Possessed (26 page)

T
hat fall, Ana filed a grievance at the jail, charging that when she was admitted in June the staff ignored a gash on the back of her head. She complained of light sensitivity and migraines, and demanded an MRI of her skull. When she talked to a nurse, she claimed the head wound could have been responsible for her “confusion” at the time of Stefan's killing. “Client said that she talked to her mom recently and was upset because her mother said something on the phone about not trusting her,” the nurse noted. The patient appeared moderately depressed and anxious, “likely due to the seriousness of her case.”

I
n November, Annika Lindqvist walked out of Stefan's apartment for the last time, locking it behind her and dropping the key at the concierge desk.

About that time, Anders Berkenstam and his wife, Pernilla, perhaps shaken by Stefan's death, moved back to Sweden. Months later, when John Jordan offered to fly him in for the trial, the scientist declined, citing health concerns. When Jordan suggested conducting his testimony via Skype, Berkenstam also refused, labeling it as too stressful. Preparing for the trial early the coming year, Jordan felt frustrated. Berkenstam was the only one to actually see Ana bite Stefan in a completely unprovoked attack, something Jordan wanted jurors to hear.

Setting aside his disappointment, Jordan continued to
prepare for trial, enlisting the aid of an expert on domestic violence, Jennifer Varela, a clinical social worker and the Harris County District Attorney's director of family violence services. Still assessing the fairness of Ana Trujillo's prosecution, the prosecutor wanted someone outside his immediate office to review all the records. “We wanted a true believer, someone who worked with domestic-violence victims to look at the case. We thought maybe she would look at the records and call us and say, ‘This woman is the victim,'” he said. “It was a lot to overcome, with Trujillo saying it was self-defense, and we felt like the world was watching.”

An earthy woman with curly dark hair and a gentle manner, Varela spent hours poring over the records. What she learned was how others saw Stefan, as a kind man who lacked the ability to say no to others, who let people take advantage of him to sidestep any conflict. Looking at his account of his childhood, she came to the conclusion that this weakness was a result of never feeling safe as a child. As an adult, Stefan became the extreme opposite of his father, totally nonaggressive. The alcohol may have served as a way to self-soothe, to help mediate depression with its roots in his childhood.

“I'd never had a victim so meek,” Varela said. “While it is often embarrassing and hard for all victims to seek help, it can be doubly so for men, who see themselves as wimpy. They don't want to be seen that way.”

That the evidence showed Stefan never fought back took a particular toll on John Jordan. There were but a few strands of Ana's hair in Stefan's dead fist, and no aggressive, only defensive, wounds on his body. Detectives had seen no cuts, no bleeding, and no fresh contusions on Ana. “That bothered John a lot,” said Sarah Mickelson. “That Stefan just lay there and took it. That was hard to understand.”

In contrast, Jennifer Varela read the reports of Ana Trujillo and her frequent angry episodes that often resulted in acting out violently yet being so charming and apologetic afterward that she suffered no repercussions. In one interview,
a restaurant owner explained how Ana hit one of his staff. Yet the next day, he let her back into the restaurant. “That was just Ana,” the man said.

Before long, Varela saw Ana Trujillo as someone who was manipulative, who craved attention, and who, when intoxicated, was filled with rage. Trujillo was a risk-taker, one who knew no boundaries, who could be charming and exhilarating, but over time became exhausting to be around. For men, Varela thought early relationships with Ana were probably exciting, before the craziness took over.

One of the deciding factors for Varela, as she weighed the relationship, was that when she compared all the witness accounts of the relationship, she found no indications that Ana had ever displayed any injuries she claimed to have suffered at Stefan's hands. Yet Stefan had a black eye, and he'd confided often in friends about Ana's attacks, the times she came up from behind and jumped him, that she got rough during sex, and that she'd tried to choke him. When she examined the case, Varela thought of how Stefan must have felt, how embarrassed he must have been to have let Ana take control of his life.

In the end, for Varela, there was one overwhelming deciding factor: “Everyone who knew Ana Trujillo told the same story, that at first Stefan loved her, but that ended. She said she was still his girlfriend, but it was obvious that Dr. Andersson wanted nothing to do with her.”

When Varela viewed the video of Trujillo's interview with police, she saw an extremely narcissistic woman, one who justified everything she did by blaming others, and one who took things she'd done to others and turned them around, in her accounts claiming to have been the victim.

