The Code of the Hills (33 page)

Chapter Forty-­Four

A
FTER SHE RESTED
the state's case, Elsie felt blissfully confident. The handwriting expert from the police department had corroborated Donita's testimony regarding the defendant's handwriting on the valentine, but the expert testimony proved anticlimactic; Donita's unexpected revelation about the axe handle, and Taney's reaction to her, carried the day.

Sorry, Madeleine, but I won't be looking for a new job, after all, she exulted.

During the recess that followed, Josh Nixon announced to the judge that he needed to make a record. Elsie perked up; she had a pretty good guess as to what that request signified.

Kris Taney was not going to testify in his own defense.

Sure enough, while the jury was outside of the courtroom, Nixon put Taney on the stand and ran him through a short examination, to make a record about his decision. The big man dwarfed the wooden witness chair. He was mulish as he acknowledged that, yes, he understood that he had the right to testify; his attorney had advised him that it was in his own best interest to testify; and that it was his own decision, freely made, to stay off the stand in his case.

Elsie watched the exchange, baffled, though it was a common enough occurrence. Defendants often opted to stay off the witness stand and rely on their right to silence. The witness stand was an intimidating place to be.

But in the Taney case, she thought the decision to stand silent was foolhardy. She pushed her chair away from the table and crossed her legs, tapping the pen on the counsel table as she assessed the impact of that decision. How could a defendant in a case like this consider staying off the stand? This was a “he said–she said” type trial, and Taney's refusal to testify meant that he wouldn't have a chance to deny the charge, explain away the accusations, point the finger another direction.

She flipped a file open to double-­check Taney's rap sheet. His criminal record showed a number of priors: a misdemeanor marijuana, a ­couple of DWIs, and two third-­degree assault convictions, along with numerous domestic dispute arrests that hadn't resulted in convictions. If he didn't testify, his criminal history would not be revealed to the jury; it could only be raised in cross-­examination. Still, she was surprised that a misdemeanor record would keep him off the stand in a felony case. Maybe Taney was too stupid to realize he needed to testify. Or maybe his attorney thought the combination of his offenses would offend the jury. Or maybe Nixon was disgusted by his client. Maybe he was ready to let Taney hang himself.

Nixon concluded his record, and the men returned to the defense table.
Why is Nixon making my life so easy, all of a
sudden?
she asked herself, then shrugged inwardly. Whatever the reason, it was fine with her, and she smiled at the defense attorney.

A thought nagged at her, however: if Taney didn't testify, she couldn't bring out the nude shots. When Rountree granted Nixon's motion to block the Polaroids from the prosecution's case in chief, the judge hinted that Elsie might use them to cross-­examine Taney when he took the stand. Now she wouldn't have the opportunity. She brushed the thought away. We're looking good, she thought. What could go wrong? The jury didn't even need to see the photos.

The judge signaled the bailiff bring the jury back. Merle knocked on the door to jury room and told the twelve men and women inside that court was reconvening. They filed back into their seats in the jury box.

“Call your first witness, Mr. Nixon,” the judge ordered.

Nixon stood, casting a sidelong glance at Elsie, as if anticipating a reaction.

“The defense calls Kristy Taney, your honor.”

Elsie gasped audibly. She jumped to her feet, and for one terrible moment she couldn't articulate a response. “Objection,” she choked.

Without looking in Elsie's direction, Nixon said smoothly, “We ask leave to treat her as a hostile witness.”

“May we approach the bench?” Elsie asked. The judge nodded, and she stormed to meet Nixon at the bench, her face turning scarlet.

“What is going on?” she demanded.

“You're about to find out.”

The judge interrupted. “Do you have a legal argument to make, Ms. Arnold?”

In fact, she did not. “I'm working on it.”

Nixon, the cat who swallowed the canary, cut his eyes at her. “Well?”

“Unfair surprise,” said Elsie, speaking very rapidly. “The defense didn't disclose this witness to me, Mr. Nixon never said he'd be calling her.”

Nixon snorted and shook his head. “Since when do we have to disclose a witness list to you? And why on earth would we have to apprise you of your own witness? Judge—­”

“Objection overruled. Defendant will proceed.”

The bailiff called for Kristy in the courthouse hallway, and she walked into the courtroom hesitantly, looking confused and reluctant to return. Nixon grinned broadly at her and indicated the witness chair with his right hand.

“Please come and take a seat, Kristy.”

She looked at the judge, who smiled and nodded, adding, “You're still under oath, Miss Taney.”

Kristy shot a look at Elsie, who she responded with a weak smile.

As Kristy settled into the chair, Nixon approached her in a manner that seemed positively chummy to Elsie.

“Kristy,” he said, “I want to show you something. I warn you that it's shocking to see, but you need to look and tell me what it is.”

