Chapter Forty-Five
When court reconvened, Karen made a motion for judgment of acquittal, which she knew she would lose.
In order to win and have the judge throw out Vanderlasky’s case, she had to convince Judge Stark that no jury would be able to convict Jack Blackburn if the evidence was viewed in the light most favorable to the State.
Karen knew that the beer glass placed her client at the scene and possession of the Jag provided a motive for murder.
“Call your first witness, Miss Wyatt,” the judge said after denying her motion and having the jury brought in.
Karen called the district attorney who was investigating Terrance Cogen’s criminal activities and established that many of the investors in his scheme had lost money and that there had been death threats aimed at Cogen.
“Mr. Blackburn calls Morris Johnson,” Karen said.
“Mr. Johnson,” Karen asked after Johnson took the oath to tell the truth and was seated in the witness stand, “how are you employed?”
“I’m the investigator at your law firm.”
“What did you do before I hired you?”
“I was a detective in the Portland Police Bureau.”
“With regard to this case, did I ask you to drive your car to the Clinton Street Tavern?”
“Yes.”
“Why did I do that?”
“You wanted me to see how long it would take to drive from the tavern to the estate of Mr. Terrance Cogen, and from the estate to the place where Billy Kramer met Cynthia Woodruff when he drove her to Arizona on the evening that Mr. Cogen was murdered.”
“Please tell the jury how long it took to drive from the tavern to the Cogen estate and then to the point where Mr. Kramer rendezvoused with Miss Woodruff.”
“I drove at the speed limit. The trip took roughly one hour.”
“Thank you. No further questions.”
“Mr. Vanderlasky?” the judge asked.
“I have no questions for this witness, Your Honor.”
“Any more witnesses, Miss Wyatt?”
“Yes, Your Honor. Mr. Blackburn calls Lenore Watkins.”
A heavyset woman in her early thirties entered the courtroom and walked to the witness-box where she took the oath. Oscar Vanderlasky looked down at his witness list and shuffled through his notes.
“Miss Watkins, how are you employed?” Karen asked.
“I’m a waitress at the Clinton Street Tavern.”
Vanderlasky frowned. He remembered seeing the name, but he didn’t see a report that outlined what the witness was going to say.
“Have I told you the date that a man named Terrance Cogen was murdered?”
“Yes.”
“Were you working at the tavern that night?”
“I checked, and I was.”
“Did you see a woman named Cynthia Woodruff just now when she left the courtroom?”
“Yes.”
“Had you seen her before?”
“Yes, on the night that Mr. Cogen was murdered.”
“Do you see anyone else in the courtroom who was at the tavern that night?”
The witness pointed at Jack Blackburn. “That man, Woodruff, and another man were at a table I served.”
“May I approach the witness?” Karen asked the judge.
“You may.”
“I’m showing Miss Watkins a photograph of Billy Kramer. Do you recognize him?”
“He was the third person at the table.”
“Do you remember the order in which the three people left the tavern?”
“I do.”
“How did they leave?”
“Mr. Blackburn and Miss Woodruff left together. Shortly after they left, Mr. Kramer paid the tab. Then he left.”
“Why are you able to remember the order?”
“Because of what happened after Mr. Kramer left.”
“Tell the jurors what happened.”
“I was busy with another customer when Mr. Kramer left. I went to the table to clear it. Mr. Kramer didn’t leave a tip, which upset me. Then I noticed that a beer glass was missing.”
“How do you know it was missing?”
“Miss Woodruff only had a glass of wine. Mr. Kramer had ordered a pitcher of beer. Mr. Blackburn and Mr. Kramer each had a beer glass, and they were refilling their glasses from the pitcher. When it was empty, Mr. Kramer ordered a second pitcher. When I brought the bill, there was a beer glass where Mr. Kramer was sitting and another glass where Mr. Blackburn had sat. When I came back to the table to clear it, the beer glass in front of Mr. Blackburn’s seat was gone. ”
“Why do you remember this?”
“I told my boss that I thought Kramer took a glass. I didn’t want to get charged for it.”
Karen gave the witness State’s exhibit five. “Does this look familiar?”
“It looks like the beer glasses we use at the tavern.”
“Does it look like the beer glass Mr. Blackburn drank from, the one that disappeared?”
“Yes.”
