Misty River, page 16
“I prefer not to because it may incriminate me.”
The courtroom erupted in laughter. The judge banged her gavel several times. “Order in the court, or I will have you removed.”
Blake didn’t care. The damage had been done. Everyone within earshot knew that Owens was a liar. “Mr. Owens,” he said. “I will accept your silence as an admission that no such women exist. I now present you with State’s exhibit twenty-one. For the record, what is State’s exhibit twenty-one?”
“You know what it is,” Owens said, “It’s just a pair of blue jeans.”
“That is correct. But it isn’t ‘just’ a pair of blue jeans, is it?”
“What do you mean?”
“Here is what I mean.” Blake walked towards the jury box, raised the blue jeans, and asked, “Isn’t it true, Mr. Owens, that the blue jeans I now hold in my hands were worn by Olivia Spencer the night you kidnapped her at gunpoint, and forced her to remove all her clothing?”
Owens’s temper was boiling over. If looks could kill, Blake would be dead. He stood up in the witness box and yelled, “How the hell would I know, Moretti? You’re trying to frame me to make a reputation for yourself. Who the hell knows where you got those clothes from? For all I know, you could have bought them from Goodwill.”
Judge Croghan leaned toward the witness box. “Mr. Owens, calm yourself and sit down, or I’ll have the deputy assist you,” she ordered.
Blake wasn’t finished. “Mr. Owens, you were sitting beside Mr. Sweeney when the evidence technician, Deputy John Otto, identified for this jury all the clothing he recovered from the scene of the rape. These blue jeans, Ms. Spencer’s blue sweater, sneakers, bra, and panties were found in the same pile. Isn’t that true, or do you want to call the evidence technician a liar?”
“Yeah, he’s a liar, too!”
“Answer this last question, Mr. Owens. You testified under oath that when you first observed Ms. Spencer in the grocery parking lot, she was wearing a mini skirt that caught your attention.
“In fact, during your recorded interview, you said she was wearing a ‘tight skirt’. I commented that it must have been a short, tight mini skirt. And you asked, ‘Is there any other kind of mini skirt?’ You don’t deny that do you? I can play the recording again or ask the court reporter to read your testimony if you like.”
“That won’t be necessary. I know what I said.”
“Then answer my question, Mr. Owens. If Ms. Spencer wore blue jeans the night you met her, and, as she testified, she took them off along with the other clothing that the evidence technician recovered in the woods, then tell us, Mr. Owens, how is it that no mini skirt, tight or otherwise, was found at the crime scene?”
Owens glanced at his lawyer, looking for help to no avail. He sat for a moment, looking around the courtroom, then said, “How the hell do I know? They’re all liars.”
“Thank goodness, Mr. Owens, the jury will determine who is telling the truth, not you. Your Honor, that concludes my examination of the defendant.”
“Mr. Sweeney, any recross of the defendant?” the judge inquired.
“No, Your Honor.”
“Call your next witness.”
“Your Honor, the defense rests.”
“Very good. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, we will take a thirty-minute recess. When we return, you will hear the closing arguments of the parties.”
Chapter 25
He Said-She Said
The Rape Trial
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury. During jury selection, you all agreed that my client, Billy Owens, was presumed innocent. I submit to you that the government has failed to prove any of the criminal charges pinned on my client, and therefore has done nothing to change his status as an innocent man. There are more holes in the government’s case than Swiss cheese.
“As I told you folks, a story has two sides. My client has cooperated with the government since day one. At his own request, Mr. Owens met with the prosecutor and provided his story. But Mr. Moretti didn’t listen to a single word my client said. Mr. Owens explained that his encounter with Ms. Spencer was consensual, and that it was she who instigated the event. Ladies and gentlemen, my client is the victim, not Ms. Spencer. This case is nothing more than ‘he said, she said’. You have not been presented with anything close to proof beyond a reasonable doubt, the highest burden of proof in our judicial system.
