Malicious Intent (23 page)

‘From a psych viewpoint, he knows what is legal and not, but that doesn’t correlate with his sense of right and wrong. He doesn’t care what our law says. He lives by family law, the only way he knows.’

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‘You’ve interviewed Mohammed. What would you say about his state of mind?’ Brody asked.

Vaughan seemed to relax as he spoke. ‘I’ve no reason to think he is delusional. He avoided questions about his business dealings but made it clear he feels that he is in the right in the way he deals with business and family. This is where conclusions become interesting. He is, to my mind, a sociopath, but it could equally be argued that he is a fundamentalist Muslim who believes he is morally right. The Old Testament supports an eye for an eye, which is what he believes he’s doing.’

‘Surely a court isn’t going to buy that?’ Grant asked.

Dr. Gupta polished her glasses with the end of her sari. ‘This is not a phenomenon restricted to Islamic people. Fundamentalists and extremists exist in many religions – Judaism, Hinduism, Christianity. In general, the more extreme the beliefs, the more brutal the abuse of perceived transgressors.’

Her left eye twitched as she spoke. ‘There have been cases in which Aboriginal tribes have administered their own justice and the police have accepted that, in addition to our legal punishment. A youth accused of murder had both legs speared after killing another tribe member. Then our courts dealt with him, so he served double penalties, if you like.’

Grant shook his head. ‘There’s a big stretch from letting the tribe go around committing payback killings and GBH.’

‘Or is it?’ Brody said. As usual, his mind seemed to work quickly. ‘Vaughan, how did you find Deab during the interview?’

‘He’s aggressive, intimidating, has poor impulse control and is difficult to predict. In addition to that, he doesn’t exactly respect women, although any mention of his own mother makes him teary. That was the only hint of vulnerability he displayed. All in all, he’s a pretty unsympathetic character.’

Brody poured himself a glass of water. ‘He’ll alienate a jury, or at least any women on it, without even trying.’ He waved the jug at the others. ‘Anyone?’

‘Thank you.’ Dr. Gupta accepted a glass.

‘What about Fatima’s state of mind,’ Brody asked, ‘as a KATHRYN FOX

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female in this environment? What do we know about her? If she had a boyfriend, why didn’t she just take off with him?’

Dr. Gupta took what barely constituted a sip. ‘That’s the difficult thing. To an abused person, an open door isn’t necessarily seen as open. Women in these circumstances can be frightened of the violence escalating if they are caught leaving. In this case, it looks as though Fatima had good reason to be terrified. I have read the domestic violence history, which is not surprising, either.’

Grant interrupted. ‘I don’t get it. The girl had a GP boss prepared to protect her; there are plenty of social supports for women who live with violence. Why didn’t she just go to a shelter so he couldn’t find her, if the bashings were that bad?’

‘With respect, Fatima belonged to a small, closed community. She hadn’t been permitted to mix with anyone else, so she knew of no other options. Would you want to leave all your friends, family and possessions if you had no skills, no means of support? These women are often suffering from poor self-esteem, and leaving doesn’t appear to be an option.’

‘We’re forgetting that Fatima disappeared for a few weeks prior to her death,’ Anya said. ‘No one admits to seeing her in that time.’

Vaughan reached for the water jug. ‘During our interview, Deab expressed disgust at how his daughter was dressed when she died. It didn’t sound like the police had told him, so how else would he know unless he saw her that night?’

Anya said, ‘Belongings and clothes are returned to the families.’

Vaughan filled a glass. ‘I should have realized. Do the police have anything to tie him to the scene?’

‘A cigarette butt found in the toilet block, which we all know is a very public place,’ Brody said. ‘It was collected a week after the death and was initially identified as an imported brand that Deab smokes.’

Anya had heard about the ‘butt bible,’ an encyclopaedia of cigarette butts compiled by an officer in his spare time. It included details as well as photos of all the cigarettes available in Australia – and many from around the world. The officer 182

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had become the pinup boy of obsessive compulsives in the police service, and a positive example of thorough, if tedious, investigation.

‘Our Mohammed was then seen discarding a butt, which was collected, and the DNA found compared with that from the toilet block. It’s a pretty good match, apparently. How reliable is that?’ Brody asked Anya. ‘I’ve had cases where no DNA was found on the butt.’

