Her deadly game, p.30
Her Deadly Game, page 30
Ambrose continued. “Dr. Bennet testified she could not convince Anne to the contrary. She said Anne was upset, distraught. She testified that when she left the LaRussa home at seven twenty-nine Sunday evening, Anne LaRussa remained very much alive.
“Now, defense counsel tried, at first, to argue that Lisa Bennet killed Anne, her best friend. The defense argued Lisa Bennet did so because Anne might have threatened Lisa Bennet’s medical license for overprescribing the opioids, in retaliation for the affair she believed Bennet was having with her husband.” Ambrose paused for emphasis. Then he said, “There are so many problems with that argument. So many.”
Ambrose listed the problems while April Richie put them up as bullet points on the computer screens. “If Lisa Bennet didn’t know Anne’s suspicions until Sunday night, why would she have purchased and brought a gun before then? She wouldn’t have.
“With this huge hole in their argument, the defense reversed course and came up with an alternative theory—this time that Anne LaRussa, confined to a wheelchair, thought up, set up, and built an elaborate mechanism to kill herself—a mechanism that took the defense’s highly skilled expert witness weeks to concoct. The defense told you their theory accounts for all the evidence gathered in the LaRussa home by the CSI team.”
Another pause. “But . . . it didn’t account for the most fundamental facts. Anne LaRussa was not physically capable of putting that elaborate mechanism in place. The defense also didn’t give you a reason why Anne LaRussa would kill herself and seek to blame her husband.
“The defense came up with yet another theory. And it is, again, centered on Dr. Lisa Bennet. The defense wants you to now believe that Anne’s best friend helped her take her own life. The same best friend who testified that Anne accused her of having an affair with her husband?” Ambrose’s voice dripped incredulity. “These are fairy tales, ladies and gentlemen. These are fables. Fantasies. This is desperation. The defense is throwing mud on the wall and hoping something, anything, will stick to create reasonable doubt in your minds so that you will free a murderer.”
That notion struck Keera in the chest. Was she about to free a murderer?
“Forget the fantasies and the fables. Remember the facts. Vince LaRussa arrived at home that night and his wife remained alive. How do we know this? Because Dr. Bennet said Anne LaRussa was alive when she departed the house at seven twenty-nine. There is no dispute about that. We can also assume, because we know Anne LaRussa spoke in detail to Syd Evans about the forfeiture clause, that she confronted her husband, Vince LaRussa, about having an affair and threatened to take all his assets. This isn’t speculation. It’s common sense. Anne LaRussa’s intent came to a head that evening. Are we to believe she didn’t also confront her husband? Why then go to all the trouble? Why hire a private investigator to get photographs, proof in her mind of the affair? Of course she confronted Vince LaRussa.
“The defense also intimates the State tried to hide Anne LaRussa’s cancer. You heard the medical examiner. Her cancer had nothing to do with her death. Maybe everything came to a head that evening because Anne LaRussa knew she was dying and didn’t have a lot of time remaining. So she confronted her husband and swore to bankrupt him. And in response, Vince LaRussa”—Ambrose pointed to LaRussa—“shot and killed his wife. Shot her in the back of the head. A coward. That, ladies and gentlemen, is the only logical conclusion, based on the evidence.” Ambrose paused as if to gather himself. Then he said, “Let’s go through it together piece by piece.”
Half an hour later, Ambrose neared the end of his closing. It had been a strong presentation under the circumstances. Workmanlike. Detailed. As usual. It illustrated how much he wanted to win this case. How much he wanted to beat Keera. But the evidence did not prove Vince to be a killer. Keera was sure JP Harrison had explained and depicted what had happened—a theory that satisfied all the evidence. She was sure Vince LaRussa had not pulled the trigger of that gun. The evidence did not, as Miller Ambrose kept telling the jury, fit.
But could LaRussa have set up the gun?
If not, why then did Keera have so many reservations?
“We’ll take a brief recess,” Judge Hung said.
Keera looked up from her thoughts. Miller Ambrose was retreating to counsel table. The jurors remained poker faced.
