Heart of a Killer (20 page)

“You’ve met him?” Novack asked.

Laufer cast a quick glance at Emerson before answering. “Yeah. I’ve met him. I was there the night he killed that Clemens guy.”

“How did you happen to be there?”

“I was at a bar at like two in the morning, hanging out with some guys. One of them was friends with Murray, I guess, because he was there as well. I didn’t even know his name at the time; didn’t even talk to him. I saw Clemens come in and go over to Murray. I don’t know how he knew him, but I saw Murray nod and get up, and they went out the back door into the alley.

“Anyway, it looked a little strange to me, so I went out near the back door to check it out. They were talking, and Clemens sort of pushed him, nothing hard. Next thing I know Murray goes like to slap him, but I saw some light off a blade. All of a sudden Clemens is grabbing for his throat, but he can’t stop the blood going through his fingers. He goes down to his knees, and then falls over.”

“What did you do?” Novack asked.

“I went back in the bar and minded my own business,” he said, and then laughed. “What the hell should I have done, make a citizen’s arrest?”

“So you don’t know where Murray went?” Novack asked.

“Yeah, I know where he went. He went back into the bar and finished his beer. And then he ordered two more after that. The guy is an ice-cold prick, I’m telling you.”

“Where does he live?”

“How do I know? You think he sends me a Christmas card every year?”

“Where does he live?” Novack asked again.

“Last I heard he lived in the city. Soho, or the Village, or something. And somebody said he was from Maine … I think … it could have been Montana, but I think it was Maine.”

“We need more than that,” Novack said.

“What do I look like? Google?” Laufer asked. Then, “Come on, I can’t have Murray finding out I’ve been asking around about him.”

“You can do it quietly.”

“No, I can’t.”

Novack nodded and stood up. “Okay, forget about it. We’re going to be interviewing quite a few of your fellow hackers. You’ve got a fairly small community, right? So we’ll just tell people that you ID’d Murray as a suspect, and ask if they know where we can find him.”

Emerson nodded. “That works.”

Laufer was scared, and he was beaten. “I’ll see what I can find out. Just don’t mention my name to anyone.”

Novack and Emerson both agreed to that, and then Novack asked, “Does the name Hennessey mean anything to you?”

“No,” Laufer said. “Who is he?”

Novack didn’t bother answering, he just told Laufer that they would be in touch.

We left, and when we got outside, I tried to talk to Novack and tell him my impressions of the interrogation. He seemed completely uninterested in hearing them, and he and Emerson left me to drive home alone, talking to myself.

I was pretty impressed by what I would have had to say.

Karen Harrison’s medical condition was as cruel as it was deadly. There were times when Karen would feel better, experience a renewed energy and stamina that surprised and delighted her. It would give her a burst of hope that she had turned the corner, that the nightmare would give way to a normal life.

But that’s not how it worked; that’s not how it ever worked. She was in fact getting worse, inexorably moving toward a time when her heart simply could not keep her body going. And anything different that Karen felt was an illusion.

The good times were always followed by a descent, and it seemed as if each time Karen fell farther than the time before. This episode was a perfect example of that. Karen had felt better for twenty-four hours, and even though she had learned not to trust the highs, she couldn’t help herself.

“I want to go see Mom,” she said.

Terry knew that Karen wasn’t strong enough to leave the hospital, especially for something as stressful as a visit to her mother at the prison. And the police wanted her to stay where she was, where she could be protected.

Karen wasn’t even aware that she was being guarded, or that she was in danger, and Terry saw no reason to burden her further with that.

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, sweetheart. At least right now.”

“Why not? I feel good, and I haven’t seen her in so long.”

“Let me see what I can arrange,” Terry said, floundering for a way to deflect the request. “Your mother had said that the visiting hours there—”

She stopped in midsentence, because Karen wasn’t listening. She had gone completely pale, her eyes rolled up in her head, and she slumped back. He head lolled back on her neck, and Terry immediately screamed.

She thought her granddaughter had died.

