The Law of Second Chances (47 page)

“Cross-examination, Mr. Taylor?”

“Yes, your honor.” Spencer walked to the podium and glared at Charlie.

“You put a lot of time in on this, Ms. Pope?”

“Yes I did.”

“And how much were you paid for your services?”

“I wasn’t. I did it for free.”

“Free? And why is it that you devoted your time for free?”

“Because Jack Tobin is a friend of mine.”

“Oh! And did Mr. Tobin tell you that he needed you to find something in those records that he could use to get the defendant off?”

“Yes. If something was there.”

“If something was there? Let me ask you, then—do you know what Mr. Robertson was doing with all these gas stations and trucks and factories?”

“No, I don’t.”

“You don’t. You don’t even know what this so-called evidence you found for your friend means, is that what you’re telling this jury?”

“Yes.”

“No further questions.”

“Redirect, Mr. Tobin?”

“No, your honor.”

“Call your next witness.”

“The defense calls Mr. Milton Jeffries.”

Milton Jeffries was a tall man with a thick moustache and glasses. He wore a brown tweed jacket, and he looked like the stereotypical professor. Jack took as little time as possible over the preliminaries; he could tell the judge was losing his patience.

“Mr. Jeffries, did you know Leonard Woods?”

“Yes, I knew Leonard for many years. He was a colleague. We both taught microbiology—I at the University of Wisconsin, he at Florida. It’s really a small community. We’d
meet at seminars a few times a year, exchange information, that sort of thing.”

“There has been some testimony about a project he was working on before his death. Do you know anything about that?”

“Yes, I do. I helped him a little bit on it.”

“Do you know who Carl Robertson is?”

“Yes. He was Leonard’s partner in the project.”

“Can you tell the jury what that project was?”

“It’s a little complicated, but I’ll try. Leonard had created a bacteria—cloned it, actually. This bacteria could break down biomass in a unique way—a way that had never been done before. Let me explain what biomass is. It’s basically the garbage of the environment—farm waste such as corn stems, cobs and leaves, sugarcane residues, rice hulls, wood wastes, and other organic materials.”

Jack could see Milton starting to drift off into that scientific no-man’s land. He needed to bring him back.

“What was the purpose of this bacteria breaking down this biomass?”

“That’s the exciting part. The bacteria can break down these waste products into ethanol.”

Jack didn’t understand, and he knew the jury didn’t either. He had to ask the question even though he was fumbling in the dark.

“So?” he asked.

“So, before this breakthrough, ethanol could only be made from high-value materials such as cornstarch and cane syrup, using yeast fermentation. In other words, the ethanol was more expensive than regular oil and the supply—corn and sugar—was limited. Leonard’s process created a virtually unlimited source for ethanol, and he wasn’t depleting the food supply. He and Carl calculated they could sell it for about $1.40 a gallon. They figured they could replace half the automotive fuel in the United States with this new fuel.”

Jack’s brain was firing with connections. It all made sense now:
Gainesville
and
breakthrough
, the relationship
with a microbiology professor—and the high stakes that had somehow led to more than one murder. Henry was right. They
were
dealing with something way over their heads.

Milton Jeffries wasn’t through. “Leonard perfected his process just before he was killed. He was about to apply for a patent. Carl was going to start production—get the trucks rolling, so to speak—the day of the application. Carl had the factories in place and had acquired the gas stations so they could be on the market literally before anybody knew they existed.”

“They could be in business overnight?”

“Exactly! And that’s the only way they figured they could be in business at all. There are some powerful interests in this country that they expected would try to stand in the way.”

“And that’s when both of them were killed.”

Spencer Taylor finally woke up. “Objection. Speculation.”

“Sustained.”

Jack didn’t need an answer. It wasn’t a question—it was a statement.

“No further questions, your honor.”

“Cross, Mr. Taylor?”

Spencer Taylor seemed almost reluctant to get to his feet. He sat in his chair with his head down without responding to the judge.

“Mr. Taylor?”

