THE JUDGES CHAMBERS-Olivia and I were sharing a sweet early morning kiss....We had arrived at court early...
"Yes, Attorneys....Not Horny Investigators who are messing up their wife's make up and getting her lipstick on their collars."laughed Olivia
in between more kisses....
"Donnie Rayyyyyy, stoppppppppppppp...We are going to get caught.." Olivia said in between slow smouldering kisses..
I said in between smouldering kisses...
"Sure I should...Ummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm...."I moaned...
I slipped my hand up her skirt...She moved it..
"No..Not in here..NO! " she said..
"Olivia Come on..a quickie?."I asked...
I slipped my hand up her skirt again, softly caressing her thighs and hips...I tugged on the waistband of her panties...She was getting aroused.....
"Ummmmmmm, you are soooo bad Donnie Ray, but we are not going to do this in here....Stop it now!." she said firmly and gently removed my hands... laughing and shaking her head.."You are too much." she giggled.
"Yes..try hard.." she said.."Don't worry...You know I'll take care of you." she said.
We kissed one last time.
.She cleaned the lipstick and make up off of my lapel as best she could..She touched herself up and we exited the Judges chambers..
We sat in the large courtroom, while she leafed through her briefs.....
ADA Yvonne Harris walked into the courtroom right after we did...She couldn't sleep either and was sitting in the quiet courtroom going through her briefs...
"Olivia...Mr. Alexander, good morning!" she said.
II-
Judge Julie Wong was presiding over this trial...We figured we'd have a new judge.....
This being another "trial of the century"
Lt. Tragg as usual, dressed to the nines, every hair in place was playing to the press..
and he was flanked by "Celebrity Attorneys" Olivia Bennett-Alexander, Beverly West, Josie Boyd, Myself and Nelson East...
We didn't even look at the press, let alone make a comment.
"Yesss, here we are again for the third time...but we are going to get justice for Elena Hammner...This beautiful woman in the prime of her life was murdered by her adulterous rat of a husband, who had the nerve to be jealous of her because she took on another lover...He is lucky that he has had very good attorneys, known for their various stunts in the courtroom, but Assistant District Attorney Yvonne Harris is just as good if not superior to Olivia and Beverly and their team and I am certain we are going to get a conviction this time." he said to the press as cameras popped.
The Press ate it up....
ADA Yvonne Harris refused to comment just as we had...
"I just wish he'd shut up sometimes." she muttured out loud..
Olivia and I, Beverly ,Nelson and Josie all smiled, having heard her...
Judge Wong, a very good Judge, and very by the book ,called her court to order...
The War that was Voir Dire...Picking a jury began with Nelson, knowing the type of juror we wanted, rather needed going for broke and ADA Yvonne Harris knowing what she needed going for broke also...
She knew how the game was played.....but so far was losing to Nelson, who was one upping her..
Attorney Yvette Jones was in the audience...She was a master at Voir Dire...She watched Nelson and nodded to his excellence...
"He's good...He's very good.." she smiled to herself..
Judge Keith Morrison was also watching the proceedings...
"Well Hello Ms. Yvette..I understand you're about to get married soon to a very lucky man.."he said..
"Ohhh Hi Judge Morrison...Yes..Gary Lockwood is about to make an honest woman out of me and your son is about to marry Bee Bee Evans in a few weeks too.."laughed. Yvette.
"Yeahhhhhhh, I'm not surprised about those two...I was just wondering when, that's all.." he laughed..
"I'm here to watch my good friend, Olivia and her team in action today....You here for them too?" she asked.
"Ohhhhhh I just like to see good attorneys sparring in court...This thing has been in the papers and I like everyone else is just curious...Newsy if you will." he laughed..
He really came to see Yvonne Harris...They had been having marathon sex practically every day and every night...and he was getting a little close to her...He wondered if she felt the same way or this was just a release for her?
She momentarily allowed her mind to drift to the marathon sex they had been having...Night after Night after night and all day on Saturdays and Sundays..
both of them squealing and moaning with delight...
her holding him and trembling something terrible after one intense orgasm after another...Against her will and her good judgement, she was falling for the judge...A man, 12 years her senior.. She was only 9 years older than his son...An attorney she had gone up against in court...
"Great job Nelson...This is a further omen that things are going to go our way..." she said.
"Good Job.." said Josie..
"Good Job.." said Josie..
How lucky was Nelson, having three beautiful women give him some love, I thought and smiled to myself.
The Third trial began...ADA Yvonne Harris gave a brilliant opening argument...but it lacked the conviction of her first two opening statements....It was as if she was kind of burned out...
Olivia and Beverly on the other hand gave a very spirited opening statement proclaiming our client's innocence and almost promising to prove it....Not just leave them with reasonable doubt..
They won the jury over right away...
ADA Yvonne Harris painted Ellery Hammner
She called out 7 women who all had lengthty sexual dalliances with him to testify...