The doctors and nurses rushed in, ushering Terry out of the room. They, too, thought they might lose Karen, but after a very nervous half hour she was stabilized.

Later that day she rallied, and was resting comfortably, while her doctors met for more than an hour to talk about her condition.

They finally called an anxious Terry into the room to tell her their recommendation. Karen needed a VAD, which was short for “ventricular assist device.” It was an implant, the sole purpose of which was to support the heart while a patient was waiting for a transplant.

Karen’s heart could fail at any time, the doctors said, and resuscitation was far from a guarantee. A VAD implant also was not a guarantee, or a long-term solution, but it was the best chance she had until a donor organ was found.

But the implantation itself was a surgical procedure, and there was no certainty that Karen would get through it. The doctors felt that it was likely she would survive, and they strongly recommended it as the only viable option.

It was not a decision that Terry wanted to make alone. She called the prison, and after waiting twenty minutes, and having the surgeon speak to the prison authorities, she got Sheryl on the phone.

She told Sheryl what was going on, and then put the surgeon on to tell her in more detail. Sheryl kept him on the phone for fifteen minutes, peppering him with questions, questions that Terry hadn’t even thought to ask.

He finally handed the phone back to Terry. “Do it, Ma. It’s her only chance.”

“That’s what I think, too,” Terry said. “Honey, I am so scared. I don’t want to lose her, but she’s so weak.”

“We won’t lose her, Ma. She’s going to keep fighting and winning until we can get her help. We won’t lose her, and we will get her help.”

After promising to do whatever was necessary to reach Sheryl after the procedure, Terry got off the phone and signed the necessary papers.

The medical team immediately went to work, not wanting to waste a second. Within thirty minutes, Karen was under anesthesia, prepped, and in the operating room. The procedure itself was a quick thirty minutes, and was instantly judged a success.

The surgeon came out to talk to Terry. “It went well,” he said. “We bought some time.”

Terry cried a bit, and then went to call Sheryl with the news. Sheryl would ask how much time Karen had, but Terry wouldn’t know. She hadn’t asked the doctor that question.

She was afraid to hear the answer.

The ruling came down at two o’clock in the afternoon. There had been no indication that it was coming, and I first heard about it from a New York
Daily News
reporter, who called to ask me my reaction to the total loss that we suffered.

I told him that I wouldn’t comment on the opinion until I had a chance to read it, though the truth was I had absolutely no desire at all to read it. He had told me all I needed to know.

I forced myself to go to the court website to read the opinion. They had rejected every one of our arguments, and had done so unanimously.

They even ruled against us on things we didn’t argue, saying that “were the Department of Corrections to facilitate a suicide, no matter what terminology is used to hide the reality, it would itself be in violation of the law. Such a decision would require a legislative act, not an arbitrary decision by the Department.”

They went on, stating unequivocally that the prison authorities had every right to put Sheryl under a suicide watch. “The evidence shows it to be completely consistent with their actions with other inmates. They have a right and obligation to ensure the safety of inmates within their control, whether or not those inmates might desire such protection.”

The opinion went on in that fashion, getting even worse as it went along. They went so far as to comment on the lawsuit itself, doubting its merits but allowing it to proceed, at least for the time being.

I would appeal the ruling; that was a foregone conclusion. But another foregone conclusion was that we would lose the appeal. The law, whether one agreed with it or not, was simply against us.

I wanted to go to the prison and tell Sheryl the bad news in person; she deserved that much and more. But I needed to get to the hospital to meet with Terry Aimonetti. Novack and I were hoping that she would have some information that could help the investigation, an investigation that now represented Sheryl’s only hope of prevailing.

I got to the hospital, and found Terry sitting alone in Karen’s room. It surprised me how young she was; she didn’t look like she was even fifty years old. Obviously she and Sheryl had both had their children at a very young age. She was crying, and for a brief moment I thought that Karen might have died.

I have very little understanding of women under any circumstances, and when they are crying I find them even more bewildering. But I came to realize that Terry was crying from happiness, and she explained about the procedure Karen had just undergone, and that she had just learned that it was a success.

