Outrage

20

Although he kept his expression dispassionate, inwardly Karp was seething as he waited for Gilbert Murrow, Pat Davis, and Danielle Cohn to take their seats in his office. Guma, Fulton, and Tommy Mack, the chief of the Homicide Bureau, were already present, the former in his favorite chair, Mack seated near him, and Clay leaning his big frame against a wall.

It was midmorning, the day after his visit to Columbia University and Dale Yancy, a morning that followed a sleepless night. This could have all been so easily avoided, he thought, fuming, with just the smallest bit of patience and attention to detail. But everybody got caught up in the immediacy of the now. The cop wanted the bust. Cohn wanted to take on a big case. And Davis wanted to shine while he was at the top and position himself for when Mack gets his judgeship.

Perhaps, in the initial adrenaline rush of thinking he had the killer in front of him, Graziani had the blinders on so tight that he could see only Acevedo. But his withholding evidence that would have ruled out the ring used in support of Acevedo’s indictment was not just a serious violation of legal procedures, it obstructed justice and inexorably led to false charges being filed against-in all probability-an innocent man.

Karp had looked at Graziani’s personnel file, delivered earlier by Fulton, and saw a mixed bag. Graziani had received commendations for his service and risen in the ranks, though he seemed stuck at detective second grade. Part of that may have been the sorts of small issues that might show up in any detective’s file-complaints about harassment, “police brutality,” and shakedowns. But there was also the glaring accusation that he’d taken DEA-marked money from a drug dealer, which had gotten him transferred from the Two-Six to the Four-Eight without any other repercussions. Probably thanks to the police union, Karp thought. The “thin blue line” mentality makes it tough on occasion to deal with the few bad apples.

However, bad apple or not, Karp’s own people had screwed up big-time, and that bothered him even more than Graziani. As the district attorney of New York County, he was responsible for the six hundred assistant district attorneys who worked for the busiest DAO in the country. Together they faced the daunting challenge of prosecuting those responsible for the fifty thousand violent crimes that occurred annually on the island of Manhattan, including approximately five hundred murders, fifteen hundred rapes, and a multitude of robberies, assaults, and kidnappings. And that didn’t include the caseloads for tens of thousands of other types of nonviolent felonies, such as burglary, larceny, fraud, traffic infractions, and misdemeanor cases.

It was a monumental task, but he’d never believed that was an excuse for sloppy work or ignoring protocol. Since coming into office, he’d insisted on a system of checks and balances that his mentor DA Garrahy had employed but were abandoned or haphazardly enforced by subsequent administrations. Again borrowing from the old man’s style, he’d also brought back what he thought of as the “institutionalization of virtue,” in which the office, and the people who worked for him, would occupy the moral high ground in the administration of justice. And, as he’d been discussing with Guma and Fulton before the others arrived, not just because it was the right thing, but because “our whole system depends on keeping the trust of the public; if we destroy that trust by compromising our ethics, the whole system crumbles.” Now, because of the callous disregard for the law of a rogue cop and recklessness motivated by the personal goals of two members of his staff, the system had been compromised, and he was angry about it.

Actually, Karp had been simmering since leaving Dale Yancy and then gone to full boil within minutes after Marlene arrived home that evening and greeted him with the now all-too-familiar “We need to talk.”

After listening to Marlene and taking a stroll around the block to clear his head, Karp had called Tommy Mack and given him a brief rundown of what had happened. The homicide chief berated himself for getting distracted by the case he was prosecuting, which had gone to the jury that day, and not “riding herd better” on Assistant Bureau Chief Pat Davis and other members of his bureau. But Karp had dismissed the self-criticism; the lack of oversight was one of the disadvantages of insisting that he and his bureau chiefs try cases to keep themselves sharp.

“This one slipped through the cracks,” Karp said. “Now the thing is to correct the problem and then make sure the cracks get filled in. I have an appointment first thing in the morning, but let’s meet at about ten and have Davis and Cohn join us at about eleven.”

He then called Murrow and gave him the same briefing. When he was finished, Karp’s administrative chief groaned loudly.

