Tragic (19 page)

Without an opening statement to give him a feel for the strategy of the defense case, Karp had to anticipate any possibility. But that was not an issue, as he believed that success in the courtroom was
all about intense and comprehensive preparation, leaving little room for the unexpected.

After Clooney declined to give an opening statement, Karp launched into the prosecution case by calling the technical witnesses who, though playing bit parts, were necessary to set the stage for the main characters. The first was the civil engineer Jack Farrell, who’d gone to the Hell’s Kitchen and New Rochelle crime scenes, measured the areas where evidence was found, and reduced his computations to two diagrams, People’s 1 and 2 in evidence. Next up was the police photographer who’d arrived at the crime scene the evening of the murder and then gone to New Rochelle at the request of Detective Fulton. The photographs also included a large black-and-white aerial view of the Carlotta house and neighborhood. He testified that he had taken the aerial photo from an NYPD helicopter so that he was able to say that it fairly and accurately represented the scene as he observed it.

The NYPD photographer was followed by a procession of pro forma homicide witnesses: the first police officers on the scene, as well as the paramedics and the assistant medical examiner who dispassionately described the fatal wounds observed during autopsy.

Karp controlled the pace of the testimony, careful to let the witnesses make the points necessary but without boring the jurors. Then he called William “Gnat” Miller to the stand to begin the second day.

As Karp waited for Miller to take his place in the witness box, he looked over the other “players” in the courtroom. The pews in the gallery behind the defense table were lightly populated. Alexei Bebnev, who he knew was in the country illegally and had no family, also apparently had no supporters in the room. The defendant didn’t seem to mind, though, as he laughed and joked with Clooney.

On the other hand, Frank DiMarzo appeared to have a large family comprised of an elderly couple, who Karp took to be his
mother and father, and a half-dozen younger women ranging in age from their teens to thirties who he guessed were sisters, cousins, or family friends. They’d already been seated that morning when the defendants were brought in. They greeted DiMarzo’s appearance with small cries of support and grief. He looked at them briefly but then hung his head. Karp had not seen him look back since sitting down at the defense table, nor did he engage with his two court-appointed lawyers who sat on either side of him.

There was one young blond woman sitting several rows behind the defense table who sat taking notes on a yellow legal pad. Karp had learned from Guma, who’d seen a pretty face and chatted her up, that she was a law intern for longtime union lawyer Syd Kowalski, a crony of Charlie Vitteli.

Elsewhere in the gallery, a dozen or so tough-looking men who Karp thought might be union members sat on the “prosecution side” of the courtroom. Scattered throughout were members of the media, who sat scribbling on notepads or quietly talking and giggling among themselves.

There was also the usual assortment of “court buffs,” people who followed interesting or high-profile cases and appeared each day to watch the wheels of justice grind. Some looked like retirees who actually dressed up for the occasion; others were more ragtag street people looking for a place to rest for a few hours with, perhaps, free entertainment. Nothing unusual on this day except for three shabbily dressed women who entered the room just a few moments before Judge See took the bench. Looking lost, they sat down in the back row and put their heads together in hushed conversation, looking up now and again as if worried someone might overhear them.

As William “Gnat” Miller was sworn in, Karp glanced over at Judge See. Built like a one-iron, with a very calming demeanor, the jurist was highly knowledgeable and well trained; in fact, he’d been a brilliant trial lawyer. He commanded respect and diffused emotional court exchanges with his even temperament.

See also liked to move his cases along, and Karp had wasted no time asking Miller to identify his co-conspirators. “A job? What sort of job?”

Taking a deep breath, Gnat let it out as a sigh, then answered. “Bebnev was going to shoot somebody and he needed a lookout, which was Frank, and somebody with a car who could drive, which was me.”

“And were you to be paid for participating in this crime?”

Miller nodded. “Yeah, Frankie and I were going to split fourteen thousand.”

“And were you in fact paid?”

“Most of it. We each got six thousand. Bebnev cheated us on the rest.”

“Did you know who Alexei Bebnev intended to shoot?”

“Not at first. Just some guy in New Rochelle.”

“When did you learn the victim’s name?”

