False Witness (21 page)

“You do look tired, Lynnie. Look,” Jim back-pedaled a little; all his points had been scored; now we were to be pals again. “Look, Lynne, we’ve been doing all the background stuff and you’ve been right front and center with the main characters. My guys are a little edgy. This is a big headline case; updated on TV every night; rerun during Sanderalee’s time slot.”

“And my pretty little face has been seen and not handsome Mr. Kasinski’s or Kelly or whatsisname, the handsome football-player type who works with Moscowitz? C’mon, Jim.” I pulled myself up straight and took a good bite of Danish. Some kind of little nuts; a tiny piece of sharp shell cut directly into my gums. I fingered it out and examined it. “Thank you very much. Any more shells or hidden tortures?”

Jim relented a little; good-pal Jim approach. “You know how these younger guys are, Lynne. They watch all the damn silly cop shows and even though they know life isn’t like that, I guess they all fantasize a little. Case ending with closeup on handsome young cop who modestly shrugs it all off: all in a day’s work and what’s the boss got lined up next, for Pete’s sake?”

His men had all been assigned and had all been working hard at their assignments, to do background investigations and to interrogate all the various names who were connected in any way to Sanderalee Dawson. They had compiled a thick, fairly neat volume of interviews and comments and statistics and data. Might come in handy someday if Sanderalee ever wanted to write a book called
People Who Knew Me.

They were feeling a little left out. My people were visible and easily spotted at the heart of the case. My people were assigned close contact with the victim and daily contact with those people immediately involved with her. Jim’s prima donnas had been toiling in the unglamorous places.

“Okay, your people do the search of Dr. Cohen’s apartment, office at Columbia, office at New York Hospital.”

“What about his cottage out at East Hampton?”

I stared blankly and Jim Barrow winked at me.
“Gotcha.
Don’t look upset, Lynne, you’ve had a lot on your mind. Okay, any hints, clues, suggestions, instructions as to what my gentlemen will be looking for?” He grinned and gestured toward the door. “You want to brief the troops or will you defer to the old soldier here?”

“How’s about you and me go out to the cottage at East Hampton, Jim, just you and me together and ... search around a little, huh? Hey, Jim. I’m tired. Very tired. Give me one of your silent but non-hostile types to drive me home, okay? I’ve had a lousy day; I anticipate a sleepless night and a rotten tomorrow.”

“Sounds like a buildup to a television commercial: take one search warrant and a half, and feel better in the morning. So, Lynne, what do you think? The doctor a nut? He do all this?”

It was a genuine question: we never exchanged “Oh-my-God, could this possibly be?” Both Barrow and I knew anything could possibly be.

I shrugged. “Listen to my tapes; study my notes. Could I have your whatsisname—Henry? Hendrison—sit in tomorrow when Dr. Cohen and company come to my office?”

“Hendrikson, Sam. You got him. Lynne, did he do this? This David Cohen of the international reputation?”

“Ask Sanderalee Dawson, pal, don’t ask me. I wasn’t there.”

Bobby Jones didn’t answer his phone so I went next door to accept Jhavi’s invitation to share their newest bootleg movie. My cat was already at their apartment; he preferred Harley’s cooking to mine. I relaxed and scrunched down into the depths of their marvelous sofa. Jake Jacobi came and cuddled on top of me: he was so damn heavy I could hardly breathe, but I guess I could breathe enough because I fell asleep and when I opened my eyes, I was covered with a cashmere blanket. The background sounds from the movie on the huge Advent had been turned down very low.

Jhavi’s fingertips tickled my forehead and he held out the telephone and he whispered quietly, directly into the phone. “Shall I tell him to just blast off, my darling, or do you want to speak to the voice of the Midwest?”

We had brought my phone into their apartment on the extra-long extension cord. I didn’t snap instantly, adrenally awake as I did when set off by a loud ring. I stretched and yawned and reached for Bobby Jones.

“Lynne, listen. I might be on to something important. What time tomorrow are we seeing the doctor and his lawyer?”

“The doctor? And his lawyer? And his Indian chief?”

“Lynne? Are you awake or what?” Bobby Jones was certainly awake and ... what? annoyed with me? about what?

