With the evidence in against Jackson and the charges formally filed, I finally got a taste of a regular MCU morning on Thursday. It was just like a morning in DVD, but instead of grinding out morning drug custodies, I was churning through the night’s assault arrests.
As required, I finished the misdemeanor screening cases first. I held back only one to issue as a felony. Robert Jenkins, a thirty-seven-year-old man with a prior trespass conviction at an elementary school, was tackled by the father of a four-year-old girl after the father found Jenkins taking pictures of his daughter at the park. The girl remained clothed the entire time, but Jenkins had manipulated her into various poses that revealed his Chester the Molester ways. When the responding police officer perused the other shots in the guy’s digital camera, he found forty photographs of eight different kids. Bent over, legs spread, fingers in their open mouths; the details varied, but the gist was always the same. Jenkins admitted to the officer that he used the pictures to pleasure himself sexually and did not consider them to be art.
A single line at the end of the police report hinted at the problem with the case: “I decided to arrest the suspect for harassment, since he touched the vic to achieve the desired pose, and such touching was offensive under the circumstances.” It wasn’t obvious what to charge the defendant with, but I wasn’t about to let a guy like Jenkins off the hook with the misdemeanor of harassment.
I flipped through the penal code to confirm my recollection, but the child sex abuse laws all required physical contact or at least nudity. I reread the victim’s statement. For the photograph of her straddling the slide, she said Jenkins told her to climb up the ladder, then pulled her feet on either side of the slide before she went down. She said the slide hurt her skin and she didn’t know why she couldn’t keep her dress beneath her legs. The officer noted some redness on the backs of her thighs. Good enough for me. An assault on a four-year-old is a felony, and I had an appellate case saying a red mark is enough to get an assault charge before a jury, which I’d pack full of parents. Jenkins could make all the arguments he wanted about strict statutory definitions, but the charge would stick.
I sent a follow-up request to a detective I knew in the child sex abuse unit asking him to run Jenkins’s other photographs by the DARE officers who worked the schools near the park. Even if finding the other kids didn’t lead to more charges, telling the parents seemed like the right thing to do. They were probably convinced that the “don’t talk to strangers” talk had been enough to protect their kids. It never is.
Thanks to a grand jury appearance and an overdue response to a motion to suppress, I didn’t finish reviewing the rest of the custodies until nearly noon. I apologized to Alice as I put them on her desk. For her to finalize the paperwork in time for arraignments, she’d have to work through lunch.
“The least I can do is bring you something,” I offered. She told me it wasn’t necessary. If the attorneys here paid for lunch every time they screwed over the staff, we’d all be broke, and they’d all be fat. But, after the polite amount of argument, she accepted.
Alice estimated she had another hour of work, so I decided to take in a quick run. Jessica Walters was also in the locker room and asked if I wanted to join her for a loop around the waterfront.
Whenever I run with someone new, I let them set the pace. We were clocking about an eight-minute mile, which was comfortable for me, but I couldn’t tell if she was holding back.
We crossed the Willamette over the Morrison Bridge, saving the prettiest, downtown side of the loop for last. Once the noise of the bridge was past us and we had dropped down to the river’s edge, she asked me if I had ever tried to run with the office’s Hood-to-Coast team.
The Hood-to-Coast is Oregon’s annual relay race from Mount Hood to the Pacific coast. At one time, there had been an official District Attorney team. When Duncan found out that the members wore T-shirts bearing electric chairs, one for each defendant the runner had placed on death row, he pulled the plug.
I reminded Jessica that the group was no longer the official office team, making no effort to hide my sarcasm.
“Whatever. Have you ever run with them?”
“I didn’t think I was eligible.” My impression was that a team member needed to have a reliable eight-minute mile, the ability and willingness to drink mass quantities of alcohol, and a penis. Two out of three didn’t cut it. “In any event, I figure you choose your battles.” If I was going to become the office’s rabble-rouser, it wasn’t going to be for the privilege of running with a group that likes to polish off the day by watching each other light their gas.
We had started a subtle incline but hadn’t dropped the pace. Jessica didn’t say anything until the path flattened out again.
