VC04 - Jury Double (18 page)

“Objection, Your Honor.” Dotson Elihu shot to his feet. “The People gave the defense only Dr. Lalwani’s written autopsy reports. The People did not turn over the tapes he recorded while performing the autopsies.”

“Your Honor,” diAngeli said, “the People turned over all medical records in their possession.”

“The issue, Your Honor, is the medical records that were allowed to
escape
the People’s possession.”

“I can’t see why this matter wasn’t raised in pretrial.” Judge Bernheim beckoned. “Counsel will approach the bench.”

The attorneys conferred with the judge in low, buzzing voices.

“Mr. Lalwani …” Tess diAngeli returned to the witness. “Two years ago, on the twelfth of September, did you perform an autopsy on the body of John Briar?”

“I did.”

“Could you outline your findings for us?”

“John Briar was a dark-complected Caucasian male of seventy-nine years of age. Examination of his body and organs revealed an extremely malnourished person—body weight was low, bones were deficient in calcium, intestines showed minor bloating and ulceration. …” He went on for several minutes.

“And what do such findings suggest to you?”

“They are symptoms of starvation and carotene excess. They indicate John Briar had been living on a diet of carrots for a year or so prior to death.”

“Would such a diet be recommended by a doctor?”

“Objection.”

“Ms. diAngeli,” Judge Bernheim said, “you know better than that. In my court, you’re going to have to lay a foundation for that question.”

DiAngeli turned to her witness. “Dr. Lalwani, are you board certified?”

“I am.”

“And the nature of board certification is that you are competent and licensed to practice general medicine on living patients, like any M.D.?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“As a licensed physician, do you feel qualified to answer the question: Would a diet of carrots be recommended by a doctor?”

“I do, and no responsible doctor would recommend it. Such a diet, pursued over a year to a year and a half, would be fatal.”

“Was it malnutrition that caused John Briar’s death?”

“No. Hemorrhaging at the back of the eyeballs showed that the cause of death was asphyxiation. Saturday before Labor Day, between midnight and two
A.M.
, John Briar was smothered with his bed pillow.”

“Your Honor, I request permission to show People’s Exhibit Fifteen.” A color photo of a malnourished seventy-nine-year-old male, lying naked beneath a disheveled bathrobe, came up on the TV screen. “Is this John Briar as he was found after his murder?”

“It is.”

A stained, crumpled pillow lay next to his head.

“And is that the pillow the murderer used to suffocate his victim?”

“It is.”

“Did you examine that pillow?”

“I did. I found saliva on the pillowcase. The DNA in the saliva matched John Briar’s DNA.”

“Permission to show People’s Exhibit Sixteen.” Another color photo came up. It showed a frighteningly thin old woman, naked on a stainless-steel autopsy table. “Is this a photograph of Amalia Briar?”

“It is,” Lalwani said.

“Could you tell the jury your autopsy findings?”

“Amalia Briar was a fair-complected Caucasian female of approximately seventy-two years of age. Examination of her corpse revealed an extremely malnourished person, with bloating and ulceration of the lower intestine. She showed faint yellow pigmentation of the skin and nails, which is a common symptom of massive carotene excess. It suggested she’d been living on a diet of carrots for a year or so prior to death.”

“Was it the diet of carrots and the resulting acute malnutrition that caused Mrs. Briar’s death?”

“No.” DiAngeli’s dress flared into violet as she stepped through a shaft of sunlight. “Do you have any idea how asphyxiation occurred?”

“I have a very clear idea. I found carrot particles on the pillowcase. I also found carrot particles on Amalia Briar’s upper molars and in her esophagus—her upper throat.”

At the prosecutor’s table, the assistant was peeling tape off the flaps of a cardboard carton.

“I conclude,” Lalwani said, “that the murderer pressed the pillow into her face long enough to cut off her air supply. Due to her weakened state, she put up no struggle.”

The assistant handed diAngeli two small pillows neatly bagged in plastic. Feathers had leaked into both bags. Even at this distance Anne could see stains. DiAngeli approached the witness stand, holding the bundle outstretched like holy relics soaked in the blood of a saint. “Is this the pillow that killed John Briar?”

Silence flowed through the court.

Lalwani considered the pillow, his lips tight and thin. “This is the pillow.”

