William Bernhardt - Blind Justice

The bullhorn crackled to life. “I repeat, put your hands in the air.” The shadowed figure continued to deliberate. “Gentlemen, prepare your gas grenades.”

“No!” The figure outside the shack screamed, terror-stricken. “You’ll kill them!” Ben saw his hand dart inside his jacket.

He never had a chance. The assault rifles fired at once, splitting the night with their thunderous booms and flashes of light. The first shot sent him careening backward. The second shot knocked him against a tree. He fell slowly down the side, leaving a grotesque red smear on the bark.

The figure hit bottom and fell forward slightly. His eyes closed. Blood dripped out of his mouth onto the ground beside his hand, still tightly clutching a small wooden slingshot.

PART THREE

The Show of Evil

33

BEN WILLED HIS EYELIDS to remain open. He would’ve slapped himself if there hadn’t been a couple hundred people watching. He had to bring himself around, and quickly. It was the first day of the trial—and he was barely able to stay awake.

By the time the federal agents had hauled him back to their headquarters, it was four in the morning; it was six-thirty before he was released. Ben was certain they were aware he had an early court date. They probably considered it an interdepartmental favor to assure that defense counsel and defendant would be operating under extreme sleep deprivation.

He hadn’t heard a word about the two men they arrested. Or Wolf.

Ben watched Christina at counsel table, her hands folded neatly in her lap. She was trying to remain placid, as Ben had instructed her, but he knew it was a struggle. She was just as worried as he was, with better reason, and she had been out just as late. Despite her valiant effort with cosmetics she customarily never used, the dark half moons under her eyes were plainly visible.

She was wearing a simple blue print dress with a lace collar. It was unlike anything to be found in Christina’s clothes closet; Ben bought it himself at the secondhand store down the street from his office. He was taking no chances; he even bought the shoes and accessories. He thought he had the look right—reasonably attractive, in a simple, understated fashion. Not at all upper class. Someone the jury could sympathize with.

The courtroom, as expected, was packed. A special row in the front of the gallery had been cordoned off for members of the press. The remaining six rows on both sides were jam packed with curious people who wanted to see the notorious Drug Princess for themselves. There were even two standing rows in the back of the courtroom, for those who were willing to remain on their feet all day long. In fact, there were still more would-be spectators outside waiting for a seat to open up in the gallery. The security guard told Ben some of them had been there since six in the morning. Ben couldn’t believe it—this was a murder trial, for God’s sake, not Phantom of the Opera. But Phantom wasn’t in Tulsa this week, Ben realized, and everybody loves a good trial.

Ben scanned the sea of faces in the courtroom. He saw few he considered friendly. Ben had forced Jones, against his wishes, to stay at the office, monitoring the telephone and poring over the records from Reynolds’s office. Loving still had not resurfaced. Ben just hoped he wasn’t found at the bottom of the Arkansas River in cement galoshes.

There was one face in the gallery Ben recognized: Margot Lombardi. He realized he shouldn’t be surprised; she was the victim’s widow, after all. She was sitting in the front, wearing dark sunglasses. Didn’t want to be recognized, he supposed. He could hardly blame her.

He leaned over the rail separating the gallery from the courtroom. “Mrs. Lombardi?”

She seemed startled. “Y-yes?”

“It’s not my job to advise you, but you know, if you’re in the courtroom, you could be called to testify.” And remind the jury that Lombardi was married, Ben thought. Wouldn’t that be great?

“Mr. Moltke assured me that wouldn’t happen.”

Ben leaned in closer. “Ma’am, your attorney, Quinn Reynolds, has been withholding documents I believe may be crucial to Christina’s defense.”

“Oh…my. Have you talked to him about this?”

“Yes. Repeatedly. And he’s refused to produce the documents. I was required to obtain them from…uh, an independent source. As a result, I don’t have a witness who can act as custodian of the documents and testify as to their authenticity.”

“How can I help?”

“I know Reynolds would refuse if I asked him to authenticate the documents. But you’re his client; if you ask, he’ll have little choice.”

“Oh. I…see.”

“Will you do it? My client’s life may be at stake.”

Margot hesitated. Her finger stroked her chin. “If my attorney didn’t want you to see the documents, he must have a reason.”

Ben’s jaw clenched.

“My financial situation is quite precarious at the moment.…If my attorney believes this is not in my best interest, I must trust his judgment.”

It was a familiar Catch-22: the lawyer blames the client and the client blames the lawyer. Disgusted, Ben returned to defendant’s table.

Moltke, of course, was playing the publicity to the hilt. He seemed ebullient; he clearly thought he had a win. He could already taste the victory, and the Senate seat beyond. And why not? Ben thought. A criminal jury trial was the prosecutor’s playpen. All that television hype about judges and lawyers making it impossible to lock up criminals was absurd. The reality was they could convict almost anyone if they wanted. Prosecutors, cops, forensic scientists—they were all players on the same team, and they all liked to win. Juries were the prosecutor’s Play-Doh. The hallowed principle of presumed innocent was a joke; most jurors presumed that if the defendant wasn’t guilty of something, he wouldn’t be sitting at defendant’s table.

Ben checked his watch; Derek was late again. Probably reading the eleventh-hour motions Ben had filed, trying to contrive reasonable excuses to deny them all. Ben hoped Derek would make a final pronouncement on his motion in limine to exclude any evidence relating to Lennie’s murder. Although Moltke insisted he had substantial evidence against Christina and expected to be filing charges against her on that murder soon, he hadn’t done so yet. And as long as no charges were filed, Ben insisted evidence of Lennie’s death didn’t help prove who killed Lombardi, so the matter shouldn’t be discussed. Derek, in a typical display of judicial cowardice, decided to reserve his ruling “until the issue was raised at trial.”

Ben nudged Christina and tried to sound jovial. “Too bad you don’t have a handsome, supportive husband in the first row. Juries eat that up.”

“ Pardonnez-moi ,” Christina said. “Would you like me to rent one? I think Burris stocks those.”

Ben smiled, but the smile was forced. Would this trial never begin?

At last, he saw some movement behind the bench. The bailiff called everyone to order and Judge Derek entered. He seemed healthy, well-scrubbed, unusually buoyant. Probably the thrill of displaying his vast judicial prowess to the packed gallery. Ben had always suspected the man was a ham actor at heart.

Derek popped a tablet out of a small box and tossed it into his mouth. “I’ve been thinking about your most recent spate of motions, Mr. Kincaid.”

This was about as welcome as an announcement that Herod had been thinking about babies. “Yes, your honor?”

“As far as I can tell, they’re just revamps of your prior motions. Consider them all denied.”

“Thank you, your honor.”