Escape (48 page)

Karp held up his hand and the psychologist stopped mid-sentence. "I didn't ask you what you may have heard from some other party. I asked if you, personally, had reason to believe that Jessica Campbell was forced to have sex against her will and therefore had no choice when deciding whether to conceive a third child?"

"No."

"So then it stands to reason that Jessica Campbell was at least partly responsible for this conception? In other words, half the DNA in little Benjamin, as well as his two sisters, was Jessica's."

"As far as I know."

"And therefore, half the responsibility for ignoring your recommendation was Jessica Campbell's."

Winkler glanced over at Lewis but got no help. "I suppose she had something to do with it."

Karp pressed on. "You testified that postpartum depression is not uncommon, is that correct?"

"It is."

"Do you have any idea what percentage of new mothers have postpartum depression?"

"No, I've never seen a figure for that."

"But quite a few?"

"Yes ... enough anyway that those of us who treat it consider it prevalent in the population."

"So if there are about 4 million births a year in the United States, would it be safe to say that thousands of those women would experience postpartum depression?"

"Yes, based on anecdotal evidence and a few studies I've seen, that's probably a low number."

"Thousands might be a low number," Karp agreed. "And of those thousands, maybe more, how many of those women hold their children under water while they scratch and fight for their lives until they're dead, or stab them in the chest until they bleed to death?"

"Objection," Lewis said. "Counsel is giving another speech. How is the witness supposed to know the answer to that?"

"Your Honor, the witness has testified that within his profession it is a known fact that postpartum depression is not uncommon," Karp said. "He has also testified that he treats quite a number of women for this affliction. I'm asking if he has personal or professional knowledge of how many women have committed these acts upon their children."

"Overruled. The witness may answer the question."

Winkler shrugged. "Not many."

"Not many? Do you know of any others in, say, the past six months since this happened, which would be about 2 million births?"

"No."

"How about the past year, two years? How far back are we going to have to go?"

"I don't know of any specifically. However, I do know there have been other cases of women suffering from postpartum depression who have harmed their children."

"But you can't name one. Let's assume such instances are rare. In how many of these rare instances would the mother NOT have realized that holding her children under water or stabbing them would injure or kill them?"

"Objection," Lewis said. "The witness has already said he doesn't know of any other cases. And besides, we're talking about one specific case here, not any others."

"Okay, I withdraw the question," Karp responded. "Instead, I'd like to ask the witness if he knows whether Jessica Campbell was aware that holding her children under water for a long period of time, or stabbing one of them in the chest six times, would injure or kill them."

Winkler waited for Lewis to object again, but when she didn't he had to answer. "I haven't examined Mrs. Campbell since this happened. I don't know what she thought or realized."

"I understand. But if I remember correctly, she did tell you she considered placing a pillow over Chelsea's head. But she knew that would harm or kill the child."

"Yes, that's what she told me."

"So even though she was suffering from severe postpartum depression like thousands of other women at that time, she knew then that smothering her child would harm or kill the child?"

"I suppose that's correct."

"Well, if she knew that smothering her child was likely to cause harm or death then, do you have reason to believe that she had no idea in March of this year that drowning her children, or stabbing one of them six times in the chest, was going to cause harm or death?"

The psychologist frowned. "I haven't spoken to Jessica about this unfortunate affair, so I don't know if something changed in her thinking."

"I see. Again, if I remember correctly, the reason Jessica did not smother her second child was because she knew that it was wrong. In fact, her suicide attempt was to prevent herself from harming her child because mothers aren't supposed to kill their children."

"I object to the overly dramatic characterization here," Lewis said. "There hasn't been any testimony about what mothers are or aren't supposed to do ... another attempt by Mr. Karp to give a little speech."

"Perhaps a bit less dramatic, Mr. Karp," Dermondy said. "Sustained. Try and sharpen the focus of your question."

"My apologies, Your Honor and counsel. So, Dr. Winkler, Jessica Campbell told you she didn't kill her second child four years ago because she knew that it was wrong. Am I correct?"

"That's what she told me."

"So even though she was suffering from postpartum depression like thousands of other women at that time, she knew it was wrong to harm her child back then?"

"Asked and answered," Lewis said.

"Sustained."

"Well, then, Dr. Winkler, do you have reason to believe that she did not know it was wrong in March of this year to kill all three children?"

"Like I said. I haven't spoken to her. I don't know what she was thinking."

"That's correct," Karp replied. "You don't know what she was thinking." Winkler didn't respond. He had the look of a man who desperately wanted to be someplace else, but Karp wasn't through with him. "Do you know of any women with postpartum depression who injured or killed their children and then took elaborate steps to hide the evidence, including removing the bodies and refusing to say what happened?"

