Batman #328

Issue Details

Synopsis

DOUBLE JEOPARDY Batman gets a home-movie starring Carl Ternion, who has been cleared of wilfully murdering gang boss Anton Karoselle. In the film, Ternion taunts Batman with the knowledge that he deliberately killed Karoselle and cannot be tried twice for the same crime. Realizing a trap has been set for him, Batman reviews the facts of the case with Alfred.   Ternion had managed to enter Karoselle's mansion, accusing him of killing Dave Stevens. Karoselle had allegedly blasted away at Ternion with a rifle, but Ternion grabbed the gun and pointed it upward. A stray blast brought a chandelier down on Karoselle, killing him just as police, already on guard, burst in. Ternion was acquitted of a murder charge.   Batman alerts Mary Ann Warner, a homeless woman, to be on the lookout for information, but she is beaten up shortly after by two punks. He rushes her to the hospital, where she gasps, "Ekk...out" before collapsing. Batman captures the punks, letting one of them, Vinnie Allen, free so he may trail him to his boss, who proves to be Ternion. Ternion, guessing Batman's scheme, shoots Vinnie dead atop Gotham Dam and almost kills Batman by sending him into the dammed waters and opening the spillway.  Later, Bruce Wayne refuses Lucius Fox's resignation due to personal problems, but gives him a leave of absence to work things out. Meanwhile, Ternion has been romancing Gilda Stevens, formerly the wife of Two-Face and later of Dave Stevens. Ternoin consults later with plastic surgeon Albert Ekhart, who says that his work will soon fade and Ternion will be as he was before. Enraged with the surgeoun, Ternion shoots Ekhart and kills him.   Moments later, Batman, Commissioner Gordon and the GCPD recover Ekhart's body from Gotham Bay the next morning and Batman realizes that Mary Ann was trying to gasp out "Ekhart". He leaves, deducing the real identity of Ternion, who is presently comforting Gilda Stevens and silently resolving to marry her "a second time" after he kills Batman. A TALE OF TIME PAST! When James W. Gordon was starting out as a beat cop, his friend Hank Weber was shot and killed by Daryl Richmond, a thief who stole Weber's jewels. Gordon chased Richmond down, getting shot in the leg while doing so, and captured him in the subway. Richmond refused to reveal where he had hidden the jewels, and eventually went mad and died in prison.   Now, many years later, Gordon is held prisoner by Richmond's son in the same subway, seeking revenge for his father's death. But the subway adjoins a cavern of the Batcave, and Batman, checking out strange noises in the rock walls, bursts through with the Batmobile and rescues Gordon, though young Richmond shoots the commissioner in the leg.   Cornered, young Richmond goes mad when he is asked where the jewels are hidden in the same fashion as his father did. Still later, Batman digs out an abandoned section of subway tunnel and unearths the Weber jewels, which Daryl Richmond had hidden with explosives. He sends them on to Gordon at the GCPD Headquarters. Gordon takes his desk-photo of Hank Weber, hoping that he's done him good at last.