Spencer raised his head at the second inquiry. “Yes, your honor.” He stood, walked to the podium, and snarled at the witness. “Mr. Jeffries, you knew both men were dead a year and a half ago, correct?”

“Yes.”

“Have you said anything to anybody about this during that year?”

“No.”

“You didn’t say anything until Mr. Tobin found you in Wisconsin and enticed you to fly back here to tell this wild story to the jury, is that correct?”

“It’s correct that I didn’t tell this story until now. It’s not a story, though. It’s fact. And I have the research to prove it.”

Spencer ignored Milton Jeffries’s last sentence. “I have
no further questions of this witness, your honor,” he said in as dismissive a manner as he could muster.

They broke for lunch after that. Under any other circumstances Jack would have wanted nothing more than to have lunch with Dick, Joaquin, Henry, and Charlie. He still had work to do, however, and lunch was a luxury he could not afford. Milton and Charlie’s testimony had presented the jury with an alternative theory about why Carl was murdered. But Spencer still had Benny at the scene and Benny with the gun. Jack could see him belittling the defense’s “conspiracy theory” during his closing:
The defense has given you nothing but wild and unsubstantiated theories. You also have the facts before you, ladies and gentlemen, facts you can get your arms around
. Jack knew he needed to deal a blow to Spencer’s facts. That was what he was hoping his final witness would accomplish, but it was a very, very risky move that could easily backfire.

When he was trying civil cases as an insurance defense attorney, he had a mantra that he followed religiously:
Pigs get fat. Hogs get slaughtered
. It meant that you didn’t try to go too far if you already had enough evidence to make your case. You never called a witness who could kill you—unless you were desperate.

Those were the rules for civil cases where, if you made the wrong decision, your client paid a lot of money. Here, the wrong decision could very well cost Benny his life.

Jack didn’t make his final decision until the jurors were seated and the court was ready to proceed.

“Call your next witness,” the judge told Jack.

“The defense calls Detective Nick Walsh.”

Nick followed the bailiff into the courtroom wearing a plain and rather undistinguished brown suit. He swore to tell the truth and took the witness stand, appearing to be as comfortable as if he were sitting in his own living room. Jack noticed and wondered if Nick was so relaxed because he knew he was going to blow the defendant out of the water.

“Detective Walsh, you were the lead homicide detective investigating the Carl Robertson murder, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And you made the decision to arrest the defendant for that murder, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And what is the standard to make an arrest?”

“Probable cause.”

“And that is a different standard from ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’?”

“Yes, it’s a much lower standard. We arrest when we feel there is a reasonable basis to do so.”

“Do you stop investigating when you arrest someone?”

“No. At least, not usually.”

“Now, I want you to recall your first interview with Angela Vincent, Carl Robertson’s mistress. Do you remember that?”

“Yes.”

“Ms. Vincent told you that Mr. Robertson got a phone call two weeks before his murder, is that accurate?”

“Yes.”

“Was there anything significant about that phone call to you?”

“Well, Ms. Vincent said that Mr. Robertson was excited about the call and he wrote down two words on a notepad,
Gainesville
and
breakthrough
.”

“Did you know at the time what those words meant?”

“I didn’t have a clue.”

“Did you think they were important?”

“Everything in an investigation is important.”

“Did you ever find out what those words referred to?”

“No.”

“In your second interview with Ms. Vincent, she told you about a woman named Lois Barton whom she’d met not long before Carl Robertson was murdered, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And is it correct that she was having an intimate relationship with this woman?”

“Yes.”

“What did she tell this woman about Mr. Robertson, if anything?”

“She basically told her everything—the days that he came to visit, the ten thousand dollars he brought her every month. She even told her when he brought it.”

This was the tricky part. This was where Walsh could go off on the supposition about Benny and the mysterious Lois Barton being partners. Jack had already gotten rid of the felony murder count, but any hint of a partnership and Benny was almost certainly sunk in the eyes of the jury.

“Was this Lois Barton a suspect?”

“Yes.”

“Did you ever find her?”

