JT [02] Horns of the Devil

by Marc Rainer

  Trask nodded. “Mr. Ambassador.” He followed Navarrete up the hallway.

  Sivella was standing in the hall by the nurse’s station with Lynn. Both were beaming.

  “Nice work again,” Sivella said. “Think it’s time for that phone call yet?”

  “Yeah,” Trask said, reaching for his cell phone. “This won’t be pretty.”

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Saturday, September 16, 9:30 a.m.

  Ross Eastman, the United States Attorney for the District of Columbia, sat behind his desk staring at Trask. “I don’t know whether to fire you or pin a medal on you, Jeff. If you’d called me to let me know this was going to happen—”

  “Ross, we didn’t know what was going to happen,” Willie Sivella said. “We had it planned as a controlled arrest scenario. Moreno and his goons were the ones who refused to surrender.”

  “The press is going to claim it was a staged massacre and an ambush, Willie. You know that.” Eastman walked around to the front of his desk and leaned against it.

  He’s relaxing a little, Trask thought. I might get out of here alive.

  “And you know we can’t control what some of those freaks write,” Doroz chimed in. “They’re going to spin it the way they want to spin it, regardless of the truth.”

  “He’s right, Ross,” Bill Patrick said. “We can defend everything that’s been done here, and these guys were trying to protect you in case something went bad.”

  Eastman stared at Trask again. “You’ve got a lot of defenders here, Jeff. I want to hear from you.” He shot a look back at Patrick before returning his stare to Trask. “Convince me that this didn’t ‘go bad,’ as your current supervisor calls it.”

  Trask measured his words for a moment. “We found the bug in Barry’s office. We certainly suspected who was on the other end, but didn’t know for sure. The bug explained a lot, but left dozens of questions unanswered. Did we set a trap? Definitely. Did we know things could get hot out there? Of course, given the fact that we’ve had executions popping up all over town. I saw it as a chance both to answer some of those questions and to apprehend the killers. We controlled the situation with as many tactical boundaries as we could to protect the public. Moreno and company decided they didn’t want to be apprehended. In the final analysis, we had one good guy wounded, and we took down or apprehended all the perpetrators.”

  “That sounds like your response to the press, if you ask me, Ross,” Sivella said.

  “It’s a start, Willie, but I didn’t ask you,” Eastman said curtly. “The least Mr. Trask could have done is to have followed your suggestion to call me from the warehouse. We have a wounded ambassador and a dead State Department employee, for God’s sake. Do we have enough evidence to lock them down as being involved?”

  “Ross, if I had called you from the warehouse, you would have been in the same mood you’re in now, and rightly so,” Trask said. “You’d have probably jerked my remaining chain so short that I would not have been allowed to follow up at the hospital with Moreno. With his taped confession and other evidence in the case, we do have more than enough to answer any questions the press, or the AG, or State, or the White House may have, and we even have the backing of the Salvadoran government. It was also my goal, Ross, to keep you and my ‘current supervisor’ out of this until we could make it right.”

  “I assigned you to this case, Jeff, and I don’t need protecting from myself. And if this big walrus,” Eastmen gestured toward Patrick, “told you otherwise, he was wrong.” He took a long breath. “Thanks for your concern, anyway. Both of you. Bill, your job now is to convince some of those press hounds in our conference room that one of them could win a damned Pulitzer if they get this story right. If you figure out how to do that, let me know. It’ll help me answer the questions coming from upstream. We have ten minutes before the press conference that I had to call before I knew what the hell I was going to say.”

  12:20 pm.

  “What did Ross tell the press?” Lynn asked.

  “He basically quoted your husband’s answers to his own questions,” Doroz said, chewing a bite of his burger. “I think he calmed down. Everybody’s safe with Ross, including Jeff ’s ‘current supervisor.’”

  “Ross dressed down Bill Patrick?” she asked.

