- In the criminal justice system,
the people are represented
by two separate, yet equally important groups:
the police, who investigate crime,
and the district attorneys, who prosecute the offenders.
These are their stories.
- You're overreacting, hon.
- The man called you an infidel, Christopher.
- [scoffs]
- Maybe dial back the large events for a while.
- What, and silence any public conversation
on God and faith because it ruffles people's feathers?
Oh, I know that look, Sarah.
- What look, Christopher?
- That look that says I'm cooking you dinner tonight.
- Three courses.
Penance for being so eternally stubborn.
- Okay. - [sighs]
- I'll go out to the garden, pick some herbs.
- Hon!
Do you know who dropped off the gift?
[car alarm blaring]
[dramatic music]
♪
[indistinct radio chatter]
- The premises clear?
- Full sweep. Not easy, given the mess.
- Jesus.
- What do we know?
- An old-school pipe bomb.
Sprinkles on top.
- The nails were on the bomb?
- About 30 from the looks of it.
- All right, do we know where the bomb went off?
- Right here.
And that's where they found her.
- Have A&E let us know if they can pull any DNA
or fingerprints. - Will do.
- Detectives.
- What do we know about the vic?
- Sarah Heartwood, age 39.
Medics took her to the ER, said she won't last the night.
- She live here with her husband?
- Yeah, he's apparently an author.
- Get a statement?
- We barely got a coherent word.
He was trying to give her mouth-to-mouth
when the bomb squad arrived.
- Where is he now?
- They put him in the bus to go to the hospital
with the victim.
- All right. Thanks.
- Is she in any way responsive?
- We can't do the full battery of neurological tests yet,
but it's not looking good.
- Doctor, is there-- is there anything more
you can do for her right now?
I mean-- - I'm sorry.
We're doing everything we can. - Is she in pain?
- Mr. Heartwood, I'm sorry to interrupt.
I'm Detective Riley. This is Detective Shaw.
We'd like to ask you some questions, if you don't mind.
[heart monitor beeping]
Thank you.
[indistinct PA announcement]
Now, you mentioned that the blast happened
just moments after you and your wife came home.
Did you notice anything unusual?
Was anything in the home disturbed?
Any signs of forced entry?
- No.
No, everything seemed perfectly normal.
- Did your wife have any enemies,
anyone who might wanna hurt her
or do anything like this to her?
- No, she was a--
is a reproductive endocrinologist.
She's beloved by her patients, her colleagues.
She spends every Sunday morning volunteering at a food bank.
No, this--this was my fault.
It was meant for me.
- How do you mean?
- I write about faith
from an anthropological and intellectual point of view,
and some people don't like
an objective, historical dissection of their beliefs.
- And you think that maybe
one of these people wanted you dead?
- Well, a few hours before I was doing a reading of my book,
and an audience member stormed the stage,
took my microphone, and told me Allah was going to punish me.
Sarah, she was, um...
she was worried, and I brushed her off.
[suspenseful music]
♪
- Hey.
Housekeeper confirms she got there at 2:30,
found a gift bag on the stoop with a pink package inside.
- Was there a card or a label? - No.
No, she said the neighbors were known
to drop off packages from time to time,
so it didn't seem suspicious.
She just brought it in with the mail.
And it looks like the bomb's tripwire was inside the box,
and it was triggered when the lid was pulled off.
- Did you get any video from the stoop?
- No, no, the vics didn't have any front door camera,
but we're still canvassing the area
to see if any of the neighbors got any footage.
- And what about ballistics from the bomb?
- Yeah, Shaw is with Arson and Explosives right now.
They said that all the recovered pieces
were covered in a black enamel paint
that masks fingerprints and DNA.
- So our bomber was not a dummy?
- No. [sighs]
Oh, hey, hold up a sec.
We've got footage from the book event.
[person shouting and spitting]
There's our guy.
- And I thought book events were boring.
- Techs report no hits on facial rec.
- What about video at the exit?
Find out which way he went.
- Yeah, there he is getting into that van.
Plumbing Pro.
- Plumbers use sulfuric acid.
- Yeah? - Mm-hmm, for clogged drains.
But if you're smart enough,
you can convert it into sulfur and use it to make gunpowder.
We improvised a lot of fireworks in high school.
