Murder in the First

My turn in the Witness stand.

"Tell me Mister Challiner," I looked into those eyes, those steel hard, blue eyes, set in that smiling face, the face that told me that she thought she had me right where she wanted me. "Tell me," She was making this a personal question not one for the Judge, not one for the jury, this was between myself and her. "On the night of the 23rd of August, where exactly were you?"

The she who was making life uncomfortable for me was my attorney Judith P. Slattery. The 'P' she would never admit, stood for Petunia, and anything less like a flower would be hard to imagine. And why was she making life uncomfortable for me when a normal Defence Attorney would be coddling me through my evidence? It was part of a strategy to show that I didn't have enough anger in me to murder my wife.

"On the 23rd of August, let me see," I was stretching. I wanted to keep those eyes focused on mine. I knew that I could hold the stare longer than just about anyone and this was becoming a competition between myself and her, a competition that I just had to win. "The 23rd, Oh yes, I didn't go home that night until 1:30 in the morning. Up until then I had been with a friend. We had dinner together until around 11:00 and then I took her home, to her place."

"You were dining until 11:00 and then you took her home, is this correct?"

"Yes."

"Yet you didn't arrive back at your house until 1:30 in the morning? What were you doing between 11:00 and 1:30 Mister Challiner?" Again the stare.

"I was saying good-night to her."

"For two hours?"

"For two hours."

"And this friend, she will verify this," there was a deliberate pause, "under oath?"

"Yes she will."

"You seem confident of that, Mister Challiner?"

"She will swear it under oath, even if in doing this she will lose a great deal of money."

"How so, Mister Challiner?"

"Because my friend and I have been having an affair for some time and if her husband, when her husband finds out about it he will divorce her and, under the terms of their pre-nuptial agreement she will stand to lose a considerable amount of money."

"And yet, knowing this, she is prepared to support you, to risk a large sum of money, to provide you with an alibi that will clear you of this charge of murder?"

"Yes, she will?"

"And what have you promised her in return?"

"My love, I have promised her that I will love her, and that when this is over I will marry her."

"How nice for her." The smile was in her eyes only.

"Mister Challiner, do you have a lot of money?"

"No, I don't. I have a good business that earns me a steady income, enough to pay my mortgage and to meet my modest needs."

"But your bank records indicate that you are in financial difficulties?"

"Yes. While my business income is sufficient to meet my needs, my wife, my late wife had different ideas as to what constitutes needs."

"And you were unhappy with her spending?"

"Yes. I worked long and hard to build up my business only to see her bringing it down with her lavish spending."

"Were you unhappy enough to kill your wife?"

"No! Much as it hurt, having to attempt to control her spending, and having her laughing in my face when I begged her to stop, I could never kill her."

"Did you love your wife Mister Challiner?"

"I did, once. While I no longer loved her as a husband should, I did not hate her. I became tolerant of her, I tolerated her for the sake of my business and the people that I employ. If she were to divorce me and I lost the business, twenty people who have been my loyal employees for the last ten years would lose there jobs. I didn't want that to happen. If I didn't have them to consider, I would have divorced her some time ago."

"But you never contemplated killing her?"

"Never."

"The Prosecution has proven, it claims, that you possess the basic elements of a murderer, which is that you had the means, the motive, and the opportunity. What the Defence has to do is to show that the possession of these elements is purely circumstantial, that possession of these elements of murder does not equate to proof that you are a murderer. Now Mister Challiner, in the police evidence under oath you agreed that the murder weapon was registered to you, is that not correct?"

"Yes, that is correct."

"Can you explain how it was that you could not have murdered your wife with that weapon?"

"While that pistol was registered in my name it was no longer in my possession. I sold it several days before my wife was killed."

"Can you provide proof of that transaction?"

"Yes there is a receipt."

"You mean this receipt," she held up a piece of paper, "dated the 16th of August that states that you sold a Glock hand gun to a company that calls itself Remington Gunsmiths."

"Yes."

"And when the police confronted you with the murder weapon, did you explain this to them?"

"Yes I did."

"Did you tell them where you sold it?"

"Yes I did."

"After you were released on bail, did you go to the Remington Gunsmiths and ask the Salesperson if they still had the gun?"

"Yes I did."

"And what did the Salesperson tell you?"

"That it had been sold some days before."

"Did you ask for the name of the person that it was sold to?"

"Yes I did."

"And what was the response?"

"That they could not divulge the name of the person that it was sold to."

"Could not, or would not?"

"Could not, they had been told by the police that they were not to tell anyone who the gun was sold to."

"But the Salesperson had told the police?"

"I can only assume that he did."

