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(Part 2) A
Benin
Babe, a Nigerian Governor, and Me
By WayoGuy
A Nigerian Governor was murdered in
New York
. The FBI arrested me in
Washington
, took me to
New York
, and charged me with the murder. The next day, the newspaper story summed up the evidence against me in the following way:
An arrest has been made in the homicide of the Nigerian Governor who was murdered a week ago at his
New York
residence. A
Washington
lawyer, also from
Nigeria
, Mr.
Nam
Noc, was picked up yesterday by the FBI from his
Washington
home. According to the arrest documents, the suspect’s fingerprints were found on the pair of scissors used to fatally stab the Governor. The FBI forensic experts also report that the suspect was in New York on the day of the murder, as shown on the flight manifest of a local airline and his fingerprints were on the front door of the victim’s house; that a telephone call had been placed from the dead man’s residence to the suspect’s law firm the same day he was murdered; that shoe prints at the scene of the murder matched the suspect’s shoe size and a pair of shoes was found at his home matching the brand that left the prints; and finally, the experts confirmed, through a surveillance video obtained from a Washington office of the Federal Express, that the suspect mailed an envelope, containing a threatening letter, to the Governor about three weeks before the murder, the envelope having been discovered in the hand of the dead body. The murder is made even more sensational by the fact that the murdered man was wanted in his home country for embezzlement of One Hundred Million Dollars ($100,000,000) of public funds.
My bail hearing was set for the afternoon of the day following my arrest before Magistrate Judge Mildred Jackson of the Federal District Court
in
New York
.
While waiting for the hearing, I was allowed to make a telephone call. With my heart pounding, and my hand shaking, I called my office and my secretary answered:
“Pat” I said, trying my best to sound normal, “I’m still in
New York
… I need you to bring me my Nigerian and American passports ….”
“Boss man,” my secretary cut me off, “please shut up and hang up that phone.” Startled, the phone fell off my hand. In an instant, my mind rushed through a whirlwind of emotional distress, self-pity, fear, anxiety, anger, dejection, as I heard my secretary say, once again, and more firmly: “Hang up the phone!”
“Pat, I need the passports. Can you catch the 2:15 flight to
New York
…?”
“No, Boss man,” she said unyieldingly, “You shut up! Shut the hell up and listen! There are federal agents here ransacking your office all morning. Call me back if and when you get out on bail. Did you hear what I said?” She hung up. I quickly realized that she shut me up before I said something incriminating just in case the FBI was monitoring my phone.
My ego and my heart were shattered. I felt a crushing headache progressively wrenching my skull as I felt sorry for my secretary. She was one of the few people I could trust in the whole world, considering all the numerous indiscretions from which she had previously rescued me, all involving women.
Although ten years younger than me, she had always looked out for me like my mother. I wanted very badly to call her back to apologize for the pain I had caused her but decided against it. I sat down and, for the first time, the enormity of my plight fully enveloped me. I was depressed.
At 4:15 p.m. that day, I was brought to the packed courtroom of Judge Jackson for my bail hearing. After the preliminaries, the judge, who recognized my status as an officer of the court, read me the standard speech about my obligation to honor future court dates, including any trial date, on the case. She asked, and I told her, that I had both Nigerian and American passports. She agreed to release me on my own personal recognizance on the condition that I surrendered both passports and agreed not to travel outside the country until my case was concluded.
Done with the hearing, I was to be remanded back to jail until I could arrange for someone to bring the passports to the authorities. At this time, my secretary, whom I had not realized was sitting in the courtroom all along, came forward and handed the passports to me. I wanted to hug her, so badly wanted to hug her, but she gently pushed me away and walked back to her seat as the court personnel and I completed the paperwork for my conditional release….
As we flew back to
Washington
, I was ashamed to look at my secretary. She, on her part, asked me only one question, a rhetorical one: “How many times have I warned you about these women?”
In
Washington
, alone in the midst of what was left of my files and documents, following their ordeal in the hands of ransacking federal agents, I promptly placed a call to my trusted grandmotherly friend, the very distinguished Dr. Suzanne Shingles, a retired pathologist and former medical examiner for the City of
Washington
.
