the 11th hour
Mar. 30th, 2006 07:51 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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allthatgoesTitle: The Eleventh Hour
Fandom: Original
Words: 3531
Notes: Actually an assignment.
Summary: A case based entirely on class evidence, haphazardly left fingerprints and uncredible witnesses explodes in the district attorney's face as CSI Leifert and Detective Grainger uncover new and highly sinister evidence -- at the very last minute.
“This is all a little bit eleventh-hour, isn’t it?’ Homicide’s Assistant District Attorney Michael Wilkes folded his fingers, frowning. “The verdict will be in in the morning. If you’re telling me you have new evidence now, you’re too late, unless you’d like me to just restart the entire trial.”
Allison Leifert, CSI level one, had never learned the proper procedure for being in the DA’s office, nor had she ever learned to shut up when inspired to speak. So, without thinking, she blurted, “That’s exactly what we’d like, yes.”
“Allison --“
“Yes, Detective, that’s right, control your crime scene unit,” Wilkes commanded, glaring at the man behind the most recent outburst. Detective Cary Grainger, age 28, was young and barely less a rookie than Leifert, was at least much more respected than she. Leifert was the youngest of her team and Grainger couldn’t believe he was stuck working with her.
On the other hand, she’d been at the scene, along with CSI 3 Lecourt and Chief Detective Inspector Mostel. Mostel, who’d been giving Grainger hell since the beginning of this case. Mostel, who seemed to get to every scene almost too fast to be humanly possible, who was always so perfect, and always breathing down his neck, trying to control his cases, grating on his nerves.
For the first time ever, Grainger had a reason to criticize him, and a lot of it was thanks to Leifert’s foolish impulsiveness. He had to thank her for that – eventually, and definitely not in front of Wilkes, who clearly didn’t like her.
“Mike, despite her uncharacteristic and uncalled for outburst, Leifert’s entirely right. The amount of new evidence has come to confirm that Alex Gargery had nothing to do with Benjamin Flynn’s death.” Grainger cleared his throat nervously. “We can’t convict this man – we can’t even finish this trial.”
“You’re telling me,” Wilkes groaned, “that my entire case is irrelevant, and further, wrong.”
“You have based everything on circumstantial evidence and foolish confessions by Gargery stating that he moved the murder weapon and the body. But he admitted that his prints should be on those items, and Lecourt and Leifert have confirmed it – there were other prints under Gargery’s.”
“The man didn’t even have proper defense,” Allison cut in again.
“Miss Leifert, if you are not quiet, I am going to have to ask you to stay out of this entirely.”
“She’s on this case too, Mike.”
“Last I checked, none of you were in charge of investigating this matter.”
“I was meant to be, Mostel just got there firs—“
“You and Mostel just can’t stand each other, Grainger. I've actually heard from Lecourt that the two of you are suing each other.”
“… that’s insane! Suing each other? No. But at this point, I have a very good reason not to like him.”
“What reason is that?”
“Start at the beginning, Cary,” Allison suggested.
“The beginning it is. Counselor, I give you People’s A: Mostel’s letter to Aaronson included with presented taped testimony from the five witnesses.”
Before Wilkes could ask what Grainger was on about this time, he slammed the letter on the district attorney’s desk:
Wilkes frowned once he went over the letter. “Your point being?”
“Well, it’s obvious Mostel doesn’t want Blankenship to talk – and Blankenship’s the only one who saw what exactly happened,” said Leifert.
“Which is why Aaronson denied the motion to supress Miss Blankenship and put her up there anyway,” Wilkes countered.
“Who wrote that motion?” demanded Grainger, “Gargery’s attorney? No. She didn’t have a word to say about it – we did, or you did, Mike, on behalf of what Mostel said.”
“Lanie Blankenship is a schizophrenic who refuses to take medications at regular intervals.”
“She still saw the crime take place!” interjected Leifert.
A female voice from the hall interrupted, gently. “Could you stop fighting, please, and get on with explaining what you’ve got? It’s helpful to my client.”
It was Laura Warner, Alex Gargery’s lawyer. Wilkes did not look pleased, and Warner looked almost guilty. “I’m sorry, Mike,” she said. “But this time he really is innocent. He denies it, I deny it, there’s no chance he could have committed this crime.”
