Fatal Vision (95 page)

The afternoon would bring Bernie Segal's finest hours ever in a courtroom—there was no doubt in MacDonald's mind about that—and he could scarcely contain his irritation at being made to sit, as if in a waiting room, while Blackburn nattered on about irrelevancies.

There was, however, in Blackburn's manner, when he resumed his closing argument at 11
a.m
., a gravity and intensity which made it plain that no matter how Jeffrey MacDonald might view it, he, Jim Blackburn—in the last hours now of the first murder case he'd ever tried—did not intend to fill the remainder of the morning with idle chatter.

"Ladies and gentlemen," he began, "when you take all seven weeks that you all have been here and all these charts and all this testimony and all the bench conferences and you pour them all out the window, you are left with two things on which I suggest that you have got to make a decision.

"One is the defendant's story and his credibility. If you believe it is true, if you believe everything he said, then your task is relatively simple. You will acquit him.

"If, on the other hand, you contrast that with the physical evidence and somehow it doesn't wash, it doesn't make sense, then you have got a little bit more of a difficult task and it might take you a little longer.

"I suggest that when you compare and contrast his story versus the government's story, you have got to come down on one side or the other, because I suggest to you that the evidence in this case—if it shows nothing else—shows that what he said and what the physical evidence says are not reconcilable. They are diametrically opposed.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I am not about to suggest that the burden of proof ever shifts to the defendant, because it doesn't. It stays with us.

"But you recall on cross-examination that we asked the defendant a lot of questions—that if the jury should find this and that, did he have an explanation. And you recall essentially his testimony: 'It would be pure conjecture,' or 'No,' or 'I can't recall.' Perhaps he does not have to explain, but think for a moment if you were on trial for your life and the only thing that made your story perhaps not believable was its inconsistency with the physical evidence.

"Don't you think if you
could
explain it, you
would?
Don't you think for one moment if you were on that stand and somebody asked you a question like I asked Dr. MacDonald and you could tell me, 'Mr. Blackburn, you are an idiot. Here is the answer. Bam': doesn't it make sense that you would do that? I suggest that it does.

"What about the blood—the Type A blood that Paul Stombaugh testified was on the pajama top before it was torn? Did you hear any defendant's experts say that there wasn't Type A blood on the pajama top before it was torn? Did you hear that? No, you didn't. And don't you know if they could have had an expert here from somewhere to say that they would have, because, ladies and gentlemen, the defendant's story is that he placed the pajama top on Colette after she was dead.

"All of the evidence, however, suggests that that pajama top was ripped before and not after it was placed on top of the chest of Colette MacDonald. Well, what does that suggest to you?

"It suggests, ladies and gentlemen, that Colette MacDonald bled on that pajama top before it was torn. We asked the defendant if he had an explanation for that, and he said not to his knowledge. Don't you know that if he could have explained it, he would have?

"We even know that Kimberly's AB blood type was on the pajama top. How did it get on there? Well, we know—if you believe the defendant's story—that on the first visit to the master bedroom—the first circuit—he took it off and put it on Colette's body and then he went to check Kimberly and then he perhaps got Kimberly's blood on it. But he did not see Kimberly until he had the pajama top off. How does the AB blood walk from Kimberly's room to the master bedroom and get on the pajama top? We asked him that question, and his response was, 'It would be pure conjecture.'

"We know, at least, that the pajama top was placed on Colette's chest. That is one thing about which the government and the defendant are in agreement. He said that he was in a state of confusion and that perhaps he put it on there to get her warm and protect her from shock, but he wasn't sure why. He was confused.

"I think that you can infer from this evidence that the reason the pajama top was placed on top of Colette's chest was because it already had Type A blood on it and he had to have an explanation that would sound reasonable as to why that Type A blood was on it.

"How did threads and yarns from the pajama top get on Kimberly's bed underneath the sheets? Fourteen of them, when the pajama top was already off? Now, we asked the defendant about that and as I recall, he said, well, they were sticking to his arms. If you believe that that is where they came from, fine. We suggest that they came from the blue pajama top itself as Kimberly MacDonald was carried back into that room with that torn pajama top and placed in that bed.

"What about Kristen? We know that at least one thread matching the pajama top and a splinter matching the club were found in her room. We know that Type A blood, from the evidence, was on the wall, splattered. We know from the evidence that Type A blood from direct bleeding was found in massive amounts on the top sheet. We know, ladies and gentlemen, that Colette MacDonald had no injuries on her legs, yet there was a lot of blood—her own blood—on the pajama bottoms. How did that blood get there?

"I suggest from the evidence that you can infer that it got there because the killer took this club and after Colette MacDonald went to Kristen's room, she was banged again with the club up against the wall and fell over and bled on the pajama bottoms.''

Blackburn paused and began to pace slowly back and forth across the courtroom. "Ladies and gentlemen," he said, "we have heard a lot about fabric impressions and contact prints on the bed sheet. How did they get there? One fabric impression contact print matched the right cuff of the defendant's blue pajama top. What did the defendant say about the bed sheet? To his memory, he could not recall touching or coming in contact with that sheet.

"But you have got a massive amount of Type A blood in the center of that sheet. You have got two impressions matching the arms of Colette's pink pajama top there. And you have got MacDonald's blue cuff—the right cuff—on that sheet. How do you explain that? What is the explanation for that?

"And then the footprint. Even the defendant agrees the footprint was probably his. The intruders did not go barefooted. The left footprint that was exiting Kristen's bedroom was made in Type A blood. How was the footprint made? And how did the fabric impressions—the contact—prints—get on the sheet?

