Presumption of Guilt (23 page)

C
HAPTER

39

F
ive weeks had passed since Molly’s appeal was argued and still no decision. That wasn’t unusual—it sometimes took months. Still, the anxiety ate at Dani. There was nothing she could do, though, to speed it along, and so she turned to other work piling up on her desk. She began with a review of letters from inmates seeking representation by HIPP. The first seven she reviewed were typical. They began with a protestation of innocence, blamed the system for being against them, then offered no facts to support their claim. Even without those facts, there was something about some of the letter writers’ voices that piqued her interest, but most times she sent back a routine sorry-we-can’t-help-you letter.

She picked up the eighth letter and began reading. “My name is Tyrone Watkins. I been in prison in Illinois since I was fifteen years old. I be thirty next month. The Chicago police said I killed a woman. When they took me in, they kept at me so many hours I lost track. Then they said if I confessed, I could go home to my mama and sleep in my bed. They told me what to say and I signed my name. I never did hurt any woman. But the judge didn’t believe me. Can you help me?”

A false-confession claim. Once, Dani hadn’t believed in false confessions, then she was proven wrong by the nephew of her childhood nanny, who had confessed to a rape and murder it was eventually proven he didn’t commit. Still, she thought it an isolated phenomenon. Molly Singer was the first false-confession case she’d handled at HIPP. And now Tyrone Watkins. She marked his file as “Accept,” and decided to do some research on false confessions.

Dani was startled to learn that a full 25 percent of exonerated inmates had confessed to their crimes. The reasons for doing so varied, but the one thing they all had in common: the confession, even retracted, had trumped all other evidence in their trials, including DNA evidence. As a lifelong New Yorker, Dani recalled the case of five teenagers convicted of the rape and brutal beating of a Central Park jogger. The woman had been so badly injured that she had no memory of the crime. Dani had been as outraged as the rest of New York at the night of “wilding,” as the police dubbed the perpetrators’ activities, and gratified by their convictions. For months, the newspapers printed stories about the crime, the criminals, and the trial. Almost absent from the newspapers were the reports of their exoneration many years later, following the confession of another man known as the East Side Rapist. When the teenagers’ trial took place, the police had a DNA sample from the victim. It didn’t match any of the teenagers. The confessions they obtained from the teens didn’t match the facts of the crime scene and were inconsistent among them. None of that mattered. It only mattered that the teens—who were between fourteen and sixteen at the time of the arrest—had confessed. When, twelve years later, the East Side Rapist, who was then in prison, admitted to the crime, they tested his DNA. It matched that found on the victim. He gave details of the night that were accurate and could have been known only to the attacker. Four young men had spent years in prison because they confessed to a heinous act they hadn’t committed.

And they weren’t alone. Dani read about the sixteen-year-old who spent fifteen years in prison for the rape and strangulation of a classmate, even though jurors had been informed that DNA evidence didn’t match his. But he had confessed, as had the man who was sentenced to death for the murders of his parents, only to be exonerated three years later when two gang members were convicted for their deaths. A father who confessed to the murder of his three-year-old daughter was eventually exonerated when DNA evidence later identified a neighbor, who by then was serving a sentence for sex crimes, as the perpetrator. The list of cases went on and on, some famous as a result of their causes being undertaken by celebrities, but most anonymous men and, yes, a few women, who languished in jail as a result of confessing to a crime they didn’t commit, and later exonerated when new evidence came to light.

Why did they do it? Dani kept digging to ferret out the answers. Some confessions were given freely, to protect the actual perpetrator. Some, like the young man whose letter she’d just read, were given because of a promise made by their interrogator—perhaps to go home, or to get a lighter sentence. Or, often, because they were desperate to end the hours upon hours of relentless interrogation. And some, like Molly, fed lies by their interrogator, came to believe they were guilty. And once made, no matter how quickly recanted, that confession became the truth in the eyes of jurors.

