Wendy Watson’s only connection to the case is that she was Denise Atkins’s friend. Trell knows that as a prosecutor he is not required to prove motive, but he also knows that juries latch on to it when it is proved. That’s why Watson is here.
“Would you say that you were Denise Atkins’s best friend?” Trell asks.
I could object that the witness couldn’t know what was in Denise Atkins’s mind, and I’d get the objection sustained. But it would be a waste of time, and would make me look like I’m trying to prevent the jury from getting information. As a rule, I use objections sparingly.
Watson does it for me anyway. “I can’t speak for Denise,” she says, “but she was my best friend and I like to think she felt the same way.”
Trell nods. “Fair enough. But is it accurate to say you had conversations that were intimate and revealing about each other’s lives?”
“Definitely.”
“I’d like you to think about the last two or three months of Denise Atkins’s life. Was there anything unusual about her behavior? Was she acting strange or different in any way?”
“Yes, absolutely.”
“How so?”
“She seemed nervous, tense. We would make arrangements to meet, maybe for lunch or dinner, and she would cancel at the last minute. She’d say she was busy at work.”
“Where did she work?”
“Starlight. It’s a computer company; Brian was one of the founders.”
“What did she do there?”
“Some kind of technology stuff; I don’t understand any of it. But Denise was a whiz.”
“Did you ever find out what was making her so tense?” Trell asks.
She nods. “She was having an affair at work.”
“Do you know who she was having the affair with?”
“She wouldn’t say, but I think it was Gerald Wright. She did mention once that it’s not a good idea to sleep with your boss. She and Gerald were very close, and I know he was pursuing her. She had been resisting for a long time, because she and Brian were talking about trying to save their marriage.”
“Did she talk about Brian much?” Trell asks.
Watson nods. “Yes, she really cared for him, but she came to realize that their marriage was over. She worried about telling him, about how he would react.”
“Did she finally tell him?”
“Yes; she said he was very upset.”
“Angry?” Trell asks.
“She said ‘upset.’ That’s the only word she used.”
“When was the last time you spoke to her?”
“About a week before she died,” Watson said. “She was rushed, and sounded nervous. She got on the phone and said she’d call me back, but she never did.”
She pauses for a moment, getting visibly upset. “I told her I understood, and said goodbye. I didn’t realize it would be for the last time.”
Trell turns her over to me. She is a sympathetic, emotional witness who is obviously telling the truth, so I have to handle her with kid gloves.
“Ms. Watson, to the best of your knowledge, was Brian Atkins ever physically abusive toward his wife?”
“No.”
“She never told you he struck her, or was physical with her in any way?”
“No. And Denise was a strong woman; she would not have put up with that. Not for a second.”
“She never expressed a fear that he might become violent?”
“Not to me.”
“You said that she was acting tense and nervous. Do you know why that was?”
“I did not know for sure; I thought it might be that she was dreading hurting Brian by telling him there was someone else.”
“So you thought that she was nervous and acting strangely because she dreaded telling Brian that the marriage was over. After she told him, did that make her feel better? Did she begin acting more normally?”
“Maybe at first. You have to understand that she was busy at work, and I am busy as well, so I didn’t see or talk to her that often. But after a short while she definitely was acting strangely again. I never really found out why; I wish I had.”
There’s nothing more for me to get from her. I don’t think she was a particularly valuable witness for Trell, but she didn’t have to be. He’s got much more ammunition to nail us with, and it’s coming.
Sergeant Luther Mitchell and his partner were the initial responders to Gerry Wright’s house. Sarah Maurer had discovered the carnage that day and had immediately called 911. It was Mitchell and his partner who got there first, and Mitchell was the first to enter the house.
That’s why he is here today, to help Trell set the horror scene as vividly as possible, in words and photographs. He’s a huge man, very intimidating, but he and Laurie were close when she was on the force, and I’ve come to know him as a good and decent guy.
“So you responded to the 911 call?” Trell asks.
“Yes, sir.”
“Describe your actions and what you saw when you arrived, please.”
“Ms. Mauer had gone home to make the call, and when she saw us arrive, she came out to meet us. She told us that she had looked into the house, and there was blood everywhere. I requested that she stay way back, and my partner and I entered the house through the open front door.
“There was in fact blood everywhere, as Ms. Maurer had said. Farther into the house, I guess you could call it a den, were a male and a female. They were both deceased.
“We searched the house to make sure the perpetrator was not still present, and determined that he or she was not. We then left the building, so that the forensics people could arrive and do their job.”
“Did you determine how the victims died?” Trell asks.
“That is a coroner function, but it appeared to be from multiple stab wounds.”
“You say the front door was open. Was there any evidence that the lock was damaged, or that there was forced entry?”
“There was not.”
“Which might indicate that the victims knew their attacker?”
Mitchell is not about to let Trell put words in his mouth. “It simply indicated to me that there was no sign of forced entry.”