I had used Dr. Shingles as an expert witness in several criminal cases while she was still active. Born and raised in
Washington
, Dr. Shingles knew all the local experts in Pathology and related fields. I had known Dr. Shingles ever since her daughter and I met and became friends in law school and the daughter later introduced me to her mother. But now, at the elderly age of 70, she was enjoying her retirement away from the courtrooms and dead bodies.
“Dr. Shingles,” I said on the phone, “This is …”
“I know who you are, boy… I saw the story in the papers and I’ve been waiting for your call. How did you get yourself in such a mess, young man?” She asked in a concerned, motherly tone.
Without hesitation, she wanted to come to my office but I offered to go to her house instead. When I got there, luckily, she was alone reading the story in the newspaper for, I imagined, the twentieth time. I told her the whole story from the day Red Rum walked into my office to the end. I did not hide anything from her. She listened, asked me some questions, and took notes. She would meet with me in my office in two days, she said, to discuss the issues.
In addition to Dr. Shingles, I hired a forensic fiber analyst; a forensic shoe print analyst; a forensic document examiner colloquially called ‘handwriting expert’; fingerprint analyst; and a forensic psychoanalyst. I footed all the travel and lodging expenses for all these experts, including Dr. Shingles, to travel to
New York
for ten days to examine all the evidence against me. I traveled with them.
The evidence examined by the experts included the dead body now in the custody of the city medical examiner, the house where the murder was committed, the alleged murder pair of scissors, all the photographs taken by the FBI of the body at the murder scene, including floor and walls, the death certificate issued by the State of New York, the pair of shoes taken from my house, the alleged threatening letter to the Governor, the FEDEX mailing as well as the brown envelopes. They videotaped and/or made copies of the evidence as appropriate. At the end of the trip, we agreed to meet in
Washington
, after each expert might have completed his or her tests and evaluations, so that they would compare notes and brief me on their findings and opinions.
But that evening, at the end of our ten-day stay in
New York
, Dr. Shingles, excitedly, came running to my hotel room. “Young man, I have some good news and some bad news for you. Which one do you want first?” My heart pounding, I asked for the bad news first.
“The bad news is that you will be re-arrested!”
“Why? Did they find another dead body? Why?” I waited anxiously, looking at her.
“The good news is that they charged you with the murder of the wrong person. The dead man is not the Governor”. She showed me the photograph of the face of the dead body and five enlarged color photographs of the Governor taken from his house. It was obvious that the body was indeed not the Governor’s.
I placed a call to the prosecutors and demanded that in light of my pathologist’s discovery that the charge against me be dismissed. I stated that, alternatively, I was ready to be rearrested and properly charged for the murder of the proper victim, or a ‘John Doe’ if the body was not identifiable, since I was already in
New York
. I did not want the embarrassment and inconvenience of being picked up by the FBI again from
Washington
. The prosecutors refused my offer and brushed me off. They had never heard of a defendant making such stupid requests, they said. I had to wait, they said, until they had done their own independent verification of my expert’s claims.
Within a week, although I was not rearrested, the prosecutors simply amended the charging documents to identify the victim as a ‘John Doe’; but the case against me would go forward while the FBI spread their dragnet looking for the Governor and Red Rum. Red Rum, they scoffed, was only a figment of my imagination; but they would look for her nonetheless. The only concession the prosecutors, and the court, would make to me was to fast-forward the trial date to honor my constitutional right to a speedy trial. The trial was set to begin July 17.
First day of trial was July 17. Following the selection of members of the jury, the government called their witnesses. With the exception of the two FBI agents who arrested me, the rest of the government witnesses were the usual experts, a pathologist, the
New York
medical examiner, a handwriting expert, a fingerprint analyst, a shoeprint analyst.
They all testified along the same line as the story published in the newspaper. The only change was the government’s admission that I was originally charged with the murder of a Nigerian Governor but the charges were later amended to identify the victim as a ‘John Doe’.