“Can you imagine if someone made up a false accusation against you, and all you had to disprove the lie was your word against the accuser’s? My goodness, without the burden of proving the accusation ‘beyond a reasonable doubt’, innocent people would be convicted daily and spend the rest of their lives in prison.
“Before I review the government’s poor excuse for proof, allow me to digress and discuss two matters.
“First, I will not defend my client’s comments that women are attracted to him, because he is not charged with being a braggart.
“Second, we all saw Mr. Owens lose his temper with Mr. Moretti. However, please remember that he has cooperated with law enforcement since the inception of this case. Unfortunately, every word has fallen on deaf ears. Yes, he is frustrated by this legal process, but ask yourself if this nightmare was happening to you or your loved one, wouldn’t you be upset, as well?
“I beg you not to hold any of that against him. Instead, judge this case on the evidence or, should I say, the lack of evidence.
“So, what evidence does the government want you folks to rely on to convict an innocent man? Think about it. They brought in Ms. Spencer, who wants you to believe she is in love and engaged to be married. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth. Ms. Spencer and her so-called fiancé fought constantly. The very same day she cried rape, the so-called love birds engaged in a significant fight. And she never got married. That’s because she was already done with that relationship and was out on Saint Patrick’s Day night looking to hook up with a man to party with. So, please, don’t fall for her ‘poor me’ act. Mrs. Elliot did. She meant well, but Ms. Spencer pulled the wool over her eyes.
“Then there was Dr. Price who examined Ms. Spencer. Remember what he said when I asked him if bruises and contusions could result from rough sex? The doctor agreed that indeed, they could have been.
“Then there was Ms. Fleming. When you think about it, she didn’t tell law enforcement anything my client didn’t tell them, and he reiterated that on the witness stand.
“Finally, I would be remiss if I didn’t remind you about the shoddy rush to judgment on the part of the sheriff’s investigation. Their sole purpose was to clear paper, so they ran with Ms. Spencer’s fable and arrested, charged, and indicted my client without obtaining his side of the story.
“Ask yourselves, what kind of government locks up their citizens without obtaining their side of the story? It certainly isn’t the America we grew up in. Sinful!
“Now you know why Billy Owens told you he was framed.
“Find him not guilty.”
“Mr. Moretti, are you ready to proceed with the closing argument for the state?” asked Judge Croghan
Of course, Blake was ready. He’d been either working on the case or thinking about it every waking moment since Hardy assigned it to him.
The closing argument was his favorite part of the trial. He was a natural storyteller. In his speeches, he gave voice to victims and survivors whom he firmly believed had a right to be heard and remembered.
Blake recognized the importance of delivering the closing in a way that commanded the listeners’ attention and tugged at their hearts. To persuade the jury that their cause should prevail, he chose a suitable theme and words that would empower the jury to decide in his favor on the grounds that it was the just and right thing to do.
A lot depended on how he was perceived in the courtroom, where he stood, the tone of his voice, the cadence of his words, and the way he looked the jurors in the eye and let them know he was being truthful.
The closing argument was the last leg of his Rule of Three storytelling. It began with the opening statement, continued during the State’s case, and finally, the closing argument when the jury heard it again. If he was consistent from start to finish, why wouldn’t they believe it?
He walked to the middle of the courtroom, set his legal notepad down on the lectern, and then slowly approached the jury box, being careful not to invade their space. He took a moment and glanced at each juror, so no one would feel left out. In a soft tone of voice, he slowly began.
“May it please the court, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, Detective Barnes, and Mr. Sweeney.”
As he delivered the closing, he moved slowly from one side of the jury box to the other, watching their eyes to be sure they were listening.
“Where were you when …? You can fill in the blank. Maybe it was a big moment in history. Perhaps it was a small moment when you were on the playground or in a bar. A time when someone needed your help. Did you do something? Did you say something? Did you help?