“How’s the evidence against Jackson looking?” she asked. She was winded but could still get the words out.
I gave her the abbreviated version. “I know the case is strong, but ever since I issued it, I’ve been finding myself getting worried. Frist thinks I might regret telling the defense about the affair.”
“It’s your first murder case,” she said, “so you’re worrying more than you need to. It’s normal. You’ll feel great by the day of trial.”
She was right. A case is always strongest at the beginning, when all you’ve got is what the police have given you. As you move toward trial, your job—and the defense’s—is to pick, poke, and prod at every last thread, any possible wrinkle that might turn out to be the glove that won’t stretch over the defendant’s hand. But by the first day of trial, you’ve tucked in the loose strings and ironed out the wrinkles, and the case is clearer than ever.
“I also still wonder why she was calling you,” I said, “and if it had anything to do with the murder. Maybe because of the gang unit? Do you work with public housing at all?” It wasn’t unusual for us to work with other agencies on long-term crime reduction plans.
She shook her head. “The community prosecution unit will call HAP sometimes if they know of a problem in the projects, but we stay out of that stuff in the trial unit. Hard enough to get cooperation on cases without getting people worried about losing their apartment.”
When I didn’t respond, she looked over at me and laughed.
“You need to chill out, Kincaid. It’s just a phone call. I called twenty people this morning, and if someone chops me up in little pieces tonight, I guarantee you it won’t have anything to do with any of them.”
“It just seems weird to call someone you don’t know, leave a message, and not say what you’re calling about,” I said. “And that number she left you was her cell, by the way.”
“It was?” Jessica’s tone told me she found that unusual too.
They say murder cases are like any other criminal case, but with one important difference: Your most important witness, the victim, is gone forever. The reason for Clarissa’s phone call was lost with her death, along with all the other information she took with her.
We picked up the pace as we passed the courtyard at the north end of the waterfront, then began the slow jog through downtown back to the courthouse. She stopped at the Plaza Blocks to stretch, and I put in about thirty seconds with her before I grew impatient. My doctor says I’ve got the heart of a healthy horse but the bones of a ninety-year-old man. Regardless of his warnings, I still spend every exercise minute I can spare going after every calorie I can burn.
“I stuck Alice Gerstein with some last-minute custodies and told her I’d bring her back some lunch, so I better get a move on,” I said, explaining my abrupt departure.
“Don’t let Frist know you’re being so considerate,” she said. “Makes everyone else in the unit look even worse.”
I was happy to find the Mexican food cart parked outside the courthouse. I got fish tacos on corn tortillas for me and a chicken burrito for Alice, then climbed the stairs to the eighth floor to polish off my workout.
Alice accepted the bag with the burrito in it and thanked me. “Sorry to break this to you, but you’ve got another visitor.”
Still out of breath and in my sticky running gear, I was in no condition to have a meeting. “Who is it?” I asked.
“Melvin Jackson’s mother. She’s been here about twenty minutes.”
“Can you tell her to schedule an appointment? I’m a mess, and I have some work I need to do before the death penalty meeting on that case.”
“I’ll do it if you want me to,” Alice said, “but I can tell you right now it won’t be pretty. She threw a fit when I told her no one was here to talk to her. We finally calmed her down by telling her you were on your way back.”
“We don’t usually meet with a defendant’s family members. Maybe she should call the defense attorney.”
Alice was patient, but the look on her face reminded me of that plumber I’d hired when I told him to try adjusting the flushy chain doohickey. “I tried that,” Alice said, “but I believe her response was, ‘I don’t need to talk to some lazy-ass public defender. I need to talk to the lady who’s buying all this bullshit about my son.’”
Given Walker’s description from the night of Jackson’s arrest, it sounded like the last two days had actually done wonders for Mrs. Jackson’s forbearance.
“Fine. I’ll be ready in a few minutes.”
When I’m not distracted by the television, the refrigerator, or singing in the shower, I can get ready in seven minutes flat. It’s one of the advantages of never learning how to put on makeup or do my hair. A shower, a hair clip, and a change of clothes are all I need to transform back into my regular everyday self.
