The Resurrection File (49 page)

“Isn't it exhilarating—
digging for truth?
” MacCameron exclaimed.

Fiona came into the room and joined them. She reminded her father that he needed to get his rest for the trial. But MacCameron said he wasn't sleepy. Besides, he added, after Will left he wanted to spend some time alone with his wife.

Before Will left, Angus MacCameron placed his hand on Will's head and prayed a blessing on him, asking for “God's power and wisdom” to guide him in the trial. And then he prayed that Will would, in God's own timing, open his heart to the resurrected Christ.

Fiona walked Will to his car outside, gave him a quick hug, and thanked him for coming.

When Will finally returned home to his apartment that night he realized that, in his busyness he had failed to check for Saturday's mail in his mailbox. He shoved his hand inside and pulled out a single envelope. It was from his uncle, Bull Chambers.

Inside the envelope there was a color copy of a photograph—and on it, Bull Chambers had written something. After Will had studied it, he laughed a loud belly laugh.

The photograph showed Will struggling to hold up the huge marlin he had caught that day on the ocean with his uncle. But Bull had drawn an arrow pointing to the marlin and then written: “J-Fox Sherman—your next trophy catch!”

Will was still chuckling as he locked the door behind him and headed for bed.

59

T
HE JURY TRIAL WAS SET TO BEGIN THAT MORNING
at 10:00
A.M
. in the U.S. District Court building in Washington, D.C. From its front steps, which face Constitution Avenue, to the left and upward the dome of the U.S. Capitol is visible in the distance. Farther still, just across the street from the Capitol, are the white marbled steps and columns of the U.S. Supreme Court building.

But the third branch of government—symbolized by the White House—is geographically removed in this triangulation of government power. Set apart, blocks away from the other two branches, the White House is bounded by trees, by guardhouses, and—at the behest of a recent President—by huge concrete pillars along its frontage on Pennsylvania Avenue—a monument to the threat of terrorism without.

But this morning, the White House rested comfortably secure from any threats of anarchy and violence from without. Within, the President was having a pleasant breakfast with Undersecretary of the Department of State Kenneth Sharptin. The shortlist of the three possible running mates was being winnowed, and sifted, and narrowed. Very soon, only one name would remain.

Billionaire Warren Mullburn had pledged his full financial support—and the recruiting of thousands of “unpaid” volunteers—to aid a presidential ticket, as long as it bore the name of Kenneth Sharptin as vice-presidential candidate. Mullburn already had in the works the construction of a lobbying organization that would fund its own massive, multimillion-dollar television ads in favor of a ticket coupling the President with Sharptin as V-P.

As Will Chambers trudged up to the front steps of the federal courthouse, wheeling a cart full of notebooks and file boxes for the
Reichstad vs.
MacCameron
case, he thought back on the history of that building. Here was the place where President Richard Nixon had been laid low by the decision of a single federal judge during the Watergate investigation. This same building was the locus of legal battles between the branches of government, grappling like titans of stone for mastery of decision-making—mastery of money—or the mastery of power.

But this was also the building where workaday grand jurors from the District—the unemployed, the hourly laborers, the civil servants—had considered, weighed, and sifted the conduct of President William Jefferson Clinton.

Here, in this architecture of freedom, even the lowly and the nameless were empowered to judge the powerful.

Will nodded hello to the security guards and bailiffs as he made his way through the metal detector and passed box after box through the X-ray machine. Judge Kaye had asked that legal counsel meet with him in his chambers at 9:30 to discuss preliminaries, and Will was a few minutes ahead of schedule. But J-Fox Sherman was already there ahead of him. He was surrounded by two legal associates, his personal paralegal, and a law clerk, all with laptop computers, freshly scrubbed faces, and steel-stiff postures.

Judge Kaye explained that each side would have three “peremptory strikes” for the jury—each party had the right to exclude three jurors for virtually any reason. He also explained his pattern for taking breaks—one mid-morning, one mid-afternoon, and lunches exactly one hour and fifteen minutes long.

