Final Analysis - Catherine Crier [126]
During a break, Sequeira offered Susan advice on how to question the detective about the letter. “You can ask him if they investigated claims made in the letter.”
“I understand your point,” Susan replied. “But the jury has to see the letter to understand what I’m referring to.”
“Ms. Polk, for the fifth time, he cannot testify to the contents of that document,” Brady told Susan. “Move on please.” Sequeira just shrugged.
Susan was now completely on her own at the defense table, having fired her case assistant, Valerie Harris, the previous afternoon. She did not provide Harris a reason for her second dismissal since the trial began.
Harris later told reporters that Susan simply said, “I think I have to do this alone.” Those close to the case later learned that Susan was angry that Harris had given her dog away after Eli was arrested and incarcerated at the same detention center as his mother. She could find no one to care for Dusty.
Having Harris off the case would present additional challenges for Sequeira. The prosecutor had been using Harris as a middleman after citing his unwillingness to deal directly with Susan. He would later admit that trying the case against Susan was extremely challenging—something he would have been ill-equipped to handle as a younger man.
Meanwhile, Susan would also suffer. Valerie had been selecting Susan’s clothing for court each day. The chore was not without its challenges. On days that Susan didn’t like the outfit, she would refuse to get dressed. Now, she would have no one to bring her clothes and came to court in prison attire. Court watchers remarked that even in jail garb Susan still managed to look elegant. She had a natural flair for making sweat pants and a T-shirt look stylish.
On Tuesday, April 5, the prosecutor called former Contra Costa criminalist Song Wicks to the stand. Wicks had collected and evaluated evidence at the Miner Road crime scene on the night of October 15, 2002. He testified that he found Felix Polk’s body splayed on the tile floor of the couple’s guesthouse when he arrived at the crime scene that night. When Sequeira brought up Susan’s accusations that he and other members of the sheriff ’s department had moved furniture to bolster their theory of the homicide, Wicks scoffed indignantly.
“Who had the most time to spend at the crime scene—the detectives, the criminalists, or the defendant?” Prosecutor Sequeira asked Wicks.
“The defendant.”
“Would your job have been made easier if you had the defendant’s bloody clothing?”
“Objection!” Susan shouted from the defense table. She was quickly overruled by the judge.
“It could have allowed me to draw conclusions, if I had the defendant’s clothing,” Wicks said over a second objection from Susan.
Anxious to get the query out before Susan could object again, Sequeira shouted his next question. “Did you find any bloody clothing anywhere?”
“No,” the investigator replied.
Judge Brady interrupted. “Mr. Sequeira, I am not hard of hearing. Please moderate your tone.”
“Sorry,” the prosecutor apologized, glaring at Susan, who sat grinning at the defense table.
“I’d like to just finish without you interrupting,” he told her after she voiced yet another objection. But Susan continued, claiming a conspiracy.
By late Wednesday, Sequeira had regained his sense of humor and was mockingly referring to Susan as “Madame Defendant.”
“The sarcasm can be done without,” Susan scolded. “Ms. Polk is fine.”
During her cross-examination of Song Wicks, Susan accused the criminalist of plotting to frame her for her husband’s murder and claimed that he and some thirteen other law enforcement officials were responsible for dousing water on Felix’s bloody head to “create a more dramatic photo opportunity.” Once again, she brought up the ottoman, accusing Wicks of having moved furniture at the crime scene. Addressing