Okay, get Shaw, call Plumbing Pro,
find out that guy's name, and bring the bomb squad.
- Yeah.
[tense music]
♪
- Ibrahim Sami?
NYPD. Open this door.
Sami, you've got three seconds to open the door.
- Hey, hey, hey, hey! - Hands where I can see them.
Hey, this is a warrant.
- I didn't do anything! - Do not touch anything.
- What did I do?
- Move, move, move, move, move, move, move.
- What are you doing here?
What is this about?
- That.
- That's research for my injunction
to stop the spread of poisonous ideas.
I'm not allowed to express my opinions?
- Yeah, yeah, opinions are fine.
Bomb making, not so much. - Hands behind your back.
You're coming with us. Come on.
- Islam means peace.
- Bum-rushing a man behind a podium strikes you as peaceful?
- Christopher Heartwood's book is an affront to Allah.
- So how about you don't read it, then?
- His book, "Playing God," claims that
the God of every religion is a figment of our imaginations.
[scoffing] A delusion created by man
for evolutionary survival.
- I understand.
You believe what you believe,
and Heartwood's book was so insulting,
so disrespectful, you had to do something.
- Exactly. - So you tried to kill him.
- What?
- You dropped off a package at his house.
One with a bomb inside.
- [scoffing] Bomb? - Yeah.
- When he was on stage,
I spit on him as he has spit on the Muslim faith.
I brought no weapon, no bomb.
But I see.
You assume a Muslim must be behind it.
- No, we assume someone with a grudge is behind it.
- Tell us about the circuit board we found in your house.
What was that for, huh?
- A customer asked me to build a lighting system.
- Why don't you tell us where you were today
before the reading, between 10:00 and 2:30 p.m.?
- Fixing broken pipes at the building in Chinatown.
The super was with me the whole time.
I arrived at 8:00, didn't finish until 3:00 p.m.
- Sami's alibi holds.
- Yeah?
We just got the security footage back
from the neighbors across the street,
which picked up our stoop.
Our gift bag boy is definitely not Ibrahim Sami.
- [whistles] Broad daylight, huh?
- Yeah. 12:32 p.m.
Bag sat there for two hours
before the housekeeper brought it in.
- That is a very relaxed bomber.
- What's that say on his shirt?
- Didn't the husband say that the wife
volunteered at a food bank?
- Harlem Mission is five blocks from the vic's house,
runs a soup kitchen daily.
- Okay, get there as soon as they open.
- Hey, my man, let me give you a hand with that.
- Excuse me, sir.
Hey, man, we're detectives with the 2-7.
Man in this picture, you know him?
- Jason.
He comes in a few times a week for food, clothing,
whatever he can grab.
- Know where we can find him?
- Usually hangs out across the street by the deli.
[suspenseful music]
- All right. Thanks. - Thanks.
♪
[dramatic music]
♪
- Not today. No, no, no, no, no.
- Do not move! Do not move.
Get on your knees.
Get on your knees!
- It's a couple loosies, brother!
Don't go all brutality on me!
- We're not here about your corner hustle, Jason.
We're here about the bomb.
- Bomb? Like explosion bomb? - Oh, yeah.
You can watch a video of yourself
planting it down at the station.
Let's go.
- Criminal trespassing, larceny, drug possession.
And now you're making bombs, huh?
- You're really climbing the ladder, aren't you, Jason?
- What are you talking about?
- You recognize those two people?
- Yeah, the lady.
- She volunteers at your soup kitchen, right?
- She's cool.
Gives you extra food if you ask.
- So what happened? She didn't smile back at you?
- What are you talking about?
- Somebody tried to kill her. She's in the hospital.
That's what I'm talking about. - That's a picture of her now.
- What happened to Miss Sarah?
- A bomb exploded in her hands!
One that you delivered!
- Yeah, you remember that package you dropped off
on their porch, 12:32 p.m.?
The one with the IED in it?
- Improvised Explosive Device.
- Pipe bomb.
- Some white guy gave me $100 to deliver that bag.
I didn't know what was in it or who lived there.
- Yeah, he's going with the random white guy story.
- Like, he pulls out a nice blue bag,
waves a $100 bill at my broke ass,
gives me an address, and tells me to drop it off.
- And you never asked why?