Nixon had the court reporter mark one of the copies of the photo of Charlene, and handed it to the girl.

“What is that?” he asked her.

“It's a picture of Charlene. A naked picture.”

“By Charlene, you are referring to your sister, isn't that right?”

Kristy said yes.

With a herculean effort, Elsie kept her face impassive, waiting for the next move. The jurors shifted in their seats, intent on the witness.

“Did your father take that picture?”

“Nope,” she answered, matter-­of-­fact.

“How do you know?”

“Daddy don't never let us be in a dirty picture.”

Kris Taney beamed and nodded, the proud father.

“Who do you suppose took that picture, then?” Nixon asked.

“Objection,” Elsie said, her voice like a rifleshot. “Calls for speculation.”

“Sustained.”

“If she knows, Judge,” Nixon argued. “I'm not asking her to guess. I just want her to say it if she knows.”

“All right, then. Watch how you frame the question, sir.”

Smiling sadly, Nixon leaned against the jury box, close to Kristy, and asked in a confiding tone, “Kristy, look at Defendant's Exhibit Number One—­who took the picture?”

Kristy looked at it, made a face. Wrinkling her nose, she said, “Uncle Al, I expect.”

Elsie's heart sank to her stomach. With her mouth suddenly dry, she said, “Objection. Witness is speculating.”

“Because it's with a instant camera, see?” Kristy said, holding the exhibit up toward Elsie. “That's how Al takes them pictures. Roy takes our pictures with his phone.”

As the courtroom erupted, the jurors turned to one another and to Elsie, looking at her with confusion and disbelief. Her mind formed a single thought:
Reasonable doubt
.

Chapter Forty-­Five

T
HE COURTROOM WAS
bedlam after Kristy's revelation. Recovering, Elsie jumped to her feet, shouting objections on every ground she could think of—­nonresponsive, irrelevant, hearsay—­while Taney slapped his knee and tipped backward in his chair, grinning to beat the band. The buzzing from the jurors in the jury box and the spectators in the gallery rose to such a level that Judge Rountree finally had to bang the gavel three times before there was silence.

“Order!” he called. Pointing the gavel at Elsie, he said, “Objection overruled. Mr. Nixon, you may continue.”

Josh Nixon shook his head with a cocky air. “No further questions.”

It was Elsie's turn. Her ears were ringing; she needed time to collect her wits, but she didn't have the luxury.

She tried, in her cross-­examination, to go over safe ground, walking the witness through her prior allegations against her father, until Josh shut it down as outside the scope of direct examination. Elsie faltered a moment, uncertain what to do next. She couldn't risk asking anything about Roy or Al, or how the pictures came to be taken, because she didn't have all the facts; every trial lawyer knew that proceeding blindly, asking questions when you didn't know the answer, was suicide.

But she couldn't give up. The jury was looking at her askance, and Elsie knew what that foretold. Nixon didn't have to prove his client innocent. The defense only had to raise a reasonable doubt to obtain a Not Guilty verdict. Nixon accomplished that with Kristy's testimony; any juror who wasn't scratching his head at this point wasn't paying attention.

Elsie made a stab at damage control. She drew close to the girl, and addressing her with gravity, said, “Kristy, you know that you have sworn to tell the truth in this trial, haven't you?”

Kristy nodded. “Yes.”

“It's a sacred oath. You understand that.”

“Yes.”

From his chair, Nixon said, “Judge, I'm going to object to this line of questioning. She's trying to bootstrap the credibility of her witness.”

“Our mutual witness,” Elsie replied without looking his way. “Defense can't logically object to that.”

“Miss Arnold's right. Overruled.”

Staring eyeball-­to-­eyeball with Kristy, she said, “Think hard, Kristy. Is everything, every single word that you've said in this courtroom true?”

“Yes.”

“I mean today, and yesterday. All true?”

“Objection. Asked and answered.”

“Sustained.”

Shut down. She couldn't reinforce Kristy's earlier testimony. Elsie stared intently at the girl, nodding, then nodded at the jury, before she told the judge, “No further questions.”

When the judge declared a recess, Elsie raced out the door. She headed for the last stall in the women's room, and bolting the door, braced herself; she thought she might vomit. Thought she'd feel better if she did.

Nothing happened. She was so dry she couldn't even spit.

She sat on the toilet and buried her face in her hands. It was over. She had blown it. How did she fail to pick up on such a terrible crime occurring right under her nose? How could she have been blind to it? Remorse sat on her chest like an elephant: she should have realized what Roy and Al were up to. Certainly, there had been signs. Looking back, she wondered fleetingly whether she'd been afraid to see the whole picture.

She looked at her watch. She had about three minutes to pull herself together.