Olivia, Josie and Beverly went at the women hard on cross and got them to admit that they knew he was married the entire time and that he never kept that from them, plus, his being married didn't stop them from sleeping with him....
It kind of made Ellery a little more sympathetic, but not much...
Nelson countered with two of the lawyers , both representing the late Kay Norman, who had worked with her on the divorces who testified that Elena had pulled the divorce decrees back herself...
Olivia and Beverly brought up the fact that she had ended the affair and that Dak Alexander couldn't get over that fact and stalked her relentlessly...
All of this was brought up in the first two trials with not much proof until now..Now they had copies of not one, not two...but FIVE restraining orders and several calls to police who had answered both her and Ellery's calls about him...Plus witnesses from her office who testified about the bouquet of flowers he still continued to send after she had broken it off with him...The phone calls, the change of phones , the entire bit..That hadn't been used in the first two trials..
"You've got to change that one person's mind and make sure you don't lose any jurors."I said..but he knew that...
ADA Yvonne Harris showed the jury photos of the murder scene...Showed the car ,which belonged to Ellery , showed the belt around her neck and the suit that was in the back seat....
She called 10 witnesses to the stand who talked about seeing them together and then finding Mrs. Hammner alone and strangled..
Josie and Nelson completely and aggressively disected their testimonies, comparing their statements now with statements they made in both previous trials and initially to the police..
She smiled and bowed...The young attorneys had done their homework...Olivia had taught them well she admitted.
Beverly asked several of the policemen at the scene if they didn't also find panties and a bra in the car...
Beverly asked several of the policemen at the scene if they didn't also find panties and a bra in the car...
They said that they did..
She presented DNA tests we had made that proved the panties and the bra belonged to the late Elena Hammner..
"Husband and wife had had sex in the backseat of the car the night before...That's why the clothing was there." said Beverly.
Finally Olivia asked..
"If I'm going to murder my wife...Why would I leave my clothing and hers in the backseat? and in MY CAR at that? " she said..
ADA Yvonne Harris gave a more spirited closing argument than she had before...It had been another long week....She hoped she had done and said enough to win the jury this time...
She remained a bit skeptical..both Dak Alexander and Frank Barber had been arrested and subpeonaed..Dak Alexander was being held in what she thought was an unrelated murder...and yet neither man was in court or had been mentioned by the defense...Just what was going on here? she wondered.. She collapsed in her seat exhausted..
She sighed...She wondered what trial he was watching...They were more aggressive in this trial than they had been in the first and second trials...She didn't feel as confident that this wouldn't end up in a hung jury too...
IV-
"It's been a week and a half...I'm not going to keep you guys here any longer than absolutely neccesary... I'm not going to retread what you've already heard from the prosecution...We are going to deal with one thing and one thing only...Whether our client killed his wife.."said Olivia opening her argument..
She did what she hadn't done in either of the other trials...She put Ellery on the stand and had him tell his story of his last hours with his wife..
He explained how they had a very good meal the night before and were elated because they had decided to give it one more try...
They had made out in the car the night before and it had turned into full out lovemaking, which explained the clothing and underwear in the back seat of the car..
"The panties and bra in the back seat were hers.? And the trousers and belt were yours." she said.
"Yes that's correct." he said.
ADA Harris went at him hard on cross, She wasn't expecting them to put him on the stand, but she was prepared...She intended to make some points...but he held to his story....He did not break..
Nelson, Beverly and Olivia presented credit card and debit card slips as defense exhibits explaining where he and his wife were at every hour of the fateful morning she was last seen alive and presented witnessess to testify to as much..ADA Harris tried to go at them hard to make points , but she did not succeed....
Frank Barber was called to testify....He testified that he saw Elena and Ellery that day...and that she asked if she could use his car....She had a meeting to go to in town...He , Ellery and Attorney Kay Norman all had a meal at a local bodega , paid in cash by Kay Norman....He left early and Kay Norman and Ellery were still there talking. The time frame he gave put Ellery miles away from the murder scene. Had Kay Norman have lived she too could have verified this account, he said.
Josie, beating ADA Harris to the punch asked him..
"You could have testified to this in the first trial...AND certainly in the second, why didn't you?" she asked.
"My life was threatened by Dak Alexander....He and his goon, a big scary black guy named Jilly approached me a day after the murder and they told me to keep my mouth closed...to get out of town or else...I got out of town...I was in Atlantic City all this time.." he said..
Given Immunity from prosecution... Jilly Robinson admitted to threatening both Frank Barber and Kay Norman with physical harm if either of them testified in Ellery Hammner's defense...Frank Barber got out of town, but Kay Norman hung around...He said that Dak Alexander wanted both of them out of town, but Kay Norman kept going to work, kept making appearences around town..
"He worried about her...He worried that the cops would eventually catch up to her and make her testify...He didn't want Ellery Hammner to be alibied...He wanted him to go to jail..After the second trial was hung..Mr. Alexander pondered kidnapping Olivia Bennett and her niece Beverly, but thought better of it..He said that would look too obvious." he said.