‘Pretty accurate. As little as 0.6 milliliters of saliva could contain enough cells for a DNA comparison.’

Grant seemed skeptical. ‘Under privacy laws, can we challenge the admissibility of the sample the police found?’

‘No, once he threw it away, it was deemed discarded and fair game for the police to collect.’

Something else bothered Anya about Fatima’s death. ‘A tampon was used as a filter. Why would Deab use that when he smoked and cigarette butts were equally good? If he knew enough about it to filter the stuff, why choose a tampon?’

‘To make it look like suicide?’ Grant offered.

‘Which is what we don’t understand if he wants the world to know what he did. Isn’t using a tampon going too far?’

Brody rocked in his chair. ‘I have doubts about the veracity of his confession.’

As much as Anya wanted men like Deab to spend their lives in prison, she had to agree. He could have been provoked into a confession, to an extent by her.

‘Why would he confess to a crime that he didn’t commit?

We don’t even know whether a crime took place, apart from illicit drug use, that is.’

‘Anything’s possible,’ Brody said. ‘We’ve got a few weeks before the brief goes to the prosecuting attorney. I’ll talk to him some more and get the son in too. Anya, I want you to focus on the fibers we discussed in case they’re helpful. Vaughan, I’d like you to write a report on the personalities of victims of domestic violence. Incidence of antisocial behavior, suicide, substance abuse. That sort of thing.

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‘Now, for the charges of GBH. We know Mohammed suspected the Galea boy of having a sexual relationship with his daughter. Grant, I’d like you to interview the girl’s friends. See if you can get a statement substantiating his claim.’

Anya had a thought. ‘You’ll need to subpena Galea’s medical records, too.’

Brody looked perplexed. ‘I’ve gone through them already and he doesn’t have any previous head injuries or anatomical variants.’

‘What about herpes?’

‘Isn’t syphilis the one that causes brain damage?’ Grant Bourne smirked.

‘If there’s no mention of it in the local doctor’s records,’

Anya advised, ‘I’d check the sexual health clinics. If he doesn’t have it and was sexually involved with Fatima, the prosecution is bound to ask the question: Who managed to give her genital herpes before she died? It’s not going to look good for your client if he bashed the wrong man.’

Outside the chambers, Vaughan positioned himself next to Anya as the others walked ahead. She took the opportunity to ask if he knew anything about cults.

He leaned closer and whispered, ‘Thinking of joining one?’

Anya felt her face redden again. ‘I’m looking into a series of deaths that may involve a cult of some kind and wondered if you know any good references or people to speak to.’

‘Interestingly enough, I have some articles in my office. The behavior techniques the leaders implement are not dissimilar to those used by perpetrators of domestic violence and sexual abuse. What specifically do you need to know?’

‘Whether any cults encourage members to kill themselves outside the cult’s premises, and whether any operate in Sydney or up the coast.’

‘Sounds intriguing. I’ll see what I can find for you and let you know. How soon do you need the information?’

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‘Whenever you can manage would be great.’

Anya pulled a card from her jacket pocket and handed it to him.

Awkward silence took over. She felt like talking longer but had nothing to say. He seemed to be waiting for her to speak, which made it worse.

‘I’ll be in touch,’ he said, saving her any more embarrassment, and left the building.

30

Anya answered the door, dressed in a striped T-shirt and capri pants.

‘Bit formal for an agricultural show, don’t you think?’ she said, assessing Kate Farrer’s caramel suit.

‘Change of plan, sorry. Gotta work.’

‘Ben’ll be disappointed. You can be the bad guy and break the news. He’s up tidying his room.’

‘Fair enough. That gives us a minute.’ She stepped back into the front yard, ensuring privacy from little ears. ‘You were right about the Finch case. As if the case wasn’t sick enough already with the old man’s jam fetish, Polilight exam showed semen right up the back of Debbie’s throat that wasn’t picked up at the initial exam.’

‘Semen in the throat isn’t the first thing you look for in a shooting victim. If jam was in other parts of the mouth, it’s understandable how it was missed.’

Kate put both hands on her hips. ‘I know the old man had a history, but I got thinking about his state of mind, or lack of it. I asked for DNA. It confirmed the semen wasn’t his.’

