did you ever go look out into the backyards, Ms Linnett?’

  ‘At some point I did, but not right after the shot was fired. I was still staring at the front porch.’ She was sitting very still in the witness chair.

  ‘Can you see into Paul’s backyard from inside your house?’

  ‘Part of it. There’s a privacy fence, so I can’t see it all.’

  ‘What’s behind your backyard and Paul’s? Is it someone else’s yard?’

  ‘No. There’s an alley.’ Her answers went along with her stiff posture, growing more clipped.

  Edward nodded again. ‘And do you have a gate into the alley?’

  ‘Yes. That’s
where the trash is picked up.’

  ‘Do you keep that gate locked?’

  ‘There is a lock, but I don’t have it locked half the time, because I go in and out that way to put trash in the trash cans.’

  ‘Do you know if Paul’s house has a gate into the alley?’

  ‘I assume so. The yards are all alike.’

  ‘Pass the witness,’ he said.

  ‘Ms Linnett,’ David asked quickly, ‘did you see or hear any sign of anyone else being in Paul Shilling’s house that afternoon? I’m talking about at the time you heard the gun go off.’

  ‘No sir. Nothing.’

  ‘Pass the witness.’

  Edward said quickly, ‘Are you sure about that last answer, Ms Linnett? Remember how confused you said you were right after the gunshot? In your confusion did you perhaps miss signs of someone else going into the house?’

  ‘No, I don’t think so.’

  ‘An unfamiliar car parked a few houses down, perhaps?’

  She sat up straighter. ‘No, I didn’t see anything like that. In fact, I looked a few minutes later when I thought of it, but there was nothing.’

  ‘When you first talked to my investigator you remembered seeing Amy on the porch when the gun was fired. So is it possible you saw two different women, one who went in a few minutes earlier and then Amy on the porch when the shot was fired?’

  Ms Linnett frowned at him, not in anger, in concentration. Then she shook her head. ‘No. There was only one woman. That one there.’

  ‘How can you be sure?’

  ‘I just am.’

  Edward sat looking at her, hoping the jury would sense and absorb his disbelief in what she was saying.

  Finally he asked, ‘You said the trash is picked up in the alley, so there’s room for a car to park back there?’

  ‘Yes. Of course.’