The CBS Murders (22 page)

The presentation was neat and orderly, or as neat and orderly as is possible in a court of law. Waples proved conclusively that four people were dead and probably a fifth, and that those four people, and probably the fifth, had been murdered by bullets to the head from a .22-caliber weapon. That was, of course, the essential preliminary. Without death, without the showing that the death was caused by another person, was murder, there could be no indictment and no trial. Everyone might know it, but the prosecution still must prove it. Angelo Sicca told how he had seen the murders of his fellow CBS technicians, how he had seen the shooter dragging the limp body of a woman, Margaret Barbera, around a silver van, how he himself had fled in fear and then returned and summoned help. What he could not do was describe the killer. “I didn't want to make eye contact.… I wasn't trying to study this man. I was trying to get out of there.”

Robert Schlop, the next CBS technician to appear on the scene, talked about stumbling over the bodies a little after the murders, though he had not seen them, had not seen the silver van, had not seen the killer. But he did remember that, a week earlier, he had seen a silver van on the pier and had brushed against its driver who was hurrying to it. The driver he remembered clearly. He pointed to the defense table, to Donald Nash, and positively identified him as that driver.

Manuel Infante, the artist-bartender, related his early morning stroll with his dog through the side streets and alleys of lower Manhattan, a stroll that ended when the dog sniffed out the body of Margaret Barbera.

Lieutenant Dick Gallagher tied Margaret Barbera to the pier as he told of hearing the report of the discovery of the body, of rushing down to Franklin Alley with the shoes found on the pier and discovering that the shoes were a perfect fit.

There were the Ridgewood teenagers who had witnessed the abduction of Jenny Soo Chin, had heard her scream as a man in a ski mask came up behind her and shoved her into her car and then drove away on a dark January night. But their descriptions of the man varied and were not consistent, and they could not point to Nash, or anyone, and say he was that man. Then cops told how, days later, they discovered Jenny Soo Chin's abandoned car on Manhattan's West Side and in it bloodstains and a spent .22-cartridge shell casing.

If they could say nothing, then, to identify the man who had done these things, or even if the same man had done them all, these witnesses, nevertheless, established clearly that initial and fateful premise: Crimes had been committed, four murders had been done, a fifth person had been kidnapped and probably murdered. Still, except for Schlop, who had seen Nash on the pier a week before the murders, there was nothing yet to tie the defendant to the crimes.

That would come with a platoon of New York cops, Kentucky State troopers, FBI agents, and expert witnesses of all kinds filling the courtroom with the details of the long investigation, of tracking down leads, of scientific tests, and a lot more, all pointing directly to Donald Nash as the killer, as the man who had done all these deeds.

The jury heard, in the jargon of the police and the language of the scientist and in everyday words, about the parking application with its attempt to deceive filed at Pier Ninety-two and how John Wales had traced it back to Donald Nash; about Nash's van spotted in Barbera's neighborhood and the calls from that neighborhood charged to Nash's phone, and other calls charged to the Nash phone; about the discovery of shell casings, on the pier, in Jenny Soo Chin's car, in the van, in Nash's garage, in the creek behind his home, and elsewhere, all fired from the same gun; about the purchase of ammunition by Nash; about bloodstains and whose they were and where they had been found; about a van being repainted; about a lost parking ticket at Newark Airport and its discovery in the van; about a chase from New Jersey to Kentucky; about arrest and more and more. The testimony and the exhibits washed across the courtroom in a flood, day by day, week by week, to the point where there were some who thought Waples was going in for overkill. But his case was circumstantial; he had no witness who could positively place Nash on the scene of the murders at the moment they happened, who had seen Nash pull the trigger. And so Waples was not one to leave anything to chance; he would miss no possibilities, would leave no air holes for Nash to find and rise to the surface.

If there was drama and surprise, it came with the appearance as prosecution witnesses, testifying under grants of immunity, of Nash's nephews, Robert and Thomas Dane, and of his common-law wife of nearly two decades, Jeanne Nash. Much of their testimony was given with reluctance, dragged from them by the battering of Waples, who treated them not as his own friendly witnesses but as hostile adversaries. And that testimony was devastating to Donald Nash.

