Don’t Look Behind You

that. She had asked him to come visit in Puyallup solely because their mother was putting too much pressure on her. She had never said what kind of pressure Geri Hesse was exerting—whether it was emotional or just full of annoying demands.
    “No. No. No.” She was not present when Joe Tarricone was killed. Sarcastically, she asked the deputy prosecutor, “Do you really think I would not remember if someone was shot in my basement?”
    As Dawn Farina zeroed in on the process involved in dissecting a six-foot-plus man into manageable pieces, the jurors listened carefully, some turning pale and others looking ill.
    Gypsy Tarricone, who still calls Dawn Farina “the little spitfire,” for her fearlessness in bringing her father’s murder case to trial and for her incisive cross-examining of Renee, listened and watched avidly. She could see that Renee was no match for Dawn.
    Renee clearly detested the prosecutor, answering her questions curtly.
    Using Renee’s earlier statement to Ben Benson and Denny Wood, Farina read aloud what the defendant had said on March 24, 2008—now fourteen months in the past.
    “You first said that you didn’t talk on the phone to Nick in Alaska before he came down here,” Farina said. “And that was a lie, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes, that was a lie.”
    “And you said that you didn’t know that Nick’s wife, Vickie Notaro, was dead before he came down here. And that was a lie, wasn’t it?”
    “Yes, that was a lie.”
    “You said you didn’t know where Joe Tarricone was when he disappeared, didn’t you? And that was a lie?”
    “Yes, that was a lie.”
    Renee’s eyes shot daggers at Dawn Farina.
    “You told Dean Tarricone [Joe’s youngest son] that you had never spoken to the police about Joseph’s disappearance. Correct?”
    “I don’t recall.”
    “And, in fact, you did speak to the police?”
    “I spoke with Detective Burger and Detective Reinicke [of the Pierce County Sheriff’s Office] about Joe’s disappearance, correct.”
    “You told Dean, during that phone conversation, quote: ‘Yeah. It was—it was before that. The last time I saw him, he wanted to go to Europe. And then when all that came about, I thought—well, maybe—heck, maybe that’s where he went. Maybe he went to Europe.’ You said that to Dean Tarricone, didn’t you?”
    “If that’s in the transcript, yes.”
    “And that was a lie?”
    “Yes, it was.”
    “You also told Dean Tarricone, during that phone conversation, quote: ‘But, you know, or I kind of figured, well, finally, maybe he met somebody else, and you know, kind of attached his affections there.’ End quote.”
    “Yes, that was a lie.” This time, Renee hadn’t even waited for Dawn Farina’s question. She had plunged ahead and identified yet another lie.
    On redirect, Gary Clower tried to defuse some of the damage Dawn Farina’s cross had done. He pointed out that Renee had occasionally been confused on the tape of her interview with Ben Benson and Denny Wood.
    “You were asked whether you made statements to the detectives regarding asking Nick for help with Joe; do you recall those questions from counsel [Farina]?”
    “I remember the questions.”
    “Do you remember being asked the question by the detectives: ‘How did you think he was going to help with the situation with Joe?’ and you answering, ‘I don’t necessarily recall thinking he was going to help. Maybe he could talk to him. Maybe I’m putting words in my head that I don’t recall, and I don’t want to do that’?”
    “The detectives had asked the question so many times, their questions were becoming my memories,” Renee testified.
    Could the jury give this bemused version of Renee’s first interview more weight than her just-ended testimony about cutting up her former lover’s body?
    It seemed unlikely.
    * * *
    “Call Nicholas Notaro.”
    The tall, shambling man who had admitted to killing both his wife and his sister’s former lover took the witness stand.
    Had Nick Notaro testified first, as originally scheduled, and as the defense planned, Renee could have backed up his version. But, as it was, he came to testify
after
she did, and he was totally clueless about what she had said.
    Nick took the witness stand fully intending to support Renee’s version of how Joe Tarricone perished in 1978. But few of his answers matched hers. He wasn’t anywhere near as cunning as Renee was, and he didn’t make a good witness for the defense.