Legal Thriller: Michael Gresham: A Courtroom Drama (Michael Gresham Legal Thriller Series Book 1) (2 page)

"Bring in the jury, we're ready to start the trial," Judge Amberlos orders the bailiff, and I swallow hard. Because I am Irish Catholic and fifty-five and still believe in such things, I pray a quick prayer for God’s pursuing grace. That’s what you do when the U.S. Government is trying to execute your client.

It is only going to get worse, and I am left hoping for that grace.

It cannot arrive too soon.

J
udge Amberlos settles
the jury in the courtroom and tells them they're now going to hear the attorneys' opening statements. He reminds them that the statements are not evidence, that they are merely commentary by the attorneys on what they believe the evidence will be. The jury is to weigh the evidence at the end of the trial against what the attorneys said in opening. Did the evidence prove what they said? The jury should pay close attention.

Bob LaGuardia goes first. He tells the jury that James Lamb broke into the home of Judge Francis Pennington Jr. and murdered his wife in cold blood. There was premeditation, there was planning, there was a carefully constructed plan of a cover-up as he wore gloves so he would leave no prints and he wore a hair net and scrubs, so there was no hair or fiber. Moreover, there was no DNA, so he knew what he was doing. Finally, he timed it so the judge was gone downtown to the federal court, where he had several years before sentenced Lamb to ten years in prison for the stabbing of a U.S. Marshal. While motive isn't a necessary element of proof, LaGuardia explains, there was motive: Lamb was in a rage at the judge over being sent to prison. Judge Amberlos has ruled that the prior conviction for the stabbing is admissible to show state of mind in the Judge Pennington murder, so LaGuardia can parade that conviction before the jury. It is done over my strong objections and, yes, my motion to suppress, which, like the one today, was also denied. The result: Lamb is an accomplished killer with a compelling motive, and he deserves to be convicted of First Degree Murder and put to death.

The look on the jury's face when I stand to address them can be reduced to one word: skepticism. They have just been turned inside-out by the government. If there was any lingering doubt about the guilt of my client, it is now vanquished with LaGuardia's opening statement. I don't want to reveal my full hand, but I take care to explain that what the jury heard about Lamb's careful planning and execution would have been the work of someone with twenty more IQ points than Lamb had. I promise them that I will produce records of his inability to pass the GED while in prison on Judge Pennington's sentence and of his IQ test of that same period. Arms are folded across chests as I talk. Body language experts would point out to me how the jury leans as far away from me as possible while I stand at the rail of the jury box and address them. But I don't need an expert to point that out; it is clear they are listening without hearing. They won't even make eye contact. James Lamb would die by their vote if they cast their ballots now. For the record, I despise the death penalty. In thirty years I have lost one client to it, and I sat in witness of the most horrifying spectacle of a human being choking to death on toxic fumes that I still have nightmares about it. If the public could witness one such violent death—even by the needle—the death penalty would become a relic pointing to the past barbarism of our time, much like the torture machines of medieval days.

Then we are off and running. LaGuardia calls Special Agent Nathan Fordyce back to the stand. Fordyce is all-FBI: a muscular man, someone who probably played meat-grinder football on a defensive line in college, and who will come across as earnest, sincere, and fair, especially in how professionally he has been investigating Lamb.

LaGuardia reviews the Lamb confession with Fordyce, the Who, What, Why, When, and Where of how the confession came into existence. Then he moves it into evidence. I make a note on my exhibit list that the jury now has it.

The confession is passed around to the jury. It is a short one. It reads:

The jury reads the confession with keen interest and makes notes as it passes among them.

Watching all this from the witness stand, Nathan Fordyce is the exemplar of fair dealing and honest police work. He neither smirks nor scowls at me when no one is looking. He is calm, cool and collected and we both know he's lying. And he is supremely confident: not only is there the confession but they also found the gun that killed the judge's wife under Lamb's mattress. Open and shut case.

LaGuardia breaks the silence once the confession has made its rounds.

"Now, Agent Fordyce, going back to the scene of the crime, I want to walk you through what you did once you arrived."

"All right."

"What time did you and Special Agent James Burns arrive at Judge Pennington's house?"

"May I look at my Activity Report?"

"Please do."

He scans over his report and then looks up.

“Our supervisor tapped us on the case at one-twenty-two that afternoon. The judge had just gone home after his morning court and his lunch and found his wife murdered."

"So your supervisor assigned you to investigate?"

"Yes, Burns and I are assigned to RHD—"

"What's RHD?"

"Robbery-Homicide Detail. That's our permanent assignment, and we were the only RHD's in the office, so we got the tap. We headed downstairs to the car pool, climbed into our vehicle, and activated our emergency lights. We ran north on Lake Shore Drive to the near north side."

"That part of Chicago people call the Gold Coast."

"Right. It's a beautiful home, and when we arrived, there were three black-and-whites pulled in the driveway. We badged the cops and went inside."

"Who did you speak to?"

"Sergeant Carmody. He told us—"

"Object," I interrupt. "Hearsay."

"It's preliminary," says Judge Amberlos. "I'll allow it."

"He told us the scene had been secured, and no one had been allowed inside since the first responders on the scene. They had talked the judge into coming outside."

"Where was the judge?"

"He was in the backseat of a black-and-white. The EMT's pulled in right after us and made sure he was okay."

"Was the judge ever a suspect?"

"No, why would he be? He was downtown in his own courtroom."

"So he was cleared?"

"Of course. So Agent Burns and I told the CSI photographer what we wanted. That was first before anyone entered the scene."

"Describe what you wanted."

