University of Copenhagen, the Harvard Business School (M.B.A.), as well as (Econ) from the London School of Economics (Ph.D.). He has been a Senior Research Fellow at the Stockholm School of Economics and is the author of the book
Magt Fordærver: Svig og Fejl i de Multinationale Corporation (Power Corrupts: Fraud and Failure in the Multinational Corporation).
Dr. Westergaard has been identified in a variety of rankings and surveys as one of the world’s most influential thinkers on leadership and accountability in the financial services industry in the context of the financial crisis.
The accompanying photo showed a dignified older man in a black suit. He had thick silver hair that looked expensively styled, a prominent nose, and puckish gray eyes. I wouldn’t have identified him as a European except for his open collar—no power tie for Hans Westergaard—and rimless eyeglasses.
“He doesn’t look like a sexual psychopath,” I offered.
“Most of them don’t.” Charley gestured for me to take a seat at the table in the training room. “You’re going to hear this anyway, and I figure it should come from me.”
“What is it?”
“Do you remember the Erland Jefferts trial?”
“Lori and I were just talking about it.”
“I didn’t want to spout off back at the house, because I don’t believe in leaping to conclusions. But there are certain resemblances between the two homicides.”
“But Jefferts is still in the Maine State Prison,” I said. “No wonder Baker is nervous. People have been claiming for years that he’s innocent. Either there’s a copycat killer out there or those fanatics were right and Jefferts was imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit.”
Charley fell silent. He leaned his knobby elbows on the table and pressed the fingertips of both hands together. It seemed as if he was searching for the right words to tell me some bad news.
“Is there something else?”
He nodded. “I heard a deputy talking. He was down to the Westergaards’ house when Walt Kitteridge was examining the body. You know Walt? He’s the state medical examiner. According to the deputy, Walt said that rigor mortis was still progressing in the deceased. It hadn’t reached its peak.”
In the back of my mind, a half-recollected textbook triggered an alarm. “What does that mean in terms of time of death?”
“It could mean a lot of things, but I guess there was still some residual body heat in the inner organs.” His voice was hoarse and he paused to get some saliva going. “The indication is that Ashley Kim didn’t die last night after the accident. She was probably killed sometime this afternoon.”
The realization was like a hand closing around my throat.
I could have saved her.
12
S even years ago, a pretty waitress named Nikki Donnatelli disappeared on her way home from a late-night shift at the Harpoon Bar in Seal Cove. The next morning, while searching for the missing girl, the cops instead found Erland Jefferts passed out behind his steering wheel on an isolated woods road.
A local lobsterman known for his dashing good looks and substance-abuse problems, Jefferts had been bounced out of the Harpoon for making lewd advances to Donnatelli. Fearing the worst, the Maine state police and game wardens began an extensive search of the surrounding forest. The hunt took the better part of two rain-soaked days, but eventually Warden Kathy Frost and her cadaver dog, Pluto, located the body of the lost girl. Nikki had been bound with rigging tape to a tree, tortured, and raped. Because of the presence of a petechial hemorrhage, the medical examiner determined that she had died from asphyxiation after Erland Jefferts taped shut her nose and mouth.
Or so the prosecution claimed. The defense argued otherwise, and there were certain inconsistencies in the evidence to back up Jefferts’s story. Problems with the autopsy, a plausible alibi placing the accused in police custody at the medically determined
Magt Fordærver: Svig og Fejl i de Multinationale Corporation (Power Corrupts: Fraud and Failure in the Multinational Corporation).
Dr. Westergaard has been identified in a variety of rankings and surveys as one of the world’s most influential thinkers on leadership and accountability in the financial services industry in the context of the financial crisis.
The accompanying photo showed a dignified older man in a black suit. He had thick silver hair that looked expensively styled, a prominent nose, and puckish gray eyes. I wouldn’t have identified him as a European except for his open collar—no power tie for Hans Westergaard—and rimless eyeglasses.
“He doesn’t look like a sexual psychopath,” I offered.
“Most of them don’t.” Charley gestured for me to take a seat at the table in the training room. “You’re going to hear this anyway, and I figure it should come from me.”
“What is it?”
“Do you remember the Erland Jefferts trial?”
“Lori and I were just talking about it.”
“I didn’t want to spout off back at the house, because I don’t believe in leaping to conclusions. But there are certain resemblances between the two homicides.”
“But Jefferts is still in the Maine State Prison,” I said. “No wonder Baker is nervous. People have been claiming for years that he’s innocent. Either there’s a copycat killer out there or those fanatics were right and Jefferts was imprisoned for a murder he didn’t commit.”
Charley fell silent. He leaned his knobby elbows on the table and pressed the fingertips of both hands together. It seemed as if he was searching for the right words to tell me some bad news.
“Is there something else?”
He nodded. “I heard a deputy talking. He was down to the Westergaards’ house when Walt Kitteridge was examining the body. You know Walt? He’s the state medical examiner. According to the deputy, Walt said that rigor mortis was still progressing in the deceased. It hadn’t reached its peak.”
In the back of my mind, a half-recollected textbook triggered an alarm. “What does that mean in terms of time of death?”
“It could mean a lot of things, but I guess there was still some residual body heat in the inner organs.” His voice was hoarse and he paused to get some saliva going. “The indication is that Ashley Kim didn’t die last night after the accident. She was probably killed sometime this afternoon.”
The realization was like a hand closing around my throat.
I could have saved her.
12
S even years ago, a pretty waitress named Nikki Donnatelli disappeared on her way home from a late-night shift at the Harpoon Bar in Seal Cove. The next morning, while searching for the missing girl, the cops instead found Erland Jefferts passed out behind his steering wheel on an isolated woods road.
A local lobsterman known for his dashing good looks and substance-abuse problems, Jefferts had been bounced out of the Harpoon for making lewd advances to Donnatelli. Fearing the worst, the Maine state police and game wardens began an extensive search of the surrounding forest. The hunt took the better part of two rain-soaked days, but eventually Warden Kathy Frost and her cadaver dog, Pluto, located the body of the lost girl. Nikki had been bound with rigging tape to a tree, tortured, and raped. Because of the presence of a petechial hemorrhage, the medical examiner determined that she had died from asphyxiation after Erland Jefferts taped shut her nose and mouth.
Or so the prosecution claimed. The defense argued otherwise, and there were certain inconsistencies in the evidence to back up Jefferts’s story. Problems with the autopsy, a plausible alibi placing the accused in police custody at the medically determined
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