“When we were parked up the street from his house,” Miller said. “Frankie had a magazine photograph Bebnev had given him to make sure it was the right guy. I didn’t get a good look at it but there were four guys standing together; one of them had a circle drawn around his face. When they drove up to the house, Frankie looked at the photo and said something like, ‘That’s the guy. That’s Vince Carlotta.’ ”

“When you say ‘they’ drove up to the house, who do you mean?”

“The Carlottas,” Miller responded, glancing quickly at the defendants before averting his eyes again. “Mr. Carlotta, his wife, and his . . . his baby.”

“Did Bebnev intend to shoot Mr. Carlotta at that time?”

“Yeah. That was the plan.”

“Please explain?”

“Bebnev had a gun and kept saying how he was going to point it at the guy’s face and pull the trigger. He kept saying, ‘Bang, bang, asshole is dead.’ ”

“You said the defendant DiMarzo spotted Mr. Carlotta while
you were parked up the street from the Carlotta residence in New Rochelle.”

“Yeah.”

“Mr. Miller, do you use any tobacco products?”

“Yeah, I chew tobacco.”

“And were you chewing tobacco the night you waited outside the Carlotta residence?”

“Yeah.”

“What were you doing with the tobacco juice?”

“I was spitting into an empty beer bottle.”

“Do you remember what you did with that beer bottle?”

“Yeah, I had to take a leak, so I got out and went over to that bush on the picture there,” Gnat said, pointing at the easel. “I took the bottle with me. That’s about when the Carlottas drove past, so I just tossed the bottle into the bushes.”

“Was Frank DiMarzo using any tobacco products?”

“No. Frankie don’t chew.”

“What about smoke?”

“Nah, he don’t smoke, either. He’s kind of a health nut.”

“What about Bebnev?”

“Yeah, he smokes like a chimney,” Gnat agreed. “Some crappy Russian cigarette. He thinks they’re better than American cigarettes but they smell like shit.”

“Fuck you,
sooka,
” Bebnev muttered, loud enough to be heard by the jurors and the judge, who gave him a blistering look that caused the Russian to drop his head.

“He was smoking while you waited in the car?”

“Yeah.”

“What was he doing with the cigarette butts?”

“Mostly tossing them out the window. One time he put one out on my floorboard, which pissed me off. He’s a pig.”

Bebnev’s eyes widened but he said nothing, just looked back up at Gnat with a tight smile on his face.

“What happened after the Carlottas got home?”

“Well, we drove to the front of the house and Frankie and Bebnev got out.”

“And what did you do?”

“I waited in the car.”

“Then what happened?”

“Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“The lady answered the door. Then the guy showed up. They talked but nothing happened. Frankie and Bebnev got back in the car and we drove back to the city.”

“Did anybody explain why nothing happened?”

“Yeah, Bebnev said he wasn’t paid to shoot no lady and a kid. I think he just lost his nerve.”

As he spoke, Gnat looked over at Bebnev, whose eyes bugged. He looked like he was going to yell something, but his attorney grabbed his arm and spoke to him quietly. The Russian yanked his arm away from the attorney, his face a mask of rage, but he remained silent.

Karp turned to the judge and asked for permission for Gnat to step down and walk over to the easel. “Mr. Miller, have you ever seen this aerial photograph of the Carlotta residence and neighborhood before?”

“Yes, you’ve showed it to me before in your office,” Miller answered.

“Did I tell you at that time why I was showing it to you?”

“Yes. So that I would know what I was looking at in court. And you wanted to know where I parked that night.”

Karp handed Miller a black marker. “Would you please draw a circle to show the jury where you parked when you were waiting for the Carlottas to return that night.”

“Right about here, in front of that school,” Miller said as he drew the circle.

“Okay, would you write ‘C’ inside the circle to indicate ‘car’?” Karp said. “Now, take the marker and indicate where you parked on the street after the Carlottas arrived.”

Gnat did as he was told and then faced Karp, who towered over him and said, “Thank you, you may return to your seat.”

When Gnat was seated, Karp asked, “So after the defendant Bebnev got cold feet you drove back to Brooklyn?”

Gnat nodded. “Yeah. I thought it might be over. I was hoping it was over. But then Frankie called a few days later and said it was back on. Only now it was going to go down in Hell’s Kitchen outside of a restaurant called Marlon’s.”

After this reply, Karp looked at his watch and then at the judge. “Your Honor, it’s about the lunch hour, and this would be a good place to break,” he said.

