Майкл Коннелли - Law of Innocence

Usually when a judge tells you to sit down it means that all that needs to be said has been said and a decision has been made.

The judge swiveled in her chair and focused on Berg.

“Ms. Berg, do you recall the teleconference referred to by counsel?” she asked.

“Yes, Your Honor,” Berg said.

There was no emotion in her tone. She had taken the same cue I had when Warfield told me to sit down.

“It appears to me that the state had every opportunity to follow and find this location and the victim’s belongings,” Warfield said. “The court tends to agree with Mr. Haller that this is about work product and a missed opportunity, not about any gamesmanship on the part of the defense. Certainly nothing I would consider a violation of discovery.”

Berg stood but did not move to the lectern, a sign that her protest was going to be half-hearted, no matter what she had scribbled on her legal pad.

“He waited three weeks to put her on the witness list,” she said. “He was hiding her importance. There should have been a written report about the interview and the search of the property. That is exactly what the spirit and intention of discovery is.”

I started to rise to object but the judge made a signal with her hand, gesturing me back into my chair.

“Ms. Berg,” the judge intoned, the first note of annoyance in her voice. “If you are suggesting that Mr. Haller is under an obligation to document his investigation with reports of his moves and interviews just like a law enforcement agency and then immediately decide whether he will call Ms. Dietrich as a witness, then you must take me for a fool.”

“No, Your Honor,” Berg said quickly. “Not at all.”

“Very well, then. We’re done here. The motion for sanctions is denied.”

The judge looked over at the calendar that hung on the wall over the clerk’s corral.

“We are thirteen days from jury selection,” she said. “I am setting a hearing for next Thursday at ten a.m. for final motions. I want to handle everything on that day. That means, get your paperwork in with enough time for the court to consider it. I want no surprises. I will see you all then.”

The judge adjourned court and I felt the dread of incarceration return before Deputy Chan and his cohorts could even get to me.

35

Upon my second arrest I was placed back in a single-bed cell at Twin Towers. This time I had even graduated to the outside wall of the jail, which gave me a window—only four inches wide and escape-proof, but it had a partial view of the Criminal Courts Building just a few blocks away as the crow flies. It was enough of a view for me to want to stay in the cell with my eyes on the prize rather than congregate in the dayroom with the other keep-aways. And this, even though I had replaced Bishop with Carew.

So I was feeling safe and secure in the module. The problem was that there were no such protections on the jail buses that moved hundreds of inmates to and from court each day. Whom you rode with and whom you were chained to was mostly a matter of chance. Or so it appeared. No matter what measure I took to protect myself in custody, I was always going to be most vulnerable on the bus. I knew this for a fact because I’d had clients attacked on the buses. And I had seen fights break out and attacks staged while riding them myself.

After the hearing on the prosecution’s motion for sanctions, I waited two hours in the courthouse jail before being shuttled onto a bus back to the Towers. I was cuffed fourth on a chain behind three other men and moved onto the bus. We were put into the second-to-last compartment and I was seated against the barred window in the forward-facing bench. The deputy checked us, closed the gate and locked it, and proceeded to fill the next compartment. I leaned forward to look across the man next to me to the prisoner seated on my row against the opposite window. I recognized him but not from the keep-away module. I couldn’t place him. It could have been from court or a potential client meeting in which I didn’t take the case. He was checking me out as I was checking him. And that fired my paranoia. I knew I had to keep a watch on him.

The bus exited the garage beneath the courts building and trundled up the steep grade to Spring Street. As it turned left, City Hall was on the right side, and several prisoners followed the tradition of flipping the finger at the seat of power. This of course could not be seen by anyone on the marble steps or behind the windows of the iconic building. The bus’s “windows” were actually slotted metal that allowed a confined view out but no view in.

I watched the man I was curious about hold his hand up and extend the fuck-you finger. He did it so routinely, without even looking out through the slots himself, that I knew he was a regular guest of the system. And that was when I recognized him. He was the client of a colleague whom I had once filled in for during a hearing before a judge. It had been a babysitting job, a minor hearing that involved a court appearance. Dan Daly had been stuck in a trial and asked me to handle it and I did.

Satisfied that I had answered the question and that the man posed no special threat, I relaxed and leaned back in my seat, tilting my head up to look at the ceiling. I started counting the days until the start of my trial and how soon I could reasonably expect to walk free after a not-guilty verdict.

It was the last thing I remembered.

36

Thursday, February 6

I could only open my eyes to narrow slices of light. It wasn’t the harshness of the light that prevented me from opening them wider. It was physical impediment. I simply could not do it.

I was disoriented at first, not sure where I was.

“Mickey?”

I turned at the voice, recognized it. “Jennifer?”

The one word set fire to my throat, the pain so sharp I grimaced.

“Yes, I’m here. How do you feel?”

“I can’t see. What—”

“Your eyes are swollen. You burst a lot of blood vessels.”

I burst blood vessels? This didn’t make sense.

“What do you mean?” I asked. “How did I— ahh, it hurts to talk.”

“Don’t talk,” Jennifer said. “Just listen. We went over this an hour ago and then the sedation hit and you went out again. You were attacked, Mickey. On the jail bus after court yesterday.”

“Yesterday?”

“Don’t talk. Yes, you’ve lost a day. But if you can stay awake, I can get them in here to do the testing. They need to check your brain function to see if there was anything … so we’ll know if there is any … anything permanent.”

“What happened on the bus?”

The pain.

“I don’t know all the details and the sheriff’s investigator wants to talk to you about it—he’s waiting outside but I told him I was going to talk to you first. Basically, another man on the bus got his chain free and used it to choke you. He was behind you and wrapped it around your neck. They thought you were dead but paramedics revived you, Mickey. They say it’s a miracle you’re alive.”

“It doesn’t feel like a miracle. Where am I?”

I was beginning to be able to manage the pain. Talking in a monotone, turning my head slightly to the left seemed to lessen it.

“County-USC—the jail ward. Hayley and Lorna and everybody wanted to come in to see you but you’re on lockdown and they’d only let me in. I don’t think you want them seeing you like this anyway. Better to wait till the swelling goes down.”

I felt her hand grip my shoulder.

“Are we alone in here?” I asked.

“Yes,” Jennifer said. “This is an attorney-client meeting. There’s a deputy outside the door but it’s closed. Also, the investigator’s out there, waiting to talk to you.”