Fury

31

Tuesday, January 25

The next morning, Karp was surprised to see Liz Tyler standing outside the courtroom without her police escort.

"I told them it wasn't necessary," she said when he asked. "I said it was fine if they just got me past the crowds at the screening area. They have better things to do than shepherd me around like I was in kindergarten. I don't know, maybe I'm starting to feel stronger."

"Have you given any thought to what you'll do when this is over?"

Tyler looked surprised, as if the question had never occurred to her. "I don't really think that far ahead, Mr. Karp. I know I must seem so weak to you. I know other women have survived what I went through and gone on with their lives, whatever that means. But if my life ended tomorrow, I wouldn't be sad. I'm tired of being afraid all of the time, Mr. Karp."

"Butch," he said.

Tyler smiled. "Butch… I think that's why I couldn't deal with resuming my life with my husband and child. I was afraid-not of what might happen to me, but that something might happen to them and I'd be powerless to do anything about it. Just like I was powerless that morning when Jayshon Sykes and the others raped me."

"You remember?" Karp asked.

Tyler hesitated. "I won't take the stand, if that's what you mean," she said. "I couldn't…and it probably wouldn't help you anyway. I'm sure Mr. Louis would soon have me confused. And to be honest, I still have a hard time differentiating what is nightmare and what was reality. But I remember Sykes was the one who first grabbed me and dragged me under the pier by my hair. And I remember…" She started to cry. "…I remember him on top of me but he couldn't…he couldn't finish, so he hit me again. The others…I remember faces and being raped, but it was as if I were crawling into a shell…they could have my body but they couldn't have me."

The last statement came out as a sob. Hesitantly, Karp put his arm around her, felt her tense and then relax against his chest. After a minute, she pulled back. "I'm sorry, but I think I needed that," she said and gave him her tiny smile. "I've never been able to find my way back out of that shell, Mr… Butch. It's like I'm living in a body that doesn't belong to me anymore."

As he began to present the defense case that morning, Karp briefly touched the damp spot on his jacket where Tyler's tears had soaked in. "Your honor, the defense calls Jack Swanburg to the stand."

Karp looked toward the back of the courtroom where a short, rotund man wearing bright green suspenders to hold up his pants entered. Swanburg looked a little like Santa Claus with his flowing white hair and beard, merry blue eyes, and a round belly that Karp suspected did, indeed, shake like a bowl full of jelly. However, Karp knew that the man's mild appearance belied his reputation as one of the country's foremost forensic scientists, a freelancer from Colorado who made his living examining forensic evidence for both prosecutors and defense lawyers.

On the witness stand, Karp quickly established that the man was a doctor of pathology with expertise in a variety of forensic disciplines, "including blood-splatter analysis, bite-mark identification, forensic photography, ballistics, and dactylography…better known as fingerprint analysis."

"Is there anything you're not an expert in?" Karp asked with a smile.

"Well, you'd have to ask my wife, Connie," Swanburg replied with a chuckle. "I'm not too handy around the house."

"Doctor, can you tell the jury how many cases you've testified in?"

"Nearly three thousand."

"For the prosecution or defense?"

"Both. I like to think that I testify on behalf of the truth," Swanburg said. "There have been times when my testimony has worked against my employer. They all know going in that I will report my findings as a man of science-without prejudice."

"Dr. Swanburg, have you studied the evidence in this case?"

"I have looked at everything-the reports and photographs, as well as the physical evidence-that I was given," Swanburg said carefully.

"Fair enough, Dr. Swanburg," Karp said, approaching the witness stand and handing Swanburg "a photograph marked as People's Exhibit 24 J from the criminal trial of the plaintiffs. Can you tell the jury what it depicts?"

"Yes, I can," Swanburg said. "It's a photograph of a bite mark on the left breast of a woman. And according to the tag on the back that woman was…Mrs. Liz Tyler."

"And what can you tell us about what it shows?"

"Well," Swanburg said, speaking to the jury, "in some ways, a clear bite mark such as the one in the photograph can be used like a fingerprint to identify who it belonged to, especially if there are particularly significant characteristics."

"Thank you, Dr. Swanburg," Karp said, retrieving the photograph and handing it to the jury to look at. "Now, did you get a chance to match the bite mark in that photograph with the dental records of Mr. Enrique Villalobos?"

