by Alex Abella
When the litany of gore ended, Reynolds turned to Ramón and, with what little sangfroid he had, attempted-and failed-to ask him neutrally, "Cross, Mr. Valdez?"
Ramón took off his glasses and rubbed his temples, as though still reeling from all the unaccustomed blood, saying, by his actions, that he too was in shock, that he could not believe the abomination that had just been shown.
"No questions," he replied, and shook his head.
Reynolds gave a snort of contempt. "Mr. Smith?"
Clay looked up, tapped his finger on his notepad.
"Just a couple of questions. Doctor, you say that victim number two, the security guard, died when the bullet entered the left side of the chest and came out through the back, piercing the sac of the heart and clipping the aorta. Is that correct?"
"That is correct, yes."
"Why was that?"
"It is very simple. The bullet first caused an internal hemorrhage, since the blood is no longer being carried through the aorta. Then, of course, the heart itself is wounded, so it rapidly ceased to function."
"You say just one bullet did this, even though he received two other bullets?"
"Yes. It was bullet number three, the last one, that did the deadly deed."
"I see. You say he also had a gun in his hand when he died?"
"That was the information I received from the police report and from my observation of the pictures taken at the scene by our people, yes."
"Did you conduct a gunshot residue test on the guard's fingers to determine whether he had fired the gun?"
The doctor shifted uncomfortably in his seat, adjusting the microphone so that now the sound came out squeaking through the speakers with a ghostly feedback: "We did the best we could."
The feedback rose to an unbearable screech. The bailiff stood up and readjusted the mike. Clay pressed on.
"What do you mean when you say 'We did the best we could'?"
"You see, under ordinary circumstances a gunshot residue test is ordered by the investigator at the scene. It is one of the many routine items that are carried out. For some unfathomable-"
"Excuse me, what was that?" asked the court reporter.
"Unfathomable, as in unexplainable, unaccountable, beyond understanding."
"Why is that, doctor?" Clay said.
"The investigator on the scene did not ask for such a test. It wasn't until the bodies were taken to the morgue, as I reviewed the paperwork, that I determined the test had not been conducted out in the field. I hurriedly ordered my assistant to sever the hands of the victim and carry out the test. I'm afraid it was too late."
"Meaning?"
"The results were inconclusive. We cannot tell if he actually fired the gun or not."
The investigator, Detective Samuels, engaged in a heated whispered exchange with Phyllis, who then shook her head in desperation and looked away from him at the judge. Even then Samuels continued pouring out his story until she finally put up her hand to stop him.
"No more questions," said Clay.
"Redirect?" asked Reynolds, looking at Chin.
"No questions."
"Thank you, Doctor. You are excused."
I turned to Ramón, who checked off an item on his list. True, it was a minor victory. Going through the reports we had noticed that the guard's gun had been inadvertently destroyed by the police before tests were conducted, which meant that no one would ever know if he fired at Ramón first. That could serve as a half-measured argument for self-defense, since Ramón could conceivably claim he had no intention of shooting to kill. The remarkable aspect of it was that Ramón had not even had to raise the issue, that Clay had done it for him, almost as though they were coordinating their defense strategies. But there were two other bullets fired at the man and in any case, the guard was only one victim. Ramón was a long ways from gaining any solid advantage.
The buzzing was incessant, like the sound a cheap radio alarm makes after you muffle it with your pillow. Then it died. Through the walls fragments of conversations seeped from the courtroom next door. The murmur of downtown traffic, the occasional toot of a pesky car horn, punctuated the uneasy calm of the empty jury room.
I took out a copy of La Opinión, the Spanish-language newspaper founded in 1926 by a Mexican immigrant which today boasts the largest circulation of its kind in the U.S. Ads for lawyers and legal assistance of every kind crowded the meager columns of print in the paper. The attorneys promised all kinds of satisfaction for job- related grievances, whether from accidents, nervous exhaustion, insults, aggravation or overwork, from whatever ailment the readers might suffer. In all colors and sizes the attorneys sprayed their pictures throughout the paper, changing their first names into the Spanish equivalent, hoping to reap more clients from the poor and dispossessed-at the rate of seventy to two hundred dollars an hour, naturalmente.
"There is no justice," I said as Clay and Phyllis entered the jury room.
"What's that, Charlie?" said Clay. "Of course there is. If you pay for it."
He plopped down on a swivel chair and rolled up the sleeves of his custom made jacket.
"Hello, Charles," said Phyllis, laying her leather portfolio on the table. I pulled out a chair for her, but she refused.
"I should tell you this is not my idea. I'm opposed to any deal whatsoever."
"Don't tell me," I said, pointing at Clay. "I thought you two had already come to terms. I'm just here for discovery and compliance."
"Well, Charles, if you don't mind, I'd like to wrap this up first. You ought to know the terms as well."
