a position behind the victim and pressed the point of the knife against the left side of her throat. As Ms. Campo entered a short hallway that led to the apartment’s two bedrooms she turned in the confined space and pushed her attacker backwards into a large floor vase. As he stumbled backwards over the vase, she made a break for the front door. Realizing that her attacker would recover and catch her at the front door, she ducked into the kitchen and grabbed a bottle of vodka off the counter. When the intruder passed by the kitchen on his way to the front door to catch her, Ms. Campo stepped out of the blind and struck him on the back of the head, knocking him to the floor. Ms. Campo then stepped over the fallen man and unlocked the front door. She ran out the door and called the police from the first-floor apartment shared by Turner and Atkins. Turner and Atkins returned to the apartment, where they found the intruder unconscious on the floor. They maintained control of him as he started to regain consciousness and remained in the apartment until police arrived.”
“This is incredible,” Roulet said. “To have to sit here and listen to this. I can’t believe what has happened to me. I DID NOT do this. This is like a dream. She is lying! She -”
“If it is all lies, then this will be the easiest case I ever had,” I said. “I will tear her apart and throw her entrails into the sea. But we have to know what she has put on the record before we can construct traps and go after her. And if you think this is hard to sit through, wait until we get to trial and it’s stretched out over days instead of minutes. You have to control yourself, Louis. You have to remember that you will get your turn. The defense always gets its turn.”
Dobbs reached over and patted Roulet on the forearm, a nice fatherly gesture. Roulet pulled his arm away.
“Damn right you are going to go after her,” Roulet said, pointing a finger across the table at my chest. “I want you to go after her with everything we’ve got.”
“That’s what I am here for, and you have my promise I will. Now, let me ask my associate a few questions before we finish up here.”
I waited to see if Roulet had anything else to say. He didn’t. He leaned back into his chair and clasped his hands together.
“You finished, Raul?” I asked.
“For now. I’m still working on all the reports. I should have a transcript of the nine-one-one call tomorrow morning and there will be more stuff coming in.”
“Good. What about a rape kit?”
“There wasn’t one. Booker’s report said she declined, since it never got to that.”
“What’s a rape kit?” Roulet asked.
“It’s a hospital procedure where bodily fluids, hair and fibers are collected from the body of a rape victim,” Levin said.
“There was no rape!” Roulet exclaimed. “I never touched -”
“We know that,” I said. “That’s not why I asked. I am looking for cracks in the state’s case. The victim said she was not raped but was reporting what was certainly a sex crime. Usually, the police insist on a rape kit, even when a victim claims there was no sexual assault. They do this just in case the victim actually has been raped and is just too humiliated to say so or might be trying to keep the full extent of the crime from a husband or family member. It’s standard procedure, and the fact that she was able to talk her way out of it might be significant to us.”
“She didn’t want the first guy’s DNA showing up in her,” Dobbs said.
“Maybe,” I said. “It might mean any number of things. But it might be a crack. Let’s move on. Raul, is there any mention anywhere about this guy who Louis saw her with?”
“No, none. He’s not in the file.”
“And what did crime scene find?”
“I don’t have the report but I am told that no evidence of any significant nature was located during the crime scene evaluation of the apartment.”
“That’s good. No surprises. What about the knife?”
“Blood and prints on the knife. But nothing back on that yet. Tracing ownership will be unlikely. You can buy those folding knives in any fishing or camping store around.”
“I’m telling you, that is not my knife,” Roulet interjected.
“We have to assume the fingerprints will be from the man who turned it in,” I said.
“Atkins,” Levin responded.
“Right, Atkins,” I said, turning to Louis. “But it would not surprise me to find prints from you on it as well. There is no telling what occurred while you were unconscious. If she put blood on your hand, then she probably put your prints on the knife.”
Roulet nodded his agreement and was about to say something, but I didn’t wait for him.
“Is there any statement from her about being at Morgan’s earlier in the evening?” I asked Levin.
He shook his head.
“No, the interview with the victim was in the ER and not formal. It was basic and they didn’t go back with her to the early part of the evening. She didn’t mention the guy and she didn’t mention Morgan’s. She just said she had been home since eight-thirty. They asked about what happened at ten. They didn’t really get into what she had been doing before. I’m sure that will all be covered in the follow-up investigation.”
“Okay, if and when they go back to her for a formal, I want that transcript.”
“I’m on it. It will be a sit-down on video when they do it.”
“And if crime scene does a video, I want that, too. I want to see her place.”
Levin nodded. He knew I was putting on a show for the client and Dobbs, giving them a sense of my command of the case and all the irons that were going into the fire. The reality was I didn’t need to tell Raul Levin any of this. He already knew what to do and what to get for me.
“Okay, what else?” I asked. “Do you have any questions, Cecil?”
Dobbs seemed surprised by the focus suddenly shifting to him. He quickly shook his head.
“No, no, I’m fine. This is all good. We’re making good progress.”
I had no idea what he meant by “progress,” but I let it go by without question.
“So what do you think?” Roulet asked.
I looked at him and waited a long moment before answering.
“I think the state has got a strong case against you. They have you in her home, they have a knife and they have her injuries. They also have what I am assuming is her blood on your hands. Added to that, the photos are powerful. And, of course, they will have her testimony. Having never seen or spoken to the woman, I don’t know how impressive she will be.”
I stopped again and milked the silence even longer before continuing.
“But there is a lot they don’t have-evidence of break-in, DNA from the suspect, a motive or even a suspect with a past record of this or any sort of crime. There are a lot of reasons-legitimate reasons-for you to have been in that apartment. Plus…”
I looked past Roulet and Dobbs and out the window. The sun was dropping behind Anacapa and turning the sky pink and purple. It beat anything I ever saw from the windows of my office.
“Plus what?” Roulet asked, too anxious to wait on me.
“Plus you have me. I got Maggie McFierce off the case. The new prosecutor is good but he’s green and he’ll have never come up against someone like me before.”
“So what’s our next step?” Roulet asked.
“The next step is for Raul to keep doing his thing, finding out what he can about this alleged victim and why she lied about being alone. We need to find out who she is and who her mystery man is and to see how that plays into our case.”
“And what will you do?”
“I’ll be dealing with the prosecutor. I’ll set something up with him, try to see where he’s going and we’ll make our choice on which way to go. I have no doubt that I’ll be able to go to the DA and knock all of this down to something you can plea to and get behind you. But it will require a concession. You -”
“I told you. I will not -”
“I know what you said but you have to hear me out. I may be able to get a no-contest plea so that you don’t actually ever say the word ‘guilty,’ but I am not seeing the state completely dropping this. You will have to concede responsibility in some regard. It is possible to avoid jail time but you will likely have to perform community service