Robert Dane was led through the abandoning of his silver van in the Bronx, its license plate and one tire removed, on the day that just happened to follow the disappearance of Jenny Soo Chin. He knew nothing about that, of course. He had ditched the van only so he could collect $6,000 in insurance, and he was surprised and appalled when the van was recovered and turned back to him.

“Isn't it a fact,” Waples demanded, “that on January 5, you loaned the van to your brother, Thomas, and your uncle?”

“No,” replied Robert Dane.

“Isn't it a fact,” Waples continued, “that on January 5, when you received the van back, you were informed that something had happened with the van?”

“No.”

“Wasn't it suggested to you that you'd better get rid of the van and that's why you took it to the Bronx?”

“No.” It was only a coincidence, a strange one, Dane insisted, that the van and the disappearance of Jenny Soo Chin so closely coincided. He knew nothing about that and had had nothing to do with it.

The jury is supposed to believe that, Waples said sarcastically, when it is a fact, isn't it, that Dane filed a false report, a criminal offense, with his insurance company about the van, and that he lied to the insurance company?

Dane admitted that he had done this criminal thing, that he had lied, but nevertheless he was telling the truth now.

If Waples, then, was, at the very least, accusing Robert Dane of being an accessory after the fact to the murder of Jenny Soo Chin—for which, having been granted immunity in exchange for his testimony, he would not be tried even if any solid evidence could be found—he went even further with Dane's younger brother, Thomas.

“Isn't it a fact,” Waples asked, though from his manner it was apparent that he was sure of the true answer, “that you conspired with Donald Nash to murder Jenny Soo Chin?”

“No.”

“Did you conspire with Donald Nash to murder Margaret Barbera?”

“No, I did not.”

Waples' disbelief was patent. He pressed on to show just how deeply Thomas Dane was involved with his uncle in these deeds, even if Thomas would never be brought to trial for that involvement. He asked Dane if he had ever seen a .22 automatic equipped with a silencer. Dane said he never had, except in the movies. But Waples moved forward, wrung from him the admission that he had made calls to suppliers of the parts for a silencer, had signed for the delivery of those parts, and had paid for them. But, he maintained, he had never opened the packages; he had done it all at the behest of Uncle Donald, and had handed the packages over to him unopened.

Waples let that hang. Then he asked if Dane had ever called Margaret Barbera at her unlisted home phone number in Queens. Dane was shocked. He had never done such a thing. Waples calmly produced telephone records that showed that just such a call had been placed from Dane's home phone. Reluctantly, Dane said that Uncle Donald often used that phone.

Had Dane ever spoken with Irwin Margolies? Never, Dane replied to Waples. Waples produced more telephone records, this time showing that a call had been made from Dane's phone to the private unlisted office number of attorney Henry Oestericher at a time when Margolies was using that office and phone. Dane had not made those calls, he insisted. And again he had to say that Uncle Donald used that phone often.

Waples kept asking, and the more he asked, the more he trapped Thomas Dane in a web of complicity that Dane could explain only by implicating his uncle ever more deeply. There was the night of the Pier Ninety-two murders and Dane's meeting with Nash, his following Nash to Newark Airport, his driving Nash back home, his shopping trips with Nash, his helping Nash paint the silver van black, his return to Newark Airport with Nash and the van, another shopping trip to buy camping equipment, another return to the airport when Nash retrieved the van once more and drove south.

All this, now, was different from the stories he had told the grand jury when it had looked into the murders. Was Dane telling the truth now? Yes, he said. Had he lied to the grand jury, then? Yes, Dane said. “I guess I was upset, nervous.”

Still, Dane had some surprises for Waples that did not sit well with the prosecutor when Dane was recalled a few days after his initial ordeal on the witness stand. In the intervening period, detectives had appeared at Dane's home, had searched his attic, had come away with another .22-caliber shell casing, a casing that matched all the others. Waples wanted to know how Dane explained the fact that such a casing happened to be in his attic, in an otherwise empty attaché case.