"A thing? He was obsessed with her...a crazy kind of obsession...After he had sex with her the first time..he was enthralled.. Like I said...It was a crazy kind of obsession...He ate drank ,slept Elena Hammner...He was furious when she said the divorce was off and she was going back to her husband..
Furious... He stalked them both...He stalked them until ...well I don't know...I don't know if he killed her..I wasn't around.." he said.
Naturally ADA Harris went hard on him trying to almost admit that he might have killed Elena Hammner, but he wasn't going for that...He wasn't putting himself in for a murder..All he would admit to was helping Dak Alexander strong arm both Frank Barber and Kay Norman from testifying on Ellery Hammner's behalf, which was witness intimidation...Which we had given him immunity from..
Hostile witness,Dak Alexander was brought to the stand next...Since he was already under indictment for the murder of Kay Norman, we knew he wasn't going to cop to anything..
He denied everything, like we knew he would...He even denied knowing Jilly Robinson....We presented photos of the two together and witnesses who knew them both quite well...
We showed the jury his personal effects, taken from his home and from his jail cell...Photos of Elena Hammner, many photos as well as copies of the many restraining orders filed against him and receipts for flowers and gifts he bought her, a married woman, who no longer wanted him...
He did have a crazy kind of obsession for her....We never said...but we successfully put it in the jury's mind that he may have been the one who killed her, since he couldn't account for his time during the murder.
"IN THE MATTER OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF PENNSYLVANIA VS ELLERY HAMMNER ON THE CHARGE OF FIRST DEGREE MURDER..WE FIND THE DEFENDENT, NOT GUILTY!!!" he said..
The Jury was polled and every last one said "NOT GUILTY".....It had been a long ordeal...Three trials, Two Hung Juries and finally an acquittal... At last it was over.
"WE DID IT NIECEY POO!" said a jubilant Olivia, who leaped up and high fived her niece..
"Thank you for trusting us and believing in us.." said Nelson...
"Some people would have dropped us after the first hung jury and definitely after the second.."said Josie.
"It was just nice how everything fell into place..."I said...
ADA Yvonne Harris sighed...She was relieved that this trial was over...and not the least bit sad that she had lost...Perhaps Ellery Hammner was innocent...even she now believed that sullen Dak Alexander might be the real killer.
She looked at us in the hallway and said..
Neither woman wanted to face the other anytime soon!
"Just can't win the big one eh Lieutenant?" said one reporter..
"The Big One? He can't win any one!" said another reporter
The room was filled with laughter..
"LOU, I'VE HAD IT WITH YOU!!!!" snarled an angry and embarrassed Lt. Tragg...
And On that note....All of us headed out of the side door...into the street.
on charges of not showing up for a subpeona... She got all charges dropped and he walked out of court a free man...
As fate would have it...ADA Yvonne Harris prosecuted Dak Alexander for the murder of Kay Norman..
She didn't have to face us again...and she was glad...He was convicted of First Degree Murder and sentenced to Death by Lethal Injection...While on Death Row, He confessed to killing Elena Hammner. After all he couldn't get another needle...He was facing one.
ADA Yvonne Harris was happy....She had put a guilty double murderer behind bars where he belonged..
and still not defining their relationship...
Since he had made the arrest this gave Lt. Tragg, a much needed victory of sorts... He bragged to the press.
"Oh My God...Me neither...I think we are going away for a few days....Get some much needed rest." said Olivia , who was sitting in my lap...
"Yes...That sounds like a good idea." I said..
"Yesssssss, I'm gonna turn my phone off." said Beverly...
"Me too!" said Nelson.....
"Yeahhh, me too!" said Josie..
"Well at least he's not here...He's on TV." said Jazzy..
''Aint that the truth..He finally got lucky....and cracked a case...Arrested the right guy.."said Dabnis.
"Donnie Ray actually made that case...He mailed him the evidence and made anonymous calls telling him where to find witnesses....That's how he made the case...You all know he couldn't have made that case on his own." said Kayla.
"I should have known." said Ray...
"I knew he was a killer....I stared into his cold, cold eyes in the dark of the night...and I felt a chill down my spine as I put the cuffs on him!"
and at Curley's bar where we were all having drinks..
"Oh My God...He's going to be impossible to be around now that he finally made a good collar."said ADA Karen Page..
''Who you telling? I'm just glad me and my guys don't have any big cases on the horizon..." said Yvette Jones.
"Yes...That sounds like a good idea." I said..
"Me too!" said Nelson.....
''Aint that the truth..He finally got lucky....and cracked a case...Arrested the right guy.."said Dabnis.
"Donnie Ray actually made that case...He mailed him the evidence and made anonymous calls telling him where to find witnesses....That's how he made the case...You all know he couldn't have made that case on his own." said Kayla.
"I should have known." said Ray...
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