“What time is it, Bobby? What are we talking about? I called you when I got home from Barrow’s office. Talk about your offended stars. My God, Bobby, it seems we have been stomping all over Jim Barrow’s best fellers. Hey, where were
you?
Out on the town?”

He was all-businesslike is
how
he was anyway, wherever he had been.

“Lynne, I have—I
will
have a freeze-frame from the news conference held the day of the attack. At a news-briefing session after the team of surgeons rejoined Sanderalee’s hand: David Cohen had a small, round Band-Aid patch on his left cheek, Lynne. I’m having the picture blown up and I’ll bring it in in the morning. Lynne, are you following me?”

“To the ends of the earth. Where are you now?”

“I’m at home and I just got here and I’ve been out trying to get the information we needed. I think I’ve got it.”

He sounded: how? Remote? Distracted? Annoyed? Excited? Impersonal? What? What?

“Bobby? Everything okay? You sound ... kind of ... funny?”

Silence; not more than a split second. A professional judgment: this man has something to hide. A personal judgment: whatever it is, I don’t want to know. I said goodbye.

What gives? I wondered. A warning? From Bobby? Suddenly I felt very cold.

S
OME INVESTIGATIONS HAVE A
life of their own: an almost biological rhythm or tempo. They are slow-paced and steady and are accomplished through meticulous researching and digging and sorting and sifting and evaluation of facts to prove or disprove the theory with which we begin. These are the somewhat leisurely, somewhat boring and arduous but somehow reassuring cases that are self-contained within the agency assigned. There is no outside monitoring or speculation or accusation or implication. Time is not particularly a factor. Accuracy and the ability to present a tight and binding case against the accused are all-important. We have the luxury of moving in one direction, compiling data, examining it and striking it all if necessary and starting again from another premise entirely.

That is the ideal type of investigation: unpublicized until such time as, equipped with substantial evidence, we bring the culprit into court. To the public, it seems that, as if by magic, we have uncovered dark foul deeds of criminal activity. Our false starts and wrong assumptions are unknown and unavailable for public discussion. If we have in fact done our job properly, there is a strong possibility that the accused, in the light of the evidence and upon sensible advice from counsel, will cop a plea: make a deal: bargain with us. Then, we can get on with the business of our office at a minimum cost to the taxpayers.

And then there is another type of investigation that gets away from you almost immediately by the very nature of the people involved. If we had any doubts at all as to the pressures to be applied in the Sanderalee Dawson investigation, reality came upon us in full force in the form of what is known as a “blind item” on Page Six of the
New York Post.
This is the page set aside for all kinds of interesting, unsubstantiated and titillating bits of gossip and innuendo.

What’s the story on the internationally renowned Israeli doctor who has been barred from Sanderalee Dawson’s hospital room? Have they previously met under very different circumstances? Is the truth more horrible than we can imagine? If so, who’s sitting on it and why?????

Every second, third and fourth phone call into my Bureau was an inquiry based on the Page Six item.

Chief Jim Barrow called: he was upset because as his men arrived with search warrants in hand at Dr. David Cohen’s apartment, at his office at Columbia Presbyterian and at his office at New York Hospital, there were mobs of newspeople, equipped with questions, cameras, microphones.

“Even, for God’s sake, out at East Hampton, Lynne. My guys called me to tell me that reporters from the little rinky-dinky local newspapers had been tipped. What’s the story on all this crap?”

“What’s the story, Chief Barrow? Okay: here’s the story. You’ve been complaining that your men were left out of everything, so I called the tip in to Page Six. Then I disguised my voice as a member of the lunatic fringe and spent all morning calling the news media. I’ve been telling everyone that Jim Barrow’s guys are on the job. That this is the opportunity they’ve all been waiting for: these are really handsome guys, very photogenic. Jim, what the hell do you want from me?”

By the time Dr. David Cohen and his attorney, Jerry Ashkenazi, arrived for our 2:00
P.M.
appointment, things had gotten hectic indeed.

Dr. Cohen’s attorney looked very agitated. He was a heavyset man of about forty with a thick dark brown toupee that was set slightly at an angle veering toward his left eyebrow. He had pudgy, thick hands, which he used to grasp his client’s wrist in what I guess he considered a reassuring gesture. However, the impression I got was that he was hanging on to David Cohen for dear life.

