Prime Witness

Chapter Twelve

The drone of the jet engines is lulling me to sleep. Claude and I are taking the red-eye from Vancouver south, and I am lost somewhere between slumberland and the snickering visage of Adrian Chambers.

Iganovich has now formally declined to waive extradition. On this Chambers has counseled him, along with the more reserved Benson-Harrington. From their vantage point there is little to lose other than the good will of a state that wants to execute their client.

Claude scrunches down a little in his chair, the back reclining as far as it will go. He rolls his head in my direction and plants the question I have been waiting for.

“How did you two meet,” he says, “you and Adrian Chambers?” Along with everyone else present at our meeting, Claude has sensed the obvious hostility between us.

“We go way back,” I say.

“Bad blood usually does,” he tells me.

“A high-profile defense can be good for your practice,” I tell him. “It can breed new clients. But in this case, part of his motive is also a well-inspired vendetta,” I tell Claude. “Something from Dante’s Inferno.”

“Tell me about it,” he says. From his tone I can tell that Claude now thinks he has a stake in this thing.

“You’ve got to understand Chambers,” I tell him. “The man is obsessive, to the point of self-destruction. Maybe it’s what gives him an edge on the rest of the world, his willingness to go to excess in pursuit of a cause.”

Claude looks at the middle distance, like he doesn’t understand this.

“There’s a story,” I say. “I don’t know if it’s true. But years ago, when Chambers was starting out, he represented some leather-vested bikers. People heavily into drugs, running the stuff from Mexico in the hollow tubes of their Harleys. It was early in his career, before the pricier clients sought him out. Anyway, Chambers represented them in a drug bust, took a small retainer and went to work.

“It’s a classic equation in hard-core criminal defense,” I tell Claude, “that if you lose, your client figures he could have done as well himself, and if you win it’s because he was innocent. Either way it is easy for them to justify the non-payment of an outstanding fee. In the case of the bikers, Chambers beat the charges in an early motion to suppress evidence. He sent them a bill for fees, and they ignored it. He sent them another. It was like he didn’t exist. As the story goes, he managed to entice these guys to his office, all three bikers, and I am told that there, he collected his fee.”

Claude looks at me. “How?”

I make a face. “According to those who claim to know, he held two pistols, one semiautomatic, fully loaded to keep them at bay, and another revolver with a single round. He lined them up against the wall and proceeded to play Russian Roulette with their collective heads until they came up with the money.”

Claude swallows hard. “It beats arbitration to get your fee,” he says. “How much did they owe him?”

“Four hundred dollars I’m told.”

He looks at me wide-eyed.

“It was the principle of the thing.”

“And he got away with this, this collection of his fee?”

“The clients were not the kind to go running to the state bar, or the law.”

“With those kinds of clients you don’t have to worry about the law,” says Claude.

“You’re wondering why they didn’t kill him?”

He arches an eyebrow, like this was more than a passing possibility.

“In Chambers I think what they saw was a lot of rage, a man dancing on the edge of lunacy, like maybe the next time they showed up he might be holding a flame-thrower. It’s why the early Indians didn’t kill crazy people,” I say. “They saw them as somehow closer to the gods. I think maybe the bikers looked into the eyes of Adrian Chambers that night, and saw their own mortality. It came down to the basics. Screwing with this guy simply wasn’t worth the four hundred dollars.

“After that, Chambers packed a loaded nine-millimeter everywhere he went,” I say. “He got a permit from the sheriff, and let the world know it. Five months later, these same three guys showed up at his front door again. Like the Horsemen of the Apocalypse, they’d been trucking white powder all over the highway between Barstow and Bakersfield. Afflicted by the galloping dumbs, they’d been nailed again, and they were looking at doing some hard time. But when they arrived at Chambers’s office this time they were packing a bankroll to choke a horse. They gave it, all of it, to Chambers up front.”

“Sounds like an American success story,” says Claude. “How did you manage to get this Horatio Alger all over your ass?”