In many of those cases, DNA ultimately exonerated the defendant. In others, the true perpetrator was arrested on different charges and evidence was found linking him to the other crime. In rare cases, the true culprit confessed.

None of those factors were present in Molly Singer’s case. If only they knew who had written the anonymous letters. He was right about hanky-panky with the jail. He obviously knew more. They needed him to connect the dots between the jail funds and the Singers’ murders. Then, maybe, Molly would have a real chance at freedom.

C
HAPTER

40

J
ohn Engles popped his head into Frank Reynolds’s office. “Want to get some lunch?”

Although Engles had an office in the county jail, he had a second office in the county government building, at eight stories the highest building in downtown Andersonville. Frank’s office was on the top floor.

Frank looked at his watch. He didn’t particularly care for Engles, but better to stay on his good side. “Sure, but let’s make it a quick one.”

They rode the elevator down to the lobby, then strolled over to a coffee shop one block away. Settled into their booth, Engles asked, “What do you think will happen with the appeal?”

Frank shrugged. “Have no idea.”

“I think she did it.”

Frank eyed him carefully. Once, he thought she was guilty, too. But someone killed Quince Michaels, and it certainly wasn’t Molly Singer.

“Even after Michaels?”

“Who knows if those investigators were right? It could have been an accident.”

“Maybe.” Frank didn’t want to say more. He didn’t trust anyone now. He tried to change the subject, but Engles wouldn’t let it go.

“You know, right now they only know that Singer and Michaels profited from the jail. If she doesn’t get a new trial, it stays that way.”

“Even if she does get a new trial, it should stay that way. If you’re right, and Michaels’s death was an accident, they can say that he killed his partner to stop him from talking. Case closed and Molly goes free.”

“I don’t think so. If they get a new trial, her lawyers are going to keep digging. I know the type.”

Frank didn’t want to think about it. He wanted this mess to be over. He looked up and saw Darlene, his favorite waitress, approaching his table. She was someone who always wore a smile and made him feel welcome.

“Hi, Frank, what’ll it be today?”

“I’ll have today’s special.”

“Good choice. And how about you, Sheriff?”

“The same.”

Before Darlene left with their orders, she turned back to Reynolds. “So what do you think will happen with Molly Singer?”

Frank remembered that Darlene had gone to school with Molly. He just shrugged and held open his two palms.

“I sure hope she gets out,” Darlene said. “I never thought she was the kind of girl who’d do something like that.”

“I hope so, too.”

When the waitress left, Engles said, “See what I mean? Everyone’s talking about it. The sooner it dies down the better.”

“Better for us, maybe, but not better for Molly.”

Engles just shrugged, as though that issue couldn’t be more beside the point.

Frank returned to his office and tried to settle down to work, only he couldn’t concentrate on anything. He worked with no success at the tightness in the back of his neck.
Calm down. Everything will be okay.
Only he didn’t believe it. Whatever happened, everything had changed for him. He realized now he’d fooled himself twelve years ago. He’d wanted to believe the Singers’ deaths had nothing to do with the deal he’d made. The day he told Alan Bryson he’d do what was asked of him, he lost himself. The man who prided himself on his integrity, who vowed to work hard for his constituents, had disappeared, gone in a puff of smoke, and replaced with a selfish, cowardly shell. He’d convinced himself over the years that his act was justified because of the good he was accomplishing as county executive. And he had accomplished much for the county. But it wasn’t enough to erase his shame.

The phone on his desk buzzed and Frank picked it up.

“Don’t forget, you have a two o’clock with the controller,” his secretary said. “It’s five of now. It’s in Conference Room A.”

“Thanks for the reminder.”

He needed to clear his mind before he walked into the meeting and put aside all thoughts but government business. He stood up and shook out his hands, blew out a series of short breaths, then gathered up his papers and walked to the Conference Room.

“Hi Harlan,” he said to the county controller, then nodded to the others in the room. They had gathered together for another in a long line of meetings to discuss the next year’s budget. He took a seat and placed a notepad and pen on the table. “So, where are we?”