Martha Jackson was in the reception area, shifting in her seat and tsk-ing every time someone walked by for a reason other than to see her. She was short for her weight, a trait that was only accentuated by the hot pink lilies on her dress that appeared to bloom from her generous bosom and broad hips.
I managed to get my name out, but she was off and running before I had a chance to offer her some water and a seat in the conference room. “You got a hundred lawyers in this office. How come I got to wait half an hour to talk to someone about a case that’s been on the news every day of the week?”
I tried to explain that not all the lawyers work on each individual case, but she was looking for a fight.
“You trying to tell me you’d leave someone waiting here if they ready to say they seen Melvin Jackson do it?”
“Is that what you’re here to say?” I asked.
That did the trick. “Hell, no. No way Melvin could kill that woman.” It was exactly what I expected to hear, and I herded her into a conference room while she repeated it every way she could think to say it. I hoped the closed door would at least buffer the outburst that was sure to greet the bad news: I wasn’t going to drop the charges and send Melvin home with her.
When she was done saying her piece, I did my best to say mine sympathetically. For all I knew, she had nothing to do with her son turning out to be the kind of man he was.
“I can’t pretend that I understand how difficult this must be for you, Mrs. Jackson, but the police have compelling evidence suggesting that your son, as hard as it must be for you to accept, was responsible for Clarissa Easterbrook’s death. I would not be doing my job if I ignored that evidence simply because a loving mother told me her son was innocent. If he claims he’s innocent, he has his own attorney to help him defend against the charges. You might want to call his lawyer and see how you can help.”
In a capital case, the bulk of the defense work often goes into the penalty phase. If Slip could calm Martha Jackson down long enough to put her on the stand, a mother’s plea for mercy can sway a jury to spare a son’s life.
“Oh, trust me, I’ll be talking to that man too, but I know there’s only so much he can do. Only you people can shut off this assembly line of a court system once it gets to going. You say you wouldn’t be doing your job to ignore evidence, but let me ask you this, Ms. Kincaid. Isn’t part of your job to pay attention to evidence that’s looking you right in the face?”
Given the circumstances her son was in and my role in that process, I showed her more patience that I normally would. “Of course it is, and I’m doing that.”
“You probably went to some fancy law school, didn’t you?” she asked.
“I’m not sure what you want me to say, Mrs. Jackson.”
“I’m pointing out that you a smart woman, but you only looking at what you want to see.”
I was getting frustrated. She was going to have to come to terms with this eventually, so it may as well be now. “I’m very sorry for your situation, but, ma’am, you know where the police found the murder weapon, and your son’s fingerprints were on the victim’s front door.”
“C’mon now, my boy was just trying to get the woman to talk to him. He wanted to sit down, look her in the eye, and ask how in the world someone can lose his home and children because of something his cousin did.”
“And maybe he finally found a way to do that.” I immediately regretted saying something so mean-spirited, but it seemed to be exactly what Martha Jackson expected.
The fire in her voice was gone. She clicked her tongue against her teeth and shook her head. “I don’t know why I bothered. Y’all just ain’t usin’ the heads God gave you. How that poor lady’s death gonna help my grandchildren? You see a colored man and assume he ain’t got sense, just an animal lashing out at the world.”
I was angry at the accusation, but knew that nothing I said would change either her perception of the criminal justice system or the many events in her lifetime that were responsible for it. “I’m sorry, Mrs. Jackson, but I can’t help you.” I opened the door to show her out.
She had one more thing to say before she left. “Melvin’s living in Section Eight—one step above begging on the streets—for a reason. Why’s he all the sudden got regular work at some fancy office development? And wouldn’t you know that’s where your poor missing judge turns up. Believe what you will about my son, but y’alls the ones ain’t thinkin.”
She walked past me through the doorway and headed for the elevator. I assumed she didn’t need an escort.
Russ Frist was standing outside the conference room.
“Melvin Jackson’s mother,” I explained.