“Ten years ago he was a rising star in legal circles in Capital City. By then he’d cornered a good part of the upper crust criminal defense practice in town. Lawmakers in trouble with overzealous prosecutors, the lobbying set, a lot of politicians and their hangers-on. He made a lot of money. He also made a lot of enemies, mostly cops who were tired of taking his abuse in court.

“As is often the case in life, Chambers lost his focus in the details,” I say. “One of his clients was Walter Henley, a bookkeeper and by some accounts principal bagman for a group of lobbyists currying favor in the capital.”

With this sign of high-level dirt, Claude is all ears.

“The DA’s office, where I was at the time, had Henley and two prominent lobbyists in its sights, hard evidence of bribery and extortion. We wanted to get Henley to roll over on the lobbyists.

“Chambers’s theory of defense was not new, or original,” I tell him. “He figured he could keep the lobbyists and Henley all back-to-back, inside under a common umbrella of defense, pissing out into the wind instead of all over each other. He had visions of holding out forever.

“I offered Henley immunity and subpoenaed him to testify before the grand jury. He could no longer take the Fifth. He had to tell us what happened or go to jail.”

“So much for honor among thieves,” says Claude.

“Chambers fell into the net when he approached Henley with a vast sum of money, cash from the other clients, to spin some yarn before the grand jury. What he didn’t know was that Henley was wired for sound. The cops had set Chambers up. A little payback for all the grief he had caused over the years.”

“Chambers took your part in all this very personally?” says Claude.

“He had good reason. I tried for a five-year stretch on sentencing. He got nine months. And disbarment, which he ultimately got reduced to five years’ actual suspension from the practice of law.”

“A slap on the wrist,” says Claude.

“He doesn’t see it that way,” I say.

Claude is quiet for the moment, lost in contemplation as if he’s fitting together the pieces of some puzzle.

“Sonofabitch,” he says. “We’re supposed to be a team. Then I open the paper and find out you’re keeping things from me.”

I’m in Emil’s office with Claude. Johnson’s holding a folded newspaper that he slaps on the desk in front of me.

“It makes me look like a fool when I have to read stuff like this in the newspaper. Reporters call me and I don’t know what the hell they’re talkin’ about.”

There on the front page of this morning’s Times is a sidebar to the story about Iganovich’s arrest in Canada, a two-column headline:

AUTHORITIES SEARCH FOR

SECOND COPYCAT KILLER

“Why the hell didn’t you tell me about this?”

“I didn’t learn about it myself until an hour before I flew to Canada, two days ago,” I tell him.

“Still, you coulda called me,” he says. “There are telephones between here and Canada, or hadn’t they told you?”

I read the first graph of the story while Emil’s chewing on my ass.

DAVENPORT-Sources close to the investigation of the Putah Creek killings disclosed today that they are now operating on the theory that a second killer, a copycat, is now at large and may be responsible for the murders of Abbott Scofield and his estranged wife, Karen. Scofield, a professor at the State University, was found murdered along with his former wife early last week. Their nude bodies were discovered by two teenagers hunting along the Putah Creek, the scene of four earlier killings involving university students. According to highly placed sources, police are now pursuing theories of a second killer due to discrepancies in the physical evidence found at the scene.

Fortunately for us these “highly placed sources” have drawn the line at divulging the specific evidence in question. As I read I cannot believe that Kay Sellig has had anything to do with this. I wonder who else in her shop may have known about our conversation. Then I think. True to her word, Sellig had faxed a copy of her report to my office while I was away in Canada. It had lain faceup on my desk with a pile of other papers for two days in my absence. Any of a dozen people could have seen it lying there, could have read its contents.

“Next time you have information,” he says, “you tell me. Understand?”

I look at Emil, but do not even give him the satisfaction of a grudging nod. Johnson is, at heart, a bully. He is pressing the outer limits of his authority right now, testing to see if I will genuflect. I have not.

“And another thing,” he says, “we won’t sit still for any crap about waiving the death penalty.” Claude has told him about our conversation with Jacoby up north.

