Dying Declaration (36 page)

60

AFTER THE BREAK,
the Barracuda decided to end the day’s testimony with the one piece of evidence that could not be cross-examined by Charles Arnold.

“Both sides have stipulated that this prayer journal of Theresa Hammond is authentic and admissible,” the Barracuda announced.
“I’d like to introduce it into evidence and read excerpts from the two entries critical to this case.”

“Any objection?” Silverman looked at Charles.

“No, Your Honor,” Charles replied, trying to look uninterested.

“Okay,” Crawford said. She walked to the front of the jury box. “The journal does not contain entries for every day. But there are two entries that fall into the time frame of Joshua’s illness. The first is dated June 1, two days before Joshua died.”

There was stillness in the jury box as they anticipated the thoughts and prayers of a mother who had watched her baby die. The Barracuda must have sensed it too and took her time finding the page.

“Here’s the entry: I have never seen Joshie so sick. God, why are You punishing him? I have prayed, Thomas has prayed, and Tiger and Stinky have offered the innocent prayers of children. Why won’t You heal him, God? Why does the temperature just increase, his pain just get worse? What could he possibly have done to deserve this? What have I done? God, I can’t hold out much longer. Please heal him and don’t let him die. I will dedicate him to Your service forever.’”

Crawford looked at the quizzical faces of the jurors. The entry seemed to hurt the prosecution’s case. It seemed to present Theresa in a sympathetic light—the suffering mother. But the Barracuda was not done.

“The next day, June 2, the day before Joshua was taken to the hospital, the entry reads as follows: ‘Josh was burning up all night and so sick this morning that he became almost lifeless. God, I fear that if I don’t get him immediate help, he will die. But I have spent hours in prayer, by myself and with Thomas and Reverend Beckham. I will trust You, God, and You alone,
for healing. I will not trust man or seek man’s medical help. Though You slay him, God, I will trust You. Today You have given me the spiritual strength to see this through to the end, whatever that might be.’”

As the Barracuda finished reading the journal, Thomas Hammond stared stoically ahead with his hands folded on the table in front of him, just as Nikki had told him to do. Next to him, Theresa stared at Crawford, tears rolling silently down her cheeks.

The Barracuda closed the journal and cleared her throat. “That entry was made at 10:00 a.m. on the fifth day. For more than thirty-six hours, Mrs. Hammond refused to seek medical help for her deathly sick son—”

“Objection,” Charles said. “I stipulated she could read the diary, not give a speech.”

“Sustained,” Silverman said.

The Barracuda looked each of the jurors in the eye, then tucked the beloved journal under her arm and returned to her seat.
“I’d like to introduce this as our next exhibit,” she said.

“No objection,” Charles said. He tried to sound unconcerned. Yet he couldn’t help but notice a few of the mothers on the jury glaring at Theresa Hammond.

61

AFTER THE FIRST DAY OF TESTIMONY,
Charles, Nikki, Thomas, and Theresa huddled in the same small, windowless conference room that they had used for the preliminary hearing. The deputy sheriff s had given Thomas an extra half hour before he would be returned to the general inmate population. Charles noticed that Theresa had not said a word in the last five minutes. Her hollow eyes stared lifelessly ahead, reflecting a wound that might never heal. Nikki was busy giving the team a pep talk and singing Charles’s praises, much to his great embarrassment.

Thomas seemed to be only half-listening to Nikki and took advantage of the first pregnant pause in her speech to ask Charles a question.

“Give me a straight answer—no fluff—how’d we do today?”

“We had a great day,” Nikki continued, pacing the room. “The opening statement was perfect, and the cross-examination of Armistead was a home run. It doesn’t get any better than this.”

“Do you agree?” Thomas looked at Charles, putting the question straight to him.

“We had a good day,” Charles said in measured tones. “Armistead came across as duplicitous—” Thomas gave Charles a quizzical look—“as someone who wasn’t telling the whole truth. But to find for us, the jury will have to believe that Joshua would have survived if he had been transferred to Norfolk Children’s. On that count, our evidence is pretty speculative.”

Thomas nodded his head, taking it all in. He seemed to appreciate the bluntness of Charles’s assessment.

Nikki’s face turned serious, and she took a seat next to Charles, across from Thomas. “The prayer journal really hurt us,” Nikki said somberly. “The reverend was immaterial. No great shakes for either side. But with that journal, the jury now has sufficient evidence to find Theresa guilty of knowing that Joshua was dying, though they don’t have the same level of evidence with respect to you.”

“That’s insane!” Thomas said, his first visible reaction since the trial started. “I was the one telling Theres that we
couldn’t
go to the doctor. She wanted to go on day one.”

Thomas placed his hand on top of Theresa’s. She blinked slowly and looked down at the table while Thomas stared at—through—Charles.
“I’ve got to testify. I won’t allow anyone to place this blame on Theres.”

“Nobody’s placing this blame on Theresa,” Charles said firmly. “And you’re not testifying. Calling you to the stand and subjecting you to cross-examination would be suicide.”

The big man heaved a disgruntled sigh and shifted in his chair. The look on his face worried Charles.

“Listen, Thomas, if anybody had told me a few weeks ago that after the first day of trial we would have the prosecution’s main witness, their
only
witness really, admitting on the stand that he was a liar, I would’ve said that’s too good to be true. But that’s what happened. We’re in the driver’s seat. Let’s not do anything rash to mess that up.”

“I just don’t want Theres taking the fall,” Thomas said. “I want you to put me on the stand if that’s gonna happen.”