- No, sir.
$100 is $100.
- Can you describe this random white guy
who gave you the money?
- Medium height, medium build.
His name might have been Jeremy.
- Why do you say that?
- He had a bracelet, said Jeremy 15.
[suspenseful music]
♪
- Hey, you guys.
Just got off the phone with the hospital.
Sarah Heartwood is in an irreversible coma,
so please tell me we have something.
- Well, I think the kid's $100 errand story is gonna hold.
He's got no motive and pipe bomb is just miles
beyond his usual misdemeanors, so.
- Was he able to give you a description of the bomber?
- One that fits half of New York City.
- What about security cameras in the area where the bag
was supposedly handed off?
- We're not gonna have a lot of luck down there.
Most of the cameras are busted.
The one thing he did give us
was that the so-called perp might go by the name Jeremy.
♪
- All right, what if Jeremy 15 is actually Jeremiah 1:5?
"Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee."
13 years of Catholic school.
But blue bag, pink box.
Those are pro-life colors.
- And our vic's a fertility doctor, right?
- Yeah.
- Well, that's close enough
for some anti-choice people these days.
Check it out.
♪
- Sarah devoted herself
to helping other couples become parents.
- She made "New York Magazine's"
best doctor list, huh?
- She was one of the top fertility doctors
in the country.
- Did Dr. Heartwood ever perform abortions?
- From time to time those are medically necessary,
but they get referred out. Why?
- She might have been targeted by somebody
in the pro-life movement.
- The anti-choice, anti-science,
anti-woman groups, you mean?
- I'm guessing there's some issues there, huh?
- Especially since
the new fetal personhood movement came knocking.
- I'm sorry, fetal personhood?
- [sighs]
The largest embryo we ever freeze
is a mere 100 cells, invisible to the human eye,
but the Alabama Supreme Court
just ruled those cells a human life.
- And I bet the fetal personhood movement
doesn't like you guys destroying unused embryos.
- They think it's mass murder.
- Any threats to the clinic?
- After the "New York Magazine" article,
we got some strange calls.
- Strange how?
- A man would say Sarah's full name, and then one word:
guilty.
- In the tri-state area alone,
there's over three dozen pro-life organizations.
- All affiliated with some religion, I presume.
- Yeah, mostly Catholic and Southern Baptist.
- Yeah, well, way to make a stand, fellas.
- I mean, I get it, but it's complicated.
- Oh, yeah.
Forgot I'm talking to a nice Catholic boy over here.
- Not really.
I mean,
my wife had a miscarriage between our two kids.
- Oh, sorry. - Yeah.
It was early on in the pregnancy.
And my wife, she's the furthest thing from a churchgoer,
let me tell you.
She's never gonna tell another woman
what to do with her body, but she grieved it, man.
I mean, I felt that too.
So I get it.
I get the importance of choice and I get the science,
but she was not grieving cells, let me tell you that.
- Sorry, brother. Mm. [phone buzzing]
Oh, we gotta go.
499 West 19th, possible package bomb at a Chelsea brownstone.
Home of Dr. Donald Travers.
- Let me guess, IVF doctor?
[siren wails]
No sign of the bomb squad.
- Anyone hurt?
- The kid's mom called, and I told her
there was a gift bag on the stoop that I brought inside.
She started wigging out, said she read about
a fertility doctor getting a bomb on her doorstep?
- Where's the bag now? - Inside with Mikey.
He wouldn't leave it and come out with me.
- Get them out of here. - Hey, hey, Vince.
The bomb squad's coming-- - We can't wait, man!
There's a kid in there! Just get them away!
- Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on.
[tense music]
♪
- Hey, buddy. I'm Vince.
I'm a police officer.
You're Mikey, right?
- Yeah. - Yeah.
Mikey, Mikey.
You know what? I'm gonna take this.
- No!
It's for my little sister.
- Uh, you're--you're a really good big brother.
You know what?
I think you might deserve an ice cream.
Do you like ice cream?
You don't like ice cream, do you?
- Yes, I do. I love it.
But I need to bring this to my sister.
- You know what, we'll find her outside, okay?
She's outside with your babysitter.
Let's go talk to her right now and get some ice cream, yeah?
- Okay.
- Okay, okay, come on.
- Wait.
The present! The present!
