Dead by Sunset: Perfect Husband, Perfect Killer? (103 page)

court scared him.

He avoided looking at his father.
 
In general, he demonstrated a

remarkable memory.
 
He remembered going from first to third grade in

Riverdale School and living in Dunthorpe.
 
He remembered the big house,

the guest house, and the live-in baby-sitters.
 
He remembered Tampico

and the little house on the farm, going to school for a few months

there, the moves to Houston, to Canada, to Uncle Herm's.

But he could not recall Bridlemile School where he spent a few short

weeks in first grade, or playing soccer then.
 
He remembered living

with his mother, and his father's apartment when they were getting

divorced.

"Your motherþ" Upham began.
 
Cheryl?"

"Do you remember the weekend she was killed?"

"Not the weekendþsome things," Jess said.

"Do you remember testifying before the grand jury?"

Before Jess could answer, Brad stood up to request a sidebar.
 
He

clearly wanted Jess off the stand.
 
Alexander overruled his

objections.

Brad seemed to be afraid of what Jess was about to say.

Answering Upham's questions, Jess said he remembered a long table in a

room and a group of people who asked him questions three days after his

mother's death.
 
But in 1994, he had only limited memory of the night

his mother died.
 
He could remember seeing The Sword in the Stone and

Rambo, and he associated those movies with the night his mother died,

but details of that night had faded for him.

"After your mom was killed," Upham asked, "where did you stay?"

"In the apartment,"Jess said, but he could not remember how long.

It had to have been a terrible, numbing time for a little boy.
 
"I

remember a key tied on a shoelace," Jess said.
 
"I think it was flat

and white.

I tied it on the handle of the door [of the Toyota van] and to my lunch

box.... Cheryl asked me to untie it and I did, but I left the key in

the car, I think."
 
The shoelace was blue, and it and the key had ended

up around Cheryl's arm as she tried desperately to get away from her

killer through the passenger door.

One thing thatSess remembered quite clearly was the sound of dishes

being washed in the kitchen of his father's apartment after Brad came

home from wherever he had been that night.
 
His father was washing

something in the kitchen.

"No more questions."
 
Upham looked toward Brad.

Brad rose to cross-examine his son.
 
He offered him a glass of water

and, in a gentle, fatherly fashion, told him not to be nervous.

Brad established that he had not seen Jess since early

Septemberþapproximately two and a half months at that point in the

trial.
 
He asked Jess to recall "the fun things" they had done

together, and to describe all the work he had done on the Dunthorpe

house.
 
But Brad did most of the talking, reminding Jess of all the

good works they had done together, giving out clothes at Christmas.

Then he launched into a very long documentary of his idyllic life with

his sons, and of the hard times they survived.
 
But he never explained

why he himself had not just gone to work.

Upham let Brad ramble onþuntil he suddenly asked his son, "Did Jim Karr

show you dirty pictures?"
 
Upham's objection was sustained.
 
There was

no foundation at all for that question.

Jess agreed that his father told him his mother had died in an

accident, and later that she was murdered.
 
But he had not told Michael

and Phillip.

"Sara had doctors hypnotize you?"
 
Brad asked quickly.
 
Objection!
 
"

"Overruled."

"I don't remember..."
 
Jess was confused by his father's constant

switching of questions.
 
He remembered that he had seen a psychologist

or a p.sychiatrist to help him deal with the events of the prior eight

years.

"On your birthdays, do I always bring out pictures of your mom?"

Brad asked.

"I remember pictures, sometimes."

Betty Troseth, sitting in the back row, was obviously distressed to see

her grandson pinioned to the witness chair, bombarded with questions

designed to make Brad look like an ideal father.

"Do you remember your dad telling you how much he missed your mother?

Remember people stealing money from us?"

Jess shook his head, confused.
 
At last, his father was done with himþ

at least for the moment.
 
It was obvious to the gallery that Brad had

tried to manipulate his son Jess to his advantage.

Brad had sent out a plethora of subpoenasþbut they all bore the same

date.
 
