On the warehouse floor I opened the report on the autopsy of Martha Renteria. I was looking for two specific things that had probably not been looked at very closely by anyone else before. The case was closed. It was a dead file. Nobody cared anymore.

The first was the part of the report that dealt with the fifty-three stab wounds Renteria suffered during the attack on her bed. Under the heading “Wound Profile” the unknown weapon was described as a blade no longer than five inches and no wider than an inch. Its thickness was placed at one-eighth of an inch. Also noted in the report was the occurrence of jagged skin tears at the top of the victim’s wounds, indicating that the top of the blade had an uneven line, to wit, it was designed as a weapon that would inflict damage going in as well as coming out. The shortness of the blade suggested that the weapon might be a folding knife.

There was a crude drawing in the report that depicted the outline of the blade without a handle. It looked familiar to me. I pulled my briefcase across the floor from where I had put it down and opened it up. From the state’s discovery file I pulled the photo of the open folding knife with Louis Roulet’s initials etched on the blade. I compared the blade to the outline drawn on the page in the autopsy report. It wasn’t an exact match but it was damn close.

I then pulled out the recovered weapon analysis report and read the same paragraph I had read during the meeting in Roulet’s office the day before. The knife was described as a custom-made Black Ninja folding knife with a blade measuring five inches long, one inch wide and one-eighth of an inch thick-the same measurements belonging to the unknown knife used to kill Martha Renteria. The knife Jesus Menendez supposedly threw into the L.A. River.

I knew that a five-inch blade wasn’t unique. Nothing was conclusive but my instincts told me I was moving toward something. I tried not to let the burn that was building in my chest and throat distract me. I tried to stay on point. I moved on. I needed to check for a specific wound but I didn’t want to look at the photos contained in the back of the report, the photos that coldly documented the horribly violated body of Martha Renteria. Instead I went to the page that had two side-by-side generic body profiles, one for the front and one for the back. On these the medical examiner had marked the wounds and numbered them. Only the front profile had been used. Dots and numbers 1 through 53. It looked like a macabre connect-the-dots puzzle and I didn’t doubt that Kurlen or some detective looking for anything in the days before Menendez walked in had connected them, hoping the killer had left his initials or some other bizarre clue behind.

I studied the front profile’s neck and saw two dots on either side of the neck. They were numbered 1 and 2. I turned the page and looked at the list of individual wound descriptions.

The description for wound number 1 read: Superficial puncture on the lower right neck with ante-mortem histamine levels, indicative of coercive wound.

The description for wound number 2 read: Superficial puncture on the lower left neck with ante-mortem histamine levels, indicative of coercive wound. This puncture measures 1 cm larger than wound No. 1.

The descriptions meant the wounds had been inflicted while Martha Renteria was still alive. And that was likely why they had been the first wounds listed and described. The examiner had suggested it was likely that the wounds resulted from a knife being held to the victim’s neck in a coercive manner. It was the killer’s method of controlling her.

I turned back to the state’s discovery file for the Campo case. I pulled the photographs of Reggie Campo and the report on her physical examination at Holy Cross Medical Center. Campo had a small puncture wound on the lower left side of her neck and no wounds on her right side. I next scanned through her statement to the police until I found the part in which she described how she got the wound. She said that her attacker pulled her up off the floor of the living room and told her to lead him toward the bedroom. He controlled her from behind by gripping the bra strap across her back with his right hand and holding the knife point against the left side of her neck with his left hand. When she felt him momentarily rest his wrist on her shoulder she made her move, suddenly pivoting and pushing backwards, knocking her attacker into a large floor vase, and then breaking away.

I thought I understood now why Reggie Campo had only one wound on her neck, compared with the two Martha Renteria ended up with. If Campo’s attacker had gotten her to the bedroom and put her down on the bed, he would have been facing her when he climbed on top of her. If he kept his knife in the same hand-the left-the blade would shift to the other side of her neck. When they found her dead in the bed, she’d have coercive punctures on both sides of her neck.

I put the files aside and sat cross-legged on the floor without moving for a long time. My thoughts were whispers in the darkness inside. In my mind I held the image of Jesus Menendez’s tear-streaked face when he had told me that he was innocent-when he’d begged me to believe him-and I had told him that he must plead guilty. It had been more than legal advice I was dispensing. He had no money, no defense and no chance-in that order-and I told him he had no choice. And though ultimately it was his decision and from his mouth that the word guilty was uttered in front of the judge, it felt to me now as though it had been me, his own attorney, holding the knife of the system against his neck and forcing him to say it.

NINETEEN

I got out of the huge new rent-a-car facility at San Francisco International by one o’clock and headed north to the city. The Lincoln they gave me smelled like it had last been used by a smoker, maybe the renter or maybe just the guy who cleaned it up for me.

I don’t know how to get anywhere in San Francisco. I just know how to drive through it. Three or four times a year I need to go to the prison by the bay, San Quentin, to talk to clients or witnesses. I could tell you how to get there, no sweat. But ask me how to get to Coit Tower or Fisherman’s Wharf and we have a problem.

By the time I got through the city and over the Golden Gate it was almost two. I was in good shape. I knew from past experience that attorney visiting hours ended at four.

San Quentin is over a century old and looks as though the soul of every prisoner who lived or died there is etched on its dark walls. It was as foreboding a prison as I had ever visited, and at one time or another I had been to every one in California.

They searched my briefcase and made me go through a metal detector. After that they still passed a wand over me to make extra sure. Even then I wasn’t allowed direct contact with Menendez because I had not formally scheduled the interview the required five days in advance. So I was put in a no-contact room-a Plexiglas wall between us with dime-size holes to speak through. I showed the guard the six-pack of photos I wanted to give Menendez and he told me I would have to show him the pictures through the Plexiglas. I sat down, put the photos away and didn’t have to wait long until they brought Menendez in on the other side of the glass.

Two years ago, when he was shipped off to prison, Jesus Menendez had been a young man. Now he looked like he was already the forty years old I told him he could beat if he pleaded guilty. He looked at me with eyes as dead as the gravel stones out in the parking lot. He saw me and sat down reluctantly. He didn’t have much use for me anymore.

We didn’t bother with hellos and I got right into it.