Authors: Nick Stone
The last day of the trial. Wednesday.
The two sides were to sum up their respective arguments; then the judge would give the jury his directions, before sending them out to deliberate the verdict.
It was almost over.
VJ thought he’d done badly yesterday. I agreed. Carnavale had been impressive,
very
impressive. Even though I knew VJ was innocent, I almost believed he could be guilty. Luckily, I wasn’t asked for my opinion.
Christine reassured VJ he’d done brilliantly, especially when she’d cross-examined him. She claimed the jury had seen through Carnavale, how he’d not so much asked questions as framed his preferred version of events
as questions
. Janet and Redpath had said nothing.
The court was packed now, as it had been from the start. But today it felt like there were even more people here. The public gallery was stacked with faces. I spotted Melissa, in a corner. Sid Kopf was right next to her, looking straight at me. I wondered if VJ’s mum had come, or maybe his sister.
Christine leaned over to me.
‘Janet told me your theory – about Sid,’ she whispered. ‘We’ll talk about that afterwards.’
‘Do you think it’s possible?’
‘Janet does,’ she said.
Turning to the jury, Franco Carnavale delivered his pitch for a guilty verdict. Gone were his snide tone, his leaning over the lectern, his pauses, the kazoo. He was now a salesman on a mission.
He started by reminding the jurors who Evelyn Bates was; her age when she died, the loving family and friends who’d never see her again and the life cruelly and callously ended. He was empathetic, his delivery powered by restrained moral outrage.
He recapped the forensics and the emotion went out of his tone. He spoke plainly and matter-of-factly.
The bulk of his summary was devoted to his theory that the accused led a double life. To the public he was the award-winning
ethical
multi-millionaire businessman and devoted husband and family man. In private he was a sexual sadist who got his kicks hurting women, hitting and choking them.
‘In the past, when he was choking women,’ Carnavale said, ‘Vernon James was at the threshold of murder. It was only a matter of time before he took that final fatal step. On the morning of March 17th he did, when he took Evelyn Bates’s life.’
Then, to conclude, he said this:
‘Vernon James is a danger to women. To set him free would be to put more young women’s lives at risk – women like Evelyn. If she died for something, then let it be to rid the world of people like her killer, the man in the dock.’
And with that Carnavale thanked the jury and sat down.
He looked
mighty
pleased with himself.
After a short recess it was Christine’s turn.
Like the prosecutor, she also faced the jury. Unlike him, she had no notes in front of her.
‘When I first spoke to you, ladies and gentlemen, I told you I didn’t like Vernon James. Well…
‘I
still
don’t like him. Why? Because he’s a depraved man beholden to his appetite for violent, sadistic sex. An appetite so rampant, so destructive, so all-consuming it’s brought him here, before you, accused of a serious, heinous crime. So, in that respect, Vernon James
is
guilty – guilty of weakness, stupidity, and a complete and utter lack of self-control. But those, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, are personal failings, not crimes.
‘I’ll be honest with you. When I heard about the case on the news, my first reaction was
He did it. He’s guilty.
‘Evelyn’s body was found in his hotel room. He checked out of the hotel without reporting it. He
must
be guilty. She’s dead. He ran. Fair cop. Case closed. Right?
‘
Wrong.
Let’s reconsider the case in the light of everything we’ve heard over the past two weeks.
‘When the police first interviewed the defendant, Vernon James, mere hours after finding Evelyn’s body, he was not only drunk, he was also – unbeknown to both them
and
himself – still under the influence of Rohypnol.
‘As we’ve heard, from both a medical professional
and
the detective in charge of this investigation, Rohypnol mixed with alcohol causes disorientation and blackouts.
‘The police interviewed a man who could only remember very confused fragments of what had happened the night before. They accused him of lying, of changing his story. They said he’d made up the woman he said he was with – a tall, attractive, long-haired blonde in a green dress. And they made much of the fact that when they showed him a picture of Evelyn Bates and asked him if that was the woman he was with, he said, “I’m not sure.”