- Dr. Travers.
- You know what, maybe now's a good time
to get this young man his ice cream.
- Yeah, let's go do that.
[siren wailing]
- What's going on here? Why us?
- We think it has something to do with your IVF work.
- You mean like anti-abortion groups?
- Have you received any threats lately?
- A month or two ago, a woman came in for a consult
and then began ranting at me about how I murder embryos.
After that, we started getting these crazy calls.
- Did you get this woman's name?
- No. She gave us a fake name.
- Can you describe her?
- 20s, tall, long braids.
She was wearing dark glasses.
She left a pamphlet on our counter
from a group called We The Living.
[suspenseful music]
♪
- Bombs?
I'm a champion for life, all life.
I'd hurt no one.
- Mind giving us your real name then?
- Andrea Rose Marcus.
- Andrea, why don't you show me some identification?
- Yes, sir.
- Virginia state driver's license.
- Moved here from Arlington last year.
- You have an alibi for yesterday, 10:00 a.m. to 12:30?
- I was on Staten Island
meeting with three different fertility doctors.
They'll remember me, I promise.
- Anyone in your group familiar with bomb making?
- As I said, we're all champions for life.
- Right.
[phone buzzing]
Okay, well, if anything comes to mind...
Give me a call.
- Bomb techs have finished their analysis
on the unexploded device.
- 10-inch section of galvanized steel pipe,
1 1/4 inch diameter.
Rigged to detonate when the gift box was opened.
- Those are machine nuts?
- Creative flourish to penetrate human flesh.
And two types of gunpowder filler,
black powder and smokeless double base Hero powder
to maximize the blast.
- Can either powder be traced?
- No, there are a few hundred shops
and distributors across the country that sell them.
- Any fingerprints or DNA?
- The whole device was sprayed with black enamel paint.
- You ever seen anything like this before?
- Not in these parts.
But I ran the size and spacing of the drill holes
on the end cap through BATS.
- You got a match?
- To a device that was found two years ago
on the steps of a D.C. courthouse.
Never exploded.
- They make an arrest?
- Mm-mm.
- How about suspects?
D.C. have anything on that?
- No, just a police sketch.
- The girl from We The Living, that looks like her boyfriend.
Saw it in a picture on her desk.
♪
- This is Shaw.
We need to dig into an Andrea Marcus.
We need the name and last known address of her boyfriend.
[indistinct chatter]
- Hey. NYPD detectives.
We were told this is a place of employment of a Patrick Wayne.
- 26, from Virginia. He work here?
- Is there an issue?
- No, no. We just need to talk to him.
- Yeah, he's, uh--he's actually over there by the stairs.
- Patrick.
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. No!
Back off! Back off!
- Let the man go, Patrick.
Let him go.
- I've got a bomb in my bag!
- All right, everybody out!
Clear the building! Everyone outside right now!
Clear the building right now! Outside!
Let this man go.
- Not until my work is done!
- Hey, do not move.
- All I have to do is tap that phone there.
You have to shoot me or this whole place is gonna blow.
- You trying to die a martyr? Is that what you're doing?
- I'm trying to leave the world a better place.
- Listen to me, Patrick.
You and I, we both know that suicide is a sin, don't we?
Right?
The Apostle Paul and Jonah, they were both tempted.
They both endured. They both pushed through.
Come on. - No! No, stop.
You don't wanna hurt this man,
I don't wanna shoot you, and you don't wanna die.
- [snarling]
- [growls]
- Nice try, church boy.
Do not move.
- No bomb?
There's no bomb in here. This was a bluff?
The whole thing's a bluff?
Patrick Wayne, you're under arrest.
Anything you say can and will
be used against you in a court of law.
Do you understand?
- Guess all that Catholic school paid off, huh?
Miles would be proud. - Yeah.
- They ran a full battery of neurological tests.
She's lost all function in her brain.
- Do they have her rigged up to all this machinery?
- Well, apparently it's her husband's wish
that she remain on life support.
- So what do you wanna charge?
- We can charge attempted murder,
and when Sarah Heartwood fully and formally dies,
we upgrade to murder.
- No, come on.
She's--she's young and she's strong.
I mean, she might survive for decades.
- So?
- So what kind of a murder case
can our office mount in ten years?