Anya’s skin prickled. ‘Someone else
was
there.’

‘Yep, your gut feeling about the toilet seat was right.’

That raised more questions than it answered, Anya thought.

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‘Why would someone go to the trouble of making sure he didn’t leave fingermarks on the doors, but not worry about having oral sex or urinating in the house?’

‘That’s what gets me. He must have cleaned himself up in there. You think if he’d worried about leaving evidence, he would have gone outside for a leak. Especially since the backyard is fairly private.’

Anya agreed. ‘Did the neighbors hear anything?’

‘The old lady a couple of doors down heard two loud bangs but had no idea when. She thought it was kids with firecrack-ers. So we don’t know how far apart the shots were. Times of death can’t be pinned down that closely to help.’

‘Maybe this guy’s pretty confident. If he’s brazen enough to put jam on himself and make Debbie lick it off, he probably cleaned himself up, assuming no one would check the toilet.’

‘Obviously he knew about Daddy’s little secret,’ Kate said, glancing up at the stairs behind her, to check Ben wasn’t within earshot. ‘So the next question is, whether this guy killed them both. Or did he come along to help Debbie? Maybe he went along having no idea about the gun or her plans. Either way, I want to find this guy. I’ll start with the DNA bank and see if he’s got priors.’

Initially, Anya had concerns about privacy issues with the New South Wales DNA bank. In a flurry of publicity, police and victims of crime groups hailed it as a godsend. Her father had even campaigned for it. In the first year, over sixty cold cases were solved with DNA matches. It soon became clear to her that having that facility meant more victims could attain closure, which had to be a good thing. And Kate was right.

This mystery man could be the key to finding the source of the lung fibers. And he could still be at risk from them if he wasn’t found.

‘By the way. You’re the toast of the station,’ Kate gloated,

‘for getting Deab’s confession. Bet Brody gave you a gold star for that little effort.’ She laughed a deep, throaty chuckle.

Anya’s cheeks burned. ‘Dan figured it was better to know KATHRYN FOX

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now instead of Deab blurting it out mid-trial. For your information, as soon as he heard it, he went into ethical mode.

There’s no way he could plead not guilty for Deab once he’d heard him admit to killing Fatima.’

‘Lawyer, ethical? You sound like you’re going soft. He hasn’t got to you, has he?’ Kate teased. ‘Buggers me what women see in him.’

‘God, no.’ Anya hadn’t been interested in anyone since Martin. Seeing her ex-husband in a suit reminded her of how attractive he’d once seemed. She lowered her voice to share the news. ‘Martin’s had a second interview at Ryde for a pharmaceutical company. He’s waiting for the official nod, but it sounds promising.’

‘So you might see more of Ben? That really is great.’

‘Aunty Kate!’ Ben took two stairs at a time, galloped to the open door and leaped into Kate’s outstretched arms.

‘Hey buddy, how’s it going? You are growing so quickly.’

Ben let go and fidgeted on the spot. ‘Are you coming with us to the Easter Show?’

‘Sorry, champ, I’ve got to work.’

Ben’s face couldn’t hide his disappointment.

‘But tell you what. Next time you visit, we can kick a football around and even fly that kite in the park. Promise. What do you say?’

‘O-KAY!’ Ben threw his arms around the best football player he knew and landed a big kiss on her mouth.

Kate returned the affection by hanging him upside down by the legs and tickling his exposed belly.

Anya put a change of clothes for Ben, jackets and snacks in the car and heard him scream, ‘Stop!’ then, ‘Again, again!’ from the doorstep.

‘Are you catching baddies today?’ he asked Kate from a semiupright position.

‘Sure hope so. You have fun and be good for your mum, okay?’

‘I’m always good!’

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Anya closed the car door and noticed Vaughan Hunter crossing the road toward her. Dressed in a pale blue shirt and khaki chinos, with a sweater draped across his shoulders, he carried a large yellow envelope. She quickly checked for stains on her capri pants that could have been put there by peanut butter fingers.

‘Good morning,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Didn’t expect you’d be at your office on a weekend, and I’m afraid I missed the post.’

‘I live here. Makes commuting easy.’ Anya wiped her palms on her pants.