“Where were you on March 17, 1987, when the defendant kidnapped Olivia Spencer at gunpoint in Hanger’s supermarket parking lot and forced her to drive her vehicle to a secluded, dark place in the woods along the Misty River?
“Where were you when the defendant chased Olivia Spencer down like an animal as she attempted to escape?
“Where were you when the defendant pointed a gun at Olivia Spencer’s head and ordered her to remove her clothing, her blue cotton sweater, her sneakers, and not a tight mini skirt, by the way, but her blue jeans, her bra, and finally, her panties?
“Where were you when the defendant pistol-whipped Olivia Spencer’s face, knocking her to the cold, wet, muddy ground?
“Where were you when the defendant removed his own clothes, laid his foul-smelling body on hers, and still holding a gun to her head, exhaled his alcohol-laden breath in her face, screaming that if she didn’t stop fighting him off, he would kill her and then fuck her?
“Where were you when Olivia Spencer was being raped by the defendant, over and over? When she cried out for help and begged him to stop?
“I suspect most of you were at home. Maybe some of you were working. Perhaps you were out with friends. You didn’t know. You couldn’t see her. You couldn’t hear her. You couldn’t help her.”
Blake raised his voice and said, “But you can now. You are here now. Olivia needs you. She needs you to do the right thing. Olivia Spencer is not asking for a lot. She only asks you to hold this defendant accountable for his brutal and heinous crimes against her.
“In the opening statement, I told you I would return to this story and explain why the State has met its burden of proof and why you must hold this defendant accountable for his actions. Everything I told you we would present in the trial, we did. The evidence we presented has been consistent throughout. The witnesses all corroborated Olivia’s testimony. The physical evidence confirmed it. That’s because it is the truth. The truth is consistent, like the needle on a compass, which always points north.
“Mr. Sweeney was correct when he said you would hear two stories. Unfortunately, that was the only accurate statement he made.
“You see, Mr. Sweeney is a lawyer and is just doing his job. Like all lawyers, he wants to win. The law and facts were not in his client’s favor, so he disparaged the victim. It was clear from the evidence that the defendant’s entire defense was based on a fairytale intended to obscure the truth.
“The defendant’s fairytale goes like this: on Saint Patrick’s Day evening, Ms. Spencer dressed provocatively for a night out on the town and seduced the defendant into having consensual sex. She took him to a secluded wooded area along the Misty River, where she voluntarily had sex with him, gave him her engagement ring as a gift, and allowed him to drive off in her car. The story was intended to cast the victim in a negative light and to make you ignore the truth.
“So, here’s the deal. It doesn’t matter what he thinks or what I think. At the end of the day, finding the truth is all that matters.
“The law gives you the power to decide the facts for yourselves. Each of you is like a judge, except you don’t have a robe like Judge Croghan. As jury members, it’s your responsibility to determine the truth by evaluating the witnesses’ testimony and the physical evidence admitted as evidence, applying Judge Croghan’s instructions, and your everyday common sense.
“Here’s what I have: I have a victim who lives a nightmare every waking and sleeping hour of the day. A woman who made an ordinary late-evening grocery run and wasn’t looking for sexual encounters. She wore jeans, not a seductive tight mini skirt. The evidence technician recovered her blue jeans, not a mini skirt, with the other clothing she was forced to remove. A bag of groceries containing perishable grocery items she purchased was recovered in her stolen vehicle and found only two houses from where the defendant was arrested. You also learned that at the scene of the rape, before she could enter her car and return home with her groceries, this defendant stuck a firearm in her back and directed her to drive to a secluded wooded end of town along the Misty River where he humiliated her, forced her to remove her clothes with a gun pointing at her head, brutally beat and raped her repeatedly.
“She didn’t take the defendant to her place or a rented motel room. She was forced to drive to a secluded wooded area where no one could see her being beaten and raped, nor hear her cries for help.”
