Undue Influence (11 page)

The absence of any prints tying Laurel to the crime, on its face, might lead to the inexorable conclusion that she was not there. On the other hand, if they can show by independent means that Laurel was inside the Vega home on the night of the murder hair or fibers, a witness, any faint moves on the Ouija board of identification that a jury might buy then the failure to find her prints in the house might lead to quiet conjecture, the kind you can’t counter, that she wore gloves. It is only a short hop from there to thoughts of premeditation. Harry fanning more pages in his pile of papers.

“All we have left is ballistics,” he says. “Single nine-millimeter slug,” says Harry. “Thin copper jacket. Badly deformed from the head shot. One copper casing, nine-millimeter Luger, with multiple toolmarks.”

“How do they account for that?” I ask. I’m thinking dry fire. I have known shooters, mostly hobbyists, hunters, and marksmen, who will work the slide on a semiautomatic by hand with live rounds to ensure that the gun will not jam when fired. This would leave extra marks on the cartridges where the tiny metal teeth grip the rim for ejection. “They’re saying the casing had been previously fired. Expanded and resized,” he says. “A reload?”

“That’s what they seem to be indicating.”

“Where the hell would Laurel buy reloaded ammunition?” Their theory starts to have holes. Harry gives me a look like take your best guess.

“You can buy the stuff at some ranges. Gun shows,” he says. Harry plugging the leaks in their case. It might float, but these gun shows and firing ranges are not places I would ever expect to see Laurel.

“Anything on the gun itself?” He shakes his head. “They’re still looking for it. Lands and grooves on the bullet are a right-hand twist. Could be any of a dozen models sold. But here’s the interesting stuff,” he says.

“Their lab found some striations not quite as deep as the grooves. Four of them at the edges of the bullet,” he says. “Each one about the width of a piece of coarse thread.”

“Do they hazard a guess?” I ask.

“Without another bullet fired from the same piece to compare, it’s tough,” says Harry. “But they think it’s a defect in the barrel of the gun.”

“It’ll make the murder weapon easier to identify than dental plates if they find it,” I say. “Let’s hope they don’t find it in Laurel’s apartment,” says Harry.

This morning Harry and I are doing some cold canvassing. Wearing out shoe leather on the cul-de-sac where Melanie was murdered, a survey of the neighbors, anything they may have seen or heard that night. With the cops holding their witness statements for another day, we have no choice but to go door-to-door. We have an uphill battle. Like Harry says, “Anyone who ever fended off a murder case knows that shit always flows downhill.” We are busy digging up dirt to build a dam. Two days ago the city’s mayor, Lama, and the Capital County DA, Duane Nelson, held a joint news conference on Laurel’s case. They cozied up to the camera lenses, basking in the glow of warm strobe lights Like they were on some hot beach in Mexico. Nelson told the press he had a stone-solid case, then proceeded to give them no details. Nelson is a good lawyer and a better politician. Even though he can’t stand Lama, having canned him once as a DA’s investigator, he bestowed
UNDUE
praise on Jimmy for netting the defendant so quickly. The event was one of those law-enforcement love fests that politicians crave victory wreaths all around a conquest in the war on crime. There was more than a little hypocrisy in this. The day before Nelson called me to ask for a continuance in Laurel’s entry of a plea. A reversal of roles.

Prosecutors with a strong case are usually hell-bent for court. He gave me some babble about assigning the case to another deputy, some minor amendments to the indictment. My antenna is up. Something is wrong hopefully with their case. I gave him the delay and told him I would get a gag order if he didn’t quit with the press. He laughed, good-natured, and assured me he would not do it again. Melanie’s murder has stirred particular anxieties in this city of political commerce, “Beltway West.” Government is a growth industry here, and the thought that legislators and their families are not safe is bad for business.

Important people can leave to go live in the foothills. The responsible voices of leadership, the Chamber of Commerce and the City Council, have been busy building on the theme that this was not a random act of violence likely to be visited on another prince of politics. Laurel’s arrest serves a useful purpose. The city is hard at work on the message that a vengeful former wife, no matter how much she is vilified in the press, is not Jack the Ripper. The Speaker of the Assembly can curl up in confidence with his concubines and sleep in peace. I punch the bell and a woman comes to the door. A pleasant face, maybe sixty-five, white hair like the lady on candy boxes, but with more style. “Margaret Miller?” I say. Harry’s gotten names where possible from voter records.