“And when we return, the defense will give its closing.”
Keera broke out in a cold sweat, suddenly nauseated. She slid back her chair. “I have to use the restroom,” she said and departed the courtroom.
She hurried down the gray-and-white marble floor to the bathroom and pushed open the door. The bathroom, like the building, was more than one hundred years old, with black-and-white terrazzo tiles, wooden bathroom stalls, and porcelain sinks. Keera turned on the tap water at the first sink and splashed cold water on her face, letting it cool her skin. She sensed someone approach the sink beside her. When she looked up, Lisa Bennet’s mirrored reflection stared at the water flowing from the tap of the adjacent sink. Keera had not seen Bennet in the courtroom. She likely had been watching the closed-circuit television in the adjacent room.
Either way, Keera sensed this chance meeting had been orchestrated.
“You’re Jack Worthing; aren’t you?” Keera said.
“No.” Bennet rinsed the soap from her hands. “I’m just the messenger. You know who Jack Worthing is.”
The door to the bathroom pushed open, and others, some of whom had been seated in the gallery, walked in. Bennet turned for the towel dispenser and dried her hands on coarse brown paper before discarding it in a bin. She glanced once in the mirror, catching Keera’s eye.
Then she left.
I’m just the messenger. Bennet had sent the emails.
You know who Jack Worthing is.
Jack Worthing was, according to Stephanie Bowers, Vince LaRussa. So what did it all mean?
Keera returned to the courtroom and retook her seat, aware that both Patsy and LaRussa watched her. Judge Hung had not yet retaken her seat on the bench. The question welled inside her, building until she could no longer suppress it. She turned and faced LaRussa. He didn’t look surprised or inquisitive. He looked at her as if he had anticipated this moment.
“You’ve known who Jack Worthing is all along. Not the person who sent the emails, but the name. You know that name.”
She expected him to deny it. She expected him to furrow his brow and look perplexed, as he had done when she first raised that name in the attorney conference room at the King County jail. She expected him to ask what she was talking about. A skilled liar.
He didn’t. Vince LaRussa’s lips inched into a thin grin. “What I’ve known is irrelevant to the job you have sworn to do, Counselor,” he whispered. “You promised to provide me with a vigorous defense, every step of the way. To the very end.” He leaned closer. His eyes darkened. His stare hardened. His jaw set. “Do your job.”
“Ms. Duggan.” Judge Hung had retaken the bench. “Does the defense wish to give a closing statement?”
LaRussa broke eye contact and sat back, staring straight ahead.
“Ms. Duggan?”
Keera looked past LaRussa to Patsy, who appeared concerned. Keera took a breath and addressed Judge Hung. “It does, Your Honor.”
She moved her laptop to the podium, her mind spinning. She looked to the jurors and somehow pulled everything together. Movement inside the courtroom slowed. She could see every move in the trial unfolding, as she once could see the moves on a chessboard being played.
“May it please the court.” She thanked the jury for their service. Then she said, “Like many of you, I have struggled with the evidence in this case, though never with Vince LaRussa’s innocence. It’s why we are here, in court, because the evidence is perplexing.” Her competitive streak kicked in. “My client, Vince LaRussa, is innocent. He came into this courtroom innocent until proven guilty. The State had the burden to prove his guilt . . . but not just to prove it. The State’s burden is to prove his guilt to each and every one of you, beyond a reasonable doubt.”
She gave her stock comments on reasonable doubt, something she used often in her trials. Judge Hung would provide the jury with a specific instruction after closing arguments.
“I struggled because the evidence seemed contradictory. I struggled to understand how all the variables fit together in a coherent theory. You heard our defense expert, JP Harrison, testify to much the same thing. He said a theory is not a theory unless it accounts for all the variables. He learned that in his high school chemistry class from his teacher, Mr. Cobalt. If the theory accounts for all the variables, he received an A. If it does not, then the theory fails. It is just a hypothesis.”
Several jurors smiled, no doubt recalling Harrison and his testimony.
