Beyond Obsession (42 page)

“For twenty-five years?”

“That number just came out.”

“You still say you had no part in the murder?”

“Yes.”

“Why did Dennis lie?”

“Obviously, he was in jail and he said he didn't want me to be with other men. That was one of his motives. He told me that one night. He didn't want me with anyone else. That was it.”

“You betrayed him?”

“Yes.”

“Did you use him?”

“Yes.”

“Did you use him to get rid of your mother?”

“No.”

Despite what appeared a damaging cross-examination of Karin, Thomas was still faced with somehow dealing with the impact of the total defense and the portrait that emerged of Karin as the victim. What did he do? Did he summon rebuttal witnesses, if he could find any, to restore some of the sheen to Joyce Aparo's tarnished image, to turn her back into the victim? He did not. Did he call those missing witnesses Christopher Wheatley and Kira Lintner to put the focus back on the crime itself and on Karin as the instigator and the collaborator? He did not. Did he call Shannon Dubois's parents or Dennis Coleman's parents to corroborate at least part of their children's testimony? He did not. Did he call Alex Markov to tell whatever he knew or whatever he was willing to tell, or even Albert Markov? He did not. Did he call others who had what might have been pivotal knowledge of Karin's role? He did not.

He did try, though, to refocus the case on the murder and on Karin. To do so, he called two rebuttal witnesses. One was Ann Marie Murray, the partner in Athena, to testify to her walk with Karin on the morning after the murder during which Karin told her how much insurance and how large an estate Joyce had, thus refuting Karin's claim that she had no knowledge of either.

The other was Jill Smith, with whom Karin lived for a few months in the winter after the murder. She was in court to relate how that winter she had driven Karin back and forth between her home and Santos's office and how during those rides she and Karin talked about the case. In one of those conversations they discussed the phone calls between Dennis in Glastonbury and Karin in Rowayton the night of the murder, of how upset Dennis was that Karin was not at home and, according to Karin, he told her he was going to kill Joyce.

“Then you knew he was going to kill your mother,” Jill Smith said.

“Yes,” Karin answered, “but I really didn't think he was going to do it, because he had told me before that he would and he didn't.”

On another ride they talked about the poisoned sandwich, and according to Smith, Karin told her she had emptied a bottle of sleeping pills into the relish. “Karin,” she said, “you could have killed your mother with that act.”

And Karin said, “I know. I know.”

Hubert Santos had a good time with Jill Smith on cross-examination. “While Karin was in your house,” he asked, “did you have someone come in and try to get rid of the evil spirits that Karin was generating?”

“No.”

“Do you belong to a charismatic church?”

Thomas objected, Corrigan sustained, so the witness did not have to answer.

“Was there another woman staying there?”

“Yes. Shirley stayed there briefly.”

“Did you tell Karin that Shirley had supernatural powers?”

“No.”

“Did you tell Karin that Shirley was going to perform a service to rid the house of the evil spirits that Karin was generating?”

“No.”

“Did you have prayer services in your house?”

“Yes. We prayed for you.”

“You prayed for me?”

“Yes.”

It had its effect. Santos smiled in bemusement, and the courtroom erupted with laughter.

33

A trial is a secular ritual, its forms codified, its manners precisely dictated. It passes from the reading of the indictment through the selection of the jury to the presentation of the evidence and the rebuttal of that evidence. It proceeds then to the closing arguments and the judge's charge and at last to the jury's deliberation and verdict. We had come to that moment when prosecutor and defense counsel, reaching for all their oratorical and legal skills, attempt to sway and convince the jury, those ultimate judges of the facts, and so carry the day.

Jim Thomas had the first word and the last, as the ritual prescribes. “It is not my job,” he began, “to convince you but to lay out the evidence for you. My opinion doesn't make any difference. It's not proper for counsel to state his opinions on what the evidence means. That's for you.”

The issues of this case, he said, were very limited. “Who's telling the truth?” Dennis Coleman, Shannon Dubois and the other witnesses for the state, or the defendant? Who has the most to gain? Does Dennis Coleman really have an interest in the outcome? Does he have something to gain? Perhaps he feels used and betrayed. Perhaps he feels anger. But did he really waver until cross-examination? Perhaps there were things he couldn't remember. But three years have gone by since the event.