"Now that you mention it, I would. Some people are not very reliable sources."
Clay reeled back in mock surprise.
"Well, Mr. Pellegrini has made his decision. Clay, he's offering your client second-degree homicide if he agrees to testify against Valdez."
"What?" Clay was genuinely surprised. "Hold on a minute. Our deal was second-degree manslaughter, that's six to eight, not homicide. That's twenty. Something got lost in this translation."
"No, I'm sorry, that's not what I said."
"Yes, it is, Phyllis. Don't play this game with me. Look, I'll put it to you straight. Connors, Pellegrini's man, he told me himself you have the authority to pull this off. My client wants to do it.
We had a deal. You can't back out of it like this."
"Clay, the crime is heinous."
"So's any murder! All killings are heinous. The point is, without my guy there's no frigging way you can make this case airtight and you know it. The LAPD did not take any fingerprints off the weapons and you know they botched up the investigation. Their usual shit job. No one was there to actually see the murders. There's always a chance some crazy juror will say she can't believe anyone, and then where are you? Look, make it second-degree manslaughter and we'll pin the tail on that Cuban ass."
Phyllis turned around, walked to the window and looked through the grimy glass at the gargoyles of the old Hall of Justice. Clay nervously lit a cigarette, then glanced at me with an apologetic shrug.
Phyllis turned around. "OK, you've got a deal. Charlie is the witness."
"Great! Let me go tell my guy. I'll call you this afternoon to set up a preliminary meeting."
Clay stood, shook her hand. "You won't regret this." He rushed out, leaving behind him a trail of Calvin Klein's Infinity.
"If you don't mind, Charlie, let's go over the discovery this afternoon. I should tell Pellegrini the deal is done."
"Chico, it's the best thing that could have happened to us. Who's gonna believe him?" said Ramón, ecstatic.
"About twelve jurors."
"You mean you don't think I'm credible?"
"I'm saying you haven't done anything to make them take our side. I'm saying, unless you get up there and testify, I'll be visiting you at the big Q. And if you do testify, I'll still be seeing you there. I mean, you don't look like the repenting kind of guy. You look calm and in control and he looks stupid and subservient. It's easy t
o believe that you were calling the shots. That you were firing the shots."
"Well, that's the way it is."
"It may well be the way it is but that's not going to help you any when he makes you."
"You know, you should have been a padre. Everything is black and white for you. Everything is always gloomy and doomed. I'll bet you're the kind who hates a sunny day because it might rain in the afternoon."
"Look, if my negativity is getting to you, I'll sign off, OK?"
Ramón shook his head in bemusement. At times like that, he pulled some kind of inner chain and the light of kindness shone through his features; he became less monstrous, less like a haunting nightmare of duty and death and more like the loudmouth who lives for rum, women and gambling. A regular kind of Cuban.
"That's just the way I am," I said. "What do you want? You want to hear something? When I turned eight years old our criada, our servant, made a big whoop-de-do and carried me on her shoulders and kissed me and hugged me because I was eight. Then she looked at me and said, 'What's the matter with you, you look so sad.' You want to know what I was thinking? I was thinking, Great,
I'm eight years closer to death. What do you think of that?"
Ramón leaned in close to me, his face practically touching mine over the low glass divider. "Let me tell you something. Don't be afraid of death. It's the most beautiful thing on earth. Nothing can compare."
16
t he jurors filed into the jury box with their usual sleepy-eyed morning looks. But they began to whisper when they saw Ramón and myself sitting alone at the counsel table.
Judge Reynolds dashed into the courtroom. "Good morning, ladies and gentlemen," he said, buttoning his robe.
"Good morning," roared back the jury like a well-behaved class of fourth graders.
"Hope y'all had a nice weekend. Now, some of you may have looked over there at counsel table and noticed one of our defendants is missing. That would be Mr .... " Here the judge made a brief show of looking up the name in his papers, as though it could conceivably have slipped his mind. "Mr. Pimienta. Well, what we can say is that his case has been handled without your assistance. You are not to consider that in your determination of Mr. Valdez' innocence or guilt as regards the charges."
"Your Honor, may we approach?" asked Phyllis. "Without the reporter."
I glanced at Ramón and he nodded. I crossed the well in front of the judge's bench and joined the huddle by the clerk. The crowd of spectators had thinned out, with only half the seats taken. But the rows reserved for the media were still full.
"Judge, we will be calling Mr. Pimienta as a witness for the People so perhaps the court could consider some kind of statement to that effect."
"Mr. Morell?" asked Reynolds.
"Your Honor, I'm just here as a mouthpiece. However, were I representing someone, I would say it probably would be best to wait until the prosecution actually called that witness and then let the jury draw whatever conclusions it chooses. After all, a lot of things could happen between now and then."