"Objection. As the prosecution witnesses noted, Jessica Campbell did say what happened.... She sent the children to be with God."

"Let me rephrase that last part. I should have said 'refused to say what actually happened.'"

Winkler wasn't about to get into another scrap with Karp on his own. "I don't know of any."

"Would it be fair to say that as a psychologist you are a student of human behavior?"

"That's an apt description of one aspect of my profession, yes."

"As a student of human behavior, if you knew of someone who had killed someone else, then cleaned up the murder scene, including hiding the bodies, and then refused to discuss what she had done or where the bodies might be found, how would you describe that behavior?"

Winkler again looked at the defense table, but Lewis was looking down at her notes.
Well, if that's the way she's going to be.
He didn't have a dog in this fight and would get paid the same amount whatever happened. "In some cases it would be an indication of guilty behavior."

"Guilty behavior because they understood that what they had done was wrong?"

"Or would be considered wrong by others."

Karp let the answer hang in the air. "Thank you, no further questions." As Karp sat down, Kenny Katz leaned over and whispered, "Like I said, who needs a shrink?"

Tran and Jojola strolled the grounds of Al-Aqsa wearing traditional tunics and
kufie
hats to blend in. They'd been told, politely, to stay within the walls surrounding the mosque; two of the mujahideen walked behind them "for your protection."

The guards had wanted to walk with them. One, their driver from the docks, who'd introduced himself as "Suleiman Abdalla," said it would be an honor to speak with two such highly regarded jihadis. But "Azahari Mujahid" insisted on his space, so they'd backed off out of earshot.

Still, they spoke in near whispers. Jojola had picked up a smattering of Vietnamese when he was "in country" back in the late '60s—what Tran referred to as Americanamese. "Good for picking up prostitutes, ordering beer, and pushing Vietnamese peasants around," he joked. It would serve to communicate basic information, and their "hosts" wouldn't know it from Tagalog, but to carry on a conversation they had to speak in English.

"It's a good thing you didn't blow her head off," Tran said. "This is bigger than Nadya Malovo. We'd be dead and the plan would go forward."

"I knew there weren't any bullets in the gun when I held it. It was too light."

"There could have been one in the chamber. After you pulled the trigger, I could tell she was thinking about that possibility, too."

"Yeah," Jojola grinned. "She turned white as a ghost, sort of like that twerp behind us, though I sort of feel sorry for that guy. It must have been rough growing up looking like that."

"Maybe, but I kept thinking about that bulge under his sweatshirt when the cop came up behind us. I'm betting it was a bomb, and if something had gone wrong, he was supposed to incinerate himself and us."

"You're right. The sympathy train grinds to a halt though when I think of what one of his buddies did in the synagogue. It's tough to keep remembering the big picture here. There was something pleasurable about looking down the barrel at Malovo's face and pulling the trigger."

"Hopefully, you'll get another chance tomorrow," Tran said. "But not until we know what they're up to."

After their arrival Saturday morning, Malovo had started right in explaining the plan—at least their part in it. The blueprints on the table were for an unidentified building. However, it was clear that the attack was at least two-pronged—"timing and coordination are essential," Malovo said. "That is, in part, why your experience and skill were requested."

They'd been told by the real Azahari Mujahid that The Sheik had recruited him not only for his expertise with explosives, but also as a display of solidarity between Islamic extremists in the Middle East and those in Asia. He'd been told that there would be other powers at play, powers that could manipulate and confuse U.S. law-enforcement and anti-terrorism agencies.

"Your martyrdom will inspire millions of new mujahideen," Malovo told Tran during a break in the planning. "There will be a global uprising. The United States will be weakened and isolated. Its allies in Europe, without U.S. support, will be forced to submit to Muslim rule. With Allah's blessing it will be a glorious new day!"

Mujahid's experience with the Regent Hotel was particularly helpful, Malovo explained, because this would be another "inside job." The target building, she said, was nearly impossible to attack from the outside. "Our objective is a single floor that must be destroyed at the proper moment in order for the plan to work."

"How do we reach this objective?" Tran asked.

Malovo unrolled one of the blueprints of a floor plan. As impervious as the building was to attack from the outside, with reinforced steel and concrete outer walls and nearly impenetrable polycarbonate windows, the interior of the building structure was nothing out of the ordinary.