“But the case does not rest on your assessment of him alone. There is all the other evidence and all the other testimony. There is Shannon Dubois. Why did she take the stand? Would she perjure herself against her best friend? Was there any motive for her to come in here and testify? The only way she could get into trouble was to perjure herself. It is the same problem we all face. Her best friend told her she was involved and would return the next morning and clean up. What kind of a burden is that to put on a sixteen-year-old?

“The defendant was not obliged to take the stand. But she did, and look at what she said about all the letters and about Dennis Coleman's testimony. Does it ring true? What was her response to the questions about the crucial papers, about all the letters? ‘I don't know, I don't recall, I don't remember.' Does that ring true? Her case rests on two things. ‘I wasn't involved, it was just fantasies, and the reason I may have fantasized was because my mother abused me. I didn't do it, and anything you may think I did wrong was because of what my mother did to me.'”

The mother. “Joyce Aparo,” Thomas said, “is not the issue in this case. Am I going to stand here and say Karin was not abused? No. But to what degree was she abused? Sure, some of the stimuli on Karin was [
sic
] not good. You shouldn't do to a child what was done to her. You shouldn't tear a child down constantly. Part of the picture is what she did in response to her mother. I submit that her explanation is not so. The psychiatrists explained her actions after the murder. But ask yourselves how impartial were the psychiatrists? Everything they said was based on what she told them. There is a flaw in the posttraumatic stress syndrome diagnosis, and Dr. Cigalis brought it out. Her conduct was consistent with someone who was involved in a murder. And does the testimony of the psychiatrists really count for anything? To accept it, you have to reject Dennis Coleman and Shannon Dubois and all the letters and all the rest.

“She manipulated and used Dennis Coleman and then wasn't quite sure what to do with Dennis Coleman, to keep him on the hook or to turn him in. She decided to make a preemptive strike and go to the police. Dennis said she used him. Others said she used him and others. She wanted the police to misrepresent where she found the letter. She lied to Dennis, and she lied to Shannon about that. If you believe the evidence, you will see that the defendant played on Dennis's emotions like she played on the violin.

“This is a sad and tragic case. The woman who was murdered loved her life. She had her problems. She was pleading for help. Look at those letters to Archbishop Whealon. But she loved her life.

“Dennis Coleman gave up a life of promise. Should you feel sorry for Joyce Aparo and for Dennis? Yes. Should you feel sorry for Karin? Yes. And I do. I wish there was something we could do for her, and for Dennis. If only someone that night had slapped him, and the others, on the side of the head.

“But they were talking murder, and not stealing apples. Though we feel sorry for the defendant, the law must apply. Abuse does not excuse what Dennis did or what she did. It may explain it and mitigate it, but it doesn't excuse it. It has no place in this case. Abuse does not impact on your decision. What we all feel in here does not matter. The evidence is what matters. Decide this case on the basis of the evidence.”

In substance, it was probably an effective argument. But Thomas is not a ringing orator. He spoke dryly and with not much emotion, and perhaps that substance was lost.

Not so Hubert Santos. He pulled out all the stops, played on all the emotions.

“Yes,” he said, “there was a conspiracy that ended when Joyce Aparo was murdered. It was a conspiracy between Dennis Coleman, Christopher Wheatley and Kira Lintner. Karin was not part of it. And anything that happened after the murder is not evidence of Karin's part in a conspiracy. The same is true of the count that she was an accessory. Once the murder was over, she could not be an accessory afterwards. What happened afterwards is not substantive proof. Karin testified that she was guilty of hindering prosecution. But that was after the murder.

“Think that after you reach your verdict, when you go home and go to sleep, can you be comfortable with what you did? Better that ten guilty persons go free than that one innocent person be convicted. Everyone makes mistakes. Juries make mistakes. They are human beings. There must be proof beyond a reasonable doubt. We are talking here about liberty, not about an accident case.

