Mr. Sandhu looks around with concern, as if he’s the one on trial or the one about to be beaten.
Judge Nguyen joins the charade by punching his own cheek and taking the blow. “Beaten, Mr. Sandhu. Have you ever witnessed anyone being beaten?”
“Beating?”
“Yes, Mr. Sandhu.”
“In India?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Of course I get beatings in Punjab. Many beatings of all kinds. That is why I come here to America. Here, right here.”
“Well, you’re not here anymore, Mr. Sandhu,” says my attorney, nodding with what I believe to be fake concern. “Thank you for your time. Not interested, Your Honor.”
Judge Nguyen says, “You’re dismissed, Mr. Sandhu.”
My attorney sits, even as the judge is issuing an evil eye our way, writes: That’s right. I do.
So you’re the problem.
You’re missing one half of the equation.
I nod at the other side of the aisle. Fuck them, too.
Precisely.
No. Fuck them. And fuck you.
Fuck you back.
Do they prosecute people they know are innocent?
How the hell would I know?
Why the hell would you take a case if they only prosecuted the guilty?
You’re gonna have to come with something bigger than that.
All right.
I stand up, the pen in my hand. “Your Honor, I don’t want this crook representing me.”
The judge doesn’t even look my way. Doesn’t swing his seat in my direction. This sends me into a euphoric state which translates in real time into reckless, but absolutely liberating free speech. “I am under no obligation, Your Honor, constitutionally or morally, to accept representation from someone so thoroughly incompetent. My liberty is in jeopardy, sir, and putting it in the hands of an attorney, frankly, means entrusting my life to a precocious used-car salesman. I would rather lie, swindle, misrepresent, hyperbolize, and smooth-talk on my own behalf, Your Honor.”
Again, the judge is calm, unrattled. The man could at least blink but he won’t afford me eye contact, extending my status of persona non grata. Even the leatherhead stenographer has stopped typing and won’t look at me. So I have said nothing. Officially. Somehow this cat knows that not acknowledging my statement is infinitely worse on my insides than holding me in contempt.
“Mr. Choi,” he says, not even asking me to sit down, “in what capacity are you with us today?”
I feel two fingers loop inside my belt line, hear the whispered words, “Trust me,” as I’m pulled downward into my seat, the counselor in question rising to his feet, smiling.
“Your Honor,” he begins, “might I apologize for the outburst of my client? He has been under an inordinate amount of stress with the recent death of his Aunt ... Liluokalani, with whom he’d resided for a decade and a half. He was Aunt ... Lily’s personal caretaker to the very last minute.”
“Mr. Choi,” says the judge, “your client’s misfortune is of no relevance in this courtroom. In fact, as evidence by the testimony you no doubt heard today from our potential jurors, we are all under stress, sir. And I am sure your training and experience have educated you on the concept of legal pertinence.”
“Yes, Your Honor, certainly.”
“Okay, Mr. Choi. Then I am also sure you will not mind if this court holds you personally responsible for any future outbursts your client should have on behalf of Aunt Lily.”
“Not at all, Your Honor.”
“Very good.”
I write on my pad for the insane: Just when I think I’m out, they pull me back in.
He writes back: Trust me for once.
Do I have a choice?
He begins to write, but I take back the pen and leap blindly into the litigational future: Go ahead, man. My life is yours. I look over at the potential twelve, whisper into his ear: “Those mutherfuckers are going to hang me.”
He glances over at the box, nods at a random potential jury member, opens up his briefcase, pulls out a brand new yellow tablet, and scribbles: Again: write it with a straight face.
I take the pen, draw an arrow halfway across the page, Those muther-fuckers to your immediate right are gonna hang me with straight faces.
Impossible.
Don’t flatter yourself, counselor.
Hangings were outlawed in this state over thirty years ago. You’d get an injection of strychnine or the chair.
Comforting. Going out with a freewill of choice of poison. Real democracy at work.
How many strikes do you have, Robert Frost?
One.
2+3 x 2+2
What the hell is that?
The time you’ll get if convicted.
What’s the first 2?
Enhancement for a prison term prior.
The 3?
