Mickey Haller 4 - The Fifth Witness

gone.

Forty-three
    The afternoon belonged to Shamiram Arslanian, my forensics expert from New York. I had used Shami to great effect in previous trials and that was again the plan here. She had degrees from Harvard, MIT and John Jay, was currently a research fellow at the latter, and had a winning and telegenic personality. On top of that she had an integrity that shone through on the witness stand with every word of testimony. She was a defense lawyer’s dream. No doubt, she was a gun for hire but she took the job only if she believed in the science and in what she was going to say on the stand. What’s more, there was a bonus for me in this case. She was the exact same height as my client.
    During the lunch break Arslanian had set up a mannequin in front of the jury box. It was a male figure standing exactly six foot two and a half inches tall, the same height as Mitchell Bondurant in his shoes. It wore a suit similar to the one Bondurant was wearing on the morning of his murder and the exact same shoes. The mannequin had joints that allowed for a full range of natural human motion.
    After court resumed and my witness took the stand, I took my time going through her voluminous bona fides. I wanted the jurors to understand this woman’s accomplishments and to like her offhand manner of answering questions. I also wanted them to realize that her skills and knowledge put her on a different plane than the state’s forensic witnesses. A higher plane.
    Once the impression had been made I got down to the business of the mannequin.
    “Now, Dr. Arslanian, I asked you to review aspects of the murder of Mitchell Bondurant, is that true?”
    “Yes, you did.”
    “And in particular I wanted to examine the physics of the crime, true?”
    “Yes, you basically asked me to find out if your client could’ve actually done the crime in the way the police said she did.”
    “And did you conclude that she could have?”
    “Well, yes and no. I determined that yes, she could have done it but it wouldn’t have been in the manner the detectives out here were saying.”
    “Can you explain your conclusion?”
    “I would rather demonstrate, using myself in the place of your client.”
    “How tall are you, Dr. Arslanian?”
    “I’m five foot three in my stocking feet, same height that I was told Lisa Trammel is.”
    “And did I send you a hammer that was a duplicate of the hammer recovered by police and declared to be the murder weapon?”
    “Yes, you did. And I brought it with me.”
    She held the duplicate hammer up from the shelf at the front of the witness box.
    “And did you get photos from me depicting the gardening shoes that were seized from the defendant’s unlocked garage and later found to have the victim’s blood on them?”
    “Yes, you did that, too, and I was able to procure an exact duplicate pair on the Internet. I’m wearing them now.”
    She kicked one leg out from the side of the witness box, showing off the waterproof shoe. There was a polite round of laughter in the courtroom. I asked the judge to allow my witness to conduct the demonstration of her findings and he agreed over objection from the prosecution.
    Arslanian left the witness box with the hammer and proceeded with her demonstration.
    “The question I was asking myself was, could a woman the defendant’s height, which is five foot three like mine, have struck the fatal blow on the crown of the head of a man who is six foot two and a half in his work shoes? Now the hammer, which adds about an extra ten inches in reach, is helpful in this regard, but is it enough? That was my question.”
    “Doctor, if I can interrupt, can you tell us about your mannequin and how you prepared it for your testimony?”
    “Of course. Everybody, this is Manny and I use him all the time when I testify in trials and when I conduct tests in my lab back at John Jay. He has all the joints like a real human being and he comes apart if I need him to and the best thing is he never talks back or says I look fat in my jeans.”
    Again she scored some polite laughter.
    “Thank you, Doctor,” I said quickly before the judge could tell her to keep it serious. “If you could go on with your demonstration.”
    “Sure. Well, what I did was use the autopsy report and the photos and drawings to exactly locate the spot on the skull of the mannequin where the fatal blow was struck. Now we know because of the notch in the striking face that Mr. Bondurant was struck from