Lisa Scottoline - Mistaken Identity

“So you went to Pat’s for a cheesesteak that night?”

“Yes.”

“How much time would you say it takes to drive from your district to Pat’s Steaks, on Tenth Street?”

“Probably half an hour, if you don’t take South Street. You know how the song goes. That’s where all the hippies meet,” McShea joked, and the jury laughed with him again. Bennie was aware she was coming off like a killjoy, but she failed to see the humor.

“Let’s do the math, Officer McShea. If it takes half an hour to get to Pat’s from your beat, it would take a half an hour to get back, right?”

“Sure.”

“So far that’s an hour. Now, did you eat the cheesesteak at Pat’s, at one of the tables outside, or did you take it out and go back to your district?”

“We ate at Pat’s. Outside, standing up, next to that big counter with the peppers and ketchup.” McShea turned to the jury in appeal, palms up. “I mean, you have to eat at Pat’s. It’s tradition.” The jury smiled, and so did McShea, who let his gaze slip toward the back of the gallery. Bennie didn’t turn to see whom he was looking at, with the jury watching her. She assumed it was his captain, since this testimony wouldn’t look so good in McShea’s personnel file. The cop was entering damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don’t territory, and Bennie intended to lead him there and buy him a house.

“Now, since this was in early summer, on May nineteenth, I bet Pat’s was hopping that night, wasn’t it?”

“Sure. Pat’s was busy. Pat’s is always busy.”

“So there was a line out front of the window, where you get the cheesesteaks, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“Did you and Officer Reston wait in line to place your order or did you go to the front of the line?”

“I don’t remember.”

Bennie folded her arms. “I don’t get it. You remember you were there, you remember what you ate, you remember where you ate it, but you don’t remember whether you went to the front of the line or not?”

“Objection, asked and answered, Your Honor,” Hilliard said.

Bennie faced Judge Guthrie. “Your Honor, this is cross-examination. The defense has a right to understand the events of the night of the murder.”

Hilliard rose on his arms. “Your Honor, anything Officer McShea ate for dinner is irrelevant to the commission of the crime in question. He was merely the arresting officer.”

Bennie had to bite her tongue. “Your Honor, the issue isn’t what Officer McShea had for dinner. It concerns the timing of his arrival at the scene of the crime and how he and his partner ‘just happened’ to be there.”

Judge Guthrie put up a hand and leaned back in his chair. “I’ll allow it, in a very limited scope.”

“Thank you,” she said, as Hilliard eased back into his chair and Bennie faced the witness. “Officer McShea, you were saying you don’t remember if you went to the front of the line to order your cheesesteak.”

“Probably if it was a busy night, we’d go to the front of the line. If it was a slow night and we didn’t have jobs, we’d wait in line.”

“Was it a slow night the night of May nineteenth?”

McShea hesitated. “I don’t recall.”

“Well, if it were a busy night in your district, you wouldn’t have left for a cheesesteak, would you?”

“Objection!” Hilliard said, rising. “Your Honor, defense counsel is asking this witness to speculate.”

“Is it just speculation that this police officer would do his duty?” Bennie asked, suppressing a smile, and noticed with satisfaction that the juror with the goatee grinned with her. She hoped he’d end up as foreman. She remembered him as bright and articulate from voir dire.

“Sustained.” Judge Guthrie nibbled the calico stem of his glasses. “You need not answer the question, Officer.”

“I’m pretty sure it wasn’t a busy night on the job,” McShea said anyway.

“Thank you,” Bennie said. “So, Officer McShea, let’s assume that on the night in question you waited in line at Pat’s. Do you remember how long it took to get to the front of the line?”

“Five, ten minutes at most.”

“By the way, how much did dinner cost that night, for you and your partner?”

“I don’t remember.”

Bennie cocked her head. Either somebody hadn’t taken McShea through the details of his story, or he had forgotten them. “You don’t remember that either?”

“No.”

“Did you pay for dinner or did Officer Reston pay?”

“Uh, I think Reston did. He’s always got dough on him. He’s single.”

Bennie didn’t smile. “Do you remember or are you making it up as you go along?”

“Objection, Your Honor!” Hilliard called from the prosecution table, and Judge Guthrie frowned deeply.

“Sustained. Ms. Rosato, I caution you to temper your questions with civility.”

Bennie took it on the chin and faced the witness. “Getting back on track, Officer McShea, how long did it take you and Officer Reston to eat your cheesesteaks?”

“Inhaled is more like it. It doesn’t take too long, not the way I eat. Fifteen minutes, a half hour, at the most.” McShea glanced again at the back of the gallery, and the look wasn’t lost on Bennie, who walked around her table to check the back pew of the gallery. To her surprise, it wasn’t any police brass who McShea was looking at, but a uniformed cop. A young, blond-haired cop who looked like a surfer. Oh, no. He fit Lou’s description of the driver of the black TransAm. Bennie’s pulse quickened.

“Let me understand your testimony, Officer McShea.” Bennie turned to make a note on her legal pad and passed the pad casually back to Judy. It said, GET THE NAME OF THAT BLOND COP IN THE BACK ROW.

She continued. “Officer, taking your estimate, that’s an hour and a half to get and eat dinner that night. How’s my addition?”

“Better than mine.”

“How many other cars cover your district of the city?” “One.”

“So when you’re not there, the other patrol officers are left with maybe sixty city blocks to cover by themselves?”

McShea looked sheepish again. “Hey, I’m not proud of it. It was a onetime thing.”

“Nevertheless, how would you characterize your district, Officer McShea, as a high-crime area or low-crime area?”

“It depends.”

“If I told you the Philadelphia Inquirer characterizes it as high crime, would you be surprised?”

“I’m not surprised by anything in the Inquirer ,” the witness shot back, but Bennie saw that the front row of the jury had lost its sense of humor. They would recognize the neighborhood and were listening with concern, especially the black librarian. As Bennie recalled, her branch was in a rough city neighborhood, and she plainly disapproved.

“Fine.” Bennie decided to leave it alone. “So other than the cheesesteak, there was no other reason you were in Detective Della Porta’s neighborhood?”

“No.”

“You didn’t have a meeting with Detective Della Porta that night?”

“No.”

“You didn’t have a score to settle with Detective Della Porta?”

“Objection!” Hilliard said, half rising. “There’s no foundation for that question, Your Honor. What is defense counsel even talking about?”

“Sustained,” Judge Guthrie ruled, sliding his chair forward so quickly that a banging noise reverberated through the courtroom’s microphone system.

Bennie backed off, for the time being. “You testified that Alice Connolly confessed and tried to bribe you not to take her into custody, is that right?”

“Yes.”

“And you testified she did this while you were arresting her, on Winchester Street, is that right?”