Michael Connelly - The Reversal

“Harry, we’re about to start. You ready?”

“I’m ready, but we need to talk.”

“What’s wrong?”

Bosch turned his body so his back was to the defense table and lowered his voice into a barely audible whisper.

“I went to see the SIS guys at lunch. They showed me some stuff you need to know about.”

He was being overly cryptic. But the photos Lieutenant Wright had showed him from the surveillance the night before were troubling. Jessup was up to something and whatever it might be, it was going to go down soon.

Before Haller could respond, the background hubbub of the courtroom ceased as the judge took the bench.

“After court,” Haller whispered.

He then turned back to the front of the courtroom and Bosch returned to his seat at the railing. The judge told the deputy to seat the jury and soon everyone was in place.

“I want to apologize,” Breitman said. “This delay was my responsibility. I had a personal matter come up and it took far longer than I expected it would. Mr. Haller, please call your next witness.”

Haller stood and called for Doral Kloster. Bosch stood and headed for the witness stand while the judge once again explained to the jury that the witness called by the prosecution was unavailable and that prior sworn testimony would be read by Bosch and Haller. Though all of this had been worked out in a pretrial hearing and over the objection of the defense, Royce stood once again and objected.

“Mr. Royce, we’ve already argued this issue,” the judge responded.

“I would ask that the court reconsider its ruling as this form of testimony entirely undercuts Mr. Jessup’s Constitutional right to confront his accusers. Detective Kloster was not asked the questions I would want to ask him based on the defense’s current view of the case.”

“Again, Mr. Royce, this issue has been settled and I do not wish to rehash it in front of the jury.”

“But, Your Honor, I am being inhibited from presenting a full defense.”

“Mr. Royce, I have been very generous in allowing you to posture in front of the jury. My patience is now growing thin. You may sit down.”

Royce stared the judge down. Bosch knew what he was doing. Playing to the jury. He wanted them to see him and Jessup as the underdogs. He wanted them to understand that it was not just the prosecution against Jessup but the judge as well. When he had drawn out the stare as long as he dared, he spoke again.

“Judge, I cannot sit down when my client’s freedom is at stake. This is an egregious-”

Breitman angrily slammed her hand down, making a sound as loud as a shot.

“We’re not going to do this in front of the jury, Mr. Royce. Will the jurors please return to the assembly room.”

Wide-eyed and alert to the tension that had engulfed the courtroom, the jurors filed out, to a person glancing back over their shoulders to check the action behind them. The whole time, Royce held his glare on the judge. And Bosch knew it was mostly an act. This was exactly what Royce wanted, for the jury to see him being persecuted and prevented from bringing his case forward. It didn’t matter that they would be sequestered in the jury room. They all knew that Royce was about to get slapped down hard by the judge.

Once the door to the jury assembly room was closed, the judge turned back to Royce. In the thirty seconds it had taken the jury to leave the courtroom, she had obviously calmed down.

“Mr. Royce, at the end of the trial we will be holding a contempt hearing during which your actions today will be examined and penalized. Until then, if I ever order you to sit down and you refuse that order, I will have the courtroom deputy forcibly place you in your seat. And it will not matter to me if the jury is present or not. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Your Honor. And I would like to apologize for allowing the emotions of the moment to get the best of me.”

“Very well, Mr. Royce. You will now sit down and we’ll bring the jury back in.”

They held each other’s eyes for a long moment until Royce finally and slowly sat down. The judge then told the courtroom deputy to retrieve the jury.

Bosch glanced at the jurors as they returned. They all had their eyes on Royce, and Harry could see the defense attorney’s gambit had worked. He saw sympathy in their eyes, as if they all knew that at any moment they might cross the judge and be similarly rebuked. They didn’t know what happened while they were behind the closed door, but Royce was like the kid who had been sent to the principal’s office and had returned to tell everyone about it at recess.

The judge addressed the jury before continuing the trial.

“I want the members of the jury to understand that in a trial of this nature emotions sometimes run high. Mr. Royce and I have discussed the issue and it is resolved. You are to pay it no mind. So, let’s proceed with the reading of prior sworn testimony. Mr. Haller?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

Haller stood and went to the lectern with his printout of Doral Kloster’s testimony.

“Detective Bosch, you are still under oath. Do you have the transcript of sworn testimony provided by Detective Doral Kloster on October eighth, nineteen eighty-six?”

“Yes, I do.”

Bosch placed the transcript on the stand and took a pair of reading glasses out of his jacket’s inside pocket.

“Okay, then once again I will read the questions that were posed to Detective Kloster under oath by Deputy District Attorney Gary Lintz, and you will read the responses from the witness.”

After a series of questions used to elicit basic information about Kloster, the testimony moved quickly into the investigation of the murder of Melissa Landy.

“ ‘Now, Detective, you are assigned to the detective squad at Wilshire Division, correct?’ ”

“ ‘Yes, I am on the Homicide and Major Crimes table.’ ”

“ ‘And this case did not start out as a homicide.’ ”

“ ‘No, it did not. My partner and I were called in from home after patrol units were dispatched to the Landy house and a preliminary investigation determined that it appeared to be a stranger abduction. That made it a major crime and we were called out.’ ”

“ ‘What happened when you got to the Landy house?’ ”

“ ‘We initially separated the individuals there-the mother, father and Sarah, the sister-and conducted interviews. We then brought the family together and conducted a joint interview. It often works best that way and it did this time. In the joint interview we found our investigative direction.’ ”

“ ‘Tell us about that. How did you find this direction?’ ”

“ ‘In the individual interview, Sarah revealed that the girls had been playing a hide-and-seek game and that she was hiding behind some bushes at the front corner of her house. These bushes blocked her view of the street. She said she heard a trash truck and saw a trashman cross the yard and grab her sister. These events occurred on a Sunday, so we knew there was no city trash pickup. But when I had Sarah recount this story in front of her parents, her father quickly said that on Sunday mornings several tow trucks patrol the neighborhood and that the drivers wear overalls like the city sanitation workers do. And that became our first lead.’ ”

“ ‘And how did you follow that lead?’ ”

“ ‘We were able to obtain a list of city-licensed tow truck companies that operated in the Wilshire District. By this time I had called in more detectives and we split the list up. There were only three companies that were operating on that day. Each pair of detectives took one. My partner and I went to a tow yard on La Brea Boulevard that was operated by a business called Aardvark Towing.’ ”