He charged him with murder.”
“Are you sure your client was innocent?”
“Positive. I spoke to the hospice nurse. She’d visited the night my client’s wife died and administered pain medication without mentioning that fact to my client. He was asleep on the couch, exhausted from caring for his wife. When he was awakened a few hours later by his wife’s moaning, he gave her another dose of medication, assuming she hadn’t had any. When I learned all this, I went to Staker and asked him to drop the charges.”
“He didn’t,” Jack guessed.
“And he used what I told him to strengthen the state’s case. In his opening statement to the jury, he said the hospice nurse had spent many nights at my client’s home, implying they were having an affair. When the hospice nurse got on the stand, Staker cross-examined her about her recent divorce and asked if she was lying because she wanted my client’s wife dead so she could be with him.”
“And her denial didn’t carry any weight,” Jack said, “because the force of the accusation was enough to get the jury to believe the affair was true.”
Diana nodded. “I’m always amazed how ready people are to think the worst about someone without a lick of proof.”
“Your client was convicted?”
Diana put down her fork, her appetite suddenly abandoning her. “He took his own life.”
“I’m sorry.”
Jack had spoken the words softly. Without his impressive array of facial expressions and tonal range, he still sounded very sincere. Diana wondered how he’d managed to do that. Was that ability part of his training, or could it be she was seeing the real him?
“When did this happen?” he asked after a moment.
She hadn’t thought she’d share this next part. Now she realized she wanted to.
“Two years ago. I’m still not able to discuss the case dispassionately. Maybe I never will be. My client was a good man who loved his wife dearly. He was depressed over her death and filled with guilt for having had a part in ending her life prematurely, however unintentional.”
“Is that why he killed himself?”
“I think he would have come out of his depression if he hadn’t been unfairly accused and tried. He left a letter, thanking me for believing him and asking me to make sure that the hospice nurse was not victimized.”
“What did Staker say when you showed him the letter?”
Diana spoke the words through a clenched jaw. “He said he wished the guy hadn’t killed himself before the jury had reached their guilty verdict because he was robbed of another win. Staker was competing with the prosecutor in a neighboring county for most convictions within a calendar year.”
Jack called Staker a filthy name, so filthy in fact that Diana decided right then that she liked Jack very much.
“Is Staker in another competition?” he asked, his tone cool with contempt. “Or does he have a vendetta against Connie?”
“I don’t know about another competition,” Diana said, “but he never has anything personal against a defendant. They’re simply not real to him. Nothing and no one is real to Staker but Staker. The law is something he uses for his own ends. He intends to use Connie’s trial to launch his campaign for judge. Her high-profile trial and conviction will give him the media spotlight he craves as the ‘hard on crime’ candidate.”
Jack chewed for a few minutes before he asked his next question. “What about the judge who will hear the case? Can you talk to him or her?”
“Him. William Gimbrere. He’s a friend of Barbara Weaton’s. And he would not be willing to listen.”
“As a friend of the mother of the victim, shouldn’t Gimbrere excuse himself from the case?”
“Every judge in the county is a friend of Barbara Weaton’s. Earl Payman should have petitioned the court for a change of venue at the time he entered Connie’s plea. He didn’t. When I did, Gimbrere told me the request had come too late and turned me down.”
“I can’t imagine that when the jury hears Connie’s story, they won’t at least opt for the lesser charge of involuntary manslaughter.”
“The only option the prosecution is going to give them is guilty or not guilty of first-degree murder. There will be no lesser charge from which they can choose.”
“The prosecutor can do that?” Jack asked.
“He’s done it.”
“But there’s no way he can prove premeditation.”
“A death doesn’t have to be premeditated to qualify as first-degree murder. Paraphrasing Washington State law, a defendant can be found guilty of first-degree murder if he or she manifests an extreme indifference to human life by engaging in conduct that creates a grave risk of death to any person and thereby causes the death of a person.”
“Like deliberately running over a guy with your car,” Jack said, nodding.
“And you can be sure that Staker will do everything he can to try to prove Connie did that deliberately.”
“How can he?”
“By characterizing Connie as a jealous lover. Bruce’s nephew said he was showing Connie his new bike and the next thing he knew she was running from the garage. Staker claims that Connie saw another woman’s panties lying on the dashboard of Bruce’s Mercedes and suddenly realized that Bruce was two-timing her.”
“The panties were there?”
“Red lace bikini,” Diana confirmed. “Part of the physical evidence in the prosecution’s case.”
“And the owner?”
“Tina Uttley, an employee at the real estate firm Bruce owned with his father and brother, identified them as hers. She’s also admitted to having an affair with Bruce at the time he was romancing Connie.”
“Did Bruce’s family know he’d proposed to Connie?” Jack asked.
“They said nothing about knowing in their statements to the sheriff’s office.”
Jack put down his knife and fork, pushed his empty plate aside. “Connie would have said something about Bruce seeing another woman if she’d known.”
“I’m certain you’re right,” Diana said. “But Staker’s going to claim that she realized the significance of the panties and that jealousy was her motive for killing Bruce.”
“Even though the nephew never mentioned that Connie even looked into the car?”
“All Staker has to do is put Connie in the vicinity and make the idea she saw the panties sound plausible. Without any other explanation for her running out of the garage, he’ll count on his suggestion to be taken as fact by the jury.”
Jack shook his head. “Connecting the dots