Dane said he had no idea. He had never seen the casing before. “I have a feeling,” he said, “it was put there. It definitely was not there before the police came. It's funny. I had a couple of dozen other boxes in the attic which were not touched.” And, Dane added, Detectives Richie Bohan and Augie Sanchez, who had done the searching and found the casing, did not seem at all surprised when they found it, and they did not even take precautions to save any fingerprints it might have contained.

Dane had another little shock, and it came when Lawrence Hochheiser, Nash's lawyer, took over to do some cross-examining. Hochheiser treated Dane a lot more sympathetically and gently than had Waples and asked Dane if he had had a visit and a discussion with one of the detectives.

Yes, Dane said. Augie Sanchez had taken him aside and suggested that he ought to pay a little visit to his uncle in jail and persuade his uncle that he “should not be taken advantage of … he should help the police clear this whole matter up and settle things.” There was Jenny Soo Chin. Dane, if he didn't already know, should find out from Uncle Donald what he had done with her and where her body was so that she could get a decent burial. That would make her family feel a lot better. And, Sanchez said, it was obvious that Nash was going to go away for a very long time, so why should he keep his mouth closed and go on protecting “that fat Jew bastard”? Dane ought to think very hard about that and talk to his uncle, because Dane was “a very lucky boy, breathing fresh air. You should be in jail with your uncle.”

(After Dane's revelation, Sanchez was asked about the story. He shrugged it off. He had talked to Dane, yes, had said much of what Dane related but, he said, he had never called Irwin Margolies “fat,” even though the man was rather obese. Sanchez, a tough, pugnacious, and, to some, a frightening figure, might dismiss it as nonsense, not worth commenting about, but it left a very bad taste in the mouths of others.)

Then there was the pathetic figure of Jeanne Nash. “Don is not a violent man,” she insisted in a shaking, tear-filled voice. “He is not a murderer. There is no way Don could have been on that pier and shot those people. There is a mistake somewhere. Don is loved by everyone. He never turned a favor down.”

Waples was gentle toward her, but he got from her what he had called her to get. She admitted that Nash had called her at home “a little bit after six” on the evening of the murders and told her to go over to Thomas Dane's house and tell him to get off the phone because it was important for Nash to speak to him.

In his opening remarks, Waples had said he would show not only that Donald Nash had committed these crimes but also that he had been hired to commit them and that the man who had hired him was Irwin Margolies, in a desperate attempt to cover up his fraud and keep his wealth. Waples never showed it. Though Margolies's name was mentioned now and again in testimony, there was no real evidence to link the two men. If Waples had no more than what he had revealed during this trial, then, some legal experts said, maybe Nash would take the fall, but he would take it alone. They had heard nothing that could possibly be used to bring Margolies to trial, or even to indict him.

The case against Nash, then, seemed overwhelming, if circumstantial. Hochheiser was in an almost hopeless position in any attempt to defend his client. He got little or no cooperation from Nash. “Either out of love or fear,” Hochheiser said, “he seems reluctant, he seems unwilling to authorize the most vigorous kind of defense.” The only witness Hochheiser could come up with to testify for Nash was an ophthalmologist, whose contribution was to say that Nash was blind in one eye and had very limited sight in the other. To Hochheiser, this meant there was no way Nash could have aimed a pistol and shot four people. Waples had a very simple answer to that. When a gun is put against somebody's head, or held within a few inches of the target, even a blind man becomes a sharpshooter.

What could Hochheiser say to the jury, in closing, to try to win those nine men and three women, to wean them from the state's case? That case, he said, was purely circumstantial, and “if you start with the presumption of innocence, then it does not fit, too much sticks out around the edges.… My client did not shoot anybody. My client did not kill anybody. They could call a thousand and fifty witnesses and he will still be innocent. Who is Donald Nash? A foolish man, but certainly not a murderer.”

Waples derided that. “I don't have the answer to what snapped in the defendant's mind that transformed him from a human being to an amoral automaton who relentlessly pursued two women for months and remorselessly executed three CBS employees,” he declared. “In this case, the circumstantial evidence is more convincing and more persuasive than direct evidence.” And he tried, one last time, to bring Irwin Margolies into focus. “Candor,” he said, “is the germ from which the pestilence of the crime grew. Irwin Margolies set in motion a chain of events that ultimately claimed the lives of five people.”