The Vendetta Defense

“Isn’t it well known that Mr. Coluzzi hated Mr. Lucia as well?”

Santoro jumped up. “Objection, Your Honor. Mr. Coluzzi’s motives are irrelevant here. The poor man is dead!”

Judy stood her ground. “Your Honor, it is extremely relevant to the defense that there was ill will between the two men. It’s important for the jury to see both sides of the story.”

Judge Vaughn said, “Sustained, but let’s dispense with the speaking objections, counsel. I give the speeches in my courtroom, not you.” The judge turned to the witness. “You may answer the question, Mrs. D’Antonio.”

The witness nodded. “It is true. Mr. Coluzzi hated Mr. Lucia, too. They hated each other.”

Judy wanted to ask why, but she let it be. It was tempting but was too risky. She sat down. “Thank you, ma’am. I have no further questions.”

Santoro was up in a minute. “The people call Sebastiano Gentile to the stand,” he said, and Judy turned, almost recognizing the old man entering the door in the bulletproof panel. Sebastiano Gentile, a small, wizened man wearing a white shirt, baggy dark pants, and a cabbie’s hat of sky blue, came in shyly and approached the witness stand. He took off his hat when he was sworn in, leaving wisps of white hair like cirrus clouds around his pink head. His eyes were blue as his cap, magnified by thick bifocals.

Judy leaned over to Pigeon Tony, to confirm her suspicion. “Is Mr. Gentile another neighbor?”

“Si, si,” Pigeon Tony said, nodding happily at the stand. The anger caused by Santoro’s opening argument had left him. It had become old home week, and Pigeon Tony was having the best time anyone could have at his own murder trial.

Santoro faced the witness after he was sworn in. “Mr. Gentile, where do you live?”

“Across the street from Pigeon To— I mean, Mr. Lucia.”

“And have you ever discussed his late wife or his son with him?”

“Yes. All the time.”

“And when was the most recent of those conversations?”

“Uh, last spring, after his son passed. He was washin’ his stoop, and I was puttin’ out the trash.”

“And what did Mr. Lucia say on that subject, as you recall?”

“He said Angelo Coluzzi killed his wife and his son. And his daughter-in-law. He told everybody that.”

Pigeon Tony remained pleased, evidently glad the facts of the murders were stated as truth, but his lawyer’s head began to throb. Judy knew what Santoro was doing. He was beefing up the evidence of Pigeon Tony’s motive, even front-loading the witness line-up with it, because his evidence of intent to murder and his physical evidence were borderline. If the jury knew Pigeon Tony’s avowed motive, it would make it easier to find that he had killed Coluzzi in that room.

“Mr. Gentile, did you hear Mr. Lucia say this on more than one occasion?”

The witness didn’t even have to think twice. “Sure. All the time.”

Santoro nodded. “Thank you, Mr. Gentile, I have nothing further.” He crossed to counsel table and hit a key on his laptop as Judy stood up.

She lingered at the podium. “Mr. Gentile, were you present at the pigeon-racing club on the morning of April seventeenth of this year?”

“No. I’m allergic to animals.”

Judy smiled, as did the jury. But it was important to stay on message. “So isn’t it a fact that you don’t know anything about the murder for which Mr. Lucia is now standing trial?”

“I really can’t say nothin’ about no murder. I don’t know.”

Judy nodded. So far, so good. “Mr. Gentile, you testified that Mr. Lucia hated Mr. Coluzzi. Isn’t it true that Mr. Coluzzi hated Mr. Lucia, too?”

Mr. Gentile smiled, revealing even, white dentures. “Oh, yeh. Angelo hated Pigeon Tony. I mean, Mr. Lucia. There was bad blood between them, very bad.”

“I have no further questions.” Judy sat down, pleased.

As Mr. Gentile left the stand, Judge Vaughn looked over his glasses. “Next witness, Mr. Santoro?”

Santoro nodded. “The Commonwealth calls Mr. Guglielmo Lupito to the stand.”

Judy could see where this was going. The cavalcade of Italian senior citizens, all of whom had heard our hero announce his hatred of the deceased, would continue. The cumulative effect would hurt the defense, even given whatever small points Judy made on cross. She had to do something. She half rose. “Your Honor, the defense objects to the repetitious nature of these witnesses.”

Santoro’s glistening head snapped around. “Your Honor, it is important that the jury see the witnesses, and how many there are.”

“Your Honor, it’s a waste of the court’s time and resources for a tangential line of questioning. Perhaps I could save time if I stipulate—”

“No, Your Honor,” Santoro interrupted. “The Commonwealth will not stipulate. I think the jury should hear this from the horse’s mouth.”

Judge Vaughn sighed. “Go ahead, Mr. Santoro, but restrain yourself shortly. You’ve made your point, and Ms. Carrier’s made hers.”

Judy sat down and scribbled for the sake of scribbling, but she was too stressed to write any jokes in capital letters. Pigeon Tony’s life was at stake and yet another neighbor was taking the stand. As much as Pigeon Tony warmed to see his old friends, she knew each one was driving a nail into his coffin. She considered asking them if they thought Coluzzi had committed the past murders, but she knew she’d draw a legitimate objection. Neither lawyer could prove or disprove the truth of the past murders, but Santoro was using them to advantage. She vowed to do the same before the case was over.

They sat through the testimony of Mr. Ralph Bergetti, Mrs. Josephine DiGiuseppe, Mr. Tessio Castello, Miss Lucille Buoniconti and, oddly, an Anne Foster, before Judge Vaughn granted Judy’s objections. Santoro asked all the same questions and got all the same answers, as did Judy on cross. But she was concerned. The jury would remember these witnesses, whose demeanor was so credible and whose testimony was undisputed. It would lighten Santoro’s burden on proving reasonable doubt. By lunch recess, Judy had serious doubts.

She had to turn it around, or Pigeon Tony was a dead man.

Chapter 39

“That was the worst thing Santoro could have done, for us,”

Judy said as she, Pigeon Tony, Frank, and Bennie sat at the round table in the courthouse conference room. It was a small white room, dominated by a fake chestnut table and ringed with four black leather swivel chairs. Right now the table was covered with a large pizza box, filled with leftover crusts.

“Agreed,” Bennie said. Her unruly hair had been swept back into a ponytail, which looked professional with her trademark khaki suit. Her face was pale, the result of hard work and worry; she had backstopped Judy on trial prep as if she were Judy’s associate and not the other way around. “You know what he’s doing, don’t you? Setting up the physical evidence.”

“I know. How’d I do, on cross?”

“Fine. You know what they say. When you have the facts, pound the facts. When you have the law, pound the law. When you don’t have either, pound the table.”

Judy grinned. “Got it. I’ll just keep pounding and hold up until it’s our turn.”

Pigeon Tony set down his half-eaten pizza crust. “Then I talk to judge?”

Judy shook her head. They had discussed this only about twelve hundred times before the trial began. “No. Then we put on our witnesses. I thought we agreed, you should not testify. It wouldn’t help your case. They have no good proof of what happened in that room except through you.”

Pigeon Tony’s face went red. “But they lie! They say Coluzzi no murder Silvana. Or my Frank. And Gemma! I hear! I know! Lies!”

“If you got up on the stand, you would tell the truth. You would say that Coluzzi did all those things, but we couldn’t prove any of it, which would make you look just like the man they say you are. An angry old man, full of hate. Legally, it’s your decision, but I am telling you not to go up there and let me handle it.”

“I tell truth! Millie tell truth! Sebastiano and Paul! They all say truth!” Pigeon Tony went red in the face, waving a finger. “I hate Coluzzi! He kill my family!