“The prosecution failed,” Keera said. “The State’s theory of this case simply doesn’t account for all the evidence and is, therefore, not a theory but a hypothesis. Mere speculation.”
She paused a moment for emphasis. Then she said, “Let’s go through the evidence Mr. Ambrose did not explain.” She hit the computer screen and put up the bullet points Ambrose had used. She used them like chess pieces to attack and deplete the State’s position one move at a time. She paused to give the jury the opportunity to think on its own. Patsy said too many attorneys told the jurors what to think. The good lawyers left the jurors white space and allowed them to seemingly reach conclusions on their own.
It was an art. It was a gift.
“The State tells you to use common sense, but the State never gives you a commonsense answer to these questions,” Keera said. “I’m sure the evidence was puzzling for some of you—until JP Harrison presented you with a theory supported by an experiment that accounted for every piece of evidence. JP Harrison presented evidence that Anne LaRussa killed herself. He presented a method by which she accomplished this. Mr. Harrison passed Mr. Cobalt’s test. He got an A.
“The State, in its closing, asked you to reject Mr. Harrison’s theory because the State says it doesn’t make sense. The State argues Anne LaRussa could not have physically set up the mechanism on her own. The State argues Anne LaRussa had no motivation to blame her husband. The State anticipated the defense’s argument that Anne LaRussa did not set up the device on her own, that she received help from her best friend, Lisa Bennet.”
Keera took a deep breath. She parted her hands, holding them palm up. “Anne LaRussa was dying. She had terminal cancer. She had weeks to live, at most. The State did not want you to know this. The State went to great lengths to not let the medical examiner, Arthur Litchfield, tell you this critical piece of evidence. What was the State trying to hide? Was the State trying to hide the fact that Dr. Lisa Bennet, an oncologist who lost her husband to cancer, knew both professionally and personally the pain and suffering her best friend would endure those final, horrible weeks; that it would be a blessing for Anne and for her family if she died quickly? Was it trying to hide the fact that Lisa Bennet would do what her best friend asked, and help her to leave this world on her own terms?
“Instead, in its closing, the State raises another question. Why would Anne LaRussa and Lisa Bennet set up the device that killed her, and why would they seek to blame her husband?” Keera turned and looked to Vince LaRussa. His eyes shifted, momentarily engaging her.
“I don’t know,” she said. She looked to the jurors. “We may never know why. But that isn’t my job. And that isn’t what you have been asked to determine. I told you in my opening statement that my job was to convince you that reasonable doubt exists as to whether Vince LaRussa killed his wife.
“The State has failed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Vince LaRussa, with malice aforethought, shot and killed his wife. But I don’t have to tell you that. You’ve figured it out on your own, as was your duty. You know Vince LaRussa didn’t do it. Vince LaRussa did not murder his wife, and that is the only question before you. I ask you to do your duty. I ask you to find Vince LaRussa not guilty.”
After a brief pause, Keera thanked the jury. She felt physically and emotionally drained as she made her way back to counsel table. The rush of adrenaline she had so often felt at the end of chess tournaments and at the conclusion of trials did not come, nor did the satisfaction.
Ambrose stood to give the final word. Keera thought he would try to provide an answer to the questions she had posed. He didn’t. He couldn’t.
“The defense would like you to believe this case is complicated,” Ambrose said. “They would like you to believe the evidence is complicated. ‘It’s too complicated to figure out, so let’s throw our hands up and find the defendant not guilty.’” He shook his head and stared at the jury. “The defense is the one trying to confuse you. Not the State. This case is simple.
“Anne LaRussa called Syd Evans to her house that Sunday night to discuss the forfeiture clause in the prenuptial agreement. Anne LaRussa called Lisa Bennet to the house that Sunday night to accuse her of having an affair with Vince LaRussa, an affair that would trigger that forfeiture clause. You heard Dr. Bennet testify on the witness stand, under oath.” Another pause. Ambrose was clearly struggling to keep his anger under control. “No one else came to the house that night. No one broke a window or jimmied a door before Vincent LaRussa came home that night. Anne LaRussa confronted him with evidence that would cost him tens of millions of dollars. And he shot Anne LaRussa in the back of the head.”