What set off that final altercation? Varela wondered if Ana, having left her phone in the cab, had used Stefan's and seen his text messages with the new woman he was dating. Or perhaps, after that disastrous cab ride, Stefan had finally announced that he was done with Ana and wanted her forever out of his life. Describing what happened that awful
night, Varela said, “Ana flies into a rage, starts hitting him, and doesn't stop.”

In Ana Trujillo, Varela saw traits she'd documented in other women who are abusive to their significant others, including a long history of violence toward people other than their partners. While men most often used violence to control and target their spouses, in Varela's experience, women acted more indiscriminately and were motivated by anger. “For these types of women, this is a way of dealing with the world,” she said.

I
n the Harris County Jail, Ana continued to sit in on group sessions on topics such as: Listening to My Inner Messages; Challenging Harmful Self-talk; Restructuring Cognitive Distortions; and Reacting to the Outside World.

In one session, Ana blamed her current state of affairs on her past, saying that her worldview changed when she was “violently attacked by a coworker,” not identifying the person. She talked of Stefan, again calling him a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, who suffered mood swings. In her account, although not attracted to him, she tried to heal him using what she called her “special electromagnetic abilities for bringing injuries to the surface, so that he could see how powerful her methods were and help her develop the science for them.”

“The client's beliefs have been catastrophically challenged,” the social worker wrote. “May be delusional . . .”

I
n a motion hearing on the case, Jack Carroll again asked for a reduced bail, and Judge Brock Thomas turned him down. That, Carroll said, left him shouting at Ana through the Plexiglas with deputies in the area, feeling unable to prepare for the trial. When he watched the video of her interview with the police, he consistently came away believing that she told the truth. “She did what she had to do to get away from him,” Carroll said. “To me, it was a pure case of self-defense.”

Around the world, the case continued to attract headlines. London's
Daily Mail
ran an article just before Thanksgiving with a photo of Stefan Andersson in a bar, one with his hands raised above his head, as if surrendering. In the comment section on the Net, one reader typed: “In the feminist America (sic) legal system, women can get away with just about anything.”

“You're afraid of a 44-year-old woman?” another poster answered. “You just lost your man card, Dude.”

I
n December, Annika Lindqvist met with John Jordan and Sarah Mickelson at the DA's office. By then, Jordan had asked Mickelson to second-chair the trial, act as his cocounsel, and she'd agreed. Jordan thought they made a good team for the case, balancing well. He was more laid-back, while she was formal in the courtroom. That she had a history prosecuting domestic-violence cases gave her added credibility in a case where that was one of the issues. “Sarah has a good reputation, and she's compassionate,” he said.

At the meeting with the two prosecutors, an animated Annika asked a long list of questions, still trying to figure out the case, coming up with ideas and suggestions, wanting them to understand Stefan. Eager to do whatever she could for her lost friend, she'd given them a time line of Stefan's life, from his birth in Sweden, through his schooling and career, concluding with what she knew about his relationship with Ana Trujillo. Rethinking the meeting, on her way home to Dallas, Annika worried that she'd said too much. Stopping to send a text, she typed to Mickelson, “Sorry about any rambling. I have so much I want to tell you about Stefan.”

“You have too much on your shoulders,” the prosecutor responded. “You need to let us help you.”

For the first time since Stefan's death, when Annika read that text, she felt the weight lift.

I
n December, after months of trying to gain his client's release, Jack Carroll found an ally. Ana's mother had pulled
together the $10,000 needed to put down with a bail bondsman to get Ana out of jail.

That news again made the papers, and when Carroll talked to reporters, he told them that he expected that self-defense would be a major issue in the case and that there would be evidence that Ana Trujillo was being abused by Stefan Andersson. “I'm going to have a limited time to try to get a jury to understand that although Ana has had problems in the past, she is a kind person at heart,” he told one reporter.

As John Jordan and Sarah Mickelson considered the remarks of the man who would be their adversary in the courtroom, they felt relieved. Having done their homework, they knew Carroll would have a difficult time portraying Stefan as an abuser. What Jordan had worried about was that Carroll would take another tack, using the eggshell defense, claiming that Ana had overreacted and killed Stefan because of a buildup of prior violence and victimization in her life. Using that approach, Carroll could have argued that prior injuries Ana suffered at the hands of others rendered her as fragile as an eggshell. In such an argument, her past would have made her hypersensitive and resulted in misinterpreting Stefan's actions, leading her to genuinely feel threatened and fear for her life.

