Bloodsworth Read online

  Jack Quill, an FBI fiber analyst, testified that the one head hair retrieved from the scene was intertwined with the red fiber. The fiber was probably from a carpet. Could the head hair have gotten to the scene because Dawn Hamilton had been playing on a carpet and picked up the loose hair before she’d gone outside, the prosecutor suggested? Quill thought it was a reasonable theory. He’d never been asked to compare the hair with those of the victim or anyone other than Bloodsworth. While it wasn’t the defendant’s hair, it could have been anyone’s.

  William B. McInnis was called as the FBI serology expert. McInnis had obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in zoology from Louisiana Tech University, undergone fifteen hours of postgraduate training in forensic science, spent a year as a crime scene trainee, and had several years’ experience as a crime scene analyst. He’d previously qualified as an expert in court over a hundred times. McInnis testified he had examined both Dawn Hamilton’s shorts and underpants and had made black markings on the panties. He testified that he’d not been able to identify any semen on either piece of clothing. The cotton swabs had no identifiable semen on them either. He found some traces of blood on the rock but of an insufficient quantity to test.

  With each of these witnesses, Scheinin made his points on cross-examination. He got Jack Quill to reiterate that the one human hair recovered could have been from the killer and definitely was not Bloodsworth’s. He had Ramsey acknowledge that none of the physical evidence linked the defendant to the crime. He asked McInnis why there was no semen on the FBI swabs when sperm had been found on the smears taken from those same swabs by the medical examiner, Dr. Smyth. He got McInnis to admit that semen, if found, might have yielded a blood type that potentially could exclude a suspect. Where were the sperm cells? Where was the scientific evidence, which might have revealed the killer’s blood type and exonerated his client? But after seeing the bloody photos of Dawn Hamilton, was the jury even listening?

  Lazzaro and Brobst then began with their identification witnesses. Nancy Hall was first. She told the jury that the man seated at the defense table was the same man she’d seen on Orion Court outside her Fontana Village apartment the morning Dawn was killed. Hall said she’d seen the man twice in the area in the week before the crime. Scheinin made some headway with her. He had her explain how she’d believed that the composite resembled her friend Mickey Manzari and that she’d even told police where to find Manzari to arrest him. But Scheinin never brought out that Hall had seen Kirk on television before going to the lineup.

  James Keller was called next. A small, gentle black man, he took his time walking from the double oak doors to the witness stand. He couldn’t hear too well and put his hand to his ear. Keller told of seeing a stranger on the way to work the day of the crime. He recalled for the jury going to a lineup and picking Bloodsworth out. He identified Bloodsworth in court as the man he saw. He maintained that he was certain of his identification. Scheinin never brought out how Keller came to the attention of the police, that the first time he claimed to have recognized Kirk and contacted them was the weekend of Kirk’s arrest, over two weeks after the crime. And Scheinin never questioned Keller as to whether he’d seen Bloodsworth on television before attending the lineup.

  Chris Shipley took the stand. It was clear that he was frightened, that he didn’t want to be there. Lazzaro asked him what the stranger by the pond looked like. “Curly hair, a bushy mustache, and muscular,” he said. Lazzaro walked him through the creation of the composite, his photo ID, the lineup. And when asked if he saw the man standing by the pond on that terrible day anywhere in the courtroom, Chris didn’t hesitate. He raised his arm and pointed to Kirk Bloodsworth. Scheinin couldn’t go too hard with Chris or it might look like he was bullying a child. But he might have done more. He asked Shipley how tall the stranger was, and Chris answered that he was about six feet tall. Scheinin never confronted Chris with his original height description, that he first told detectives that the man was six foot five. Scheinin did, however, enter into evidence the statement Chris had given detectives on the afternoon of the crime, which contained the height description. He also had Chris admit that the stranger by the pond did not have red hair. It was honey yellow, Chris agreed. For the most part, though, Chris’s trial testimony was believable and compelling.

  Little Jackie Poling was called and failed to identify Kirk in the courtroom. But he was followed by his mother who told the jurors how Jackie had come to her after the lineup and told her that number six, Kirk Bloodsworth, was the man at the pond. Scheinin did little with her.