“No.” The crowd started murmuring. Judge Middleton rapped his gavel on the dais and, like trained dogs, they stopped.

“I assume, then, that your investigation continued after the defendant was arrested, is that correct?”

“No, that’s not correct.”

“No? Is there a reason why you stopped looking for this woman?” Jack was in that proverbial no-man’s land again. He had no idea what Walsh was going to say.

“I was told not to.”

Jack felt that statement was worth repeating. “You were told not to?”

“Yes.”

“By whom?”

“By my superior, Assistant Chief Ralph Hitchens.”

“What were the circumstances that caused Assistant Chief Ralph Hitchens to tell you to stop your investigation?”

“He just called me in his office.” Nick Walsh looked right at Spencer Taylor. Jack thought he saw a smile cross the detective’s face for a split second. “Mr. Taylor was there,” Walsh continued. “They told me I was off the case and that the investigation was closed.” Nick hadn’t been asked who was present: he didn’t have to offer Taylor’s name up, but he recalled the meeting in Hitchens’s office well. He remembered Taylor’s arrogance.
Payback is hell
, he said to himself.

His offer did not go unnoticed by Jack. Nick Walsh appeared to be helping him. He continued his questioning.
“Mr. Walsh, you also investigated the murder of Sal Paglia, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“Who was Sal Paglia?”

“He was the defendant’s lawyer before you.”

Spencer Taylor was on his feet. “Objection, your honor. Relevancy.”

“I was thinking the same thing, Mr. Tobin,” the judge said. “Where is this going?”

“I was just about to ask Mr. Walsh that question, Judge.”

“Ask it, then.”

“Mr. Walsh, are there any similarities between the murders of Sal Paglia and Carl Robertson?”

“Yes, there are. They were both murdered with a Glock nine-millimeter semiautomatic weapon, and they were both murdered execution-style with one shot to the head.”

“Did you ever determine who killed Mr. Paglia?”

Spencer was on his feet again. “Objection, your honor. Relevancy. We can only try one murder at a time.”

It was a speaking objection, but the judge let it go. “Overruled. He has established the relevancy, Counsel. Answer the question, Detective Walsh.”

“No, the murder of Sal Paglia is still unsolved.”

“Did you recover the slugs that were used?”

“Yes.”

“What type were they?”

“Nine-millimeter Parabellum, or Luger, standard grain.”

“Are they similar to the bullet used in Mr. Robertson’s murder?”

“They are the same.”

Jack now knew who had sent him Sal Paglia’s autopsy report. “Where were the slugs that you recovered?”

“One was lodged in a concrete column. That was the head shot. There were two other shots that were imbedded in the floor.”

“So there were three shots?”

“Yeah. The way we figured it, the initial shot was at point-blank range to the back of the head. That was the fatal
shot. After that, the killer put two slugs into the body for insurance.”

“And you’re saying they all passed through the body?”

“Yes. You shoot a person with a Glock using that type of ammunition at close range and the bullet is going to pass through unless it hits a bone or something and shatters.” That statement directly contradicted the testimony of the coroner.

“The bullet in Carl Robertson’s murder was lodged in the back of his skull, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“What does that tell you?”

“That he probably was not shot at close range. At close range the bullet would likely have passed through the skull.”

“Have you tested the slugs from Sal Paglia’s murder to see if they came from the gun that was recovered last week?”

“No. We really couldn’t because the slugs were too distorted.”

“How about the shell casings?”

“We never found the casings.”

“Did you look?”

“Oh, yeah.”

“What did you conclude must have happened to the shells?”

“The murderer picked them up. This was a hallway outside an elevator. If the murderer didn’t pick them up, we’d have found them.”

“Does that happen often that a murderer stops and picks up the shell casings?”

“No. It’s a sign that somebody is taking their time. They are very deliberate. It’s the sign of a professional.”

“Why would picking up a shell casing be important?”

“Because the shell casing can be matched to a gun. If the slugs are distorted, you won’t be able to match the gun and the slug. If you had the casing, though, you could.”