Wilkes looked sour, but waved Grainger on.
An hour later, Judge Charles Aaronson’s chambers were very, very crowded. Aaronson had not been pleased at all about being woken in the middle of the night, and became rapidly less pleased as he was told the reasons why he was sitting there in the middle of the night in the first place.
Grainger, Leifert, Lecourt and the other two members of the crime scene unit, Gaffney and Hammond, were playing their little games with Aaronson’s head and presenting the case in a manner more resembling the conclusions on a crime drama than as professional detectives – because they were enjoying the suspense.
(Leifert, at least, confessed to being a huge fan of ‘CSI.’ No one was surprised.)
Aaronson, on the other hand, was not enjoying the suspense. The many references made to the testimony of a witness named Sadie Syme had lead to ADA Wilkes – who was playing along with the very same game – to phone the woman and have her come into chambers to re-present her observations. Syme was tired, and said she’d be along as soon as she possibly could, she wanted to help – and that’s when CSI Lecourt began her dramatic reading of Syme’s testimony.
“My chambers are not a theatre,” Aaronson muttered. “Why don’t you just play the tape?”
“You’re spoiling my fun,” Lecourt sighed, leading Wilkes, Warner, Leifert, Hammond and Gaffney to giggle. Aaronson scowled, and Lecourt hit play.
Syme’s testimony followed thus:
“I’m afraid I don’t see how any of this is relevant – we have examined Syme’s statements fully and have found no reason this exonerates Gargery from suspicion – just because one of the wintesses believes he looked innocent?” Aaronson demanded.
“And felt innocent – what is she, a psychic?” added court clerk Sif, the skeptic.
“It’s not what Syme said about Gargery,” said Grainger. “It’s what she said about the sirens and Mostel. It threw all of us off, until Lecourt went back to the timeline –“
“—and I noticed,” explained Lecourt, “that it seems Mostel arrived before anyone heard any sirens.”
“Anyone?” The judge’s eyes narrowed. “Did you check with everyone?”
“Maybe he’s psychic,” muttered Sif.
“How is that relevant?” asked Hammond, who, being a laboratory technician, hadn’t been aware of this role in the unraveling of the case.
“How could he have been there before there were sirens? He showed up before they heard any sirens, he could’ve showed up before the 911 dispatcher did anything. We re-checked all of the other witness statements, and none of them even mentioned the ambulance except for one Mr Everly, otherwise known as ‘the tall man with the cane,’ according to Syme.”
“He sounded suspicious,” Sif threw in. “Sociopathic.”
“You’re way off,” said Leifert. “Did he show up?”
There was a rap on the door.
“Mister Sif, letting people in is your job.” Sif scowled as Aaronson made that statement, and opened the door. In stepped spritely yet sleepy-looking Sadie Syme, and a tall, thin man with a cane – and sunglasses.
“I’m not sociopathic,” said Everly, “just blind. But even I knew there was something wrong with things when I heard Mostel’s voice before I heard the restaurant owner close his cell phone.”
Aaronson was staring at Everly. In fact, everyone was, except for Grainger, Leifert, Wilkes and Syme. Had Everly known this, he probably would have scowled. Instead, he made an educated guess, and added,
“And you can stop gawking at me, I’m just as observant as the next guy, even if my testimony was worthless on the witness stand.”
“It wasn’t worthless –“ Warner began, but Everly cut her off. “Nobody understood what I meant. Describing a scene without sight.”
“Topic!” cut in Wilkes. “Topic. It’s one in the morning and this has to be discussed and determined now, so let’s do it.”
By one-thirty, all of the evidence was in chambers with the sequestered group. Warner and Wilkes were sitting on opposite sides of the room and weren’t speaking to each other – Aaronson had ordered them to shut up on behalf of both their clients. Grainger had said so many bad things about Joshua Mostel that Lecourt suggested he sue him in a civil trial and stop bringing personal bias into the case. Grainger didn’t have a problem with it. Leifert was sitting on the edge of Aaronson’s desk, and Sif had fallen asleep on the couch.
The chain of custody was metaphorically lying broken on the floor, but at that point, nobody was really caring.
“So what have we got?” asked Aaronson.