  “Just for a minute,” Trask said. “They go back a long way. I think he was just pissed at being kept out of the loop and wanted Bill to know that. Point taken. Anyway, we get to stay on the case of Esteban Ortega. No conflict there. I just have to hand off everything on Moreno to the Prince of Alexandria. The Department gave the case to G. Gary Gray from the Eastern District of Virginia. I’m briefing him after lunch.”

  “You’re shitting me,” Lynn said. “Isn’t that the guy who walked out on that terrorism case in Phoenix?”

  “Yep. The G unit charged a dozen defendants with financing terrorist activities, got a mistrial, and then left that appointment to get closer to Washington and the big money firms. He left his former office holding the bag, and they had to scramble to get ready for the re-trial. At least they won it. My spies in Alexandria think he lobbied for this one because it can be the feather in his cap that gets him a high-six-figure job on K Street with one of the big lobbying firms. He figures he can get the first death penalty in the District in the last century.”

  “You think he’s got a shot at that, Jeff?” Doroz asked.

  “There are plenty of bodies and statutory aggravating factors for the Department to certify the case as capital,” Trask said, “but in the final analysis, I doubt it. Odds are that Magistrate Noble will appoint J. T. Burns to represent Moreno. He won’t be able to stop a conviction—there’s too much evidence—but he’ll eat Gray alive on the sentencing phase. Moreno’s dead daughter is a powerful mitigating factor, and Burns will pull a high-dollar shrink in to say that the loss of his little girl snapped something in Moreno’s mind. This is a predominantly black town, and our jurors don’t think that capital punishment has ever been fairly applied. I’ll probably end up having to testify to get Moreno’s confession admitted.”

  “You did pretty well against Burns in the Reid case,” Lynn said. “You can handle him from the witness stand, too.”

  “I don’t think it’s going to matter,” Trask said. “Moreno will get convicted here, then he’ll get life. The wild card is what happens in Maryland after the first trial. If Gray doesn’t get a death verdict here, the Maryland guys get a shot at Moreno for the murders he committed there. Depending on the jury pool, a capital verdict there isn’t out of the question. Anyway, you guys need to give Gray all the help he needs, whether or not you think he deserves it. He’ll be a pain in the ass to work with, but the goal is convicting Moreno. Remember that.”

  “Not a problem,” Doroz said. “You’ve just spoiled us a little. At least we can still work on Ortega. What’s the next move there?”

  “Finding him,” Trask said. “Hopefully our friend Santos can get a lead on that. It’s my guess that Ortega’s got his head down somewhere in Fairfax County on the Virginia side. That’s where that heaviest concentration of MS-13 types live around DC. Santos’ attorney is supposed to get back with me on that.” He looked at Doroz. “How’s Puddin’?”

  “He’s gone, left his credentials on my desk with a letter of resignation. He had some leave on the books, so I signed him out in case he changes his mind. I just don’t expect him to.”

  Trask nodded, looking at Lynn. “If you were gone—”

  “Don’t say that, Jeff,” she said. “This is who you are. You’re needed here.”

  “Still, that had to be a hell of a blow,” Trask said. “If you were gone, I’m not sure who I’d be anymore.”

  3:00 p.m.

  “I fully expect to get a capital verdict in this case, given the evidence,” Gray said as he looked around the squad conference room. Trask’s incident summaries were still pinned to the wall.

  “Good luck with that,” Trask said. “Burns is no pushover.
”

  “I hear you did well against him in the Reid case.” Gray was still looking at the wall.

  Trask sized him up. Gray was a tall, blond guy who could have had a career as a male model, and had probably been told that by anyone who could hold his attention long enough to pry him away from a mirror.

  “We got lucky and found a smoking gun. Even with that, I’m not sure the jury would have given Reid the juice,” Trask said. If you don’t get your verdict, you’ll find someone else to blame. It certainly won’t be your fault, will it?