  Donna Ferguson testified after Jackie and also pointed to Bloodsworth as the strange man in Fontana Village the day of the slaying. She claimed she’d seen him walking with Dawn, that he told Dawn that he was playing hide-and-seek with Lisa, and that he invited Dawn to help him go find Lisa. Ferguson said she was just six feet away from Dawn and the stranger. “I got a good look at his face,” she said. Scheinin did better with Ferguson. He brought out her prior inconsistent statements, that she’d originally told the police that she never saw the face of the man with Dawn. And he got her to admit she’d smoked a joint the morning of the crime. But she was the fifth one to identify Kirk. Five different identification witnesses. Hard to overcome.

  Lazzaro and Brobst weren’t finished. They called Detective Capel to fill in the blanks, wrap up the story, reiterate how the composite was created and how the photo and lineup identifications came about. Capel mentioned the missing persons report filed by Wanda Bloodsworth and described the gambit played on Kirk, suggesting that the detectives didn’t think Bloodsworth even saw the rock on the table. Capel repeated what he considered to be the incriminating statements Bloodsworth had made afterward about the rock. He also volunteered that Bloodsworth had said that he’d been out buying drugs on the afternoon of the murder. Cross-examining Capel, Scheinin brought out that Chris Shipley had first described the strange man as being six feet five inches tall. Scheinin got Capel to agree that Bloodsworth must have seen the rock on the table, given what he said afterward. The two fenced, back and forth. Scheinin asked Capel about the man who’d found Dawn Hamilton’s clothes, Richard Gray, and elicited that a pair of panties had been discovered in Gray’s car. During the redirect examination, though, Capel told the jurors that Gray had been eliminated as a suspect through interviews.

  Donna Hollywood, from Harbor to Harbor, then testified, providing information about Kirk’s strange behavior after July 25, his claim of illness, his abrupt departure. The prosecutors finished by calling Rose Carson and then Tina Christopher. Rose told the jury that Kirk, after he came back to Cambridge, told her that he’d done “a very bad thing, and also that he’d gone to the state hospital for help.” Tina Christopher said that she couldn’t remember back to August “too good.” She was asked if she saw Kirk Bloodsworth in the courtroom, and she answered no. When prodded by Ann Brobst, she remembered that back in August, Bloodsworth had helped some friends move a motorcycle and then had talked to her of a murder. He went on about a little girl, a bloody rock, and some guy that was with him who was supposed to have done it, she said. She testified that about three times he told her that there was a guy with him who took the little girl off. Because she seemed to be having trouble remembering, Brobst showed her a written statement police had taken from her and asked Judge Hinkel to admit the written statement into evidence. Scheinin objected, but the judge allowed it. During cross-examination, Scheinin brought out that Tina was smoking marijuana when she supposedly heard Kirk talking about the murder.

  The state’s case had gone in well, gone in with hardly a glitch.

  SIXTEEN

  STEVEN SCHEININ THEN had his turn. He began the defense case by calling several police officers who’d taken statements from Nancy Hall and Donna Ferguson the day of Dawn’s death. These officers testified as to the early descriptions these women had given and what they’d said that day, statements different from what they told the jury. He brought in Officer Charle
s Moore, who’d taken the statement from Donna Ferguson that she didn’t see the man calling for Lisa and didn’t know if he was the same man that she’d previously seen sitting on the electric box. Lazzaro, cross-examining him, pointed out how little experience he had in felony investigations compared with the homicide detectives handling the case.

  Scheinin tried to call other officers to make the point that dozens of police had gone around Fontana Village broadcasting the description given by the two boys and showing the composite sketch, suggesting to everyone the characteristics of the assailant. Judge Hinkel wouldn’t allow any of it. He sustained the prosecutors’ objection to this whole line of questioning as irrelevant.

  When it came time in the trial for Scheinin to put on his alibi witnesses, it was nearly noon. Scheinin asked Judge Hinkel for a luncheon recess, one that would have allowed him time to talk to them before they testified, to perhaps do some last-minute preparation. Hinkel wasn’t ready for a recess and denied the request. Scheinin had no choice but to call them. One by one, they took the stand. They did not seem well prepared.