Lastly, the judge indicated that he would be conducting the trial in “bifurcated” fashion. The evidence relating to Reichstad's damages—the injury to his reputation, and his “mental anguish”—would be reserved for the second stage of the case. That evidence would only be heard if Reichstad prevailed—and MacCameron lost—on the single question involving “liability.” That question to the jury was this: “Did Reverend Angus MacCameron, in the subject article concerning Dr. Albert Reichstad, publish allegations which were substantially truthful?”

A “yes” verdict meant that the trial was over and MacCameron had won. A “no” verdict would require MacCameron to pay the hundreds of thousands—perhaps even millions—of dollars in damages that the jury would then determine in the second phase of the case.

“Bifurcation” is usually considered an advantage to the defense, since juries hearing evidence on a plaintiff's damages sometimes become more sympathetic toward the plaintiff on other issues in the case. But here, Judge
Kaye's decision was no sign of partiality toward Will's side of the case. The judge simply preferred that procedure in all of the damage lawsuits that came before him.

When Will and the other lawyers left Judge Kaye's chambers and entered the courtroom, one half of the benches in the audience section were filled with prospective jurors. On the other side, Will noticed Angus MacCameron sitting with Fiona.

Behind them was a round, familiar face. It was Brother Billy Joe Highlighter, flanked by elders of his church. As Will would learn at break, they were there in the courtroom to be a “spiritual presence for the truth.”

Dr. Reichstad, and several of his research associates, were in the front row.

In the last row in the back, in the far corner, Jack Hornby sat with his arms stretched along the back of the bench, a look of subtle amusement on his face.

Jury selection in the case took all morning, and into the afternoon. Will struck from the jury an official with Atheists International and a disgruntled government scientist who had sued a co-worker (unsuccessfully) for having defamed his professional reputation. Lastly, he removed from the jury a pastor from a denomination called the Universalist Sanctuary of Light, which maintained that Jesus never rose from the dead, and whose members religiously followed the writings of Warren Mullburn, whom they considered a “prophet” of evolutionary theology.

J-Fox Sherman struck the wife of a Baptist minister, a YMCA leader (presumably because he also taught Sunday school at his church), and the director of a black gospel choir.

When the jury had finally been selected, Will felt that his client still might get a fair trial—though considering the jury he was left with, perhaps not in
his
lifetime, and perhaps not in
that
courtroom. It was at such times that Will Chambers the trial lawyer was reminded that human justice must invariably have a human face and a human heart.

If justice were to be meted out in the case of
Dr. Albert Reichstad vs. Angus MacCameron and
Digging for Truth
Magazine,
then something extraordinary would have to happen.

There were six jurors and one alternate juror: a chemistry professor who had “no use for most religion”; a bored-looking postal worker; an accountant from the General Service Agency, who said he feared “fundamentalists” because they “blow up buildings”; a grade-school teacher; a construction contractor; an anthropology teacher in a local high school, who said she had read and appreciated some of the writings of Dr. Reichstad,
but boldly proclaimed that it would not affect her ability to be impartial; and lastly, a bouncer in a dance club.

After a break, Sherman and Will gave their opening statements.

Sherman was winsome, casual, detailed, and persuasive. He promised the jury that they would see evidence of three types that would compel a finding of “no” to the jury question.

First, he explained, the jury would behold the professional credibility of Dr. Reichstad. Sherman stretched out his arms—like a male “Lady Justice.” A catalogue of Reichstad's world-class accomplishments tripped off Sherman's tongue: his awards, his published works, his multiple degrees from prestigious institutions, and the documentary film being made on his life by The Smithsonian Institution. As he listed Reichstad's qualifications, Sherman's outstretched right arm slowly lowered under the invisible weight of his client's professional prowess. Then he described the sparse and erratic career of Angus MacCameron. But as he listed MacCameron's qualifications, his outstretched left arm never moved, as if to say, “The defendant, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, is not only a lightweight, he is a featherweight.”