"The police stated that during a search of your home they found evidence that the gun in question had been kept in the top drawer of the cabinet beside your bed. Do you deny that this was where the gun was kept?"

"No. When I had it in my possession that was where I kept it. I reasoned that, if an intruder broke into my house he would not stand around twiddling his thumbs while I unlocked my safe to retrieve the weapon. It had to be kept close at hand."

"If you no longer owned the weapon, how then do you explain the traces of its existence in the drawer?"

"Simple. While I may tidy the drawer from time to time, I did not see the need to thoroughly scrub it on a regular basis, so it stands to reason that there would be traces of gun oil in that drawer if I hadn't properly cleaned it out since I sold the gun."

She turned her attention to the judge. "Your honour, the Prosecution is withholding evidence. Under the rules of disclosure, any evidence that they obtain as a result of their investigation, that has a bearing on this case, has to be revealed to the Defence. We contend that the Prosecution knows to whom the murder weapon was sold and have not released that information."

The Prosecutor stood up. "Your Honour, may I take a few minutes to confer with the police on this."

"I believe that is in the court's best interests that you do."

A quick, but heated, conference took place between the Prosecutor and the investigating Detective. He took a sheet of paper from a folder on the table in front of him and handed it over to the Prosecutor. Who, ashen faced, stood up and addressed the Judge. "Your honour, my associate here assures me that this was a momentary lapse on his part that the evidence was not passed on to the Defence." He handed the sheet to the Clerk who handed it to the Judge who looked at and frowned before handing it back to the Clerk who handed it to my Attorney who looked at without surprise.

"Your Honour. This creates something of a problem, one which forces me to, should it become necessary, withdraw from this trial. But before I withdraw I will move a motion that makes that withdrawal un-necessary. In the light of this evidence, that this court find my client not guilty of the charge of murder. I must also question why it was that the police saw fit to withhold this vital piece of evidence, not only from the Defence but from the Court? How, if there was no collusion between the police, Remington Gunsmiths and a third party, can they explain how it is that the page of the receipt book that recorded the sales transaction between my client and the Remington Gunsmiths, has mysteriously disappeared? Why they should withhold the name of the person who purchased the murder weapon from Remington Gunsmiths, just who are they protecting? Could it be my husband, Miles Slattery, who for almost a year was having an affair with the wife of the Defendant and who, by his own admission to myself and other prospective witnesses, who the police also failed to mention, sought to end that relationship. The police have overlooked the obvious that this man, my husband, had the means, the murder weapon, the motive, to end the affair, and the opportunity, he had a meeting with her that night. Was it in order to protect this person, a person who had so much influence within the force?"

The Judge ordered a mistrial pending further investigation into the Police conduct of the investigation and the involvement of Miles Slattery.

We were in bed again. "Would you have asked me to reveal that you were my lover?"

"If necessary to establish your alibi, yes I would have. I would have then had to resign as your Defence Attorney, but I would have found a competent replacement. But that was to be a last resort. We were unable to get that vital evidence from the gunsmith so we had to force the police's hand. I knew that he had bought that weapon so that you could be framed for the murder. Proving that he had was vital, and the only way that I could, was to force the police to reveal that evidence."

"I'm so glad that I needed that advice that day."

"Don't worry, if you hadn't come to me I would have come to you in due course, you see I'd known for some time that my husband was fucking your wife, I just had to figure out how I could use that information to my advantage. I think that I succeeded, don't you." I had to agree with her.

Now for the wash up:

There was no second trial. I was a free man.

Miles Slattery was tried and found guilty of First Degree Homicide and is currently doing a 25 to Life stretch with little chance of parole.

Former Lieutenant Bentley, in return for providing the evidence that convicted Miles Slattery, was allowed to resign from the force with full entitlements on the condition that he moves interstate. He is now a PI but probably not for much longer. He was caught supplementing his fees by extorting those he is paid to investigate in exchange for falsifying evidence that would otherwise have convicted them. His PI Licence is currently under suspension pending an investigation of his practices.

Me, well I offered to sell my business to my staff so that I could retire, but they refused the offer. We have instead come up with a profit sharing agreement that allows them a greater autonomy in the running of the business and me to cut down on my working hours so that I can concentrate on my new life direction.

Judith P (for Petunia) Challiner (formerly Slattery) and I got married this very afternoon. We have just managed to slip away from a potentially rowdy reception and are in the very hotel room where we first made love not all that long ago, and who said that sentimentality was dead? Judith has informed me that she has every intention of being very tired, and very sore, tomorrow when we board our plane for our European honeymoon.

There is a large bed. There is a beautiful woman. There is a beautiful naked woman extending a very open invitation to me to join her on that bed, naked, her, bed, woman, sex, breasts, pussy, aah Heaven.