reached the hotel somewhere around 1:45. Stefanie was waiting; they’d had sex. After that, he’d showered and then left immediately, because he wanted to have some time alone to prepare for his next appointment. Stefanie had stayed in the room in order to take a bath before she set off, and she had told him she didn’t want to be out of there until 3:30. He had tucked five hundred euros in her purse, which was their standard arrangement.
He had used the elevator next to the suite to go down directly to the underground garage; it would have taken him a minute, two at most, to get to his car. He had left the hotel at around 2:30 and driven to the zoological garden, Berlin’s biggest park, and taken a walk for the better part of an hour, thinking intermittently about his relationship with Stefanie and deciding that he had to end it. He’d left his cell phone switched off; he hadn’t wanted to be disturbed.
At four o’clock, he’d been at a meeting on the Kurfürstendamm with four other men. Between 2:30 and 4:00, he had met no one, nor had he had any phone conversations. And no one had passed him when he left the hotel.
Defendants and defense lawyers have a curious relationship. A lawyer doesn’t always want to know what actually happened. This also has its roots in our code of criminal procedure: If defense counsel knows that his client has killed someone in Berlin, he may not ask for “defense witnesses” to take the stand who would say that the man had been in Munich that day. It’s a tightrope walk. In other cases, the lawyer absolutely has to know the truth. Knowledge of the actual circumstances may be the tiny advantage that can protect his client from a guilty verdict. Whether the lawyer thinks his client is innocent is irrelevant. His task is to defend the accused, no more, no less.
If Boheim’s explanation was correct—that is, that he’d left the room at 2:30 and the cleaning lady had found the girl’s body at 3:26, then there was a little under an hour to deal with. It was enough. In the space of sixty minutes, the real perpetrator could have entered the room, killed the girl, and disappeared before the cleaning lady entered. There was no proof of what Boheim had told me. If he had kept silent during his first interview, it would have been easier. His lies had made the situation worse, and there was absolutely no trace of another attacker. Admittedly, I did think it unlikely that a jury would end up convicting him in a major trial. But I doubted that any judge would vacate his arrest warrant right now—a suspicion clung.
Forty-eight hours later, the examining magistrate called me to arrange a time for the formal review of Boheim’s remand in custody. We settled on the next day. I could have the file picked up by a courier; the DA’s office had approved its release.
The file contained new inquiries. Everyone in the victim’s cell-phone address book had been questioned. A girlfriend, in whom Stefanie Becker had confided, explained to the police why she had turned to prostitution.
But what was much more interesting was that the police had located Abbas in the meantime. He had a record—break-ins and drug dealing and, two years previously, an offense involving grievous bodily harm, a fight outside a discotheque. The police had questioned Abbas. He said he had followed Stefanie to the hotel once, out of jealousy, but she’d been able to explain what she was doing there. The interrogation went on for many pages, and the detectives’ suspicions were clear in every line. But finally when it came down to it, they had a motive but no proof.
Late in the afternoon, I paid a visit to ADA Schmied in his office. As always, he welcomed me in both a friendly and a professional way. He didn’t feel good about Abbas, either. Jealousy was always a powerful motive. Abbas could not be excluded as the alternative killer. He knew the hotel, she was his girlfriend, and she had slept with another man. If he had
He had used the elevator next to the suite to go down directly to the underground garage; it would have taken him a minute, two at most, to get to his car. He had left the hotel at around 2:30 and driven to the zoological garden, Berlin’s biggest park, and taken a walk for the better part of an hour, thinking intermittently about his relationship with Stefanie and deciding that he had to end it. He’d left his cell phone switched off; he hadn’t wanted to be disturbed.
At four o’clock, he’d been at a meeting on the Kurfürstendamm with four other men. Between 2:30 and 4:00, he had met no one, nor had he had any phone conversations. And no one had passed him when he left the hotel.
Defendants and defense lawyers have a curious relationship. A lawyer doesn’t always want to know what actually happened. This also has its roots in our code of criminal procedure: If defense counsel knows that his client has killed someone in Berlin, he may not ask for “defense witnesses” to take the stand who would say that the man had been in Munich that day. It’s a tightrope walk. In other cases, the lawyer absolutely has to know the truth. Knowledge of the actual circumstances may be the tiny advantage that can protect his client from a guilty verdict. Whether the lawyer thinks his client is innocent is irrelevant. His task is to defend the accused, no more, no less.
If Boheim’s explanation was correct—that is, that he’d left the room at 2:30 and the cleaning lady had found the girl’s body at 3:26, then there was a little under an hour to deal with. It was enough. In the space of sixty minutes, the real perpetrator could have entered the room, killed the girl, and disappeared before the cleaning lady entered. There was no proof of what Boheim had told me. If he had kept silent during his first interview, it would have been easier. His lies had made the situation worse, and there was absolutely no trace of another attacker. Admittedly, I did think it unlikely that a jury would end up convicting him in a major trial. But I doubted that any judge would vacate his arrest warrant right now—a suspicion clung.
Forty-eight hours later, the examining magistrate called me to arrange a time for the formal review of Boheim’s remand in custody. We settled on the next day. I could have the file picked up by a courier; the DA’s office had approved its release.
The file contained new inquiries. Everyone in the victim’s cell-phone address book had been questioned. A girlfriend, in whom Stefanie Becker had confided, explained to the police why she had turned to prostitution.
But what was much more interesting was that the police had located Abbas in the meantime. He had a record—break-ins and drug dealing and, two years previously, an offense involving grievous bodily harm, a fight outside a discotheque. The police had questioned Abbas. He said he had followed Stefanie to the hotel once, out of jealousy, but she’d been able to explain what she was doing there. The interrogation went on for many pages, and the detectives’ suspicions were clear in every line. But finally when it came down to it, they had a motive but no proof.
Late in the afternoon, I paid a visit to ADA Schmied in his office. As always, he welcomed me in both a friendly and a professional way. He didn’t feel good about Abbas, either. Jealousy was always a powerful motive. Abbas could not be excluded as the alternative killer. He knew the hotel, she was his girlfriend, and she had slept with another man. If he had
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