“I need you to be brutal.”
Eric stood with his hands folded, staring down at the two long, foldable tables I’d set up in the apartment above the garage. For the next few months, this would be my trial prep war room for Katy’s case. Better to keep everything outside the office and away from Emma. One week after Katy’s arraignment and I had my copy of the complete police report.
As expected, the district court judge denied bail. For strategic matters, we had chosen not to waive Katy’s right to a speedy trial. Time was more on the prosecution’s side than mine. Barring any delays, Katy would face a jury by the end of the summer.
Jeanie sat in a recliner against the wall, sipping green juice from an insulated mug. It turned out she liked camping out in my garage apartment more than her own office. The chair was Joe’s. He had rented the place from me for almost a year after he and Katy first split up.
“Imean it,” I said to Eric. “You’re my gut check on this. On the evidentiary side. Jeanie, you’re my ethical gut check. I want to make sure we’re on solid ground at all times.”
“How’d he take it?” Jeanie asked. “Judge Castor. When you filed your appearance. I realized I never asked you.”
“He wasn’t happy. But he couldn’t find any flaws in our legal argument. He was convinced this is what Katy wants.”
I had moved two whiteboards from the office and set them up in the corner of the room on easels. I wrote Guilty on one board and Not Guilty on the other. Today, we’d go over the basic case against Katy and figure out the shape of my defense.
Eric walked over to the Guilty board and picked up the red dry erase marker. In his neat block lettering, he wrote “Jenna Rodney” then circled it three times.
“What do we know about her so far?” Jeanie asked.
I picked up a one-page report Eric had compiled with Katy’s housekeeper’s background.
“Twenty-eight,” I said. “She’s lived in or around Delphi her whole life. Has a high school diploma but no college. She worked in food service at Great Lakes University just out of school. She started cleaning houses for extra money. As of four years ago, she transitioned to that as her main source of income. Her client list includes two other houses in Tom Loomis’s neighborhood. One across town in Sycamore Hills.”
“Oooh,” Jeanie said. “Fancy. Those are million-dollar homes.”
“She also takes care of the vet clinic on Wood Lane. All word of mouth. She doesn’t advertise. Self-employed with no LLC or any formal business structure.”
“Do we know who she associates with?” Eric asked.
“Katy says she has an on-again off-again boyfriend but Jenna doesn’t go into much detail about her personal life. She’s just been a sweet, earnest, hard-working kid for as long as Katy’s known her.”
“No funny business between her and Tom?” Jeanie asked.
“Katy said no and was pretty adamant about it. She said she’s never had any issues with Jenna and boundaries.”
“No record?” Eric asked.
“Nope,” I said. “Clean as a whistle. Every single one of her clients hired her after a referral from another client on her list. Katy told me she actually has a waiting list because she’s so busy.”
“Somebody’s lucky day,” Jeanie said. “She’s recently had a spot open up.”
I shot her a look. Jeanie smiled. “Sorry. Too dark? Too soon?”
I rolled my eyes. “She even declares all of her income even though she gets paid under the table.”
Eric had Jenna Rodney’s formal statement in his hands. The prosecutor had also sent over the recording of her interview. I practically knew it by heart already.
“Her routine was to start at Tom’s at six a.m. every Friday. She’s worked for him for four years. He was one of her first clients. Katy says he’s directly responsible for referring her to two other people in his neighborhood.”
“Her alibi is about as solid as it gets. She came from the vet clinic first. Cleans there on Friday mornings. Gets thereat three thirty and works two hours before they open at six. A couple of overnight pet care personnel vouched for her arrival time and that she left at 5:37. Then drives over to the Loomis’s. She gets there a few minutes before six. Neighbor’s security camera shows her car pulling into the driveway at 5:52,” Eric said. “Walks into Katy and Tom’s bedroom. Sees Katy standing over Tom’s dead body with the knife.”
“Then runs out of the house, hails a neighbor, calls 911,” I said.
“Katy’s story is that she slept through the whole thing?” Jeanie asked.
Eric turned around and wrote “Katy’s story” on the Guilty board.
“Unless she’s telling the truth,” Jeanie said. “Do we have toxicology?”