‘Ladies and gentleman of the jury, Mr James wasn’t lying when he said those words.
He really wasn’t sure
. He wasn’t sure of where he was, where he’d been, who he’d been with. He probably wasn’t entirely sure that what was happening to him then was even real.
‘A single dose of Rohypnol has a cycle of between eight and twelve hours. It’s at its most effective in the first six hours. After that it starts to weaken, and the person who’s taken it slowly regains clarity of mind. Their memory comes back.
‘And so it proved with Mr James. The first official police interview took place at Charing Cross at 1 p.m. That was when he was initially shown the picture of Evelyn.
‘The second police interview took place three hours later. He was shown the photo of Evelyn again and said, “No. That wasn’t her.” And he also told the police his version of events. He told them he’d gone up to his room with a tall blonde in a dark-green dress. He remembered her name – Fabia. He tried to seduce her in his suite and she viciously assaulted him.
‘Yes, he’d changed his story to a completely different version of events. Of course it was different, because it was based on the memories that were coming back to him as the drug was wearing off.
‘And Mr James has stuck to that version ever since. It hasn’t changed at all. It’s the same version he told me, and it’s the same version he told the court. And it is also, in my opinion,
exactly
what happened.
‘You’ll remember that the defendant’s doctor gave evidence on behalf of the prosecution. He said that he’d prescribed Rohypnol to Mr James for an anxiety disorder.
‘The prosecution contends that the defendant deliberately drugged himself after he’d murdered Evelyn, to give himself an alibi of sorts – to make out that he’d been set up for the murder.
‘That is absurd. It assumes that Mr James somehow managed to stay in full possession of all his mental faculties while under the twin influences of alcohol and Rohypnol – a combination well known to cause temporary amnesia.
‘Secondly, where did the Rohypnol found in both the victim
and
the suspect come from? Not from the
legally prescribed
packet found in Mr James’s office. That would have left traces of blue dye in both the victim’s and the suspect’s urine.
‘No. The Rohypnol used on both the victim and the defendant on March 16th or 17th, was of the illegal variety. The kind that leaves no traces, and is completely undetectable when mixed with drink. There is no evidence that Mr James ever possessed that type of Rohypnol.
‘Now let’s consider the actual evidence against Mr James. As you saw, from the CCTV footage, he
did
meet Evelyn Bates; very briefly, in the hotel nightclub. They spoke for approximately ten seconds, before Evelyn was knocked over by a passing crowd of dancers. She was on the phone at the time. The phone went flying, as did Evelyn. She landed on Mr James. The two of them fell over. As she tried to get up, the strap of her dress broke, her hair got entangled and she accidentally scratched his cheek. A witness saw them rolling around on the floor together.
‘This explains the very few hairs found on Mr James’s person. It also explains the reason he had scratches on his cheek, and why his blood and skin were found under Evelyn’s fingernails. As for the phone in his pocket – he picked it up off the nightclub floor because he was going to hand it in to reception.
‘After he left the club, Mr James was seen at a bar on the eleventh floor of the hotel, at around 11.30 p.m. The barman – Gary Murphy – said he noticed the scratches on the accused’s face. So they were definitely made
before
he went up to his room.
‘Secondly, the defendant was not alone. Mr Murphy told the court that Mr James was with a tall woman – at least six feet in height. She had long blonde hair, and was wearing a dark-green dress. Mr Murphy was very specific in describing the dress. It was skin tight, split to the thigh, and the back was exposed. That was
not
the dress Evelyn Bates wore. Hers was a much brighter shade of green, and a completely different style.
‘Mr Murphy insists he told the police this, yet they chose to ignore the details. They were selective in the way they took down his statement. For them it was enough that the defendant was seen with a blonde in a green dress.
‘When this came out in open court, the prosecution brought up Mr Murphy’s previous criminal record for perjury, effectively suggesting he was lying again.
‘Yet, why would he lie? He had no reason to. He doesn’t know Mr James. He has nothing to gain, except a clear conscience that he told the truth – the whole truth, and not an edited version.
