"## [theme]" "This memo" "If it's some kind of joke, I'm not laughing." "It's no joke, Mr. Kendall." "We need at least a week's delay." "Heller, Mitchell Heller, our test pilot" "The results of our human stress runs in the last two weeks are completely unreliable." " Then replace him." " We can't." "It's either nurse Heller along or drop him and start over with other men." "We do have two standby pilots beginning the test series, but orienting them into the Moonstone program will mean at least a three or four week delay." "Mr. Owen, I remind you this Human Factors Section is six weeks behind schedule now." "Heller is only psychologically upset, Mr. Kendall." "It's nothing serious or permanent, a mild sort of anxiety neurosis." "Dr. Carey, you're asking me to shut down a $500 million priority defense effort because one man's broken out in some sort of rash?" "Mr. Kendall, that is not why I" "If you'll come to my office," "I'd like to show you a test film that may give you the answer you're looking for." "[Owen] This is one of our tests to determine minimum levels for safety, actually a test of the limits of a man's endurance." "[Linda] For this test, Heller, in the space suit, was under anesthesia." "While he was still in the Air Force," "Major Heller applied for selection as one of the Mercury Astronauts." "He was removed from consideration by his commanding officer, a-- a General Brand." "Major General Addison Brand?" "[Linda] Yes" " Yes, that's the name." "Heller resigned his commission, came to Winslow Aeronautics and became a grounded astronaut in our stress tests." "He's overworked himself almost to the point of exhaustion, where there's no longer a line between real and imagined illness, these occasional attacks of what appears to be asthma." "We knew he was overextending himself, but his work was so amazingly good, so free of any possible criticism, and Heller himself was so anxious to finish his work, that we kept on with him." "[Linda] Then suddenly a dormant, up-to-then unimportant, buried hatred for some Air Force General was pushed by his strain and exhaustion to the surface, affecting him and his work." "This is Heller, taken by a hidden camera after the test." "So Heller saluted from habit." "The place is full of officers." "What's that got to do with General Brand?" "When he saluted in that film, there was nobody else in the room." "I've only been filling in since Mr. Winslow's death." "The Board of Directors has hired a new man to head the company." "You can take the matter of the delay up with him." "I wish you luck." "He's a retired Air Force Major General, and his name is Brand, General Addison Brand." "Project Moonstone, three basic missions" "Earth orbital flight, circumlunar flight, manned landing and exploration of the moon." "Shephard and Grissom have penetrated space and returned safely." "Colonel Glenn has successfully orbited the earth three times." "The pressure to bring Project Moonstone in ahead of schedule is building up." "Is the Project ahead of schedule?" "On schedule?" "No, this top priority space effort is six to twelve months behind schedule." "I'm sorry I'm late." "I had to arrange a pass at the gate for a visitor." "[Kendall] General Brand, this is our test subject" "Mr. Heller and I, unfortunately, are already acquainted." " Look, General" " Would you please be seated, Mr. Heller?" "The critical path lies here, the physiological data." "All basic design is dependant on statistical evaluation of stress tolerances, the astronaut's stress tolerances." "Human Factors Section." "Even a superficial analysis can pinpoint the flaw." "Mr. Kendall, as acting president of the company since the death of Phillip Winslow, you were aware that the project was badly behind schedule?" "Why, yes." "Mr. Owen, as chief of Project Moonstone, you were aware that the work of dozens of departments was literally at a standstill because of one man's inability satisfactorily to perform his assigned duties?" "[Owen] Yes, sir, but it was a case of nursing along the only one qualified test subject we had." "[Brand] As the testing department's physician and psychologist, Dr. Carey, you were confident in your ability to nurse this incompetent along, that is, until, of course, you concurred in Mr. Owen's request" "for suspension?" "As confident of my ability, General, as I suspect you are of yours." "Mr. Heller, I've always had consummate regard for your qualifications for, as well as your dedication to, space research." "My only reservation has been the question of where best to use what talent you possess." "That's why you had me taken off of Project Mercury, isn't it-- in order to "best use" my talent?" "It takes thousands of skilled specialists to push a piece of hardware carrying a man into space and back." "I can see you in many, many places in that concept, but not as