by David Ellis
“So tell me your life story,” I say, once we’ve thoroughly covered the weather.
She smiles. “Not much of a story. More like a paragraph.”
“What kind of work did you do over at the prosecutor’s office?”
“All kinds of felonies. Whatever came into my courtroom.”
“Murder trials?”
“Sure.”
“Win?”
She tilts her head, her thumbs rising from her clasped hands. This is her way of saying yes. She probably figures if she makes a point of saying, Oh, yeah, the State always wins, I’ll freak out like this thing is a done deal. And if she says, No, I lost a lot of them, I’ll worry about the competency of my lawyers. More likely, she’s just being humble.
“Why’d you leave?”
She shrugs her shoulders. “Change of scenery.” It strikes me as a forced answer.
“Pretty nice scenery,” I say, waving my hand around the room.
“It’s a good place to work.” She doesn’t seem too interested in elaborating.
“Do you know my prosecutor?”
She smiles. “Roger Ogren? Yeah, I know him. He’s an up-and-comer. I worked with him on one case.”
“He’s good?”
She takes a moment before answering. “He’s thorough. He’s pretty good on his feet, but he’s a little tight in front of juries.”
“My apologies,” Paul Riley says as he enters the room with a broad grin, probably one better suited for lunch with a CEO than for a guy whose life hangs in the balance. Paul is in full corporate mode, a crisp white shirt with thin burgundy lines, a blue silk tie. His cuff links are gold circles with a small ruby in the center. A little flashier than the plain white shirt and navy tie he wore to my preliminary hearing. We shake hands. With a comforting pat on my shoulder and a ripple in his forehead, he asks me how I’m holding up.
We take our seats, and Paul tells me that they’ve had a chance to review the evidence. But first, he wants to know what I’ve been doing. I assure him that, pursuant to his strict orders, I have not discussed this case with anyone, especially with the press. But he goes ahead and gives me the lecture again.
This is the first time I’ve been with Paul when I wasn’t in jail or in court, and I appraise him with a new eye. He really is the classic image of the silk-stocking corporate lawyer, precise in his movements, clear in his enunciation, careful in his choice of words, and meticulous to a fault in his appearance. His hair is the color of sand, with streaks of gray on the sides, parted sharply, not a strand out of place save for one stray bang falling on his forehead to give off the spontaneous, windblown look. Though I suspect that if I touched it, it would be brittle from hair spray. A tornado couldn’t blow it awry.
In the handful of days I have spent with Paul, I have learned only a few things about the man I will ask to save my life. First, Paul knows the criminal justice system in this county inside and out. He knows all of the judges on a first-name basis; Christ, he seems to know just about every employee in the criminal courts building. He understands the politics, particularly those of a county prosecutor who is seeking higher office. He tells me that there may be moments in this ordeal where this advantage could be utilized.
Second, he is very, very bright. He is a quick learner on the facts, asks all the right questions. He is patient and intent and discerning.
Third, he is confident to a fault. He is more aware than anyone of point number two above.
And finally, he has a habit that has already found its way under my skin: He likes to ask himself questions and answer them. Would I prefer that you hadn’t spoken to the police? he asks. Yes. But do I think it’s fatal to our case? No.
Paul asks Mandy to present a summary of the evidence.
“The state’s theory,” Mandy begins, “is that you broke into the Reinardts’ house with the intent to murder Dr. Derrick Reinardt, that you shot him twice, and that you removed his body from the house.” Mandy gets out of her chair and paces behind it.
“The forced entry is easily proven from the state of things at the home, the broken glass door. The state will offer a 911 call from Rachel Reinardt, saying that someone’s attacking her husband.”
At my preliminary hearing, the prosecutor played Rachel’s 911 call. We were given a copy of the transcript from emergency dispatch. I have my own copy, which I’ve kept with me. I pull it out again as Mandy continues.
OPERATOR: 911.
CALLER: Please . . . please . . . come quick . . . he’s going to hurt me.