Leifert cleared her throat. “Lanie Blankenship’s statement on the stand. When Mike questioned her, asking if she saw the killer in that very room, she pointed over at the defendant’s table and said ‘yes, that’s him right over there.’”
“So she identified Gargery as the killer! This is nonsense. You talked me up into protesting just to make my case a joke—“
“Mike, he didn’t do anything,” Warner insisted.
“Both of you shut up,” moaned Sif.
“No,” Grainger explained. “That’s what everyone thought. But what was Gargery’s motive? He didn’t even really have one. He barely knew Ben Flynn, despite being related, and we’ve established that Gargery had no idea that he was included in Flynn’s will. Nobody knew who was in Flynn’s will. Flynn’s will wasn’t even in this country, and it’s been corroborated that Gargery and Flynn hadn’t spoken in years. He moved the murder weapon only out of remorse.”
“You made this same statement at pre-trial,” Aaronson said. “And you were told to stop acting in Miss Warner’s place as the defendant’s defense.”
“I’m not done. There were plenty of people standing behind Gargery who Blankenship could have identified as well. Killers who aren’t caught have been known to come to the trials of the unfortunate idiots taking the fall for their actions.”
“So you think, all of you –“ Aaronson waved his hand at Grainger, Leifert, Lecourt, Hammond, Gaffney and Warner, excluding Wilkes out of diplomacy, “that someone else killed Flynn and showed up at trial, and he happened to be sitting or standing directly behind Gargery? That’s insane.”
“So’s the witness,” Sif added helpfully.
“Actually, he’s completely right,” said Grainger. “Lanie Blankenship isn’t what we’d call sane, but she is credible, because she doesn’t lie. She never has. She just leaves things out, because she believes that what she understands, we all understand by nature of our listening to what she says. And you’re going to say it’s total nonsense and that I’m personally biased, but we think we know who really killed Flynn. Allison?”
Leifert stood, smiling confidently. “The fingerprints found on Flynn’s body belonged to two separate parties –“
“Three,” cut in Aaronson. “That’s what evidence says.”
“Two. One of our checkers was out sick – everyone missed the error.”
Everyone groaned.
“Two separate parties,” Leifert continued. “Alex Gargery, who admitted to moving both the body and the murder weapon – a dagger, which also had his prints, as well as two other unclear sets below them – and Joshua Mostel.”
“Oh please,” Aaronson couldn’t help but groan again. “Grainger, you’ve set all of this up as a personal beef against a detective you can’t stand –“
“No he didn’t,” said Hammond. “I called him when I confirmed the second set of epithelials on the knife. We didn’t have a comparison point until yesterday morning. That’s when I decided to run them by exemplars we had in the building. I had one from Mostel because after the siren inconsistency, Gaffney was curious and tricked him into providing a sample.”
“You tricked him?” Aaronson wasn’t sure he wanted to hear more.
“I didn’t do much,” Gaffney confirmed, “just told him we needed it because we were taking swabs from all officers. He said he never touches evidence without gloves, and I said I knew, and he said he wasn’t going to be spitting on evidence either, and I said I knew that too, and we were just testing a new gel electrophoresis.”
Hammond added, “And we were. That just isn’t why we took his. It’s part of the reason we took everyone else’s – the other one was to make the story look true.”
“You’re insane,” contributed Sif. “Hanging around with Grainger. His methods are contagious.”
“It was his idea!” Grainger pointed at Gaffney.
“Who knew the police acted like little kids all the time?” Syme joked toward Everly, who laughed.
“So what you’re saying,” the judge said, “is that the second set of fingerprints and epithelials both belong to Joshua Mostel, who was never on the scene without gloves.”
“As far as we know,” cut in Leifert.
“Lanie Blankenship could have IDed him. That’s the reason he didn’t want her to testify. And she did point at him in trial.”
“Grainger, the only evidence we have against Mostel is the same circumstantial class evidence we have against Gargery.” said Aaronson. “And Gargery had motive –“
“Coincidence! He didn’t even know they were related!”
“Can you prove Mostel had motive?” asked Warner, who was obviously beyond intrigued.
“Not yet,” Grainger admitted. “But I have a plan.”
At three in the morning, Judge Aaronson hung up the phone.
