Dead River (33 page)

Judge Vetter sat on his pecan-wood throne, leaning his chin on his right hand. A large stainless-steel pitcher of ice water was at his left side with a full glass sitting beside it. He reached for the glass and took a sip. Then he leaned back in his chair and pawed at his uncombed and knotted hair. Harley could see the proceedings were already weighing heavily on the judge’s patience.

Jacobson finally wrapped up his questioning of Wilkerson.

“Would you care to cross-examine the witness, Mr. Buckwald?” Vetter asked.

“No, Your Honor, the defense has no questions for the witness,” Harley said as he stood and buttoned his suit coat. Then he unbuttoned his coat and slowly sat back down.

Harley glanced at his client, and Sikes looked back at him in disbelief. His rubbery cheeks bounced on his face as he shook his head.

“Keep calm, son,” Harley whispered, as he leaned in close to Sikes. “Remember, no outbursts.”

 72

THE NEXT WITNESS called by Jacobson was Todd Zeller, the deputy sheriff who was in charge at the McCarthy house while the forensics team had gathered evidence. Jacobson walked him through each bit of evidence taken at the McCarthy’s, spending several minutes going over the hair samples that were found in the bedroom where Sikes had stayed. Again, slow, boring, but this time informative.

“That’s all the questions I have for the witness, Your Honor,” Jacobson said, staying in his usual droning voice.

“Mr. Buckwald, would you care to cross-examine?” asked the judge.

“Yes, Your Honor, I would. May I approach the witness?”

“Yes, you may.”

Harley stood and buttoned his suit coat. He swaggered toward the witness stand and stopped two feet short.

“Deputy Zeller.”

“Yes, sir.”

“I would like to know more about the gathering of the evidence at the McCarthy house.”

“Okay.”

“Were there any members of the sheriff’s criminalistics forensic team that gathered evidence at the McCarthy house that were also at the Riley residence on August 18?”

“Actually, it was the same team of individuals, sir.”

Harley slowly spun around to look at everyone in the courtroom. He continued his rotation until he faced the witness again. “I see, it was the same team. And didn’t at least one of the individuals examine Miss Sara Ann Riley’s car in the driveway at her residence?”

“I wasn’t there, but I guess one of them did. It was in the report.”

“Yes, it certainly was in the report.”

Now Harley backed away from the witness stand and addressed the entire courtroom. His hands were in the air, like he was conducting an orchestra. “So here you have a person inside the Riley girl’s car, gathering evidence, and a few days later the same person is at the McCarthy house.” Here it comes, raise doubt. “Don’t you think there’s a possibility that the person gathering evidence inside the Riley girl’s car could have ended up with some of her hair strands on his shoes, and then a few days later, while at the McCarthy house, that same hair could come off his shoes and end up on the carpet in the bedroom where the hair was found?”

Jacobson shot up out of his chair. “Objection! Speculative, Your Honor, the witness would be drawing his own conclusions,” he growled.

“Sustained.”

“Yes, Your Honor,” Harley submitted.

Harley paused a moment for effect. Then he turned and again faced the witness. “Okay then, Deputy Zeller. Can you tell the court the procedures used by the criminalistics team members after leaving a crime scene?”

“I don’t understand the question. What procedures are you referring to?”

“Okay, let me be more specific. When the evidence is taken back and cataloged are the individuals that gathered the evidence required to clean their shoes?”

This time Jacobson was out of his chair even faster. “Your Honor, I object! If Mr. Buckwald is leading us back to his previous outrageous assumption of transference of evidence, I—object!” Jacobson’s face was glowing red.

“Sustained. Sit down, Mr. Jacobson,” ordered the judge.

Jacobson sat down hard in his chair. He glared at Harley, but Harley only glanced in his direction for a second.

“Mr. Buckwald, stop this line of questioning,” ordered Vetter. “This case is not being tried here today. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Your Honor.” Harley looked at the judge. Vetter’s hair seemed to have sprouted an additional two inches since nine o’clock. “I have no more questions for the witness, Your Honor.”

Jacobson’s final witness was Sam Weber. Yet again, the testimony was long and monotonous. Even the court deputy was beginning to fidget in the corner.

“Mr. Buckwald, would you like to cross-examine?”

Harley stood and buttoned his coat. He picked up his legal pad and thumbed his way through the sheets until he arrived at the page he needed. He looked in Vetter’s direction.

“May I approach the witness, Your Honor.”

“Yes, you may,” the judge said, taking a sip from his glass of water.

Harley turned his attention to the witness. “Mr. Weber.”

“Yes.”

“How are you this morning?”

“Ah, I’m all right.”

Harley scanned the page in his legal pad once more and then placed it on the table. He walked toward the witness stand, stopping only inches from Weber.

“So let’s see, Mr. Weber, you met Special Agent Goldman and Detective Wilkerson at approximately 11:55 pm the night you performed the analysis on the hair samples. Is that correct?”

“That sounds about right.”

“That seems pretty late to perform such an important task. Weren’t you tired?”

Jacobson stood and firmly planted his hands on the table. “Objection, Your Honor,” he barked.

“What’s your objection, counselor?” asked Vetter.

“Relevance, Your Honor. It’s not clear where this line of questioning is going.”

“Overruled. Answer the question, Mr. Weber,” Vetter ordered.

Jacobson slowly sat down in his chair.

Weber cleared his throat. “Naw, I wasn’t tired.”

“You can remember back to that specific night?”

“Sure, got a great memory. Look, I’m up at all hours of the night at home sometimes. I’m used to being up late.”