“Spit it out, Gilbert,” Karp said insistently, knowing what was coming.

Gilbert Murrow was a somewhat short and pudgy fellow who favored vests and round, wire-rimmed glasses that gave him the appearance of a research librarian. One of Murrow’s roles was to act as Karp’s liaison with the media; as such he sometimes complained that he was the only one in the office conscious of the fact that the position of district attorney was an elected one.

If there was a problem with the case, the press could be expected to make his life unpleasant. “At the risk of the slap-down I know I’m going to get,” he said, “I was just contemplating how the media is going to react. They’ve been running Columbia U Slasher newspaper exposes and television specials since Acevedo’s arrest. They’ve as much as convicted him. Now they’re going to look like fools who sensationalized this, and who do you think they’re going to take this out on?”

“Please spare me the rhetorical questions,” Karp replied, annoyed.

“Us… and more specifically, you, the New York DA who persecutes innocent young men on a whim,” Murrow said. “We’ll all be pilloried, but they’ll also use the tar and feathers on you.”

“And my reaction to what the media says is…?” He could feel Murrow slump into his seat even over the telephone.

“‘Who gives a rat’s ass.’”

“Right,” Karp said. “But it’s okay, Gilbert, it’s your job to give one, and I appreciate it. But the day I run this office according to how I’m going to be treated by the media instead of what’s right is the day I should be removed from this office.”

Murrow sighed again. “Yeah, and you’re right, but I had to say it. So what do you want me to do?”

Karp thought about it for a moment. His first reaction was to say “Our only option is to address this mistake as straightforwardly as possible and with transparency,” then another thought crossed his mind and he hesitated. “I want to sleep on it,” he said, and told his friend to show up in his office at eleven.

When the three new arrivals were seated, Karp looked from face to face, noting the apprehension on the visages of Davis and Cohn. Murrow just looked resigned.

“Okay, let’s get started,” Karp said. “I want to talk about the Yancy-Jenkins case, and the first thing I’ll say is that in the end, I take the blame for this fiasco.” He noticed Cohn shoot a quick glance at Davis. “Yes, ‘fiasco,’ and that’s putting it kindly. But as I said, the buck stops here. Apparently, I have not adequately expressed that the way we conduct business in this office is nonnegotiable.”

Karp let the comments sink in as the color drained from Davis’s face and Cohn’s expression went rigid. Guma studied his cigar as Fulton gazed up at the ceiling and Mack leaned forward with his elbows on his knees and hands clasped in front, as if praying that his subordinates could come up with some reasonable explanations.

Holding up two fingers, Karp stated categorically, “Let me emphasize again the gold standard around here. We need two things before we proceed with any case. The first is: are we absolutely, one thousand percent convinced that the defendant is factually guilty? Two: do we have legally admissible evidence to prove beyond any and all doubt that the defendant committed the crime?” He shook his head. “We didn’t meet either one of those criteria in Yancy-Jenkins.”

Karp then gutted the case, starting with his examination of the case file, noting the absence of a DD-5 regarding the provenance of the ring. He then moved on to the visit to see Dale Yancy, and finally the results of his wife’s investigation. “Before I even get to the ring,” he said, “I have several issues that should have raised red flags. Let’s start with the confession. Where’s the narrative?”

No one responded, so he went on. “Detective Graziani asked a lot of leading questions, particularly when the suspect didn’t give the ‘correct answer’ to the original question or balked,” he said. “All detectives do that to an extent to flesh out the details of a confession, but not until after the suspect has given a narrative-‘Here’s where I was, what I did, how I did it’-of what happened. But here there was no narrative against which we could have sought some corroboration. In fact, more often than not, Graziani provided the answers when he asked the questions.”

Karp picked up the case file folder that was lying on his desk and turned to a page in the transcript he’d earmarked. “For instance, this is a passage where Acevedo has just told Graziani that the deceased, Olivia Yancy, was his girlfriend, which he later will admit was a lie. So Graziani asks him if he and Yancy had been having ‘kinky sex and it got out of hand.’ I’m reading now from page three of the transcript of the statement the defendant gave to Detective Graziani.