“I spoke directly to Mostel’s daughter. She thinks we must be positively insane to be asking her to do this.”
“That’s because we are,” said Sif, who was now hanging over the side of the couch clumsily. “But whether we’re crazy or not, Grainger’s sold me. The baddie inspector did it, and botched every step of this investigation just to make sure we didn’t catch him.”
“Well, Samantha Mostel isn’t about to rifle between her father’s papers to find out if it was Flynn who was blackmailing Mostel about his bad gambling ticket – did you know he gambled? I didn't –“ At this declaration by the judge, Grainger snorted, and Aaronson cleared his throat. “—she is, however, willing to testify that she knew.”
“What?” demanded Grainger.
Sif fell off the edge of the couch.
Leifert dropped her coffee.
Warner’s eyes widened.
“Did Samantha just confess to murdering Flynn? On the phone?” Lecourt wasn’t about to believe it.
“Unfortunately,” Aaronson muttered, “yes. But Samantha Mostel wasn’t present, it’s not her DNA, not her prints –“
“—she wasn’t in the courtroom for the wacko to ID –“
“—shut up, Sif –“
“—it’s conclusive!” blurted out Grainger. “She freaked out at you because she knew we’d caught Mostel in it and is trying to defend her father! She also knows we don’t have enough time to run a full investigation before this trial!”
“This is insane,” Leifert muttered.
“I think we’ve covered that,” said Sif.
Two days later, Alex Gargery was getting out of a taxicab. He’d been acquited – the jury didn’t buy Wilkes’ supposed airtight case after all, and in the end, Wilkes was glad. That’s not to say that anyone who had been in Chambers that evening ever told anyone about their beliefs over Mostel – Joshua, that is. They were too distracted by the fact that Samantha Mostel confessed in the courtroom just after the acquital. That family had gone from perfect to bad to worse.
Gargery wandered into Greenbaum’s diner, and sat down at a barstool next to Grant Everly, who smiled in that blank sort of way. Sadie brought them coffee, and that’s when they heard the scream from outside.
“Lanie?” It was the Blankenship chauffeur. “Lanie – oh my god, Lanie – Lanie!”
A red Jetta GT drove away.
Only Everly was facing that direction, and he didn’t see a thing.
Fandom: Original
Words: 3531
Notes: Actually an assignment.
Summary: A case based entirely on class evidence, haphazardly left fingerprints and uncredible witnesses explodes in the district attorney's face as CSI Leifert and Detective Grainger uncover new and highly sinister evidence -- at the very last minute.
“This is all a little bit eleventh-hour, isn’t it?’ Homicide’s Assistant District Attorney Michael Wilkes folded his fingers, frowning. “The verdict will be in in the morning. If you’re telling me you have new evidence now, you’re too late, unless you’d like me to just restart the entire trial.”
Allison Leifert, CSI level one, had never learned the proper procedure for being in the DA’s office, nor had she ever learned to shut up when inspired to speak. So, without thinking, she blurted, “That’s exactly what we’d like, yes.”
“Allison --“
“Yes, Detective, that’s right, control your crime scene unit,” Wilkes commanded, glaring at the man behind the most recent outburst. Detective Cary Grainger, age 28, was young and barely less a rookie than Leifert, was at least much more respected than she. Leifert was the youngest of her team and Grainger couldn’t believe he was stuck working with her.
On the other hand, she’d been at the scene, along with CSI 3 Lecourt and Chief Detective Inspector Mostel. Mostel, who’d been giving Grainger hell since the beginning of this case. Mostel, who seemed to get to every scene almost too fast to be humanly possible, who was always so perfect, and always breathing down his neck, trying to control his cases, grating on his nerves.
For the first time ever, Grainger had a reason to criticize him, and a lot of it was thanks to Leifert’s foolish impulsiveness. He had to thank her for that – eventually, and definitely not in front of Wilkes, who clearly didn’t like her.
“Mike, despite her uncharacteristic and uncalled for outburst, Leifert’s entirely right. The amount of new evidence has come to confirm that Alex Gargery had nothing to do with Benjamin Flynn’s death.” Grainger cleared his throat nervously. “We can’t convict this man – we can’t even finish this trial.”
“You’re telling me,” Wilkes groaned, “that my entire case is irrelevant, and further, wrong.”