  “I’m certain I can have the same success that you did, Jeff. I was first in my class at UVA law, was editor of the Law Review, and I’ve had over thirty trials now. How many have you had?”

  “I stopped counting at three-hundred,” Trask said. He saw the jolt in Gray’s demeanor. It lasted only a second.

  “Impressive. How did you come by all that experience?”

  “About 275 courts-martial. I had the whole Southeast. Twenty-five bases. On the road for five years, trial to trial.”

  “Oh, so those were military trials.”

  Trask didn’t react. He had expected the comment. “We used the Federal Rules of Evidence, with some small modifications. They were real trials, with judges, juries, and everything. And since you were wondering, I attended Ole Miss Law. Not Law Review though. I decided to get more trial training so I went to the Moot Court Board. They had a higher GPA than the Law Review while I was there. You have everything you need now?”

  “Yes, I think so. Thanks for the update.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  April 4, 1:30 p.m.

  It was time. And the time had arrived much sooner than Trask had expected. The Department had certified the case for a capital sentencing hearing if a conviction was returned on the homicides. That had not been a surprise. What had surprised him was the speed with which the trial date had approached. Burns was his usual crafty self and had pushed the case forward, asserting Moreno’s right to a speedy trial instead of asking for the usual barrage of delays.

  The old fox knows that the government’s case actually gets better with additional time to prepare; it’s just a myth that a delay always benefits the defense.

  Trask paced back and forth in the witness room. At least Gray was doing one thing correctly, saving the confession—the coffin nail—for the close of the case. That’s why Trask was testifying last. Gray had used Lynn to testify about the attacks on them in their home, saving Trask to describe the events at the hospital after Moreno’s arrest.

  Start strong, finish strong, and bury any weaknesses in the middle…trial advocacy 101. The jury’ll convict him of the homicides, and the judge will then surprise them by telling them that they now have to consider the death penalty or life without release. A bifurcated, or two-part trial. Guilt phase followed by sentencing phase. That’s where the challenge will be for you, Gray old man.

  Trask wasn’t really nervous. He’d been a witness in a couple of other cases, courts-martial to be precise. He’d also prepared hundreds of witnesses for trial before and had mentally split his own personality in order to coach himself while getting ready for this moment. But it’s J. T. Burns. I know I could handle him if I were trying the case, but Gray’s sitting in that chair, not me.

  He’d forced himself to separate as much as possible from the task force, leaving them to the tender mercies of G. Gary Gray for the past couple of months. He’d had to do it. It was Gray’s case, and if he was to have any chance of prosecuting it successfully, Gray would have to be comfortable with it, massage it, mold it into something he knew. Trask’s continued presence would have been too much of a distraction.

  He had, nevertheless, been given a nightly update by Lynn regarding Gray’s management ability and techniques, usually laced with language that would make a veteran sailor retreat. Trask was somewhat surprised that Gray had survived to see the beginning of the trial. He was convinced that several of the investigators on the task force had been considering the commission of their own perfect crime.

  Since Trask was a fact witness in the case, he had been prohibited from watching any of the trial. He had been getting summaries from Barry Doroz, who had been allowed to remain at counsel table with Gray as the government’s case agent. He had been told several times by Bear that he could have done a better job, but that the proof was going in with few problems. Trask remembered the Reid case. Burns is no “springbutt” as Lassiter had called them. He won’t be attacking every little thing just because he can. And if he isn’t attacking anything yet, he’s saving his ammo for what he thinks he can attack successfully. That target might be painted on me.

  The knock on the door startled him, even though he’d expected it. Tim Wisnewski had been acting as the witness manager for the trial team.

  “They’re ready for you, sluggo. Go get ’em.”

  “Yeah. Thanks, coach,” Trask said as he grabbed his suit coat and buttoned it. “If I’m not out in an hour, call the police or something.”