“Yes.”

“My name is Paul Madriani, this is Mr. Harry Hinds. We’d like to talk to you for a moment concerning the death of Mrs. Vega.” The smile fades on Mrs. Miller’s face.

“Are you with the police?”

“We are lawyers, Mrs. Miller, hired to represent Laurel Vega. We’d like to talk to you if you have a moment.”

“Oh.” An expression like leprosy is now stalking her just beyond the screen door. There’s a lot of pained indecision. She would rather not, but doesn’t want to be unfair. It is what the criminal defense lawyer sees with the good citizen, the detached witness. I can tell by the way she studies us that Mrs. Miller is uncertain whether by merely entertaining us on her front porch she is now violating some criminal law. “I don’t know. I guess it would be okay. If it’s all right with the police,” she says. “Last time I looked, they hadn’t repealed the First Amendment,” says Harry. She’s giving him an imperious look as I knee him, a good one, in the thigh. Mrs. Miller gives me a smile. She unlatches the door and swings it open. Like a brush salesman I am busy giving her a full complement of teeth, artless smiles, and assurances that the law permits her to talk with us. Harry, properly rebuked, gives her a business card and a ration of happy horseshit. “It’s all part of the process of getting to the truth,” he says, something Harry’s shown no interest in except for those few times in open court when it has reared up and kicked him in the ass. From the look on Mrs. Miller’s face, it is against her better judgment, but she invites us in. The Miller home is no hovel. Her living room has more bird’s-eye maple than some palaces, enough antiques for a museum. It is festooned with trinkets from around the world, figurines carved of ivory, masks on the wall with the look of Polynesia. The lady, in her time, has the appearance of a global traveler. There is a picture propped on a table, of a man, she looks younger, his arm around her.

They are in some far-off place, a lot of stone steps and jungle vines.

There is no Mr. Miller. Or if there is, he does not vote. Harry’s guess, given to me on the street, is that the man has gone on to the great cul-de-sac in the sky. She offers us the couch, then fidgets, not sure whether we’re the kind of guests to whom she should offer coffee. She finally decides that the right to talk does not include beverages. “Mrs. Miller, we have a number of questions we’d like to ask you.” I make it sound like I’m working from a questionnaire, some marketing survey, all very clean and clinical, “just the facts, ma’am.”

“Why don’t you take a seat?” I say. Prerogatives in her own house. She could throw us both down the front stairs and we would have no recourse. Except for unusual circumstances, the law does not permit a criminal defendant to depose or otherwise take a sworn statement from a witness unless they agree to cooperate. She sits on the edge of a chair, the last two inches supporting only her spine. Her posture conveys the thought that she doesn’t intend to stay this way for long. “Have you talked to the police about the events of that night?”

She nods.

“Can I ask you how many times?”

She has to consider this for a moment. Bad news.

“Three times. Once here. Twice at their office,” she says.

“The police station?” I say. She nods.

Only serious customers go there. “Did you call them?”

“Oh, heavens no!

They came here. Knocked on the door. Like you,” she says. “The morning after she was… ” She reaches for the “m” word, but can’t say it. Like perhaps this might be offensive to us. “The morning after she passed on,” she says. Sweet and a little singsong, she makes it sound like some shifty-eyed embolism sneaked up and took Melanie in her sleep. We should wish for her on the jury. “Can you tell us what you told the police?”

“I’m not sure I’m supposed to.”

“Did the police tell you not to talk to us?”

She shakes her head.

“That’s because under the law, they can’t. The police are forbidden to tell a witness not to cooperate with the defense in a criminal case.

That’s the law,” I say. It is also a quantum leap from the inference I would have her draw that she must talk to us. “It’s how we get to the truth,” I say. “Everybody talking to everybody else.” I make it sound like a social tea. “I’m sure you’d like to cooperate?”

“Oh. I don’t want to be uncooperative.”

“Of course not. And we appreciate it. Now can you tell me, as well as you can, what you told the police?” The devil at work. “I guess you want to know about the woman,” she says.