“Alice told me about her when I got back, but I didn’t want to walk in. Sounded like you had everything under control.”
“Sure, if you consider being an insensitive prick having things under control,” I said. “It’s not her fault her son’s in a jam.”
“More hers than yours, Kincaid. Let it go.”
Letting things go never was my forte.
At two o’clock, the members of the death penalty committee gathered to decide whether Melvin Jackson should live or die if convicted. Even the boss himself showed up, joining Russ Frist, Jessica Walters, Rocco Kessler, and me.
Rocco Kessler spoke first. His real name is Richard, but somehow the macho nickname grew out of his initials. Knowing him, I suspected he engineered the transition himself.
I hadn’t seen him since leaving DVD, where he was most memorable as the supervisor who wanted me fired. He must not have missed me much, since he took his chair in the conference room without so much as a hello.
“Let’s get this show on the road. Duncan wants to keep things moving, and I plan to stick to the format we’ve always used.” The dearly departed Tim O’Donnell had previously chaired these meetings. “The husband’s coming in at three, Kincaid?” he asked.
I nodded. “He’s the only one. The trip downtown’s too hard for the parents, and the sister just called—her kids are having a meltdown and she couldn’t pawn them off on her folks. For what it’s worth, my gut tells me they’ll go either way on the sentence. They know nothing’s going to bring Clarissa back.”
“Okay, then. Take as long as you need to tell us about the case and the defendant, this”—he looked down at his notes—“Melvin Jackson. What we usually do is just go around the room and give our initial impressions, then go from there.”
I finished in twenty minutes, spending only half of that on the evidence itself. What made this meeting a difficult one wasn’t the question of Melvin Jackson’s guilt but the balancing of two seemingly irreconcilable images of the man. I tried to give it to them straight, covering both the aggravated nature of the crime and the sympathetic story of a father with no prior criminal history beating a lifelong addiction to keep his children.
Rocco asked Jessica to speak first.
“I think this is one of the hardest cases we’ve seen. At first blush, it’s got death penalty written all over it. The guy snatches a woman off the street, for Christ’s sake. But when you think about it, the reason those cases give you such a visceral reaction is that you think of a sex offender. You think of the Polly Klaas or Dru Sjodin cases. Melvin Jackson’s not one of those guys. He’s not a predator. And we also don’t have any prior acts of violence; I’d be inclined to seek life.”
Rocco looked to Russ.
“I’d go death penalty but accept a plea to life. We might not know exactly what Jackson did to her, but the ME says the vic’s shirt was off when she was beaten. We also know he stalked her. I see where you’re coming from, Walters, but to me this isn’t just some guy who snapped. Think of what it must have been like for the victim in those final moments, taking her clothes off for him. That’s more than garden-variety murder.”
Rocco jumped in next. I was getting the impression he forgot I was there. “I’m with Frist,” Rocco said. “The guy might not have any priors, but that just means no one caught him before. Even by his own sad story, he’s a doper who thinks he deserves a medal for choosing his kids over heroin.”
Jessica shook her head. “Forget for a second that Melvin Jackson’s a black man who lives in public housing and Clarissa Easterbrook’s an attractive, wealthy judge.”
Rocco accused her of playing the race card, and the room broke out in a cacophony rivaling Crossfire. Duncan made a time-out sign with his hands and told everyone to let Jessica finish speaking, but Jessica held up her hand. “Never mind.”
I, however, minded. She had a valid point, and they should at least take it into consideration. If this was going to be my case, I couldn’t be afraid to speak up.
“Jessica’s right,” I said. “When a defendant looks like Melvin Jackson and the victim looks like Clarissa Easterbrook, that alone pushes buttons we might not even know we have.”
Rocco didn’t want to hear it. “That’s a PC load of crock, Kincaid.” Aah, sweet memories of my former boss. “Jackson’s race has got nothing to do with this, and I don’t want to hear another word about it.”
“Well, that’s all you’re going to hear about if Jackson’s not comparable to other capital defendants. You tell me: Have we ever asked for a death sentence against a white defendant with no prior violence?”