Trell then introduces photographs from the crime scene and lets Mitchell identify them. They are gruesome and horrible, and the jury recoils from them, as they should. Trell wants that reaction; he wants them to feel like someone should pay for such a horrible act. Of course, the only person handy that they can make pay for it is Brian Atkins.
There is almost nothing for me to get from Mitchell when I start a cross-examination, so I ask a few perfunctory questions and thank him for his time.
If I’m going to throw punches, I want them to have a chance of landing. Otherwise I’m just flailing around, and the jury will know it.
Next up is Janet Carlson, the only coroner in America who could moonlight as a model for Vogue if she were so inclined. Janet is beautiful, and I mean Laurie kind of beautiful, and people who don’t know her simply do not believe her day job is cutting up bodies.
But she is completely competent at what she does and is widely respected in her field. She is also an outstanding witness, and while I can try to get her to say favorable things, there’s no way I can successfully attack what she says.
After presenting her credentials to the jury, Trell asks her what the causes of death were for the two victims in this case.
“Multiple stab wounds,” she says.
“How many?”
“Seven in the case of Mr. Wright, nine in the case of Ms. Atkins.”
“Did they bleed to death?” he asks.
“Extraordinarily unlikely; each victim received stab wounds into the heart, any of which would have been sufficient to cause death.”
“So it’s fair to say that the killer continued to stab bodies that were already deceased?”
“I would agree with that,” Janet says.
“Would you say that is the sign of an enraged killer?”
<
br /> “That is not within my province,” Janet says, although Trell knows that the question was more important than the answer. The jury has heard it, and though Janet refuses to confirm Trell’s theory, it no doubt makes sense to them.
Trell takes her through a few more of the gorier details, further horrifying the jury, and then it’s left to me to try and repair the damage.
“Ms. Carlson, do you know who committed this terrible crime?” I ask.
“I do not.”
“Can you tell us how tall the killer is?”
“No.”
“Weight?”
“No.”
“Male or female?”
“No.”
“Do you know the motive?”
“No, I don’t. That has nothing to do with my work.”
“You testified that the killer stabbed numerous times, and probably continued after the victims were dead.”
“Yes.”
“In the heat of the moment, would death have been obvious?” I ask.
“I would doubt it.”
“So unless he or she stopped to feel for a pulse, or listened for a heartbeat, there would have been no way to be sure the victim was dead?”
“That is very likely, yes.”
“The jury has seen graphic pictures of the murder scene. Is it fair to say that the victims lost a great deal of blood?”
“No doubt about it.”
“Arteries were severed?”
“Yes.”
“Blood would have been spurting?”
“Definitely.”
“As we have seen, the blood was all over the room. Would some have gotten on the killer?”
“I can’t say for sure,” she says, “but it would be hard to imagine otherwise.”
“Thank you, Ms. Carlson.”
There is nothing louder than a ringing phone at four o’clock in the morning. It ricochets around the room, deafening and heart-poundingly jolting to anyone who has the misfortune to be in hearing distance. I would estimate hearing distance of a 4:00 A.M. phone call to be about twelve miles.
In the long history of middle-of-the-night phone calls, there has never been one that brought good news. It just doesn’t work that way. So I pick this one up with a mixture of dread and panic. Laurie sits up in bed, watching me, no doubt feeling the same.
Please don’t let it be about Ricky.
It isn’t; it’s Sam. “Andy, I’ve got something you need to see.”
I don’t answer him right away; instead I turn to Laurie. “It’s Sam.” She slumps back down to the bed in relief and exhales; I think it’s the first act of breathing she’s done since the phone rang.
“It’s four o’clock in the morning, Sam; you scared the shit out of us. What are you, a dairy farmer?”
“I’m sorry, but I wanted to get you before the court day started.”
“The court day hasn’t even started in Europe yet,” I say. “But never mind that; what’s going on?” Even though Sam can be a lunatic, if he’s calling me at this hour it really may be something important.
“I found something on Westman’s computer. But you need to see it.”
“Where are you?”
“At the office,” he says.
“Why aren’t you at home?”
“I’ll explain when you get here.”
“Okay. It’ll take me a little while.”
“No problem,” he says. “Bring coffee.”
When I get off the phone, I relate the conversation to Laurie. She agrees that Sam must have found something significant and wants to go with me.
“He wants me to bring coffee.”
“That’s a very good idea,” she says.
We shower and dress quickly, stop for coffee, and are at Sam’s office, which is right down the hall from mine, in an hour. He opens the door to let us in, grabs the coffee from my hand, and heads back to his computer setup on his desk.
He’s got his main desktop, and two other laptop computers off to the side. One of them looks like Joseph Westman’s, but I can’t be sure. “Come over here,” he says, and Laurie and I do so.
“Sam, you didn’t have to spend all night working on this,” I say.
