The Doctor and Mr. Dylan (30 page)

It was a controversial move, calling Johnny to the stand. He wore a lot of different hats in this trial: he was the son of the accused, the son of the deceased, and a Hibbing General Hospital operating room employee who was working on the day of his mother’s surgery. All three of these roles made Johnny integral to the defense case.

As soon as Johnny was sworn in, he snapped his head erect and stuck out his jaw in defiance. He still hadn’t ventured a look in my direction. Martinovich began with a series of questions that established Johnny’s identity as the son of both the victim and the defendant. Then the footing grew stickier. “Can you describe your mother’s mood when she arrived in Hibbing, one day before her surgery?”

“She was angry,” Johnny said.

“Angry at whom?”

“Mom was angry at everybody. Angry at Echo because Echo wouldn’t have an abortion. Angry at me because I got my girlfriend pregnant. Angry at Dad because he brought me to this town.”

“Were you angry at her?”

“Not really. I mean, I didn’t like the way she was screaming at everyone, but I’d heard her yelling a million times in my life. I’d gotten numb to it.”

A million times indeed
, I thought.

“Why did you move from California to Hibbing?”

“To switch high schools. Hibbing has an outstanding high school. My Dad graduated from Hibbing High.”

“Don’t they have outstanding high schools in California?”

“Yes, they do.”

“Isn’t it true that you and your father moved here so that your college application would come from Hibbing, Minnesota, instead of from Palo Alto, California?”

“Yes. We thought there would be less competition for me to get accepted into a top college if I graduated from a small town in Minnesota.”

“Why didn’t your mother move to California with you?”

“Mom couldn’t move. Her job was selling real estate there.”

“But your father relocated. And he had a job at Stanford Medical Center that he left behind, correct?”

“Correct.”

“Can you describe your relationship with your father?”

Johnny looked over at me for the first time. I forged the smallest of smiles.
Come on, Johnny. Tell them how close we were.
“Dad and I were good before Mom’s death,” he said. “Dad would do anything for me.”

“Have you ever seen your father act with violence toward your mother?”

“No way.”

“Have you ever seen your father act with violence toward to anyone?”

“No.”

“Have you ever seen your father threaten to harm your mother?”

“No.”

Martinovich moved to a different topic. “Do you have any family or friends who are diabetic?”

“Yes. My girlfriend, Echo Johnson, is diabetic.”

“Does Echo use insulin?”

“Yes. She wears an insulin pump every day.”

“Who does Echo live with?”

“Echo’s parents are separated, and she lives half of the time with her mom and half the time with her dad.”

“Can you tell the court who Echo’s dad is?”

“His name is Bobby Dylan.”

“The same Bobby Dylan who was briefly your mother’s nurse anesthetist?”

“Yes.”

“Echo must have a supply of insulin somewhere. Did you ever see her vials of insulin at the home of either of her parents?”

“No.”

“Did you ever look inside the refrigerator at either of Echo’s houses?”

“Yes.”

“Did you see vials of insulin there, inside the refrigerators?”

“I don’t recall.”

“OK, let’s shift gears. Did you see your mother at the hospital on the morning of her surgery?”

“Yes. I went into the operating room to greet her, right before she went to sleep.”

“She was awake?”

“Mom was sleepy, but awake. She knew who I was.”

“Who else was in the room with you?”

“Dad, the operating room nurse, the surgical tech. And Echo.”

“Why was Echo there?”

“She’s an orderly at the hospital, just like me. I wanted to see Mom, and Echo joined me.”

“Did you get close to your mother’s body in the operating room that morning?”

“I gave her a hug.”

“Did you inject any drug into your mother prior to her surgery?”

Johnny expanded his chest and snorted, “No. I did not.”

“Did you see Echo inject anything into your mother prior to the surgery?”

“No way. That’s ridiculous. She’s an orderly. She never gets close enough to a patient’s IV to do that. And besides, Echo would never do anything like that.” Johnny’s face turned crimson. He was flustered and there was nowhere to hide.

“Did you see Bobby Dylan at your mother’s bedside at any time?”

“No. By the time I arrived in the operating room suite, my dad had taken Mr. Dylan’s place at my mother’s bedside.”

“Can you describe your mother’s emotional state in the minutes before she went to sleep?”

“She was doped up. High. She wasn’t mad anymore.”

“And your father’s emotional state?”

“Dad was very professional. He gave me time to connect with my mom. He didn’t rush me out of the room.”

“Did he seem unusual in any way?”

“He was calm. Dad was all business, and he showed no emotion at all.”

“Was he at all nervous?”

“No.”

“Was he angry?”

“Not at all. He was as unflappable as ever. Cool, calm, and on task.”

“Very well. Thank you, Johnny. I have no further questions, Your Honor.”

It was Mr. Hamilton’s turn at the podium. He focused his stare on a spot on the ceiling above Judge Satrum’s bench while my son waited in silence on the witness stand. Hamilton began the cross-examination by asking, “Johnny, did your father love your mother?”

Johnny said, “I don’t know. Ask him. They were separated, so they didn’t get along that great.”

“Did your father’s feelings toward your mother influence his decision to move to Hibbing?”

“I think so. They fought a lot. One night back in California he told her, ‘I’m sick of you, and I’m sick of our bogus marriage.’ The next day he and I agreed to move to Hibbing.”

“Johnny, were you aware your father was having an affair with Lena Johnson?”

“Yes.”

“Did your father ever talk about divorcing your mother?”

“Not to me.”

“Did he talk about marrying Lena Johnson some day?”

“No.”

“You said that when your mother arrived in Hibbing, she was angry at Echo, angry at you, and angry at your father. Was your father angry at your mother in return?”

