“Was Walter Timmerman at home?”
“He was not.”
“Did you know where he was?” I ask.
“No.”
“Did his wife know where he was?”
“I don’t know.” His answers are getting shorter as his worry increases. Some people do the opposite; they feel if they talk enough, they can make the problem disappear in a sea of words. Sykes’s reaction is the opposite; I’m going to have to pry the words out of his mouth with a crowbar.
“But she wasn’t worried about his returning and walking in on you?”
“She did not seem worried. No. And we were not doing anything we needed to worry about.”
“Is it possible that Walter Timmerman was at home, and that you forced him into the trunk of your car and drove him to Paterson?”
Richard objects before Sykes can answer, and Hatchet admonishes me. I didn’t expect to get an answer, which would have been an outraged
“Mr. Sykes, may I see your cell phone, please?”
I see a flash of real worry, if not panic, in his eyes. “It’s turned off.”
“That would be a good answer if the question had been,
He takes it out of his pocket, and I get permission from Hatchet to have him turn it on. I then get Hatchet’s approval to have the court clerk dial a number, which I have her read off one of the discovery documents. As soon as she does, Sykes’s cell phone starts to ring.
“Please answer it,” I say.
He does so, but doesn’t look happy about it. “Yes,” he says, and the court clerk confirms that she hears Sykes’s voice through the phone.
“Mr. Sykes, based on the documents that were provided by the prosecution and submitted to the court, your phone is the one that called Steven Timmerman at seven twenty on the night of the murder. It was registered to Timco, so the prosecution assumed, I believe incorrectly, that Walter Timmerman made the call. Did you call him?”
If he says no he will clearly be lying, so he tries “yes.”
“What was the purpose of that call?”
“Mrs. Timmerman had told me she was concerned about Walter; she didn’t know where he was, and that was unlike him.”
“But she wasn’t concerned thirty minutes before, when you were there?” I ask.
“That’s correct. Maybe something happened; maybe she learned something. I didn’t ask. I called Steven to see if he knew where his father was.”
“You were out at the time? Is that why you used your cell phone?” I ask.
“Yes. I was in the car, as I said, I was probably running some errands.”
“But you knew his number?”
“Yes.”
“Because you had called him before?” I ask.
“Yes.”
I introduce more documents into evidence, and then hand them to Sykes. “These are Steven Timmerman’s phone records from that number for the last year. Please look at them and tell the jury which calls that you made to him. Take your time.”
He looks through the papers for about three minutes and then hands them back to me. “I don’t see any. But I know I called him a number of times. Maybe it was more than a year ago.”
“But you called him often enough that you remember the number?”
“Yes.”
“Maybe you can help me. I haven’t called Steven at home because he has been in a jail cell since he was wrongly accused. When he’s released I’ll need to call him to discuss my fee, so what is his number? Just so I’ll have it.”
He hesitates, and then says, “I can’t remember now. It’s hard to think clearly when I’m being attacked like this.”
“When you called Steven, what did he say?”
“That he had no idea where his father was; that they hadn’t been in much contact lately.”
“So when he was no help, who did you call next?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Your phone records show no other calls that night.”
“Then I didn’t make any.”
“So you were worried about Mr. Timmerman, you got no information from Steven, and that eased your mind enough not to call anyone else?”
“I said that Diana was worried about him. She probably made the other calls. These were not very significant events at the time, Mr. Carpenter. My recollection is not clear.”
“Okay. I’ll change the subject to something hopefully clearer. Let’s talk about money. I was reading the terms of Walter Timmerman’s will, and basically he left his estate and share of the company to his wife, Diana. Are you aware of that?”
“I’ve read it in the newspapers.”
“If she were not alive when the estate was settled, the money would then go to Steven. Are you aware of that?”
“Vaguely.”
“But if Steven were not in a position by law to receive the money, say if he were in jail for killing his father, Walter Timmerman’s stock goes back into the company. Did you know that?”
“I did not.”
“Therefore, all the other shareholders would then automatically have a bigger piece of the company. By my figuring, and correct me if I’m wrong, your personal stake in the company would increase by over eighty million dollars.”
“I have not given it a moment’s thought,” he says.
“Wow. You must be really rich,” I say, and am pleased when a few jury members laugh at the absurdity of it. “Most people would give at least half an hour’s thought to getting eighty million dollars.”
“I am fortunate enough to be well off financially. No amount of money would make me harm my partner and friend.”
“You don’t consider sleeping with his wife harmful to him?”
“That is something I deeply regret.”
I consider whether to delve into the likelihood that Sykes knew about Walter’s DNA work, and that taking it over was a motivation for murder. I decide against it, because it would just be me accusing and him denying, and I have nothing factual to catch him on.
I let Sykes off the stand, and Richard attempts to rehabilitate him. It gives him a chance to once again vehemently deny any wrongdoing, and to rail against the injustice of being asked about minor incidents that happened a long time ago, and then having the inference drawn that his inability to answer accurately should be incriminating.
We definitely won this round, but I just don’t know if we won it by a big enough margin.
PERRY MASON HAS LEFT THE BUILDING.
Actually, I’m not sure he was ever here. Sykes did not break down and admit his guilt, nor did I get enough out of him that his guilt was obvious.
But I made a lot of progress, and no fair-minded observer could have come away with anything near certainty
