A Reasonable Doubt by Susan Sloan (free novels .txt) 📕

shook his head.  “No one said anything about streetlights.”

“Where you told if there was a moon shining at the time of the murder?  Were there stars in the sky?  Was there anything that could have provided enough light for someone to actually see by?”

“As far as I know, it was clear around midnight,” the analyst replied.  “There were stars, but the moon was a crescent, with only three percent illumination.”

“So then, would it be fair to say that the alley would have been pretty dark that night?”

“Yes, I think it would be fair to say that.”

“Dark enough, so that if you were walking back there, and you saw someone perhaps fifteen or twenty feet away -- even if you knew that person, you might not be able to recognize him?”

“Objection, Your Honor,” John Henry cried.  “Calls for speculation.  The witness has already testified he wasn’t there.”

“I’m perfectly willing to recreate the scene in the alley and have the jurors decide for themselves, Your Honor,” Lily responded innocently.  “I just thought the expert witness put up by the prosecution could save us the time and expense.”

Grace Pelletier hid a smile.  “Objection overruled, but rephrase the question, Miss Burns.”

“All right, based on your expertise in crime scene analysis, Mr. Thurman,” Lily rephrased, “what would you say the probability would be that you could recognize someone in an unlit alley, under a crescent moon, from, say, fifteen feet away?”

“Under the conditions I understand were present at the time, probably not very good,” the analyst replied.

“One last point on this, then,” Lily pursued.  “To your knowledge, was Dale Scott wearing a uniform that night, or a badge, or anything at all that would have identified him in the dark as a police officer?”

“No, I don’t believe so,” Fletcher Thurman replied.  “As shown in the photographs, Detective Scott was wearing street clothes -- brown slacks, tan sport shirt, brown leather jacket.”

“Street clothes,” Lily echoed.  “No uniform, no badge, nothing that would readily identify him in an alley in the middle of the night?”

“No.  But I don’t think that’s unusual.  It’s my understanding that detectives don’t wear uniforms.”

“If that’s the case, is it conceivable then that the defendant might not have realized that the man he encountered in the alley that night -- the man that he would ultimately be held responsible for killing -- was a police officer, and not just some sinister stranger wielding a gun?”

“Yes, I guess it’s conceivable,” the witness allowed.

“In the middle of the night, without any light, Dale Scott could have been anybody, couldn’t he?” Lily pressed the analyst.  “He could have been an innocent person stepping outside for a smoke, or a homeless person looking to find shelter, or even someone who had chosen that location specifically because it was dark and it was usually deserted, and he was up to no good -- isn’t that possible?”

The witness nodded.  “Yes, it’s possible.”

“Thank you,” Lily said.  “All right, now, I’m particularly interested in your theory of the shooting.  You said that, based on your reconstruction of the crime scene, Dale Scott was down on his knees at the time he was shot.”

“That’s correct.”

“How did you reach that conclusion?”

“I reached that conclusion based on the position that the body was in,” the analyst said.  “It fell sideways as a result of the force of the shot, and it was bent in a manner that indicated that the victim had been kneeling at the time the shot was fired.”

“And you were able to discern this from looking at the crime scene photographs?”

“Yes,” Thurman confirmed.

“Were you able to tell if the body had been moved?”

“Based on the information I was given by the investigators, and on my analysis of the photographs taken, I concluded that the body had not been moved.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“The blood pool was consistent with the body having been in the position where it was found and photographed.”

“You concurred with the prosecutor’s opinion that this could have been an execution-style shooting, did you not?”

“I did.”

“Would you be good enough to describe such a scenario for the jury?”

Thurman turned to the jury.  “When we say an execution-style shooting, what we usually mean is a head shot where the victim is on his knees or has his back to his assailant, and the shooter is standing either behind him or beside him.  In this case, it was beside him.”

“Beside him?” Lily repeated.  “The shooter was standing beside him, not kneeling beside him?”

“No, from the angle of the shot,” the analyst said.  “I would say he was standing beside him.”

“How tall was Dale Scott?”

Thurman checked his notes.  “He was five-feet-ten inches tall.”

“And what did he weigh?”

“My notes say that Detective Scott weighed two hundred and sixteen pounds.”

“And will you tell the jury how tall the defendant is, and how much he weighs?”

The analyst looked blank.  “I have no idea,” he replied.  “I was never asked to measure him or weigh him.”

“You weren’t asked to measure or weigh him?” Lily echoed.  “Well, when you analyzed the trajectory of the bullet, what did the angle of the shot tell you about the height of the shooter?”

Thurman glanced over at John Henry and then back at Lily.  “I was never asked to perform a trajectory analysis,” he said.

“A capital crime, involving the murder of a police detective, and you were never asked to do a trajectory analysis?”

“No.”

“Why do you suppose that was?”

Thurman shrugged.  “This is a county that doesn’t waste taxpayer money on unnecessary tests,” he replied.  “I was told it was an open and shut case, and all I was required to do was confirm who had fired the gun.”

“I see.”  Lily shot a withering glance in the direction of John Henry, who shifted uncomfortably in his seat.  “Well then, I guess we’ll just have to do a little analyzing right here, won’t we?”  She turned to the defendant.  “Jason, will you stand up for the jury, please?”

Jason Lightfoot did as he was told, pushing back from the table and uncoiling his