“Dennis Coleman is a troubled young man, seriously mentally ill. He sat here for twenty hours and described in detail how he killed Joyce Aparo as calmly as going to McDonald's and ordering a Big Mac. He was as cold as ice. We said lots about Joyce Aparo, but we never said she deserved to die. Dennis Coleman was not a farmhand hired to do this. He has an IQ of one hundred thirty-seven. Dennis Coleman was prepped to be a witness. Dennis Coleman was charged with murder. The same crime Karin is charged with. He faced a twenty-five-year minimum mandatory sentence, a sentence that cannot be overturned or reduced or suspended by a judge no matter how he feels. And Dennis Coleman knew that. And the maximum sentence in this state for murder is sixty years and twenty years for conspiracy, so Dennis Coleman faced in essence twenty-five to eighty years. He asked himself, ‘How do I get out of this jam?' Let's make a deal. Shannon Dubois and Christopher Wheatley and Kira Lintner had already made deals, so who was left to give them to make a deal? The only person who never tried to make a deal. Karin. So Dennis had to make a deal, and he did, and the state recommended that he get forty-two years. But Dennis didn't like that deal. He wanted to sweeten it up. So he starts to say, ‘I was mentally ill,' and so he ends up with thirty-four years, only nine years above the minimum mandatory sentence.

“Do you want to believe that kind of witness beyond a reasonable doubt? He's got everything to gain now. There's the board of pardons. It's the oldest game in the book. He's going to the board of pardons in four years, and it has the power to reduce a sentence. He's going to try to get them to do it. He's going to show them a piece of paper with Karin's conviction, and he's going to say Karin made him do it. ‘I was a sex slave and she made me, she begged me to do it, and now she's convicted. The jury bought my story. She begged me, and she made me.' Is that the kind of witness you want to believe beyond a reasonable doubt?

“Dennis was manipulated, yes. But not by Karin. By Joyce Aparo into her own murder. She took him out to dinner, to the movies, shopping, in July while Karin was in Rowayton. What do you think he and Joyce talked about? Only Joyce Aparo and Dennis Coleman know what was said between them, and one is dead and the other is trying to get out of prison. But we may be sure they talked about a thing they had in common. Karin. And Joyce said, Karin is so happy; she's seeing Alex Markov. She's going to Rowayton. Her violin is getting better. She's so happy. She did a head game on this young man. We know what this woman was capable of.”

In ringing, melodramatic tones and phrases Santos recapitulated the events of the spring and summer of 1987, when Dennis's “life was falling apart. He had a terrific job and he loses it. By June he's a short-order cook at a country club. His life is falling apart. And at the end of May Karin tells him they should halt their relationship for a month, ‘and I'm in love with Alex Markov,' and she's spending more time with Alex Markov in Rowayton. On June twenty-sixth, the anniversary of their first date, Joyce has an accident and Alex Markov drives Karin to the hospital and he drives her back to the condo and Dennis comes over and Alex is there, in the shower, and he's going to spend the night. His anger is building up.

“On July fourth Karin tells Dennis that she's had sex with Alex Markov, and from July seventh to July fourteenth she goes to Woodstock with Alex Markov. Dennis is frantic. He wasn't sleeping; he wasn't eating; he's walking around like a zombie. And he learns that Joyce is promoting Alex Markov and Karin, and his anger is uncontrollable. On July twenty-eighth Karin tells Dennis what if she had more sex with Alex, and he explodes and says, if it's true, he'll drive off the road and kill them both. That's why she wrote in her diary that he was suicidal. And two days later he's crying and begging outside her window for her not to go to Binghamton. He was beyond obsession.

“But she goes to Binghamton. And on August fourth he goes into the house, and he sees pictures of Alex Markov on her dresser, and he opens her drawer and pulls out her diary, and he reads of all the occasions she had sex with Alex Markov. That's when he wrote the ‘I will “do the deed”' note. He's frantic and hysterical, a zombie at that point.

“On August fourth, eight hours before the murder, he calls Karin and he hears her breathing heavily and he hears Alex Markov in the background and he assumes he's interrupted sex. Eight hours later he murders Joyce Aparo. And what does he do that evening? He goes to look for beer and he goes to Kira Lintner's house and they sit around and drink beer and watch horror movies, they watch
Friday the 13th
, with its scenes of teenage sex and the murderer who kills all the kids and who turns out to be a mother. And then he decides to do the murder, and he goes out and buys the panty hose and the black stuff and everything else. Did Karin tell him to do these things? Poppycock.