  Joey Martin went first, followed by Tammy Albin. Wanda Bloodsworth went next. Birdie Plutschak and Dawn Gerald testified as well. All swore that Kirk was home at the South Randolph Road address the morning of July 25. But the prosecutors knew how to make these witnesses look confused, uncertain, like their stories were contrived. It wasn’t hard. Ann Brobst cross-examined Wanda Bloodsworth. “When did you first try to remember back to what happened that day?” Brobst asked her.

  “When Detective Capel had told me he suspected Kirk of murder,” Wanda answered.

  “And do you remember when that was?”

  “I don’t remember exactly what day it was.”

  “Well, surely that was very upsetting to you?”

  “Yeah,” Wanda answered.

  “You can remember that day, I imagine, vividly, isn’t that correct?” Brobst’s tone was facetious.

  “Yes.”

  “But can you tell us what day of the week that was that Detective Capel talked to you?”

  Wanda started to fidget. She looked around the courtroom, as if for help. “No,” she said. “Because he was there more than once,” she added.

  Brobst asked some other questions, then worked her way back to this same point—Wanda’s inability to accurately remember dates. “Now, would you please tell the members of jury what time you got up on July18 the preceding week?” she asked.

  Wanda was baffled. She again looked toward Scheinin, as though he could answer for her. “I don’t know,” she finally said.

  “You don’t remember that?”

  “No.”

  “Do you remember what you did that day?”

  “No.”

  “Do you remember what you were wearing that day?”

  “No.”

  “Do you remember what you had for dinner?”

  “No.”

  Brobst kept her off balance. “Now, you said that it was the day that Kirk was arrested, that you first realized you would have to think back to the 25th and that you believe that was about August 7?”

  “Yes.”

  “So it was about two weeks later?”

  “Yes.”

  “What were you doing two weeks ago today?”

  “Two weeks ago today?”

  “Hmm, hmm.” Brobst was patient now.

  “February, I was here I think it was—oh, no.” Wanda put her hand over her face. “I don’t know what I was doing,” she said.

  Others fared worse. Ann Brobst sensed that Joey Martin was repeating a canned story. “When did you first realize that you would have to come in and tell the members of the jury what happened on the date that Mr. Scheinin directed your attention to?” she asked.

  “Last night.”

  “And was that the first time that you tried to remember what happened back on this date?”

  “No. I remember a lot of it, but the date, the day and the date itself, I’m not too sure of.” Joey was easily confused.

  “Okay,” Brobst pressed. “Now, do you remember what you were doing July 18, 1984?”

  “Is that the day?”

  “I’m asking you, if you remember.”

  “I don’t remember. If that’s . . . I don’t know . . . Dates I’m not good with.”

  Scheinin called Wayne Palmer and Jeffrey Wright to complete the alibi. They held up no better on cross-examination than the others. Of them all, Birdie Plutschak was the most composed. Brobst did little to dent her testimony.

  While Birdie was on the stand, Scheinin asked her whether Kirk had called her the night he left Baltimore. She answered that yes, he had. Scheinin asked her whether Kirk had told her then that he had done something bad. She said yes again. Scheinin asked her to tell the jury what that something was. The prosecutors objected. The question called for hearsay, they argued. Judge Hinkel sustained the objection and told her that she wasn’t permitted to answer the question. She couldn’t repeat what Kirk had told her the bad thing was. She did manage to blurt out that it didn’t have anything to do with Dawn’s murder, but the jurors never heard her confirm that he’d mentioned a taco salad.

  But Scheinin had reason to hope. At least he’d put on the stand more alibi witnesses than the state had put on ID witnesses. He also offered some confirmation that the alibi witnesses were correctly remembering the date. Wanda had brought to court a copy of the mental health clinic record from July 25. It confirmed that she was at least remembering the right day. A receipt from the sporting goods store confirmed that Jeffrey Wright sold his rifle there on July 25. Details that might make a difference.

