ILL-TIMED ENTANGLEMENTS (The Kate Huntington mystery series #2) by Kassandra Lamb

scare the suspect into a plea bargain.”
    “Do you really think Lindstrom could build a case against Betty?” Kate said, dismay in her voice.
    Rob held up his big fist and started ticking off points. His index finger went up. “He’s got a half dozen witnesses who heard the victim make her accusation and threaten to sue, and the defendant reacted with shock. The prosecutor would pound that point, that Betty was so upset, she was speechless.” He extended the next finger. “The very next morning the victim is found dead.” Another finger went up. “The scene says it was a crime of passion. An impulsive striking out during an argument.”
    His little finger joined its buddies. “The defendant’s fingerprints and hair are found at the scene. And a defense attorney would sound pretty lame trying to make a case that the victim hadn’t cleaned her living room in three months.”
    Rob wiggled his thumb. “The defendant has no alibi. Lindstrom’s got opportunity, means and motive. Actually a less dedicated detective might have already arrested her. The fact that her nephew is an attorney may be all that’s stopping him.”
    Kate stopped walking and turned to face him, shock on her face. “Hell, Rob, this is the United States in 2006, not medieval Europe. How does Betty
maybe
wanted to kill Doris, and
possibly
could’ve killed her, become she
did
kill her? Don’t they have to prove she did it?”
    “In theory, but in practice the prosecutor looks at the case and asks himself, or herself, can I convince a jury this person is guilty.”
    They started walking again, along the stretch of road between Betty’s section of The Villages and the buildings clustered around the recreation building.
    “There was a case up here in Pennsylvania, a few years ago,” Rob said. “Man was found dead in his car, side of his head bashed in. Woman was seen getting into his car and her fingerprints were found in it. She was arrested for second degree murder.
    “Her story was that a stranger stopped his car and asked for directions, throwing open the passenger door to talk to her. When she leaned over to answer his question, he dragged her into the car and took off. Took her to the spot where the car was later found, and tried to rape her. She fought him, he hit his head against the side window and she assumed he was just knocked out. She took off. Went home, shaken and ashamed of her stupidity.”
    “So she didn’t report it,” Kate guessed.
    Rob nodded. “Prosecutor claimed that she and the guy were lovers, and they’d had an argument. She’d hit him and left him for dead. There was no evidence that she even knew the man, but the prosecutor was very persuasive and her fresh-out-of-law-school public defender was not. Actually, her lawyer was an idiot. A female police officer had come forward and reported she’d been approached by the same guy when she was off duty, in exactly the way the woman claimed. She’d flashed her badge at the guy and he took off.
    “The prosecutor ignored that piece of information and her lawyer, for some obscure reason, didn’t use it. After the prosecutor had mopped the courtroom floor with his green opponent, a better lawyer was hired by a local rape victim advocacy group. He filed an appeal and had the cop testify. The appeals court’s hands were tied, though. It was not new evidence. Her defense attorney had known about it at the time of the first trial.”
    “Wait a minute, I read about that case somewhere,” Kate said. “The woman was eventually pardoned by the governor of Pennsylvania.”
    “Yes,
nine years
after she was convicted. Her daughter was fourteen. The girl’s foster parents had thought it would be too upsetting to bring her to prison to visit her mother, so the woman hadn’t seen the child since she was five.”
    Rob had to grab Kate’s arm as her steps faltered. “Holy… crap,” she said, although that wasn’t the word she was thinking. “Okay, I get it. The legal