“Get up here,” Judge Moreland said angrily to the attorneys. “Now!”
The conference was brief and intense. Moreland was animated. He shook his finger at Ludik and told the U.S. Attorney loud enough for me to hear to “back off.” I found myself admiring the way he ran the courtroom. And wondering what in the hell was happening.
When Ludik returned to the podium, he wasted no time.
“Detective Hoyt, back to the laptop. It is listed as ‘Evidentiary Item #6’ on the list, correct?”
Cody said, “Correct.”
“Let me ask you something as an experienced detective and investigator. Did you find anything about the photos themselves to be unusual or odd?”
Cody hesitated. “I’m not sure what you’re asking.”
But I did. And it had occurred to me earlier when we saw them but didn’t hit home until now. I felt sick inside. Olive, who suddenly got it as well, reached out and grasped my sleeve.
“The photos of the children,” Ludik said. “In all of them, the children are at their homes or with their families. They are the kinds of photos all parents take of their kids. We all have these kinds of photos on our desks. Isn’t that correct, Detective?”
“I’m not sure,” Cody said.
“Get to the point,” Judge Moreland said.
“I will do that now, Your Honor,” Ludik said deferentially. But he hesitated and looked down, as if gathering strength, as if preparing himself to do something he really didn’t want to do, but I recognized it as stage acting.
“Detective Hoyt,” Ludik said, “before we go back to that, let me draw your attention once again to the list of evidence gathered at my client’s trailer. Do you agree that there are 108 pieces of so-called evidence?”
“Yes.”
“Now, please turn to another document in your file, Detective Hoyt. This is the check-in sheet from the evidence room at the Denver Police Department dated June 8. Can you find it?”
Cody took his time. Finally, he grunted.
“Look at it closely, Detective Hoyt. It’s basically a copy of the other sheet, but there is a number on the right of each item of evidence where it’s been officially received by the sergeant in charge of the room. As each piece of evidence is entered, the sergeant assigns it a specific inventory number and date, correct?”
Another grunt.
“As I read the document, Detective Hoyt, there is one piece of evidence not registered by the sergeant on June 8. It’s on the list, but it isn’t noted until June 12-four days later. Do you see the item, Detective Hoyt? I’m referring to evidentiary item number 6, the laptop. It appears that the laptop was collected from my client’s trailer on June 8 but wasn’t checked into the authorities until June 12. Is that what you see as well, Detective Hoyt?”
“Yes.” Barely audible.
“And whose initials are those near the check-in entry on June 12, Detective Hoyt?”
“Mine.”
“So did the sergeant in charge of the evidence room make a stupid error, or was there really a four-day gap between when the laptop was taken and when it was checked in?”
Cody fixed a dead-eye stare on Ludik.
“Detective Hoyt, did you answer the question?”
Cody mumbled something I couldn’t hear. The whispering and murmuring in the courtroom among the spectators and the reporters drowned it out.
Judge Moreland called for quiet. When he had it, he turned to Cody, said, “Detective Hoyt, please answer the question.”
“I had the laptop in my custody,” Cody said.
“You did?” Ludik asked, false astonished. “Is that normal? Isn’t that a breach of departmental regulations?”
Cody said, “I wanted to see what was on it. I was doing my job.”
“Your job,” Ludik repeated with sarcasm. “So you’re a computer expert? You’re qualified to root through a suspect’s computer on your own for four days? Four days when real experts could have been going through it? And where were you doing this technical work-in your private Bat Cave?”
Blair was on her feet. “Judge, that’s argumentative! He’s harassing the witness.”
Olive whispered, “The judge is letting Bertie get away with stuff I can’t believe. He must be really mad at the detective, is all I can figure.”
Uh-oh. I tried to make eye contact with Cody, but he wouldn’t look up.
Cody glared at Ludik. His eyes burned red, his mouth was pinched tight.
Ludik apologized, then: “I’ll rephrase, Your Honor. Detective Hoyt, where were you on the weekend of June 9 and 10 immediately following the raid in Desolation Canyon? And where were you Monday, June 11, when the Denver PD log shows that you didn’t report for duty?”
Cody broke his glare from Ludik and looked to Blair and the U.S. Attorney, expecting something, help maybe. None came. The two of them were glaring at each other, obviously wondering who had missed this detail if it were true.
“Detective Hoyt?” the Judge prompted.
“Evergreen,” Cody said. The town of Evergreen was in the mountains via I-70.
“In a hotel in Evergreen?” Ludik asked innocently.
“No,” Cody answered.
“Where, then?”
“Where do you think I was?” Cody asked, baring his teeth at Ludik. “You seem to know everything, and you like drawing it out.”
“You were in jail, weren’t you, Detective Hoyt? Arrested for public intoxication Friday night, June 8. You were in the Evergreen town jail until Monday morning, weren’t you?”
Cody said, “I was. I was celebrating our arrest of Aubrey Coates, and things got out of hand, I guess.”
“You guess?”
“They got out of hand.”
Olive whispered to me, “My God. They didn’t know!”
Blair stood and asked for a recess. Moreland denied it.
Ludik shook his head sadly, as if it troubled him that the prosecution’s case-all those hours of preparation, all those press conferences announcing the capture of the Monster, all of the witnesses leading up to this moment-were an unfortunate waste of time.
“So where was the laptop while you were in jail, Detective Hoyt?”
“In my car. Locked in the trunk.”
“Are you sure? Could you somehow see your car out the window of the jail cell?”
“Your Honor!” Blair said, standing up, her voice high-pitched. “He’s once again harassing the witness.”
“It’s a legitimate question,” Judge Moreland answered, disappointment in Cody written across his face. He seemed the most let-down of all. “And one the witness will answer.”
Not “Detective Hoyt,” but the witness.
“Of course I couldn’t see it,” Cody said.
“So,” Ludik said, “for two and a half days the crucial piece of evidence in this case-the piece of evidence the prosecution is counting on to send my client to prison for the rest of his life-was in the trunk of your car in a parking lot outside of a bar in Evergreen, Colorado?”
Cody tried to swallow, and it looked like it hurt. “No one tampered with it,” he said.
“Oh? And how can you be sure?”
Cody looked away. “It wasn’t tampered with,” he said, without emotion.
Ludik moved in for the kill. “Detective Hoyt, let me follow up on a question that I brought up earlier-something that’s been bothering me ever since I saw the evidence against my client. You say you’re an expert in pedophiles and their behavior, that’s why you targeted my client. But don’t you find it strange that the photos he supposedly had on his laptop computer of the seven missing children were not pornographic or suggestive in any way? That they were candid shots taken mainly by their parents? That, in fact, the photos were the same ones circulated by the various police departments in their missing-persons alerts?”
Blair, despite herself, let out a little gasp. The U.S. Attorney turned sidewise in his chair, away from Cody. Aubrey Coates slowly leaned back in his chair and looked over his shoulder at the Wingate family, as if saying, “See?”