A Darkness More Than Night

rejoinder. “Let the witness complete his answer and then we’ll see how vague it is. Go ahead, Detective Bosch.”
    Bosch cleared his throat.
    “I was going to say that several samples of pubic hair not -”
    “What is ‘several,’ Your Honor,” Fowkkes said. “My ongoing objection is to the lack of preciseness this witness is offering the jury.”
    Bosch looked at Langwiser and saw how mad she was getting.
    “Judge,” she said, “could we please have direction from the court as to when objections can be raised? Defense counsel is seeking to constantly interrupt the witness because he knows we are moving into an area that is particularly devastating to his -”
    “Ms. Langwiser, this isn’t the time for closing arguments,” the judge said, cutting her off. “Mr. Fowkkes, unless you are seeing a dire miscarriage of justice, I want objections stated either before a witness speaks or after he has completed at least a sentence.”
    “Your Honor, the consequences are dire here. The state is trying to take away my client’s life, simply because his moral views are -”
    “Mr. Fowkkes!” the judge boomed. “That goes for you, too, on the closing arguments. Let’s continue the testimony, shall we?”
    He turned to Bosch.
    “Detective, continue – and try to be a little more precise in your answers.”
    Bosch looked at Langwiser and saw her close her eyes momentarily. The judge’s offhanded direction to Bosch had been what Fowkkes was going for. A hint to the jurors that there might be vagueness, maybe even obfuscation in the prosecution’s case. Fowkkes had successfully goaded the judge into appearing to agree with his objections.
    Bosch glanced over at Fowkkes and saw him sitting with arms folded and a satisfied, if not smug, look on his face. Bosch looked back down at the murder book in front of him.
    “Can I refer to my notes?” he asked.
    He was told he could. He opened the binder and turned to the evidence reports. Looking at the medical examiner’s evidence collection report, he began again.
    “Prior to autopsy an evidence-collecting brush was passed through the victim’s pubic hair. The comb collected eight samples of pubic hair that subsequent laboratory testing showed to have come from someone other than the victim.”
    He looked up at Langwiser.
    “Were those pubic hairs from eight different people?”
    “No, the lab tests identified them as coming from the same unknown person.”
    “And what did this indicate to you?”
    “That the victim likely had sexual relations with someone between the time of her last bathing and her death.”
    Langwiser looked down at her notes.
    “Was there any other hair evidence collected on the victim or at the scene of the crime, Detective?”
    Bosch turned a page in the murder book.
    “Yes, a single strand of hair measuring two and one half inches long was found entangled on the clasp of a gold necklace the victim wore around her neck. The clasp was located at the back of the victim’s neck. This, too, was identified during lab analysis as coming from someone other than the victim.”
    “Going back for a moment to the pubic hair. Were there any other indications or evidence collected from the body or the crime scene indicating the victim had engaged in sexual relations in the time between bathing and her death?
    “No, there wasn’t. No semen was collected from the vagina.”
    “Is there a conflict between that and the finding of the pubic hair?”
    “No conflict. It was simply an indication that a condom could have been used during the sex act.”
    “Okay, moving on, Detective. Fingerprints. You mentioned fingerprints were found in the house. Please tell us about that area of the investigation.”
    Bosch turned to the fingerprint report in the binder. “There were a total of sixty-eight exemplars of fingerprints gathered inside the house where the victim was found. The victim and her roommate accounted for fifty-two of these. It was determined that the remaining sixteen were left by a total of seven people.”
    “And who were these people?”
    Bosch read the list of names from the binder. Through questioning from Langwiser he explained who each person was and how the detectives traced down when and why they had been in the house. They were friends of the roommates as well as family members, a former boyfriend and a prior date. The prosecution team knew that the defense would attempt to go to town on the prints, using them as red herrings