This was how murder cases progressed in real life: point by minuscule point until a picture began to emerge, like a pointillist painting.
The prosecution scored body blows with video evidence, a steady parade of expert witnesses, and pained testimony delivered by Shaneah Jenkins and Ursula Ward, who choked up when she was shown a photograph of her son’s corpse.
“I understand that this is very emotional for you,” Judge Garsh told Ward. “But it’s very important that you manage during this time you are testifying to retain control of your emotions, and not to cry while you are looking at any photo that may be shown to you.”
Shayanna’s sister told the court about going to her sister’s house after Odin’s death, and about Aaron’s attempt to comfort her by telling her, “I’ve been through this death thing before.”
When the DA pulled up video surveillance that showed Shaneah coming into the house and giving her sister a long, strong hug, Shaneah began to cry, took a tissue out of her purse, and dried her tears.
Shaneah also said that Aaron had not visited Odin’s family after the death. Aaron and Odin had been friendly, she said, but not especially close.
Given Aaron’s defense—based, in part, on the idea that Lloyd and Hernandez were far too friendly for Aaron to have had anything to do with the murder—this information was less than damning. Still, it was enough to cast doubts on the relationship Aaron’s lawyers had set out to describe.
The defense scored smaller points, like the ones they had scored with Officer Zimmer.
But on February 12, Detective Daniel Arrighi took the stand.
The prosecution was already at a disadvantage, insofar as Arrighi went. During the lead-up to the trial, Judge Garsh had ruled that the text messages that Odin had sent to his sister, immediately before his death, would not be admissible.
The texts were hearsay, Garsh had said, because they were statements, made out of court, by someone who could not be called to testify.
This was a heavy blow for the prosecution. But Garsh had also ruled that evidence seized in the course of one of the searches at Aaron’s home in North Attleboro would be inadmissible.
A state trooper named Michael Bates had deprived the prosecution of that evidence by filling his paperwork out sloppily, and failing to properly transfer a few details from the affidavit to the search warrant.
The judge didn’t think that there was anything malicious in the mistake. According to testimony Trooper Mike Cherven had given on June 18, 2014, the omissions shouldn’t have mattered at all because he had carried both documents into Aaron’s home at the time of the search, and had made them “available at all times” for the duration of the search itself.
In fact, Cherven had said, the documents were attached to each other with a paper clip.
But after reviewing evidence that indicated that Cherven had entered the house empty-handed, and left again, seven minutes later, to conduct an interview at the North Attleboro police station, Garsh ruled against admitting the cell phones and iPads that the police had seized in their search.
“The court credits none of this testimony,” Garsh had written, in a sharply worded ruling. “Even if Cherven had brought the affidavit in a folder along with the search warrant to the residence, and the court finds that he did not, indisputably he was not present ‘at all times’ during the search.”
Given the harshness of the judge’s ruling, the DAs had good reason to leave Mike Cherven off of their witness list.
But the downside of the DA’s decision was that Detective Arrighi, who had worked closely with Cherven during the investigation, would have to work twice as hard during James Sultan’s relentless cross-examination.
On the stand, Arrighi appeared to be a bit nervous. Maybe it was just his manner. But Sultan seemed to smell blood.
The lawyer came out swinging.
Sultan interrupted Arrighi several times, badgered him, questioned his training. Time and again, he allowed a note of contempt to creep into his voice.
“You peeked into the windows?” Sultan asked.
“Correct,” said Arrighi.
“You peeked into the garage?…You gave Trooper Cherven a boost so that he could peek into the garage? And then the two of you went into Aaron Hernandez’s backyard?”
“Yes, sir. Correct.”
“Were you invited to go into his backyard?”
“No, we were not.”
“And then you peeked through the windows in the backyard, right?”
Sultan kept emphasizing the word: “Peeked…peeked…peeked…” implying that Arrighi and Michael Cherven had acted like trespassers and Peeping Toms. Moreover, Arrighi and Cherven were both dressed in street clothes. Their SUV was unmarked. How was Aaron to know they were cops? And what made Arrighi and Cherven think that Aaron was under any obligation to come to the door when they knocked?
Next, Sultan attacked Arrighi for stopping Shayanna’s car, after she had dropped Aaron off at the North Attleboro Police Station.
“Miss Jenkins and their baby started driving away?” the lawyer asked. “Right?”
“Yes, sir. Correct.”
“Driving home? Is that a fair assumption?”
“Yes. Fair assumption, yes.”
“It was eleven o’clock at night by then, right?”
“Correct.”
“And you and Trooper Cherven—or, Trooper Cherven—activated his blue lights and pulled her over, right?”
“Correct.”
“Now, when the two of you pulled Shayanna Jenkins, and her baby, over—at eleven o’clock at night—was she committing any traffic infraction?”
“No, he just activated the blue lights—”
“Will you answer my question,” the lawyer interrupted. “Was she committing any traffic infraction?”
“No, sir.”
Sultan gave the cop a long, questioning stare—as if to say, “Really?”
“The baby was in the car, asleep. Right?”
“Yes.”
The implication, here, was that Detective Arrighi and Trooper Cherven had acted like creeps.