the one man riding that hardware." "No." "You made that plain when we were both in uniform." "[Brand] Major Heller or Mister Heller, these test results confirm my considered judgment." "You show no more stability or consistency on the ground than I anticipated you would in a space capsule, stability under crisis 100,000 miles out in space." "A control panel malfunctions." " How do you react?" " Brand!" " How do you fix it?" " Brand, I warn you" "Violence, Mr. Astronaut?" "Would you smash your fist in the panel?" "And that secretary he brought in with him, Terry Faye." "You take it from one of the top PR men in the racket, Mitch-- yours truly, Eddie Lewis" "I tell you there's smoke and fire in that cozy, little wigwam." "Yes, sir, there's plenty of s" "What's the matter?" "Mitch, you all right?" "[strained breathing]" "Anyway, she sends for me." ""Mr. Lewis"-- as if she didn't know my name" ""Mr. Lewis, our Public Relations program must personalize the project with extensive picture coverage."" "Project, my foot." "Personalize the General-- that's what she means, and that's what he wants." "Eddie, we have some work to do." " Would you excuse us, please?" " [Mitch panting]" "Oh, yeah, sure thing, doc." "I'll see you around, Mitch." "Mitch, if you remember, would you send me that bio poop I asked you about?" "Huh?" "Linda, I'm sorry." "This work, it's all I know." "Nothing else means anything to me." "You've accomplished a great deal, Mitch." "You don't have to kill yourself." "You don't have to go on proving yourself all over again." "You're like Brand." "You think I'm no good, a failure, that I can't do those tests." "No, Mitch." "Well, he's wrong." "He's always been wrong about me." "Oh, Mitch, please" "He's got to be wrong, and you've got to help me prove he's wrong." "Linda-- that medicine, that special medicine you had made up for me..." "No." "The stuff's strong." "It'll stop these attacks." "Mitch, face the truth." "Linda, you've got to help me." "Please, help me." "Take off your jacket." "Roll up your sleeve." "[wheezing]" "Easy now." "Slowly." "Slowly." "Mr. Heller?" "I'm Paul Drake." "You called me this morning." "When I picked up my pass at the gate, the guard told me I'd find you here." "Oh, yes, Mr. Drake." "Linda?" "We have a test scheduled in five minutes." "I suggest it might be politic to be on time." "Mr. Drake." "On the phone you told me about some papers that were stolen from you-- blueprints, I think you said." "Yes, a space capsule remote control valve, a radical design I've working on for several years, off and on." "Detailed drawings are in an 8x11 manila envelope with my name in the corner." "Did you keep those papers here in the plant or at your home?" "Well, I'm not quite sure where I had them last." "Tell you the truth, I haven't worked on or even looked at those blueprints for several months." "You're sure they're missing?" "I looked for them last night." "I sort of thought I might have to get into a different line of work." "I couldn't find the drawings at home, wasn't sure whether I'd had them there last or here at the plant." "What did plant security here say when you checked with them?" "I didn't check with them." "You see, this invention of mine hasn't been registered or patented yet." "It could be worth a great deal, now, to me." "I thought it would be better handled by a reputable detective agency." "I can't exactly go snooping around a defense" "I have to leave now, Mr. Drake." "Why don't you start with my apartment." "You can check with my landlady, and we'll go on from there." "And this is important to me, very important." " Mr. Heller" " I'll check with you later." "## [classical]" "[knocks] ## [louder]" "Mitch." "Why are you so surprised, Bonnie?" "We did have a date tonight, didn't we?" " But my maid" " Oh, she called me, all right, to tell me that Mrs. Winslow was sick in bed." "I brought you these." "I was worried about you." "Went to your apartment, but you weren't there." "How did you happen to, uh..." "Find out you that you were at Winslow lodge?" "We came here often enough with Phil before he died, didn't we?" "I just thought that" "Well, I guess you're not so sick after all." "Mitch, please." "Good friends." "Isn't that what you were pleased to call us, Bonnie?" "Good, good friends, no need to make fools of each another, to blatantly lie to each another?" " [Bonnie sighs]" " Mr. Heller." "It's all right, Addison." "It's only a misunderstanding." "Mr. Heller's made a mistake." "I couldn't possibly have had an appointment with him when I had already made arrangements to show the lodge to a new tenant." "Then I suggest you leave now, Mr. Heller." "I see that your "tenant" is carrying two copies of the lease." "I'm sure that you'll be a very accommodating landlady," "Mrs. Winslow." " [door slams] - [sighs]" "Your copy of the