“What the hell are we supposed to tell the families? Some pin-striped ninny in Washington signed a treaty so we can’t execute the murderer who butchered your kid? No,” says Emil. “No deals.” His brow is twisted in anger over one eye. “That sonofabitch comes back here and he faces the death penalty.”

In actuality this decision rests with the chief prosecutor of this county, myself at this moment. But it is a weighty matter, one affecting the longevity of elected officials in this place.

Johnson is late for a meeting out of the office. He’s looking for his little binder, a speech before the Rotary Club. “Where the hell is it?” he says. Then he finds it.

“Tell them,” he says, “tell them no deal. And find out who leaked this shit.” He’s hitting the newspaper on the desk with his finger. “It sure as hell wasn’t any of my people.” In Emil’s eyes this apparently is the only benefit of not knowing what was going on. His own skirts on this leak are clean.

He’s headed for the door. “We’ve already got problems with this sonofabitch Park,” he says. “Fill him in,” he tells Claude. “Tell ’em what that slant-eyed prick has done.” Then he’s out the door.

Claude looks at me and shakes his head.

“Park made some derogatory comments about Emil in the press.”

“About now I’d like to concur,” I say. I have little sympathy left for Johnson. “The man will not take sound advice,” I tell Claude.

“Park has also hired a Canadian barrister,” he tells me.

“What?”

“We got a call this morning from the Canadian Department of Justice,” he says, “Jacoby. He’s had contact from a private barrister representing some of the victims. The guy wanted to know what was going on with Iganovich.”

“This is getting very messy,” I tell him.

“Could they cause any trouble in Canada, with the extradition?” he asks.

“They could piss off some people in high places.”

“Maggie Wilson’s specialty,” says Claude.

“It could limit our chances to finesse Iganovich out of their country and back here. What did Jacoby tell their lawyer?”

“I don’t know. We didn’t get into details,” he says.

“Find out,” I say. I am worried that he might have told their barrister about the treaty provisions on the death penalty, or that the lawyer might stumble over them on his own. If so, all hell will break loose.

Eight-thirty in the morning and I am greeted by the voice of the office receptionist over the com-line.

“Call for you,” she says. “Judge Ingel.”

I pick up the receiver. It’s a female voice on the other end, Ingel’s clerk. She tells me the judge will be with me in a moment, that they are busy linking a conference call.

The voice, like gravel on a dusty road, comes a second later.

“Madriani, you there?” I can tell by his tone that Ingel is pissed about something.

“Your honor.”

“We’d like to know what the hell’s going on.” I can hear breathing and background noise on the line.

“Excuse me,” I say, “but who’s on the line?”

“Judge Acosta,” he says. “Who else?”

The Coconut can be a real case. Prevented from pawing through my files, he now uses Ingel to tap my phone.

“What is it you want?” I say.

“We’re hearing rumors,” says the Prussian, “that you’re getting ready to cut a deal on the death penalty with the Canadians.”

“Who told you that?” I say.

“We have our sources.” This time it is Acosta’s voice coming back over the line.

I can guess where this comes from. Emil has been talking to Ingel. His way of assuring that I hold the line on any deal for extradition.

“Well, you’ve heard wrong,” I say. “And Emil knows better. I’ve already told him there will be no deals. Does he want it in blood?”

“Keep a civil tongue,” says Ingel. He’s putting on a little demonstration of authority for Acosta, telling me that there was no reason I should have barred the Coconut from my files. “Judge Acosta was not asking to copy anything, just looking,” he says. “After all he has a legitimate interest in the case.”

“He does,” I say. “The same as any other survivor. Maybe I should post all the investigative reports, all the contacts and leads the police have, on a wall in the courthouse so they can all read at the same time?”

“That’s enough,” says Ingel.

“You see what I have to deal with?” Acosta tells him. For several seconds they cut me out of the loop of discussion, the general consensus being that I am an uncooperative asshole, all this while I listen.

It is a colloquy I might expect from two legislators, people who never see bounds to their perks of power and special privilege, but not from sitting judges.