“Dad wasn’t very happy to see her show up in Hibbing. Mom was spitting venom when she arrived. She started drinking at 6 a.m., five minutes after she walked through our front door.”

“Did they argue that morning?”

“They always argued. Mom blamed Dad for everything. She hollered so loud the walls shook. She said it was all his fault, my getting Echo pregnant and all. I was upstairs, and I heard Mom say something like, ‘You’re the one who let Johnny hang out with some trailer-trash Iron Range girl who isn’t smart enough to swallow a birth control pill once a day.’ Dad screamed back, ‘You were in bed with some bearded stooge the last time I saw you.’”

“Let me ask you again,” Hamilton said. “Was your father angry at your mother, the day before the surgery?”

Johnny looked over at me again. Had he betrayed me by sharing all this? I nodded to him. All he was doing was telling the truth under oath. Johnny sighed and said, “Yes, my dad was angry. He was pretty mad at Mom the day before her surgery.”

“Very well,” Hamilton said. “I have no further questions.”

Johnny’s eyes looked glazed and opaque as he left from the witness stand. There were no further looks in my direction. He wasn’t seeking my approval or my validation. Johnny’s journey through the gallery was a militaristic march that ended as he blew past the rear door and out of the courtroom.

I emptied my lungs. It had sucked, seeing my son on the stand, and he’d done nothing to establish my innocence. Johnny shared that I was a competent father. He described me as calm and professional prior to the anesthetic, but he’d also confirmed that I was an angry husband. Johnny had not seen Bobby Dylan at his mother’s bedside. He had done nothing to establish Dylan’s guilt.

Johnny’s testimony hadn’t helped me one bit. Johnny’s testimony was a bust.

It was time for Bobby Dylan to answer some tough questions. I’d waited four months to watch Ed Martinovich joust with my enemy. At last we’d have Dylan where we needed him: under oath, exposed, and with nowhere to hide. Our defense strategy was built on Dylan’s proximity to Alexandra’s death. Our defense strategy was built on the possibility of Bobby Dylan’s guilt. For me to look good, Dylan had to look bad, and he was going to look bad today.

Martinovich stood and said, “The defense calls Mr. Bobby Dylan.”

Dylan appeared at the rear of the courtroom. He wore a blank sneer as he ambled past us. He was a caricature of superiority and self-righteousness. Dylan wore a pendulous knee-length black coat, an open-collared white shirt, and no tie. When he sat down in the witness box he erupted into a fountain of nervous mannerisms. Dylan ran his fingers through the orb of his fuzzy gray mane, rubbed his nose, and pulled on the wisps of his thin moustache. He closed his eyes and kept them shut, as if to dismiss himself from the reality of the courtroom in front of him.

“Mr. Dylan, you’re a nurse anesthetist, correct?”

“Yes.”

“And you were at work at Hibbing General Hospital the morning of Alexandra Antone’s surgery, correct?”

“Yes.”

“How much time did you spend attending to Mrs. Antone on the morning of her surgery?” Martinovich said.

“I never attended to Mrs. Antone,” Dylan said. His eyes remained closed. I could see his eyeballs circling behind the lids; the thin layer of skin cells a flimsy barrier protecting him from Martinovich.

“We’ve heard testimony that you were alone with her in the operating room.”

Dylan’s eyes sprang open, black beads floating in bloodshot whiteness. He said, “I told you, I never took care of her. I was scheduled to be Mrs. Antone’s anesthetist, but when I met her in the preoperative room, she refused to consent to me as her anesthetist.”

“What did you do at that point?”

“Nothing much. I brought her to the operating room as a favor to Dr. Perpich. Dr. Perpich had a bug up his ass to keep things moving along so he could get to his son’s hockey game in Duluth that afternoon. I didn’t do a damn thing to Alexandra Antone. I left her there in the operating room when her husband arrived. The woman was awake and neurologically intact when I left her.”

“Did you start her intravenous line?”

“I did not. She already had an IV in place when I met her. It was started in the Emergency Room before she arrived at the O.R.”

“Did you inject anything into Alexandra Antone’s IV?”

“No. I injected nothing into Mrs. Antone.”

Martinovich was calm, his icy stoicism a marked contrast to Dylan’s twitchy behavior. Martinovich had anticipated this denial. His work today was to entice Bobby Dylan into a blunder, a gaffe, or a misstep that would expose his guilt. “Were you upset at Alexandra Antone before you met her?” he said.

“Hell, no. I’d never seen the woman before the day of her surgery. Her husband Nico used to tell me that she was a pain in the ass. My daughter Echo told me Mrs. Antone was nasty and threatening the night before her surgery. Both Nico and Echo were right. Mrs. Antone was bitchy and condescending when I met her. I can’t say that I liked her much, but I didn’t care enough about her to be angry.”

“Were you angry at Nico Antone on the day of his wife’s surgery?”

Dylan shrugged, and didn’t answer right away. “No,” he said. His countenance suggested the truth was less monosyllabic.

“Mr. Dylan, how would you characterize your relationship with Dr. Antone?”

“We used to be friends.”

“You used to be friends?”

“That’s right.”

“What ended your friendship?”

“He was boffing my wife. I didn’t like it and I told him so. It wasn’t cool, what he did to me.”

“Were you jealous about that fact?”

“I didn’t like it. This here’s a small town. Lena and I are separated but not divorced. Nico knew I still cared about my wife. Did it bother me that my so-called-friend was sleeping with my wife, and that he concealed that fact from me? Yes, it did.”

“Dr. Antone’s son impregnated your 17-year-old daughter. Were you angry about that fact?”

“Yes, I was upset about the pregnancy.”

“When Dr. Antone’s wife Alexandra showed up in Hibbing, she requested that your daughter get an abortion. Is that true?”