“Acevedo’s answer: ‘No. We don’t have sex.’

“Graziani’s leading question: ‘But you tied her up and put duct tape over her mouth?’

“Answer: ‘I guess.’

“Question: ‘You guess? Or you know?’

“Answer: ‘I know.’

“Question: ‘And you cut her clothes off with your knife.’”

Karp stopped reading for a moment and looked at Cohn and Davis. “I’m sure you recognize that Graziani is supplying information to Acevedo that only someone with knowledge of the crime scene would have.” When the two nodded he continued. “Graziani has just told, not asked, the suspect if he cut the victim’s clothes off her with a knife. And Acevedo answered, ‘Yes.’” Karp looked up from the transcript.

“He admitted the same things to me,” Cohn pointed out.

“You’re absolutely right,” Karp agreed. “Nearly word for word.”

“An indication of truthfulness,” Davis suggested.

“Maybe,” Karp conceded. “Or that he memorized what he was led to say.”

“I wasn’t leading him in the Q amp; A,” Cohn said, “when I questioned him.”

“You’re right,” Karp said. “Your Q amp; A was right out of the book. But it was already too late; he knew what to say.”

“He’s not like one of those guys who confesses to things he didn’t do for the publicity,” Cohn said. “He tried to run from the cops when they stopped him. And he first denied everything-the Bronx case, our case. He was trying to avoid being caught, not give himself up.”

Karp nodded. “However, he didn’t put up much of a fight. Basically, Graziani would ask a question, the suspect would answer, the detective would then tell him he was wrong and suggest what the correct answer would be, and Acevedo would agree.”

“But isn’t it normal for a perp to lie the first time they’re asked?” Cohn asked.

“And maybe he’s just not a good liar, or he feels guilty,” Davis said. “So all it takes is a little push in the right direction.”

“Could be,” Karp replied. “But there’s a difference between a push in the right direction and being told what to say. I’ve been informed that the defendant has a history of confessing to minor offenses at his school and possibly even misdemeanor vandalism.”

“That’s a long way from confessing to murder,” Cohn said.

“Right again,” Karp said. “But it’s certainly something we should have checked out. Has anybody bothered to ask Detective Fulton if he could have one of his detectives run this stuff down?”

Silence. Karp thought for a moment before continuing. “I also have a problem with Graziani lying to Acevedo about there being a witness who saw him leave the Yancy apartment building.”

“The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that police officers can lie, or use trickery, to get a suspect to admit the truth,” Davis said. “Cops do it all the time. Such as telling a suspect that he’s been caught on surveillance video or that he left a fingerprint at the scene of the crime.”

Karp pursed his lips and looked around the room. Tommy Mack had buried his face in his hands and was shaking his head. Guma grimaced, closed his eyes, and stuck a cigar in his mouth. Fulton was watching Davis like he expected him to burst into flames. But Murrow just shot the assistant chief and Cohn dirty looks; he knew who he had to blame for the coming media storm.

Very carefully, his voice clipped and hard, Karp leaned forward to look Davis in the eye and said, “I know what the courts have ruled and that it’s common practice with cops and in a lot of DAOs, but there’s a difference between what we can get away with and what’s right. It’s not even worth the damage it will do to you at trial.”

“What do you mean?” Davis asked.

“When the detective eventually takes the stand, we have the obligation to present to the jury all the relevant facts and circumstances regarding the defendant’s confession, including the detective’s tricky tactics, if any,” Karp said. “The defense will then attempt to focus the jury on the detective’s deceit, trying to make a collateral issue into a giant big deal, maybe even the central focus. So instead of keeping the jury’s focus on the defendant’s guilt, the jurors may be led to equate the detective’s deceit with everything done investigatively. We don’t want the jurors thinking, If he was capable of manipulating the defendant into confessing with lies, what’s to stop him from manipulating us with lies?”

Davis tried to respond. “I thought our job was to get at the truth. What’s the harm if it accomplishes that?”

