David Simon - Homicide - A Year On The Killing Streets

Fahlteich pointed out that in some ways the homicide unit was its own worst enemy: “Every year we give them a clearance rate above the average, so every year they figure we can make do with what we have.”

“That’s it exactly,” said Nolan.

“So,” Fahlteich continued, “when we come back and ask for more detectives, or better cars or radios or training or whatever, the bosses can look at the rate and say, ‘Shit on that, they don’t need anything more than they got last year.’”

“We’ve done with so little for so long that now it’s coming back to haunt us,” Nolan said. “I’ll tell you, if we get two more nights like this last one, we’ll never climb out of the hole.”

“We might not climb out anyway,” said Fahlteich. “We’ll be lucky to get above sixty percent from where we are now.”

“Hey, if we don’t,” said Ed Brown, “it won’t just stop with the lieutenant. They’ll go and have themselves a housecleaning, and a lot of people up here are gonna be out the damn door.”

“No shit,” agreed Fahlteich.

Then Nolan brought the room to silence. “I think this just might be the year,” he said with the barest of smiles, “when the wheels fall off the cart.”

You are a citizen of a free nation, having lived your adult life in a land of guaranteed civil liberties, and you commit a crime of violence, whereupon you are jacked up, hauled down to a police station and deposited in a claustrophobic anteroom with three chairs, a table and no windows. There you sit for a half hour or so until a police detective-a man you have never met before, a man who can in no way be mistaken for a friend-enters the room with a thin stack of lined notepaper and a ballpoint pen.

The detective offers a cigarette, not your brand, and begins an uninterrupted monologue that wanders back and forth for a half hour more, eventually coming to rest in a familiar place: “You have the absolute right to remain silent.”

Of course you do. You’re a criminal. Criminals always have the right to remain silent. At least once in your miserable life, you spent an hour in front of a television set, listening to this book-’em-Danno routine. You think Joe Friday was lying to you? You think Kojak was making this horseshit up? No way, bunk, we’re talking sacred freedoms here, notably your Fifth Fucking Amendment protection against self-incrimination, and hey, it was good enough for Ollie North, so who are you to go incriminating yourself at the first opportunity? Get it straight: A police detective, a man who gets paid government money to put you in prison, is explaining your absolute right to shut up before you say something stupid.

“Anything you say or write may be used against you in a court of law.”

Yo, bunky, wake the fuck up. You’re now being told that talking to a police detective in an interrogation room can only hurt you. If it could help you, they would probably be pretty quick to say that, wouldn’t they? They’d stand up and say you have the right not to worry because what you say or write in this godforsaken cubicle is gonna be used to your benefit in a court of law. No, your best bet is to shut up. Shut up now.

“You have the right to talk with a lawyer at any time-before any questioning, before answering any questions, or during any questions.”

Talk about helpful. Now the man who wants to arrest you for violating the peace and dignity of the state is saying you can talk to a trained professional, an attorney who has read the relevant portions of the Maryland Annotated Code or can at least get his hands on some Cliff’s Notes. And let’s face it, pal, you just carved up a drunk in a Dundalk Avenue bar, but that don’t make you a neurosurgeon. Take whatever help you can get.

“If you want a lawyer and cannot afford to hire one, you will not be asked any questions, and the court will be requested to appoint a lawyer for you.”

Translation: You’re a derelict. No charge for derelicts.

At this point, if all lobes are working, you ought to have seen enough of this Double Jeopardy category to know that it ain’t where you want to be. How about a little something from Criminal Lawyers and Their Clients for $50, Alex?

Whoa, bunk, not so fast.

“Before we get started, lemme just get through the paperwork,” says the detective, who now produces an Explanation of Rights sheet, BPD Form 69, and passes it across the table.

“EXPLANATION OF RIGHTS,” declares the top line in bold block letters. The detective asks you to fill in your name, address, age, and education, then the date and time. That much accomplished, he asks you to read the next section. It begins, “YOU ARE HEREBY ADVISED THAT:” Read number one, the detective says. Do you understand number one?

“You have the absolute right to remain silent.”

Yeah, you understand. We did this already.

“Then write your initials next to number one. Now read number two.”

And so forth, until you have initialed each component of the Miranda warning. That done, the detective tells you to write your signature on the next line, the one just below the sentence that says, “I HAVE READ THE ABOVE EXPLANATION OF MY RIGHTS AND FULLY UNDERSTAND IT.”

You sign your name and the monologue resumes. The detective assures you that he has informed you of these rights because he wants you to be protected, because there is nothing that concerns him more than giving you every possible assistance in this very confusing and stressful moment in your life. If you don’t want to talk, he tells you, that’s fine. And if you want a lawyer, that’s fine, too, because first of all, he’s no relation to the guy you cut up, and second, he’s gonna get six hours overtime no matter what you do. But he wants you to know-and he’s been doing this a lot longer than you, so take his word for it-that your rights to remain silent and obtain qualified counsel aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.

Look at it this way, he says, leaning back in his chair. Once you up and call for that lawyer, son, we can’t do a damn thing for you. No sir, your friends in the city homicide unit are going to have to leave you locked in this room all alone and the next authority figure to scan your case will be a tie-wearing, three-piece bloodsucker-a no-nonsense prosecutor from the Violent Crimes Unit with the official title of assistant state’s attorney for the city of Baltimore. And God help you then, son, because a ruthless fucker like that will have an O’Donnell Heights motorhead like yourself halfway to the gas chamber before you get three words out. Now’s the time to speak up, right now when I got my pen and paper here on the table, because once I walk out of this room any chance you have of telling your side of the story is gone and I gotta write it up the way it looks. And the way it looks right now is first-fucking-degree murder. Felony murder, mister, which when shoved up a man’s asshole is a helluva lot more painful than second-degree or maybe even manslaughter. What you say right here and now could make the difference, bunk. Did I mention that Maryland has a gas chamber? Big, ugly sumbitch at the penitentiary on Eager Street, not twenty blocks from here. You don’t wanna get too close to that bad boy, lemme tell you.

A small, wavering sound of protest passes your lips and the detective leans back in his chair, shaking his head sadly.

What the hell is wrong with you, son? You think I’m fucking with you? Hey, I don’t even need to bother with your weak shit. I got three witnesses in three other rooms who say you’re my man. I got a knife from the scene that’s going downstairs to the lab for latent prints. I got blood spatter on them Air Jordans we took off you ten minutes ago. Why the fuck do you think we took ’em? Do I look like I wear high-top tennis? Fuck no. You got spatter all over ’em, and I think we both know whose blood type it’s gonna be. Hey, bunk, I’m only in here to make sure that there ain’t nothing you can say for yourself before I write it all up.