California Girl

36

1970

ORANGE COUNTY SUPERIOR COURT, Department C-7.

“The defendant will rise.”

Cory Bonnett unfolded from the table and stood. Suit and tie. Hair cut short. Trim mustache. Judge Sewell had allowed him to be tried unmanacled until his first interruption or indiscretion. Six weeks later Bonnett’s big freckled hands still hung free at his sides.

Nick sat second row behind the prosecutor’s table. He had testified for three days in August, almost a month ago now. Then once last week during redirect. Had memorized Andy’s articles and huddled with Lobdell. Lucky had called it “synchronizing our watches.”

Abbott Estle couldn’t catch them. Nick denied that he had ever gone to Mexico for any reason connected to Cory Bonnett. Lobdell corroborated him and he corroborated Lobdell. Estle’s questions came to sound redundant, then badgering. His inferences unlikely. The People’s objections were sustained. The harder Estle climbed, the faster he slid.

Bonnett stared at the floor during most of Nick’s time on the stand. The few times their eyes met Nick saw contempt and hatred and arrogance. Nick held the look and gave them back.

Bonnett never testified and the evidence buried him.

Janelle as informant. Bonnett as target. A sexual relationship. Janelle’s disloyalty. Janelle’s pregnancy by another man. Bonnett’s jealousy. The witness who saw him follow her into the Sav-On parking lot and drive her away a few minutes later in his white Cadillac. Bonnett’s disappearance. Bloody sheets-Janelle’s blood type. The victim’s three flesh-and-blood-packed fingernails-Bonnett’s blood type. Bloody saw blade-Janelle’s type once again, ladies and gentlemen, do you see a pattern emerging? Strangled in a Newport Beach apartment where the maid had seen them the Friday before she died. Dumped and decapitated in the SunBlesst orange packinghouse in Tustin. White Cadillac seen at packinghouse by witness Terry Neemal. Man seen carrying something body-sized into packinghouse by Terry Neemal. Yes, Terry Neemal is a transient. Transients lack homes, not eyes. Thank you, Mr. Neemal. That will be all. No, Mr. Neemal, thank you but you’re finished. Yes, Mr. Neemal, you’re free to talk to the reporters.

Nick could tell by the jurors’ expressions that they believed. Sewell, too.

And they should, he thought. This, the part that matters, is all truth.

“Mr. Bonnett, do you have anything to say before the verdict is read?”

Bonnett’s voice was clear and strong. “I didn’t do it.”

“You were offered a chance to set us straight. Is that all you have to say, Mr. Bonnett?”

“What else matters?”

“Noted. Foreman, have you filled out the verdict forms?”

“Yes, your honor.”

“Clerk, please read the verdicts.”

The clerk was a trim middle-aged woman with dark hair and frown lines around her mouth. She looked once at Bonnett. Once at Sewell. Then read:

“We the jury in the above-entitled action find the defendant, Cory Bonnett, guilty of murder in the second degree. On the charges of forcible rape we find the defendant guilty. On charges of assault with a deadly weapon upon a police officer we find the defendant guilty.”

The reporters bolted for the nearest telephones. Karl Vonn walked out with them.

“Bailiff,” said Sewell, “please bind the prisoner for transport back to the jail. I’m going to set a sentencing date of September twenty-six. That’s two weeks out. I’ve got some thinking to do and I want the time to do it. I would like to thank the jury again for their patience and insight. Court is adjourned.”

Nick shook hands with the prosecuting attorneys. Shook hands with Lobdell and a couple of detectives. Sent one last long stare back at Cory Bonnett as the bailiff cuffed his hands behind his back.

“THE DEFENDANT will rise.”

Nick watched the sentencing from a seat near the rear exit. Watched the reporters get ready to run for the phones. Funny to see that gaggle and no Andy. PFC Andrew Becker now stationed in Cu Chi province.

Nick watched the Honorable Edgar Sewell behold Cory Bonnett with hard unblinking eyes.

“Mr. Bonnett, I’ve spent some hours thinking about you and what you did. I won’t say I spent any sleepless nights wondering what your sentence should be. Though I spent a sleepless night or two after seeing the pictures of what you did to that girl. For the crime of murder in the second degree I sentence you to forty years in state prison. For the crime of forcible rape I sentence you to twelve years in state prison, to be served consecutively. For the assault with a deadly weapon upon a police officer I sentence you to five years in state prison, to be served consecutively.”

Nick heard the intake of breaths. Edgar Sewell continued to stare down at Bonnett.

“Mr. Bonnett, the California penal code calls what you did a crime of passion. We know that passion can destroy just as surely as it can create. This is a crime of jealousy and fury and waste the likes of which I hope never to hear about in my courtroom again. You will be eligible for parole in fifteen years should you demonstrate such fitness to the Board of Prison Terms. Use that time, Mr. Bonnett, to reflect on the irrevocable damage and horror in what you have done, and upon the great potential you stole from young Janelle Vonn. Use that time to find your God and your soul and see if they can help you find a way back to your humanity again. Mr. Bonnett, you have acted with what the law calls an abandoned and malignant heart. With what remains of your life see if there is anything you can do through which you can earn forgiveness and not just punishment. If not, Mr. Bonnett, we’ll see you in fifty-seven years. Some of us will. I’ll be dead and you’ll be eighty-one years old, which is even older than I am now.”

Nick took the stairs down to the first story. Heard the reporters storming out behind him. Saw Sharon marching toward the DA’s office with an armful of files held to her chest.

He stepped out into the hot September afternoon. White thunderheads towered in the southeast. Up over Yuma, thought Nick. The rain will chase all the doves south. Thought of standing by a Yuma cotton field with his mom and dad and David and Clay and Andy, shotguns ready. And the way Max could spot those birds so far away. Just dots in the sky coming toward them. The boys shaking with excitement and trying to find their safeties and Max chuckling while he swung and dropped a pair that landed right on the railroad tracks. Monika a good shot, too, but her heart wasn’t really in it. David didn’t like the killing. Clay the best shot of the four boys and didn’t mind the killing at all. Andy involved but somehow outside himself, too, watching like he always did, like he’d be tested on it someday.

In Nick’s mind the railroad tracks in Yuma became the railroad tracks running by the SunBlesst orange packinghouse. He knew they always would. Knew the packinghouse would connect to everything that would ever happen to him. As it had since he was sixteen.

He’d closed his first case.

Cost eight men their lives but he’d done it.

Caused immeasurable waves of sorrow and loss but he’d done it.

Cost him his own life but he’d done it.

For Janelle and for himself.