The Bomb Maker's Son (29 page)

“That’s correct. Enhancement technology in the nineteen seventies wasn’t what it is now.”

“So the FBI wasn’t even sure that it was Rachel O’Brien calling?”

“That’s right. We believe the caller was using a pay phone on a busy street.” He looks at the jury. “For those of you too young to remember a pay phone, it was a telephone in a glass booth that you put coins in to make a call. Usually a very grimy glass booth.”

Like a safety valve on a pressure cooker, the laughter releases much of the pent-up tension in the room. That’s too bad—I wanted to keep the room on edge.

“But it sounded like O’Brien to me,” he adds.

“Were you sure it was Charles Sedgwick who answered?”

“Yes, it was clear enough from the timbre of his voice, though it was sometimes unclear what he was saying.”

“You say you concluded that the second man on the tape was Ian Holzner because Charles Sedgwick said something about ‘Ian taking care of it’?”

“That’s not my testimony. Sedgwick made that statement, but I concluded that it was Holzner because Sedgwick seemed to call the other man
Ian
.”

“You just said
seemed to.
”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’re not a hundred percent sure.”

“No.”

“Was there static on the tape?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Hissing sounds?”

“As I recall.”

“And you said traffic noise?”

“Yes sir.”

“And not only was the tape garbled, and there was traffic noise, but you said that Sedgwick apparently covered the phone with his hand when talking to this second man?”

“That’s correct.”

“But despite the garbled tape and the muffled receiver and the traffic noise, you still believe the second man in the room was Ian Holzner?”

He crosses his arms and sits back in his chair to convey finality. “Yes, I do.”

I’m about to pass the witness when Lovely hands me a note, suggesting a question I don’t know the answer to, that ultimate risk on cross. Holzner’s core meltdown forces me to take the risk.

“Was this tape recording used in Rachel O’Brien’s trial?”

“Not that I recall.”

“You don’t recall or the recording wasn’t used.”

“It wasn’t used.”

“Why not?”

“Objection,” Reddick says. “It calls for the witness to speculate about the reasons the attorneys—”

“Overruled,” the judge says.

“Do you know why the recording wasn’t used at the O’Brien trial, Agent Roudebusch?” I ask.

“Yes. Ralph Hilton and I had a disagreement about who was speaking on the tape.”

“Which was?”

“He didn’t think the other man was Ian Holzner. And . . .”

“And what, sir?”

“He didn’t believe the woman caller was Rachel O’Brien.”

“You and he agreed on Charles Sedgwick?”

“Yes, counselor. We agreed on that.”

“Do you know if Ralph Hilton is still alive?”

“Yes, sir. Ralph Hilton is retired and living in the Portland area with his daughter.”

“Oregon or Maine?”

“Oregon. His daughter and son-in-law own a vineyard.”

“Ralph Hilton isn’t on the government’s witness list, is he?”

“It’s my understanding that he’s not.”

“I have no further questions,” I say.

Roudebusch climbs down from the stand and leaves the courtroom. Once the jury is excused, I say, “The defense has a motion, Your Honor.”

“The motion is granted,” the judge says. “How many days do you need, Mr. Stern? And keep your seat, Ms. Reddick.”

“Given the travel, three days, Your Honor.”

“Okay, Mr. Stern. You have three days to interview Ralph Hilton and Charles Sedgwick. For good cause shown, the motion to continue the trial is granted. Marshal, notify the jurors that they get a few days off.”

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

After rising in the ranks of the FBI and being promoted to headquarters in Washington, DC, former FBI Agent Ralph Hilton retired in the late 1980s and then publicly condemned a number of FBI practices that supposedly had been discontinued in the 1960s, including “black-bag operations”—breaking into and entering onto private property without a warrant, declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1972. Hilton claimed that the practice had continued under the Reagan administration, an allegation that was never proven. For years after, he served as a private consultant and taught classes on government and criminal justice at Pomona College, east of Los Angeles. He currently resides in Portland, Oregon.

It’s December, rainy season—the locals say it’s always rainy season—and while it’s hardly pouring, there’s a steady drizzle that has the streets slick. Fortunately, Hilton doesn’t live far from the airport. I drive up a hill to Portland Northeast, an evolving neighborhood where the working class is being pushed out by an urban-professional gentry—rising stars at Intel and Nike—who are renovating the stately Cape Cod-style homes. The rain picks up, and worse, the intersections in Hilton’s neighborhood don’t have stop signs, so I have to move at a crawl.

