"Sergeant Callery, would you please describe the condition of the body when you found it?
"Callery swallowed hard before answering. 'Are you sure you want me to?' "This would be the focal point, Ben Kincaid realized, for the entire trial all that came before and all that followed. Every murder trial had one an indelible moment in which sympathies were polarized and the full gravity of the crime struck the jury like a ball peen hammer to the head. Even though he knew there was not a soul in the courtroom who did not already know the answer to this question in gruesome and graphic detail, this would be the moment when everything changed, and not for the better."
So begins William Bernhardt's tenth and most controversial court room thriller with his protagonist, Ben Kincaid. This time out Kincaid is not only a defense attorney, but becomes a defendant as well.
When veteran police detective Joe McNaughton is found savagely murdered and
mutilated, and hung from a public fountain in downtown Tulsa, Ben's client Keri Dalcanton is immediately charged. Keri is a petite, 19-year-old stripper, and the mistress of the married officer. All evidence leads conclusively to her as the prime suspect in the murder.
Keri and her brother Kirk move to Tulsa from Stroud after a massive tornado all but levels the town, and their parents are killed in an automobile accident leaving the two young siblings alone in the world to fend for themselves. Both Keri and Kirk look for work, but find nothing that will pay the rent. Then, Keri, a stunning blue-eyed blond, takes a job as a stripper in a local "Gentlemen's Club." She doesn't like the work, but it does keep her and her brother with a roof over their heads and food on their table.
At the club, Keri meets Joe McNaughton who fails to tell her he is a married man. Their romance seems to Keri like a gift from God. Joe has a good job, he is handsome, and a big man, over 220 pounds capable of protecting her and caring for her. He is her knight in shining armor until the faithful night Andrea McNaughton appears at Keri's apartment and accuses her of
stealing her husband away.
Kirk, a quasi-religious young man with enough demons to fill two hells, is fiercely
protective of his younger sister. He comes on stage in many chapters with bizarre behaviors and rantings that show he should be confined to a mental institution, yet he is free to roam the streets and seek atonement for some sin he's committed. What sin? We don't yet know, but he feels God has turned away from him and that his evil ways have damned him eternally.
The conviction of Keri Dalcanton is all but assured when Ben discovers a major blunder by an overzealous officer. Consequently Keri is set free and a firestorm of outrage ensues within the police department. Arlen Matthews, the detective whose work brought on the dismissal of the case, refuses to let it die. He's got a plan to get around double jeopardy and to get Ben Kincaid in the process some call such a plan the "Blue Squeeze."
Major Mike Morelli, Tulsa P.D.'s chief homicide detective is going under cover on
another case, but before he goes he tells Ben trouble is brewing over the Dalcanton case. Good cops are on a crusade because Joe McNaughton was very popular with the rank and file. Mike also tells Ben to watch his back "The boys are after him (Ben) as well as Dalcanton."
Then, in a surprise raid on Ben's office, the missing murder weapon is found caked with blood in a file drawer in Ben's office. Of course, Matthews found the knife and took great pleasure in arresting Ben.
All that follows Ben's arrest may make you a bit uneasy, it did me. The arrest of a defense attorney is not a Hallmark moment for those involved. An appeal is made to get around the double jeopardy attached to Keri's first trial. A new trial is ordered and there the story picks up momentum. It is "edge of the seat"reading from this
moment right through the last word of the story.
Bernhardt's style and voice in "Murder One" excites, titillates, and shows an author attaining his full potential. The courtroom scenes are amazing. They teach as well as entertain. The characters coming and going throughout the novel are superbly drawn. The story, while brutal and in some instances necessarily sexual in content, rises to any reader's expectations of excellent writing.
There's no second guessing, you never see the ending coming. Never. That is a feat few novelists ever achieve. "Murder One" has everything, a tough prosecuting D.A., a defense attorney you alternately respect then wonder about, a half dozen suspects beside Keri that lend great suspense, and dialogue to die for. I never thought of Bernhardt as having a particular sense of humor, but in the midst of some really ugly business, up jumps a line or two that eases your mind and causes a chuckle. By the time you've taken your next breath, the "funny" is gone and
the "drama" is at bat once more.
The last three chapters shoot Roman candles through your brain. You agree with Ben, "How could I be so stupid? How could I be so blind?" The answer is outstanding craftsmanship that step by step places all the pieces of the puzzle into place. At this moment, this fatal moment, you understand evil more heinous than we've dared believe is at work, nothing is what is seems, and justice is not always simple.
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(Jones is a published writer & literary critic)
COPYRIGHT APRIL 19, 2001, PATRICIA A. JONES, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
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