Essentially, they said, I was still the murderer. The good news, they argued, which was that the Governor was probably alive, was actually cancelled by the bad news, which was that there was still a dead man. They told the jury that I was back to square one because all the evidence against me, except the alleged threatening letter addressed to the Governor, still pointed to me murdering whoever it was that died. In fact, said the imaginative prosecutor, I was in such murderous frame of mind, with such malignant intent, that I mistook the wrong man for the Governor when I stabbed him with the pair of scissors. It was just ‘John Doe’s luck that he happened to be at the house on that date and time. By what was known in the law as ‘transferred intent’, the government told the jury, over my objection, I still had the intent to commit murder.
At the conclusion of the
New York
medical examiner’s testimony, I cross-examined him:
“Sir, is it your testimony that the dead man was killed with a pair of scissors as alleged by the government?” I asked.
“Yes,” that is my testimony.
“Is it not normal for your office to record a detailed description of a homicide victim?”
“Yes, it is,” he answered.
“And in addition to photographing the victim, is it not normal for your office to retain and safeguard articles of clothing found on the victim?”
“Yes”, he said.
“And in addition, make note of birthmarks and tattoos, if any, on the body?”
“Yes, sir. That is standard procedure” he admitted.
“And in addition take fingerprints and DNA samples?”
“Yes.”
“Is it not also a standard procedure for the medical examiner's office to perform an autopsy on the body of a homicide victim?”
“Yes, that is correct.”
“And to perform toxicological tests to determine, among other things, if there are prescription or illegal drugs in the body that may have caused the death?”
“Yes, sir.”
“It is true, is it not, that in this case, your office did not perform any of the procedures, standard tests, examinations, descriptions, notations, that I have just listed?”
“We did not think they were necessary”, he said.
“Sir,” I concluded, “with all due respect, your office did not even discover that the victim was not the Governor of Nigeria, whose name you originally listed on the death certificate, until my expert witness alerted the authorities to the mistake.”
“It was just a mistake,” he answered.
“Really? And now, with no scientific backing, you want this jury to believe that the dead man died as a result of the alleged stabbing with a pair of scissors?”
The prosecutor’s objection was sustained. But the jury heard me and my point was made.
Second day of trial was July 18. On this day, I took the witness stand and testified truthfully and honestly. I told the jury the truth from the day a seductive lady, who identified herself as Red Rum, came into my office and how I fell stupidly into her trap without realizing that I was being framed for a murder.
I should have known, I testified, that her name ‘Red Rum’ was ‘MURDER’ spelled backwards. She was obviously playing games with me. The prosecutor’s cross-examination of me was brutal. He designed the questions to convey to the jury that I had concocted the incredible story of ‘Red Rum’ because I was a lawyer and therefore would not be deceived so easily by a girl regardless of how she was dressed.
I observed a few jurors rolling their eyes to indicate that they did not believe my story after I admitted that I had not given the FBI the $10,000 that I testified that Red Rum dropped on my desk. I thought I was screwed as I stepped down from the witness stand following the cross-examination.
Third day of trial was July 19. On this day I started to call my witnesses. My first witness, Dr. Shingles, testified that she had reviewed all the available death records, medical records, and the FBI agents’ reports. She testified that she had determined that the time of death of the victim, on the day of the homicide, was no later than 2:05 p.m. using what pathologists called the rate method. She testified that she arrived at this result, in this case, by measuring the amount and distribution of rigor mortis (the stiffening of the muscles) of the dead body, gauging the variance in body temperature, and measuring how far the dead body had putrefied.
Dr. Shingles explained that the rate method worked because, by standard scientific measurement, the rate at which these events (rigor mortis, body temperature variance, and putrefaction) occurred was known; so a pathologist can, with a dead body, retrace and calculate when these events were initiated or stopped by the fatal blow.
She further explained that in the present case, the body’s rigor process was reported to have commenced when the police discovered the body at 8:05 p.m. Therefore, since the standard rule of thumb was that rigor commences at about 6 hours after death, the victim had to have been killed at least six hours before the police discovered it.
She testified, in conclusion, over the prosecutor’s overruled objection, that since I left Washington on that day on a 3:15 p.m. flight, which took 50 minutes to arrive
New York
, it was impossible for me to have murdered John Doe. The victim was dead at least two hours before I arrived
New York
.