"Well, Charlie," snorted Reynolds, "short of another quake, I just don't see what else could occur but your point is well taken. Sorry, Phyllis, I'm not going to tout your coming attractions. You can do that yourself pretty well, I know."
Phyllis muttered the time-honored reply of counsel, no matter what the instant decision. "Thank you, Your Honor."
Back at the counsel table Ramón leaned over.
"I hear the judge is banging one of the clerks."
"That's not going help you any."
"It might put him in a better mood. Looks like you could use some too, mano. When was the last time you got laid?"
"I get fucked every day."
"The People call Remigio Flores."
Detective Samuels shot a glance at his two cohorts in the back. They nodded, stepped out of the courtroom and returned with the parking attendant.
Remigio had put on a lot of weight since our interview at the park, when he had attempted to run away from· Detective Moat. The LAPD had probably canceled his soccer playing, thinking the next time he ran for it they might not catch him. Moat now had a partner, another imposing blond specimen of surferhood, so that little Remigio seemed like a paunchy, undergrown little devil being brought to the altar of justice in some faded nineteenth-century
print.
Remigio's eyes darted nervously around the courtroom, taking in the expectant curious faces of the jurors, the judge, the audience and gave an audible "ah" when he saw me and Ramón. His right hand shook as he took the oath.
"You were right," said Ramón. "I can see the tattoo."
"Yeah, it looks like he tried to rub it out," I said. "Look at the discoloring in the skin around it."
"Please state your name, spelling the last name for the record," said Curtis.
Remigio eventually informed the court that he was twenty-three years old, a native of Guatemala and a resident of Los Angeles for the last three years. Yes, he had been the parking attendant the morning that Mr. Valdez, the defendant in the gray suit and red tie, had driven in with another man, both dressed all in white and smelling of 4711 cologne.
"Did you see the defendants enter the store?" asked Phyllis.
"Yes, I did."
"Could you see inside the store while they were in there?"
"Yes. One of the walls has a large picture window facing the parking lot. It was real clear."
Phyllis stepped to the back of the room and came forward with a diagram of the location that she set up on an easel. For the next hour she filled in all the blanks that a juror might possibly have wanted filled-the lighting, the distance, the perspective and orientation, the numbers of cars and people, the sight line from the attendant's booth, the number of times he walked away to move other cars. All the variables that might have helped the defense were wiped out one by one.
Now for the final rivets in the edifice: "Did you see the defendant, Mr. Valdez, shoot any of the people in the store?"
Remigio paused. His testimony up to that point had been faceless, exact. Now he had to start paying his debt to society and the D.A.'s office and name names, point fingers. He glanced straight ahead, looking neither right nor left but focusing on the back wall of the courtroom forty feet away.
"Sí. "
"Yes," replied the interpreter with an inappropriate grin.
"Who did he shoot?"
"I saw him shoot the manager."
"With what?"
"With a short rifle, like the ones they use on TV. An Uzi, I think."
The questions came in rapid-fire succession, like the hail of bullets that raked the store that winter morning.
"What position was the manager in when you saw him shot?"
"On the ground."
"Did you hear the shot?"
"Yes, I did."
"How many shots were there?"
"Many. A blanket of shots. About twenty, I think."
"Who was firing?"
"The defendant."
"Did anybody else fire?"
"No."
"What about the store guard? Did you see him?"
"Yes."
"Did the guard have a gun?"
"Yes."
"Did he have it in his hands?"
"Yes."
"Did he fire it?"
"He never had a chance. That defendant there struggled with him and shot him. Then everybody started screaming."
"What did you do?"
"I got scared so I ran back to the booth to call the police."
"Did you hear any more shots?"
"Oh, yes. But I didn't hang around. I was afraid of stray bullets. I almost got killed like that once in Guatemala."
"Did you ever go near the store again?"
"No. No.I quit after that."
"No further questions."
Judge Reynolds turned to Ramón. Phyllis had shown that Ramón had killed during the commission of a robbery, which fulfilled the requirement of special circumst
ances for a capital case. Now Ramón truly had to prove what kind of pro per attorney he could be.
"Cross," said the judge.
"Thank you, Your Honor. Mr. Flores, where in Guatemala are you from?"
"Objection, irrelevant," piped in Phyllis.
"Overruled," said the judge, no doubt thinking the best way to hang Ramón was to give him plenty of rope.
"Guatemala City."
"I see. What zona in Guatemala City are you from?"
"Excuse me, I don't understand," Remigio said.
"Zona. Area, zone, zona. Guatemala City is divided into zonas, neighborhoods. Which one are you from?"
Remigio snapped back, "Seven."
"I see. That's near the Reformer's Tower, right?"
"A few blocks away."
"Very good. Now, how long did you say you've been in this country? Three years?"
"Objection, irrelevant."
"Overruled."
"Three years, yes."
"So, are you here legally?"