  The huge oak doors leading into the courtroom of United States District Judge Waymon Dean closed behind him. Trask walked down the aisle separating the two sides of the peanut gallery, the section of the courtroom reserved for spectators and the press. It was full. A sound feed had actually been provided into a second, empty courtroom so the overflow who had not been admitted to the day’s proceedings could hear the trial in progress. It was audio only. Cameras weren’t allowed in federal court. Trask pushed through the low, swinging double doors into the well of the courtroom, raised his hand and took the oath, then climbed the four steps to the chair in the witness stand.

  Gray smiled at him from the podium in the center of the courtroom.

  “Please state your name and your place of employment.”

  “Jeffrey Trask. I’m an Assistant United States Attorney for the District of Columbia.”

  Gray, to his credit, let Trask tell the story of Moreno’s confession with few interruptions, only breaking up the narrative with questions as required by the Federal Rules of Evidence. Narratives weren’t actually supposed to happen; lawyers were supposed to ask questions, and witnesses were supposed to answer them. Another legal fiction.

  Trask noticed that Burns appeared to be bored with the whole tale. Moreno, seated beside Burns at the defense table, had been well coached. The malevolent stare from the hospital room was disguised for the court proceedings. Only once or twice did the defendant’s single, functioning eye look up at Trask, and then it quickly retreated to the papers on the table.

  There was a fifteen-minute break following the direct examination. Trask headed for the men’s room for a final pit stop before cross. Burns was there when he entered.

  “Hello, Jeff.”

  “J. T.”

  “New role for you?”

  “I’ve done it before, actually.”

  “Good. This should be fun, then. See you shortly.”

  Yes, you will. I just wish you weren’t so confident about it. What do you have cooking in that head of yours?

  Trask walked back to the witness room and found the half-full can of Diet Coke he’d left there. Wisniewski was reading a newspaper.

  “How’d direct go?”

  “Not bad. Got the story told.”

  “Ready for cross?”

  “I have no idea. I’m ready for what the cross should be, but it’s Burns, so who knows.”

  “You’ll be fine. No sweat.”

  Yeah. Trask walked back toward the courtroom. That’s what my boxing coach at the Academy told me before I got in the ring with the golden gloves champ of California. He just forgot to tell me who my opponent was.

  The jury filed back in. Judge Dean gave them his grandfatherly smile, then nodded toward Burns.

  “Cross-examination. Mr. Trask, you are reminded you are still under oath.”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  Burns took the long way to the podium, walking behind his client to the far end of the defense ta
ble and around that. This gave him the chance to give Moreno a reassuring pat on the back en route.

  A little theatre, J. T.?

  “Good afternoon, Mr. Trask.”

  “Mr. Burns.”

  “We’ve met, haven’t we?”

  Trask couldn’t resist smiling in response to the question. “Yes, sir, I’d say that was an understatement.”

  There were chuckles from the jury box.

  Good. Trask smiled back at them. A point for me. At least I didn’t get shut out.

  Burns was smiling back at Trask. “Some very high-profile cases, wouldn’t you say?”

  “I think that’s a fair assessment.” Where are you going with this, J. T.?

  “Why do you think we keep meeting like this?”

  What? Why aren’t you objecting to that one, Gray? Trask saw that the prosecutor was writing notes on a tablet. Wonderful. Clueless and emphasizing all this for the jury. If you’re writing, they think it must be important.

  “I’m sorry, Mr. Burns, what was your question?” Maybe if I get him to repeat it, Gray, you’ll hear it the second time.

  “I was asking, Mr. Trask, why you and I keep meeting in these important cases?”

  Still no objection, although completely irrelevant, so I have to answer it. “I can only assume, that it is because the court feels confident in appointing you to represent defendants in challenging matters.” How’s that, J. T.? “Challenging” means when your client is guilty is hell.

  Burns shot him a wry look and smiled. “Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Trask. I hope that you are correct, and may I suggest that your own abilities are why your office appoints you to cases of considerable magnitude as well?”