“And is this the pillow that killed Amalia Briar?”

“It is.” DiAngeli turned. “Your Honor, the People ask that these pillows be marked People’s Exhibit Number seventeen and eighteen.”

The bailiff took the pillows to the court clerk’s desk.

Judge Bernheim shifted papers, looking for something. “The pillows will be so marked.” DiAngeli asked the witness if he had been able to determine the approximate time of Amalia Briar’s death.

“Amalia Briar was asphyxiated sometime between five and six
A.M.
on Labor Day.”

Cardozo had taken a moment to finish up some backlogged paperwork when the smell of Old Spice invaded the cubicle.

“Hey, Vince.” Greg Monteleone’s voice. Boyish and exultant. He was holding an enormous cheese Danish in one hand; an orange Post-it was sticking to the Danish. “A call came in Wednesday, three
P.M.
Woman with a French accent.” He angled his thumb and stuck the Post-it to the desk lamp. “Britta Bailey caught the squeal.”

“That took you twenty-four hours?”

“Couldn’t get to it till this morning. Had a break in the Gonzales case. Sorry.”

“What was the break?”

“False alarm.”

Cardozo reminded himself to have a look at Greg’s case reports. Something was going on besides work. Greg had started wearing that gold chain like a dog tag and he was basting himself in Old Spice.

Cardozo peeled the little orange square off the lamp. “What’s this scribble?”

Greg tilted his head. “Mademoiselle Josette de Gramont. She phoned in the complaint. She works at that private school over on Madison—the École Française.”

Dotson Elihu had a purposeful way of moving across empty space, which shaped the courtroom into an audience. There was a promise in that stride:
Keep your eyes open, folks, and you’ll see something explode.

“Dr. Lalwani … isn’t it a fact that during your autopsy of John Briar, you tape-recorded your observations?”

A half-beat hesitation. “I did.”

“Didn’t you state on that tape that John Briar died of accidental self-suffocation?”

“I made no such statement.”

Elihu was standing close now, hunched toward the witness. “Did you not also state on that tape that the torn bed pillow was pressed into John Briar’s face
after
death?”

Lalwani shifted in his chair. “I made no such statement.”

Elihu shook his head; a show of bemusement. “Your Honor, I request permission to play to the jury the relevant portion of this witness’s autopsy tape.”

“Your Honor,” diAngeli said, “that tape cannot be played. Mr. Elihu is bluffing. As he is well aware—we do not possess it.”

With an expression of astonishment, Elihu turned to the witness. “Dr. Lalwani, didn’t you testify that you turned the tape of John Briar’s autopsy over to the prosecution?”

“I normally turn such tapes over to the prosecution, but in this case I was unable to. We were short of tapes and I had to reuse the Briar tape to record an autopsy performed later the same day.”

Elihu’s incredulous gaze moved slowly across the jury, then back to Lalwani. “Then we have only your recollection as to what that tape contained?”

“No, I prepared a written report from the tape before it was recorded over.”

Elihu strolled three steps, thinking, and stopped. “Did you tape-record your observations during the autopsy of Amalia Briar?”

“I did.”

“And didn’t you state on
that
tape that Amalia Briar died of accidental self-suffocation?”

“I did not.”

“Then perhaps we could play the tape of Amalia Briar’s autopsy and straighten this matter out. You
did
turn the tape of Amalia Briar’s autopsy over to the prosecution?” DiAngeli leaped up. “Your Honor, I object. Counsel knows that both tapes were recorded over. This is repetitious and getting us nowhere.”

“Mr. Elihu,” the judge said, “do you have a point to make?”

“Yes, Your Honor. One tape might conceivably have been recorded over, as the witness claims. But for two autopsy tapes—both critical to the defense—to be recorded over goes way beyond probability.”

“Objection—counsel is neither a witness nor an expert in probability.”

“Your Honor, it hardly takes an expert in probability to smell wholesale suppression of evidence.”

Judge Bernheim whacked her gavel on the bench. “The People are sustained, and the defense will please move forward.”

“Your Honor, I request that the jury be shown People’s Exhibit Seventeen.”

“Objection.” DiAngeli shoved back her chair. “The witness was never questioned concerning that photograph.”