And will our witnesses still be alive or our evidence intact?
He killed a woman
for giving other women reproductive choices.
And Patrick Wayne is not some lone lunatic.
He is part of a movement, a growing movement,
who is mounting an attack on women's rights.
We have to send a message.
- How strong is our case, now?
- We have an eyewitness who claims the defendant
paid him to deliver the bomb and half a dozen calls
from the defendant's phone to the victim's clinic,
and, of course, the threats he made to the police
when they tried to apprehend him.
- The courts have recognized brain death
in a few manslaughter cases.
- Yeah, but Patrick Wayne had clear intent.
Besides, if we charge man one, double jeopardy could attach
and we'd never be able to go after him for murder.
- So let's charge attempted murder.
- And risk letting him walk in ten?
- It's not perfect, Sam, but I'm not comfortable
declaring that neurological death is exactly the same
as full circulatory death.
Since when did we get to distort science
for our own convenience?
- The courts have been pretty busy
redefining when human life begins.
Maybe it's time to ask when it ends.
Patrick Wayne is clearly a danger to the public.
The bomb makes it arson plus murder.
Let's take a shot at murder, first degree.
- Dismissal? On what grounds?
- The so-called victim is alive and breathing
at Mercy General Hospital.
- Your Honor, Sarah Heartwood is
not considered fully alive by any legal or medical standard.
- Do you have a death certificate?
- We do, Your Honor.
- The victim's heart is beating and she is breathing.
- By virtue of artificial life support.
- You want me to treat this case, this charge,
as though, to be perfectly frank,
the victim were already in the ground?
- We do.
- Many states allow exemptions
for recognizing death by neurological criteria.
- But New York isn't one of them.
- Your Honor, The People versus Eulo
long ago established the brain death standard for homicide.
- Prosecution cites a case from 1984.
Our understanding of-- of the brain and the body
has changed vastly.
And science, artificial intelligence.
I mean, who knows what we're capable of
in the next five to ten years?
- That is all well and good, but it's just theory.
Sadly, the reality is more grim.
Sarah Heartwood is neurologically dead.
She will never regain consciousness.
We have a team of experts ready to attest to this.
- I'm going to allow the people to proceed.
Motion to dismiss is denied.
[tense music]
- We're on our way.
- Yeah, now we just have to make sure that Sarah's husband
is on board with us declaring his wife dead.
- It's not a religious issue,
but I feel that Sarah is still alive,
that she's still with me.
- That is entirely understandable.
- I mean, her hand, when I hold it, it's still warm.
- Christopher, you understand
that the hospital has declared Sarah brain-dead?
- Her doctors are excellent.
They've mapped out the science for me.
- And we are charging the bomber
with first-degree murder.
- Go after that sick animal with everything you've got.
It's just--
I'm not ready to disconnect her from life support yet.
- It's all right. You don't have to.
- No, but we will need you to testify.
And for that, you can't waver
on your acceptance of Sarah's death.
Putting Patrick Wayne behind bars will depend on it.
[suspenseful music]
- I'll do what I need to do.
- Thank you for your time, Christopher.
♪
Your bedside manner could use a brush-up, Sam.
- Our whole case hinges on our claim that she's dead, right?
That this was murder, that
his crime merits the highest level punishment,
so we need our case and him to be rock-solid.
- I get it, but he's not ready to say goodbye
no matter what the medical experts say.
- There's no chance-- - I--I--I know
the chances are remote and it might not be logical
or rational, but it's not our job to rob him of that hope.
- No, but it is our obligation
to let him know the cost of that hope.
- We conducted an electroencephalogram,
a digital subtraction cerebral angiogram,
and additional apnea testing.
- In layman's terms, every possible test.
- Every test in the guidelines
of the American Academy of Neurology.
- And in your opinion, what caused
the cessation of brain function in Sarah Heartwood?
- Multiple depressed fractures
and basal fractures throughout her skull.
Her brain essentially suffocated and drowned.
- Thank you, Dr. Matthis.
- Does Sarah Heartwood maintain any neuroendocrine function?
- She does, but that's not uncommon for brief periods.
- Which means, does it not,
that her brain is still somewhat alive?
- The cessation of all other brain functions
which are needed for her to live
without artificial support are irreversible.