Since Carroll chose a self-defense argument, however, that wasn't on the table.

T
he afternoon Ana was released from jail, articles ran in newspapers announcing that the infamous stiletto killer was free on bond. Hours later, she showed up at James Wells's apartment, knocking on the door. Chanda Ellison answered, thinking that the landlord wanted to pick up the rent.

“Hey, Chanda,” Ana said, smiling as if nothing had happened.

“Are you kidding me?” Ellison responded. “The same person you left here still exists. I speak for both of us, James and me, when I tell you that you cannot be here. You are
going to walk away from this door and never think about coming here again.”

With that, Chanda closed the door.

The phone rang incessantly for days after, Ana calling, presumably looking for a place to stay.

H
er daughter out of jail and awaiting trial, Ana's mother rented her a small apartment in Houston, so that Ana could be close to Jack Carroll's office to prepare. Not long after, on a downtown street, Teresa Montoya recognized Ana despite dark glasses and a floppy hat. “You look like hell,” the hairdresser said.

“I know,” answered Ana, whose hair was growing out, streaked with grey.

That afternoon, Montoya skipped work and the two women went to the Aquarium, a downtown amusement venue with a Ferris wheel and an aquatic carousel, restaurants and games. “We acted like little kids,” said Montoya.

They ate sushi, and afterward Montoya took Ana to the salon. There Montoya colored and cut her friend's hair. On her ankle, Ana wore an electronic monitor and had to return to her apartment by nine. Montoya drove her to the apartment, where Ana thanked her.

E
arly in 2014, at the DA's office, Mickelson and Jordan continued to prepare their case. To get ready for trial, scheduled for April, they met with Dr. Ross, the assistant medical examiner, to discuss the autopsy. During the meeting, Ross told the prosecutors what they expected to hear, that unlike in the movies, she couldn't pinpoint an exact time of death, but the forensic pathologist estimated that it might have taken thirty minutes up to an hour for Stefan to have bled out and had his heart stop. While the death tied to the head trauma, the pathologist also mentioned that she couldn't rule out that Stefan had suffered some type of heart event from a rush of adrenaline pumping through him during the attack. And she still believed it was very possible that his breathing
had been restricted, either by strangulation, from Ana sitting on his chest, or both.

Looking at the time line, reconstructing what they knew about the events of that night, the prosecutors judged that the most likely scenario was that the altercation began at 2:13, when Stefan's next-door neighbor heard a man yelling. That continued for only minutes, then the apartment fell quiet. Approximately an hour and twenty minutes lapsed before Ana called 9-1-1, ample time for the first responders to have found the blood coagulating and drying on the carpet.

Finally, in February, DNA reports on the swabs taken from the scene arrived, and they, too, suggested that the clash had been one-sided. All the samples matched blood taken from Stefan's body during the autopsy. None of the blood on the murder scene tied back to Ana Trujillo.

That information in hand, the prosecutors discussed how they saw the upcoming trial, and the stance they would take in the courtroom. One thing Jordan considered interesting was the tarot-card book, along with the stories he heard of Ana's interest in witchcraft and the occult. Was that something they wanted to put in front of the jury? “It was so bizarre,” he said. “She had such strange behavior, you just throw it out there and the jury decides what to believe, as long as it is credible evidence.”

Mickelson, on the other hand, thought of the book's being open to the death card as a strange coincidence, something they could mention at the trial but not explore further, not something that was important. She worried that bringing up the witchcraft stories could muddy the case. After thinking over the situation, Jordan agreed.

Lining up their witnesses, one they decided not to put on the stand was Jim Carroll—the hotel manager who said Ana told him she'd hit anyone who tried to “mess with” her with her stiletto heel. That call was Jordan's decision. Carroll had given multiple interviews on the case, and Jordan was uncomfortable with the situation. “I tend to be skeptical
of people who court the press,” he said. “I felt unsure about it and decided the comment could cut both ways.”