The immediate silence at the table was answer enough, but it wasn’t the right one for Russ and Rocco, who began walking through individual cases, struggling to compare them to Jackson’s. Duncan chose to stare at the ceiling. I couldn’t tell if he was seeking spiritual guidance or picturing himself under fire by civil rights protesters on future campaign stops.
We were still debating the case when Alice Gerstein rapped on the door and peeked in. “Dr. Easterbrook and his lawyer are here whenever you’re ready.”
From what I’d heard, the usual goal of these meetings was to make the decision before the family arrived, then use the rest of the time to get the family on board. But Duncan wasn’t going to make Townsend wait while we continued to argue.
“For now, we’ll hear what he’s got to say. If I make a final decision, I’ll let everyone know. We may just have to meet again.”
I moved to the empty chair between Rocco and Russ. It might have seemed like a thoughtful gesture so Townsend could sit next to his own attorney. In truth, it was to ensure that Roger didn’t sit next to me. I wasn’t sure I could resist the temptation to kick him in the shins if he irritated me.
With constituents in the room, Duncan ran the floor. He got about as far as any government lawyer short of the solicitor general would have before my ex took over. Roger Kirkpatrick is and always has been a power lawyer.
“We appreciate your having Dr. Easterbrook here so he can communicate his views in person. I’m sure you understand that this is not an easy thing for him to talk about.”
As much as Tara and Susan had emphasized Townsend’s deterioration, they had nevertheless understated it. His eyes were puffy, his skin pale; he looked at the table when he spoke, barely registering our presence. He mumbled something about being against the death penalty, hating Melvin Jackson, and being a doctor, before Roger spared him—and us—further embarrassment.
Roger placed his hand on Townsend’s shoulder. “It’s OK. Let me see if I can explain what you told me earlier.” He shifted his attention to the rest of us. “Townsend has struggled this week with a new emotion—a hatred of Melvin Jackson that is more intense than anything I’m sure any of us has felt before. When he first heard Monday about the evidence found in Jackson’s apartment, his instinct, and I’m being frank here, was to kill Jackson himself.”
Townsend didn’t currently look capable of—let alone driven to—revenge, but maybe the change was further proof of what this week had been like for him.
“I spent a lot of time calming him that night, talking to him about the court system and convincing him that the case was strong enough that I was confident your office could convict. I left his house Monday night certain that he would be lobbying you to pursue this prosecution as a capital case. But when we talked the next day, Townsend told me he’d been up all night, trying to picture what the rest of his life would be like if Jackson were dead or if Jackson were in prison. And, he’s convinced the right outcome is a life sentence—not just to spare Jackson but to spare himself. He’s a doctor in the business of saving lives and was quite frightened, I think, of the emotions that Clarissa’s death triggered in him. I don’t think he could live with himself if another human being—even one as despicable as Jackson—were put to death, even in part to console him. Townsend, do you have anything you want to add?”
From appearances, I wouldn’t have thought that Townsend was even listening, but he responded to the question. Sort of. “Clarissa’s gone. She’s not coming back.”
I had heard of similar cases, even stories of the families of murder victims going to bat to save the defendant. But I couldn’t begin to understand it. I wondered if they ever saw the videotape of that guy who killed all those nurses in Chicago. After his capital sentence was reversed by the Supreme Court, an investigative reporter caught him on camera in prison, taking drugs, talking up the joys of prison sex, and boasting to his fellow inmates about the ways his victims begged for mercy before he strangled them. The death penalty might not be a deterrent and might cost a hell of a lot more than a life sentence, but it meant that a victim’s parents never had to go to sleep at night wondering what their kid’s murderer was up to. Townsend was telling us to ignore the only factor that made me hedge on the death penalty—a survivor’s need for what’s lamely referred to as closure.
Duncan had launched into “the speech,” the one every prosecutor gets used to giving, the one where we promise to take into account the person’s feelings about the disposition of a case but explain that the ultimate decision needs to be on behalf of the entire citizenry. Roger cut him off.
“I’ve explained all that to Dr. Easterbrook already, Duncan.”
