Steve Martini - The Judge

“I don’t know.” I ask Lenore what she thinks.

“What? I’m sorry. I wasn’t listening.” Minds on a parallel course-at this moment, initial panic.

We do a quick inventory of the materials we would be turning over.

“Go ahead,” I finally tell him.

Lenore agrees. “Give it to them, but hold up on our witness list. No sense being too generous,” she says.

Harry nods. He is probably still adding names from the phone book to our own list of witnesses to keep the D.A. guessing and the cops wasting time checking them out, though the salient experts will float to the surface with the first viewing, as soon as we disclose.

He tells me that the state has not turned over its own witness list. This is a major concern for our side, not only because of the experts, but because we do not yet know whether Oscar Nichols, the judge to whom Acosta unburdened his soul to the tune of death threats against Hall, has told the cops about this.

“We could interview him,” says Harry. “Find out,” he says.

Lenore slumps into the client chair next to him, and finally snaps out of her reverie over the thumbprint.

“That would be a mistake,” she says. “It’s a subtle thing. Maybe Nichols gave Acosta’s comments no credence. A confidence to a friend that in his mind meant nothing. If we go poking around, we elevate this. He may feel compelled to come forward,” she says, “to tell the cops.”

It’s a good point. “We’re better to leave it alone and just wait,” I tell Harry.

He gives me a look, as if to say, “Siding with her again.”

I ask him to take the latest discovered items in order.

“First some bad news, hair and fibers,” says Harry.

“You recall the animal hair?”

I nod.

“Coarse, reddish brown?”

“The client tells us he has no animals,” I tell him. “He’s allergic.”

“Maybe so,” says Harry. “But the cops found hair of similar texture and color on several items of furniture in his house and on the carpets.”

Harry gives me a look that says I told you so.

“There was not a lot, mind you,” says Harry. “But then they don’t need to find a hair ball in his throat, do they?”

“Where’s it from?” I ask.

“Horses,” says Harry. “Seems the Mrs. rides.”

“Lili?” says Lenore.

“Right. A stable out in the country. She leases a horse and takes lessons. According to the report, she started eight months ago. Their theory”-Harry’s talking about the cops-“is that she brought the stuff home, and the judge picked up traces on his clothing. From chairs, whatever. Somehow it got on the blanket that the girl’s body was wrapped in.”

I give Lenore a look. She was with me that day at the jail when we questioned Acosta and heard his emphatic denials.

“It’s pretty hard to forget about something like that,” I say.

“A horse,” says Harry. “You think he would remember a horse.”

“You asked him if he had any pets,” says Lenore. “He doesn’t.”

“I hope he’s more forthcoming if he takes the stand,” I tell her.

“Maybe yes, maybe no,” says Harry.

Lenore gives this a shrug. “Hair is not definitive,” she says. “They can only testify that it is similar. A lot of people ride. We could check the stables in the area and get samples. Use our own experts and probably find a dozen horses in different stables that shed similar hair.”

“Yes, if that were all they had,” says Harry. “Then there’s the fibers. The little blue ones found with the body, on the blanket. Remember?”

Harry tells us that the prosecution’s report also confirms the bad news given to us that day by Lano at the county jail. These blue nylon fibers match the carpet found in Acosta’s county car.

“There are a million similar vehicles with carpets of the same kind,” says Lenore. “I’ll bet the city itself owns twenty of them. Maybe more,” she says.

Harry’s pushing for another meeting with our client, something along the lines of a “come to Jesus gathering” with psychic rubber hoses.

“Anything from Serology, the blood typing at the girl’s apartment?” I ask. This could be the clincher, if the perpetrator was injured in the fatal melee. If Acosta’s blood type is there, I would join Harry with the truncheons at the jail in the morning.

“Type A,” he says. “Same as the girl. It’s all they found. Same on the blanket.”

“Did they find any blood in the judge’s car? Anything in the trunk?” I ask.

“If they did, they’re not saying,” says Harry.

They could be holding this for a surprise, but it is a risk. Radovich would dump all over them, sanctions that could include exclusion of the evidence.

“They’ve got four more days ’til the deadline, close of the period for discovery,” says Harry. “They could drop it on us anytime before then.”

“Why would they wait?” says Lenore. “If they had blood in his vehicle, four days is not going to make a difference. We have plenty of time to check it out. DNA is going to say yea or nay.”

I think Lenore is right. I think they looked and came up with nothing. It is therefore better not to put it in the report, though they can be sure we will question them about the absence of blood in the vehicle at trial.

Harry tells us about the note on Hall’s calendar, the one showing a meeting between the girl and Acosta on the afternoon she was killed. Harry thinks the judge is lying to us. We talk about this for several moments, what the note could mean, always returning to the same point. We have no answers. I am at least relieved that this is now out in the open, no longer something that might slip out in an unguarded moment in front of Harry.

“Any murder weapon?” says Lenore.

“Nothing,” says Harry. “Not a word. They may fall back on the theory that she struck her head in a fall. Some heavy furniture near the scene. You should get over and look at the place,” he says.

“Right,” I tell him. “Make a note, Lenore.”

She gives me a look to kill.

There is a little more miscellaneous stuff, and Harry runs through it.

“The girl’s little black notebook,” he says. “Phone numbers and the sort.”

This raises an eyebrow from me.

“Nothing too interesting. Some cops’ phone numbers. To be expected,” says Harry. He has a photocopy of this book and hands it over to me, pages stapled at the top right-hand corner.

“I would expect,” says Harry, “that she would have cops’ phone numbers. She was a groupie. A wannabe. Police science major. There’s other numbers in there, too.”

“Right,” I tell him. I thumb through it quickly, maybe thirty pages. No deep revelations, though some pages are missing. I ask Harry about this.

“Yeah. The pages for the letters A, I, K, and L,” he says. “Cops say they were ripped from the book. They don’t have ’em, either, and they don’t know why they were torn out.”

“She has the number for Vice,” I tell him.

Harry shrugs. “She worked there.

“The pathology report is now in.” Harry’s already moved on while I am still reading. He gives us a rundown.

“The rape kit exam was negative for any indications of sexual trauma. According to the medical examiner, and I quote, ‘There is no evidence of trauma and no foreign matter,’ pubic hair for the uninitiated,” says Harry, “‘found in or near the victim’s genital area. No semen found in the vaginal vault.’ Seems sex was not on the perp’s mind,” says Harry.

“Next, ligature wounds, really bruises. These were found front and rear on the victim’s throat.”

Harry drops the report on the corner of my desk and comes out of his chair, going behind Lenore.