David ed. - Face Off (2014) Anthology

“No. I came here when I was three with my mother and father and two brothers.”

“Do you have any other relatives living in the Middle East, say, outside of Saudi Arabia, at the present time?”

“Objection as to relevance, Your Honor.” The prosecutor was on his feet once more.

“May we approach the bench?” said Madriani.

The judge waved them on. Off to the side, away from the witness, Paul told the judge that the questions were intended to lay a foundation for the issue of credibility, which was always relevant. After all, it was the prosecution who put the witness on the stand.

“I will give you a little latitude, Mr. Madriani, but let’s try and tie it to something in the case.” The judge eased back in his chair.

Paul picked up where he left off.

“Yes,” said Mirza. “I have one brother and my grandparents who live in Shubra al-Khaymah.”

“And where is that?” said Paul.

“It’s a town just outside Cairo in Egypt.”

“So your family lives in the same country my client is from?”

“If you say so,” said Mirza.

“When is the last time you spoke to your family in Egypt?” said Paul.

“I don’t know. I don’t remember.”

“A month ago?”

“Longer.”

“Two months?”

“I don’t know. As I said, I can’t remember.”

“Mr. Mirza, isn’t it a fact that the testimony you have offered before this jury here today is false? Is it not true that you never saw anything that night and that, in fact, the information you have testified to here today was provided to you by outside parties who have threatened your family in Egypt unless you testify in accordance with their instructions?”

“No, that’s not true,” said Mirza.

“Isn’t it a fact, Mr. Mirza, that you received a letter, typed correspondence, hand-delivered to your home, instructing you to incriminate my client, telling you what to say, giving you details including the defendant’s taxi number, the license number of the vehicle, the location of the alley, and other specifics like the time of your supposed observations, and telling you that unless you did as the letter instructed your family members in Egypt would be killed? Is that not a fact?”

“No. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” The discomfort level of the witness was obvious.

Madriani lifted a sheaf of papers from the table in front of him. Beneath the papers were several large glossy photographs as well as photocopies of a letter and its envelope. Madriani handed one set to the bailiff who delivered it to the judge and another to the prosecutor.

“May I approach the witness, Your Honor?” The judge nodded as he read from his copy of the letter.

“Mr. Mirza, this is not the original but a copy of the letter in question. The original has already been examined by a laboratory employed by the defense. It was turned over to the police for their examination less than an hour ago. I should tell you that our experts have already identified your fingerprints on the original letter and its envelope. You should be advised that perjury is a serious crime. I remind you that you are under oath.”

Mirza looked at the document.

“Your Honor, we’ve never seen this before.” The prosecutor was on his feet waving his copy of the letter at the judge.

“Neither had I, Your Honor, until late yesterday morning,” said Madriani, “when, subject to a subpoena, the letter was found in a safe-deposit box belonging to Mr. Mirza at Fontana Bank in the city. It was tucked inside a large manila envelope containing some insurance documents.”

“I’ve never seen this before,” said Mirza, his hands shaking.

“We would ask for a continuance,” said the prosecutor.

Madriani ignored him. “Then perhaps you can explain to the jury and the judge how it came to find its way into your safe-deposit box with your fingerprints on it?”

“The witness will answer the question.” One thing judges don’t like is perjury.

Mirza looked up at the judge, then toward the prosecutor, and finally at Madriani. A bewildered expression spread across his face. “I don’t know! I really don’t know!”

· · ·

Six days later, after the police crime lab verified Mirza’s fingerprints on the letter and its envelope, both sides made their closing arguments to the jury.

In the courtroom, crowded to overflowing, Alex Cooper sat just beyond the railing behind Madriani at the counsel table. In closing, it took little more than an hour for Madriani to shred the State’s case given that the testimony and evidence of the prosecution’s chief witness had turned to dust. Other than the bleak GPS data putting Mustaffa’s taxi in the vicinity of the body dump, Mirza’s testimony was the only real evidence tying him to the crime. Worse, it now appeared as if there was an active conspiracy afoot to frame Mustaffa.

Paul explained to the jury that while he could not defend Mirza’s conduct on the stand, he understood the unwillingness on the part of the witness to own up to his perjury. After all, his family was in jeopardy and he had reason to be afraid for them.

Mirza, to the last breath, denied ever having seen the letter in question. He claimed that, to his knowledge, no one had ever threatened his family and no one had told him what to say on the stand. He was adamant. No doubt the DA’s office would take him to its own version of the woodshed for a thrashing on the issue of perjury if the jury failed to believe him. Still, there was no way to explain the fingerprints and the letter in the safe-deposit box, all belonging to Mirza.

After retiring to the jury room for deliberations, it seemed that the headiest item on the jury’s agenda was the election of a foreman. Before the noon break they were back with a verdict. “On the count of violation of Penal Code Section 187, first-degree murder, we, the jury, find the defendant, Ibid Mustaffa, not guilty.”

There was a veritable uproar in the courtroom as Mustaffa was discharged by the judge. Madriani made plans to meet with him the following Monday at his office in San Diego. Mustaffa left to get his personal belongings that had been taken from him the night of his arrest.

Paul, Alex, and Jenny Corcoran retreated through the phalanx of reporters to a restaurant for lunch and a glass of wine. It was Friday afternoon. Alex had to fly back to New York, but Jenny was able to stay on. She made plans to get together with Paul and his girlfriend, Joselyn Cole, as well as his law partner, Harry Hinds, in San Diego for a quick visit.

After lunch, some local sightseeing, and a heavy dinner, the lawyers parted as Paul dropped Alex at the airport. She was still conflicted, she told him, about how it felt to hear that Mustaffa was acquitted when her first assumptions about his guilt in this heinous crime were so strong.

Paul headed back to his own room. He would spend one more night in the City of Angels before collecting his luggage, picking Jenny up the following morning, and heading south to San Diego and home.

As for Jenny, she was exhausted. As soon as she got to her room and showered, her head hit the pillow and she tried to sleep. But still the subconscious was at work. Something troubled her. It was the testimony of Terry Mirza.

In the true-to-form trials of the real world, Perry Mason endings with witnesses crumbling on the stand and admitting their guilt do not occur, except in one narrow band of cases. People who commit perjury and who are confronted on the stand with irrefutable evidence of their lies often do recant their testimony, particularly when admonished by counsel and the judge in stern language that perjury is a serious crime for which they could pay a stiff penalty, including time behind bars, if convicted. Mirza had been told this several times and still he stuck to his testimony. He insisted that he had never seen the letter threatening his family or directing him how to testify.