“So you don’t think working late that night had any affect on your ability to properly analyze the hair samples?”

“Nope, none at all.”

“Can you give the court a quick synopsis of what you do in the lab? I mean in general.”

“Sure.”

“Thank you, Mr. Weber.”

Weber nodded his head and wrapped his long, tentacle-like fingers around the arms on the chair in the witness stand. “As I mentioned before, I work for the Florida Department of Law Enforcement in the regional office in Orlando. I’m one of two forensic examiners of hair and fibers. We examine hair and fiber using a microscope and look for certain characteristics.”

That was enough for Harley to get Weber going. “So let’s talk about hair samples,” Harley interrupted.

“Okay.”

“So you can take two separate hair samples from the scalp of a human, collected from two different locations, and then try to match them by comparing their characteristics under the microscope. Is that correct?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Okay. And is that what you did the night you analyzed the Riley girl’s hair?”

“Yes.”

“And they matched?”

“Yes.”

“Did you find any characteristics of the hair that were unusual?”

“Nope, none at all. Her hair was blond, but natural blond. It wasn’t bleached. A lot of women like to bleach their hair, and we can tell when we analyze it.”

Weber looked around the courtroom for a response. Only the court deputy snickered.

Harley smoothed his hair back with his right hand and continued his questioning. “You just told the court that you didn’t find anything unusual about the Riley girl’s hair, is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, I’m sure.” Weber’s face began to flush.

“Okay, Mr. Weber.” Harley looked down at his shoes and then at the witness again. “So you determined that the two different hair samples matched, but you didn’t find anything unusual with one of the samples?

“What?” asked Weber, now wearing a puzzled look. “I already said I found nothing unusual about the victim’s hair.”

Harley ignored the witness’s response. “You also told the court that the victim’s hair was not bleached, is that correct?”

“Yes—yes, I did.”

“So any damage to the hair wouldn’t be a result of chemical bleaching, but it could be a result of some other abuse, say from a shoe that repeatedly stepped on it.”

Mr. Slick bolted from his chair with his hands high in the air. “Objection, Your Honor! I demand that you stop this line of questioning.”

“Sustained!” Vetter’s forehead wrinkled, and his eyes narrowed as he stared at the prosecutor. “Sit down, counselor. I make the demands in this courtroom.”

“Yes, Your Honor.” Jacobson said, crumbling back into his chair.

Vetter then directed his attention to Harley with his finger aimed and ready to fire. “Mr. Buckwald, that’s it. If you continue this line of questioning, you’ll be held in contempt. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, Your Honor. I have no further questions for the witness.”

Harley walked back to the defense table. Mr. Slick gave him a burning glare. This time Harley shot a smile in Mr. Slick’s direction. Vetter announced a fifteen-minute recess. Harley figured Jacobson needed the break more than anyone in the courtroom.

Harley had two character witnesses, Chester Manley and Dallas DuPont. They were both electricians who worked with Sikes at McCarthy Electrical Contracting. Jacobson cross-examined the first witness, Chester, in his usual boring monotone that put the court deputy in a constant fidgeting frenzy, to fight nodding off. Dallas Dupont was another story. Less than one minute into Jacobson’s cross-examination, Dupont became so flustered he broke wind. This sent the entire courtroom into a fit of laughter, with the exception of Judge Vetter and Mr. Slick. After several raps of the gavel, Vetter regained control of his precious courtroom.

When it was finally over, Harley sat coolly next to his client, and Mr. Slick consulted with his assistant. The courtroom buzzed as Vetter rustled papers he had spread before him. He occasionally sipped out of his glass of water. He read some of the documents and scanned others. He tugged on his stringy gray hair and mumbled to himself as he made notes, consulting with his assistant three times. Then he finally nodded to the court deputy, who quieted the courtroom.

“I’ll make this short,” announced Vetter, adjusting his wire-rim glasses. He glanced around the courtroom and then continued. “After hearing the testimony this morning, it’s my determination that there is probable cause to continue holding the defendant, Mr. David Allen Sikes, without bond, until such time that this case is brought before the grand jury.”

There was a current of whispers and murmurs from the back of the courtroom. Harley stared straight ahead in the direction of Vetter, who was again fumbling around in his stacks of notes. Vetter stopped his search and looked up. His face was drawn tight, and every hair on his head seemed to stand at attention. The overhead halogens reflected off his shiny skin.

The judge’s gavel hit the hardwood block with a crack. “Order in the court. Last warning. If I hear anything but silence in here, I will ask the court deputy to clear the courtroom.”

Vetter went back to business, thumbing through the papers that were now strewn about. Finally he called his assistant and whispered something in her ear. She reached down and handed him a stapled stack of papers. The assistant smiled and returned to her seat in front of the judge’s stand. Vetter mumbled something and then cleared his throat.

“The grand jury hearing for this case is scheduled for December 6, at 1:00 pm.” Vetter immediately raised himself up and carefully managed the five steps down to the floor. He disappeared through the pecan door.

 73

EARLY TUESDAY MORNING, the day after the preliminary hearing, accused and attorney sat across the table from each other in the now-familiar light-green room in the county jail. Harley explained to Sikes the State would respond to his motion for pretrial discovery next week. They should also find out about the DNA test results soon. But for now, he wanted to talk to Sikes about another matter.

“Son, do you remember me telling you that the police have the killer’s voice recorded?”

“Yeah.”

“I found out some more details. Apparently the voice was distorted, probably using an electronic device. In spite of this, there are two witnesses that say they recognized the voice.”

Sikes didn’t speak, lowering his eyes and staring at the tabletop.

“They both said it was yours.”