Genesis

Chapter 19

May 9th

10:35 A.M.

So that’s the long and short of it,” Laurie said to Dr. George Fontworth, who had been appointed two years ago to serve as the deputy chief medical examiner under Laurie, replacing Paul Plodget. At first she had been disappointed with the selection because she and Jack had never believed George lived up to his potential. He had stellar credentials, perhaps the best of the OCME, having been trained by some of the forensic greats, but he had been content seemingly to do mediocre work over the years as one of the staff MEs. But to Laurie’s pleasant surprise, the appointment as deputy chief had lit a fire under the man to the point that she had to give the Selection Committee credit for seeing his potential. Particularly over the past year, he turned out to be a huge asset to her on multiple fronts. Jack had labeled the transition astounding.

“Any questions, George?” she asked. They were in Laurie’s office, she behind her huge desk and George seated across from her. The desk was a partner’s desk, so for meetings such as this one, the seating arrangement was natural. For meetings involving more people, Laurie preferred to use the large library table she had at the other end of her office that had adequate space for up to ten people. For meetings of that size, they had to raid other offices for chairs.

“I can only think of one question,” George said. His expression was appropriately serious in respect to what Laurie had just told him. “How long do you think you will be hospitalized?”

“That’s hard to say,” she said. “Of course, I’d like it to be the minimum possible, but it all depends on what is found.”

“I understand,” George said solemnly.

Laurie had just finished telling George that she had made plans within the hour to undergo semi-emergency surgery. As soon as she’d got to the OCME that morning, she’d put in a call to Dr. Claudine Cartier, one of the NYU Langone Medical Center’s busiest surgeons, who specialized in breast surgery. She had been highly recommended by the oncologist Dr. Wayne Herbert, who had in turn been recommended several years ago by Dr. Sue Passero, Laurie’s internist and old college chum. She had already briefly spoken with Claudine Cartier the previous day after getting the bad news from the screening and had been told she had to make the decision as to how to approach the biopsy dilemma. When Dr. Cartier had returned the call that morning, Laurie had told her she had decided to deal with the suspicious lump with the “Angelina Jolie approach,” namely with bilateral mastectomies and an oophorectomy. Laurie had already had one ovary and one fallopian tube removed years earlier when she’d had an ectopic pregnancy. Her only other wish was to do the procedure as soon as possible. Dr. Cartier said she understood, would check her schedule, and get back to Laurie, probably that afternoon, about when it could be done. Optimistically she’d added that the chances of scheduling the operation within the next few days were very good because she’d had several cancellations due to patients having influenza.

“I’ll be letting everyone know as soon as the operation is scheduled,” Laurie said. “I wanted to tell you first since you’ll be the one shouldering most of the burden. There is nothing key scheduled except for the need to finalize the plans for the new Forensic Pathology center so it can be sent out to bid. But even that can wait. Thank goodness I got the City Council Health Committee meeting out of the way yesterday. I wouldn’t have wanted you to suffer through that.”

“I still might have to, after what happened last night,” George said.

“I certainly hope not,” she said, although she knew there was a slight chance. That morning when Laurie got to the OCME, intending to call the surgeon immediately, she had to deal with another mild calamity first by having a lengthy and unpleasant meeting with the director of the Mortuary/Transportation Department. Even though at the City Council Health Committee meeting the day before she’d testified that the problem of bodies being misdirected had been solved with the changes that she’d instigated to the case management system, it had happened again, just last night. Similar to the previous episode, the deceased shared the same family name. This time it was Cooper. However, they did not share the first name as had been the case with the two Nortons, so the incident highlighted pure, unadulterated mismanagement on the part of the responsible mortuary technician. On this occasion it was an Arlene Cooper and an Alan Cooper, meaning they didn’t even share the same gender. Luckily the mix-up was immediately discovered by the first funeral home, so the involved families remained in the dark about their loved ones taking one extra final ride before their funerals.

George pushed back from the desk and stood; Laurie did the same.

“I want to thank you in advance for what you’ll be doing,” Laurie said. She was genuinely grateful, and it was going to be one thing less to worry about with George at the helm while she was in the hospital and convalescing at home if that was necessary.

“I’m here to help you, Laurie. We will all want you to be back as soon as you can. I hope all goes smoothly.”

“I appreciate your thoughts and well-wishes,” she said as she accompanied George to the door. “I’ll keep you up to speed as things develop. Until I make an announcement, I would prefer that you keep what I’ve said to yourself.”

