Chapter 9 - THE TRIAL
The trial lasted twelve weeks.
Marcus’s defense argued Caroline and Priscilla conspired to seize both companies.
Diane described herself as a mother trying to save a family legacy.
Dr. Kline claimed he misunderstood the purpose of the medication.
The documents disagreed.
The prosecution began with the wedding footage.
Diane shoving Caroline.
The slap.
Marcus smiling.
Priscilla noticing the ring.
Then moved backward.
The psychiatric petition.
The proxy documents.
The trust debt.
Thomas Keene’s recording.
The tampered phone.
The emergency sedation plan.
One system.
Multiple crimes.
Priscilla testified first.
The defense asked why she trusted Caroline.
“I didn’t.”
The attorney smiled.
“Then why act on her file?”
“I verified it.”
The smile disappeared.
Caroline testified last.
The defense displayed photographs of her bruises.
“You arrived intending to provoke sympathy.”
“I arrived injured.”
“You brought confidential information.”
“I brought proof of crimes involving my property.”
“You publicly destroyed a wedding.”
“There was no lawful wedding to destroy.”
“You struck no one, yet you engineered arrests.”
Caroline looked toward Marcus.
“No. They engineered the evidence. I stopped hiding it.”
Marcus took the stand.
He blamed Diane.
Debt.
Pressure.
Caroline’s absence.
Priscilla’s ambition.
The prosecutor asked, “Who smiled when your wife was slapped?”
Marcus said nothing.
“Who planned to sedate two women?”
Silence.
“Who used marriage as an acquisition tool?”
No answer.
The prosecutor held up Caroline’s wedding ring.
“You treated this as proof she belonged to you.”
Then held up the unsigned proxy.
“And this as proof Priscilla would.”
She faced the jury.
“Neither woman signed away herself.”
The verdicts came after three days.
Guilty.
Marcus received thirty years.
Diane received twenty-two.
Kline received fourteen.
Several executives and attorneys received lesser sentences.
Thomas Keene’s death was reopened as homicide.
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Evidence linked Marcus’s security contractor to the marina.
Additional charges followed.