“The woman?”

“The one who came to the house.”

“You saw someone come to the Vega house the night of the murder?”

“Yes.”

Harry and I look at each other. Bingo. The cops have a live one. The first neighbor who has seen a thing. “Can you tell us what time you saw this person come to the house?”

“Actually I saw her twice,” she says. “The first time about eight o’clock or thereabouts. A lot of noise. Arguing on the front porch,” she tells us. From the way she says this the cops may not need a lip-reader to peruse Jack’s security tapes. “Were you able to identify this woman?”

With this she looks at me. “I think it was your client,” she says.

“They showed me a picture. Actually several pictures. I was able to pick her out. It was hard to miss her. She made so much noise and all.”

“And did you see this woman leave?”

“I did. A few minutes later.”

“About what time was that?”

“I think I told the police about eight-twenty. She got in her car and drove off. I may be wrong, about the time I mean. The police thought it was closer to eight-thirty. They’re probably right,” she says. “Why do you say that?”

“I’m not very good on time,” she says. And because they’re the police.

She doesn’t say the latter, but I can tell from the look on her face, like every good citizen Mrs. Miller is anxious to defer to authority.

The next item I tread on carefully, not anxious to reinforce something that may not be helpful. “You say someone came to the house a second time that night. Was that later?” I ask. “That’s correct.”

“You saw this person?”

“I did.”

“And what time was this?”

“About eleven o’clock. Maybe a few minutes after. I saw her out on the street.”

“Did the person arrive in a car?” I say.

“You mean the second time?”

“Yes.”

“No, I didn’t see a car.”

“Did you see which direction she came from, the second time?”

‘sno. She just seemed to be standing there, near the driveway at the front of the house. And she’d changed.”

“Changed?”

“Her clothes.”

“What makes you think it was the same woman you saw earlier in the evening?”

“The build. The way she walked. Her face,” she finally says.

“You saw her face?”

She nods, soberly, like she knows this is bad news for our side.

“What was this woman wearing when you saw her the second time?”

“Sort of a sweatshirt, with a hood. It looked like running clothes to me. Like perhaps she’d been out jogging or was getting ready to go.”

“But you did see her face?” says Harry. “Pretty well,” she says. “Enough to identify her?” She thinks for a moment. The ultimate issue. “Yes.”

“You’re sure it was the same woman you saw earlier in the evening? The one on the Vegas’ porch who was making all the noise?”

“Oh, yes. We’ve established that,” she says.

“We?” I say.

“The police and I.” Jimmy Lama’s conquest. Mrs. Miller’s views are no doubt now cast in stone. “Have you signed a statement?” I ask this in clinical terms, like no big deal. You can change it at will. “Last week,” she says.

“And they taped their conversation with you.”

She looks at me like she’s not sure. But, knowing Lama, this is a certainty. “The first time this woman came to the house, did you see the car she was driving?” Harry is now double-learning her. “Yes. It was green, large. A Pontiac, I believe.”

The lady has a good feel for cars. Laurel has a late-model metallic-green Pontiac. “But you never saw this car later that night?”

Harry looking for a point. She looks at him grudgingly. “She could have parked it around the corner,” she says. In the role of good cop, bad cop, it is clear who is going to get the confidence of Mrs. Miller.

“Still, you didn’t see it?” I ask.

“True.”

“Had you ever seen that car in the neighborhood before?”

“No.”

“Had you ever seen the woman before? The one you identified for the police?” I say. “Not that I can recall.”

“But the second time you saw the figure” Harry’s not conceding it was Laurel “the second time there was no car.”

“I said I didn’t see a car.”

Harry’s just checking. Hostility rating high.

“Did you think this was strange? No vehicle.”

She makes a face. “Lots of people run,” she says.

We probe for openings, any concession she might be willing to throw our way. “Did you actually see this person, the second figure did you actually see this person enter the Vega house?”

“No. And I told the police that.” She’s nodding to us, like isn’t that fair? “Thank you,” says Harry. Now if she will only retract her identification of Laurel on that second trip, Harry would kiss her behind. “How well did you know Melanie Vega?” I ask.