"Yes," Swanburg said. "I examined the X-rays taken in the prison dental office during a routine checkup."

Louis almost knocked over his chair standing up. "Objection. Whatever tomfoolery is going on regarding this bite mark, these records were obtained without a proper search warrant or notification to counsel."

Karp silently thanked Harry Kipman. "To the contrary, your honor," he said. "We obtained the records with a subpoena duces tecum and notified counsel, all as part of our pretrial motions. However, Mr. Louis made no objection at that time. I guess he must have missed it."

"I'll allow it," Klinger said, though it was clear she wasn't happy.

Karp handed Swanburg a set of X-rays. "Are these the dental records you examined?"

Swanburg nodded. "Yes. You'll notice that Mr. Villalobos has protruding incisors-somewhat rodentlike."

The courtroom erupted with laughter as Louis again jumped to his feet. "I object to that characterization-obviously planted by the defense."

Before Klinger could respond, Swanburg apologized. "I'm sorry, your honor, I did not mean to disparage Mr. Villalobos. I was just trying to characterize…describe the sort of bite pattern his teeth would leave. I withdraw the comment." He smiled so innocently that even the judge smiled back.

"Very well, Dr. Swanburg…but do try to limit your comments to less…uh, disparaging descriptions…and stick to the science."

"Good advice, your honor, I should know better," Swanburg said and turned to beam at the jurors. "So let me rephrase that… Mr. Villalobos's incisors protrude, which would give an elongated bite pattern."

"Could he have created the bite mark on Ms. Tyler's breast?" Karp asked.

"Objection," Louis said. "Calls for conclusion."

Karp rolled his eyes. "Your honor, Dr. Swanburg has been admitted as an expert witness in this field. Of course, he's going to reach a conclusion."

"The witness may answer the question."

"Yes, certainly. No, Mr. Villalobos could not have created that particular bite mark."

"Thank you, Mr. Swanburg," Karp said. "Let's move on." He walked over to the podium where he flipped a couple of switches, darkening the courtroom and starting a slide projector that pointed to a screen off to the jury's side. A photograph appeared showing the side of a woman's head. The face was swollen and discolored, a large white patch over her eye. "Can you identify this photograph for the jury, please."

"Yes," Swanburg said. "It is a photograph taken of Mrs. Tyler's head, I believe the day after the assault."

Karp used an electronic pointer to indicate a long, straight purple mark on the side of Tyler's skull just above her ear. "Can you identify this mark?"

"Yes, it is a severe contusion-a bruise, in layman's terms," Swanburg replied. "It is approximately five inches long and a half-inch wide. It is the result of a blow with a blunt object that also fractured the victim's skull, somewhat like tapping an egg with a butter knife to crack it open."

Karp pressed the projector button and another photograph appeared on the screen. "And this?"

"It is a blowup-greatly enhanced and sharpened with the aid of the equipment at my lab in Colorado."

"What can you tell us about this photograph that we perhaps could not see in the first version?" Karp asked.

"Well, the most significant thing is the pattern of ridges along the main contusion," Swanburg said. "Notice their regularity."

"And what does that tell us?"

"It tells us that to a high probability, the object used to administer the blow was man-made," Swanburg said.

Suddenly realizing the implications, Louis, who'd all but ignored Swanburg's reports in the pretrial hearings, objected as he wiped furiously at his face with his handkerchief. "Your honor, what is this high probability? Sounds like guesswork to me."

The judge turned to Swanburg. "Care to answer?"

"Well, yes," Swanburg said, sounding somewhat miffed that Louis had referred to his efforts as guesswork. "Very little in this world, even the world of science, is 100 percent sure. I'd say this is about 98 percent."

"I'll allow it," Klinger said with a sigh and a disgusted look at Louis.

"Could this contusion have been caused by, say, a piece of driftwood?" Karp asked.

The judge looked at Louis as if she expected him to object. But he just waved her on.

Swanburg shook his head. "No…very unlikely. The contusion is too straight, the pattern of ridges too regular to have been created by Mother Nature."

Karp picked up the bag with the piece of rebar he'd shown Villalobos and handed it to the witness. "Dr. Swanburg, are you familiar with the object contained in this bag?"

Swanburg looked carefully at the bag and the evidence slip on the back. "Yes, I am. It is a piece of half-inch steel rebar, approximately thirteen and a half inches long."

"How are you familiar with it?" Karp asked.