Secondly, Sherman pointed out that when MacCameron wrote his article he had no proof whatsoever that a) Reichstad's opinions about 7QA were scientifically unfounded, or b) that Reichstad was in any way “connected” to the deaths of Azid and Hunter. He urged the jury to listen closely only to the evidence—and to reject any “speculations and fantasies which might be the product of a religious extremist like MacCameron.”

Lastly, he pointed out that “right here, in this courtroom, you are about to see the unveiling of one of the world's most important discoveries about the real Jesus of Nazareth; and that unveiling will show the absolute falsity of Mr. MacCameron's lies against Dr. Reichstad.” Then Sherman described the 7QB fragment, which, he asserted, actually corroborated the 7QA fragment—as well as Reichstad's interpretation of it. According to Sherman, 7QB actually mentioned the St. Stephen's Gate location of the very tomb—hitherto unknown—that Sherman declared passionately, “must obviously still, to this day, contain the body of Jesus, the world's greatest moral teacher, but who was certainly no resurrected godlike creature.”

Sherman sat down, and Will rose to his feet and walked to the lectern in front of the jury box. He had no notes in front of him. The contours and lines of his opening statement had not just been memorized—they had been consumed into the fibers of his thinking and feeling about this case.

Then Will stepped away from the lectern, and began to speak.

“Ladies and gentlemen. You are to be the judges of ‘truth' in this case. Not because Mr. Sherman or his client, or I or my client, have decided that it will be so. But because a free system of government has summoned you; called you from your everyday tasks to come here—to this place, at this time—to render a judgment about ‘truth.' There is no greater task in a free nation than this.

“The facts will show that Reverend Angus MacCameron wrote a scathing article against Dr. Reichstad. And it was scathing. But the facts will show that he spoke the truth when he wrote what he did. When he stated that Dr. Reichstad's opinions about the 7QA fragment were seriously flawed, and perhaps even fraudulent. Much is at stake with Dr. Reichstad's opinions about this tiny, ancient piece of papyrus. For if he is correct, then we may be witnessing the death of Christianity as a religion.

“If Dr. Reichstad is wrong, then Reverend MacCameron has helped to expose where the real lie rests—because the lie is not with the article in his little magazine. To the contrary, the evidence will conclusively show that the lie rests squarely on the head of a world-renowned scientist who, for reasons yet to be explored in this case, is trying to sell to the world a hoax of unearthly proportions.”

Then Will paced over to the center of the courtroom where, on a display easel, there was a greatly enlarged photograph of 7QA fitted together with 7QB. Will told the jury that in the upper right corner there was a missing fragment. But this missing “X fragment” completed the all-important first and second sentences of 7QA. Without “7QC,” as Will called it, the 7QA fragment seemed, when considered just by itself, to be describing the corpse of Jesus of Nazareth, and suggesting that his body never left the tomb.

He urged them to consider that Dr. Reichstad had made no search for 7QB. That Angus MacCameron was the one who, in fact, finally produced it; and that 7QC was still out there somewhere in some hidden corner of the world. Without 7QC, the missing fragment, Will said, his voice becoming passionate, Dr. Reichstad had merely shown a part of a face, and then declared it to be a portrait. Displayed to the world a patch, and declared it to be a garment.

“If we commissioned a great artist to paint a full portrait, but received only half a face—and one ear, one eye, only part of the mouth—wouldn't we declare that painter to be inept?” Will asked the jury.

“If we pay a tailor to sew a suit, but it has only one sleeve, wouldn't we say that the tailor was a fraud?” he added.

Will continued by telling the jury that the evidence would show how Reverend MacCameron knew that a half-truth is much more dangerous
than a full-blown lie. So he published the truth about 7QA and Dr. Reichstad in his magazine.