lease, Mrs. Winslow." "[Bonnie chuckles]" "[over intercom] Grip each control firmly." "You'll have to compensate for the input bias on both dials by nulling the X-Y signal fed in on tape." "[Owen] Cameras ready, Bruce?" "Ready, Mr. Owen." "Start the cameras." "Tape on." "[humming]" "Increase vibration." "Raise noise level." "Stage one, mark." "[humming louder]" "[rattling]" "[Owen] More vibration, more noise." "[Attendant] Stage two, mark." "[humming louder]" "[Owen] More vibration, more noise." "[Attendant] Stage three, mark." "[pitch rising]" "What are you testing for?" "Performance decrement-- how much physical and mental torture an astronaut can take before he cracks up and loses control." "Increase noise and vibration." "[Attendant] Stage four, mark." "Mr. Young," "I called and arranged for you to be at the General's quarters last night to take some photographs." "You didn't show up." "I'm sorry, Ma'am." "The Public Relations Director, my boss, asked me to do something else." "[Terry] Mr. Lewis?" "Yes, Ma'am." "He said there were some night "hot shot" tunnel pictures that couldn't wait, might be weeks before we could get to them." "Miss Faye, give Mr. Lewis two weeks' notice." "He's fired." "General, please, don't touch that." "Look at this data compilation." "I've permitted you to continue these tests for 10 days." "Look at these results." "Well?" "No comment?" "[Owen] Sir, they're a little erratic." "[Brand] Erratic?" "That's a masterly understatement, Mr. Owen." "[strikes paper with stick] This indicates either gross and utter incompetence on the part of the test subject or mental and physical deterioration so marked and obvious as to render his work worse than useless." "We can afford neither time nor money wasted on unreliable testing." "Miss Faye, inform the Legal Department that Mr. Heller's services as testing astronaut will no longer be needed by Winslow Aeronautics, as of today." " [ringing louder] - [no audible dialogue]" "## [classical]" "[Brand] Heller?" "Come in." "Come in." "Door's open." "[siren wailing] [horn honks] [tires screech]" "Lieutenant Anderson, police." "Mind telling me who you are and where you're coming from?" "Heller, Mitchell Heller." "I've just been at the Winslow lodge." "[Anderson] Just?" "Five, maybe ten minutes ago?" "I suppose so." "Spoke to a man named General Brand." "You can check with him." "What's this all about?" "When you spoke to this General Brand, he was all right?" "Everything, so far as you could see, was normal at this Winslow lodge?" "Of course." "Look, what is this?" "[Anderson] I think you'd better leave your car here and come with us." "Now, wait a minute." "I'm afraid we'll have to insist, Mr. Heller." "## [continues]" "Now would somebody please tell me what this is all about?" "Mr. Young?" "I was here at 8:45." "The place was a shambles, like there'd been a fight, and General Brand was dead." "What?" "The phone was ripped out, so I had to drive all the way down into town to call the police." "I came out here to take pictures." "I took them at 8:45." "Now, what is this, Bruce?" "You know that isn't the truth because I was here after that, and there isn't one single stick of furniture out of place inside that lodge, and as for General Brand, what do you mean he's dead?" "I spoke to him not 10 or 15 minutes ago, at 9:00, right inside there." "Suppose we go inside and see." "## [Beethoven Symphony No. 5 theme]" "Paul, you're sure that medicine vial was labeled "Distilled Water?"" "Yep, I'm sure." "No antihistaminic, no medicine of any sort." "Just plain old distilled water." "One shot in the arm, and he bounced back from that asthma attack like a yo-yo." "He couldn't really have been sick." "What about those drawings he hired you to recover?" "That's another thing." "Believe me, Perry, I checked, and I'm convinced that one-- no drawings were ever stolen from him, and two-- there probably never were any drawings." "You picked yourself a dilly of a client." "I'm glad he's yours and not ours." "Not yet, but Paul has that generous look in his eyes." "All right, Mr. Sherlock Holmes, all that expensive sleuthing must have turned up something." "Before he died of a heart attack six months ago," "Phillip Winslow, even though he was president of Winslow Aeronautics, was running this space project thing himself, so he and my client Mitch Heller became pretty friendly." " Well" " Don't tell me." "Let me guess." "Old friend Mitch picked up the pieces with Winslow's widow." "Along came big-shot general, with whom Mitch is not so friendly." "Easily consolable widow meets general" "And my client's up on a murder rap." "I gather, then, there is a Winslow widow?" "Pretty, easily consolable, and an old hand at playing the field." "Name's Bonnie." "Paul, you are asking me to help Mitchell Heller, aren't you?" "I think Mitch Heller is off his rocker." "I also