If all his witnesses showed up on the date specified, they would

be packed in the hallway like sardines.
 
He had subpoenaed virtually

the entire Oregon State Police staff and they knew better than to make

the trip to Hillsboro without further notification.
 
But Sara brought

Brad's three youngest sons as their subpoenas dictated.
 
The boys were

nervous, too upset to eat lunch.
 
And Brad allowed Sara and his own

sons to wait all day in the corridor.
 
The next day, they were not

there.
 
He insisted they were violating their subpoenas, he wanted them

available in case he needed them in court.

That was the way the trial was going, just as Upham had feared.

There was no order and little continuity.
 
Brad didn't know how to

crossexamine witnesses, and belatedly realizing his omissions, he

wanted them back after they had left.
 
Certain witnessesþlike Betsy

Welch, Cheryl's attorney, and Julia Hinkley, the O.S.P criminalistþwould

almost wear a path back and forth from their offices to the witness

stand.

Time after time Judge Alexander attempted to explain the law to Brad,

and even to protect him from his own ignorance.
 
And he warned him that

he did not intend to give him a crash course in criminal defense during

the trial.
 
"Mr. Cunningham, am I going to have to sit here through

the trial and teach you the law?"
 
Alexander asked.
 
"The vast majority

of what you said was improper.
 
You still haven't figured out what your

role is here."

On November 21, Dr. Karen Gunson took the stand to testify about the

autopsy she performed on Cheryl Keeton's body eight years before, and

once more Cheryl's family braced themselves to hear the terrible

details.
 
In her soft feminine voice, Dr. Gunson described the massive

head wounds Cheryl had sustained.
 
She used enlarged photographs to

show the jurors the victim's injuries.
 
She pointed out the "defense

wounds" that Cheryl had sustained when she tried in vain to ward off

the blows coming, in all probability, through the driver's-side

window.

Finally, Betty Troseth could not take any more of this.
 
She moved

quickly from her seat at the far end of the last row and disappeared

through the double doors into the corridor.

Dr. Gunson pointed out that the most unusual abrasion was the angry

red line across the front of Cheryl's waist.
 
She didn't know what had

caused that.

"Death was instantaneous?"
 
Upham asked.

Dr. Gunson shook her head slightly.
 
"No, it probably took several

minutes."

One of Brad's contentions was that Cheryl drove herself onto the Sunset

Highway.
 
Upham asked Dr. Gunson if Cheryl's wounds would have allowed

her to drive.

"No way."

Upham then asked who usually takes custody of a body after it is

released by the Medical Examiner's office.
 
Dr. Gunson listed the

answers in descending order.
 
"First, the husband or spouse, then the

parents, then children or other family.
 
Finally, a public official."

Upham asked if Cheryl's husband had claimed her body.

"No."

Brad remained seated when he cross-examined Dr. Gunson.
 
Some of his

questions seemed designed to challenge the thoroughness of her

postmortem examination of Cheryl's body, others to learn details of her

death that he wanted to know.
 
"Was she ever conscious?"
 
he asked,

referring to the period after Cheryl had been attacked.

"Probably she would have gone unconscious and remained so."

"Part of the time?"
 
Brad pressed.
 
"Passing out and coming to?"

"Probably not."

"Was she in close contact with [her attacker]?"

"Probably within arm's length."

Brad asked if fingernail scrapings had been taken.

"I observed Julia Hinkley attempting to take scrapings."

"Were her hands bagged?"

"Yes."
 
There was blood under Cheryl's fingernailsþher own blood þbut

her nails had been too short to retain other material.

"Did you check for semen?"
 
Brad asked.

"I took anal and vaginal swabs."
 
There had been no evidence of sexual

assault.

"Did you estimate time of death?"

"It appeared that she died shortly before her automobile was found."

Brad sighed suddenly, a dramatic sound full of pathos, as if he were

about to break into tears.
 
He looked down at the table in front of

him, the very image of a grief-stricken widower.
 
But the dark shadow

across his face disappeared in an instant and he continued to question