John Lescroart - A Plague of Secrets

“What are you talking about?” Stier snapped.

Hardy kept himself at attention, eyes forward.

After a satisfying five seconds Braun finally came at him. “Did you hear Mr. Stier’s question, Mr. Hardy?”

“Of course, Your Honor.”

“Well?”

“I’m sorry. Well what, Your Honor?”

“I asked you if you’d heard Mr. Stier’s question.”

“Yes, of course, but you’ve instructed me many times to address my remarks only to the court. I’m trying to hone to the court’s protocol, Your Honor. As to Mr. Stier’s question, I’m certain he knows full well what I was talking about.”

“Would you care to enlighten the court what that is?”

“Certainly, Your Honor. It’s no secret that for the past several months Mr. Glass, the U.S. attorney here in San Francisco, has been prosecuting a campaign in the civil courts, in the media, and with a federal grand jury, trying to link my client and her husband to her brother and to the mayor and trying to implicate all the families in a money-laundering, dope-dealing, and racketeering conspiracy. That’s why I submitted all the questions for your voir dire about which of our prospective jurors follow the news closely. I had assumed you were aware of this, Your Honor.”

For an answer Braun turned to the prosecutor. “Mr. Stier?”

“Nonsense, Your Honor. It’s true that Jerry Glass has been following his own trail of malfeasance that appears to lead through some of these same individuals, including Mr. Hardy’s client, but to imply that we’ve colluded to prejudice-”

“Excuse me, Your Honor. I didn’t mean to imply any such thing. I meant to state it as established fact.”

Stier wheeled on Hardy. “That’s absurd.”

“To the contrary,” Hardy replied evenly, facing Braun. “It’s demonstrable, Your Honor. Debra Schiff, the homicide inspector who arrested my client, has been designated a special agent for Mr. Glass’s federal grand jury. Some would call that collusion.”

Braun glowered.

“But more to the point, Your Honor, Ms. West’s and Mr. Fisk’s right to be here, and my client’s right to have them here, is absolute. Of course, if you or Mr. Stier would like me to pass along a message to the mayor and a member of the Board of Supervisors that you want them to leave, I’d be happy to oblige. I’d actually be kind of interested to hear what they had to say to that.”

A longish pause. Then, “All right”-Braun bit off her words-“that’s quite enough. I won’t condone this type of bickering, either here or in my courtroom.” Hanging her head for a second, she shook it in disgust, then came back to the attorneys standing before her. “This situation infuriates me, but I don’t see any help for it. You gentlemen are excused. I’ll be out there again in just a minute.”

Word had evidently spread quickly, and by the time Hardy was back next to Maya at his table in the bullpen, there wasn’t a seat to be had in the gallery. A line stretched out through the door that led from the hallway into the courtroom, and Hardy was more than a little surprised to see Abe Glitsky standing in it, just inside the door, having come down to check out the show. He gave Hardy an infinitesimal nod.

Because they were scheduled to appear as witnesses and could not remain in the courtroom, Schiff and Bracco had both abandoned their earlier front-row seats in favor of a couple of reporters, who were among the number of people questioning both Harlen Fisk and Kathy West in what appeared to be a virtual impromptu press conference. Indeed, the gallery was fairly humming on all sides, so much so that the bailiff’s ringing call to order as Braun reentered the room and ascended to the bench went largely unheeded.

Hardy, up front, heard it and turned, but the noise behind him continued and, if anything, increased. Until Braun, standing, used her gavel, at first once, gently. And getting no response, then with a more imperious and forceful Bam! Bam! Bam!

“Order!” she called out. “Order in this court!”

Until gradually, finally, the place grew silent.

Braun waited until the last whisper had died, then put her gavel down and, still standing, leaned forward onto her hands, scowling down at the crowd. “This is a court of law,” she began, her voice strained with emotion. “There is no place in it for bedlam. I would ask those of you who have seats now to please take them, and for those of you standing along the sides, find a seat or I will be obliged to ask you to leave.”

After giving the gallery time to comply Braun finally took her seat. “Thank you. The court,” she went on, “recognizes Her Honor, the mayor of San Francisco, Kathy West, as well as City Supervisor Harlen Fisk, and welcomes them both to these proceedings.” In a convincing display of graciousness the judge nodded through a tight smile, then turned immediately to the prosecution table.

“Mr. Stier, are the People ready to begin their case?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

“Mr. Hardy, the defense?”

“Ready, Your Honor.”

“All right, then. Mr. Stier, you may begin.”

For all of hislow-affect demeanor and appearance, Stier’s public persona projected the first hint of the enigmatic Paulie-a real authority that seemed based on equal parts confidence in who he was and the certainty of his position. He spoke in a normal, conversational tone with few oratorical flourishes, but his down-home sincerity created a simple eloquence that rang with conviction.

“Ladies and gentlemen of the jury.” He was standing just in front of and sideways to Hardy and Maya, facing the jury box. As he began, he held his hands in a relaxed manner down and slightly out in front of him, reminiscent of a shortstop in the ready position, from time to time bringing them up, clasping them for emphasis, or sometimes pointing a finger from one of them for clarity or effect.

“The evidence and facts in this case are fairly simple, straightforward, and unambiguous. They concern a significant drug-dealing operation and long-standing relationships among three individuals that for some unknown reason suddenly went bad, with tragic, in fact fatal, results for two of them. And they point to an inescapable conclusion-that the defendant in this case, Maya Townshend”-and here he turned and pointed a finger directly at her-“willfully murdered her accomplice in her marijuana business, Dylan Vogler, and then several days later she willfully murdered another former accomplice in the marijuana business, Levon Preslee.

“Here’s how we know this.

“At nine forty-seven on the night of October twenty-sixth of last year, a young man who is one of the two victims in this case, Dylan Vogler, the manager of a coffee shop called Bay Beans West on Haight Street here in the city, placed a phone call to his employer, the defendant Maya Townshend. We don’t know precisely what he told her during that phone call, but whatever the message, it was important enough that Defendant first lied to the police about ever having received the call, and only when caught in the lie did she admit that it was enough to convince her to get up before dawn the next morning and drive to Bay Beans West.”

Hardy squirmed. Maya had not been caught in a lie but had admitted her deception to the police on her own, on his advice. He made a note to make the point later through Bracco or Schiff. But for the moment the accusation rang unchallenged in front of the jury.

Stier went on. “Less than one hour later, by the time it was just starting to get light, Mr. Vogler was dead, shot once in the chest at point blank range in the alley that runs behind Bay Beans West. There was no sign of a struggle. Police investigators discovered a gun in the alley from which one shot had recently been fired. One bullet was recovered. One shell casing was recovered. Both matched the gun. This gun belonged to Defendant. It was registered to her and her fingerprints were on it, as they were on cartridges inside the gun.