in a sealed and marked bag at the Justice Center and then brought it to
the crime lab without opening it. Later, Heidi Chung would explain
that she removed the purse from the sealed bag that had been marked by
Officer Calabrese. It's the kind of testimony that puts jurors to
sleep, but, unfortunately, lawyers have to jump about six evidentiary
hurdles to get to the good stuff.
After Mike, I'd call the EMTs who drove Kendra to the hospital. They'd
help show how bad Kendra looked at first. Then we'd get into what
actually happened to her.
I was especially concerned about Kendra's initial lies to the police
about why she was in Old Town and whether she used heroin. I walked
them through how I was planning to deal with this. First, Ray would
testify about the initial interview with her. The bar against hearsay
would keep him from repeating most of Kendra's statements, since they
weren't made in court. But I could ask him about statements that were
eventually determined to be false. Out-of-court statements are only
hearsay if offered for their truth. He could also testify about
Kendra's demeanor.
I'd follow Ray with the ER doctor. If the jury didn't understand
Kendra's explanation for why she lied, they might hang their hats on
the Narcan if an MD explained the effects of the drug.
After the doctor, Jack Walker would testify about the second interview
with Kendra. I wanted him to talk about the change in Kendra's
demeanor from the first interview to the second and what he said to
Kendra to get her to open up with him. 'Explain it to the jury just as
you did with me,' I
told him. 'If they're going to understand why she was initially
dishonest, it's going to come from you, followed directly by Kendra.'
After Kendra, I'd call Andrea Martin to describe Kendra's recovery
since she'd been home. Then Deputy Lamborn and Dave Renshaw would
testify about Derringer's shaved body hair, followed by Chuck's
testimony about the car overhaul.
'Chuck, be ready to go over the contents of the work order from the
Collision Clinic.' The only bone Lopez threw me was on that order. The
document was admissible under a hearsay exception for business records,
but technically I should bring in an employee to establish the
foundation. I'd included the shop's custodian of records on my witness
list just in case, but Lisa had agreed to stipulate to admissibility.
Stipulating for business records was the usual professional courtesy,
but with Lisa it could've gone either way.
After Chuck, I'd call Heidi Chung, closing on the strength of the
fingerprint evidence.
When I'd finished, the detectives were clearly impressed.
Ray Johnson nodded his head. 'Man, that's classy, Kincaid. You've got
him smack down, girl.'
'Hey, you guys did all the work. I just put it together in a way that
gets it all in front of a jury.'
'You think he's going down on all counts?' Walker asked.
'To be honest, I'm not so sure. If Derringer were smart, he'd abandon
this whole identity defense, especially since we got that fingerprint.
If he'd focus on the actual legal charges instead of denying identity,
he could beat the attempted murder and try to get out from
responsibility for the sex acts of Suspect Number Two. But the jury's
likely to get so pissed off by his lame-ass alibi defense, they're not
going to split the legal hairs in his favor. They'll convict him of
the whole damn thing once they decide he was the one who did it.'
Mike Calabrese liked that possibility. 'Why shouldn't the loser get
smacked for lying his ass off? Would be nice for a jury to call
something in our favor for once.'
We turned to the defense witnesses next. Lisa had given me the bare
minimum, names and addresses. She had even listed the five witnesses
in alphabetical order so I wouldn't know who was most important.
Jack Walker started with the top. 'Well, you know who Derrick
Derringer is. He's the scumbag's brother slash alibi.'
'Last time we talked about him, we hadn't found anything to prove they
weren't together. I'm assuming that hasn't changed.'
Walker said, 'All we got is that he's lied for his brother in the past
and is no stranger to the system himself.'
'Yeah, but is the jury going to hear about that?' Ray Johnson asked.
I nodded my head and popped open a can of Diet Coke that Calabrese
tossed me from the MCT mini-fridge. 'The priors for sure. As soon as
a person takes the stand, all his felony priors come in to impeach. I'm
sure the jurors will be real impressed that big brother's got a robbery
and two forges. As far as his statement backing Derringer on the last
beef, I filed a motion to get it in. Have to wait and see. If the jury
hears about it, Derringer's toast. They'll not only know that the
alibi's bullshit, but they'll also figure out that Derringer's done
this kind of thing before.'