OPERATOR: Ma’am, where are you?
CALLER: He’s going to hurt me.
OPERATOR: Who is going to hurt you? Ma’am, where are you?
CALLER: Please . . . my husband . . . please . . . oh God.
(END OF RECORDING)
God, she tried so hard to cover for me. I imagine her, as I have so many times since that night, lying in that room. Her body trembling, her blouse torn, her face battered, her entire world shaken. No doubt the thought had crossed her mind, during the endless episodes of abuse, while she clutched the pillow or ran from her husband as he wielded the belt. No doubt she had considered the possibility of a life without him; maybe she had even fantasized of his death. But she saw the good in him, the helplessness and desperation and insecurity that drove him to the abuse. And then she did the same for me. She tried to help him, tried to reach him even then. There she lay in that room, as the brutal November wind blew through the shattered glass door, left only with her husband’s blood on the carpet, a victim of my choice, not hers. She could have been angry with me, or she could have saved herself from any risk and turned me in. God knows, there was little time for deliberation. But all she did at that point was protect me. She crawled into her living room and made this phony emergency call, like it was some unknown intruder who had attacked her husband. During the swirl that was her life coming undone, she thought of me. She covered for me. She became an unwitting accomplice, endangered herself, for me.
“Intent,” says Mandy, “will be proven by the fact that you immediately attacked Dr. Reinardt. You didn’t pursue Mrs. Reinardt, at least not in any measurable way. You didn’t steal anything. You simply shot him in cold blood and then picked him up and hauled him away.” A little blunt for my liking; Mandy is in her prosecutor’s role.
“That is what the prosecution has to prove under the law. What they don’t technically have to prove, but will usually need to prove to convince a jury, is motive. Why did you do this? The state will argue that you were having an affair with Rachel Reinardt. You killed Dr. Reinardt so you and Rachel could be together with his money.” Mandy’s eyes catch mine, then move away. She does not want to confront me on this point, at least not yet.
Mandy looks at Paul, who is seated opposite me on the long marble table. “Now,” he says to Mandy, “let’s talk about the holes in the state’s case.” I have the distinct impression at that moment that Mandy has reviewed the evidence much more thoroughly than Paul.
Mandy takes the cue, first tucking a stray hair behind her ear, a rather endearing habit of hers. “The state has not produced the gun used to kill Dr. Reinardt. They found no fingerprints at the scene. Although they have not taken any samples of your blood yet, they do not believe that they have found any blood in his house besides his own.” She begins pacing again. This is her opening statement in my defense. “Nor did they find any traces of Dr. Reinardt’s blood in your house. Nothing in your car. Nothing in the trunk of the car, which is significant because that’s where they would expect you to put the doctor to take him . . . wherever it is they think you took him. The detectives’ report says the trunk and interior were ‘impeccably clean.’ To them, of course, that means that you cleaned out the car feverishly after you got rid of the body. But in the end, all it proves is that there is absolutely no evidence that Dr. Reinardt was ever in that car.
“Another gaping hole in their case is the body.” She shrugs. “They don’t have one. They can’t even
say for certain that Dr. Reinardt is dead. The only reason they even think he was shot is that Rachel said so, and that the neighbor heard gunshots. And Dr. Reinardt’s gun is missing.
“Finally, there’s the fact that your name is signed out of your office building that night—actually, the following morning—as leaving work at three-twenty A.M. Which puts you at work at the time Dr. Reinardt disappeared.”
Yeah, I was feeling pretty good about that myself.
“Unfortunately, the prosecution has gotten hold of the building security records.”
Uh-oh.
“The building security records show that on November nineteenth, someone using a McHenry Stern building card entered the building at three-thirteen in the morning. Which McHenry Stern employee, no one knows from the card itself, because they’re not personalized cards.”
“It could have been any McHenry Stern employee,” I say.