‘The barman described the very same person Mr James has always insisted he went up to his room with. Fabia. Not Evelyn.
Fabia.
‘I’m sure you’ll remember Rachel Hudson, the escort who gave evidence. She was tall and blonde. So too, according to her, were three other escorts Mr James had been with.
He has a type
, she said. Tall, attractive, blonde, with long straight hair.
‘Granted, Evelyn Bates was blonde. Her hair was medium length and curly. She was five feet four inches in height. She was not tall. And she was not Mr James’s “type”.
‘You will also – I am sure – never forget what
Mizz
Hudson had to say about the defendant’s sexual practices. He liked slapping and choking her during sex. He choked her with his
belt
while he was taking her from behind.
‘Evelyn Bates was strangled by
hand
. And she was
facing
her killer. There is absolutely no medical evidence of sexual activity. And neither was there any bruising to her face – only to her neck, made by the killer’s
hands
, not his belt.
‘And what of those hands? No fingerprints were found on the victim’s throat or neck. The pathologist stated that this is because her killer wore gloves. Yet no gloves were found at the crime scene. And no gloves were found in Mr James’s office, where he went directly from the hotel. No gloves were found in the rubbish bag Mr James put his dirty clothes in, although Evelyn’s phone was found there.
‘The police and the prosecution contend that he must have disposed of the gloves en route. Yet, if that’s the case, surely he would have had the wherewithal to get rid of Evelyn’s phone too?
‘The fact that the killer used gloves disproves the prosecution’s case for premeditated murder in a fundamental way. Because it would mean that Mr James would have had to have come to the hotel with the
intention
of strangling someone – anyone – to death. That’s not why he went to the hotel at all. He went there to receive an award.
‘Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, it is my opinion that the bulk of the prosecution’s case is little more than grasping conjecture masquerading as fact.
‘Now I usually have infinite respect for the police, both as an institution and as individuals. But on this occasion, with this case, I find my sympathies challenged. Why? Because they didn’t do their jobs properly.
‘In investigating a murder, the police must focus on the victim as much as the suspect. They must reconstruct to the best of their ability the victim’s last movements. On this occasion, they didn’t.
‘We know that Evelyn Bates left the hen party she was attending early to go back to the hotel. We know that she went to the nightclub. We also know that she met – or rather, encountered – Mr James there. We know she left the club at around 11.15 p.m.
‘Some time after that Evelyn Bates wrote a note informing her roommate that she had gone up to a private party in Suite 18. That she actually wrote the note is not in dispute. How the note got into her room is. What is certain is that it was put there at 2.20 a.m. But not by her.
‘You will recall that I cross-examined DCI Reid over keycard entry data for Suite 18, where Mr James stayed, and Room 474, where Evelyn Bates stayed. DCI Reid told the court that she was seeing the data for 474 for the first time. She – the head of this investigation – had not thought to check it.
‘Had she done so at the very start, she would have found that someone using a hotel staff passkey had entered Room 474 at 2.20 a.m. on March 17th – well within the agreed timespan of Evelyn’s murder.
‘The police didn’t know this had happened until I pointed it out to them, here in court.
‘This wasn’t the only occasion they failed to act on discrepancies in the keycard data. On March 16th, shortly before 9 p.m., while Mr James was downstairs in the ballroom attending the award ceremony, someone used a hotel passkey to enter his suite.
‘The police had this information, yet made no effort whatsoever to find out who that person was and what they were doing in a room that several hours later became a crime scene.
‘Why were they so sloppy, so negligent? The only explanation I can give is that they assumed they had their man. To convict someone of murder, you need much more than assumption. You need
absolute
certainty.
‘You will shortly be asked to deliberate your verdict. You will be told that you have to be satisfied that the prosecution has proved its case beyond reasonable doubt.
‘The prosecution concluded its summary by telling you to find Vernon James guilty, because his murder of Evelyn was part of an escalating pattern of violence towards women.