think he's guilty as sin, but I've seen his war record as a pilot in Korea." "I know what decorations he won and how he won them, and I know him." "I like him." "Perry, he deserves the best." "Yes, Perry, I promised I'd ask you to help him." "I know it sounds crazy, like some sort of hallucination, but I swear to you, Mr. Mason, there wasn't a sign of a struggle in that room when I spoke to Brand." "You couldn't be mistaken about the time?" "No, the clock on the mantle and my wristwatch both said 9:00." "It had to be 9:00." "Did you see him?" "No, he was upstairs dressing, said he had somebody coming up and couldn't see me at the moment." "Did he tell you who that somebody was?" "No." "I agreed to meet him at a restaurant down the road in half an hour." "The police stopped me on my way to the restaurant." "Feeling as you did about Brand, why did you go to the lodge to see him?" "He sent for me." "After firing you?" "He told me, on the phone, he didn't like me any more than I liked him, but he did want me to stay on at Winslow, as Director of Testing in the Human Factors Section." "He asked me to come to the lodge at 9:00 to discuss it." "When did he call you?" "Oh, let's see, it was about 3:00 in the afternoon." "I was in the locker room, alone." "It was after the noise-and-vibration test." "He called me from his office." "Well, Perry Mason." "What do you know?" "Hamilton." "Mr. Heller, you've already met Lieutenant Tragg." "This is Hamilton Burger, the District Attorney." "You representing Heller, Perry?" "Yes, I am." "Fine." "I'm glad you're here." "I'd like permission from both of you to have Mr. Heller examined by a competent psychiatrist, just in case we find ourselves arguing a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity." "Not guilty of what?" "Murder, in the first degree." "We found the murder weapon, a .45 service automatic." "Perry, it belongs to your client, Mitchell Heller." "You say Mitch Heller said that he received a call from General Brand yesterday afternoon?" "Yes, at about 3:00." "It would have been impossible for the General to have called Heller at 3:00 or at any time yesterday afternoon." "[Mason] Impossible?" "[Terry] Yes." "From the moment the test was over at 2:00, until 6:00, we left for the evening," "General Brand was dictating confidential reports to me in his office." "Neither one of us left that office at any time, and there were no phone calls in or out." "Now, Mr. Mason, if there's nothing more, may I please be excused?" "Yes, of course." "Thank you." "Mr. Lewis, did Mitch Heller keep a .45 service automatic here at the plant?" "Yes, in his locker." "He let me use it any time I wanted to." "Security has a range right here on the plant." "I understand you were discharged yesterday?" "I was fired yesterday, Mr. Mason, re-hired today." "Mr. Kendall took care of it." "The Chairman of the Board called me this morning, told me I'd be named to head the project, possibly, within a few months, take over the duties of the late Mr. Winslow as company president." "This may or may not be related to Brand and the murder, but can you tell me anything about the Board of Directors and the difficulty it's having with Mrs. Winslow?" "The trouble began when Winslow started divorce proceedings against his wife." "Phillip Winslow agreed to a cash settlement." "He was getting out of the company entirely." "The Board had prepared a resolution agreeing to redeem his personal stock and retire it as company treasury stock." "There was even a contract drawn up, covering the company's buying his stock." "You mean there was an actual Redemption Agreement prepared between the company and the Winslows?" "Yes, drawn up by the company lawyers." "After Phillip died, that Redemption Agreement was never found, at least, not the original." "They found the carbons, unsigned, in his desk." "Signed, or unsigned, there was no trace of the original." "Mr. Kendall, the noise-and-vibration test Heller did so badly on-- may we have someone make the same test?" "Certainly." "I'll call and have it set up." "Eddie, would you take them down to the test lab?" "[test capsule whirring]" "[rattling, whining]" "Mr. Owen, Heller was an engineer as well as a test pilot." "Did he like to tinker?" "Did he like to make things with his own hands?" "Mitch?" "Not particularly, that is, not more than what he had to do as part of his work." "I guess Paul has had enough of outer space for now." "Shut it down." "Would you help Mr. Drake out, please?" "Let's check the recordings." "Not bad at all." "Considering Mr. Drake's total inexperience, the results are not unusual, but certainly better than average." "How did Paul compare with Mitchell Heller's results on the same test?" "Well" "We'd already asked for a suspension of the tests because of Mitch's erratic results." "Mr. Owen, how do the tests