“Your witness, Mr. Vanderlasky,” Karen said, her tone neutral and no trace of a smile on her face.
Vanderlasky looked flustered. He took some time pretending to look at his notes while he struggled to think up questions for the witness who had crippled his case.
“Miss Watkins, you said that State’s exhibit five resembles the glass you use in the tavern.”
“Yes.”
“Isn’t it true that many bars and taverns in Portland use this type of glass?”
“Yes.”
“And they’re sold in stores around the city?”
“I’ve seen them in some stores.”
“You can’t swear that this glass is the glass Mr. Blackburn drank from at the Clinton Street Tavern, can you?”
“No, it just looks like it.”
“No further questions.”
“Miss Wyatt?” the judge asked.
“Can we take a brief recess?”
“Will fifteen minutes do?”
“It should.”
Karen walked to a corner of the courtroom where she and Morris Johnson would not be overheard.
“Should I call Jack?” she asked.
“No. All he can do is say he didn’t kill Cogen. Vanderlasky can use his prior statements to rattle him. He’d look bad.”
“That’s what I think.”
“And I think you poked a lot of holes in Vanderlasky’s case,” Johnson said.
“Enough to raise a reasonable doubt without putting Jack on the stand?” Karen asked.
“More than enough.”
“Should we call Horan? He told the shrink that he saw a person with long, black hair in the mirror. Jack has blond hair, but Rosemarie Cogen is taller than Jack, has a motive for killing her husband, and has long, black hair.”
Johnson shook his head. “Oscar would tear the congressman to shreds.”
Karen sighed. “I agree.”
“Any more witnesses?” Judge Stark asked when court reconvened.
“No, Your Honor. The defense rests.”
“Then do you have any motions before I bring back the jury so they can hear closing arguments?”
“I do. Now that all the evidence is in, I want to renew my motion for a judgment of acquittal. It is our position that there is so much reasonable doubt about Jack Blackburn’s guilt that no reasonable jury could find him guilty, even if you took the evidence in the light most favorable to the State.
“Let’s look at the sequence of events on the evening Mr. Cogen was killed.
Miss Woodruff’s evidence proves that Billy Kramer lured my client to the Clinton Street Tavern to frame him for the murder of Mr. Cogen.
That means that Kramer knew Cogen was dead before he lured Jack Blackburn to the tavern and before Mr. Blackburn got possession of the Jaguar.
“Now, the only evidence placing Mr. Blackburn near Mr. Cogen’s body is the beer glass.
But Lenore Watkins’s testimony provides overwhelming evidence that Mr. Kramer took the glass from the tavern as part of his plan to frame Mr. Blackburn, and Miss Woodruff told you that there was time for Mr. Kramer to leave the tavern with the glass, plant it near Mr. Cogen’s body, and drive to the place where Kramer picked up Miss Woodruff so they could flee to Arizona.
“Then there are the barbiturates that were used to sedate Mr. Cogen. Mr. Kramer knew that Mr. Cogen habitually drank milkshakes. How did Mr. Blackburn know that? There is no evidence that he ran in Mr. Cogen’s social circle, and there is no evidence, except for the beer glass, that he was ever at the estate.
“The person who is most likely to have killed Mr. Cogen is Billy Kramer, the person who admitted to framing my client and who went on the run.”
Oscar Vanderlasky started to stand.
“Mr. Vanderlasky,” Judge Stark said, “before you say anything, I have something to say to you. It is very difficult to win a motion for a judgment of acquittal, but I am going to have to think long and hard about what I am going to do in this case. I can tell you that if I were on this jury, I would definitely have a reasonable doubt about Mr. Blackburn’s guilt on the murder charge.
“I am going to suggest that you talk to Miss Wyatt about a way to resolve this case before you answer her argument for this motion. So, I am going to recess court and clear the courtroom so you two can talk.”
“What’s happening?” Jack asked as the spectators left the courtroom.
Karen leaned over and spoke softly so no one could hear what she said. “The guards are going to take you upstairs while I talk to Mr. Vanderlasky and try to convince him to drop the murder charge.”
“That would be great.”
“Keep your fingers crossed.”
Karen signaled the guards, and they escorted Jack out of the court and back to the courthouse jail.
Karen had been watching Vanderlasky, and she could tell that he was upset.
She detested the prosecutor, and she would love to rub his nose in the fact that a competent prosecutor would have found out the truth about the beer glass before going to trial, just the way he would have figured out the importance of the lamp in Laurie Post’s case.