“She’s not taking the fall,” Nikki said. “There won’t be any fall to take.”

Thomas turned to Charles. “You agree?”

Charles hesitated; there were no guarantees in jury trials. “Having you take the stand is not the answer.”

There was a knock on the door from the deputy sheriff. “Just a minute,” Charles called. He turned to Thomas and Theresa, blowing out a deep breath while he rubbed his forehead. “We’ve got to call Tiger as a witness tomorrow. He’s going to have to recant his videotaped statement about Joshua being sick for five or six days.”

“We can’t put him through that.” Theresa sounded desperate. “There’s got to be another way.”

“I wish there were,” Charles answered calmly. “But there isn’t.”

Another knock on the door. “It’s time,” the deputy called.

“We’re coming!” Nikki yelled. “Give us a break.”

Thomas stood and stared down at Charles. “I need to talk to Tiger for a few minutes before court,” he said. “Can you arrange for us to meet him here a few minutes early?”

“I’ll try,” Charles said.

Thomas then glanced nervously at Nikki and Theresa, before turning back to Charles. “Can I ask you somethin’ alone?”

Charles looked at Nikki. “Can you buy us a minute with the guard?”

Nikki let out a quick puff of air, as if insulted that Charles would even ask such an obvious question. “He’s a man, isn’t he?”

Another knock, this one louder than before.

After Thomas and Theresa hugged, the women left the conference room. Nikki started in on the deputy even before she had closed the door behind her. When the men were alone, Thomas sat down heavily and stared at folded hands.

“My faith kilt him, didn’t it, Rev? Or maybe I should say my lack of faith.”

Charles thought for a moment about the question—had been thinking about it dozens of times since taking this case. “No,” he said, shaking his head slowly. “I think you had plenty of faith, Thomas.” Charles hesitated, wondering whether the big man could handle what Charles really thought. “This isn’t about faith. It’s about love. Scripture says that when all the smoke has cleared, three things will remain—faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.”

At this, the eyes of Thomas rose slowly until they locked on Charles. They were deep pools of sadness, reflecting a bitter loss compounded by Thomas’s unyielding guilt. An overwhelming sense of sympathy almost prevented Charles from saying these next words. But sometimes, Charles knew, the most necessary truths were also the most painful ones.

“I’m no expert,” Charles said quietly, “because I’ve got no kids of my own. But it seems to me that being a dad is not as much about faith as it is about love. Next time, let your heart tell you what to do.”

Thomas nodded, but before he could respond, the deputy knocked on the door and entered without waiting for a response. Nikki was right on his heels, complaining loudly.

“No more favors for you guys,” the deputy said. “I give you an inch and you take a mile.”

On the way back to the office, Charles stopped at a FedEx place and removed the letter to Senator Crafton from his briefcase. He knew time was running short.

He was so emotionally sapped from the long day in court that he didn’t have the energy to even think about what he had to do. Besides, he had prayed about it and thought about it practically nonstop for the last seven days. He had carried the letter with him everywhere he went. He had to get this behind him.

He could convince himself one way before he went to bed at night and change his mind the next morning. He had never felt so torn.

He scribbled a note on the bottom of the letter:
This is the only copy of this information I have sent. Call me.
He wrote out his cell phone number just to be sure. He addressed the overnight package, paid the cashier, and tried to put it out of his mind.

Charles prayed he had done the right thing.

He drove away from the FedEx office feeling despondent. The images from the dream still haunted him—rows and rows of graves, Denita’s loud and mocking laugh so vivid he could hear it ringing in his ears. He needed to stop thinking about it and get back to the case. There was so much to do. And the fates of the Hammond family, including little Tiger and Stinky, hung in the balance. He needed to get Denita out of his mind for now, process these emotions later—but how could he?

He picked up his cell phone and dialed Nikki. “What time can you make it to the war room?”

“I’ve got to pick up the kids and take them to Theresa’s. It’ll probably be at least eight.”

“Plan on staying late. We’ve got jury instructions to get ready . . . a closing argument to prepare.”

“I’ll just let the kids stay with Theresa tonight,” Nikki said. “That way we can work as late as we need to. One night won’t matter.”

Charles had a bad feeling about leaving the kids with their mother but didn’t want to say anything that might disrupt the tenuous relationship he had established with his volatile partner. “See you at eight.”

“See you at eight, handsome.”

The phone went dead, and Charles grinned. He loved it when she called him that.

At precisely eight, the deputy commonwealth’s attorney’s office phone rang. She had already been to the gym and worked off her frustrations with Brandon. Armistead had bombed today, and she would never forgive him.

She let it ring three times. She had a lot to do. She thought about just letting it go. They could always leave a message.

Curiosity won out. “Hello.”

“Ms. Crawford?”

“Yes.”

“This is Frank Morris, deputy sheriff at the jail. Sorry to call so late.”

“I’m pretty busy here. What’s up?”

“You’re the prosecutor trying that case against the parents who let their kid die, aren’t you?”

“Yes.” He now had her attention.

“Then I’ve got somebody you need to talk to, and you need to talk to him right away.”

“Go on.”

“His name is Buster Jackson, the cellmate of the kid’s father, Thomas Hammond. Jackson says he’s got some information that’ll help you. He wants to make a deal. Wants to talk to you without his attorney present.”

“Interesting,” the Barracuda said. “Buster Jackson. I think I know this guy. Can you bring him over right away . . . without Hammond knowing what’s happening?”

“Sure,” the deputy sheriff said. “I’ll see you in twenty minutes.”