They had been accosted in the lobby of our building by the hungry hordes of media-land. They had had questions screamed at them, accusations shouted at them, demands for explanations, statements and unhindered photo opportunities. In effect, our office represented a safe-house and we assured them of a secret, reporter-proof exit at the end of our conference.

Jerry Ashkenazi was not a criminal lawyer. He had been intimidated by events from the time he got up in the morning and received a phone call from David Cohen to the effect that three men with a search warrant were seeking access to his apartment.

“Is this how these things are generally done, Mrs. Jacobi?” Mr. Ashkenazi demanded to know. He missed the signal that went around the room: from me to Bobby Jones to Lucy Capella to Jim Barrow’s man, Sam Hendrikson. What we have here, friends, is a man in over his head. Let’s hope, for his sake, he realizes this fact very soon. Or that he doesn’t and lets his client talk and talk and talk.

Dr. David Cohen did not miss the signal. Dr. David Cohen did not miss very much. He sat straight in his chair, not leaning back, yet not looking tense. Just alert and slightly wary. And slightly angry-but-controlled.

“Is it customary,” Dr. Cohen asked me, “for people with a search warrant to show up unannounced at seven o’clock in the morning?”

“It’s as good a time as any. They were on the first shift. Did they also advise you about your offices and your cottage out at East Hampton?”

Dr. Cohen nodded. “Yes. If there was any specific item you wanted, it might have been easier to just ask me. They were going through my things like marauders.”

His attorney leaned forward, pressing Dr. Cohen’s wrist in what looked like a death-grip. “Easy, David, easy. Let me talk, let me make the complaint.”

He proceeded to tell me that Barrow’s men were going through David’s apartment like marauders and that if they’d only said what it was they wanted, it would have made matters easier. He asked about ten questions relative to search-and-seizure procedure: what were they allowed to take? who had the receipts for items taken? why were they taking these things? where were they being taken off to? why? when would they be returned? if some tests were to be run, by whom and toward what end?

This guy was asking us to educate him.

“My advice to you, Mr. Ashkenazi, and no offense intended, is that you should confer with someone on your staff who is familiar with criminal procedure.”

“Criminal procedure? Criminal procedure?” He stood up and looked around, shook his head and then sat down again. “What criminal procedure? Do you know the kind of man we are talking about here? Do you know the reputation of this man? Do you know the things that David Cohen has accomplished? My specialty is defending against malpractice suits. This is what my firm does, that is what my partners and I do. If I thought for one minute that Dr. David Cohen—that this eminent microsurgeon, world-famous, a pioneer in this technique—if I thought for one split second that he should be represented by a—God-forbid—criminal lawyer, then a criminal lawyer would be sitting here next to him and not me. But just tell me, please, since I am not familiar with the procedure, under the search warrant, what are you people entitled to anyway?”

A really ludicrous thought flashed through my brain: what if, by some unexpected and terrible miracle, Dr. David Cohen felt called upon, right now in the presence of all here assembled, to confess to the crime that was alleged against him. Would it be thrown out because he did not have proper legal representation to advise him of his rights?

We led Dr. David Cohen carefully according to a prearranged plan we had discussed before he and his attorney arrived.

Lucy was good at the possibly incriminating areas. Her questions sounded more like sincere requests for information that might one day be helpful to her:
e.g.,
Dr. Cohen, you’re a runner. From your apartment, where do you generally run? Goodness, do you risk the 72nd Street transverse? Ah, that would make a good run: from your apartment on 69th and Fifth, up to 72nd, across the park, down Central Park West to Central Park South to Fifth Avenue and 59th and up to 69th Street. At night, Dr. Cohen? Goodness, have you ever encountered any muggers? Well, you must be one of the very few New Yorkers who can make that claim.

“I’ve come to the conclusion that how you present yourself makes a difference,” Dr. Cohen explained to Lucy, who nodded, taking advice and instruction very nicely.

“You know, Dr. Cohen, I think you’re right about how you present yourself, the kind of aura of self-confidence one gives off.”