With an unforgiving face and a grave voice Blake pointed at the jury and said, “The defense put one witness on the stand. That witness stunk up this courtroom with his lies and inconsistent demeaning accusations of consensual sex.”
Blake turned and pointed at Owens, who had nowhere to hide. “That witness was this defendant.
“Ladies and gentlemen, think about this: to believe the defendant, you would have to believe he’s God’s gift to women, and the sex was so good the victim handed over her engagement ring and the keys to her car as a reward for giving her the most sexually satisfying night of her life.
“To believe the defendant’s lies you would have to disbelieve not only the victim, but also Zelene Elliot, Doctor Jeff Price, and the first responding deputies who confirmed that Olivia Spencer’s injuries and appearance were consistent with her story that she was beaten and raped.
“To believe the defendant’s fable, you would have to disbelieve the testimony of his girlfriend, Valerie Fleming, who testified to his disheveled appearance when he returned home after raping Ms. Spencer. You would have to disbelieve her testimony that he tried to give her an expensive engagement ring he didn’t have the money to buy, which, coincidentally, belonged to Ms. Spencer.
“Finally, ask yourselves why Olivia left the scene of the attack naked if the encounter was consensual.
“The truth is that the defendant is not the victim here. Olivia Spencer is the victim.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, Olivia Spencer had the courage to walk into this courtroom, swear to tell the truth, and endure ridicule from the defense. She had to relive the nightmare that began on March 17, 1987, which started in the supermarket parking lot when she was kidnapped at gunpoint and forced to drive to the secluded banks of the Misty River, where she was repeatedly raped. Nevertheless, she took the stand and shared her story with you in hopes that you’d hold her assailant accountable.
“The defendant wants you all to believe that he did nothing wrong. He wants you to believe Olivia Spencer’s actions are why we’re here today. The truth is that’s not true.”
Blake turned his attention to Owens, raised his voice, pointed at him, and said, “It’s that man’s fault, right there. He is the reason we are all here today. On Saint Patrick’s Day night of 1985, Billy “Buck” Owens kidnapped, raped, and robbed Ms. Spencer. He wrote this script. He picked the judge, the lawyers, the witnesses, and you, the jury. He did all that right here, in the town of Misty River, in your backyard, the night he raped Olivia.
“Folks, those are the facts. You know Ms. Spencer spoke the truth because her story is consistent with the testimony of all the other State’s witnesses. Furthermore, you know it’s the truth because her story is consistent with all the physical evidence. Finally, you know it’s the truth because her injuries were consistent with rape and assault as depicted in the photographs you observed during trial.”
Blake walked closer to the jury box, looked the jurors in the eye and softly said, “Today you can use your voice to say Billy Owens is responsible for the crimes he committed against Olivia Spencer. Today, you can use your voice and tell the defendant he is guilty and should be held accountable for his actions.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, on March 17, 1987, this defendant kidnapped, robbed, and raped Olivia Spencer. I respectfully ask you to find him guilty. It’s time he is held accountable for his actions.”
While the jury deliberated, Blake told Jennifer he was going for a walk to get fresh air, which wasn’t true. He had to get out of the courthouse because every five minutes someone asked him if the jury had reached a verdict yet. Not that he was concerned about the outcome, but he wanted to be alone to review the trial presentation and make mental notes of what he should have done differently for future reference.
Jennifer knew that during jury deliberations, he hung out on a quiet park bench a couple of blocks from the courthouse. Two hours had passed when she received a call that the jury had reached a verdict.
Blake found himself lost in thought, perched upon the unforgiving surface of the cement park bench. He nibbled on a Snickers Bar, its caramel sweetness mingling with the weight of his ruminations. Suddenly, piercing through the haze of his introspection, Jennifer’s voice rang out like a clarion call, shattering the silence that enveloped him. “Blake,” she declared with a sense of urgency, “we have reached a verdict.”
Blake and Barnes took their places at the prosecutor’s table in the packed courtroom. Jennifer and Ralph sat with Olivia directly behind them.