compare?" "Mr. Drake was comparatively better than Heller." "You mean an experienced subject, like Heller, didn't do as well as Drake?" "Mr. Mason, these figures don't lie." "Dr. Carey, to do so badly, Mitchell Heller must be really sick." "No." "No, he" "He is not sick." "[gasps]" "There's a gentleman in blue guarding the front door." "Would you like to try to explain to him what you're doing here and what you're looking for?" "I've been following you for two hours, and, lady, you've led me a merry little chase." "Who are you, and what do you want?" "I'm a private detective, and I don't want anything, but the man I work for, Perry Mason, would like to talk to you." "Well, I don't want to talk" "Ah-ah-ah-ah-- The Law, remember?" "I consider Mr. Drake's behavior inexcusably high-handed, little short of criminal." "Mrs. Winslow, I thoroughly agree with you." "Report him to the police, or better still, contact the District Attorney directly." "Well, as long as I'm here, I suppose I may as well talk to you." "There are a lot of questions I'd like to ask you concerning your relationship to Heller and General Brand, but before we get to that," "I'm curious as to why you were at the lodge." " What were you looking for?" " Looking for?" "Could it have been the Redemption Agreement" "Winslow Aeronautics prepared for signature by you and your late husband?" "I don't know what you're talking about." "[Drake] Mrs. Winslow, for three years now, another company has been trying to buy into and take over" "Winslow Aeronautics, and for that single outstanding and controlling block of stock your husband owned, they'd pay double the market value." "[Mason] If you and your husband signed the still-missing original of that Redemption Agreement, and that signed agreement now exists, it is valid and binding on his estate." "Winslow Aeronautics would pay, through his estate, the market value of that stock-- $1 million." "And if you had the agreement, it would be to your advantage to destroy it, then wait for the estate to leave probate, and sell the stock to this other company for $2 million." "[Mason] If the agreement hasn't been destroyed, if somebody else has it, then that somebody else is in a perfect spot to hold you up, to make you the perfect target for extortion." "Now, who has the agreement?" "Wha" "[Tragg] We do, Perry." "I was telling Andy it pays to make visits to your office... unannounced." "You know, he's-- he's right." "We don't actually have the agreement, only a photostat." "The District Attorney has the original, which didn't quite burn up in the lodge fireplace, where somebody tossed it the night of General Brand's murder." "We expected that someone might come back to the lodge." "That seemingly indifferent policeman at the door was just a decoy." "You saw us there?" "And heard you and followed you and Mrs. Winslow." "By the way, Paul," "Mitch Heller hired you to find some stolen papers, drawings, I think, didn't he?" "Tragg, forget those drawings." "If the original of that Redemption Agreement" "The extortion agreement, a million dollars' worth of extortion, I think you said." "What about that, Perry?" "Well, if it was thrown into the fireplace, why didn't it burn?" "It was protected inside a heavy manila Winslow Aeronautics envelope." "With Mitchell Heller's name, in his own writing, over the company name in the corner." "Dr. Carey, you heard the testimony of the psychiatrist appointed by this Court, in which Mitchell Heller, the defendant, was found sane now, sane at the time of the murder, and competent at that time," "to differentiate between right and wrong." "I ask you both as a doctor and as Board-Certified Psychologist if you agree with that opinion?" "Yes." "[Burger] We have offered this medical testimony," "Your Honor, not to anticipate a plea of insanity from the defense, but as a means of proving that, as the psychiatrist also testified," "Mitchell Heller, the defendant, was at the time of the crime not only sane, but emotionally disturbed." "Do you agree, Doctor, that the defendant felt he had been a victim of great injustice at the hands of General Brand?" "Yes, but" "Would you say that defendant harbored unreasonable hatred against General Brand?" "Well, not exactly." "You see" "Excuse me." "I ask you, as a trained psychologist, fully aware of the meaning of the word "hate,"" "did Mitchell Heller hate General Addison Brand?" "Yes." "If anything, Mitch Heller hated the General even more than he had in the Air Force." "Yes, but Miss Faye, you were in love with General Brand." "Don't you think it's possible that your involvement with the decedent could color your memory about the man who here stands charged with his murder?" "Why, certainly not." "Everybody knew that Heller hated the General." "If the Redemption Agreement were turned over to the Board of Directors," "Mrs. Winslow