Karp had had enough and pounded his desk with his hand. “What harm?” he growled. “Damn it, Pat, what harm is there in lying to get at the truth? Are you listening to yourself? Lies and cheating to win a verdict are corrupting agents that eat at the foundation of the entire system. And that foundation is the public’s trust, which will be further eroded: You can’t trust cops. You can’t trust the district attorney’s office. Who can we trust?”

Pale and sweating, Davis started to mumble a reply, but Karp held up a hand. “Enough! I let this go on as a reminder that this case is a perfect example of why we bring such cases to the Monday bureau meetings, where we can ask these sorts of questions and make sure we’ve done our job professionally and thoroughly. But all of this back-and-forth now over missing narratives, leading questions, and the ethics of lying is moot. It’s yesterday’s news as far as I’m concerned.”

Standing to look out the large window beside his desk at the busy street below, Karp then turned to face Davis and Cohn. “Now, does someone want to explain to me why no one in this office bothered to corroborate the single most important piece of evidence in this case, or noticed that the investigating detective apparently had not, either?”

“Acevedo confessed that he took it from Olivia Yancy,” Cohn said weakly.

Karp glared at her for a moment before responding. “He was led to say that by Graziani and then he just repeated it to you. And nobody bothered to check it out-the only piece of evidence we had to ascertain the credibility and trustworthiness of the confession. Instead, we just went ahead and presented the case to the grand jury and obtained an indictment against Acevedo, who, as far as I can see, is an innocent man.”

“He’s not necessarily innocent because this wasn’t the ring taken from Olivia,” Davis argued. “Maybe he mixed up which ring he took from which victim.”

“Unfortunately for that theory, his story checks out,” Karp replied. “Acevedo bought it from a guy in the park who’d stolen it from a woman. And unlike our so-called evidence, this was corroborated. And the ring was the only thing that tied Acevedo to the murders of Olivia Yancy and Beth Jenkins.”

“He was identified by an assault victim in the Bronx,” Cohn said. “And confessed to that other murder-Dolores Atkins.”

“Just as Acevedo’s confession to Graziani and the Q amp; A with you is worthless,” Karp said, “I suspect the confessions in the Bronx are as well. I have no idea about the validity of that witness’s ID, but the way this case has plunged downhill, I’d strongly suspect that too.”

Karp looked over at Guma. “So, Ray, what do you think we should do now?”

Guma inspected his cigar for a moment and shrugged. “I think we need to DOR the case,” he said.

Karp nodded. “Yeah, I thought of that, and if dismissing the case on his own recognizance would get Acevedo out of jail, I’d agree we should do it right now. Unfortunately, it wouldn’t do him any good. The Bronx DAO still has a hold on him for its cases, and he’s not going anywhere. My thought was to hold off, at least until the Bronx DA decides what they’re going to do, so we don’t tip off the real killer that we’re now still looking for him. Maybe he makes a mistake. In the end, the only way we recover from this is to catch and convict the son of a bitch who butchered those women.”

Pat Davis stood up. “You’ll have my resignation by this afternoon.”

It took Karp a moment to consider the offer. “You do what works for you, Pat,” he said. “You’re a good attorney, and I’d rather not lose you. But I also can’t let this one slide-there’s too much at stake and quite simply, you knew better. So if you choose to stay, I’ll be transferring you to the Felony Trial Bureau, where you’ll work under close supervision for the time being.”

Davis blinked back tears as his Adam’s apple bobbed up and down; he swallowed hard and nodded. Karp turned his attention to Cohn. “Danielle, I believe your mistakes were the result of inexperience. Right now, you will be assigned to assist Ray Guma full-time on the Yancy-Jenkins case. And I hope you’ll learn from this.”

Cohn bit her lip and then bowed her head. “I will. And I look forward to working with Ray.”

“We’ll see if you still feel that way after actually spending a lot of time in his company,” Karp said with a half smile.

“Hey, why am I always the fall guy…,” Guma said, laughing.

“Typecasting?” Mack replied.

When the others left his office, Karp’s intercom buzzed. “District Attorney Sam Hartsfield is on line two,” Milquetost announced.

“Hello, Sam, what’s shaking up north?” Karp said.

