The Verdict (51 page)

‘No. He used to change it every time we met. It was a joke we had – at least at the beginning.’

‘How did you find out who he was?’

‘I knew he worked in finance.’

‘How?’

‘Escorting’s a very small world. I knew other women who’d been with him, who he’d done the same things to,’ she said. ‘And once, while he was asleep, I went through his wallet. Not to steal, you understand, but to find out who he was.’

Carnavale took a pitstop there, had a quick consultation with his junior.

‘Mr James was never arrested in connection with the assault,’ Carnavale said. ‘Why was that?’

‘I withdrew the charges.’

‘Why?’

‘I hadn’t told the police I was an escort.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because I didn’t think they’d take me seriously,’ she said. ‘I also weighed up what might happen on the off-chance there was a trial. I’d be in the public eye and my reputation would be ruined. Everyone would know what I did for a living. And it would follow me around. That’s when I thought of pursuing the matter out of court.’

‘In other words, you decided to get a pay-off from Mr James?’

‘An escort’s career is short. You don’t find too many over thirty. I’m now thirty-three,’ she said.

‘Is that a “yes”, Ms Hudson?’

‘Yes.’

‘How did you contact Mr James?’

‘By email. I sent him the pictures I’d taken of myself after his assault.’

Carnavale asked the court clerk for Exhibit 26 – Rachel Hudson’s photos.

‘Let the record show that these photographs came not from the witness, but were recovered from the accused’s laptop.’

She confirmed that they were of her, and that she’d taken them.

The photos were passed to the jury.

They saw Rachel Hudson’s heavily bruised face, one eye swollen and closed to a slit; the bruises all over her arms and legs and back, the black rectangular patches and bloody scratches on her neck, no doubt made by the belt.

The jurors were all horrified. One young man went pale. The Asian woman gasped. The writer couldn’t look.

‘Did he reply to your email?’

‘No. But I got a phone call from someone a few hours later – a man with a London accent. He said he was calling on behalf of the person I’d emailed. He offered me £10,000 in cash. I negotiated. We settled on £100,000. It was going to be paid in staggered amounts over a two-year period. If I agreed, I’d get half upfront, the rest over the next two years.’

Carnavale paused there, let the jurors write that one down. And they
all
did. We no longer had three decision-makers to worry about, but twelve.

‘How did you receive the money?’

‘In cash, always. And in person. I arranged to meet the man who’d called me at a Burger King on Oxford Street. I took a friend of mine along – mostly for protection, and to have a witness, just in case. She sat in a corner and got a photo of the man on her mobile. He gave me two copies of a non-disclosure agreement to sign. I read it through and signed. He took one copy and left the first instalment of £50,000 in an envelope on the table. He said he’d be in touch next year.’

Carnavale looked at the court clerk.

‘Can the witness be shown Exhibit 27, please?’

The clerk handed her a single photograph of David Stratten, dressed in a beige raincoat. He was sat at a small table in front of Rachel, with his hand on a padded envelope.

‘Is that the man?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can the record show that the man with the witness has been identified as David Stratten, a freelance private investigator. Mr Stratten died in April.’

The jury was passed the photo.

‘Did Mr James ever contact you again?’

‘No.’

‘Are you still an escort?’

‘No, I left the business after that.’

‘Thank you.’

Carnavale sat down without another word.

I helped Christine to her feet.

‘Ms Hudson, you stated that Mr James choked you with his belt?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did he ever use his hands to choke you?’

‘No.’

‘Never?’

‘No. He only used his hands to slap me.’

‘You said you talked about Mr James with others in your profession. How many people did you talk to?’

‘Three or four.’

‘Which was it, three or four?’

‘Three.’

‘All escorts?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did you discuss what he did to them?’

‘Yes.’

‘Did he choke them too?’

‘Yes.’

‘With his hands or his belt?’

‘His belt.’

‘Not his hands?’

‘No.’

Christine paused, turned a page in her pad, turned it back again.

‘About these three women, how would you describe them, physically?’ she asked.

‘They’re all blonde. Long hair. And tall.’