would receive, through the probated estate, approximately $1 million for her late husband's stock, but if that agreement were-- were not found, the stock itself would revert to Mrs. Winslow." "Another company was prepared to pay her $2 million for the stock." "In other words, whoever had that Redemption Agreement had a piece of paper worth a million dollars to Bonnie Winslow." "Phillip Winslow died of a heart attack in his office within hours after getting his wife's signature on that agreement, and yet the signed agreement was not found in his office when it was searched the following day." "Who found Phillip Winslow dead?" "Who waited with him in Winslow's own office until the doctor arrived?" "The defendant, Mitchell Heller." "The afternoon of the murder, I received an unsigned note, typed on company stationery, saying that the writer had the missing agreement and offered to turn it over to me for half a million dollars." "[Burger] What did you do, Mrs. Winslow?" "I told General Brand about the note." "He thought he knew who the extortionist was." "He said he'd call me later." "[Burger] And did he call you?" "[Bonnie] Yes, he said he had contacted the extortionist-- he didn't tell me who he was--- but that the extortionist was coming over, later, to the lodge." "He promised to get back the agreement and-- and destroy it." "[Burger] Cross-examine." ""Destroy"?" "Did you say General Brand promised to destroy that agreement?" "Yes." "You see, by then the General and I had begun to see, well, eye-to-eye on certain matters." "[Mason] Mrs. Winslow, when the General called back, a few hours before his death, are you sure he said nothing at all to indicate the identity of the extortionist?" "[Bonnie] As a matter of fact, he did, yes." "He said he thought he knew who the man was because he knew him from the Air Force." "[Mason] No further questions." ""The fireplace, in addition to log and kindling ash, contained residue of cigarette butts, one burnt button, one folded-over scorched aluminum strip, 5/8 x 3 1/2 inches, a partially burnt 8 1/2 x 11 inch manila envelope," "and the scorched and smoke-smudged paper inside that envelope." "The paper was the signed Redemption Agreement." "The envelope containing it was from Winslow Aeronautics, with a handwritten signature in the upper left-hand corner-- the signature of the defendant, Mitchell Heller." "[Burger] Mr. Young, picture "A"" "is the one taken by you." "Picture "B" was taken by the police later." "In his statement to the police, the defendant claims that the lodge was in perfect order when he talked with the decedent, General Brand, at 9:00." "Mitch Heller couldn't talk to the General at 9:00." "The General was dead." "[Burger] As standard procedure in stress tests, a complete tape recording is made of everything said, including what the test subject himself says." "During the test that you conducted on the day of the murder, it was possible for the defendant, Mitchell Heller, inside the chamber, to hear every single word that was uttered by General Brand." "That day's tapes, authenticated by yourself and by your assistants, also included what the defendant said at that time." "Would you read for us, please, the marked passage from this transcript of your tape recording." ""General Brand's voice" "'Miss Faye, notify the legal department" "'Mr." "Heller's services as a test astronaut 'are no longer needed at Winslow Aeronautics, as of today.'" ""Mitchell Heller's voice-- 'I--"'" "[Burger] Go on, Mr. Owen-- read us what Mitchell Heller said." ""Mitchell Heller's voice" "'I'll kill you." "So help me, Brand..." "I'll kill you."'" " I'll have no part of it!" " Why, you in" "I warned you." "Don't try to force me!" " Force you?" " I'll have no part of it!" "[door slams]" "Frightened by the threat of exposure in his attempt to extort half a million dollars from Mrs. Bonnie Winslow, the defendant, Mitchell Heller, kept his appointment at the lodge." "When General Brand took from him the envelope containing the Redemption Agreement and threw it in the fire, the two men struggled, and during that struggle, the defendant, Mitchell Heller shot and killed General Addison Brand." "Your Honor," "I move that the defendant be bound over for trial at Superior Court on a charge of murder in the first degree." "Before I rule on the motion by the prosecution, is it your intention to present a defense, Mr. Mason?" "[door opens]" "Yes, Your Honor, we shall present a defense." "We waive opening statement." "As my first witness, I call Lieutenant Arthur Tragg." "What?" "Lieutenant Tragg, did we have an appointment during the noon recess, to discuss some evidence in this case?" "Yes, we were supposed to meet in the Interview Room, at the end of the hall." "When I got there, you were in the washroom." "You said you'd changed your mind and would see me in