Tran had looked at the plan, grateful that as a former Viet Cong guerrilla, he had experience making bombs and had been updated by one of Jaxon's agents on board the ship in Mujahid's particular style. He did what he hoped was a passable job of indicating where he would plant the charges against the ceiling's support beams in order to destroy the floor above. What he and Jojola found interesting was that their part in the plan wasn't to cause massive casualties. Malovo had even shrugged when Tran noted that explosives alone might not bring the building down.

To accomplish his part of the mission, Tran would have Jojola and two members of the Al-Aqsa Brigade, who had been training in explosives, at his disposal. Malovo and the others assigned to this part of the mission would be responsible for securing the floor and holding off any counterattacks by law-enforcement and security forces.

After finalizing the plan that morning, Tran and Jojola helped supervise the loading of explosives and weapons into two vans. They were ready to go.

"So where is this building?" Tran asked.

Malovo gave him a funny look. "It is not necessary for you to know yet. This is not to insult you, but for the success of the mission. If any of us are captured or betrayed, no one person—except for myself and The Sheik—will know the entire plan. That is why we don't even have the name of the building on the blueprints."

"And what if you're captured or betrayed?"

Malovo smiled, but only so that she could point to one of her molars. "This is a false tooth. It takes considerable force to break it—so that there are no accidents—but it can be done, releasing a poison so powerful that I would be dead before I blinked."

"I would like to know at some point what I will be destroying," Tran said. "I can picture the New York skyline in my mind. I have imagined it ever since the great attack of September 2001. I had hoped to subtract from that skyline myself. Now, my final legacy is to be one floor of a building?"

"It would do you no good to imagine any single structure," she said. "And besides, the target is not in Manhattan, but across the river in Brooklyn. It is not the building that is important. If you need to imagine something as your final legacy, then imagine a map of the United States going up in flames."

Tran smiled and spoke to Jojola in Vietnamese. "Laugh and smile, stupid American dog," he said to his friend, who gave him a hard look but then did as he was told.

Tran bowed and said in English, "We think that is a very good image. Thank you for this opportunity, Ajmaani."

With nothing else to do but wait, Tran and Jojola went outside hoping to talk privately. As they drew close to the back security gate of the compound, they could hear a man outside the walls shouting. Looking through the bars of the gate, they saw Edward Treacher standing on his milk crate. "Who is this fool?" Tran asked, moving closer to the gate.

A guard shrugged. "Just some filthy street preacher." The guard then shouted at Treacher, saying, "Go on, this is a place for good Muslims, not infidel beggars and human garbage."

Outside the gate, Treacher glared at his detractor and pointed at him, his eyes rolling wildly around beneath his bushy brows. "WHEN HE BROKE OPEN THE FIFTH SEAL, I SAW UNDERNEATH THE ALTAR THE SOULS OF THOSE WHO HAD BEEN SLAUGHTERED BECAUSE OF THE WITNESS THEY BORE TO THE WORD OF GOD! THEY CRIED OUT IN A LOUD VOICE, 'HOW LONG WILL IT BE, HOLY AND TRUE MASTER, BEFORE YOU SIT IN JUDGMENT AND AVENGE OUR BLOOD ON THE INHABITANTS OF THE EARTH?'"

Treacher stood with his finger still raised as though he might conjure up a bolt of lightning with which to strike the guard down. Then he hopped down off the milk crate to the sidewalk. "That was Revelations 6:9-10, friends. I don't suppose you fellow travelers have any spare change with which to feed the hungry ... the hungry being yours truly?"

"Go on, get away," the guard shouted, moving his hand beneath his tunic as if to draw the gun he obviously had strapped beneath his arm. "Or I'll come out there and shoot your non-believer ass."

Treacher screwed up his face as if contemplating a biblical retort to put the guard in his place, but then thought better of it and turned to leave.

"Wait," Tran commanded. He pointed up to the darkening sky where the tiniest sliver of the new moon hung like an earring. "Tonight begins Ramadan, the month blessed by Allah as the most sacred. Good acts bring a greater reward during this month than at any other time of the year." Tran pulled a dollar bill and a pen from the pocket of the pants he wore beneath his tunic. He wrote a few words on the bill, then balled it up and tossed it through the bars of the gate before the guards could react.

"What did you write?" the guard demanded. He had been told by Ajmaani that the two visitors were not to have any outside contact. But now the little Asian had passed some sort of message to the bum. Ajmaani would not be happy if she knew.

"A message to save his soul—'There is no God but God, and Muhammad is His messenger'—not that I think this infidel dog has the brains to understand," Tran responded testily, thankful for his lesson in Islam from Lucy. "But if it is possible, then this is the month when non-believers may best be persuaded to submit to the One True Faith before it is too late."