She left the stall and scrubbed her hands at the sink, ran a comb through her hair, applied a swipe of lipstick. She shook her head to clear it, squared her shoulders and headed down the hallway. As she turned the corner, she spied Ashlock. He walked up to her, and she asked, in a near whisper, whether he'd heard about Kristy's testimony. He nodded.

“They should be picked up, Ash,” she said. “Roy Mayfield and Al. Questioned about child porn activities.”

“I sent an officer out to find them about five minutes ago.”

“Thank God. What do we do with Donita?”

“I've got her shut up in the conference room across the way. As soon as Patsy gets here with the recording equipment, me and Donita gonna have a talk.”

Elsie nodded, silent. Ashlock put an arm around her and gave her a squeeze. “But what about our case against Kris Taney? How does it look in there?”

Elsie let herself lean into him for a moment. “I've lost it, Ash.”

“What about rebuttal evidence?”

Closing her eyes in a bid to control her panic, she said, “I got nothing. Not a goddamned thing.”

“Tiffany is under subpoena.”

Her eyes popped open. “Fuck, Ash, the girl can't talk.”

“I think you're going to have to take another shot.”

Their eyes locked, she debated the possibility. After a pause she said, “Meet me by my office with her in a minute. I'll get Rountree to extend the recess.”

A few minutes later she sat in her office surveying Tiffany, dwarfed in an office chair with her favorite Barbie. The child twisted the doll's head back and forth; Elsie thought it might split in two from the punishment.

Rising from her chair, she walked over to Tiffany and stood at her side, studying the Barbie with interest. It was naked, except for a makeshift denim jacket, a blue square of fabric from which her plastic arms protruded. With a start, Elsie recognized the remnant of fabric Charlene had toyed with in the car at Sonic. “Your Barbie is so darned pretty; almost as pretty as you,” she said. Looking at Tiffany with a friendly smile, she asked, “Is she your best friend?”

Adamantly, Tiffany shook her head.

“Oh, okay,” Elsie said, nodding thoughtfully. “I should've thought: I bet I know who your best friend really is.”
Be careful
, Elsie warned herself;
don't spook her
. “Bet it's Charlene.”

Tiffany ducked her head, but Elsie saw a flash of pain cross the girl's face. “Is it Charlene?”

After a moment the child nodded, a slight movement of her head.

Elsie touched the Barbie's blue jacket with a gentle finger. “Did Charlene make that for your Barbie? Before she left?” Tiffany pressed her lips together, but she stroked the jacket on the doll's back.

Quiet, gotta be quiet.
In a whisper, Elsie said, “Charlene's my friend, too.”

Though Tiffany's head was bent, Elsie could see a skeptical expression; but she forged on. “We were helping each other before she left. Tiffany, she'd want you to help me, too.”

Elsie knelt before the child and peered into her face. “Charlene would want you to tell me about it, Tiffany.”

Tiffany pressed her lips tightly together, lifting the Barbie to block her face. In desperation, Elsie tried another tactic.

“Maybe Barbie could tell me. She's a big girl, all grown up.” Elsie scooted closer and said, “Show me on Barbie, please, Tiffany. Did your daddy touch Charlene? Just show me where, on your Barbie.”

Though it seemed that the child wasn't listening, Elsie waited for a long moment, holding her breath. Finally, Tiffany's hand moved, hesitantly grazing Barbie's groin.

Elsie's scalp prickled with excitement, but she suppressed her reaction and spoke quietly. “Where else? Where else did your dad touch Charlene?”

Tiffany put a finger on Barbie's breast.

“Did you see it, with your own eyes? Tell me, Tiffany: what did you see?”

The child sat, silent. Trying not to press her too hard, Elsie urged, “Tell Barbie what you saw.”

A whisper came out as soft as the rustling of a leaf. Focused on the doll's face, Tiffany said, “I seen it. His worm.”

Elsie's breath caught. At long last the child had spoken. Carefully, lest her excitement scare the girl, she said, “Tell me. What did he do with his worm?”

“He put it in they tootie.”

Bending close to her ear, Elsie asked, “What about you?”

Tiffany made a face and shook her head. “When I'm bigger.”

Elsie's eyes stung; she turned away, so the child couldn't see. When she composed herself, she said, “Tiffany, what would you think of coming into the courtroom with me, you and Barbie? Could you say just what you told me?”

A violent change came over the girl; she jumped from her chair and fled to a corner, huddling with her head buried. Elsie watched her in silence for a moment, before stepping over to the child and laying a firm hand on her shoulder.

Soothingly, she said, “It's all right, Tiffany; don't worry. Everything will be all right.”