‘Approximately your height?’

‘Yes.’

‘Would you say Mr James has a type?’

‘Obviously.’

Christine beckoned to me and whispered for me to hand her a couple of pages from my file – any old pages would do.

‘Did these three tall blondes tell you they’d also been paid off by Mr James, so they wouldn’t press charges?’

Rachel Hudson didn’t reply. She looked at Carnavale. Blinked.

‘Ms Hudson, you’re under oath,’ Christine said, very calmly.

‘Can you repeat the question?’

‘Did the three escorts you spoke to about Mr James tell you he’d paid them off so they wouldn’t go to the police.’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Did they tell you the sums of money they received?’

Rachel took a deep breath. Looked at Carnavale again. Unfortunately I couldn’t see his face.

‘Ms Hudson,’ Christine said, a little more sternly. ‘Would you like me to repeat —’

‘No,’ she said, a little louder than before.

‘“No”, what,
Mizz
Hudson? “No”, you don’t need me to repeat the question, or “No”, they didn’t tell you about the settlements, the hush money they’d received from him?’

‘Yes,’ she said. ‘They told me they’d got pay-offs.’

‘Did they tell you how much?’

‘Yes.’

Christine lifted up the sheets of paper I’d given her – a list of unused evidence. Rachel Hudson stared at the paper.

Carnavale’s hands were clenched – no, clasped – on the desk in front of him.

‘Ms Hudson, do you remember how much, roughly, each of the women got from James?’

Rachel Hudson blushed now.

‘One got £15,000, one got £20,000, and one £30,000.’

‘Did any of these women tell you they’d pressed charges?’

‘No.’

‘Do you know if they did?’

‘I don’t think they did.’

‘Why did one woman get £15,000 and another £30,000?’

Rachel looked at the floor, sighed heavily.

‘Ms Hudson, may I once again remind you —’

‘That I’m under oath? I know,’ she snapped. ‘And, yes. One escort got paid less than the other, because she didn’t look as bad.’

‘By “bad”, you mean —’

‘Beaten up. And the woman who got the least money told me if she’d known he was that rich, she’d have let him beat her up worse and threatened to press charges so she could get more.’

A couple of jurors gasped.

‘And that’s exactly what you did, wasn’t it,
Mizz
Hudson? You encouraged Mr James to go further, didn’t you? You didn’t yell out the safety words at all, did you? You didn’t signal for him to stop. You encouraged him to hit you harder and harder, so you could get more money out of him. What’s a little extra pain if you’re getting an extra £500? Then you played your ace. You let him almost kill you by choking you, so you could take your injuries to the police – not for justice, but to satisfy your own personal greed. Isn’t that the case,
Mizz
Hudson?’

The witness blinked, looked at Carnavale, then at the jury, then at the public.

‘I wanted to get out of the business,’ she said, finally.

‘So you admit to effectively setting Mr James up in a sting?’

‘He deserved it,’ she said. ‘He’s a violent man, a sadist. He gets off on hurting women. I took that bastard for everything I could.’

There was a commotion in the public gallery, and from the press, and even among the jurors.

The judge banged his gavel for silence.

Carnavale rose as I helped Christine down to her seat.

‘Miss Hudson, thank you for your candour,’ he said. ‘I have a few more questions. Are you OK to carry on?’

‘Yes,’ she said.

‘Were any of your other clients rough?’

‘Some were.’

‘Were they as rough as Vernon James?’

‘No. They respected the boundaries.’

‘Did you ever – for want of a better word – blackmail any of your other clients?’

‘No.’

‘Would you have blackmailed the accused if he hadn’t hurt you?’

‘No,’ she said.

‘Do you regret not pressing charges against Vernon James?’ he asked.

‘Yes, I do.’

‘And why is that?’

‘Because Evelyn Bates would still be alive today,’ she said.

There were sighs in the jury, more commotion in the gallery.

‘Thank you, Miss Hudson,’ Carnavale said. He turned to his junior and she smiled at him.

Ahmad Sihl came into the courtroom. He avoided looking at the dock as he took the stand.