"He's right," said the guard named Suleiman. "It's in the Qur'an. 'Whomsoever God desires to guide, He expands his breast to Islam.'"

Outside the gate, Treacher picked up the crumpled bill, which was blowing down the sidewalk in the slight breeze. He paid no attention to any message written on it and simply stuffed it in his pocket. "Thank you, kind sirs," he shouted back at the men inside the gate. "But a dollar doesn't go far in these troubled times. I don't suppose the rest of you would care to contribute to my ministry?"

When no one responded, Treacher shrugged and shuffled off down the street. "Merry Ramadan," he shouted over his shoulder. "Or whatever it is you folks wish each other."

As they turned away from the gate, Suleiman received a cell-phone call. He listened for a moment and then motioned his charges back inside the mosque. "The imam would like to speak to you," he said.

They'd turned to head for the entrance when they heard the sound of the security gate opening behind them. Tran and Jojola looked back and saw a long black limousine pull in and then head down into the underground parking structure.

Inside the mosque, Tran and Jojola were led past the sanctuary, where dozens of people were talking about where they'd been when they looked up and saw the new moon. The congregation had been told that the two visitors were imams from Indonesia in the United States to raise money for Muslim organizations caring for the victims of the December 2005 tsunami.

It was a generous congregation. In fact, the dollar bill Tran had given to Treacher had been pressed into his hands that afternoon by an older man who'd introduced himself as Mahmoud Juma, a native of Kenya.

"I don't have much, and I will not be here tonight for Ramadan service," the old man apologized. "I am going on a trip with my grandson. But I wanted to help."

Reaching the reception area outside of Jabbar's office, Jojola noted the absence of Miriam Khalifa. His biggest concern in joining Tran as Abu Samar had been that she might accidentally give him away if she saw him at the mosque. The test had come after they arrived Saturday morning and were introduced to the mosque community. Miriam had been there and he'd seen her eyes widen with recognition, but she'd quickly put her head down as befitted a modest Muslim woman and no one seemed to notice.

Ushered into the office, Tran and Jojola saw Jabbar sitting in his chair, engaged in an animated conversation with Malovo, who stood near the window. Whatever they were discussing, it came to a halt when they entered.

Moments later, they learned who had been in the limousine when an older white man and a younger Arab entered the room.
"Salaam,"
Jabbar said, rising to introduce the newcomers to Tran and Jojola. "Sheik Mujahid and Sheik Samar, this is Mr. Dean Newbury and The Sheik."

Jabbar licked his thin eggplant-colored lips. The plan was nearly ready and not a moment too soon; Jabbar was sure that he'd developed an ulcer, and his sleep was restless and full of frightening dreams. Tonight he would sleep one last time in his bed, and tomorrow he would be on his way to Sudan, where his benefactors had arranged a comfortable "retirement" as a reward for his services. He would be given a new identity, though when the time was right and his enemies vanquished, he'd emerge as one of the heroes who had helped to bring about the new Islamic caliphate. Perhaps then he'd return to the mosque in Harlem to lord it over the weak-willed members of the congregation—people like Mahmoud Juma. Too
bad his daughter, the lovely Miriam, will not be present,
he thought as he smiled at The Sheik,
but everyone has to make sacrifices.

Disgusting,
thought The Sheik as he nodded back at Jabbar. He looks
like one of the lizards my brother and I used to chase in the al Zubair desert.
The thought of his brother brought a twinge of pain.
Don't worry,
Anan, soon I will avenge your death, and the world we envisioned will be a reality.

In the meantime, he needed Jabbar and the scum that he'd recruited as jihadis. They weren't much different from the illiterate, gullible mujahideen plucked from the slums of the Middle East and Asia; all of them were willing to die for a taste of Paradise. As for himself, tomorrow his public persona would "die," but The Sheik would rise from the ashes and the world would tremble.

The call of the
muezzin
signaled the start of the evening
Taraweeh
prayers that would be said every night throughout Ramadan. "I should go to lead the congregation," Jabbar said and looked at Tran and Jojola. "Would you do us the honor of joining us in preparation for your martyrdom?"

Tran and Jojola wanted to stay to hear what The Sheik and Dean Newbury, who had been a surprise, were going to talk about. But it was clear that they were expected to leave.

After they'd gone, The Sheik turned to Dean Newbury. "So have all arrangements been made for my 'escape' tomorrow?"

"Yes. One of the men who will be with you—the odd-looking nigger with the skin problem—will show you the exit, and my man will be waiting on the other end to take you to the airfield in New Jersey."