“You have based everything on circumstantial evidence and foolish confessions by Gargery stating that he moved the murder weapon and the body. But he admitted that his prints should be on those items, and Lecourt and Leifert have confirmed it – there were other prints under Gargery’s.”
“The man didn’t even have proper defense,” Allison cut in again.
“Miss Leifert, if you are not quiet, I am going to have to ask you to stay out of this entirely.”
“She’s on this case too, Mike.”
“Last I checked, none of you were in charge of investigating this matter.”
“I was meant to be, Mostel just got there firs—“
“You and Mostel just can’t stand each other, Grainger. I've actually heard from Lecourt that the two of you are suing each other.”
“… that’s insane! Suing each other? No. But at this point, I have a very good reason not to like him.”
“What reason is that?”
“Start at the beginning, Cary,” Allison suggested.
“The beginning it is. Counselor, I give you People’s A: Mostel’s letter to Aaronson included with presented taped testimony from the five witnesses.”
Before Wilkes could ask what Grainger was on about this time, he slammed the letter on the district attorney’s desk:
- Dear Sir,
Enclosed in this package are the testimonies of four of the five witnesses to the murder of Mr Benjamin Flynn on the morning of the thirty-first. They should be seen as sufficient to proceed with trial.
All statements were taken within five hours of the body's discovery. Each witness was monitored in interrogation and asked for dictated statements post-interview.
The fifth testimony is unneccessary. Its meaning is incoherent, and the witness refuses to clarify.
I am of the personal belief that Miss Blankenship is also as well not a credible witness and should not be presented in court.
Sincerely,
Joshua Mostel
Wilkes frowned once he went over the letter. “Your point being?”
“Well, it’s obvious Mostel doesn’t want Blankenship to talk – and Blankenship’s the only one who saw what exactly happened,” said Leifert.
“Which is why Aaronson denied the motion to supress Miss Blankenship and put her up there anyway,” Wilkes countered.
“Who wrote that motion?” demanded Grainger, “Gargery’s attorney? No. She didn’t have a word to say about it – we did, or you did, Mike, on behalf of what Mostel said.”
“Lanie Blankenship is a schizophrenic who refuses to take medications at regular intervals.”
“She still saw the crime take place!” interjected Leifert.
A female voice from the hall interrupted, gently. “Could you stop fighting, please, and get on with explaining what you’ve got? It’s helpful to my client.”
It was Laura Warner, Alex Gargery’s lawyer. Wilkes did not look pleased, and Warner looked almost guilty. “I’m sorry, Mike,” she said. “But this time he really is innocent. He denies it, I deny it, there’s no chance he could have committed this crime.”
Wilkes looked sour, but waved Grainger on.
An hour later, Judge Charles Aaronson’s chambers were very, very crowded. Aaronson had not been pleased at all about being woken in the middle of the night, and became rapidly less pleased as he was told the reasons why he was sitting there in the middle of the night in the first place.
Grainger, Leifert, Lecourt and the other two members of the crime scene unit, Gaffney and Hammond, were playing their little games with Aaronson’s head and presenting the case in a manner more resembling the conclusions on a crime drama than as professional detectives – because they were enjoying the suspense.
(Leifert, at least, confessed to being a huge fan of ‘CSI.’ No one was surprised.)
Aaronson, on the other hand, was not enjoying the suspense. The many references made to the testimony of a witness named Sadie Syme had lead to ADA Wilkes – who was playing along with the very same game – to phone the woman and have her come into chambers to re-present her observations. Syme was tired, and said she’d be along as soon as she possibly could, she wanted to help – and that’s when CSI Lecourt began her dramatic reading of Syme’s testimony.
“My chambers are not a theatre,” Aaronson muttered. “Why don’t you just play the tape?”
“You’re spoiling my fun,” Lecourt sighed, leading Wilkes, Warner, Leifert, Hammond and Gaffney to giggle. Aaronson scowled, and Lecourt hit play.
Syme’s testimony followed thus:
- My name is Sadie Syme. Okay, well, that's not right entirely. My name is Cassandra Syme, but everyone calls me Sadie. I work as a waitress at restaurant of fellow witness, Murphy Greenbaum. This is what happened to me, I swear upon the Bible. My innermost thoughts and feelings are, mostly to my discredit, included.