"Well, the judge's wife was on her back on the floor with one leg drooped up and over the piano bench. She was wearing a thin gown of some sort and it was open down the front. Her breasts were showing. We were interested in her positioning, number one, and interested in the four bullet holes in her body—three in the chest and one between her eyebrows."

"And what about the judge’s son?”

"The judge's son was in his room in his bed. He was taking his afternoon nap as he was only a year old."

"Describe what you saw in his room."

"No mess, no fuss. Sound asleep. I touched his pulse just to be sure.

"What did you do next?"

"I went back into the family room and told the CSI where I wanted extra effort."

"Where was that?"

"I was looking for any distribution of the mother's blood inside the family room."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning put the area under special lights and try to find footprints that maybe tracked her blood away from where she was sprawled out. We might get a trace on some suspect's shoes, and I wanted to know as much about carpet print as we could find. Plus shoe size."

"What else?"

"Latent prints. Always."

"What else?"

"Well, I wanted all bullets recovered from the walls in case any rounds had passed through her body. Later I would be glad we found the spent bullets and casings because we were able to match those items with the gun we recovered from the apartment of James Lamb."

The jurors look up as one. The murder weapon? In the defendant’s possession?

"That was the gun you found during the search and seizure."

"Right. We searched his apartment on information he was dealing drugs with a federal fugitive. Once we found the marijuana we searched the rest of the apartment. We found the gun under the mattress in the only bedroom. Forensics had it matched forty-eight hours later."

It continues, each answer burying the death needle in Lamb’s arm. We stop and break for lunch and then we're off and running again. The direct examination continues for another three hours. Fordyce describes the murder scene, the bodies, the ballistics, the autopsy—everything to give the jury the twenty-thousand-foot view of the case. He uses dozens of photographs to indicate what he means by the blood, the wounds, the fatal shots—any and all gore and grief he can describe.

When he is finished, he has just described a blood bath. Which, in fact, it was.

The mother's head wound had bled profusely as part of her skull was blown away; the shots in her chest had missed her heart, and it kept beating long enough to pump blood all around her torso. Bloody footprints led all around the room—forget the special lights to find them; they were everywhere.

Finally, it comes my turn to cross-examine. It is just after four o'clock.

"Mr. Fordyce, were my client's fingerprints found on the gun you say you discovered in his apartment?"

"No."

"Were my client's fingerprints located at the Pennington residence where the murders occurred?"

"No."

"So for all we know, you could have found the gun at the scene of the crime and later planted it in James Lamb's apartment under his mattress, correct?"

"Except that's not what happened, counselor."

"That's what you say. But what proof do you have that it wasn't you moving and hiding the gun?"

"You have my word. And my fingerprints aren't on the gun."

"You were wearing gloves at the murder scene?"

"Yes."

"And you were wearing gloves at the search and seizure in my client's apartment?"

"Yes."

"So your prints wouldn't be expected to be found, would they?"

"No."

"So the absence of any prints from your fingers would be normal, correct?"

"Yes."

"By the way, you've shown the jury the confession that you say my client freely gave. Was that confession captured on video?"

"No."

"But you have video capability in the interrogation room where you obtained the confession, correct?"

"Yes."

"So. Why not video?"

"I didn't think it was necessary. Your client immediately said he did it and would sign a statement. There wasn't any issue about voluntary or not. So we wrote it up, and he signed it. It all happened in about fifteen minutes without video. It happens."

"So you're saying it's common to obtain confessions and not record them on video?"

"Very common."

"Who was in the interrogation room when my client confessed?"

"Me and my partner."

"James Burns?"

"Yes."

"Describe what was said leading up to the confession."

"I reminded Mr. Lamb that we found the gun at his place. We asked him whose gun it was. He said he bought it at pawn. We asked him where and he didn't remember."

"Describe where you were sitting."

"Lamb was at the head of the table, and Burns and I were on each side. Your client wanted a cigarette and we gave him one. There're ashtrays there. We asked him if he needed anything to drink or if he needed to use the restroom and he told us no, that he was fine. So I then said, look, you can't tell us where the gun came from, you have a prior felony conviction, and you're on parole and can't even have a gun, so we know you've violated your parole, and you're going back to prison on that alone. So why not just tell us what happened at the judge's house?"

"What did he say?"

"He takes a deep drag and blows smoke at the ceiling. Then he jerks forward in his chair and says, ‘All right. All right. So I went there, and she opened the door, and I pointed the gun at her and forced her back inside. It was the family room. I told her to sit down on the piano bench. Then I shot her. I looked in the rest of the rooms. I was looking for the judge himself.'"

"My client told you that?"

"He sure did."

"So what happened next?"

"There's a computer and printer. Burns types it up and prints it out and your guy signs. That's the sum and substance, counselor. Case closed."

"He was placed under arrest at that time?"

The witness smiles. "Well, I wasn't going to set him free."

"No, I suppose you weren't. What puzzles me is that less than three hours later the FBI Agent In Charge holds a press conference and tells the world that the Pennington case has been solved, that there's been an arrest and a confession. Why so fast to get the story out there?"

"People were scared with a killer running loose, and I guess the government wanted to tell them the case had been cracked."

"You were at the press conference?"

"Me and Burns both. Check the video, counselor."

"You must have been feeling quite proud. Was it then that you leaked the confession to the press? The reason I ask, it showed up on CNN that same night."

"I honestly don't know how that happened. It didn't come from the FBI, that much I can tell you."

"Well, who else would have had it?"

"U.S. Attorney, clerk's office—I don't know. Haven't you investigated, counselor?"

“Apart from the gun, wouldn't it be fair to say that the only connection between my client and the murders is the confession?"

"I suppose."

"You suppose?"

"Yes."

"Well, was his hair found there? Or any fiber from his clothing or apartment?"

"No."