Elihu tossed the prosecutor a courtly smile. “I’m not cross-examining on the photograph. I’m cross-examining on the dead woman. I request the photograph purely to refresh the witness’s memory.”

“Objection overruled,” Judge Bernheim said. “The photograph is already in evidence. Show it.”

A moment later the image of Amalia Briar, serenely dead on a raft of percale pillows, glowed on the TV screen.

“Dr. Lalwani—you claim that this is a photograph of a woman who was savagely murdered, a woman who died in abject terror?”

“She was near death and unable to defend herself. It took very little force to suffocate her. She may not even have been aware of what was happening.”

“You say a pillow was used to suffocate John Briar, because the DNA of saliva on his pillow matched his own DNA.”

“Correct.”

“You mentioned no saliva on Amalia Briar’s pillow, yet you claim
her
pillow was used to smother
her.
What evidence supports this conclusion?”

“Carrot particles on her pillow and in her mouth.”

“I see. The carrot DNA on the pillow matched the carrot DNA in her mouth?”

“I didn’t test the carrot DNA.”

“You didn’t test it.” Elihu stroked his chin. “Now, Doctor, you say you found hemorrhaging at the back of John Briar’s eyeballs, and you say this proves he was suffocated.”

“Correct.”

“Did you find similar hemorrhaging at the back of Amalia Briar’s eyeballs?”

“I did not. But in some cases—”

Elihu turned. “Doctor, are you familiar with sudden infant death syndrome?”

“Objection.”

“I’m going to allow that question,” Judge Bernheim said.

“Yes,” Lalwani said in a guarded voice, “I’m familiar with the phenomenon.”

“In SIDS, don’t infants sometimes asphyxiate themselves?”

“They sometimes roll onto their stomach and position their mouth and nose in the pillow or bedclothes. If they lack the strength or coordination to roll to their side, they risk asphyxiation.”

“What is the effect of long-term starvation upon an elderly person’s strength and coordination?”

“Those abilities would be somewhat compromised.”

“Could an elderly, starved, weakened, bedridden person such as Amalia Briar … suffocate herself?”

“Accidental suffocations among the elderly do occur. But Amalia Briar died faceup.”

“But if she died facedown—hypothetically, now—would the evidence rule out accidental death?”

“Not necessarily, but she died faceup.”

“Why bother to kill her if she was already so near death?”

“Are you asking me to read minds?”

“I’m asking you for an expert opinion. Why didn’t the murderer roll her onto her stomach if that would make death appear accidental?”

“In my opinion, the murderer did not care whether or not the death was detected as a murder.”

EIGHTEEN

2:20
P.M.

A
NNE SAT IN THE
jury room, watching the sunlight walk across the floor. She could feel resentment filling the room like a cold, dark fluid.

Abe da Silva, the bald-headed juror, was tossing paper gliders at the wastebasket. Ramon Culpeper had laid out a game of cards on the conference table. Thelma del Rio peeked around his elbow. “Solitaire?”

“Not exactly.”

“What kind of cards are they?”

“New Age.”

P. C. Cabot scowled at his watch as though he suspected it of lying to him. “She tells us to be back at two sharp, and it’s nearly two-thirty. What the hell do these judges
do
?”

“One of the Coreyites’ victims almost died,” Thelma was saying. “Surgeons had to work on her for
ten hours
to close her up.”

“I didn’t hear anything like that,” Shoshana said.

“Thelma, please,” Anne said. “I really wish we could talk about something else.”

Thelma drew herself up to full sitting height, her features righteous. “I guess some people don’t want to know what’s happening to children nowadays.”

“Some of us happen to love and care about kids,” Anne said. “And we resent having their pain and suffering reduced to prurient gossip.”

“Right on,” Abe da Silva said.

“Well, I’m
sorry
.” Thelma mustered a look of dainty astonishment. “It’s not as though I was trying to personally offend you, but I thought as jurors we ought to know the kind of evidence Judge Bernheim is suppressing.”

“If the judge suppressed it,” Seymour Shen said, “how did you happen to hear it?”

“I think Thelma’s making it up,” Donna Scomoda said.

“Hey. Didn’t you hear me yesterday?” Ben Esposito said. “Don’t discuss the case. Those are our orders.”

Anne had a sudden screaming need to get away from this claustrophobic little room, to go out and breathe the exhaust-laden air of the street.