He stared at them. His voice calmed. “Tragic, but straightforward. Simple.
“Don’t let the defense confuse you. Find the defendant, Vince LaRussa, guilty of first-degree murder.”
Ambrose sat.
Vince LaRussa’s fate was now in the jury’s hands.
So why did Keera feel like it remained in hers?
Chapter 36
Judge Hung sent the case to the jury just after lunch. Vince LaRussa was escorted back to jail to await the jurors’ verdict. Keera did not talk to him. She gave Patsy that task. Then they returned to their office. Both expected a long deliberation. Two hours after returning, Keera received word from Judge Hung’s court clerk that the jurors had several questions. Judge Hung wanted counsel to brief those questions, meaning provide legal support for their positions, further indicating a long deliberation.
“I’ll do it,” Ella said in Keera’s office with Patsy and Maggie. “I have that research, and I know the trial transcript better than anyone.”
“Thanks, Ella,” Keera said as Ella headed to the door.
“Not a problem.”
“I mean it,” Keera said.
Ella stopped and looked back. Her eyes panned from Keera to Patsy, then to Maggie, and finally back to Keera. “This is what family does,” she said.
Keera smiled. “And law firms.”
“I’ll make some fresh coffee and order in sandwiches,” Maggie said. “Anything in particular?”
“I’m not hungry,” Keera said.
“I’m ordering you a sandwich and you’re going to eat it,” Maggie said. “That goes for you too, Dad.”
Keera smiled. “Okay. But first I’m going to go for a walk to clear my head.”
“Take your cell phone,” Maggie said and left Keera’s office.
“You want some company?” Patsy asked.
“I think this time I’ll go alone.”
“You have that look,” he said.
“What look is that?” Keera said, feigning ignorance.
“That look young defense attorneys get when they realize the person they’re fighting so hard to get off is guilty. They wonder what the hell they’re doing, what kind of person they’re putting back on the street.”
“You’ve experienced it,” Keera said.
Patsy smiled, rueful. “I have. And I can tell you it isn’t nearly as bad as that feeling you get when you know an innocent client is going to be convicted.”
“I’m sure it isn’t.”
“So, what’s eating you, kiddo? LaRussa didn’t kill his wife. I think that’s pretty clear.”
“Is it?” Keera asked. “I’m no longer so certain. Maybe he didn’t pull the trigger, but I don’t think he’s innocent, Dad. I just don’t know what he’s guilty of.”
“Is this doubt coming from Jack Worthing, and all the people he’s sent us to talk to?”
“I ran into Lisa Bennet in the bathroom just before giving my closing argument. I said, ‘You’re Jack Worthing.’”
“What was her response?”
“She said, ‘No. I’m just the messenger. You know who Jack Worthing is.’”
“Vince?”
“I think it means she wrote the emails and she helped Anne set up the device. I think she sent me to talk to those people, to his mother, to learn that Vince is Jack Worthing. Just before I gave my closing I turned to Vince and asked him.”
“What did he say?”
“He told me to do the job I promised to do.” She sighed. “Remember I said there’s a line of dialogue in The Importance of Being Earnest?”
“I remember you said something. I don’t remember the line.”
“‘The truth is rarely pure and never simple.’ I think that applies here. I just don’t know what the truth is, in this case.”
Patsy didn’t answer right away. After a few moments, he said, “Here’s the thing to always remember, kiddo. You were retained to do a job. You can’t beat yourself up because you did that job well. It’s the State’s job to put criminals behind bars. I think you still have some PA blood in you, and it’s making you question your job as a defense attorney. It takes time to understand a defense attorney’s job isn’t to get anybody off. It’s to make sure your client’s rights are protected. If you do your job, then the outcome—guilty, not guilty, hung jury, is irrelevant.” Patsy walked to the door. “Go for your walk. You’ll feel better. I’m going to my office and your sister is going to force-feed me a sandwich.”