Griffith gave me a look across the table at the use of his first name. No one ever said my ex-husband lacked balls.
“Townsend, why don’t you wait for me in the lobby?” When the door was closed, Roger continued. “I’ve also explained to Townsend that you shouldn’t have a problem sticking with this as a noncapital case. You’re in a liberal county where most people feel the same way he does about the death penalty. In fact, according to our research, your office seeks the death penalty in only a third of your agg murder cases. Let me be blunt here; I’m not real impressed with what I’ve seen so far in your office.”
I shouldn’t have changed seats. Talking me down to my boss was bad enough. But doing it in front of my coworkers was definitely shin-kick-deserving behavior.
“Until we essentially served Jackson to them on a platter, the police were content to sit back and assume this was a textbook case of ‘the husband must have done it.’ I’m sure you have fine lawyers if given the appropriate resources, but I also know what can happen when people are overworked. Maybe to save resources, you go for the death penalty hoping to plead it out to a life sentence. Given how this case started, I would hope you would defer to Dr. Easterbrook’s wishes. If anyone has a right to dictate what happens to Melvin Jackson, he does. If I feel like you’ve continued to ignore him, I’ll follow up again with the media.”
When I was with him, I had actually been attracted to Roger’s confidence. I understood now why everyone else had called it arrogance, and I felt responsible that he was unleashing it on my office. I couldn’t stand another minute of it.
“Even for you, Roger, you are totally out of control.”
The table went silent. Roger looked smug, Duncan looked embarrassed, every one else looked shocked, and I couldn’t stop myself. “What kind of person can take Townsend Easterbrook’s pain and parlay it into billable hours and a chance for a few minutes in front of the cameras? Stop thinking about yourself for one minute and you’d realize that the screwup you keep rubbing in our faces had as much to do with the owners of the office park—who happen to be your clients—as with the police.”
“Samantha, you’re embarrassing yourself,” he said.
“No, she’s not.” It was Russ. “What’s embarrassing is your attempt to bully this office. You assume that because we’re prosecutors, we’re a bunch of bloodthirsty rednecks. As for the bureau’s delay homing in on Jackson, your client wasn’t exactly forthcoming. The cops had to get their information from the workers on the site, and—funny—they seemed to be under the impression that it was union work.”
Talking about the Glenville development project brought Mrs. Jackson’s words back to me.
“Who is your client anyway, Roger?” I asked.
“I told you,” he said. “Dr. Easterbrook came to us through OHSU.”
He knew exactly what I was talking about. “Who’s in charge of the construction in Glenville?”
“I wasn’t aware that the DA’s office had taken over the operations of the National Labor Relations Board. For what it’s worth, the nonunion work on the site was permissible.”
“So tell me who the client is. I want to know how they came to hire Melvin Jackson. From what I’ve heard of him, I’m not sure I’d want him to mow my backyard, let alone hire him on a major development project.”
But Roger was done talking to me. He stood up and offered Duncan his hand. “Duncan, unless you have any more questions, we’ll be on our way. Please let me know your decision once you’ve made it.”
Then I got a glimpse of how Duncan Griffith had earned his political reputation. When he took Roger’s hand, I could tell his grip was firm. “The decision was made before you interrupted me with the theatrics, son. We’ll be asking for life without parole. You might want to consider knocking the last twelve minutes off Dr. Easterbrook’s bill. Now, if it’s all right with you, I’ll walk you out so I can thank your client for coming in.”
We were still rehashing the events of the meeting when Duncan returned. “Anyone got a problem with that?”
No problems. “Very good then,” he said, knocking on the table as he walked out. “Oh, and by the way, Samantha, your ex-husband’s a major asshole.”
I don’t think Duncan realized he was dropping a bombshell. I hightailed it out of the room while my coworkers were still begging for the tawdry details of my short-lived marriage.
A few minutes later, Russ came into my office.
“I hope you didn’t mind me sticking up for you back there. I know you had everything under control, but, Jesus, what a prick.”
“And they say chivalry is dead,” I said.
“Yeah, well don’t let the word out. I’ve got a reputation to protect.”