- But you could not say that all of her brain is dead?
- Technically, I could not say that.
[tense music]
- No further questions.
- [sighs]
Redirect, Your Honor. - Go ahead.
- Does Sarah Heartwood meet the legal and medical criteria
set by the Uniform Declaration of Death Act?
- She does, entirely.
- And have you or anyone in your hospital
ever diagnosed brain death,
with or without endocrine function...
that later proved false?
- Have we ever been wrong?
Uh, no.
♪
- Hey.
Thanks.
[sighs]
[soft bluesy rock music playing]
♪
Our doctor did a good job today.
Hmm? Made it clear that Sarah is dead.
- What happens the next time some "angel of death" nurse
yanks a ventilator?
I mean, what's the charge?
Nothing? 'Cause you know damn well the defense will say
by law, the victim was already dead.
Thanks to us.
- Um...
I don't deny there are consequences, Nolan, but...
[sighs] That bastard killed Sarah Heartwood for--
for trying to help people have children,
for bringing life into this world,
for giving women choices.
And his mission is to kill more doctors like her, so
whatever we need to do
to bury his ass is what we need to do.
- Okay.
[sighs]
Well, we still have to find a way to show
that he is a danger to the public.
We have to tie Patrick Wayne to the bomb that killed Sarah,
which is not a given.
There's no fingerprints, no video,
just the testimony of the drug addict who delivered the bag.
- Okay.
Okay, so we start at the end instead.
- The end?
- The arrest.
- The suspect suggested that he had a bomb.
Detective Shaw and I were scared.
We asked the workers to clear out.
He took another worker hostage, suggested he was ready to die,
that he had made the world a better place.
- Thank you, Detective Riley.
- Detective...
why were you scared?
- We believed the defendant had a bomb.
- And then you chatted with my client
for quite some time, correct?
- Yes, we were trying to keep him talking
so that he wouldn't blow the building.
- With what?
Some empty pipes and a tool in his bag?
I mean, isn't it true that you tackled and arrested my client
despite the fact that
he had nothing but a work tool in his possession?
- Objection, argumentative.
- Withdrawn.
Nothing further.
- Detective Riley, could you clarify for the jury
why you were scared during Patrick Wayne's arrest?
- Yes, the day before, we were called to the scene
of a serious attack at Sarah Heartwood's home,
and the next morning,
we were called to the scene of an attempted bombing.
- Could you explain what happened?
- The bomb was in a blue gift bag,
and a five-year-old boy was playing with it.
- Objection!
- Uh, Your Honor, the defense opened the door
by asking why Detective Riley was scared.
- I'll allow it.
- Who was the boy?
- The boy's name was Mikey Travers.
His father is an IVF doctor like Sarah Heartwood.
- Objection. - Sustained.
Move along, Detective Riley.
- The bomb was covered in sharp pieces of metal
that were designed to tear a human body to shreds.
The boy, his nanny, and his little sister
were all near the bomb.
We were all terrified.
And it was my belief at the time...
That we were dealing with a serial bomber.
- Your Honor, the people rest.
- Dr. Calhoun, could you tell the court your area of study?
- I specialize in the study of Lazarus syndrome.
- And can you explain what that means?
- Well, I've spent the past 15 years overseas
and in the United States interviewing individuals
diagnosed as brain-dead.
- And how can you possibly interview people who've
been diagnosed as brain-dead?
- Because they woke up.
[tense music]
- Dr. Calhoun, why are you here?
- Because I believe Sarah Heartwood could wake up.
[loud indistinct murmuring]
[gavel slams] - Quiet, please.
- Your Honor, I'd like to meet in chambers.
- We'll take a brief recess.
- Your Honor, this is the definition of fringe science.
- No, Dr. Calhoun is not--
he's not presenting scientific evidence.
It's more spiritual and anthropological.
- What do you mean?
- Calhoun is a medical doctor,
but he's also a PhD in anthropology
and his testimony is based upon his doctoral research.
- The court held in Frye v. United States
that scientific evidence needs to be vetted
in a separate hearing before being presented to the jury
so as not to confuse them with bogus expert testimony.
This is black-letter law, Your Honor.
- He is testifying about people that he has met personally
and spoken to, and according to People v. Oddone,
personal knowledge, experience, observation,
and research are completely exempt from the Frye test.