“Well”—Mandy starts to make a face, then gives an apologetic tilt of the head—“yes, no one can say for sure who used the card. But there was only one McHenry Stern employee whose name appeared on the sign-out sheet during the early morning of November nineteenth. If someone other than you used the card, they never signed in.”
“It would be like they just came in the building and then turned around and left,” I groan.
“Exactly.”
A dumbshit, that Kalish kid is.
Mandy shrugs. “But still, Marty, all in all, it’s a pretty weak case. Besides that little piece of evidence, which is far from direct evidence of guilt, they don’t have much at all. In fact, the only other thing they have is the alleged confession.”
“Yes,” Paul agrees, “they do have that.” I turn to Paul to hear his input, but he sits silent. Apparently this was the only observation he wanted to make.
“Now,” Mandy says, “our theory of the case.”
I nod. “You want to hear my story?”
“No,” Paul jumps in. “We’ll get to that. I want to outline our possible theories.”
“Fine.”
Paul clears his throat. “The first one is, plain and simple, that you didn’t do it. They have the wrong person. With what they have now, it’s a strong argument. Now the downside, as we said, is the alleged confession. If they can convince the jury that you said you did it, then we have some explaining to do.”
“And the sign-out sheet at the building?” I ask.
Paul shrugs. “Who knows? Maybe it was you who came into the building with that card. So what? You came in to get something from work—we’ve all done that.”
“I had a big project going down. A big meeting the next day. I can prove that.”
Paul points at me. “There you go. You were working all hours that night, at home. You came back to work to get something you forgot.”
“But then I should have signed in, too,” I say, “when I first entered the building. The fact that I didn’t might suggest I was concocting an alibi.”
He waves me off. “I hate signing those things. You blew it off.”
This guy’s all right.
“The other angle they have is the romantic link. They are going to try to put you and Mrs. Reinardt together. If they succeed, they can make a good case based on motive. And that will go a long way, Marty. If a jury thinks you had good reason to want Dr. Reinardt dead, they might overlook some of the other deficiencies in the proof.
“Okay. Now. Rachel has denied that you and she were involved. She has some friends who think she was having an affair with someone, they don’t know who. The Reinardts’ maid said she had seen you at the house before. But that’s not saying much. Even Detective Cummings said that all you foundation members were at that house periodically.”
Yeah. Right. Good.
“The other potential defense theory,” Paul says, “is justification. We concede that you did forcibly enter the house and shoot Dr. Reinardt. But we argue that you are not guilty by reason of defense-of-another. The law in this state recognizes the defense-of-another as a complete justification for killing. We would argue that you reasonably feared for the immediate safety of Rachel.”
This defense comes from my comments to Paul when we discussed bail. I told him that if all I was doing was trying to save someone, how could I be a threat to society? Paul didn’t want to hear it, in part because, as he said, he didn’t want to give the prosecution a preview of our defense, and in part because I don’t think he wanted to hear my story until he knew the evidence.
“Now, we haven’t talked yet about what happened that night. But there is a good indication that Dr. Reinardt was abusing his wife. She was pretty bruised up. The police were following this lead, they had talked to some people. Maybe you were saving Rachel from the doctor. Maybe you thought he was going to kill her.”
Something stirs within me. At this moment I believe that Paul thinks I’m the killer.
“What are the holes in that theory?” I ask.
“First,” Paul starts, “Rachel Reinardt told the police that a man in a ski mask broke into the house, attacked her, and ultimately killed her husband. She didn’t say she was being attacked by her husband when you valiantly came to her rescue. If that’s what really happened, we will have to deal with the fact that she lied to the police.”
Mandy pipes in. “That could be explained. Many victims of domestic violence deny the abuse. We could argue that she was in denial.”
