Dead Man's Rule by Rick Acker Page A

have a date for you tomorrow.” She gave him a poisonous look. “This is extremely unprofessional of you.” She opened the door and stalked out without waiting to hear Ben’s response.
    Ben smiled and turned to the court reporter. “Off the record.”

    Eight days later, Ben sat in his conference room, waiting for Nicki Zinoviev and Anthony Simeon to arrive. A box of documents in neatly organized folders sat on the chair beside him. Each folder contained three copies of an exhibit that Ben planned to use in Zinoviev’s deposition—one copy for Ben, one for Simeon, and one for the court reporter to attach to the transcript. They included the transcript of Zinoviev’s testimony from the TRO hearing, which Ben planned to spend at least half an hour asking about; a contract between Zinoviev and the Brothers LLC for the sale of the contents of the safe-deposit box for $100,000; two different versions of Zinoviev’s criminal record (the one he had produced in discovery and the one Sergei Spassky had uncovered); and a number of other equally damaging documents. He also had marked-up transcripts from the depositions of the four members of the Brothers, men who had been in Soviet prison together but were not actually brothers. Unfortunately, they were cagey, well-prepared witnesses, and their testimony had been basically useless. Nicki would be a different story. This will be like shooting fish in a barrel, thought Ben in happy anticipation.
    He glanced at the clock and saw that Zinoviev and Simeon were fifteen minutes late. Were they going to back out on him? They had fought this deposition as long as they could. Even after Ben’s exchange with Janet Anderson at Dr. Ivanovsky’s deposition, they had continued to put him off. It wasn’t until Ben scheduled an emergency motion to compel and sent a draft of it to Simeon that they finally relented.
    And now Ben was beginning to fear that they were at it again. He could already hear the excuses he would get from Simeon’s harried secretary: “Mr. Zinoviev had a family emergency, we’ll have to reschedule,” or “Mr. Simeon developed a scheduling conflict with another case; he’ll get back to you with a new date.” Ben regretted not having gone forward with his motion to compel. It might have annoyed the judge, but at least there would be a court order requiring Zinoviev to appear for his deposition, and he would be in contempt of court if he didn’t.
    Ben waited five more minutes, then he walked back to his office and pulled Simeon’s card out of his Rolodex and dialed. In case Simeon didn’t pick up—and Ben doubted he would—Ben pulled up the draft motion to compel on his computer and started updating it. To his surprise, the attorney himself answered on the third ring. “Anthony Simeon,” he said in an odd monotone.
    “Tony, it’s Ben Corbin. What’s going on? You guys were supposed to be here almost half an hour ago.”
    Simeon took a deep breath before responding. “Ben, I just got off the phone with my client’s landlord. He found Mr. Zinoviev lying in the hall outside his apartment this morning.” His voice shook and he was clearly rattled. “He’s dead. The police are there now.”

C HAPTER F IVE
    T HE D EAD M AN’S R ULE
    After he got off the phone, Ben sat in his office in shock for several minutes. According to Anthony Simeon, the preliminary cause of death determined by the police was an unintentional drug overdose. Zinoviev had needle marks on his arms and legs, and initial tests showed lethal amounts of heroin in his blood.
    Ben remembered how Zinoviev had squirmed and sweated on the witness stand at the TRO hearing. And he must have known his deposition would be worse.
    Ben felt a twinge of guilt as he wondered if one of the reasons Zinoviev overdosed was that he was nervous about his deposition the next day and was trying to relax. “God rest his soul,” Ben murmured to his empty office.
    With a start, Ben realized that the court