Hilton lives in a small, two-bedroom A-frame that must have been built in the 1920s. He answers the door, and when he sees me, he grunts. It’s not a cold call—he agreed to meet with me—but he repeats exactly what he told me on the phone. “I can’t help you. I don’t want to help you. Your client is guilty.”

In his seventies, he’s a tall, elegant man with ashen hair, an ashen complexion, and an ashen disposition. When I reiterate that I’d like to speak with him, he invites me in and offers me tea. The house is immaculate. Books and magazines are neatly organized in a large bookcase that occupies an entire wall. There are family pictures on the mantle—Hilton with a wife, daughter, and son at various ages, and then in later years, Hilton with a daughter, grandchildren, and no wife. There are also official documents—diplomas from the University of Arizona and Vanderbilt Law School and a picture of Hilton shaking hands with President Lyndon B. Johnson.

He goes to the kitchen and minutes later returns with two mugs of tea. As soon as I take my first sip, he says, “Stay and drink as long as you want. But let’s keep the conversation short. It’s true Elie Roudebusch and I disagree about whose voices were on that tape. I don’t think O’Brien or Holzner were part of that conversation. But that doesn’t help you. Because whoever was on that tape wanted to
prevent
the bombing, as I interpreted it. They were frightened, not brazen, not calculated. I think Holzner and O’Brien did exactly what they were charged with, and these fellow travelers got scared but couldn’t prevent it.”

“What about Charles Sedgwick?”

“Oh, Chicken Charlie was definitely on that tape. That’s one of the injustices of this whole sorry saga. In my opinion Sedgwick wanted to prevent the bombing and is the only one who spent his life in prison. Whether Holzner has the lethal poison injected into his veins or not, he’s escaped justice. I’m sorry to say that, because I know he’s more than a client, though he obviously wasn’t father of the year.”

“But he is my father,” I say almost without volition. “And he was a terrific father to his other children.”

“And you want to save his life. I can understand that. Apologies for my bluntness, which some call callousness. It’s who I am.”

“If you’re so vehement, why hasn’t the US Attorney called you as a witness?”

He straightens his long legs and crosses them at the ankle, wincing from what’s probably an arthritic knee or hip. “I don’t like what the Bureau did back then. I hated what happened to Jerry Holzner. It’s a black mark on this country that should be prominently featured in history books but that’s been buried in the slag of time and deceit. I don’t like practices that continue to this day. I don’t agree with Elias about what’s on that tape—he was a good, honest cop, by the way, just mellower than I am—and that would make for conflict. I’ve always thought O’Brien might’ve been the moving force behind the group. Holzner was more charismatic, a good front man, but I heard a lot of those tapes. O’Brien was soulless, if you ask me. Holzner was conflicted. His megalomania came from ego, a young person’s reaction to adoring followers. O’Brien’s megalomania was sociopathic.”

I ask for some examples.

“Holzner had a love for his family, especially his father and brother. Jerry was older in years but acted more like the younger brother, always trying to emulate Ian. But Ian kept him away.”

“Could Jerry have—?”

“Been involved in the bombing? Who knows? As I said, he wanted to be like his brother.”

“You said O’Brien was different?”

“No soul. She cut her family off at the knees. She’d mock their liberalism, their upper-middle-class values. On one recording, she calmly proclaimed that she’d kill her parents herself if it would advance the cause of the revolution. It wasn’t hyperbole, in my opinion. Which, along with the different speech patterns, is why I do not believe the woman on the tape is O’Brien. That woman was scared. Rachel O’Brien didn’t know fear.”

“And yet she wasn’t convicted of the Playa Delta murders.”

“She was a wonderful actress and had that son of a bitch Moses Dworsky as a lawyer. He was as brilliant as he was despicable.”

“Dworsky was just doing his job.”

“He was not just doing his job. He’s a true believer and that’s dangerous in an attorney.”

“Is it? I think passion—”

“Are you a true believer, Mr. Stern? I’m not talking about the facts of a particular case. Do you believe in something so strongly that it colors every move you make in a courtroom in every case?”

