Cape Fear

The prosecution had presented a streamlined case against Christopher McCowen. It claimed the garbage collector went to Christa Worthington's house after midnight for sex, and then he stabbed her through the chest. The DNA and his statement to police back it up, argued the prosecutor.

But now the jury would hear from McCowen's defense lawyer Bob George, and the high-profile Boston attorney had a completely different interpretation of events.

Bob George [defense attorney]: Three or four other men were accused at one point or another of killing Christa Worthington.

The defense lawyer began by telling the jury that this was nothing more than a rush to judgement against his client. It was true, he conceded, that Christopher McCowen's DNA was found on Christa Worthington.

But investigators, he charged, let racial stereotypes cloud their vision.

George: As soon as they see the black garbage man it's rape, not just rape, aggravated rape, because this woman would never have had sex with a garbage man unless it's rape.  

But attorney George said that's just what happened. Christa Worthington had sex -- consensual sex -- with McCowen three days before her body was found.

George: He went up there Thursday. Went to talk with her about removing her Christmas tree. A sexual event occurred in the living room.  And then he left.
Dennis Murphy [Dateline correspondent]: She comes onto him?
George: Yep, and--
Dennis Murphy: That's his story?
George: As far as the details of what happened, he said that it was a consensual, sexual event.  A mutual affair.

Which is why, the lawyer said, his client's DNA was found on Christa. What's more, he asked the jury to be skeptical of all the crime scene evidence that had been introduced.

George: You don't have to be on the staff of CSI to know that this is not a good crime scene … You've got so many vehicles in the driveway, it's like a traffic jam at Times Square. You see fingerprints from the entire police department and fire departments, it's Truro in the house ... all over the house.

NBC video Defense: Nothing matches Physical evidence doesn't match the story told by prosecutors, says McCowen's defense attorney in opening Dateline NBC

Exhibit "A" in the defense's theory that the forensics had been hopelessly tainted was the blanket that an arriving paramedic had draped over the half-naked body for decency's sake. 

That blanket, it turned out, had semen on it, belonging not to Christopher McCowen but to Tim Arnold, Christa's old boyfriend.

The implication was that Arnold may have been the last to have seen Christa alive. 

Or was it someone else?  The lawyer pointed out that crime scene technicians had collected another swab of semen from Christa's body -- semen the state never tested.

Since Christa was known to have been intimate with several men, the untested semen, he argued, may have belonged to one of those lovers.

The defense lawyer asked a crime scene forensics expert why they didn't test the specimen and look for a match.

George [defense attorney]: Was that semen swab ever tested in this case?
Saferstein: I have no evidence of that.
George: Was it ever compared to standards that you saw were submitted for Tim Arnold or anyone else in this case?
Saferstein: I have no evidence of that.

DNA testing cuts both ways.

It can accuse the guilty or clear the innocent. McCowen's lawyer thought the failure to test the DNA on that swab was a grave mistake.

George: I'm trying to tell you: You could have exonerated Chris McCowen if it wasn't his semen on the external swab.

Claiming the forensic collection and testing was bungled was the defense's response to the first part of the evidence against McCowen -- his DNA that was found on the victim.

As for the second part, the police statement given by McCowen that sounded to some ears like a partial confession, the defense answered that by arguing police intimidated McCowen into signing a false statement after six hours of relentless questioning.

The defense called an expert witness, a psychologist, to explain to the jury how someone with a 78 IQ like McCowen could be browbeaten by authorities into signing a false confession. "An individual like that would get twisted up in responses," said the psychologist, :Would say one thing at one point would say something else later on ... just out of sheer confusion."

They used high-pressure pysch games, said the defense. And under questioning lawyer George got Tim Arnold, one of Christa's former boyfriends, to say he endured the same police tactics when he came under suspicion.

Even the former son-in-law of Tony Jackett said he was shaken when the cops put him in the hot seat, saying "My heart was racing, my body was covered in sweat, I was drenched in sweat and my head was kind of very light and spinning and I wasn't really able to think straight and correctly."

Were the cops heavy-handed interviewing suspects? We'll never know, because the cops also failed to tape record their interrogations. Everyone in court was poorer because of that decision.

So if McCowen didn't kill Christa, who did?  His defense lawyer seemed to suggest it was his party buddy, Jeremy Frazier.

Frazier told the prosecution he'd been sleeping off a buzz on a friend's couch when Christa was murdered. But on the stand, under defense grilling, that friend who'd given Frazier both a place to sleep and an alibi added a twist to his version of events.

He acknowledged that the first time he talked to police he told them he didn't know where Frazier spent the night.

George [defense attorney]: When they first talked to you about Jeremy Frazier staying at your house, you didn't confirm that in any way did you?
Friend: No, like I said I didn't want to get involved in any of this cause I knew I would have to come back up here and get my life rearranged.

But in his closing, Bob George made it clear that he didn't have to prove who did kill Christa

NBC video McCowen glad to talk with police In closing, defense attorney says McCowen was glad to talk to police, but they couldn't accept his relationship with Worthington Dateline NBC

Worthington -- only that the state's case against his client was full of holes, from that tainted crime scene, to the forensic testing, to the interrogation.

"Restore him to his family and find him not guilty of these three indictments.  Thank you," said George to jurors.

It was now the jury's case to consider. There were boxes of evidence, photos and DNA science.  But the courtroom drama was far from over.  It had only moved a few feet to the deliberation room.  Twelve strangers were about to give legal veterans more than a few surprises.

As the hours stretched into days and the days into more than a week, some wondered if the jury would ever reach a verdict.