‘Mr Sihl, how long have you known the accused?’ Carnavale asked.

‘Twenty years.’

‘In what capacity?’

‘I’ve been his business lawyer from the time he made his first deal, to the present day,’ Sihl said. Was it me or was his Scottish brogue that much more pronounced today?

‘Would you say you’re friends?’

‘Aye.’

‘Is that a yes?’

‘Aye.’

Some laughter in the gallery. A couple of smiles from the jury.

Carnavale checked his papers, made a few scribbles. I got his shtick now: break his cross-examination up into small info blocks, with a pause between each so the jury could swallow and absorb what they’d just heard.

‘Do the following businesses mean anything to you – the Camelia Group, Orchid and Essence?’

‘They’re escort agencies.’

‘All three were shut down last year for prostitution. The owners are currently serving custodial sentences. When the police went through their books, they found copies of invoices, including sent to Sihl-Bose. What is the name of your law firm, Mr Sihl?’

‘Sihl-Bose.’

Murmur from the public.

‘Would you care to tell the court why three escort agencies invoiced your firm to the tune of £80,000?’

‘We used their services.’

‘Who’s “we”?’

‘The firm.’

‘Your firm?’

‘Aye.’

Carnavale craned forward, making me think of a crow spotting distant prey.

‘You mean to tell me your whole firm of twenty-nine lawyers
used
escorts?’

That line was delivered with a hint of nasal sneer, to some laughter. This was the infamous ‘kazoo’ Christine had warned us about, the tone Carnavale adopted to mock a witness.

‘
We
didn’t
use
them in the sense you mean – as in sexually,’ Sihl said, unflappable. ‘I meant the firm – the organisation, not the people who work there. Twice a year we throw parties for clients – actual and prospective – one in the summer, one at Christmas. Because our clientele is heavily – though not exclusively – male, we hire attractive women to mingle among the guests. A lot of our clients like the sight of a pretty girl.’

‘Did your clients know they were prostitutes?’

‘They were escorts, no prostitutes.’

‘
Aaaaah,
yes. Semantics strike again,’ Carnavale kazooed.

Mild to medium laughter – but not from the jury. They were fascinated. They could sense a reveal coming.

‘Did your clients know they were escorts, then?’

‘They’re not stupid,’ Sihl said.

‘Wouldn’t you say that’s at best a chauvinistic way of doing business – and at worst a kind of pimping?’

‘It’s called getting a client laid.’

More mild laughter. Sihl was holding his own.

‘So you agree the women were there to have sex with your clients?’

‘If they wanted to.’

‘Did your clients pay these women for sex?’

‘I don’t know. I never asked.’

‘Or did your firm pay the escorts extra – a retainer, if you will – to have sex on demand?’

‘We did no such thing. We employed the women for the night, for the duration of the parties.’

‘Who chose them?’

‘We all did, at the firm.’

‘Do you employ women at your firm?’

‘I do.’

‘Were they involved in choosing the escorts?’

‘They were.’

‘And they didn’t think there was anything backward or even misogynistic about using women as ornaments?’

‘No one complained,’ Sihl said.

‘Would you have taken those complaints seriously?’

‘Of course.’

‘So you wouldn’t have hired the escorts if one of your employees had complained?’

‘I would have excused them from attending the party.’

That earned Sihl a grumble from the public gallery. He didn’t react. Carnavale was making him look like a sleazy sexist pig.

‘Did you know the accused cheated on his wife?’

‘We never discussed his marriage.’

‘You’ve known the accused twenty years, and you’ve
never
discussed his private life?’

‘It’s none of my business.’

‘Did it come as a surprise to you when he was arrested for murder?’

‘No…’ Sihl said. ‘It came as a complete shock.’

Eh?
 

I thought that was the moment Sihl was going to turn on VJ.

Carnavale made another pitstop; ticked things off in his pad, turned a page, took his time looking it over.

‘Do you know someone called David Stratten?’

‘I knew him, yes. He died recently.’

‘What was your relationship with him?’