I was late. Oh, Hell, was I ever late. Looking at my watch, I saw that it read 6:31, and I was supposed to be at the shop to open for the breakfast coffee run, which was at 7am. I couldn't very well open when I was still in the car on my way to the bank, where I desperately needed to pick up a few bank slips.
I should've known better, seeing as how the bank didn't supposedly open until 7 either. Just because it had always been open early previously doesn't mean that it would still be. The morning staff on Thursday had changed, so far as I'd heard.
It had definitely changed. I found the parking lot astonishingly vacant, just a few cars and one large limousine. I knew the fancy car on sight - it was the Blankenship limo, and I did my best to avoid it. Nobody really wanted to talk to the Blankenship girl ... Lanie, I think her name is. She was utterly bonkers. That's the only person I knew beforehand, except for the next face I saw. And that was the face, not Lanie Blankenship's or her driver's, that caused me to duck behind a truck.
There was good old Murphy Greenbaum, my very favourite boss. I absolutely loved Mr Greenbaum's nasty attitude toward anyone being six seconds late. Of course I was going to be even later if I were going to wait to approach the bank until after Mr Greenbaum had left, but it was better, I thought, than running into him there.
Had I known that I was going to be written down as a murder suspect, however, I would've walked up right away! The outrage! All right, I know. I'm getting ahead of myself. It's impossible to describe this situation to its credit, really.
I was hiding behind the armored car for - I think about twelve minutes, as I continuously glanced at my watch. I was not in view of the other people, nor were they of me, and I couldn't see any of them. All I was watching was a small red Jetta GT, which wasn't going anywhere. The Jetta, as far as I knew, belonged to Mr Greenbaum. I'm aware of how foolish it is to have hidden from one's boss, but honestly, I didn't know I was hiding from a murder scene.
I heard the scream about a minute later, and that's when, against my own judgement, I ran out from behind the car and looked. That's when I saw the stricken face of the young man I later learned was named Gargery... staring at the side door to the bank in utter horror.
Everyone else ran over, and Mr Greenbaum, ignoring me (I'm not sure if he even saw me) rapidly dialed 911. The only one who didn't really look effected was Lanie Blankenship, which puzzled me quite a bit. It was the dead body that every present party was worried about, despite knowing that he must be dead -- that is, until we saw the police detective arrive. The body couldn't get into any more harm, but Alex Gargery, who seems to have been the one to have found him ... well, Gargery looked innocent. He felt innocent, too.
The one who didn't feel innocent was a tall man with a cane, who was hovering over the body and looking, unfeeling, over it, as if what was on the ground didn't bother him any at all.
When Investigator Mostel came, he asked us for statements, and we all glowered at him. At that point, Mr Greenbaum had noticed me, and was shooting 'I'll kill you later, Sadie' looks in my direction - likely concerned about the opening of the diner which, as far as we knew, nobody had opened. He had to stop staring at me when the sirens started drowning out his chance to lecture me.
Actually, one person didn't glower.
The man with the cane. He didn't glower. He didn't even look at anyone, and that was when he was directly asked a question. He answered the question ... looking directly over the body, and watching the Blankenship limousine. Though he didn't really seem to be watching it, either.
I didn't know any of them, least of all Ben Flynn. He was the new Thursday guy at the bank.
I'm not sure what else you want me to say.
“I’m afraid I don’t see how any of this is relevant – we have examined Syme’s statements fully and have found no reason this exonerates Gargery from suspicion – just because one of the wintesses believes he looked innocent?” Aaronson demanded.
“And felt innocent – what is she, a psychic?” added court clerk Sif, the skeptic.
“It’s not what Syme said about Gargery,” said Grainger. “It’s what she said about the sirens and Mostel. It threw all of us off, until Lecourt went back to the timeline –“
“—and I noticed,” explained Lecourt, “that it seems Mostel arrived before anyone heard any sirens.”
“Anyone?” The judge’s eyes narrowed. “Did you check with everyone?”
“Maybe he’s psychic,” muttered Sif.
“How is that relevant?” asked Hammond, who, being a laboratory technician, hadn’t been aware of this role in the unraveling of the case.