“Well, as we’ve covered, we anticipate revenues will be down again this year. We’d hoped housing prices would have started to come back and increase our share of property taxes, but it seems unlikely.”

“You know I won’t impose any new taxes,” Frank said.

Harlan had his calculator in front of him and punched in some numbers. “I’m well aware of that. We’re going to need to streamline expenses. I’ve put together a list of the cuts we’ll need from each department.”

Harlan handed Frank a sheet of paper with names and numbers on it. The county executive looked it over, but it all seemed a blur to him. Thoughts of Molly and his role in the fraud against the county rose in him like flood waters. He tried to control his growing sense of desperation, but it seemed like a mammoth task. He was walking a tightrope. On one side lay self-preservation, on the other, integrity. He knew he would fall. He just didn’t know on which side.

C
HAPTER

41

D
ani had to read the Appellate Division’s decision twice before it sank in.

Denied. No new trial.

The court had been split three to two. The majority wrote:

At the outset, we find that the defendant exercised due diligence in coming forward with her new evidence. However, although the revelation about the fraud perpetrated by one of the victims and his partner is certainly troubling, no compelling evidence tying that crime to the murders has been presented. Furthermore, the fact that one juror, who had doubts during the original trial, claims he would have voted differently had he been made aware of the victim’s wrongdoing, is simply not probative of what a reasonable man, the standard required by law, would do with that information. The defendant has failed to provide a sufficient nexus between the two events for it to have a probability of creating a more favorable outcome for her. Accordingly, her request for a new trial is denied.

The minority were more sympathetic.

Our system of justice abhors the notion of keeping a person incarcerated if there is the possibility she is innocent of the crime. With that in mind, it is within the power of this court to review the findings of fact made by the county court judge. With respect to the finding that the tactics used by the police were insufficient to trigger a false confession, we must disagree. Since the only significant evidence tying Ms. Singer to the murder of her parents was her confession to those crimes, evidence relating to circumstances resulting in false confessions, and therefore whether her confession was false, is highly germane and should have been left for a jury to consider. Since these studies of false confessions were not available at the time of her trial, it constitutes newly discovered evidence, as is the now clear evidence of criminal wrongdoing by Ms. Singer’s father and others. For these reasons, we would remit this case back to the county court for a new trial.

There was no place left for them to go. Except in death penalty cases, the New York Court of Appeals, the highest one in the state, wouldn’t question a judge’s exercise of discretion in a 440 hearing. She picked up her phone, buzzed Melanie, Tommy, and Bruce, and scheduled an impromptu meeting in fifteen minutes. While she waited, she called Josh Cosgrove, hoping against hope that he had some news for her.

“I’m afraid not,” he said after Dani filled him in on the appellate court’s decision. “We have good news for us, but it’s not going to help you.”

“What’s that?”

“Lisa Michaels has agreed to turn over the unlawful proceeds from the jail construction, including the amount used to purchase their house. We don’t have to bring an action against Quince Michaels’s estate.”

“It’s nice to know someone has a conscience. Although I guess it’s easier to be noble when you’re wealthy in your own right.”

“I guess we’ll never be tested that way, given the careers we’ve chosen,” Cosgrove said. Dani knew that was certainly true. Government and nonprofit lawyers were at the bottom of the attorney pay scale. College professors were only marginally higher. She ended the call and went into the conference room. Melanie and Tommy were already seated and Bruce entered moments later.

“We lost the appeal on Singer,” Dani announced to them. “It was a three-two verdict. No new trial.”

“So it’s over?” Melanie asked.

Dani had been thinking about that question. “Maybe not. Paul Scoby blackmailed Mary Jane Olivetti. He must have been in on the scheme. We also think Frank Reynolds was in on it. But the big fish—at least for us—is the possibility that Judge Bryson was part of it. If we can prove that, Molly would have to get a new trial. He was the original judge on her case and presided over her 440 hearing. If he’d been involved in a criminal enterprise with the victim, he would have to have recused himself. He didn’t.”