Sentence for the assault.
Second 2?
Second strike enhancement.
Last 2?
Hate-crime enhancement.
Enhance these nuts.
That’s what better happen if you go up for ten, Emily Dickinson.
Can you get us out of here for a bit? Maybe we should talk?
Yep and yep. We’ll have lunch.
“And it’s on me,” he says, standing and nodding at the judge.
28
I Know This Whole Thing Sickens You
“I know this whole thing sickens you,” my attorney says.
I sip my Coke, look out the cafeteria window, and watch the jurors, litigants, defendants comingle as if they’re all friends out here in real life, returned from the virtual reality of a courtroom. “It just reaffirms the way the world works, man.”
“Let’s talk about the law.”
“Tablets of stone on Sinai?”
“Code of Hammurabi.”
“Fourteen stations of crucifixion rock?”
“Magna Carta and the rights of man.”
He’s good, fast, rightly vocationed. I say, “What a sham this thing is.”
“A snow job?”
“A dyslexic jow blob. We nolo contendere the show, Your Honor, yo no contesto por que yo no understand what jou want from me, man.
He laughs and I smile and this exchange makes the Samoan lady from the jury pool raise her eyebrows suspiciously. She’s at the table next to us: two sandwiches, two bags of chips, no guests at her table.
“The law says we’re not supposed to be near any jury members.”
“Don’t worry about it,” he says. “Happens all the time. Look, you can tune out in the courtroom, okay? That’s why I came today.”
“To allow my mind to wander?”
“To give you a break. Don’t worry about anything in there. I’ve got something that’s gonna shut the case down, so you can rest a little, all right?”
I look up and he nods firmly. It’s kind of him, an affirmation of a different sort. “Why you doing this, man?”
“Look, I can’t say I felt bad for you in there because you’ll take it as pity. I can’t say that it was wrong what happened to you because I work for the system that made it wrong. Let’s just say I felt a little guilty for fronting you off back at the Fairmont.”
The Samoan lady has somehow moved closer to us, is sitting now right behind us, spying on our conversation. My attorney reads my mind. “I’m telling you. Don’t worry, okay?”
“So what are we gonna do for the next fifteen minutes: share stories about the bar exam?”
“We could talk about your second strike.”
“This thing’s a joke and you know it.”
“Well, then, let’s get Lincoln-Douglas on one another. Old times sake.”
“Bring it, Dishonest Abe.”
“So what’s the beef?”
“We’ll keep it on topic. Argue: The three-strikes law is not a sham“.
He knocks on the tabletop, closes his eyes, opens them, and says, “California’s three-strikes proposition was put on the b
allot in the mid-nineties and voted into law by the good people of this state. Landslide figures, my friend. There’s a reason for this: The law is sound. Premised upon the idea that society cannot allow a violent felon to repeat a crime, or one of equal or greater value, more than three times, despite his background, his economic circumstances, his genetic predilection, or our pervasive and good-hearted belief in rehabilitation. In this pragmatic state, there is a statute of limitations when it comes to our faith in the corrective capacity of lawbreakers. We aren’t magicians, but we aren’t stupid either. Your floor.”
“Pretty impressive,” I say.
“We’ll see.”
“I’m used to standing.”
“I’m used to DAs. Can’t have it your own way all the time.”
“I feel you.”
“Stop stalling.”
I smile, say, “Been some time, man.”
“You’ll be okay,” he says, and raps on the tabletop for me.
“Well, here goes,” I say. “In the mid-nineties, we purchased a good sold by the Wilson administration. They told us it would apply to the irredeemable worst: repeat murderers, rapists, et cetera. We good sheep of California, given to the romantic notion that the law, once erected, is unshakable, did not appreciate that the law, like a reef, is a living organism in a constant state of flux. It moves by case precedence, which is to say it moves by stories, officialized into existence by the cracking echo of the gavel. The three-strikes law, with thirteen years of momentum, has now grown to include that most heinous of felon, the petty thief, the most demonic of maniacs, the piss-test flunker, the parole violator, the reefer addict, the domestic disputer, perhaps one night it’ll even snag a wicked jaywalker. By now, fewer than half of “violent” third-strike lifers are even violent the last time round. Shear not this sheep, ‘cause I smell a sham. I hear, Madam Justice, a tedious argument of insidious intent. Your floor.”
