CHAPTER 49

“Call your first witness, Mr. Corvelli.”

“The defense calls Mindy Iokepa.”

Turi Ahina suddenly grabbed my left arm and pulled me back into my seat. “What the fuck you doin’, Mistah C?”

I pried his thick fingers from my suit jacket. “Saving your ass.”

Jake distracted Turi as I rose and stepped over to the podium. Meanwhile, Flan escorted Mindy Iokepa through the double doors in the rear of the courtroom, up the aisle, and helped her onto the witness stand.

“Good morning, Miss Iokepa,” I said. “Thank you for being here today.”

She smiled at me and nodded, then glanced over at Turi and mouthed, It’s okay.

“May I call you Mindy?” I said.

“Of course you may.”

“Mindy, would you please tell us your relation to Turi Ahina?”

After the slightest hesitation she said, “Turi is my daughter’s father.”

I glanced back at Turi, whose cheeks were rosy, his good eye welling up with tears. This was precisely what I wanted from him today, raw emotion. Of course, that wasn’t why I’d never told him I planned on putting Mindy Iokepa on the stand. He would never have allowed me to if I had. He might well have chosen to fire me or, worse, pled guilty. That was how far Turi would have gone to protect the mother of his child, the daughter of a state senator running for reelection.

“And your own father is?” I asked.

“Dave Iokepa. He is the state senator for District Sixteen.”

“And your father is up for reelection this November?”

“Objection,” Dapper Don said calmly. “Leading.”

Narita chuckled. “That is no secret, Mr. Watanabe. I am sure all of us have seen a few yard signs in recent weeks.” He turned to the witness. “You may answer the question.”

“Yes, my father is up for reelection in November.”

I moved to the defense table and picked up an envelope. From the envelope I removed an eight-by-eleven-inch, green page, with the heading “Certificate of Live Birth.”

“I would like this document marked as Defendant’s Exhibit H,” I said.

The clerk marked the page with a removable sticker then handed it back to me, while Jake provided original certified copies to the Court and Donovan Watanabe.

“May I approach the witness, Your Honor?”

“You may.”

“Mindy, I’m going to show you a document marked as Defendant’s Exhibit H, and I would like you to tell me if you recognize it.”

“I do,” she said as soon as I handed it to her.

“What is this document?”

“It’s our baby’s birth certificate.”

“What’s your child’s name, as it is listed on the birth certificate?”

“Ema Leilani Iokepa.”

“A beautiful name,” I said, smiling.

Ema Iokepa’s birth certificate proved easier to get than Barack Obama’s. All I needed was the father’s signature on a letter authorizing the release of the certificate to me. I snuck the authorization letter into a bunch of forms I had Turi sign. He never read anything I gave him to sign, not even the Queen for a Day agreement, which could easily have affected the rest of his life. So what the hell was one more? I figured. I made a photocopy of his driver’s license. I included the photocopy, along with the signed authorization letter, my own letter of request, and a check for $10, made payable to the state Department of Health. I sent the letter off and waited. If I received a phone call from the Department of Health telling me I had the wrong dad, nothing lost, nothing gained. But I didn’t receive such a call. Instead, a few days after I mailed the request, I received a certified copy of Ema Iokepa’s birth certificate.

“What name is listed as the mother’s name on the birth certificate?” I asked.

“Mine. Mindy Iokepa.”

“And what name is listed as the father’s name?”

“Turi Ahina.”

“Thank you.” I took the birth certificate back from the witness and entered it into evidence, then asked, “How old is Ema?”

“She’ll be sixteen months on Election Day.”

“Is there any court order granting Turi Ahina visitation rights?”

“No, but Turi knows he’s welcome to visit with Ema anytime he likes. He’s a wonderful father.”

Nice touch. “Is there any court order granting you child support from Turi Ahina?”

“No, there is not. But Turi gives me money to help raise Ema every month. I never once had to ask him for a penny.”

“How much money does Turi Ahina provide you every month to help raise Ema?”

“Five thousand dollars.”

I waited while the number echoed through the courtroom, then said, “How does he pay you this five thousand dollars? By check?”

“Always in cash.”

“On the evening of July twenty-third of this year, did you speak with Turi Ahina?”

“I did.”

“What was that conversation about?”

“He simply told me he’d drop by my home with the envelope at around eleven o’clock.”

“Where do you live?”

Mindy supplied her address on Kolohe Street, and I asked her where that was in relation to the shooting.

“The shooting happened just a few doors down from my house.”

“Did Turi ever deliver the envelope that night?”

“He did not.”

I switched gears. I was about to elicit testimony that would corroborate the defense theory that Detective Kanoa Bristol fired at Turi first. Of course, now that I had established Mindy’s relationship with Turi, this particular testimony would be taken by the jury with a grain of salt. Clearly, as a witness, Mindy Iokepa was biased.

“Did you hear the gunshots fired at approximately eleven o’clock on that evening Turi was supposed to visit you, the night of July twenty-third?”

Mindy started tearing up on the stand. “I did.”

“Did you answer when the police arrived and knocked on your door?”

“They never knocked on my door.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m positive.”

“Had the police shown up at your door and asked you whether you had heard gunshots, what would you have told them?”

“I would have told them that I had.”

“Think carefully, Mindy. How many gunshots did you hear that evening?”

“I heard three gunshots, one right after the other after the other.”

I paused to allow her words to sink in. Then I continued, “Do you know a man named Max Guffman?”

“Barely. But he’s my neighbor.”

I asked her to identify where he lived in relation to her house. Once she supplied the answer, I asked about the navy Honda Civic with the Jesus fish and the KEIKI ON BOARD sticker.

“I’d seen the car plenty of times, yes. But never again after the shooting.”

Although we learned that Max Guffman did indeed hail from Washington State, the Washington State Department of Licensing informed us that no vehicles were currently registered under his name. Without the number of the license plate the defense would have to rely on the testimony of Mindy Iokepa and Max Guffman himself, along with the single photograph downloaded from Brian Haak’s Facebook account.

“Did one of my investigators, a Mr. Ryan Flanagan, ever come by your house and ask you about seeing this navy Honda Civic?”

“Yes.”

“What did you tell him?”

“That I’d never seen it before.”

“You lied?”

“Yes.”

“Why did you lie?”

“Because I was scared. Scared for my baby.”

“What about Turi?”

“I knew he didn’t want me to say anything or else he would’ve told you and you would’ve come looking for me. He told me before the shooting that he trusts you with his life.”

I tried not to get choked up at the podium. I cleared my throat and asked, “Is there any other reason you didn’t come forward?”

“My father. I knew that if it came out that Turi was Ema’s father, he’d lose the election because of all the press attention Turi was getting.”

“But when I came to you with Ema’s birth certificate, you changed your mind. Why?”

She smiled at Turi while wiping a tear from her eye. “You told me I had no choice.”