court." "What time was this?" "12:30." "Would you look at this early afternoon paper?" "There was an altercation in the Interview Room." "The reporters escorted me to the Court Clerk's office, where I checked the hearing transcript, and stayed there with me from 12:15 to 12:45." "That's impossible." "I spoke to you myself, in that Interview Room at 12:30." "Impossible?" "You could have mistaken my voice." "Let's check it." "I'm going to the far end of the courtroom and speak to you." "Close your eyes, Lieutenant Tragg, and listen." "I've changed my mind." "Sorry, Tragg." "I'll see you in court later." "That was your voice and the exact words you used when you spoke to me from the washroom." "Listen again." "[Mason's voice] I've changed my mind." "Sorry, Tragg." "I'll see you in court later." "The whole incident was staged for your benefit, Tragg." "You never heard me say those words, not now, not a few moments ago, and not at 12:30 in the Interview Room." "You were listening to Jamison Sewall, an actor and impersonator." "[Mason] With the Court's permission, we are going to demonstrate what the defense contends was the actual sequence of events on the night of the murder." "Now, Mr. Young, how would you characterize the scene at the lodge, in terms of what happened prior to your arrival?" "I'd say there had been a real lulu of a knock-down, drag-out fight there." "I have here the two pictures-- "A" and "B"." "Now, please look at them." "If there had been, as you say, a "lulu of a knock-down, drag-out fight,"" "why isn't there one piece of furniture in that room broken?" "Not the glass lamp bases, not the light bulbs, not the ceramic ashtrays." "Now, there is an answer." "The actual murderer was concerned with more than the death of General Brand." "He was concerned with involving Mitchell Heller as the apparent murderer." "Mr. Sewall will portray the murderer, who parked out of sight, then entered the lodge and confronted General Brand." "The murderer had used Heller's gun, stolen from his locker at the plant, to kill." "Now, he wanted Heller to have an hallucination, a delusion, to see something that didn't exist." "Step two-- the murderer sets the stage." "As we shall see, it would be necessary to have an exact record of how the stage was set." "That camera takes, and develops, its own photographs in a matter of seconds." "To prove an hallucination, you need a witness to reality." "At 8:45, the witness, you, Mr. Young, keeps his appointment, an appointment made by the murderer." "You see the room carefully arranged to suggest a fight, you see the corpse, you leave." "But the murderer had made a second appointment-- one for 9:00." "Now, he must work fast." "Step three-- remove all evidence of a struggle or a killing." "9:00, Mitchell Heller, on time for the appointment made by the murderer over the phone, shows up, knocks." "[Brand's voice] Heller?" "Come in, come in." "The door's open." "Mind telling me what time it is?" "The time is 9:00." "[Sewall, as Brand] I tried to reach you, but you'd already left." "I'm expecting someone here." "I'd like to see him alone, if you don't mind." "There's a fine restaurant, a place called "The Falcon," down the road." "I'll meet you there, in half an hour." "[Mason] Heller left the lodge, driving straight toward the oncoming police." "You, Mr. Young, had seen a corpse." "Step four-- using the picture he had taken earlier, the murderer recreated the exact evidence of a struggle that never took place." "Now, you, Mr. Young, returned with the police and with Heller-- a Heller swearing he had just seen something that obviously wasn't so and had talked to someone who was already dead." "This is the negative tab on the special film this camera uses." "What is it made of, Mr. Young?" "Why, it's laminated paper." "That's all." "Paper that should completely burn." "Please strip it apart, Mr. Young." "Now, that is a metal pod, containing developing chemicals." "Now, this is part of the transcript of Lieutenant Anderson's testimony." "Please read the underlined portion." ""The fireplace, in addition to log and kindling ash, contained residue of cigarette butts, one burnt button, one folded-over scorched aluminum strip, 5/8 x 3 1/2 inches."" "Mr. Young, this is the counterpart of what you took from the negative tab, what the murderer mistakenly threw into the fire, not aware it wouldn't burn." "Would you describe it, please?" "Why, it's a folded-over, scorched aluminum strip-- 5/8 x 3 1/2 inches." "[Mason] From an examination of the physical facts in the case, suppose we return now to the area of motive." "Whoever had stolen the Redemption Agreement made no use of it for months, until the afternoon of the murder, when the extortion note was delivered, the afternoon, I believe, Mr. Lewis, you were fired." "Yes, the same afternoon Mitch Heller was fired." "Mitch