But Karen wasn’t going to do that. No case she handled was ever her case.
They were her clients’ cases, and her job was to save her clients, not exact revenge.
She opted for diplomacy. Karen pulled a chair next to the prosecutor’s table. Vanderlasky turned toward her.
“You think you’re so smart,” he spat out.
“No, Oscar. Morris just kept digging, and we got lucky. If you take a minute to think about what just happened, you’ll realize that you got lucky too. How would you feel if you convicted Jack, then you found out that he was innocent?”
Karen didn’t think that Vanderlasky would spend a nanosecond regretting the conviction of an innocent person, but she pretended that she thought he would.
“I still think your guy killed Cogen, but I’ll give Blackburn a break and let him plead to manslaughter.”
“Didn’t you listen to the judge? He’s ready to dismiss all the charges. Your only chance of convicting Jack of murder was the beer glass, and that won’t work anymore.”
“What do you want, Wyatt?” Oscar asked.
“You’re going to look good if you drop the charges in the interest of justice.”
“You want this all to just go away?”
“Jack’s gone through a lot.”
“Jack is a thief. He would have kept that car forever if he hadn’t been arrested.”
“You’re probably right, but life in prison is a pretty steep price to pay for boosting a car.”
Karen let Vanderlasky think. She knew he’d heard the judge, and she gave him time to come around.
“I’ll dismiss the murder charge. But Blackburn has to cop to the theft charge.”
“That sounds fair. Do you want to do time served on the theft and probation? You’ll sound great when I tell the reporters how you believed that this was the best way to serve justice.”
Half an hour later, Karen and Vanderlasky told Judge Stark that they had arrived at a plea agreement that Mr. Blackburn had accepted.
“What have you two decided?” the judge asked when they were on the record.
Karen let Oscar Vanderlasky save face by presenting the plea agreement as something he had proposed.
“Your Honor, in the interests of justice, I have offered to dismiss the charge of murder in exchange for a plea of guilty to the count in the indictment that charges Mr. Blackburn with the theft of the Jaguar automobile. Additionally, we have agreed that the defendant should receive a sentence of five years on the theft charge, but you should place him on probation instead of having him imprisoned and give him credit for the time he has served in jail awaiting trial.”
“Is your client willing to accept Mr. Vanderlasky’s offer, Miss Wyatt?” the judge asked.
“Mr. Blackburn will accept Mr. Vanderlasky’s offer, and I want to commend him for being open-minded and putting the interests of justice at the forefront in this prosecution.”
“Very well. Mr. Blackburn, do you understand what has just happened?”
“Yes, sir. I’m not going to be charged with murder anymore, and I admit that I knew I didn’t have any right to drive the Jaguar and should have brought it back to Mr. Cogen, who I knew owned it, because of the registration.”
“I will accept your plea, Mr. Blackburn, and the sentencing recommendation. Mr. Blackburn, you are lucky to have the assistance of an excellent lawyer and a prosecutor who wanted to see justice served.”
Vanderlasky left the courtroom. When the reporters stopped him, he put a spin on his decision to drop the murder charge that made him sound like Mother Teresa and Martin Luther King Jr. rolled into one.
When Karen spoke to the press, she heaped praise on her adversary, even though he had dug in his heels during their negotiations, only giving in when she reminded him that there was a good chance that Judge Stark would grant her motion and declare a mistrial on the auto theft case that would leave him with nothing.
“I’m glad that’s over,” Karen said as she and Morris Johnson headed back to the office.
“You did a great job.”
“No, Morris. You won this case when you found Lenore Watkins. Her testimony destroyed Oscar’s case.”
“Why don’t we agree that we’re a pretty good team?”
Karen smiled. “It’s a deal.”
“So,” Morris asked. “Who do you think killed Terrance Cogen?”
“I have no idea, and it’s not my problem anymore.”
“Aren’t you curious? I lean toward Kramer. Though I can’t figure why he’d do it.”
“There are enough possibilities. Kramer, the people Cogen scammed, Rosemarie, someone from the Disciples. You’re just going to get a headache trying to guess the killer.
Me, I’m going home, sip a glass of an excellent Oregon pinot noir to celebrate, and soak in a tub filled with steaming-hot water. See you in the morning.”