“How could he have been there before there were sirens? He showed up before they heard any sirens, he could’ve showed up before the 911 dispatcher did anything. We re-checked all of the other witness statements, and none of them even mentioned the ambulance except for one Mr Everly, otherwise known as ‘the tall man with the cane,’ according to Syme.”
“He sounded suspicious,” Sif threw in. “Sociopathic.”
“You’re way off,” said Leifert. “Did he show up?”
There was a rap on the door.
“Mister Sif, letting people in is your job.” Sif scowled as Aaronson made that statement, and opened the door. In stepped spritely yet sleepy-looking Sadie Syme, and a tall, thin man with a cane – and sunglasses.
“I’m not sociopathic,” said Everly, “just blind. But even I knew there was something wrong with things when I heard Mostel’s voice before I heard the restaurant owner close his cell phone.”
Aaronson was staring at Everly. In fact, everyone was, except for Grainger, Leifert, Wilkes and Syme. Had Everly known this, he probably would have scowled. Instead, he made an educated guess, and added,
“And you can stop gawking at me, I’m just as observant as the next guy, even if my testimony was worthless on the witness stand.”
“It wasn’t worthless –“ Warner began, but Everly cut her off. “Nobody understood what I meant. Describing a scene without sight.”
“Topic!” cut in Wilkes. “Topic. It’s one in the morning and this has to be discussed and determined now, so let’s do it.”
By one-thirty, all of the evidence was in chambers with the sequestered group. Warner and Wilkes were sitting on opposite sides of the room and weren’t speaking to each other – Aaronson had ordered them to shut up on behalf of both their clients. Grainger had said so many bad things about Joshua Mostel that Lecourt suggested he sue him in a civil trial and stop bringing personal bias into the case. Grainger didn’t have a problem with it. Leifert was sitting on the edge of Aaronson’s desk, and Sif had fallen asleep on the couch.
The chain of custody was metaphorically lying broken on the floor, but at that point, nobody was really caring.
“So what have we got?” asked Aaronson.
Leifert cleared her throat. “Lanie Blankenship’s statement on the stand. When Mike questioned her, asking if she saw the killer in that very room, she pointed over at the defendant’s table and said ‘yes, that’s him right over there.’”
“So she identified Gargery as the killer! This is nonsense. You talked me up into protesting just to make my case a joke—“
“Mike, he didn’t do anything,” Warner insisted.
“Both of you shut up,” moaned Sif.
“No,” Grainger explained. “That’s what everyone thought. But what was Gargery’s motive? He didn’t even really have one. He barely knew Ben Flynn, despite being related, and we’ve established that Gargery had no idea that he was included in Flynn’s will. Nobody knew who was in Flynn’s will. Flynn’s will wasn’t even in this country, and it’s been corroborated that Gargery and Flynn hadn’t spoken in years. He moved the murder weapon only out of remorse.”
“You made this same statement at pre-trial,” Aaronson said. “And you were told to stop acting in Miss Warner’s place as the defendant’s defense.”
“I’m not done. There were plenty of people standing behind Gargery who Blankenship could have identified as well. Killers who aren’t caught have been known to come to the trials of the unfortunate idiots taking the fall for their actions.”
“So you think, all of you –“ Aaronson waved his hand at Grainger, Leifert, Lecourt, Hammond, Gaffney and Warner, excluding Wilkes out of diplomacy, “that someone else killed Flynn and showed up at trial, and he happened to be sitting or standing directly behind Gargery? That’s insane.”
“So’s the witness,” Sif added helpfully.
“Actually, he’s completely right,” said Grainger. “Lanie Blankenship isn’t what we’d call sane, but she is credible, because she doesn’t lie. She never has. She just leaves things out, because she believes that what she understands, we all understand by nature of our listening to what she says. And you’re going to say it’s total nonsense and that I’m personally biased, but we think we know who really killed Flynn. Allison?”
Leifert stood, smiling confidently. “The fingerprints found on Flynn’s body belonged to two separate parties –“
“Three,” cut in Aaronson. “That’s what evidence says.”
“Two. One of our checkers was out sick – everyone missed the error.”
Everyone groaned.