Heller, who fitted the General's only description of the extortionist because he had served with him in the Air Force." "Now, I have a full report as to why you left your last job as public relations man at the Air Base commanded by General Brand." "All right, so I was caught peddling advance copies of news releases to the magazines and fired me." "That doesn't make me a murderer." "Does it make you an extortionist, Mr. Lewis?" "Mitchell Heller sent you some biographical background material you had asked for." "How did it come to your office, in what kind of container, Mr. Lewis?" "Well, it was a company envelope with" "A company envelope with his signature on it?" "Was that the envelope in which you inadvertently, or deliberately, carried the Redemption Agreement when you kept your appointment with General Brand." "But that appointment was for 7:30." "I was out of the lodge by 8:00." "Brand grabbed the envelope away from me and through it into the fire, but I swear to you, I didn't kill him!" "[Mason] The killer had to be someone who knew in advance that General Brand was coming to take over the company." "Now, who knew that, Mr. Lewis?" "Gordon Kendall, he knew, and Mrs. Winslow." " And you?" " No!" "No, I didn't know." "Yes, Eddie Lewis did know in advance General Brand had been employed." "He told me about it." "That's a lie." "He's lying." " Silence, silence" " I didn't know." "I tell you, he's lying." " Bailiff, silence that man." " Yes, he's ly" "He is lying." "[Mason] May I suggest, Mr. Owen, that your memory may be at fault, that it wasn't Eddie Lewis who told you the General had been hired, but rather the Chairman of the Board at Winslow Aeronautics?" "I have this deposition." "Now, would you tell me, or shall I read to the court, what else the Chairman of the Board told you?" "Well, he said he wasn't satisfied with my work as Project Chief." "And that you-- you, Mr. Owen, were responsible for the delay in Project Moonstone?" "That's ridiculous." "Every department was delayed because of the test results." "The truth is that the entire project was badly mismanaged before those test results became unreliable." "You knew it, you knew it was your fault, and you tried to protect yourself." "It wasn't Heller's performance, but your deliberate tampering with the equipment, that produced faulty results, isn't that true, Mr. Owen, little or no prospects of another job after being fired?" "It was then, wasn't it, Mr. Owen, you decided to steal the radically new electronic remote control valve" "Mitchell Heller had invented?" "I had to have it, Mr. Mason." "Those tampered-with tests, hopefully made to protect your job, could serve an alternate function." "They could prove Heller mentally incompetent, poor Mitchell Heller, saluting nobody in an empty room." "That room wasn't empty." "You framed that episode, as you framed the other episodes, to discredit him." "Suddenly, with General Brand's arrival, your entire plan threatened to explode in your face." "Mitchell Heller wasn't the only one who knew of that invention, now, was he?" "[Owen] No." "No." "Brand knew." "In the Army, Heller had requested Brand's permission to have a model built and tested." "Part of the bad feeling was due to Brand's having turned down that request." "Well, if Brand was dead and a psychotic Heller was convicted of his murder, why, then, no one would know there was an invention or that it had been stolen." "The entire murder plan, the time schedule, the created illusions-- all designed to fit the hallucinatory psychotic image of Heller you had built, designed to convict another man of the murder you committed." "I had nothing against General Brand, believe me." "I hardly knew the man, but I had to kill him and put the blame on Mitch." "I had to kill him." "Don't you see, Mr. Mason?" "Don't you see?" "[machine whirring]" "Acceleration 5 G's and holding." "Interior temperature 100 degrees." "Mark." "All right, you can shut it down now." "I think you like it, being on this end of the tests." "Chief of the Human Factors Section." "Poor Owen, he was prophetic when he enticed me out to the lodge to talk over the job." "Mr. Mason, that actor, Sewall, you used in court, was fantastically good, but how did Matt Owen fool Mitch and Bruce Young on the phone?" "He had me fooled at the lodge, too." "I could've sworn that was the General's voice." "It's amazing what hidden talents people have." "He just happen to possess the wrong ones." "You ought to know what hidden talents are, Mr. Astronaut." "Hey, I didn't do too badly on that test, did I?" "Well, now, if you like it so much" "I'm sure it could be arranged." "Give you another and different ride." "What do you say, Paul?" "[gibbers, squeals]" "Well, if I'm not back in time for the test, just start without me." "Subtitled By J.R. Media Services, Inc." "Burbank, CA"