Dead by Sunset: Perfect Husband, Perfect Killer? (108 page)

as it usually was when he questioned witnesses, there was apparently

something in it that raised the hairs on the back of Cecilia Von

Beroldingen's dog.
 
The perfectly trained animal leaned forward and

growled deep in its throat, a sound that no one in the courtroom

missed.

Brad had always been a quick study, and he had apparently boned up on

DNA.
 
The DNA pattern revealed during Von Beroldingen's tests, he

submitted, was not that unique.
 
In fact, he managed to establish that

approximately one out of ten Caucasians in the greater Portland area

also had the same DQ A!pha genotype that Brad did.
 
It was not as if he

had left a fingerprint on Cheryl's flesh, a fingerprint that was

absolutely unique to him.
 
Von Beroldingen could only say that he was

among the 10 percent of the population who could have left the

contaminants on the retrieved hairs, as opposed to the 90 percent with

other DQ Alpha genotypes who could not.
 
This was physical evidence to

be considered with the circumstantial evidence that pointed to Brad,

but it was not conclusive.

There were fireworks later in the day when the defense's DNA expert,

Randell Libby, testified.
 
Brad's questions and Libby's answers seemed

to meld too well, and a suspicious Upham raised an objection.
 
It

turned out that Libby had prepared seven and a half pages of questionsþ

including many of the answers he planned to giveþfor Brad to use.

Upham said that the list should have been shared with the prosecutor,

and that the fact that it was not was a violation of discovery.

Judge Alexander sent the jury out, and when they were gone, he ruled

that Libby's testimony and the list that Upham called "crib notes" were

indeed a violation of discovery.
 
Randell Libby and his testimony

disappeared from the trial.
 
When the jury returned, he was gone and no

explanation for his absence was given.

Brad moved once again for a mistrial.

"Motion denied."

Brad took the witness stand for a second time on December 14.
 
He was

once again both witness and defense attorney as he continued his direct

examination of himself.
 
He spoke for more than two hours, focusing on

the good times and bad times of his marriage to Cheryl.
 
On a number of

occasions he choked up and seemed about to burst into tears as he

remembered his love for Cheryl.
 
His emotions were still evanescent,

howeverþgone in an instant.
 
Strangely, his grief did not prevent him

from harping on Cheryl's promiscuity.
 
Again and again he told the jury

that she was having sexual relationships with seven or eight men at the

time of her death.
 
"That didn't make her a bad person," he said

generously.
 
"It didn't bother me."
 
With a half smile of sad

acceptance, he said only that he had worried because he didn't think

Cheryl's affairs left her much time to care for their three sons.

Brad insisted that he was home with his sons all the Sunday evening in

question, except for two quick runs with Michael to the parking

garage.

He estimated he hadn't been out of his apartment for more than ten

minutes total.
 
"I was trying to run off his energy," he said of

Michael.

"He was very hyper that evening."

He denied that he gave conflicting stories of his whereabouts and

activities to a number of different people.
 
"I am telling you today,"

he said earnestly to the jurors, his voice quavering, "I did not kill

Cheryl."

Just as Judge Alexander had warned him, Brad was now fair game for the

prosecution.
 
Scott Upham had memorized the convoluted transfers of

homes, land, building materials, heavy equipment, guns, and vehicles

that Brad had accomplished.
 
He had already been relentless in

questioning some of Brad's attorneys and accountants, and now he was

harder on Brad himself.
 
Many of Brad's holdings had never been

disclosed to the bankruptcy court.
 
This, Upham maintained, was one of

Brad's reasons to want Cheryl dead: she had been about to expose his

financial machinations.
 
Now, Upham did what Cheryl had been unable to

doþhe held those transactions up to the light.

Brad had a hard time explaining how trucks and trailers and guns

changed hands on paper but, apparently, not in reality.
 
The Prowler

trailer that had eventually been purchased by Sara had bounced all over

Washington State without ever once actually moving.
 
Paperwork showed

that Brad had given it to a law firm to pay for attorneys' fees, then

bought it back, then given it to his father.
 
It seemed to have been

the same with Brad's guns and expensive cameras.
 
He fumbled when he

tried to remember where they had all gone.
 
