Leichenblass

Protests outside the courthouse, live coverage, a flurry of flash photography – the sensational murder trial in which Dr. Kay Scarpetta must testify as the key witness is not just a media spectacle; it resembles a witch hunt. For the public and the prosecutor, the verdict is already clear: Gilbert Hooke brutally murdered his fiancée after an argument, desecrated her body, and threw her into the Atlantic. However, the experienced forensic expert Scarpetta can prove that her now-deceased colleague, who performed the autopsy, overlooked crucial evidence: the absence of livor mortis that the body would exhibit if it had been exposed to the air for an extended period, and the diatoms found in the young woman's lungs, indicating death by drowning. The prosecutor pulls out all the stops to undermine Scarpetta's credibility. And it gets worse: the sister of the judge, an employee of the CIA, is found dead. Although she is explicitly forbidden from doing so by the highest authorities, Scarpetta conducts her own investigation, as she knows the family personally.