She called Sheryl to tell her the news, and after a ten-minute wait got her on the phone. I could hear Sheryl crying through the phone, and the two of them went on that way for three or four minutes. Three or four minutes of listening to two women cry feels a lot longer.

Finally, Terry put me on, and I told her straight out that we lost the court case. “I’m sorry, Sheryl. It wasn’t even close.”

“I understand, Harvard,” she said. “And as phone calls go, this is still a good one.”

“The parole board is our best shot now.” I could have substituted “only” for “best” in that sentence, but I didn’t.

“How is that going?”

“I spoke to Novack a little while ago; he says he’s making progress. That’s the first time he’s said that, so maybe it means something. I’m meeting with him later; I’ll let you know what I find out.”

“Come here if you can,” she said.

“I will.”

I had questions for Terry, but before I could get to them I had to answer a bunch of hers.

“Are you making progress on getting Sheryl what she wants?”

It seemed like she couldn’t bring herself to verbalize what it was that Sheryl wanted, and I understood that completely. “It’s very difficult,” I said. “We are making progress, but partial progress isn’t enough. It’s all or nothing, and I honestly don’t know how it’s going to come out.”

She nodded. “I don’t even know what I want. It seems that either way I lose my little girl.”

I then asked her about Hennessey, but she claimed to have no idea who or what I was talking about.

“Sheryl told us the truth about the day that Charlie died.”

“Thank God,” she said. “I’ve wanted to tell someone for so long.”

She had not known Hennessey’s name, and certainly had no idea how we could find him. She was happy to sign a power of attorney, allowing me to get her bank records, in the unlikely event that the money she had been receiving could be traced. Novack could have gotten a court order to get the records, but this was easier and quicker.

Other than the access to the financial records, Terry really had nothing else to offer. I had hoped to talk to Karen, but she was still in the recovery room, and in any event should not be exposed to the stress my questioning might cause.

Unfortunately, spreading stress seemed to be all I did.

Novack was in his precinct office when I got there. Actually, he was in the front lobby, talking to a uniformed officer, a conversation that was breaking up as I walked in.

“You’re here,” I said.

“Wow, you don’t miss a thing,” he said. “It’s like Sherlock Holmes became a hack lawyer.”

“Sorry, I guess I expected you to be out actually doing something.”

“How’s your client’s daughter feeling?” he asked, knowing I had been to the hospital to talk to Terry.

“Not good. She just had a surgery to implant a device that can keep her alive for a while, but not long term.”

He shook his head. “Shit.” It was an unlikely one-word sentence to show a soft side of someone, but he had just pulled it off. Then, “Come on back.”

Once we were in his office, I told him that I brought Terry Aimonetti’s power of attorney with me, that would allow her financial records to be examined.

He nodded. “Good. Give it to me.”

I ignored the request. “What did you think of Laufer?” I asked. He hadn’t given me a chance to talk about Laufer after the interrogation, and I still wanted to.

“I thought he was a sniveling, chickenshit nerd. Other than that, I liked him.”

“You want to know what I thought?” I asked.

“Not even a little bit. But I’ve got a feeling you’re going to tell me anyway, so make it quick. There’s no jury here.”

“I thought he was lying.”

“About what?”

“Everything he said. I think it was all bullshit.”

“Well, since you lawyers wrote the book on bullshit, you might know it when you hear it. Tell me why.”

“A few reasons. First of all, he talked too much. He told you much more than he had to; you just weren’t that scary. He didn’t have to describe to Emerson or to you what happened at the bar that night; you would have no way of knowing that he was there. If he was so scared of Murray that he looked around in a panic when you mentioned his name, you guys would be the last people he’d tell it to.”

“He was afraid of losing his job,” Novack said.

I shook my head. “I don’t buy it. I checked into his job; he teaches two courses, an hour a week for each, at that junior high. Makes maybe six grand total. If he loses that job, he can go work at McDonald’s and step up an economic class.”