Under direct examination, Rosen testified that he thought the police could easily be blameless, citing a berry aneurysm of the brain.
Blameless!
So to sum up, the lawyer said, in your professional opinion, you feel that Miss Carramias death was
not
due to any action on the part of the police officers in question.
Thats correct, Rosen said, turning to the jury. In my opinion, there is a reasonable degree of medical certainty that the decedent died of natural causes.
Yeah. Like the sidewalk stood up and cracked her skull open.
Thank you for your honesty, doctor. The defense attorney favored the jury with one of his nauseatingly smarmy smiles. No further questions.
Manny rose from behind the plaintiffs table and approached the witness. She was going to eat him up and spit him out.
Dr. Rosen, how much are you being paid for your testimony today?
My fee is five thousand dollars for my time, not my testimony.
Manny raised a scornful eyebrow. A
day
?
Yes.
He hadnt charged
her
that much last March to do a second autopsy. Maybe if shed outbid the defense she could have recruited him for Essies parents.
I see, she said. You work for the City of New York, correct?
Im deputy chief medical examiner. But Im testifying in this case in my private capacity as a physician and a forensic pathologist.
Blood was in the water and she was the shark. In your role for the city, isnt it important to have a good relationship with the police?
He crossed his legs, unfazed. Manny noticed that his suit jacket had been patched.
What? Couldnt afford a new suit at five thousand per? What a loser.
Of course, he said, but that doesnt affect my opinion.
Doctor, are you acquainted with Dr. Justin West, medical examiner for the State of New Jersey, and Dr. Sanjay Sumet, the forensic pathologist who testified for the plaintiff in this case?
Indeed. Theyre both fine men and fine doctors.
Doctors West and Sumet agree that Miss Carramia died as the result of a blow to the head. But you claim she died of natural causes a brain aneurysm. Is that right?
Yes. As Ive just testified, a ruptured berry aneurysm. Rosen shifted back in his chair, which creaked under his weight. The witness box wasnt designed to accommodate such long legs. Manny hoped he was as uncomfortable in his lies as he was in his body. But there was no strain detectable in his voice. My opinion is based on the material Ive reviewed: the autopsy report, witness statements, and my dissection of the brain, which had been retained by the medical examiner.
But theres nothing in her medical records to indicate she had such a condition.
Rosen turned to the judge. Is that a question?
Smug prig.
Ill rephrase, Manny said quickly. Was there anything in her medical history to suggest she suffered from this she cast a meaningful look at the juryrare condition?
Rosen shrugged. There probably wouldnt be.
She shook her head as if shed never heard anything so outlandish. Then isnt your opinion awfully convenient for the police? In fact, arent you handing them a gift-wrapped Get Out of Jail Free card?
All six lawyers for the defense leaped to their feet, like cheerleaders at the big game. Objection! one shouted.
Manny rolled her eyes at them. Its a figure of speech.
Shes being argumentative, said another.
The judge grinned. What else is new? Manny started to speak but he waved her off. Overruled, he said.
Thank you, your honor. She turned back to Rosen. Doctor, isnt it true that, in cases such as this, the testimony of the officers involved is often unreliable?
He leaned forward. Not necessarily.
Got him!
Really? She brandished a document. This is an abstract of a paper given at a meeting of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences in February 1993, based on a study of twenty-one police takedown death cases. It concludes that pathologists should
not
rely on police testimony in such cases because its often inaccurate, possibly due to stress or simple dishonesty. Are you familiar with the paper?
I believe so. Was he winking at her?
Didnt you write it, Dr. Rosen?
How can he be so unruffled? Ive nailed him.
Youre missing the point, he said. In those cases, the police testimony conflicted with the science. Here, it doesnt.
Manny turned on him, hair flying out of her hastily engineered chignon. Do you expect this jury to believe that she just
happened
to die while being arrested? What does your science say about implausible coincidence?
Rosen tapped his fingertips on the wooden railing, the first sign of anger. Its not a coincidence, he said, keeping his voice under control. The bursting of a natural aneurysm can be brought on by emotional stress or physical exertion, like getting caught shoplifting and struggling with the police.
Uh-oh. Juries didnt like it when you called an expert witness a big fat jerk, which she was tempted to do. But this last from him was a point for the defense.
Dr. Rosen, she said, recovering, two of your colleagues have testified that Miss Carramia suffered a subdural hemorrhage, which is nearly always indicative of blunt force trauma. Are they lying?
Rosen rubbed his temple.
If Im lucky, maybe hes having an aneurysm of his own.
Not at all. Without fully dissecting the brain, it was an easy mistake. He addressed the jury in a gentle voice, as though he were Mister Rogers and they lived in his neighborhood. An aneurysm is like a very small balloon. When this one burst, the blood flowed through the very thin arachnoid layer, which is the inner membrane covering the brain, to the outer thicker dura covering, creating a subdural hemorrhage from natural causes. Its true that most subdural hemorrhages are due to trauma. This one wasnt. To demonstrate, Rosen formed a ball with his cupped hands and then opened the top one as though they were hinged at the pinkies.