‘David was a private investigator my firm used from time to time.’

‘So he worked for you?’

‘He did, but not exclusively. He was freelance.’

‘What kind of work did he do for you?’

‘Background checks into potential clients, business partners, that sort of thing.’

‘Did he do any work for you between 2008 and 2010?’

‘Aye.’

‘What kind of work?’

‘Background checks.’

‘After Mr Stratten’s death, the police were handed his appointments diaries going back to 2007. In the 2008 and 2009 diaries they found four names – women’s names – as well as their mobile numbers, and alongside those, in brackets, sums of money – £15,000, £20,000, £30,000, £50,000. There was also a tick near each. These women were all escorts who’d been employed by the three agencies your firm did business with – including Rachel Hudson, who gave evidence today.’

Sihl looked at Carnavale nonplussed.

‘You were the first person the accused called after his arrest, weren’t you?’ Carnavale asked.

‘Yes. I’m his lawyer.’

‘You’re his
business
lawyer.’

‘At the time he didn’t have a criminal lawyer, because he didn’t need one,’ Sihl said. ‘He contacted me to get him appropriate representation, which I did.’

Pitstop time.

I checked the jury. Inscrutable. They were waiting for someone to crack or fold. No sign of that from either of them. I wondered if Christine would even need to get Ugly on Sihl, drop the A-bomb of filth VJ had handed her on him in a sweary three-minute monologue down in the cells this morning. Sihl had been staunch so far.

‘After the police arrested the accused for Evelyn Bates’s murder, they searched his offices and his home. Among the items removed were several laptops. One of these laptops was used by the accused exclusively for his dealings with escorts. Computer forensics examined the machine and found the accused had had numerous encounters with escorts, including all four listed in Mr Stratten’s diaries. Don’t you think that’s more than just a coincidence, Mr Sihl?’

‘I don’t understand the question,’ Sihl said.

‘I suggest that you employed David Stratten as more than just an investigator. He was your bag man. He paid off escorts like Rachel Hudson so they wouldn’t report your biggest client to the police.’

Sihl was as cool as frost on an iceberg.

‘I may be a business lawyer, Mr Carnavale, but I took the same oath you did. And I would never break, let alone demean that oath. You can suggest, insinuate, even
intimate
all you want, but you have absolutely no proof whatsoever to back it up. What you’re suggesting is little more than a sordid conspiracy theory at best,’ Sihl said.

That stung Carnavale. But Sihl hadn’t finished.

‘You’re fond of that little word, aren’t you? “Suggest”. It’s the fig leaf you’re hiding your totally inadequate case behind, isn’t it? You can’t flat out accuse me of perverting the course of justice in a court of law, because you have absolutely no proof or evidence I did. That wouldn’t just be inadmissible and get struck from the record, it would also be slander.’

Carnavale sighed impatiently.

‘One final question, Mr Sihl. Did you ever share escorts with Mr James?’

‘
Share
them? As in what? Go Dutch?’

Loud laughter.

‘I meant use the services of the same one, based on Mr James’s recommendations.’

‘No.’

‘Have you ever used an escort service?’

‘Personally or professionally?’

‘Personally.’

‘No.’

‘Have you ever met a woman called Rachel Hudson?’

‘No.’

‘Her working name was Tina Hart.’

‘I’ve never met her.’

Carnavale sat down.

Christine was up next.

‘What are you doing here, Mr Sihl?’

‘I was legally compelled to come,’ he said.

‘By the prosecution?’

‘That’s correct.’

‘But you wouldn’t be here otherwise, giving evidence against Mr James?’

‘No, of course not. Besides, as you’ve heard, there’s no evidence to give against him on my part.’

A few moments later Sihl stepped down.

Carnavale only had one more witness to call – Nikki Frater, VJ’s PA.

But he told the judge he’d decided not to call her after all, as her evidence was merely to confirm that the police had followed correct procedure when searching VJ’s office.

‘Rubbish,’ Christine whispered to me. ‘He doesn’t think she’ll make any difference.’

Carnavale rested his case.

The judge dismissed us for the weekend.