"We had fifty guns...."

Some went to a gun shop on consignment, some to his law firm.
 
He

wasn't quite sure.

When Upham pointed out bankruptcy report irregularities, Brad had a

ready answer.
 
"Cheryl filled those out," he said.

Upham was also fascinated with Brad's tax returns, returns that Brad

seemed to have forgonen.
 
During the years when he had brought in

virtually no income, he had taken huge deductions for business

expenses.

Cheryl had also threatened to expose his tax dodges to the IRS

þheightening his motive for murder.

Brad's face glistened with sweat as he tried to answer Upham's

increasingly intricate questions.
 
At the same time, he took notes to

help him with his own re-direct testimony.

Brad wasn't concerned with questions about his sex life.
 
He readily

admitted to having affairs with his baby-sitter Marnie and with Lily

Saarnen.
 
As for his other coworker, Karen Aaborg, he was disdainful.

"She would come to my apartment and she was a date I couldn't get to go

home.... She wanted sex so I did.... I only slept with her so she'd go

home."

"You have a facetious sense of humor?"
 
Upham asked suddenly, changing

the subject.

"Yes," Brad said warily.

"The poison plot' was a joke?"
 
Upham asked incredulously.

"Cheryl and I thought it was a joke," he said, then added, "But it was

like Bettyþto poison me and take the kids to Arkansas and hide them so

Cheryl could live the kind of life she wanted until she wanted them

back."

It was obvious to everyone watching that Brad was not only in deep

water, he was way over his head.
 
Upham hit him again and again with

questions that demanded precise answers.
 
And Brad could no longer

tailor his answers to fit the facts and make them sound like anything

but fiction.
 
Even so, he would not show that he was in the least

rattled.
 
He continued to write down each question Upham asked him.
 
He

was alternately insolent and bored.
 
He ignored Upham as much as anyone

on the witness stand could ignore the attorney who was verbally

pummeling him up one side of the courtroom and down the other.

Brad choked up as he said he had cried when he learned how Cheryl had

died.
 
"Finch said she had been bludgeoned.... You understand my state

of mind," he said.
 
"I was nauseous.
 
I was actually weaving.
 
I threw

up a little in my hand and ran for the bathroom."
 
Had he forgotten Jim

Ayers' testimony that he had shown virtually no emotion upon learning

that Cheryl was dead, and that neither he nor Finch had told Brad how

Cheryl died?

Again and again, Upham tripped Brad up.
 
On times.
 
On whom he had

talked to the night of the murder and when.
 
Even on what snacks he fed

his children and what was on television.
 
Brad was angry, but

controlled.

"You were wearing a yellow-and-orange vest when Jess opened the

door?"

Upham asked.

"No."

"You didn't tell Jess you'd been jogging around Sara's hospital?"

"No.

"You washed up in the kitchen?"

"No."
 
Brad said he had put an old pair of shoes and pants in Sara's

car because he had to test soil on land in Tigard the next day.
 
He had

planned to pick up his Suburban at Providence Hospital early the next

morning.

Upham asked a question that surprised Brad.
 
"Who was going to take

care of Phillip?"

Brad looked puzzled.

"You didn't call anyone Sunday night to take care of Phillip Monday

morning?"

He had not.
 
The inference was, of course, that Brad knew that this

Monday morning would be different, that there would be no need for

routine baby-sitting.

Brad wanted to talk instead about the many loads of laundry he had done

in his apartment Sunday night.
 
"I did a lot of wash.
 
I was staying

busy," he said.
 
"I was having a good time with my sons."

Brad's answers were making less and less sense.
 
Now in response to

many of Upham's questions, he evaded answering and talked instead of

the destruction of his life by everyone.
 
He could count on no one.
 
He

had been fired after Cheryl's murder.
 
Yes, Sara had paid some of his

legal feesþbut he had paid her back.
 
Bob McNannay withheld trust funds

from the boys, so he had had to borrow from the Colville tribe.
 
He had

had no choice but to let Sara adopt his sons so Betty wouldn't get

them.

Sara didn't want children.
 
"I wish I hadn't done it."

Upham showed Brad the letter in which he begged Sara not to divorce