Judge See glanced at the clock on the wall over the courtroom doors and nodded. “I’m sure we’re all ready for a bite,” he said to the jurors. “The court clerk will escort you back to the jury room and we’ll see you in an hour.” He banged the gavel. “Court is in recess.”

A
FTER SPEAKING QUICKLY TO
G
UMA,
Karp left the courtroom and hurried down to the street to grab a hot dog at the vendor next to Dirty Warren’s newsstand. He barely had time to take a bite of the dog garnished with mustard and hot sauerkraut when his eccentric friend poked his head around the corner of the stand.

“Hey, Karp,” Dirty Warren yelled. “How’s it . . . fuck piss shit . . . going upstairs? I hear you got one of the . . . oh boy whoop . . . perps on the stand.”

“Yeah, the getaway driver,” Karp acknowledged. “A guy named ‘Gnat’ Miller. You know him?”

“Nah, I don’t hang . . . tits oh boy ohhhh boy . . . out with murderers, well, other than David Grale.”

Karp rolled his eyes at the mention of the insane killer vigilante who haunted the subterranean bowels of New York City with his army of Mole People, preying on evildoers like some sort of dark comic book antihero. “How is David these days?”

“I’m going to go . . . whoop whoop . . . see him tonight,” Dirty Warren replied. “He got word to me that he may have some important info about your case. Not to change the subject or anything but this guy, Gnat Miller, I guess his . . . whoop whoop . . . conscience got the better of him?”

“Yeah, that’s about the size of it,” Karp replied. “That and Marlene nailed his butt, no pun intended, and we had him dead to rights.”

“Yeah, she’s a regular Nancy Drew. Hey, here’s one for you: ‘Conscience . . . that stuff can drive you nuts!’ Whoop oh boy nuts balls.”

“I thought I told you to never again imitate Brando doing
On the Waterfront
,” Karp growled, feigning a serious look.

Dirty Warren giggled. “I thought it was appropriate given the circumstances.”

“Maybe so, maybe so,” Karp replied with a grin. “By the way, you hear anything more about these supposed eyewitnesses to the murder coming forward?”

Dirty Warren acted like Karp had just revealed a state secret. He came out from his newsstand and walked up next to Karp. “Careful,” he said. “The streets got . . . crap my ass . . . ears. Nothing but rumors still. People are scared. Folks are getting their throats . . . oh boy whoop oh boy . . . cut, if you know what I mean.”

Karp nodded. “Yeah, I know,” he said. “But if you get a chance to talk to any of these people, you tell them that I’ll personally guarantee their safety, but I can’t do that if I don’t know who they are.”

“Yeah, yeah, sure,” Dirty Warren said. “If I talk to them I . . . boobs titties . . . will.”

“All right, my friend, got to run,” Karp said, stuffing the last bit of hot dog into his mouth and sipping the remains of his orange soda as he headed back into the Criminal Courts Building.

As he rode the elevator up, Karp wondered if he would ever be able to knock over the last domino in this case, the seemingly elusive Charlie Vitteli. He would have loved to see the photograph Miller had mentioned that DiMarzo used to identify Carlotta and wondered if it would have led him to the end of the game. But a search of DiMarzo’s home and Miller’s car had not turned it up.

But the game’s not over till the fat lady sings,
he reminded himself.
And we’re a long ways from that.

When Karp reentered the courtroom he noticed that among the few spectators already there were the three poorly dressed women he’d seen previously. “Good afternoon, ladies,” he said as he walked past.

The women looked at him, their eyes widening with surprise or . . . something he couldn’t put his finger on. Then they went back to their conversation.

“When?” one asked the others.

“When the hurly-burly’s done,” the black woman replied.

“When the battle’s lost or won,” added the last.

Karp shook his head.
Street people quoting Shakespeare in court
, he thought.
The denizens of this city never cease to amaze me.
He considered whether to toss a line at them, but decided to check in on Miller, who was in the witness room adjacent to the court.

“How you holding up?” Karp asked when he walked in.

“Okay,” Miller said and shrugged. “I wish I could talk to Frankie and try to explain why I’m testifying. We’ve been friends for a long time and been through a lot of good times and bad. He’s my kid’s godfather. I remember talking to him in our cell at juvie; we swore we’d never turn on each other.”