- Dr. Calhoun has never treated
or even been in a room with Sarah Heartwood.
He cannot speak to her condition.
- Your Honor, prosecution's own witness declared
that no brain death determination
has ever been reversed,
and based upon Dr. Calhoun's research, that is inaccurate.
The jury has a right to know.
[tense music]
- I agree.
I'm going to allow Dr. Calhoun's testimony.
♪
- 13-year-old Jonathan Myers in Mississippi
even had full recollection
of things said in his hospital room
after his doctors declared him brain-dead.
- So Dr. Calhoun,
in your personal experience with Lazarus syndrome,
what do you think happened?
- The doctors and scientists
thought they had answers only God has.
- No further questions.
- Dr. Calhoun, the cases you cite,
I was able to read about them just during this brief recess,
because there are so few.
Do you know what percentage of brain death declarations
worldwide result in reversal?
- One is too many.
- Since you're not a statistician, allow me to help.
Aggregating the available data,
the approximate percentage is
Point-zero... zero...
zero... one percent.
- An inconsequential number, you imply.
As long as it's not you.
But what if it were?
♪
What if you were the lucky soul who got his life back?
♪
- What the hell happened?
- [sighs] It's an 11th-hour ambush.
- They got the press involved now too.
Half the city is waving placards
saying, "Wake Up, Sarah."
What are the odds the jury isn't feeling the same?
- It's certainly possible.
Their so-called expert was, uh...
more charming than I had hoped, but--
- That's not very encouraging.
- No. [sighs] I think we'll be okay.
We just need to rebut Calhoun's testimony
and bring the conversation back to actual science.
- I think we're past that.
- What do you mean?
- This case is no longer about science or medicine.
It's about emotion.
It's about people contemplating the unknowable end of life
and being scared.
If the defense wants to pull heartstrings,
we need to do the same.
So beat them at their own game.
Prepare a closing that paints a portrait of our victim.
Show the jury who Sarah Heartwood really was
and make them feel the life he stole from her.
Whether or not Sarah is legally
or scientifically alive or dead,
she is lying in bed, unconscious, intubated,
hooked up to all kinds of machines.
That's her reality, and the jury needs to feel that.
- I'll do my best.
[knock at door] - Hey.
- Hi.
- So I went over Sarah Heartwood's whole life.
Educational records, legal documents.
She had a living will,
a clearly written DNR and advance directive
stating she did not wanna be artificially kept alive.
- [sighs] He definitely doesn't wanna pull the plug.
So what's your point?
- If her wishes had been followed,
we wouldn't be here, Nolan.
We wouldn't be trying to convince the jury
that she's actually dead.
- That ship has sailed, Sam.
- No. We're on the ropes here, Nolan.
We went out on a limb.
No, I went out on a limb.
And now if one juror believes that
Sarah Heartwood might actually wake up one day, we're screwed,
regardless of how emotional and brilliant
your closing might be.
[tense music]
- I get it, Sam.
But that is the risk we assumed
from day one.
[sighs]
And yet we've moved forward anyway.
♪
[ventilator whooshing]
- Christopher.
Did you know Sarah had Do Not Resuscitate instructions
in her legal documents?
Did she share that with you?
[machines beeping]
When she was brought into the hospital,
did you discuss her wishes with her care team?
- I just wanted my wife to live.
[machines beeping]
[somber dramatic music]
♪
- Do you think Sarah would consider this living?
Do you think she would want her killer to go free?
♪
- Hey, good.
I want you to have a look at my closing.
- We need to call the judge.
- Huh?
- We have information
to share with the jury prior to your summation.
- Are you saying--
- Sarah Heartwood took her last breath
at 8:04 this morning.
They finally took her off life support.
♪
- Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,
have you reached a verdict?
- We have, Your Honor.
We find the defendant, Patrick Wayne,
guilty of murder in the first degree.
- Thank you for your service.
You're excused.
[dramatic music]
♪
- As long as you can sleep at night.
- [sighing] Oh...
I can, trust me.
We put a cold-blooded murderer away for life.
It's a good day, Nolan.
♪
- Hey, Nolan. - Hey.
[sighs]
- Hey, Dad.
How was your day?
♪
[dramatic music]
♪
[wolf howls]