"I submit that it is reasonable to infer from the evidence that after Colette MacDonald was struck with the club in Kristen's room, she came to rest on the floor. We suggest that that bedspread and that blue sheet from the master bedroom were then brought into Kristen's room. Colette was laid on it, and, ladies and gentlemen, she was picked up and carried back to the master bedroom. And we suggest that as the defendant did that, he stepped, unbeknownst to him, in a blood type that was not Kristen's and made that footprint as he exited that room."

Glancing briefly at handwritten notes, Blackburn moved on.
^‘‘
We know," he said,
^‘‘
that pieces of latex were found torn and some with Type A blood on them in the master bedroom. How did they get there? We asked the defendant about it, and he said,
^‘
Not that I can recall,'
^‘
No,' or
^‘
No explanation.' Again, while he has no legal responsibility to explain, don't you know—don't you know that if he could have, he most certainly would have?

^‘
‘
We know that somebody wrote the words
pig
in Type A blood on the headboard over where Colette MacDonald slept. We know that a blue thread matching the pajama top was found in that area. We know that there is a good possibility from the evidence that the surgical glove fragments found in the bedroom matched gloves found elsewhere in the house.

^‘‘
And isn't it interesting, ladies and gentlemen, that droplets of Type B blood—that of the defendant—are found in the kitchen near the cabinet where surgical gloves are kept? According to his story, the kitchen was the thirteenth stop on his rounds—drops of blood at number thirteen, but at number one, where he was cut according to his story, there wasn't any.

^‘‘
I think you can infer from the evidence, ladies and gentlemen, that this defendant with his medical knowledge—with his medical ability—knowing that MPs would soon be on the way—very likely inflicted one—not all, but one—injury in the bathroom, and that is where the B-type bloo
d
came from and that was close to the end and that is why B-type blood was not found until number thirteen in the kitchen.

^‘‘
But, ladies and gentlemen, I believe that you could throw the whole shooting match away except for two pieces of evidence. I think you could just hold on to two—this club and this pajama top." Blackburn held both in front of the jury.

^‘‘
Why are they so important? Well, you remember, the defendant said that he hadn't seen this club until April 6th, and he didn't think this was the club that he was hit with. The club, the knives, and the icepick were outside the door. He didn't go outside the door, but he went to it. The club had A and AB blood on it and it had two little blue threads on it which matched identically the threads from this pajama top.

^‘
That sounds sort of minor, really, until you think about something. How did they get there? If he never touched the club, if he never saw it, if the pajama top was not taken off his body until this club was already out the door, how in the name of all that is reasonable did they walk out the door and get on the club and stick to it?

"I suggest from the evidence that there is an explanation and that is that this club was not outside the back door until
after—
that pajama top dropped threads and yarns and blood to the floor, and as the club fell on the floor, it picked up the threads and picked up the yarns with the blood and then it was thrown out the door.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I have talked to you a long time about all this type of evidence. But what does it mean? How could this have happened?

"We know from the evidence that the defendant, as we have said before, was a good doctor. We know that his family loved him. We know that from the Valentine cards. We know from the card that he read from the witness stand shortly before the end of direct examination that Colette loved him very much.

"I suggest to you, however, that what the defense tried to do was to prove the defendant's love and character through Colette and not through himself. We know that the defendant had been unfaithful in his marriage. We know that he had worked the weekend before; he was perhaps tired. We know from the evidence that there was a—maybe it is a minor problem—the problem of Kristen coming to the bed. We know that he, according to his story, went to bed late that night and found that the bed was wet.

"I am not by any stretch of the imagination suggesting that the slaughter took place over any one thing. I don't think so, but I think that you can infer from the evidence that a fight developed in the master bedroom between Colette and the defendant—a struggle—an altercation. We know that Colette was bruised— perhaps she was struck.

"You know those words—'Daddy, Daddy, Daddy, Daddy.' I believe those words were said, but not from fear of intruders. I think you can infer from the evidence that they were said as Kimberly came to the master bedroom to find out what was going on between her father and mother. We know that she was there. We know from the evidence that her blood was found on the sheet, on the floor, and in the hall.

"We suggest, perhaps, that Colette in an attempt to save herself or to fight back, got the old dull Geneva Forge knife and perhaps struck the defendant.

"I suggest that the defendant, perhaps in a frenzy, perhaps mad, perhaps disgusted, perhaps exhausted—he knew that he was going to be away for thirty days in March, if he could, while his wife was six or seven months pregnant—the defendant in one tragic, brief moment—so brief—lost control and came back with that club, and as he did, he struck Kimberly and struck his wife.

"At that point, ladies and gentlemen, the future is at stake. It may be too late at that point to undo that which is done. You know how hard it is to unring the bell. You know the words, 'Jeff, Jeff, Jeff, why are they doing this to me?' Think how close that is to, 'Jeff, Jeff, Jeff, why are
you
doing this to me?"

"After Kimberly was struck, we suggest that she was picked up and carried back to her room and struck with this club again and that Colette went to protect or to see what was happening to Kristen, and while she was in there, Colette was struck again and carried back to the master bedroom.

"Then, of course, things had simply gone beyond repair. You can't go back and make the family happy again, drink liqueur, and watch Johnny Carson. It has gone too far.

"An Old Hickory paring knife was located and that knife was taken and Colette MacDonald was stabbed sixteen times and Kimberly was stabbed in the neck at least eight to ten times.