“It goes without saying,” George said. “Will you be at this afternoon’s conference?”

“I certainly plan to,” Laurie said.

After George walked across the outer office and into his own, Laurie called out to Cheryl that she was expecting Dr. Nichols and to send her right in. In anticipation, she left her door ajar.

Returning behind her desk, she sat down. She needed a little breathing time as it had been nonstop activity since she’d arrived. But it wasn’t to be. Almost the moment she sank into her desk chair Aria walked through the open door. Curious whether their time together the day before doing the autopsy would influence Aria’s haughty, almost aggressively hostile attitude, Laurie watched her from the moment she appeared. Most people were mildly intimidated by the size of the office in conjunction with Laurie’s lofty title. But not Aria. She didn’t so much as glance at her, nor did she seem to survey the scene. Instead she just marched in and plopped herself down into the seat that George had just vacated as if it were her office, not Laurie’s. Only then did she look across the desk at Laurie with an expression of contemptuous boredom. With some effort Laurie controlled her irritation.

The two women eyed each other for a moment, each expecting the other to break the silence. Laurie was the first to respond. “After working together yesterday, don’t I deserve at least a ‘Hello, Dr. Montgomery’?”

“You’re the one who asked me to come here, not the other way around.”

“I suppose you’re right,” Laurie said, inwardly smiling at her own behavior. It wasn’t like her to have such petty thoughts. She reminded herself she was dealing with an individual with obvious psychological problems, which was one of the reasons she had requested to see her. That morning, like almost every morning, Laurie made what she called autopsy chief rounds. Just after nine she’d gone down to the pit despite how busy she was and went from table to table to hear extemporaneous presentations by each medical examiner of the case they were doing. The overt justification for the exercise was the idea of her possibly adding some bit of knowledge or experience to the case. For the newer MEs and the Forensic Pathology fellows, this often was helpful and educational, less so for the more experienced. But for Laurie, it was a pleasure as well as an acknowledgment of how much she missed participating in the nitty-gritty of forensic pathology these days. Around 9:15 as she was nearing table #1, the table that Jack invariably used, she became aware of Aria’s presence. Although it sounded as if things were going okay with Jack lecturing and Aria seemingly listening, which surprised her, she didn’t want to be the spark that might set off a major conflagration between two potentially flammable personalities. So she deliberately avoided table #1 or even advertising her presence by saying hello. Yet her curiosity had been aroused. When she got back to her office a few minutes later, she sent Aria a text that she wanted to see her. Finding out why she and Jack had not been at each other’s throats was just one of the reasons why.

“How is your day going?” Laurie asked.

“That’s what you needed to talk to me about?” Aria asked with obvious disbelief. Small talk to her was clearly a total waste of time.

“I understand you were assigned a gunshot case this morning,” Laurie said. “Did you find it interesting?”

“No! It was a bore,” Aria said. “Dr. Stapleton likes to lecture too much, overly explaining even super-simple stuff.”

“Most people don’t find working with Dr. Stapleton boring,” Laurie said. She couldn’t help but feel a little defensive. She wondered who had been acting out of character. When she had first realized they were together, she’d regretted not telling Chet to avoid pairing them. Yet her concern obviously had been without basis. Her curiosity ratcheted upward.

“Most people are probably reluctant to tell the truth about Jack Stapleton because he is married to the chief,” Aria said.

“Maybe so,” Laurie said to humor her but also thinking there might be some truth to what she had just said. It was an issue she’d not given too much thought. Nonetheless, she couldn’t wait to hear Jack’s side of this strange episode, recognizing that he had to have been on remarkably good behavior for some unknown reason. With that decided, she moved on to the real reason she wanted to see Aria. “Have you made any progress with the Kera Jacobsen case?”

“Some, but not a lot,” Aria said. “Enough to realize I’ve hit somewhat of a brick wall.” Although brick wall was a common term, Aria had found in her reading about genetic genealogy that the field had commandeered the term for problems some people faced while filling out their family trees. Curiously enough, it applied already to Kera’s case even though the genealogy part hadn’t begun.

“You’ll have to explain,” Laurie said.

“I spoke with the MLI on the case as you insisted,” Aria said. “He was helpful in that he put me onto the only two people who might have been able to help me locate Lover Boy: Kera’s close friend and coworker, Madison Bryant, and a nosy, paranoid, misfit neighbor, Evelyn Mabry. I already spoke at length with both of them. By far Madison Bryant was the most helpful. Evelyn Mabry was a dud. She saw Lover Boy on multiple occasions by looking through her peephole but claims she never saw his face. All in all, Lover Boy managed to keep his identity unknown from either one, which has just magnified my suspicions about the guy.”