He knocks fast, too fast. I’m a little worried, already thinking ahead to my next platform. “Make no mistake about it. The law has been successful. Overwhelmingly. Crime rates have dropped since inception, this despite a tremendous population boom occurring over that same period. That is against the law of averages. Virtually ahistorical. If people out there are afraid of the three-strikes law, it’s the right people who are afraid. Your floor.”
The Samoan lady is now turned in her seat, watching us.
I tap on the tabletop with one finger, looking her in the eye until she looks down, and then proceed. “We’ve made American history, all right: we incarcerate the most people in the world. Now that’s a statistic to be proud about. Of course, this is done by economic design. AT&T has a multimillion-dollar contract with the California Department of Corrections. The correctional officers’ union is the strongest in the state; the Austrian bodybuilder in Sacrameento bows in deference to their will. Their salaries rival or eclipse street cops, firemen, and of course lowly teachers. Our new saviors of society are now legally state police. Can carry guns on the street. I am afraid. We all should be. Of them. Your floor.”
He spins in the seat. The Samoan lady is nodding her head, chewing her sandwich, like, Wow. He’s a good talker. What kind of criminal is this?
My attorney says as much without turning to her. “Aces, isn’t he?”
“Stop stalling,” I say.
Then he inhales, nods, says, “The common complaint against the current state of the penal system is that our recent prison growth speaks to a nefarious campaign of revitalizing a stagnant economy. Crossing into the golden state, a visitor might wonder why the greater majority of these facilities congregate in the central valley. I’ll answer a question with a question: What, precisely, is nefarious about employing over forty thousand people, the greater majority of whom have families, in a region that was otherwise unilaterally agrarian and thus seasonally infertile? You turn the badness of criminality into the goodness of jobs. Sounds like socially responsible capitalism to me. A true rarity, we all realize, which makes my case all the stronger. Your floor.”
The Samoan lady’s clicking with her tongue, squinting approval at the way we’re throwing around ideas. Suddenly I come from a good family.
She’s on the second sandwich, awaiting my response.
I knock three times, close my eyes, say, “The question for the three of us to consider is rather one of comparative absurdity.” I open my eyes. “In punitive terms. Any American of any political persuasion would denounce the Indonesian practice of chopping off the fingers of thieves, agreed?” Here I pause. The Samoan lady thinks about it, shivers, nods. My opponent doesn’t, but I didn’t expect him to. “In fact, in this modern world it is considered nothing short of absurd. Why is it, then, that a thief we incarcerate for life would offer up not only a finger but an entire arm as a bonus limb in exchange for a removal, or even a reduction, of his sentence? Wouldn’t he, by the law of what is civilized, prefer the punishment that we, the civilized, render? The answer, of course, is of course not. And the reason for this is that it’s more absurd—more draconian, I should say—to strike someone out for petty theft than to chop off that person’s finger. What more need be said? When limbs are offered as punitive recompense, you’ve reached immoral critical mass. Your floor.”
He looks at me, smiling. Nods, says, “Not bad, Mr. Lincoln.”
I smile back, nod back.
“Let’s go,” he says, smiling at the Samoan lady. She now likes me, will maybe even throw up a not guilty vote. “I’m gonna get Nguyen in chambers before we start up again. Bet I can get him to make it a half day.”
“And the case?”
“Jesus. Faithless. I told you: Don’t worry”
We get back to the courtroom, take our seats beneath the looming eyes of the jurors, and rise at the order, “All rise!” when Judge Nguyen reemerges from his courtroom office. As he’s regally adjusting into his seat, my attorney says, “Would it trouble the court for a sidebar, Your Honor?”
The judge looks over at Mr. Weil, who’s fumbling with his electrical equipment, and says, “Is this necessary, Mr. Choi?”
“I’d say so. Could save us a lot of time, Judge.”
Still looking at the pyrotechnics of the prosecutor, Judge Nguyen says, “Any objections, Mr. Weil?”
