Blackstone and Julia ordered some carry-out Thai food that evening, and then worked late, until almost midnight. When they were finished, Blackstone electronically served their motion for discovery on AUSA Henry Hartz and filed it with the U.S. District Court by e-mail. It was thirty-seven pages long.
Blackstone loaded a lot of unusual information requests into his written demand. Unlike civil cases, where the discovery rules allow almost unlimited inquiry into every conceivably relevant area, in criminal cases defense counsel has to operate in a legal straitjacket. The government has to disclose evidence to the defense only within certain narrow categories. But Blackstone thought he had found some loopholes.
He found that the FBI reports previously produced to him by prosecutor Hartz contained numerous redactions: words and sentences blacked out. Those were the bits of information the prosecution didn’t want Blackstone to read, and which Hartz had determined were protected from disclosure. But Blackstone needed as many facts as he could gather to defend his client. He wanted it all.
One of the blacked-out sentences in an FBI report produced to Blackstone seemed as if, in the grammatical context of the unredacted sentences before and after it, it had revealed some personal information about Horace Langley. In his motion, Blackstone argued for the full release of that information because, in his words, “The defense believes that Mr. Langley’s possible association with any number of ideological groups, including the Freemasons, is material to the defense of this case.” Blackstone had remembered Vinnie’s comment about Lord Dee’s interest in the Booth diary pages. All of that overblown stuff about the “ultimate secret of the Freemasons.”
But the way that the criminal law professor saw it, the real blockbuster in his motion was his demand, in paragraph 77, for everything the government had, in terms of evidence, investigation, or scientific analysis relating to the notepad that was found lying on Langley’s desk after the murder. More than that, Blackstone was demanding the right to have the notepad examined by his own expert.
When Julia asked him what he was looking for, Blackstone smiled one of his know-it-all smiles and then proceeded to explain.
“According to the reports, his pen was a Faber Castell Porsche P3150 ballpoint. One of those heavy, expensive jobs—you know, the kind they don’t call just pens, but writing instruments,” Blackstone explained. “That thing would have left a deep imprint on the page as well on as the pages underneath.”
“Porsche? I thought they made cars.”
“They do. And they also have a line of pens for those who love their cars. Not a bad car, the Porsche. But no Maserati,” Blackstone noted with a grin.
“So,” Julia continued, her brow furrowed, “the pen impresses a mark—all the way down to several pages underneath. And we get a microscopic examination of those pages still left on the pad of paper—to see if we can decipher what Langley wrote as he was examining the Booth diary?”
“Nice work, Robins,” Blackstone said. “I lead you to water, and you drink—we make a terrific team.”
Julia paused for a minute and then decided to speak her mind.
“J.D., just once in a while, you can try not to be so condescending.”
That is when she got up from the conference table, grabbed her briefcase and her purse, and walked out of the office to go home.
Blackstone, who was still studying the motion he had just e-mailed out to the opposing attorney and the Court, was trying hard to act like Julia’s comment didn’t bother him.
The next day, early in the morning, Blackstone traveled over to the federal detention center. He was waiting in the drab lobby of that facility to greet Vinnie when she was released on bail.
After she gathered her personal effects, Vinnie ran out into the lobby, threw her arms around her attorney, and kissed him on the cheek.
Blackstone, a bit embarrassed, moved away slightly and took Vinnie’s arms off his neck, as a female jailer behind the glass window glared at him.
“Easy,” Blackstone said to his client. “This is only step one. We still have a case to win.”
“And you will do that, I know it,” she gushed. “You are my defender and my deliverer.”
Blackstone was uncomfortable with her grandiose accolades. So, as he walked her to his car he changed the subject and quickly launched into a preview of the discovery motion he had filed. He drove her to her apartment in Alexandria, not far from her studio. As they were driving, he glanced several times into his rearview mirror.
“Why do you keep looking back?” Vinnie asked.
“Just curious,” was all he said.
Blackstone could see the tan Ford Taurus behind him.
And he knew Tully Tullinger well enough to know that somewhere back there, behind that car, was his private investigator, tailing the Taurus.