“Okay, let’s go back a bit. Do you recal a breakin and attempted rape of a woman named Lana Cantrel in Victory Hil in 2009?”
Hannah raised her voice again for the benefit of the gal ery. “Lana was at home alone with her baby late at night. A man broke into her home and attacked her. Luckily, Lana’s husband came home unexpectedly from a business trip and interrupted the attack.
According to the police report the attacker escaped and left no DNA evidence behind. Do you recal that case?”
“I do,” Pierce said gravely. “Not al of the detail. It was a long time ago, but I recal the case.” God he was good. He came across like an upstanding guy. The kind of serious, measured, feeling person you’d want to have running your town’s law enforcement. Hannah thought about that moment in the bar after Sean had been beaten to a pulp. Now, Pierce. Now you get what’s due.
“Do you recal then that your crime scene officers did in fact recover hair evidence from the Lana Cantrel case?”
“No, I don’t. As you said, there was no DNA evidence in that case.”
“You don’t recal that hair evidence was recovered from the scene in the ordinary way and logged into evidence by an officer named Nicola Pandy?”
“I . . . no. I don’t recal .” For the first time, Pierce looked uncertain.
“You don’t recal going to Officer Pandy and threatening her?
Officer Pandy’s grandson had a record for pot possession. You don’t recal going to her, taking that evidence bag from her, that bag which contains the hair evidence recovered from the Cantrel scene, and then threatening Officer Pandy? Warning her if she told anyone about what you had done, that next time you arrested her grandson, it would be for intention to supply and it would be heroin?”
“Absolutely not.”
“So if I were to cal Officer Pandy to the stand and she were to testify to that effect, she would be lying?” Hannah waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the courtroom, as if she had Nicola Pandy right there, ready to go. In fact Pandy was retired and living in Florida. Hannah had spoken to her on the phone. Pandy had no family in Virginia these days. She would be wil ing to testify, she said, but travel wasn’t easy for her with her various health problems, and she certainly couldn’t have gotten to Yorktown with an hour’s notice.
Pierce didn’t know any of that though. His eyes swept the courtroom, looking for a woman he hadn’t seen in person for over seven years.
And the judge saw him do it, even as he denied everything.
“She would be lying, yes,” Pierce said firmly.
Hannah picked up the bag and carried it to the evidence clerk.
“Judge, we’d like to admit this into evidence please. It is hair evidence taken from the Lana Cantrel case. The chain of evidence is written on the bag. It tel s you who col ected the evidence and the person to whom they passed it. The name of the crime scene officer who col ected the evidence is written on the bag. Nicola Pandy.
Officer Pandy doesn’t work for the state of Virginia anymore. She is wil ing to testify because her grandson and al of her family have left Virginia and are therefore no longer in danger from Sheriff Pierce.”
Jackson Engle stood. “Objection, Judge. We have no information as to where this evidence came from. Anyone can throw some hair in a baggy and write a name on the front. This is hardly credible. And Ms. Rokeby seems to have forgotten that she is here to question the witness, not to testify herself. And even if Ms. Rokeby was a witness, which she is not, she has no direct knowledge of any of this. This is al hearsay.”
“Actual y,” Hannah said. “I recovered this evidence myself just over an hour ago when I broke into Sheriff Pierce’s private office in his home here in Yorktown. Sheriff Pierce maintains a col ection of duplicate police files and what appears to be voluminous blackmail material in that office, including a duplicate of the Sarah Fitzhugh file.
That’s where I found this evidence.”
Pandemonium broke out in the courtroom. The public gal ery burst into conversation. Engle jumped to his feet again and cal ed out objections. The judge cal ed for order. Eventual y, more perhaps because people wanted to see what would happen next than for any other reason, the courtroom quieted.
“Judge, this supposed evidence was obtained by the most egregious breach of Sheriff Pierce’s constitutional rights and should be excluded on that basis. It’s not admissible.”
But Hannah was ready. “Burdeau v. McDowel , Judge. I am not a member of law enforcement. I’m a private citizen. And I just have a few more questions.”
The judge hesitated. Her eyes were on Jerome Pierce. Hannah got the distinct impression that the al egation that Pierce was a blackmailer hadn’t come as a complete surprise to the judge, but she came down on Hannah’s side. “Proceed, Ms. Rokeby, but careful y please. These are very serious al egations.”
The courtroom settled again into tense, anticipatory silence.
Hannah was painful y aware that every person in the courtroom was focused on her and on what she might say next. This was so difficult and Jackson Engle was right. She was essential y trying to testify through Pierce. Her eyes went to Michael Dandridge. Her father.
God. What kind of man was he real y? Not the monster of her mother’s fairy tale, but not an angel either. None of that had been real. From now on she would look at life with eyes wide open. Right now Michael looked flushed and agitated. Excited and scared at the same time. His freedom in her hands. It was too much.
“Isn’t it the case, Sheriff Pierce, that you knew that your brotherin-law, Derek Rawlings, was the man who committed both crimes? The rape and murder of Sarah Fitzhugh and the attempted rape of Lana Cantrel ? That you covered up for Derek Rawlings after the murder of Sarah Fitzhugh because he was your brotherin-law and you did not want the social embarrassment that would fol ow if he were exposed?”
“Absolutely not,” Pierce said. He was red-faced with fury and frustration and he was sweating hard.
“Isn’t it the case that you arrested Michael Dandridge for the murder of Sarah Fitzhugh as part of that cover-up, and that you beat him up during your interrogation to force him to confess?”
“No. No way.”
“And isn’t it the case that after Derek Rawlings tried to rape Lana Cantrel , you stole and hid the hair evidence from that case to make sure that it wasn’t tested? You couldn’t al ow the hair to be tested because you knew it would match the hair recovered from the Fitzhugh murder, and if that was discovered, your whole setup against our client might wel col apse.”
“You are ful of shit,” Pierce said. Spittle flew from his mouth.
“This is unacceptable. I don’t have to take this.”
Hannah turned to Burrel . “Judge, I spoke to Teddy Rawlings.