As they prepared, they, too, considered how they would present the man at the center of the case, Stefan. As kind as he was, as gentle, Stefan was flawed; he drank heavily and could be considered an alcoholic. Yet neither prosecutor thought that was something the jury would focus on. “Clearly, it was an addiction,” said Jordan. “But people adored him, and I started to see him as Norm on
Cheers
, shy but friendly.”

“Stefan Andersson had his own demons,” said Mickelson. “He was lonely. He had friends across the world, but he lived alone. He suffered from depression, and he drank too much. In the end, I thought he just felt sorry for Ana, and perhaps she was companionship. I thought the jury would understand that.”

In the weeks before the trial, the prosecutors held final interviews with witnesses; two were the cab driver and her common-law husband, Rosemary Gomez and Reagan Cannon. During that meeting, something surprising happened, when Cannon told the prosecutor two facts he had forgotten earlier: that Ana had left her phone in the cab, and that in the middle of the night, Cannon called Stefan's phone, and Ana answered. When Jordan asked where Ana's phone was, Cannon said he still had it at home.

The next day, Jordan sent an officer to pick up Ana's phone from Cannon, and the prosecutor subpoenaed both sets of cell-phone records. Once they arrived, Jordan found the call Cannon mentioned listed at 3:37
A.M.
That piece of evidence was a missing link. For the first time, Jordan understood why Ana called 9-1-1 when she had. Wherever her mind had gone after the killing, whatever she was doing in that apartment while Stefan Andersson lay dying, the call broke the trance and brought her back to reality. She'd suddenly realized what she had done, that she couldn't cover it up, and that she needed to call and report the killing.

Finally, just a week before opening statements, Jordan
and Mickelson went to the HPD property room with the two CSU officers who'd worked the case, Duncan and Aguilera, to view the physical evidence one more time. Out of a box, they pulled Ana Trujillo's high-heel shoe, still covered in Stefan's hair and blood. Jordan looked at it, put it back in the box, and felt ready to proceed.

Still, there was much to consider.

In the days leading up to the trial, the tension built, as Jordan and Mickelson wondered if Carroll would put Ana's medical records from the jail into evidence, the ones in which she showed bruises to the nursing staff and claimed to have suffered injuries during the fight with Stefan. If Carroll did, the prosecutors thought it could help their case. “That would open the door for us to bring in James Wells and the medical records from the fight with Chanda Ellison,” said Jordan. “That would help us show who Ana Trujillo truly is.”

To prepare in case that happened, Jordan asked Wells and Ellison to his office, and they brought their attorney, Allette Williams. That day they discussed the physical evidence, and Williams, who knew how Ana had bitten Wells, would later say she told the prosecutors she, too, believed that Ana was indeed capable of striking without warning. Yet her client equivocated when he discussed the woman he'd once tried to help. “James Wells still cared about Ana Trujillo,” said Jordan. “Despite everything, he still made every excuse for her.”

To the prosecutors, however, that didn't matter. What they wanted to hear and did hear was that his story was consistent: that Ana had attacked him without reason. As much as Wells cared about Ana, he wasn't willing to lie for her, and his story hadn't changed.

A
t the same time, just a block from the DA's headquarters, in his own second-floor office in a building next to a bail bondsman, Jack Carroll, too, worked on the Trujillo case.
His hopes that domestic-violence-victims organizations would come to his client's aid had evaporated, and Carroll, along with the formidable cost of clearing his calendar for the preparation and the trial, was in the difficult position of personally paying for expert witnesses. “It cost me some money,” he said. “But I figured it was a high-profile case, so it was worth it. And I thought the court would reimburse me after the trial.”

One of those experts was Dr. Lee Ann Grossberg, a forensic pathologist who worked briefly for the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office before setting up a consulting service. Carroll hired her to review the autopsy and crime-scene photos.

After she did, Grossberg told Carroll something he found interesting, that in her opinion, while admittedly garish, Stefan's wounds were superficial, none fracturing his skull or facial bones. In fact, Grossberg wondered if Stefan might have died of a heart attack. Similar to one of the medical examiner's theories, Grossberg thought it was possible that, terrorized by the altercation, Stefan's body flooded with adrenaline, driving up his blood pressure and leading to his death. If Stefan hadn't died of a heart attack but loss of blood from his dozens of wounds, Grossberg agreed that Stefan might have lingered. Either way, Carroll was left wondering if there was the possibility that medical personnel might have been able to save Stefan's life.