'All right. Overruled. You may answer that question.'
To Riggio, it was all the same. Unruffled, she nodded. 'Yes, the Khalils had widespread business interests.'
'Just here in this country?'
'No. Overseas as well.'
'In Iraq?'
'According to the children, yes.'
'But you didn't check that information yourself?'
'We were beginning to verify all the information we'd gathered when Mr. Nolan was murdered.'
'So,' Washburn said, 'the answer is no, you didn't check the information about the Khalils' business interests in Iraq, isn't that so?'
'Your Honor!' Mills tried again. 'Relevance?'
Washburn said, 'It'll be clear in a second, Your Honor.'
'All right, but it had better be. Overruled.'
'Special Agent Riggio, Mr. Nolan worked for an American security contractor firm in Iraq, did he not? Allstrong Security.'
Now Mills was on her feet. 'Your Honor, please! We've discussed this before. This fishing expedition is going nowhere and the only purpose to eliciting this hearsay is to suggest a connection between Mr. Nolan and the Khalils, which is unsupported by any evidence.'
Washburn knew he could probably get away with at least one outburst per trial. He figured this was as good a time as any, and whirled around on Mills. 'There's a whole lot more evidence of Nolan's involvement with the Khalils' murders than of my client's. You just don't want the jury to hear anything that doesn't fit your theory.'
'Mr. Washburn!' Tollson exploded. 'Both of you. Enough. Any more of this and somebody's going to get a contempt charge. You're to address your remarks to the bench and not to one another.' Tollson stared them down, giving equal time to both. Then, glancing at the wall clock, he said, 'I'm calling a ten-minute recess so everyone can cool off.'
When Washburn resumed, his was once again the voice of sweet reason. He produced a stack of documents received from the FBI and gave them to Riggio on the stand. 'Special Agent Riggio. Using these business records, did you have an opportunity to investigate the fragmentation grenades that you discovered in Mr. Nolan's apartment?'
'Yes.'
'And what did you discover?'
'These particular grenades were produced in late two thousand two-if you want the stocking and serial numbers, I've got them, but-'
'That won't be necessary. Go ahead.'
'And they were shipped to Iraq in the early weeks after the invasion.'
'Do you know if they were delivered to Mr. Scholler's patrol?'
'No.'
'No, you don't know, or no, they weren't?'
'They were delivered as part of a consignment to Allstrong Security in Iraq.'
'Is there any evidence that Mr. Scholler at any time had possession of these grenades, or shipped them back, by whatever means, to the United States?'
'No.'
'Special Agent Riggio, have you any witnesses that reported seeing these grenades in Mr. Scholler's possession at any time?'
'No.'
Even though he'd gotten the right answer on the last several questions, Washburn knew it wasn't much. But it was probably all he was going to get. He smiled at the witness. 'Thank you,' he said. 'No further questions.'
26
By the following tuesday afternoon, the weather had turned. A violent early-season storm toppled trees and flooded many of the low-lying streets around the courthouse, playing enough havoc with the morning's traffic patterns that court couldn't be called into session until nearly eleven o'clock, and then only to adjourn almost immediately for an early lunch.
In the previous two trial days, Washburn hadn't had much to say to the witnesses Mills called. The other FBI agent, Jacob Freed, provided pretty much the same testimony as his partner, Marcia Riggio. Washburn hammered a bit at the provenance of the frag grenades again, at the lack of real investigation into the lives and motives of possible other suspects in both the Khalil and Nolan murders after they'd identified Evan as their main person of interest. But he knew that he'd inflicted little if any damage to the prosecution's case-the fact, and Washburn hated to admit it, was that the FBI and Spinoza had coordinated very well, and had fashioned an evidentiary chain that was pretty damn compelling. In the end, Washburn just wanted to get Freed off the stand as quickly as possible, although he still took the better part of half a day.
Likewise, David Saldar, the locksmith, came to the stand and, by far the most nervous and uncomfortable witness to date, gave his testimony without any surprises. He was talking about an unarguable point in any event- Evan Scholler had done exactly what Saldar was saying he'd done. He'd lied to a friend, he'd used the police uniform to buttress his credibility, he'd let himself into a home that was not his. It wasn't exactly a high-water mark for the defense, but Washburn couldn't do anything about that either.
Mills's final witness, who'd taken up most of yesterday's-Monday's-time, had been Tara. In spite of clearly conveying to the jury that she was involved with Evan, she not only reaffirmed the fact that Nolan had told her he was concerned and worried about Evan's break-in, but she also provided the crucial testimony of the overt threat to Nolan's life that Evan had made at the Old Town Traven.
Coming from a woman who so obviously did not want to hurt the defendant, Tara's testimony seemed to resonate with the jury in an especially powerful way. And Washburn, try as he might, couldn't get a handle on what he could cross-examine her about-that she hadn't believed Nolan's assertion about Evan planting the weapons in his house? That Evan hadn't really meant what he'd said about killing his rival? Neither of those opinions would be admissible, since that's all they would have been-the opinions of a woman, the jury would feel, who would certainly lie if lying would help her lover's defense.
Now the prosecution had rested and Washburn would get his chance to present an affirmative defense. But in the absence of a client who could even deny that he'd committed the crime, in the absence of an alternative suspect, and with the plethora of motive and opportunity weighing in against Evan, he knew that this might be the legal challenge of his entire career. He didn't have much, and what he did have was dubious at best.
The first order of business was to try to get the jury, to the extent it was going to be possible at all, into Evan's camp. Reminding himself that he only needed one juror, he settled on a woman in the back row named Maggie Ellersby, who was about the same age, and pretty much had the same suburban-housewife look, as Evan's mother, Eileen. More than that, during jury selection she'd revealed that she had two sons of her own; that she was opposed to the war in Iraq, although she supported the troops there. She might have a liberal streak, which in turn might extend to perceiving Evan as some kind of a victim of something, and hence not completely culpable. Beyond that, she had been married to the same man for thirty years, and so might in her heart be rooting for Tara and Evan to put this problem behind them and have a life together. All of this, of course, was extremely nebulous, but it gave Washburn hope to have a 'litmus juror' to whom he could target his defense.
'Your Honor,' Washburn said as a fresh squall of rain tattooed the courtroom's windows, 'the defense calls Anthony Onofrio.'