“So how are you going to get him back?” Acosta is asking for my strategy on extraditing the Russian.

“The State Department is putting pressure on the Canadian authorities,” I say. “In the end, we are confident they will return the suspect without any waiver of capital punishment.”

An audible “humph” from the other end of the line, like he gives this little credence. I begin to believe that Acosta would prefer that I fail. I think that maybe his commitment to his sister and family is not as strong as his desire to tromp my ass.

“What about this copycat thing in the papers?” says Ingel.

“Right now just a theory,” I say. “Discrepancies in some of the physical evidence.”

We go over this. Without divulging any details, I assure Acosta that this does not appear to affect his niece’s case. Again a lot of mild scoffing on the other end of the line.

“You will keep us posted?” says Ingel.

“To the extent that I can,” I say.

“Yeah,” says Acosta. “Sure. Like access to the files.”

Ingel consoles him a little, tells me good-bye, like I can ring off now, while they defame me in private for awhile.

I hang up. But for the next several minutes my ears are burning.

Days have passed and I am only now able to follow up on Kay Sellig’s advice that I talk with the county’s medical examiner, Dr. Lloyd Tolar.

Tolar is a teaching physician with a full-time position at the university medical school. A trained pathologist, he is under contract to the county to provide coroner services, a position which he rolls neatly into his teaching assignment. I am told that he uses students to assist him in servicing the county contract, that the university receives the payment for this from the county. A cozy arrangement.

When I get to Tolar’s office, I am ushered to a chair in a reception area and told that the doctor is running late, a teaching assignment in another building. He is expected momentarily.

A second later I sense a presence behind me. When I turn I’m facing a kid, no more than twenty-five, in medical garb.

“You’re Mr. Madriani?” he says.

“I am.”

“Dr. Jamison,” he says. He shakes my hand. “I’m one of the interns assigned to assist Dr. Tolar. He’s not going to be able to meet with you today. Last-minute conflict,” he says. “He asked me to sit in, to talk to you, to answer any questions. We can use his office.”

Before I can say anything, Jamison is heading toward a large glassed-in office on the other side of reception. I follow him through the door and he turns on the light.

“So you’re the acting DA,” he says. He eyes me up and down as if to pass a quick judgment. “You’re here on the Putah Creek things?” he says.

“Yes. I haven’t received a copy of the pathology report in the last two murders yet, Abbott and Karen Scofield.” I tell him that Sellig had advised me to come in and talk, that there was apparently some problem, questions before the report could be completed. I lift an eyebrow. “And some information that perhaps we have a different perpetrator here.”

He projects poise beyond his years, self-assured, more than a little arrogant.

“Some of our findings,” he says. “We were not sure whether you would want them reduced to writing in the pathology report, or kept verbal at this point. A question of discretion.”

What he’s talking about is the practice of finessing an expert report, in this case the autopsy, to keep certain critical information away from any adversary come trial. Normally such documents are disclosed during discovery.

“What are we talking about?” I say.

“Pretty clear medical evidence,” he says, “that these victims were not killed where they were found, but moved there later.” He’s talking about the Scofields.

“That the killer stabbed them with a knife first, and then tried to mask this with the metal stakes. It was well done,” he says. “But not that well done.” A point of pride, I think.

Jamison talks without notes, conversant with details. I suspect that perhaps he assisted Tolar in the autopsy.

I ask him to tell me more.

He says that they found a contusion on Abbott Scofield’s head and evidence that he was unconscious when stabbed. The wife was not. Both were stabbed with a sharp single-edged knife about nine inches long. The stakes were inserted later into these wounds, then driven through the bodies to make it look as if the same MO was used as in the earlier cases.

Sellig was right-this is dynamite stuff. “Can you gloss it in the report?” I say.

“We can keep the facts broad, leave out the conclusions.” He says this like they have done it before.

I weigh the risks. Once in the report there is no way to take it out.

“For now,” I say, “until we know who’s going to be looking at the report, that might be best.”