My father unabashedly tries his cases in the press. So much so that he often claims his best opening statements have been made on the courthouse steps. The impromptu press conferences he holds there are designed to win over the jury, even when they won’t actually be selected for another year or more. His hope is that by the time they are actually seated in the jury box, he’s already won their hearts and minds through the media. Prosecutors play that game too, but according to my father they’re pikers compared to him. He says their press conferences lack the pizzazz of a catchy sound bite, and so even when they make the news, no one remembers a word that was said the next day—much less months later when the trial begins.
In the DA press conferences I used to attend, I would stand off to the side, usually just out of the camera’s lens. The speaking was handled by the DA himself, or Lauren Wright, in the rare instance that the DA decided someone who actually knew something about the case was better able to provide information to the press. My one and only star turn occurred when Lauren got a question she couldn’t answer and she called on me to respond. I stepped up to the microphone and said, “At this time, we have no evidence supporting that theory.”
For the press conference about my sister’s disappearance, more than a hundred reporters are in attendance. That’s more than sat through the last briefing about Jennifer Barnett. An ordinary missing-persons case might only attract four or five, if that many, and that assumes the police even hold a press conference.
My father and I wait in a small conference room at One PP for Gabriel to arrive. Then we’ll all go to the press room together.
“There’s something I need to talk to you about,” I say, “and it may be a little difficult for you to hear, but I think it’s important.”
He looks at me with concern. Given how tragic his world has turned in the last forty-eight hours, I’m certain my father can’t conceive of what I could say that would add to his pain.
“Charlotte wrote a novel. Or part of one. It’s really good. In fact, it was going to be published. The last time I saw her, she told me the good news and gave me a copy. I think it might contain clues as to what actually happened to her. You know how Charlotte’s stories always have real-life aspects to them?” He nods. “I think this one does too. It’s about a woman named Clare who’s an MFA student at NYU—so no mystery there. This Clare has a boyfriend who’s a standin for Zach. And in the book, at least, the boyfriend is abusive and Clare’s scared of him.”
My father winces as if he’s been struck. “Did Zach ever . . . hit Charlotte?”
“I don’t know,” I say, ashamed that I don’t have the first clue whether my little sister was being abused by her boyfriend. “I can’t imagine Charlotte putting up with something like that, but . . . the book has a lot of stuff that makes me wonder how well I actually knew her. This Clare character is also seeing two other men: a banker named Matthew and a student she calls Jason. The student’s in a class that Clare TA’s, and you know how Charlotte was a teaching assistant for an undergraduate class last semester? That makes me think that maybe this Jason character is real. And if he’s real, maybe Matthew is too.”
My father looks at me with a distant gaze. He obviously knows even less than I do about Charlotte’s life.
“What’s the book about?” he asks.
Damn. I buried the lede, and now I have to tell him the worst part.
I exhale deeply. “It’s a . . . murder mystery. In it, I think Charlotte actually foresaw her own death. Her character in the book—Clare, the one based on her—gets murdered. Charlotte never reveals the killer because the manuscript she gave me was only half written. But the reader knows it’s one of three men: Marco, the artist-boyfriend; Jason, the student; or Matthew, the banker.”
Gabriel arrives a few minutes later. He introduces himself to my father and apologizes for making us wait.
“We only have a minute before this is going to begin, but I wanted to give you a sense of how it’ll work,” he says. “First I’m going to say a few words, mainly designed to disabuse the press of the idea that a serial killer is on the loose. After that, I’ll answer half a dozen or so questions. Following the Q and A, I’m going to turn the microphone over to you, Mr. Broden. I think only one family member should speak—if that’s okay with you, Ella?”
I nod. “Yeah. That’s fine.”
“Okay,” Gabriel says. “Any questions for me?”
“No,” my father and I say in unison.
He checks his watch. “Let’s do this, then.”
Gabriel leads us through the door of the waiting room and into the police department’s press space. The lighting is too harsh, and I shield my eyes slightly with my hand. Gabriel doesn’t flinch, however. He’s done this before. In fact, he did it just last week regarding Jennifer Barnett.
Once behind the lectern, in a strong, confident voice, Gabriel says, “My name is Lieutenant Gabriel Velasquez. I’m going to make a brief statement, and then I’ll take some questions. Charlotte Broden, a twenty-five-year-old graduate student at New York University, has been missing since Wednesday morning. Although it’s early in the investigation, we’ve already developed a short list of people of interest in the disappearance. Let me say at the outset that we have absolutely no reason to believe that there is any connection whatsoever between Ms. Broden’s disappearance and the previously reported disappearance of Jennifer Barnett. Now, I know that some of the more irresponsible members of the press have raised the possibility that someone might be targeting young women in our city. There is absolutely no evidence to support that conjecture. Obviously, I cannot share with you the leads we have uncovered in either investigation, but I will tell you that at the present time we have a limited number of suspects in both matters, and I can further state that there is no overlap between the two suspect lists. Now I’ll take a few questions.”
Virtually every hand in the press gallery shoots up. They look like third-graders with the right math answer.
Gabriel points to an older man sitting in the first row. I recognize him from television.
“Jack, why don’t you start it off?”
“Thank you,” Jack says, coming to his feet. “Should the public be concerned about a possible serial killer? Are there any patterns that people should be cognizant about? Like with Son of Sam in the 1970s, when it was known he was looking for couples parked in cars?”
Gabriel takes a deep breath. “As I said just a moment ago, there is nothing for the public to fear because there is no evidence of any link between these two disappearances. It is extremely irresponsible to claim otherwise, as your question implies.”
Gabriel next selects a younger woman in glasses sitting in the middle of the press pack. “Is the police department considering imposing a curfew?”