“Did you make any other observations about the victim, particularly about his hands?”

“Yes, they were not cut or injured.”

“What did that suggest to you?”

“The absence of defensive wounds suggested he did not struggle or fight back against his assailant, which suggested he was either surprised or never saw the attack coming and did not have a chance to get his hands up to block the blows.”

“Suggesting he may have known his assailant?”

Jonathan levitated his butt a few inches above his chair again. “Objection. Speculation.”

“Sustained.”

“All right, what did you do next?”

“Well, the murder was still relatively fresh. The park had been sealed, and we immediately searched it to ascertain if there were any individuals in it. That search had begun before I got there.”

“And did you find anyone?”

“We found a few people who were pretty far away from the scene. No one seemed particularly suspicious. There was no indication that any of them were connected with the homicide in any way.”

“No blood on them?”

“No.”

“No knives?”

“No.”

“So it’s fair to say that in the early hours of the investigation you had no obvious suspects?”

“We had no suspects at all.”

“And over the next few days, how many suspects were you able to identify and develop?”

“None.”

“What did you do next? How did you continue the investigation?”

“Well, we interviewed everyone we could who had any information. The victim’s family and friends, anyone who might have seen anything the morning of the murder.”

“Did this include the victim’s classmates?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“There was some delay in getting into the school. The parents in the town were concerned about us interviewing the kids. There was some discussion about whether the kids needed to have a lawyer present at the interviews and whether we could go into the school without a warrant, into the lockers and things. There was also some discussion about whether it was appropriate to use the school building for the interviews and which students we would be allowed to interview.”

“What was your reaction to all this delay?”

“Objection.”

“Overruled.”

“I was angry, to be honest. The colder a case gets, the harder it is to solve.”

“And who was running the case with you for the district attorney’s office?”

“Mr. Barber.”

“Andrew Barber, the defendant’s father?”

“Yes.”

“Did it strike you by this time that there was something inappropriate about Andy Barber working this case when his son’s school was involved?”

“Not really. I mean, I was aware of it. But it wasn’t like a Columbine thing: we didn’t necessarily have a kid-on-kid murder. We did not have any real reason to believe any of the kids at the school were involved, let alone Jacob.”

“So you never questioned Mr. Barber’s judgment in this regard, even in your own mind?”

“No, never.”

“Did you ever discuss it with him?”

“Once.”

“And would you describe that conversation?”

“I just said to Andy that, you know, just to cover your… derriere, you might want to pass this one off.”

“Because you saw a conflict of interest?”

“I saw that his kid’s school might be involved, and you never know. Why not just keep your distance?”

“And what did he say?”

“He said there was no conflict, because if his kid was ever in danger from a murderer, then that was all the more reason he would want to see the case solved. Plus, he said he felt some responsibility because he lived in the town and there weren’t many homicides there, so he figured people would be especially upset. He wanted to do the right thing for them.”

Logiudice paused at that last phrase and glared at Duffy for just an instant.

“Did Mr. Barber, the defendant’s father, ever suggest that you pursue a theory that one of Ben Rifkin’s classmates might have murdered him?”

“No. He never suggested that or ruled it out.”

“But he did not actively pursue a theory that Ben was killed by a classmate?”

“No. But you don’t ‘actively pursue’-”

“Did he try to steer the investigation in any other direction?”

“I don’t understand, ‘steer’ it?”

“Did he have any other suspects in mind?”

“Yes. There was a man named Leonard Patz who lived near the park, and there was some circumstantial indication he might be involved. Andy wanted to pursue that suspect.”

“In fact, wasn’t Andy Barber the only one pushing Patz as a suspect?”

“Objection. Leading.”

“Sustained. This is your witness, Mr. Logiudice.”

“Withdraw the question. You did ultimately interview the children, Ben’s classmates at the McCormick School?”

“Yes.”

“And what did you learn?”

“Well, we learned at some length-because the kids were not very forthcoming-that there was an ongoing beef between Ben and the defendant, between Ben and Jacob. Ben had been bullying Jacob. That led us to begin considering Jacob as a suspect.”

“Even while his father ran the investigation?”

“Certain aspects of the investigation had to be carried out without Mr. Barber knowing.”

This came as a hammer blow to me. I had not heard it before. I had assumed something like it, but not that Duffy himself was involved. He must have seen my face fall, because a helpless look crossed his face.

“And how did this come about? Was another assistant DA appointed to investigate the case without Mr. Barber’s knowledge?”

“Yes. You.”

“And this was done on whose approval?”

“The district attorney, Lynn Canavan.”

“And what did this investigation reveal?”

“Evidence developed against the defendant to the effect that he had a knife consistent with the wounds, he had sufficient motive, and most important he had stated his intention to defend himself with the knife if the victim continued to bully him. The defendant had also come to school with a small amount of blood on his right hand that morning, blood drops. We learned these things from the defendant’s friend, Derek Yoo.”

“The defendant had blood on his right hand?”

“According to his friend Derek Yoo, yes.”

“And he had announced his intention to use the knife on Ben Rifkin?”

“That’s what Derek Yoo informed us.”

“At some point did you become aware of a story on a website called the Cutting Room?”

“Yes. Derek Yoo described that to us as well.”

“And did you investigate this website, the Cutting Room?”

“Yes. It is a site where people post fantasy stories that are mostly about sex and violence, including some very disturbing-”

“Objection.”

“Sustained.”

“Did you find a story on the Cutting Room website that related to this case?”

“Yes, we did. We found a story that described the murder essentially from the murderer’s point of view. The names were changed and some of the details were a little off, but the situation was the same. It was obviously the same case.”

“Who wrote that story?”

“The defendant did.”

“How do you know that?”

“Derek Yoo informed us the defendant had told him.”

“Were you able to confirm that in any other way?”

“No. We were able to determine the ISP of the computer the story was originally uploaded from, which is like a fingerprint identifying where the computer is located. It came back to the Peet’s coffee shop in Newton Centre.”

“Were you able to identify the actual machine that was used to upload the story?”

“No. It was someone who linked to the coffee shop’s wireless network. That was as far as we could trace it. Peet’s does not keep records of which computers jump on and off that network, and it does not require users to sign on to the network with a name or a credit card or anything. So we could not trace it any further.”

“But you had Derek Yoo’s word that the defendant had admitted writing it?”