Once, he turned and asked Portell if he was from the Wamego Times.
“I said, ‘yes,’ and he wanted to shake my hand, but the Marshals wouldn’t allow it and shoved him back into his seat.”
Pickard testified that the only reason he and Apperson came to Wamego was to help Skinner destroy a dangerous drug lab: they were Samaritans played for fools. Among other assertions, Pickard testified that Skinner “claimed he might have part of the clandestine laboratory of George Marquardt and some of Marquardt’s ergotamine tartrate.” In Skinner’s amateurish hands, that could only spell disaster.
Leonard and AUSA Hough fenced throughout. When the prosecutor asked if Leonard could recall previous contradicting testimony, he’d taunt, “Use your mind.”
“Don’t be insulting,” shot back Pickard.
Pointing to his fifteen different aliases, Hough asked him which he preferred.
“You may call me Mr. Pickard,” answered Leonard.
When Pickard expressed concern from the witness stand over his wife and child, Hough baited: “Which one? With Trais Kliphuis or Natasha Kruglova?”
“I think that’s reprehensible on your part, sir,” said Leonard.
The bickering arose so often and with such bile that Judge Rogers weighed in. Siding frequently with Hough, he instructed the jury to ignore Pickard’s sarcasm, but also cautioned the AUSA to be “less harsh” and give Pickard time to answer.
“I’m used to some of this in this trial,” he said. “And I want you to stop! I want you to stop quarreling.”
On March 4, days before taking the stand, Karl Nichols made his final entry in the Skinner file. Despite having to clean up Todd’s messes during the previous two years, he wrote, “It has been determined that the potential benefit to DEA and the public interest outweighs the negative risks associated with this CS.”
There had never been any question that the government’s case hinged on Todd Skinner. In total, Pickard would spend five days on the witness stand; Skinner was there for eleven.
“Skinner was drugged out on benzodiazepines throughout his testimony,” recalled John Halpern.2
Valium did not prevent him from lying under oath. In one particularly glaring exchange, Apperson’s attorney Mark Bennet annihilated Skinner’s credibility:
Bennett: Over the years of illegal activity, you’ve found it necessary to be quick-witted and untruthful?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: Have you made up stories to stay out of jail and out of trouble?
Skinner: No.
Bennett: Have you made up stories to stay out of jail?
Skinner: No, I don’t think I’ve been in a situation like that.
Bennett: Have you developed an ability to look someone in the eye and lie to them about illegal activity?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: From age nineteen to the present, have you lied to authorities to conceal your drug use?
Skinner: I’d have to think a long time about that.
Bennett: You’ve lied to conceal possession of drug manufacturing equipment?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: You’ve lied to conceal your involvement in an illegal drug lab?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: You’ve lied to people about stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: When you get right down to it, Mr. Skinner, you’re willing to lie whenever it will benefit you, isn’t that right?
Skinner: No, that’s not true.
Bennett: But you’re willing to lie to stay out of trouble?
Skinner: Yes.
Bennett: And you’re willing to lie to stay out of jail?
Skinner: I don’t know about that one. I need to ask a lawyer before I answer these questions.
Bennett: Mr. Skinner, you’re willing to lie to this court, aren’t you?
Skinner: Again, I’d like access to a lawyer.
While the jury was out of the courtroom, Hough admitted that Skinner perjured himself, but maintained that most of his testimony was truthful. In order to penetrate drug organizations, he explained, the DEA often had to rely on sketchy insiders.
The defense called for an immediate mistrial.
“It’s a trial by ambush, judge, and that shouldn’t be allowed,” said Bennett. “This has been deliberate and intentional from the beginning. It’s just not fair, your honor.”
Rogers told Bennett to “sit down and shut up,” then sided with the prosecution.
As the trial dragged on, Mark Bennett observed, “We’ve been together so long I told somebody we should have a float in the St. Patrick’s Day parade.”
Judge Rogers denied a defense final request for more time to examine prosecution exhibits and to call more witnesses.
“To suggest that you two very experienced attorneys need more time to prepare your final argument is not a good excuse at all,” he said.
“Although we may be experienced, judge, there were over nine hundred exhibits and thousands of pages of reports and notes,” said Rork. He threw up his hands. “I’m not Superman.”
Rogers was unmoved. Final arguments began the next day. Hough went first.
“What you have here is two California men who want to sell you some ocean-front property in Kansas,” he said. “The fact is, the ocean is not in Kansas. You see the defendants before you, stripped to the bone for what they are—LSD manufacturers with an LSD distribution network.”
Pickard was “the chemist, the lead man,” said Hough. “He’s not the mild-mannered policy schmuck he would have you believe. Mr. Pickard was in charge all along. Mr. Apperson would have you believe he’s stupid. Anyone—a fifth grade kid—has had enough science to know this was a laboratory.
“The defendants are gamesmen and gamblers. But the truth is . . . in this case, they’ve rolled craps.”
In their own closing, the defense zeroed in on Todd Skinner.
“This was a setup, ladies and gentlemen,” said Mark Bennett. “A setup in which Gordon Skinner was trying to get out of his own problems. The government, much to their chagrin, found out Mr. Skinner never met a lie he didn’t like or embrace.”
Apperson’s lawyer advised the jury to weigh carefully each of Hough’s assertions, as they were based on the self-serving inventions of a lifelong con