Watching the child shaking in misery, she knew that there was no way she could extract testimony from her in court. The sight of Tiffany in the corner rekindled her fighting spirit; the man who had crippled his child in such fashion should pay.

The trial wasn't over yet, she thought. She still had closing argument.

Taking a deep breath, she said, “Don't you worry, Tiffany. I'll do the talking for both of us.”

T
HE PALMS OF
Elsie's hands were clammy as she held onto the wooden bar of the jury box and looked into the faces of the twelve jurors. Midway into closing argument she had summarized her evidence and explained how it applied to the jury instructions.

The valentine, she thought. Time to drive that home.

She had to be careful; she couldn't comment on the defendant's failure to testify. It could be reversible error because he had the right to remain silent.

She said, “Remember the valentine card. You heard about it—­saw it—­held it in your hands when it was passed around the jury box. What did the defendant say on that card? What were his exact words?”

She focused on a mustached juror with savvy eyes. He should get the point: the card contained the only statement that Taney had provided at the trial.

“That card, addressed to JoLee Stokes, said ‘what me and Char do don't mean nothing. You're my girl.'

“Think about the significance of those words. ‘What me and Char do.' Ladies and gentlemen, you know what he's talking about. You heard the transcript of Charlene Taney's preliminary hearing testimony—­sworn testimony—­where she described exactly what it was that Kris Taney and his daughter ‘do,' the sexual and perverse acts he made her perform. You heard that in the transcript.”

At the word “transcript,” a middle-­aged woman in a knit pantsuit cut her eyes away. A negative jolt went through Elsie; she was rejecting the point. Maybe she didn't like a transcript substituted for live testimony. Or maybe she found Charlene's descriptions off-­putting.

Without a pause, Elsie moved her focus to the young woman with the ponytail. She had been extremely attentive throughout the trial. “He says in the valentine, ‘You're my girl.' Why does he say that? What does it mean? Ladies and gentlemen, we get his point, don't we? The defendant is reassuring JoLee that she has the position of girlfriend rather than his daughter Charlene.”

The juror with the mustache nodded, just a fractional movement of his head. Elsie breathed out; she needed the mustache juror and the construction worker in her pocket in the jury room.

Nixon stood. “Objection. Calls for speculation.”

Rountree's brow wrinkled. “Overruled.”

Elsie was heating up, feeling the endorphin rush that sometimes came to her during argument.

“So—­we have the Taney family in Barton, Missouri. On High Street, the defendant lives with his battered and beaten wife, a woman he has crushed in countless ways. You remember the axe handle. And in that home, the defendant has his ‘girl' JoLee. And he has his daughters. Kristy Taney sat in this courtroom and told you under oath that her father has raped her. You heard the testimony of her sister Charlene describing the sexual abuse the defendant inflicted on her since she was nine years old.”

A juror in her fifties with salt and pepper hair looked bored or skeptical or both. Elsie zeroed in on her; the woman held one of twelve votes.

“Remember the testimony of Dr. Petrus. He examined Kris Taney's daughters. He told you that neither Kristy nor Charlene has the hymen intact. Ladies and gentlemen, we are adults, we know what a broken hymen signifies.”

“Objection. The witness did not tie the examination to my client.”

Judge Rountree said, “Sit down, Mr. Nixon; the jury recalls what the doctor said.”

Elsie continued, “What the doctor told us is a part of the picture, a picture of a household in McCown County where women and children are subjected to the abuse and the tyranny and the sexual whims of the defendant.”

Nixon jumped up again. With an ironic tone, he asked, “Is tyranny a violation of the Missouri criminal code?”

Turning on Nixon with ire, Elsie said, “You want to make jokes? Is this funny to you?”

Judge Rountree raised a restraining hand. “Overruled, Mr. Nixon; this is argument. Miss Arnold, you have one minute remaining.”

She returned her focus to the jury. “We have proved in this trial, beyond a reasonable doubt—­that this man,” and she pointed at Taney again, “this man committed the felony offense of statutory rape of his daughter Kristy on November twenty-­fifth. And we have proven that defendant committed the felony of statutory rape in the first degree on multiple occasions with his daughter Charlene.”

“Ladies and gentlemen, the defendant believes: what he and his daughters do sexually ‘
don't mean nothing.'

“It is your job to prove him wrong. To prove that what he has done to his daughters is a horrific and significant violation of the criminal law of this state. The way to prove this—­to Kris Taney and to our community—­is to find the defendant guilty of counts one through five.”

After a final look over the twelve faces, she sat down, a pulse pounding in her throat.

While Josh Nixon delivered his closing argument, Elsie sat in her seat, composed, wearing a skeptical expression on her face. She held a pen and wrote rapidly, almost illegibly, as she prepared to have the final say. She would have five minutes for rebuttal when Nixon was done.