Fourth day of trial was July 20. On this day I recalled the pathologist, Dr. Shingles, to testify about her observations of, and conclusion on, the stab wound on the left side of the victim’s chest. She testified that she had almost forty-five years experience in observing and studying stab wounds; and that she had previously testified on similar issues numerous times in court.
She informed the jury that the pattern of a stab wound from a double-edged knife would leave two sharp edges at both ends; that each end would look like the tail end of the letter ‘V’. It was her opinion that the victim in this case was not killed with the pair of scissors found on the body because both outer edges of the scissors were blunt while the only wound on the dead body had two sharp edges indicating that the victim was stabbed with a two-edged knife. Dr. Shingles opined, over the overruled objection of the prosecutor, that the pair of scissors was planted after the murder.
She further testified that when an assailant attacked a victim with a knife or a pair of scissors, unless the victim was completely immobilized by poison or drugs prior to the attack, he generally would sustain ‘defense wounds’ on his arms or hands in his attempt to ward off the assailant. But, in my case, she concluded, there was only one wound on the victim, no ‘defense wounds’ and no sign of struggle. Even the blood from the wound coagulated neatly on the chest of the body. These facts, she testified, indicated that the victim here was either not conscious when stabbed or was killed by means other than by stabbing. She opined that the stab wound was, within a reasonable degree of certainty, just a ruse planted by the real killer.
Finally, Dr. Shingles concluded, she was certain, within a reasonable degree of medical certainty, that the victim was not killed with the pair of scissors as the government claimed. But, in the final analysis, regardless of how the victim was killed, whether by poison, drug, or stabbing, that I did not have the time to have arrived in
New York
within the timeline for the murder.
--------------
On the fifth and final day, following the government’s, and my, closing arguments, I sat with my expert witnesses, waiting for the jury verdict. I had purposely not called the handwriting, fingerprint, and shoe analysts, as my witnesses because they had nothing positive to say. I hoped that the jury would conclude that Red Rum had purchased identical shoes and planted the shoe print evidence at the murder scene just the same way she tricked me into mailing the FEDEX envelope.
For three days, the jury deliberated without reaching a verdict. All the expert witnesses were now gone, leaving me, my secretary, and my well-wishers hanging round the courthouse, waiting for a verdict.
On the fourth day, all parties were quickly summoned into the courtroom by the judge. We were informed that there had been two urgent developments: the government had an offer to make me, and the jury had also reached a verdict.
The government offered to dismiss all charges in light of some new evidence discovered by the FBI. The judge asked me if I wanted to hear the jury’s verdict anyway or did I prefer that the jury’s verdict be sealed. I chose to hear the verdict. The verdict was NOT GUILTY.
In my euphoria, I forgot to find out why the government wished to dismiss the charges, until I saw the following newspaper story the next day:
Murder Charges Dismissed Against Lawyer; Alleged Victim Still Alive, Charged with Fraud, Murder.
The government, yesterday, dismissed all charges against the
Washington
Lawyer, Mr.
Nam
Noc, whose trial for the murder of a Nigerian Governor in
New York
, had made international headlines.
The dismissal followed the arrests, in the
Bahamas
, of the alleged victim, a Nigerian Governor and his mistress dubbed Red Rum, according to the arrest records.
All evidence and closing argument had been tendered at the trial. While the parties were awaiting the jury verdict, the FBI, using the fingerprints obtained from the body of the dead, was able to identify the body as that of Walter Hendricks. Apparently, Mr. Hendricks, a homeless man who was a known panhandler at the corner of Park Avenue and 28th Street, had not been seen since the day the Nigerian Governor was allegedly murdered at his New York residence. His cause of death, at this time, is still pending; but the FBI suspect foul play.
The FBI was tipped off by information revealed, at the trial of
Nam
Noc, that routine autopsy, toxicological procedures, and fingerprinting were not performed by the
New York
medical examiner on the dead body. There are unconfirmed reports that the Chief medical examiner is in FBI custody and has confessed to his role in supplying the body to the Governor and his mistress. Apparently, the Governor had hatched the plan to escape the Nigerian government’s inquiries into his embezzlement of some One Hundred Million Dollars of public funds.
WayoGuy@aol.com
(Attorney in
Washington
,
DC
)
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Posted by Robot| 26.03.2007 16:15