  Scheinin also thought his next witness might win over some jurors. In the middle of trial, after seeing for the first time the tennis shoe that Capel had measured and noticing that inside it was marked size 8, Scheinin had contacted Richard Rudolph, the proprietor of Towson Bootery, and asked if he would testify as a shoe expert for the defense. Rudolph was known as the Mayor of Towson. His shoe store, located in the heart of town, had been a local fixture, a hangout for gossip and political talk for decades. Rudolph had fit many generations with shoes. If you needed a pair, your children needed a pair. And if you needed a favor, something done, a good word with the town council, say, or some Orioles tickets, Rudolph was the man to see. Large, engaging, and robust, he was a local legend. When Scheinin called him to the witness stand, Rudolph brought with him his own specially designed foot and shoe measure. There, before the jury, Scheinin had Rudolph measure the tennis shoes that had been seized, the ones Ramsey had measured with a ruler and about which the FBI expert testified. They measured size 8. Rudolph then measured one of Kirk’s feet. It was size 10½. Scheinin had Rudolph try to put the tennis shoes on Kirk. Rudolph should have been on vaudeville. He went through great pains to try and jam them onto Kirk’s feet. Maybe he tried too hard. He forced them on him, but only after Kirk’s toes curled up.

  Lazzaro and Brobst that night regretted the shoe debacle. “Sometimes you have to take an arrow and not wince,” Lazzaro told Brobst. “We’ll have to deal with it somehow in our closing . . .”

  Following Rudolph, it was finally time for the defendant. Scheinin called Kirk Bloodsworth to testify. Kirk rose, turned briefly to face the silent crowd, then walked to the witness stand. He steeled himself. He knew it all came down to this moment. Kirk’s best chance lay with himself. This was it. No dress rehearsal. No coming back. What he wanted to do was to jump out of the witness box, take each juror there by the collar, and shake hard until each understood that he was innocent. But all he could do was answer the questions posed to him by the lawyers. He was at the mercy of the lawyers.

  Kirk raised his right hand and swore to tell the truth, as all the witnesses had done. Scheinin asked him questions about his general background, his time in the marines, his relationship with Wanda, and he answered carefully, deliberately. His voice was steady. He looked at the jury without trying to stare. He tried to stay calm, to concentr
ate on the questions, not to be emotional, though he felt like this wasn’t who he really was. He described how he’d worked at Harbor to Harbor and been off on July 25. He recounted that he’d been home at the Randolph Road address most of that morning and then gone out with Wayne Palmer to look for some marijuana to buy. He was never anywhere near Fontana Village. He didn’t kill anybody.

  Scheinin asked Kirk about leaving the Baltimore area, and he explained why he decided to leave. The bad thing he told everyone he’d done referred to his earlier promise that he’d buy his wife a nice dinner, her favorite, a taco salad. Instead of doing this, he’d left his job and left her without even saying good-bye. Kirk replayed his first interview with Ramsey and Capel in Cambridge and denied that he was later talking about blood on a rock, though he admitted talking about the rock and panties they’d shown him. Kirk told the jury the tennis shoes in question weren’t even his. Scheinin indicated then that he had no further questions.

  Lazzaro stood to cross-examine Kirk. For a moment, he just eyed the defendant, as though sizing up his target, as though adjusting his crosshairs. With his first few words, he threw Kirk off guard. He asked about his mother, whether she was strict, whether she was domineering. The psychological profile was his blueprint. He asked questions about the other women in Kirk’s life, whether they were domineering or violent. “Isn’t it true, Mr. Bloodsworth, that all of the women in your life scolded you and dominated you? Isn’t it true that you were frustrated by that? That this frustration built up over the years? That you finally vented your frustration on this little girl?”

  Lazzaro had Kirk recount the stressful living conditions at South Randolph Road, the fights with Wanda. Lazzaro paced back and forth in front of Kirk. He asked him about the statements he made to Rose Carson that he had done a very bad thing. He scoffed at the taco salad excuse. Had Kirk repeat it. Lazzaro’s expression showed his incredulity. The jurors, from their reactions, seemed to agree. To all Lazzaro’s questions Kirk answered with short, clipped, responses. That’s all Lazzaro gave him the opportunity to do. Lazzaro asked about him working in a funeral home with dead bodies. He brought up the comments Kirk had supposedly made to Tina Christopher in Cambridge about a bloody rock, and underscored those for the jury. “Isn’t it true that you knew about the bloody rock because you were the one that used it to bash Dawn Hamilton’s head in?” He asked Kirk about his strength and muscular condition. If a few of the questions seemed a bit random, they weren’t. The prosecution would return to all of these subjects later. They were all grist for the closing argument Brobst would give and the rebuttal argument with which Lazzaro would conclude the trial.