“Don’t worry. One act of semidecency won’t make a dent,” I said, smiling. “So I was surprised Duncan made a decision. You think it was because of the racial politics or to appease the husband?”
“Christ, Kincaid, you’re almost as bad as your limousine-liberal ex. Duncan might have done it because he thought it was the right thing to do.”
I suppose with politicians it’s the decisions that count, not their reasons for making them.
“So how long were you guys married?” Russ asked.
I felt like I owed him at least the party line. “Not long. Things were all right for a few years in New York, but they fell apart when we moved to Portland.” Then I surprised myself by not stopping in the usual place. “We seemed to have a disagreement over the appropriate use of his penis.”
Russ almost spit out the coffee he had just sipped.
“Sorry,” I said sheepishly. “A little too much information?”
“No, just a—well, it was a funny way of putting it. You’re not one of those girls, are you?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I know I haven’t been any kind of girl since I was seventeen years old.”
“Excuse me, Gloria Steinem. You’re not one of those crazy women who always goes after the bad boy, are you? First it’s that guy, now it’s Forbes. You know something none of the other women around here know, or do you just like to flirt with disaster?”
“I’ve known Chuck Forbes since I was fifteen years old, and he’s nothing like Roger Kirkpatrick.”
The silence was not just uncomfortable. It made me wonder what everyone in the office must be thinking. And saying.
“Sorry,” he said, “it’s none of my business. You ready for the prelim tomorrow?”
I was grateful for the change of subject. “Piece of cake,” I said. “Was it just me, or did Roger seem reluctant to give us anything about the owner of the Glenville property?”
Russ shrugged his shoulders. “He’s probably no different from the rest of those private-firm fucks. Acts like the big man, but when push comes to shove he’s scared shitless of his clients. You don’t need it, but if you’re really curious, call one of the paralegals in the child-support enforcement unit. They’re pros at running down property-owner records.”
Maybe I would.
“If I don’t see you, good luck tomorrow,” he said. “Do you know who the judge is yet?”
“Prescott.”
“Got news for you, Kincaid. You could be looking at a long day.”
Kate Prescott is the slowest judge in the courthouse. A big fund-raiser for the Democratic Party, she came to the bench a year ago from a large corporate firm. She tries to make up for her lack of litigation experience by being thorough. I had a plea fall apart once in her courtroom when a transexual prostitute who’d been through the system a hundred times finally gave up on the process. In her words, “Honey, if I knew it was gonna take this long, I’d have asked for my trial. If I’m losing time on the street, it might as well be interesting.”
If Prescott didn’t move things along, Jackson’s prelim could be painful.
“Page me if you need anything,” Russ offered. “And, Kincaid, for what it’s worth, any guy who’d even think of stepping out on you is clearly out of his mind.”
Now that might ruin Russell Frist’s tough-guy reputation.
Roger’s show was not the only power play I’d have to contend with that day. As I was getting ready to leave, Duncan called. Before he got to the point, he had to dress me down for my outburst in the meeting.
“Don’t get me wrong,” he said, “it wasn’t what you said that was the problem. He deserved every word of it. But when I’m in the room, you’ve got to trust that I’ll handle it.”
“Does this mean I’m fired?”
“I’ll give you a Get Out of Jail Free card for that particular outburst. Your reward for being married to the jerk. But, seriously, over time I hope you’ll stop trying to carry the load all on your own.”
“I’m independent, sir.”
“Tell me about it. So don’t freak out that I’m calling to give you a heads-up. T. J. Caffrey just called. He’s rabid. Seems your defense attorney has subpoenaed him to the prelim.”
I couldn’t say I was surprised. Slip knew he stood little chance of getting the case kicked at a prelim. He was trying to give us a preview of the mess he’d create for us at trial. Fortunately, Duncan’s own trial experience wasn’t too far in the past for him to recognize it was inevitable too.
“I told him there was nothing I could do,” he said, “but his attorney wants a courtesy sit-down with you tomorrow morning. I told him you’d oblige.”
It gave me something to look forward to.