Though I don’t say it to Hilton, my answer is no. The most effective lawyers are anything but true believers. You have to be malleable to take a side that you disagree with, have to let go of firmly held beliefs, even have to make odious arguments, all based on the premise that a democratic system of justice requires it. You can’t be the kind of true believer that Ralph Hilton is describing.

“Do you know that he’s my private investigator?”

“Of course. I’m following this trial closely, hoping justice will finally prevail. I don’t know how you got under the covers with that man.”

“He’s changed his political views after 9/11. He voted Republican.”

He lifts his teacup with one hand and gives a scoffing wave with the other. “There’s an adage about leopards and spots, Mr. Stern. I’d advise you to look it up. But never mind all that. Since Dworsky is working for you, why don’t you have a copy of the tape recording in question?”

For a moment I mistake the confusion in his voice and his slightly slack jaw for nascent senility until I see the intense clarity in his eyes. He’s a man who enjoys games and secrets.

“Why would Dworsky have a copy of that recording, Mr. Hilton?”

“He was given a copy of the tape for the O’Brien trial.”

Upon learning this information, I thank him and end the interview. As soon as he shuts the door behind me, I take out my cell phone and punch in Moses Dworsky’s number. It’s raining hard now. I open my umbrella and make a dash for my rental car, a fire-engine-red Mazda 6 that shines through the gloom, but my clothes are wet before I get inside. The call rolls over to Dworsky’s voice mail after one ring, meaning that the phone is off. Still, after I leave a message for him to call me right away, I retry his number twice more and then send him a text, though he’s such a Luddite that I doubt he even knows about text messaging.

I try the office and reach Eleanor Dworsky. “What do you mean, where is he? He’s away on business for you.”

“What business?”

“How the hell would I know? You would know, not me.” She promises to have Moses call me if she hears from him and hangs up before I can say, “Thank you.”

Then I call Lovely Diamond. Her phone, too, immediately rolls over to voice mail. Again, I leave multiple messages.

I sit at the curb in the rental car. The rain pounds on the metallic roof, the sound like corn kernels popping in a microwave. I can’t fathom Moses Dworsky’s objective. He’s helped our case by locating background witnesses, setting up the meeting with Charles Sedgwick, and providing an office and staff (if you can call Eleanor
staf
f
). And yet, intentionally or not, he cost us the chance to win the motion to exclude evidence because the FBI tortured Jerry Holzner, and he’s possibly withheld relevant and potentially useful information. Is Dworsky’s goal to look cooperative while sabotaging us? Ian keeps insisting that even after forty years, even after helping O’Brien avoid a murder conviction by blaming Holzner, Dworsky is fair-minded. Either my father is a fool or he knows something about Dworsky that I don’t.

I check my text messages one last time and look for new e-mails just in case. I’m about to start the engine when my phone rings. I’m hoping it’s Moses, but it’s Lovely.

“Do you know where Moses Dworsky is?” I ask. “Hilton said Moses knows about that recording and once had a copy in his possession.”

“Parker—”

“Eleanor says he’s doing something for me, but I don’t know what he’s talking about. Do you—”

“Parker, just listen!” she shouts.

I listen.

She takes two heavy breaths and says, “Dworsky went to visit Charles Sedgwick in prison. Did you tell him to go see Sedgwick?”

“Of course not. But it’s not a bad idea. He’s the only one whom Sedgwick might talk to.”

“Omigod, Parker, he posed as Sedgwick’s attorney, got in the same room with him, and stabbed him to death.”

“How would he get a knife past prison security?” It’s not the logical first question, but sometimes shock makes you jump five steps ahead.

“It was a prison shiv that he must’ve gotten inside. The whole thing had to be planned in advance. He convinced the prison officials that he was Sedgwick’s lawyer. He showed them his old bar card from ninety-one, and they just let him meet with Sedgwick alone.”

So Moses Dworsky just murdered the only identifiable person who could testify to what was on that recording and who could maybe, just maybe, exonerate Ian Holzner, which means that Dworsky’s objective has been to sabotage our case, and Holzner was a fool for trusting him. But there’s another, more troubling explanation. What if Sedgwick was finally going to verify that Holzner was on that recording, that Holzner truly committed the crime? What if Dworsky killed Sedgwick at Ian Holzner’s request in a last-ditch attempt to avoid a conviction?