“True,” Paul agrees. “On the other hand, there would be the impression that she was covering for you. The state would try to tie in Rachel to some alleged conspiracy with you to kill her husband. Another flaw in this theory: Why were you there? What were you doing so close to the Reinardts’ house at ten o’clock? It would be hard to tell a jury that you just happened by their house and saw what was going on. They’re going to think you were there for a reason.” He pauses on that thought. My heartbeat does a little pause of its own. “Another problem. Dr. Reinardt was shot twice. Why shoot him a second time? You probably had removed Mrs. Reinardt from danger with the first shot. Why keep shooting?”
Paul catches the look on my face and holds up his hand. “Marty, I’m just telling you what the prosecution will say. We could argue that firing twice in a row was just a reaction. It could be consistent with defending Mrs. Reinardt.”
“And the sign-out sheet . . .”
“Well, that’s another problem. It’s one thing if you’re a perfectly innocent person, running to work to grab something. But if you did shoot the doctor, it will look like you went to work to create the alibi. It looks like you had a guilty mind.”
This is not going well. I ask if there are any other problems.
Apparently there are. “The fact that you fled. Of course, you would have been scared. Didn’t know what to do. Again, we can argue that these actions were consistent with trying to save Mrs. Reinardt’s life. But the prosecution will say it was part of your scheme with Mrs. Reinardt.
“And the final, and potentially greatest, flaw is that by admitting you killed Dr. Reinardt, you are admitting you took him from the house and disposed of his body. And no matter how great your motives were in killing him, there is no justification for kidnapping him. He was not a threat to Mrs. Reinardt once he had been shot, and maybe was already dead. And if he wasn’t already dead, you let him die.”
I close my eyes for a moment. Ideas are swirling in and out, as I try to consume everything he’s told me. A brief surge of panic comes to my throat, and I fear for a moment that I will lose my lunch on this beautiful marble table. Paul offers to get me a glass of water, but I decline. For several minutes Paul and Mandy sit silently, busying themselves with nothing, waiting for me to gather my thoughts.
“Let’s assume,” I finally say with a deep exhale, “that Rachel sticks to her story. She didn’t see the guy’s face. Let’s assume that’s the truth.” I have my attorneys’ full attention. “Assuming that, which is the stronger theory? That I didn’t do it, or that I did but I was defending Rachel?
”
Paul clears his throat. “If I had my choice”—I consider this an appropriate preface—“based on the evidence we have now, I’d say our best bet is arguing that you didn’t do it.” He looks at Mandy, who nods.
“And if I tell you I didn’t do it, how do you defend me?”
“Simple. We go hard on the alibi and point out the lack of physical evidence.”
“And that’s it.”
“More or less.”
“Tell me about the ‘more.’”
Paul leans back in his chair. “You have something in mind.”
“Yes, I do. Does this ‘simple’ case include pointing the finger at Rachel?”
Paul meets my stare. “It might.”
“That’s not acceptable.”
Paul wets his lips and clasps his hands over his folded leg. “We’ve had this conversation before, Marty. I will not accept any restrictions on my defense of you. I have no idea at this moment what our investigation will turn up. I will tell you this: As of this moment, having done very little investigation, there is clearly some reason to believe that Mrs. Reinardt is implicated in this. The police were certainly looking at her. If I have to point the finger at her, I will do it in a heartbeat. As long as it doesn’t hurt you.”
Fair enough. I get up from my chair, my legs wobbly, and wander to the window. It’s windy today, the lake is kicking the buoys up and down in the water. I sit on the short bookcase against the window.
“Maybe you should be less worried about Mrs. Reinardt,” I hear Paul say, “and more worried about yourself.”
A defense attorney’s worst enemy is his client. I vividly remember these words from Professor Tice in my criminal procedure course in law school. Most defendants are guilty of the crimes of which they’re accused, and many are unwilling to admit as much even to their own lawyer. And at least in theory, defense attorneys aren’t supposed to let their clients perjure themselves; if the lawyer knows the client did it, he can’t let him take the stand and say he didn’t. So lawyers don’t want to hear their clients confess, and the clients are even less willing. As a result, defendants will often fail to tell attorneys things they need to know to prepare a proper defense.