“So ‘Lover Boy’ is what you’ve decided to call the missing father?” Laurie said.

“Yeah,” Aria said. “Seems appropriate. My sense is that they didn’t do a lot of socializing. I think they just met at her place for sex, which was most likely his decision, not hers, which makes me guess he is married.”

“It seems to me that you are making a lot of assumptions.”

“You wouldn’t think so if you’d been forced by your nanny to watch as many soap operas when you were a kid as I did,” Aria said.

“Perhaps,” Laurie said, feeling sorry for Aria and the kind of childhood she must have had. “But I think I should point out that calling the missing father ‘Lover Boy’ sounds distinctly pejorative. I need to remind you that as the forensic pathologist on the case, you should try to stay neutral and unemotional. Our job is to get at the truth of the manner and cause of death, and let other people cast blame if it’s warranted.”

“To me that’s just a lot of bullshit,” Aria said. “Please, no lectures! I got enough lecturing this morning watching the gunshot autopsy. Maybe maintaining neutrality is the goal you people strive for, but it isn’t realistic. Not for me, and not for your hubby yesterday afternoon. I could hear him and that cop carrying on about how they felt about the shithead that dunked that poor child into a bathtub of scalding water. I feel the same about Lover Boy. I want to find him.”

“On some cases it’s hard to remain emotionally neutral. I give you that. Regardless, the more unemotional you force yourself to remain, the better job you’ll do. Trust me. Forensic pathology is a fantastic resource for a ton of reasons, including helping law enforcement. But it has its limitations, and this Jacobsen tragedy might be one of those cases where it can’t answer all the questions. Unless we learn something unusual from Toxicology or get a surprise about someone else’s fingerprints or DNA on the syringe, I believe we’re going to have to sign it out as an accidental overdose. Tell me, did you do the dictation of the autopsy as you said you would do?”

“No, I didn’t,” Aria said. “I’ll do it this morning. I’ve been busy since we finished yesterday.”

“It’s best to do the dictation immediately after the case to keep from forgetting important details,” Laurie said, hearing the mild accusatory tone in her voice.

“Relax,” Aria said. “I’m not going to forget any details. Trust me.”

“I’ll trust you only after I read the autopsy report, and it is complete,” Laurie told her.

“I spent most of the night studying some new stuff,” Aria said. “I think forensic pathology has a lot more to add to this case. Despite the brick wall, I think it can find Lover Boy.”

“And how do you imagine that might happen?”

“By taking advantage of the fact that the NYU OCME possibly has the biggest and best DNA lab in the world.” Aria moved forward in the chair as evidence of her excitement. “What needs to happen is that the Molecular Genetics Department has to team up with ancestral DNA or genetic genealogy companies. Genetic genealogy has overnight become a powerful tool now that fifteen million people plus have been encouraged by the companies to have their DNA added to the ancestral database.”

For a few beats, Laurie stared at the pathology resident sitting in front of her while she struggled to figure out how to respond. Laurie could immediately sense the woman’s enthusiasm and commitment, which she appreciated and didn’t want to suppress. After all, one of her goals for having done the Kera Jacobsen autopsy with her was to get a struggling resident interested enough in forensics to perform adequately to avoid a potential brouhaha between the NYU Department of Pathology and the NYU Department of Forensic Pathology. Yet the idea of the OCME using ancestral DNA as part of the forensic investigation was inherently flawed, and from an administrative point of view a nonstarter.

“I can sense your disbelief,” Aria said in response to Laurie’s silence. “I have to admit, that was my initial reaction as well. Ironically enough, it was Kera’s friend and coworker who brought up the notion by reminding me of the relatively recent apprehension of the Golden State Killer in California. Do you remember that? It was all over the news.”

“Of course I remember that case,” Laurie said.

“Did you know that they went back to find common great-great-great-grandparents who lived in the early 1800s in order to find the guy? Then they had to construct some twenty-five family trees with thousands of relatives, but they still found him. It’s pretty remarkable when you think about it.”

“I agree,” Laurie said. “But finding the Golden State Killer was different from what we’re facing with Kera Jacobsen. They had the killer’s DNA. It was just a matter of law enforcement matching the DNA with a specific individual.”