Lord, Manny thought. Hes becoming taller in the witness stand. More authoritative. And the jurys starting to believe him!
Additionally, Rosen continued, when the top of the skull was removed at autopsy, blood leaking from the postmortem incisions pooled inside the lower part of the skull, making it look like an even bigger subdural bleed. It could easily be mistaken for a traumatic injury, but its actually consistent with the officers testimony that the victims head never struck the ground.
In your opinion, Manny snarled, watching uncertainty cloud the jurors faces.
If that pontificating hired gun persuades them
An opinion, Rosen said, which is backed by the vomitus the medical examiner found on the victims clothing. Vomiting is a classic sign of a leaking berry aneurysm.
Manny felt her blood pressure spike. Her hair fell wetly across her cheeks. The son of a bitch was twisting the girls suffering to get the cops off the hook. That vomit, she said, is evidence of the trauma six policemen inflicted on a one-hundred-and-five-pound girl. Or didnt you read Dr. Sumets report?
I did. But what he failed to note was that the vomitus recovered from her jacket sleeve contained eggs, tomatoes, and tortillas.
Exactly. Which the victim ate for breakfast.
Counselor, Rosen said, condescension dripping from the word, according to her family, Miss Carramia ate at ten-thirty a.m. If shed vomited as a result of the arrest four hours later, the food would have been mostly digested. It was not. This is proof that vomiting
preceded
the arrest. The girl died of natural causes. Thats what the science tells us.
Manny shot a glance at the jury.
They believe him.
She felt sick, cold.
Counterattack. But how?
Dr. Rosen, she said, apart from all this suspect speculation, you dont have any solid evidence about what happened to Miss Carramia, do you?
He leaned back, looking maddeningly comfortable. She envisioned him with pipe and slippers. The body always tells the story, he said. Not only about how people died but how they lived.
She felt a shiver of fear.
Never mind that hes an arrogant jerk. Just finish your cross.
Come on, Doctor. Now youre telling us you can read a body like some psychic with tea leaves?
Mistake! Never ask a question you cant answer. What the hell am I doing?
Go ahead. Enlighten us. What could you know about the death of Esmeralda Carramia that hasnt been covered by two years worth of investigation?
For one thing, he said, she was a gang member.
Manny heard a gasp and looked behind her. Mrs. Carramia sat with her face covered by her hands, sobbing.
The evidence is in the autopsy photos, Rosen went on. Miss Carramia had a pachuco tattoo.
Manny breathed a sigh of relief. You mean the crucifix? A religious symbol?
Now Rosen stared directly at the jurors. A simple homemade cross with three small dashes on top. Its a gang sign, often made with ink or ashes. Hers also had a fourth mark on the lower right side. His voice lowered. The jury leaned forward to listen. This indicates heroin addiction. In the really rough gangs its a badge of honor. Its usually a prison tattoo, by the way.
Manny felt dizzy. She saw Mr. Carramia, his face ashen, lead his wife from the room. They looked like a pair of children caught with their hands in a candy box. Rosen had transformed their angelic little girl into a shoplifting drug-addicted gangbanger. And her parents had known it all along. Move to strike, she said tonelessly.
Lost. Ive lost.
A defense lawyer was on his feet. Counsel opened the door when she had Miss Carramias mother testify about her childs spotless record.
The judge nodded. She sure did.
The others in the room, Essies friends and the friends of the cops, sat silently for a moment and then began to talk, heedless of the judges gavel. Only Rosen was still, sitting in the witness box like a king on his throne or, Manny thought, like my executioner.
No further questions, she whispered.
IT WAS JAKES IDEA of a perfect rainy Friday night. The trial was over, the truth had prevailed too bad about Manny Manfreda; she had done a good job but she didnt have the right evidence and now he was alone in his Upper East Side brownstone kitchen, eating Chinese food, reading a treatise on blood spatter, and listening to Duke Ellingtons soundtrack of
Anatomy of a Murder.
Brilliant movie, inspiring music.
Peace, its wonderful.
Alongside his take-out containers, piles of paperwork cluttered the top of his chrome-and-red Formica table; hed tackle it over the weekend. His kitchen held a motley group of appliances: a recently purchased commercial stainless steel refrigerator, an avocado-green stove from the sixties, a white porcelain double sink from the fifties. The countertops were fifties Formica in green geometrical patterns; the metal cabinets, painted and repainted over the years, were a drab beige. A butcher-block island, scarred by years of white rings from wet plates and glasses, stood in faded glory in the center of the space. French doors in the back opened into a garden, converted by neglect into living quarters for a few happy squirrels, some pigeons, and an occasional chair.
Jake had bought the five-story brownstone in the mid-1980s, shortly after being hired at the MEs office. He could only afford it because it was north of Ninety-sixth Street near Harlem, in those days not the nicest of neighborhoods. But he didnt see it as an investment or even a possession. He saw New Yorks history: the wealthy who had once populated the area, the careful work of nineteenth-century stonemasons, and the varied texture of the constantly changing community. When he finally had the money to do some work on the place, it was so full of forensic teaching materials and artifacts, he had no idea where to start. Besides, he didnt have the time. This was New York. People died by the hundreds every day. He