"Well, I have one just like it."

"Oh? And why is that?

"Because I was asked to see if I could duplicate the injury to Mrs. Tyler, using an exact copy of the piece of rebar in the People's exhibit."

"How did you go about that?"

"My associates and I used our copy of the rebar to strike the sides of pigs."

"Pigs, Dr. Swanburg?" Karp said as though surprised. "Why pigs?"

"Well, we use pigs quite a bit in forensic testing," Swanburg said. "It might be a bit embarrassing to some of us, but pigs are nearly identical to humans in the chemical makeup of their bodies, as well as certain physical characteristics. For instance, their skin is nearly hairless and reacts to injury much like ours."

"Now, Dr. Swanburg, I'm noting that some of our jurors are looking a bit squeamish," Karp said. "Did you hurt these pigs?"

Swanburg looked worried. "Well, in the sense that delivering a blow hard enough to cause a contusion, which means the breaking of blood vessels and injuring the skin-I guess you could say we hurt the pigs. However, the pigs were anesthetized during the procedure, and then given painkillers until the bruising went away. We take good care of our little piggies. They spend most of their time wandering the grounds and eating."

Karp smiled. "So then, doctor, what was the result of your experiment?"

"Please turn to the next slide. Ah yes, there…this is a photograph of a contusion caused by striking a pig with our piece of steel rebar. Note the long, straight bruise with the evenly spaced ridges."

"Dr. Swanburg, in your expert opinion, could an object such as the People's Exhibit have created the contusion we saw on the side of Ms. Tyler's head?"

Louis roared as he jumped to his feet. "I object. Why was I not told of this experiment? I demand that this so-called evidence be thrown out and the defense counsel censured for attempting to sneak false evidence into this trial."

Karp smiled. Here was the reason for not asking for any adjournments. Louis was lazy and now he was going to pay for it. "Your honor, I believe if plaintiffs' counsel will refer to his notebooks, Defense Exhibits 30-45, he will see that he received this evidence nearly two weeks ago. Again, he made no objection in any one of a half-dozen pretrial hearings after that date."

Stunned, Louis turned to his notebooks. "Give me a moment, your honor." Turning to the specified pages, he mopped at his face, then smiled broadly. "Oh, yes," he said. "Now I remember. We didn't consider this important at the time, nor do we now. Please continue, doctor."

After the lunch recess, Swanburg returned to the stand. Karp looked back at the row of benches behind his table. Repass, Russell, and Torrisi were in their seats but Tyler was missing. Good, he thought. He'd told her she might want to miss the afternoon's testimony, and she'd taken his advice.

The reason was soon clear as he put up on the screen a frontal photograph of Tyler's nude body taken after the attack. Swanburg pointed out the bruising on her arms and legs.

The next photograph was a close-up of the bruising on Tyler's legs. "Can you give us an opinion, doctor, on what caused these marks?"

"Yes, you can see the pattern left by hands as they held her down. She must have struggled quite hard."

Karp put another photograph on the screen. A close-up of Tyler's chest-with the bite mark clearly evident-as well as her upper arms. "What can you tell us about these bruises?"

"Again, you can see the marks of hands on her arms as though she was being restrained."

"Thank you, Dr. Swanburg, I have no further questions."

Klinger invited Louis to cross-examine the witness. He stood and smiled at the jury, then shook his head as if they'd all been witnesses to some sort of card trick.

"Good afternoon, Dr. Swanburg. I won't keep you or these good people long, but let's review by starting with the bite mark. Is it possible that more than one person in this world might have teeth like that?"

"Well, yes," Swanburg said. "There are any number. However, given that one of-"

"Thank you, Dr. Swanburg, I'd appreciate it if you'd just answer the question I ask rather than try to continue to testify for the defense."

"I was trying to answer the question completely."

"And I can appreciate that but it's also true the defense hired you to appear here today, isn't that so?"

"Yes."

"And they-or I guess I should say the taxpayers of New York-are paying you the handsome fee of $550 an hour, plus expenses."

"Well, yes, but my fees are in line with-"

"Just a yes or no will suffice, doctor."

"Yes, that's all true."

"Thank you. Now, let's move on to the object that was used to strike Ms. Tyler. I believe you testified that it is 'unlikely' that something created by nature, such as a piece of driftwood, would have caused that bruise. But it doesn't rule it out, now does it?"