“No,” says Mr. Weil, his glasses falling to the tip of his nose. His sound system lets out a screeching whine. Everyone in the courtroom, including the judge, winces. I smile, squinting. The bailiff walks over, his keys rattling, and yanks at something under the table. The speakers pop and we have silence. The bailiff comes up with a plug which he stuffs into Mr. Weil’s hand.
The DA mumbles, “Sorry, Your Honor.”
“All right, all right,” says the judge. “Is it off now?” I think I hear a “dammit” under the judge’s breath.
“Yes, Your Honor,” says the bailiff, shaking his head.
Visibly concentrating, Mr. Weil says with as much bass as he can summon, “I’m sorry, Your Honor.”
The judge looks down at his watch and says, “Okay. Is it off, counselor?”
“Yes, Your Honor,” Mr. Weil whispers.
“What we are going to do is end the day right here. We’ll have everything in order by tomorrow. Each of us, myself included, is expected back here promptly at nine in the morning. You may check in at the office of the clerk where you will receive your instructions for the day.”
“All stand!”
Again we stand accordingly and watch Judge Barret Nguyen slip slowly off his seat into a standing position. He pays no attention to anyone or anything in his courtroom, and as I wonder if he’s ever tripped on his gargantuan robe, I think, A graceful exit gives the final stamp of authority to the story.
When His Honor is through the door and back in chambers, the multinational jury disperses. Mr. Weil passes me head down and farthest from the table as if I—or, rather, we—were toxic. My attorney says, “Here’s where the game ends for you, John, twenty thousand dollars of a turntable to boot.
”
Mr. Weil doesn’t respond, and I say, “I actually feel sorry for that guy.”
“I don’t,” says my attorney.
“So what’s up now, man?”
“Now it’s over. You may as well leave. And don’t come back.”
“How?”
“He’s got no victim, no witnesses. Unless the case is moved down to Chiapas.”
“They got deported?”
“Deported. Arrested. Hiding. Benefit of a brouhaha with illegals.”
“And what about the girl?”
“Athena Taj McMenamin of Monte Sereno, California?”
I nod. “That would be her.”
“You sure?”
“Who could forget Athena?”
“I thought she was Catwoman from the Blue Noodle Cabaret Club.”
“Nah,” I say.
“Oh, yeah. May not have been of age either. Turn of the century. Will be happy to look into it. Athena’s at Mardi Gras in New Orleans right now. Probably see her on a Girls Gone Wild video by the end of the month. I’m sure her big cause isn’t bigger than her reputation, to which I wouldn’t mind putting a question or two.”
“You don’t fuck around, do you?”
“If Weil wants to go to bat against me, I’m gonna k him in three pitches. Then I’m gonna beam him on the way back to the dugout. He isn’t one tenth the attorney I am. I’ve got so many ears in his outfit I can’t keep track. That’s why you could’ve never been a lawyer, my friend. You’d try to be the next Atticus Finch: the loner, free of the filthy sleuth of his peers. That’s only in made-up books, Paul. You’d quit before your first case.”
“Probably.”
“Definitely. This is a chess game where swindling is necessary.”
“That’s what I was saying earlier.”
“I know you were.”
“Well,” I say, “we made a nice team for a minute, anyway.”
He nods, zips up his bag, says, “I’m off to meet my maker. Debate you later.”
I suddenly feel warmth toward the cat. As if he’s a little brother on my heel. Trying for something, anything, I say, “I guess I’ll stick around till you get out, Dong-hoo.”
“Suit yourself.”
The courtroom’s now cleared out and it’s just the bailiff and me for half a minute and then, with a nod that says, Don’t fuck around in my absence, lowlife, the bailiff bounces too, grumbling something into the radio pressed to his ear. It’s my trial, it’s my ass, but I’m not privy to the hand jive that’s going on right now “behind chambers,” so I put my face into my elbow instead and slobber into a dream about the proverbial ideal woman who has never existed, and never will exist, but who is eternal and worth dying for nonetheless, and before anything gets steamy between us, I hear the harsh words of coitus interruptus: “You’re dismissed, Mr. Tusifale!”
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