“That was exactly my response when Madison Bryant suggested the idea to me,” Aria said. “But I had no idea how this genetic genealogical field has progressed scientifically over just the last few years, and how popular it has become. Overnight it’s practically created a virtual army of homegrown genealogists who are truly dedicated. At first these people were interested in uncovering their personal family tree, but then they seemed to get hooked and now are eager to help other people solve their issues. I think we could get a virtual army working on Kera’s case.”

“Well, that’s all very interesting,” Laurie said. “But there’s a reality here that I must bring to your attention above and beyond the problem of us not having the father’s DNA.”

“We might not have the father’s complete DNA, but with the fetus’s DNA we have fifty percent of it right off the bat. We also have the mother’s DNA, so we don’t have to guess which half of the fetus’s DNA comes from the father. Interestingly enough, this situation turns out to be exactly the same as an individual who was conceived with donor sperm. Many of these people are very interested in finding their genetic fathers if for no other reason than to feel genetically connected. Entire websites and organizations have popped up just to help these people, along with fascinating statistical tools to help them find genetic matches in the vast DNA database, which is expanding on a day-to-day basis. I’m sure that it will work.”

Laurie cleared her throat, not sure how to begin explaining to Aria that her suggestion wasn’t about to happen. With her elbows on the desk, Laurie tented her hands and looked her straight in the eyes. Aria stared back with even more intensity, absolutely confident in what she had just said.

“It sounds to me that you’ve given this idea some serious thought,” Laurie said, wanting not to sound too negative in light of Aria’s zeal.

“You bet your ass,” Aria said. “I stayed up most of the night reading about genetic genealogy. It’s surprisingly complicated stuff, which I am amazed has been absorbed and understood by so many people trained in neither biology nor statistics.”

“I hate to break this to you, Aria, but unfortunately, there is a legal restriction here that is insurmountable.”

“Oh, come on,” Aria snapped. Her mouth dropped open in shock. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

Laurie gritted her teeth at Aria’s choice of words. “I know you like to speak your mind,” she said. “But in my presence, I ask you to refrain from vulgarity.”

Aria rolled her eyes.

“I see you don’t agree,” Laurie said. “Well, be that as it may, I need to tell you that here in New York State we have a Commission of Forensic Science established by law. One of the commission’s major roles is accreditation of DNA laboratories, which is necessary if DNA results are to be accepted in the court of law. The OCME Molecular Genetics laboratory is accredited, as I’m sure you are aware, and we must maintain that accreditation, which requires constant effort. Commercial genealogy companies are not accredited DNA laboratories, and if our lab has anything to do with them, we would instantly lose our accreditation. Do you understand?”

It was now Aria’s turn to stare with disbelief at Laurie.

“Your silence tells me you don’t understand,” Laurie said. “Let me give you an example. In the court of law, evidence must have a clear chain of custody that cannot be challenged. Commercial DNA laboratories accept saliva DNA samples with absolutely no chain of custody. All they have is the consumer’s word of the origin of any given sample. Same with how the sample is treated in their laboratories. Obviously, we here at the OCME have to do it in a completely different fashion. Also, our laboratory has to adhere to specific rules about training and mechanisms to uncover negligence or misconduct. The commercial labs have none of that. We’re two different worlds that cannot work together or interact.”

“I think this sucks,” Aria said. “It’s bureaucratic bullshit. Here’s an opportunity for a major witness to be discovered, and it has to be abandoned. That doesn’t make sense to me. No way!”

“You are entitled to your opinion,” Laurie said. “But that’s the way it has to be. Perhaps we can find another forensic case for you to become interested in pursuing.”

Aria stood up. “I’m not going to give up on this one even if I can’t get the Molecular Genetics lab involved. As you said yesterday, I’m still listening to Kera Jacobsen.”

“Suit yourself,” Laurie said. “But I’d like you to keep me informed of what progress you make and don’t make, and you cannot involve our Molecular Genetics Department. In the meantime, I’d like you to dictate the autopsy report.”

“Okay,” Aria said simply. She stood and walked out without saying goodbye or looking back.

For a few minutes Laurie stared at the open door, replaying some parts of the conversation and marveling anew at Aria’s personality. For a moment, she entertained the idea of giving Jack a call to find out what had transpired during the autopsy he’d done with the woman. She still couldn’t believe there had been no fireworks, knowing what she did about both people. But she didn’t have time for such a personal indulgence, when she was imminently expecting a call from the architects about the new Pathology building.