“I didn’t plan to, but once I started I couldn’t stop. Sit down,” he instructs, pointing to two chairs across from the desk. This is obviously Sam’s show, so we continue following his commands.
“I’ve completely gone over Westman’s computer, starting with financial information. Fortunately, he kept records of his passwords on his computer, which is the absolute dumbest thing you can do.”
I don’t say anything, because the “dumbest thing you can do” is exactly what I do on my computer.
“That made it much easier to get around. Financially, his wife is exactly right, and the information the accountant gave her is accurate. He’s been converting assets into cash, and there is no record of where that cash is going. He could afford it; the guy was rich as hell.”
Sam continues, “He was also heavily into kiddie porn; it’s hidden everywhere. Disgusting stuff; I won’t show it to you. You can just take my word for it.”
“We will,” Laurie says.
“But that’s not all his wife was right about,” Sam says. “Come here and check this out.”
Laurie and I come around and look at what he’s pointing at. It’s on Westman’s computer, and there’s a site on the screen that at first glance looks much like the betting site that was on Bowie’s computer.
But it isn’t.
It’s a place to order drugs, prescription drugs, illegal drugs … I’m not an expert on the subject, but I can’t think of one that is not on here. “Holy shit,” I say, because the more shocked I get, the more eloquent I become.
“It’s like Amazon for illegal drugs,” Laurie says.
“Exactly,” Sam says. “And the only reason I was able to find it was because Westman left his passwords where they could easily be found.”
The implications of this are staggering, and I’ll need some time to understand them.
I’m not going to get that time soon, because Sam says, “I haven’t gotten to the important stuff yet. I could have told you about all this over the phone.”
“What else is there?” I ask, mentally forgiving Sam for the 4:00 A.M. call.
He points to the other laptop on the desk. “I typed the address of that site into this computer. It came up as an entry page needing a password. There was no hint on that entry page what the site was for. No big surprise there; they want to be careful.”
He continues, “So I used Westman’s password and got in. They haven’t shut off his account because he died; maybe they don’t even know, or maybe they just forgot.”
“They can’t tell it’s coming from a different computer?” Laurie asks.
“Technically they could, but it wouldn’t matter to them. A client like Westman could use different computers. As long as he has the password, they wouldn’t care. But I had to download a program to make it work on this computer.
“But here’s the thing,” he says, and pauses for effect. “When I tried to hack into this site, to find out everything about it from the inside, I couldn’t.”
“Why not?” I ask.
“Because it doesn’t exist, at least not in any meaningful sense.”
“You’ll need to explain that,” I say.
“It’s almost an illusion. Sort of like a front. What comes into this feeds into their real site, but they have a way to route it so that it can’t be followed. The same thing was true with Bowie’s gambling site; it’s why I couldn’t find it.”
I still have no idea what he’s talking about, and I tell him so.
“When you go on a Web site, any Web site,” he says, “the connection doesn’t go from you directly to the site. It gets routed in what would seem to you like a crazy manner … all over the country, maybe all over the world. The Internet finds the fastest route, and it’s never direct.”
He continues, �
��They have found a way to direct the routing, to choose their own route, and send it through such a bizarre and complicated pattern as to make it impossible to follow and penetrate.”
Sam can see the look of confusion on my face, so he tries harder to explain. “You know what the dark Web is?”
“No.”
“Okay, well it’s an area of the Internet that search engines don’t access, that you need special configurations to get into. Law enforcement has a very difficult time penetrating it, so lawlessness can run rampant.”
“Is that what this is?”
“No, that’s what is so remarkable. This exists out in the light … just as impenetrable, yet at the same time available to anyone they want to get to it.”
“If it’s identical to Bowie, then Petrone has to be behind it. And it fits into Winters making the drug deliveries.”
“So we know what they’re doing, and how,” Laurie says. “We just can’t prove who is behind it.”
“I still haven’t gotten to the best part yet,” Sam says, clearly gloating. “You ready?”
“Ready.”
He hunches over the non-Westman laptop. “I use this computer as a spare just for situations like this,” he says, tapping some keys. “Look at this.”
I look and see that he has opened an application called an “activity monitor.” He points to the screen. “You see that?”
“I see the screen,” I say, “but I have no idea what I’m looking at.”
“I don’t either, Sam,” says Laurie.
Sam nods and points. “Okay, that means that the computer is being used; there’s a program running.”
“So?”
“So I’m not using it. They are. My downloading the program has allowed them inside my computer. They now have complete access, and I’ll bet they have the same access to Westman and everybody else they deal with. Most people wouldn’t be able to detect it; they wouldn’t even have reason to look.”
He pauses to let all of this sink in. “They know everything about everyone they deal with. There are no secrets.”
Laurie and I ask a lot more questions, and Sam tries to make it all clear. I get the gist of it, without understanding all the technical aspects, and I certainly know enough to know that it can have a tremendous impact on our case.
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