Practice to Deceive

oldest friends. Young said he had seen Jim about three times during the Christmas holidays in 2003. The last time was on the twenty-sixth.
    “Morning or afternoon?” Montoya asked.
    “Between noon and one.”
    “Was he by himself?”
    “No, he was with Peggy Sue Thomas.”
    “No more questions.”
    On Friday, July 20, 2012, Banks recalled Detective Mark Plumberg to the stand. The tall investigator went over the circumstances of his videotaping Jim Huden in Punta Gorda in the late summer of 2004. He, Mike Beech, and the Florida officer were present at the time.
    After some editing (to remove about eight minutes of tape where Huden sat alone waiting for the interview to begin), Matt Montoya reviewed the tape and agreed that the jury could see it. It was shown to both the jury and the gallery.
    It was, of course, a damning tape, where Jim had been advised of his Miranda rights and he freely admitted going to Whidbey Island with Peggy at Christmas, and discussed the present he delivered “to Mark’s apartment” during that time.
    Greg Banks again questioned the county coroner, Robert Bishop, to help the jury understand blood back spatter. Bishop had been the Island County coroner for decades. When Banks asked him how much experience he had in evaluating fatal gunshot wounds to the head, Bishop answered: “Ninety-two fatal gunshot to the head cases [specifically], and over five thousand deaths since I became coroner.”
    “What is your opinion as to where the victim was shot [inside the car versus outside]?”
    “I feel very strongly he was shot where he was found, considering evidence of blood drainage as the victim was positioned in the car, lack of blood over bottom of the driver’s-side door frame, position of feet, no bunching of pants around the knees—which appears when a body has been moved— and the tiny shards of shattered sunglasses.”
    Bishop’s testimony negated virtually all of Dr. Jon Nordby’s scientific conclusions. Indeed, Nordby’s ponderous and lengthy time on the witness stand had obviously annoyed some of the jurors as they struggled to keep up with his theories.

C HAPTER T HIRTY-SEVEN
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    E VERYONE INVOLVED HAD EXPECTED Jim Huden’s trial to last at least two weeks. But then the gallery had hoped to hear from both Jim and Peggy Sue. Most of the testimony so far had shown that everywhere that Jim went in late 2003 and early 2004, Peggy Sue went, too.
    No longer.
    Jim had never made so much as a move toward the witness chair, and no one had seen Peggy Sue anywhere near the Island County courtroom. Had they testified, the trial would certainly have been much longer. As it was, there had been only eight days of testimony when the opposing attorneys rose to make their final statements. Judge Vickie Churchill would then give the jury instructions for their deliberation.
    Judge Churchill advised the jury on that Friday morning that they would need to agree that four elements of the case before them had been proven in order to find James Huden guilty of first-degree, aggravated murder:
1. That Russel Douglas was indeed deceased.
2. That the incident occurred in the state of Washington.
3. That James Huden was involved in the murder of Russel Douglas on December 26, 2003.
4. That Douglas’s homicide was premeditated.
    Greg Banks began his closing arguments and stressed that all of these essentials had been proven in Huden’s trial. Bill Hill’s testimony and physical evidence had validated the third element, and circumstantial evidence had substantiated the fourth. The site of Russ Douglas’s homicide and the fact that he was deceased left no doubt that number one and number two were correct.
    Banks moved to charts and photographs that would help the jurors understand timelines and the trail of the deadly .380 Bersa to and from Washington State and Arizona.
    Russ Douglas’s face appeared on the screen, along with photos of Bill Hill and Keith Ogden.
    “This case is also about heroes,” Banks said. “I submit to you that Bill Hill is a hero; he had to choose between loyalty to his best and closest friend, and what his conscience told him.”
    And so, of course, did Keith Ogden, the former Oregon cop who hadn’t hesitated to turn in the .380 when he learned that Washington detectives were looking for it.
    “Neither of them were familiar with Whidbey Island or the crime, but they were motivated to testify against Huden because of their consciences.
    “Mr. Hill knew there was