“My esteemed colleague the district attorney of New York County, Mr. Roger ‘Butch’ Karp, I presume.” Hartsfield chuckled. “My belly shakes a bit but that’s about the extent of it in the beautiful borough of the Bronx.”

Karp laughed. While Detective Clay Fulton had played fullback in college and was a big muscular man, Sam “Dump Truck” Hartsfield had been the starting left tackle at Tulane, and he made Clay look svelte. His playing weight had been 310 pounds, and that had gone up considerably when he gave up the NFL for law school. He did, indeed, have a belly that shook.

“I believe you called,” Hartsfield said. “How you doing, Butch? Long time no see.”

“I’m doing well, Sam, thanks for asking,” Karp replied. He genuinely liked Hartsfield. He was a few years younger than Karp, but Hartsfield had spent his formative prosecutorial years under legendary DA Francis Garrahy, and the old man’s ethics were ingrained in him, too. The two men thought much alike when it came to how best to run their respective offices and the role of a district attorney in the system. Both were competitive men who’d played major college sports but understood that their job wasn’t about wins and losses in the courtroom. The only game that mattered was justice. As a matter of fact, as cornball as it seemed to the young Turks entering the justice system, and even to the ring-wise old hands, Karp started every summation by reminding the twelve jurors “that a trial is a search for the truth. A sacred, solemn search for the truth under the rules of evidence.”

“Good, good,” Hartsfield said. “Your message said you had some questions about the Dolores Atkins case and the suspect Felix Acevedo?”

“That would be the one,” Karp said. “If I can be blunt, what’s the status of your cases?”

“Well, I believe we’re set for a preliminary hearing next week,” Hartsfield said. “I’m told that the lead detective, an old hand named Phil Brock, wanted to run down a few things.”

Karp frowned. “I haven’t read much about your cases,” he said, “but I understand Acevedo confessed to the Atkins murder before he confessed to our double murder case?”

“That’s correct,” Hartsfield said. “And to the assault of another woman, too; the cops initially picked him up on assault.”

“And don’t you have a witness-the assault victim, if I’m not mistaken-who ID’d him in a lineup?” Karp asked.

“That’s true,” Hartsfield replied. “But it was a pretty shaky ID. At first she wasn’t sure; then she thought it could be one of two guys-one a cop and the other our suspect. She asked if she could hear them repeat the threat he used; that’s when she ID’d Acevedo and said she thought he was the one. But she admitted that she never really got a good look at him and I expect any decent defense lawyer is going to hit that hard. We didn’t find any physical evidence on him, or in his things at his parents’ apartment, that tied him to our homicide victim, Dolores Atkins. Not like that engagement ring; you have an ace on the table with that.”

“How well do you know this detective Phil Brock?” Karp asked.

“Well, I’ve worked with him directly on a dozen cases over the years,” Hartsfield said. “Nothing flashy, but methodical and doesn’t cut corners. Avoids the press like the plague. Just does his job and does it well. He’s got to be getting close to retirement.”

“My kind of cop,” Karp said. “They make the best witnesses on the stand, too.”

“I agree,” Hartsfield replied. He paused for a moment. “What’s this about, Butch?”

Once again, Karp quickly explained what was happening with the Yancy-Jenkins case. “You might want to hold off on that hearing, Sam,” he said. “I know you have a problem because of the witness’s ID, but I think the confessions are pure fantasy. It might be worth it to let me and my guys sift through this before you end up having to dismiss the charges after the fact.”

“Whew, I don’t envy you the hell you’re going to catch,” Hartsfield said. “But thanks for the heads-up. You’ll keep me in the loop?”

“Absolutely,” Karp replied. “In the meantime, if you decide to dismiss, let me know. I don’t want to unnecessarily tip off the killer, but I’d also like to get Acevedo out of jail if he’s not the right guy for your cases either.”

“You got it,” Hartsfield replied. “When this is over, let’s get together; been a while since we’ve had a chance to catch up. Maybe take in a Yankee game. I have some choice tickets to the Red Sox game in a few weeks if you’d be interested.”

“That would be a pleasure,” Karp replied. “Always get a kick seeing the Bronx Bombers beat up on the Sox.”