“Two separate parties,” Leifert continued. “Alex Gargery, who admitted to moving both the body and the murder weapon – a dagger, which also had his prints, as well as two other unclear sets below them – and Joshua Mostel.”
“Oh please,” Aaronson couldn’t help but groan again. “Grainger, you’ve set all of this up as a personal beef against a detective you can’t stand –“
“No he didn’t,” said Hammond. “I called him when I confirmed the second set of epithelials on the knife. We didn’t have a comparison point until yesterday morning. That’s when I decided to run them by exemplars we had in the building. I had one from Mostel because after the siren inconsistency, Gaffney was curious and tricked him into providing a sample.”
“You tricked him?” Aaronson wasn’t sure he wanted to hear more.
“I didn’t do much,” Gaffney confirmed, “just told him we needed it because we were taking swabs from all officers. He said he never touches evidence without gloves, and I said I knew, and he said he wasn’t going to be spitting on evidence either, and I said I knew that too, and we were just testing a new gel electrophoresis.”
Hammond added, “And we were. That just isn’t why we took his. It’s part of the reason we took everyone else’s – the other one was to make the story look true.”
“You’re insane,” contributed Sif. “Hanging around with Grainger. His methods are contagious.”
“It was his idea!” Grainger pointed at Gaffney.
“Who knew the police acted like little kids all the time?” Syme joked toward Everly, who laughed.
“So what you’re saying,” the judge said, “is that the second set of fingerprints and epithelials both belong to Joshua Mostel, who was never on the scene without gloves.”
“As far as we know,” cut in Leifert.
“Lanie Blankenship could have IDed him. That’s the reason he didn’t want her to testify. And she did point at him in trial.”
“Grainger, the only evidence we have against Mostel is the same circumstantial class evidence we have against Gargery.” said Aaronson. “And Gargery had motive –“
“Coincidence! He didn’t even know they were related!”
“Can you prove Mostel had motive?” asked Warner, who was obviously beyond intrigued.
“Not yet,” Grainger admitted. “But I have a plan.”
At three in the morning, Judge Aaronson hung up the phone.
“I spoke directly to Mostel’s daughter. She thinks we must be positively insane to be asking her to do this.”
“That’s because we are,” said Sif, who was now hanging over the side of the couch clumsily. “But whether we’re crazy or not, Grainger’s sold me. The baddie inspector did it, and botched every step of this investigation just to make sure we didn’t catch him.”
“Well, Samantha Mostel isn’t about to rifle between her father’s papers to find out if it was Flynn who was blackmailing Mostel about his bad gambling ticket – did you know he gambled? I didn't –“ At this declaration by the judge, Grainger snorted, and Aaronson cleared his throat. “—she is, however, willing to testify that she knew.”
“What?” demanded Grainger.
Sif fell off the edge of the couch.
Leifert dropped her coffee.
Warner’s eyes widened.
“Did Samantha just confess to murdering Flynn? On the phone?” Lecourt wasn’t about to believe it.
“Unfortunately,” Aaronson muttered, “yes. But Samantha Mostel wasn’t present, it’s not her DNA, not her prints –“
“—she wasn’t in the courtroom for the wacko to ID –“
“—shut up, Sif –“
“—it’s conclusive!” blurted out Grainger. “She freaked out at you because she knew we’d caught Mostel in it and is trying to defend her father! She also knows we don’t have enough time to run a full investigation before this trial!”
“This is insane,” Leifert muttered.
“I think we’ve covered that,” said Sif.
Two days later, Alex Gargery was getting out of a taxicab. He’d been acquited – the jury didn’t buy Wilkes’ supposed airtight case after all, and in the end, Wilkes was glad. That’s not to say that anyone who had been in Chambers that evening ever told anyone about their beliefs over Mostel – Joshua, that is. They were too distracted by the fact that Samantha Mostel confessed in the courtroom just after the acquital. That family had gone from perfect to bad to worse.
Gargery wandered into Greenbaum’s diner, and sat down at a barstool next to Grant Everly, who smiled in that blank sort of way. Sadie brought them coffee, and that’s when they heard the scream from outside.
“Lanie?” It was the Blankenship chauffeur. “Lanie – oh my god, Lanie – Lanie!”
A red Jetta GT drove away.
Only Everly was facing that direction, and he didn’t see a thing.
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