Steve Martini - Undue Influence

‘Now, is there an objection?’

‘Vague as to time,’ says Harry.

‘I’ve forgotten what the question was,’ says Hastings. He has the court reporter read it back.

‘Sustained. Would you like to restate the question, counsel?’

Westaby regroups.

‘During the last month,’ he says, ‘have you discussed with Laurel Vega any matters, any matters at all, pertaining to this custody proceeding?’

‘I’m going to object to that, your honor.’ Harry’s up again.

‘On what grounds?’ Westaby’s into him before the judge can move.

‘Mr. Westaby — ’ Hastings has his gavel halfway off the bench.

‘On grounds that any conversations regarding these custody proceedings are now intimately connected with the criminal case involving Mrs. Vega. As such we would contend that communications between Mr. Madriani and Mrs. Vega are protected by the attorney-client privilege.’

There’s stirring in the press rows.

‘That’s garbage,’ says Westaby. ‘There’s no attorney-client relationship. How are they connected?’

‘We don’t have to disclose that,’ says Harry. ‘To compel an answer to the question would be to force the defense in a capital case to disclose vital information concerning its strategy.’

‘And we’re just supposed to take your word for it?’ says Westaby.

‘I’d appreciate it,’ says Harry.

‘Well I’m not prepared — ’

Hastings cuts him off. ‘You’re telling this court that issues regarding these proceedings, the custody of the Vega children, bear directly on Laurel Vega’s criminal defense?’

‘I am, your honor.’

‘I’d like to hear it from Mr. Madriani,’ says Hastings.

‘That’s correct, your honor.’

Harry and I are talking about the theory that Jack cooked up the custody petition as part of a scheme, coupled with Melanie’s murder, when he found out she was having an affair with another man. And now he is using his children and the demise of his wife to dodge doing time on the federal corruption sting, a conviction that Hastings knows nothing about. I wonder what he would say if he knew that Jack could be headed for a federal penitentiary. No doubt the kids would be wards of the court.

‘I don’t believe this, your honor. A smokescreen,’ says Westaby. He’s in Jack’s ear at the counsel table. We clearly have Vega’s attention. He’s looking at me, eager eyes, wondering where we’re headed, what I know.

‘I used a chartered gamblers’ special,’ she says, ‘and a bus to get them there.’

This is Laurel’s explanation of what she was doing in Reno the night Melanie Vega was murdered.

‘I had to get them away.’ She’s talking about the children, Danny and Julie. ‘They couldn’t deal with that house any longer, or with their father.’

I think she is coloring it, in shades of her hatred for Jack.

‘And don’t try looking for the kids. You’ll never find them.’

‘I wasn’t thinking of it.’

This morning Laurel is a new woman, bright-eyed and intense when I visit her in the glass-walled cubicle of the county jail.

Harry has carried out his threat made some weeks ago: the news article about the sale of the Justice Department computers and the compromised federal witnesses. He has given copies of this thing to one of his clients downstairs. It has made its way like some political tract onto the bulletin board of the dayroom on each floor of the jail, a kind of cryptic warning to those who would trust the state and might be tempted to snitch on their compatriots. As Harry says, ‘If necessity is the mother of invention, government is the father of fuckups.’

There are no rings of fatigue under Laurel’s eyes. She talks of the impending trial as if it is something to savor, like whatever doesn’t kill you only serves to make you stronger. A lot of bravado now that her kids are beyond Jack’s reach. What a good vendetta will do for the spirit.

This is the story that I am to sell to a jury as to Laurel’s whereabouts on the night of the murder — the image of a woman trekking over the mountains to obtain plane tickets to spirit her children away from their father while the question of custody is pending before a court. That she sees nothing wrong in this illustrates the poverty of judgment that settles like ground fog in a bitter divorce. Morgan Cassidy would no doubt remind the jury that it is inspired by the same venom that leads to murder.

‘We weren’t going to win the custody case,’ she says. ‘I had to do something. I won’t say where they are.’ She is adamant on this. I don’t tell her, but I have no desire to know, particularly after my last curtain call from Jack and his lawyer. For the moment I am off the hook while Harry and Westaby brief points and authorities on the law of attorney-client privilege.

‘They are safe and well cared for.’ Laurel giving me assurances about her kids.

‘I’ll tell the judge. He’ll be relieved.’

This has never been my concern. Knowing Laurel, it would have been the first item on her agenda, that her children be taken care of.

‘Why didn’t you just buy two plane tickets in Capital City?’ I ask.

‘Yeah, at a thousand dollars a pop,’ she says. ‘What was I supposed to do, go to Jack and ask for the money? Try getting two tickets at anything approaching fair price without a fourteen-day wait,’ she says.

‘You could have waited.’

She looks but doesn’t respond.

‘What were you afraid of?’

‘I wanted them out of that house. Just leave it at that,’ she says.

I have the thought that crosses every mind. But while Jack may be many things, I have never pegged him as a pedophile.

‘So you went to Reno?’

‘I had a friend. She works at one of the casinos. She has access to tickets on charter flights.’

Laurel makes a face, a little embarrassment. ‘Freebies,’ she says. ‘People fly into town to gamble, they drink, they get carried away, and they miss their flight out. It happens almost every time,’ she says. ‘So there’s open seats.’ What’s more important, she tells me, there’s no record of the names for the substitute passengers, no flight list that Jack’s lawyers or a PI can scrutinize to find the name Danny or Julie Vega. The woman is not stupid.

‘They’re probably going to subpoena you to answer questions in the custody case.’

‘I’ll take the Fifth,’ she says.

I try to explain to her that unless we can convince the judge that in some way the custody issues are related to the criminal charges, the privilege against self-incrimination does not apply.

‘What can he do if I refuse to talk, put me in jail?’ She takes in the concrete walls around her and gives me one of her better smiles.

‘The first time in my life I’ve felt completely invulnerable,’ she says.

It is as if she is drawing strength from her circumstances, nothing to lose, the kids out of harm’s way, toe to toe with Jack and the fates. At this moment when I look at Laurel I am moved by the fact that she is consumed with the fervor of the battle, in the way Joan of Arc led the troops before being fried at the stake.

‘To hell with him,’ she says. She’s talking about Jack.

She gives me a look, something that says: ‘And to hell with you too for not helping me with my children.’ This last I read whether from my own guilt or the demon look in her eye.

I’m afraid Laurel at this moment is not considering the consequences if we lose.

But she is right about one thing. Jack is running out of options for finding the kids. As for myself, the judge seemed satisfied that I had no personal knowledge regarding the whereabouts of the Vega children. He seemed reluctant to allow Westaby to explore what might be privileged communications with a defendant facing capital charges. He has sent the lawyers off to do what judges always do when they can’t make a decision — churn more paper. All in all, Jack has hit a stone wall when it comes to finding his children. No doubt he will play this, too, for sympathy when it comes time for sentencing on the charges.