"No."

"And is there anything on that piece of rebar from the trial that links my clients-who by the way are not on trial here-to it?"

"No."

Karp let Louis make his little speeches and asides without objecting. He was hoping that the lawyer would gain confidence and walk into his trap. Come on, baby, keep walking, he thought.

"Dr. Swanburg, let's for a moment revisit the photographs on the arms of Ms. Tyler," he said. "Now, couldn't these be the marks left by one man who was raping a woman as he held her down?"

"No."

The smile on Louis's face disappeared and reappeared on Karp's.

"No? And why not?"

"Because if you look carefully, you will see that the finger marks were not made by a man having sexual intercourse while lying on top of a woman. They're inverted and were made by someone who was leaning or kneeling at her head and holding her down."

Louis turned away from the jury so as not to reveal that he knew he'd been had. He looked up at Karp and saw the smile. "No further questions."

Karp rose for redirect and the coup de grace. "Dr. Swanburg, what conclusions can you draw from the bruises?"

"That at least three men participated in holding down the victim," Swanburg said. "One on each of her legs and one, as I said, at her head."

Karp nodded. "No further questions."

The rest of the day Karp spent playing the confessions of the plaintiffs. By the time he turned off the video machine, the jurors looked like they'd been beaten themselves. He'd refrained from commenting-if he felt it necessary, he could do that during closing arguments and summation-but for now, the videos demonstrated that the Coney Island Four were not browbeaten or intimidated. There were no big cops hovering over them or yelling in their faces. And he'd ended the session with Desmond Davis laughing about what they'd done to "the bitch" and Sykes shouting at the female police officer, "I want to lick your pussy."

Karp went back to his office feeling that he'd scored the major blows in the trial. But there were still some threads that worried him. The physical evidence placing Villalobos at the scene was irrefutable. Also, what if Louis tried to intimate that Kevin Little had assisted Villalobos-hence his reason for turning on the others-but that the remaining Coney Island Four had not participated? He needed Kaminsky. Kaminsky and the letter would be even better, because then he could go after Breman and Klinger for their participation in this travesty. If they could just have found Hannah Little the problem would have been solved, too.

That evening, Karp was looking forward to a little downtime with his family. Zak seemed none the worse for wear and enjoyed telling anyone who'd listen how he told the fearsome terrorist Al-Sistani to "shove it, asshole," until his father had said enough was enough. The only thing that seemed to truly be upsetting the boy was that he'd been warned that under no circumstances could he talk about the incident with anyone but family. Karp had impressed upon him the seriousness of the population of New York learning they'd come within a few minutes of having weapons of mass destruction used against them. For once his son understood the gravity of the situation, even if he had to remain disappointed that the further exploits of Zak Karp had to remain a secret.

Marlene also seemed to have dealt well with her excursion back into the world of violence. "It's how you look at it," she tried to explain. "In John's culture, a warrior avoids violence unless as a last resort, and I think that was about as last a resort as you can get."

Suddenly there was a buzzing at the security door. Karp sighed and went over to press the intercom button. "Yes, may I help you?" he asked.

A man's voice, heavily accented, answered. "You are being invited to a meeting with an old friend tonight."

Karp raised his eyebrows and looked at Marlene, who shrugged.

"And where am I supposed to meet this friend?" Karp asked with a laugh.

"Not just you…the presence of your wife is also requested."

"Well, that's even better. But as I said, when and where am I supposed to meet my old friend?"

"Midnight at Battery Park near the Staten Island ferry dock."

"Okay, I'm game. Who is this friend?"

"I can't say, other than he asks you to remember the pieces of candy he gave you as a child."

Suddenly Karp took notice. Uncle Vladimir? But why the secret midnight meeting? "Did he say why I might be interested in this meeting?"

"You wish to meet Igor Kaminsky, no?"

Marlene's jaw dropped as Karp said, "No, I wish to meet him, yes."

"Then midnight at Battery Park."

"Wait!" Karp yelled, but there was no other response. He and Marlene hurried over to the window and looked down. A large man jumped in the driver's side of a big, dark, but otherwise nondescript American sedan and immediately sped off.

"Well?" Marlene asked.

"I hear Battery Park is very romantic in the subzero cold on a dark night when the chance of frostbite is ridiculously high," he said.

"Karp, you sweet-talking devil, I'm in," she replied.