An Engineered Injustice

by William L. Myers Jr.

  “You guess so?”

  “I mean, I knew the rule. I didn’t know why Amtrak instituted it.”

  “Are you serious? You didn’t know that the purpose of the rule was to prevent engineers from being distracted and causing train crashes?”

  Eddy’s eyes dart to Vaughn, then back to the prosecutor. “No, I knew that it was to prevent you from being distracted.”

  “To prevent train crashes, to save lives?”

  “Yes.”

  “And yet . . .” Christina pauses. “And yet you brought a second cell phone into the cab for the express purpose of making and receiving calls during your run.”

  “Calls with my wife only, because of the break-ins, beca—”

  “And when questioned about it by the National Transportation Safety Board, you lied to them.”

  “Well . . .”

  “Does this sound familiar to you? ‘I always kept my cell phone in my knapsack, turned off.’ Didn’t you tell that to the NTSB when they interviewed you?”

  “Yes.”

  “And how about this: Question, ‘So, your phone was off, and it was in your knapsack?’ Answer: ‘Yes.’ That was you again, to the NTSB?”

  “Yes.”

  “And it was a lie, wasn’t it, Mr. Coburn?”

  Eddy looks down. “Yes.”

  “Oh, and here’s another question: ‘When was the last time you were on the phone before the accident?’ Answer, ‘I called Kate, my wife, just before I boarded the train.’ Another lie?”

  Eddy’s shoulders slump. “Yes.”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t hear you.”

  “Yes!”

  “You tried to deceive the NTSB—you tried to deceive the whole world—into believing that you had only one cell phone with you, and that it was turned off.”

  “I was worried about my wife, the baby. I—”

  “Is there a wife exception to the Amtrak rule prohibiting cell-phone usage on the engines?”

  “No.”

  “Now, Mr. Coburn, you had made this run before many times, isn’t that right?”

  “Sure.”

  “And you would have known that there would have been more than two hundred souls sitting behind you on that train?”

  “There would be a lot of passengers, yes.”

  “You knew there’d be men and women and even children?”

  “Yes.”

  “Some of them probably going to business meetings, others to attend shows or concerts?”

  “Okay.”

  “Probably some college kids going back to school after a weekend with their parents?”

  “That could happen.”

  “Young couples taking a day off, like Mr. and Mrs. Nash.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you knew, Mr. Coburn, that every single one of those people was dependent on you to get them there alive and safe.”

  “Absolutely.” Eddy says the word proudly, sits up in his seat. “That’s my job.”

  “Dependent on you not allowing yourself to become distracted for any reason.”

  “Any reason that I could prevent.”

  “That you could prevent? Is that what you said?”

  “Yes, meaning—”

  “You’re not claiming you had no power to prevent yourself from bringing a second phone into the locomotive, are you?”

  “What I mean is . . . No, I’m not saying that.”

  “You’re not claiming that you had no power to prevent yourself from turning the phone on? That you had no power to prevent yourself from talking into the phone? That you had no power—”

  “Objection.” Vaughn is standing now. “Badgering the witness.”

  “Sustained. You’re beating the proverbial horse, counselor. Move on.”

  Christina smiles. “Yes, Your Honor.” She walks back to her table, pours water from the pitcher into her glass, and takes a slow sip. She glances at Vaughn, who spots the gleam in her eyes. He’s given her an opportunity rarely accorded a prosecutor—the chance to question the defendant at a preliminary hearing—and she’s making the most of it.

  She returns to the podium. “Now, let’s run through this story of yours about the shootout at the O.K. Corral.”

  “Objection.” It’s Vaughn.

  “Sustained,” says the judge, but she’s smiling at the prosecutor’s metaphor.

  “You claim you were being shot at?”

  “Yes.”

  “When you told us about your injuries yesterday, I don’t remember you saying you’d been shot. Were you hit by any bullets, Mr. Coburn?”

  “No.”

  “You said it was more than one shot. It was shot after shot after shot.”

  “Like, three or four. More, maybe.”

  “Yet neither Amtrak nor the NTSB found any bullets inside the locomotive. Did you know that?”

  “No. I don’t know what they found.”

  “Can you explain that to me? How can shot after shot be fired at the glass windshield and none of the bullets makes it inside the cab?”

  “I’ve never even fired a gun. I don’t know anything about that.”

  Christina smiles. “For that second call, who was on the other end of the phone?”

  “Like I said, I didn’t know—”

  “What is the real reason you squatted down on the floor?”

  “I didn’t squat. I dove. I thought I was going to be killed.”

  “Your friend, Reggie Frye, the man who oversaw the TracVac you crashed your train into. He’s the same one who gave you the phone.”

  “Just like I said, yes.”

  “When, exactly, did you and Reggie plan this whole thing?”

  “Objection!” Vaughn is angry now. “There is no basis for a question like that. It doesn’t even make sense—why would anyone plan to crash a train they were on themselves? Move to strike!”

  The judge sustains the objection.

  Christina is moving beyond recklessness to intentional conduct. Nothing would ever come of it at trial; there’s no fair basis in the evidence to support even asking this line of questions. But Christina isn’t doing this for the legal proceedings. She’s doing it for sport. She’s tasted blood. She likes it, and she’s getting carried away. It happens to trial attorneys all the time.

  Christina’s torture of Eddy Coburn continues for another thirty minutes, until the judge shuts it down. “You’ve moved beyond beating the horse, Ms. Wesley, to stomping it. One more question.”

  Christina Wesley glares at Eddy. “Mr. Coburn, can you imagine anything more reckless for an engineer to do while driving a train carrying hundreds of people at eighty miles an hour than to knowingly put himself in a position where he can’t see the track ahead and can’t reach the controls to stop the train?”

  His shoulders stooped, his voice weak, his head lowered so that he’s looking into his lap, he answers, “Someone was shooting at me.”

  By the time he voices the words, Christina is halfway to her seat. She has no interest in his answer. And Vaughn senses that no one else does, either.

  “Present your first witness,” Judge Johnson says to Vaughn.

  Vaughn glances at his cell phone and sees that Erin has not called or texted while Eddy’s been on the stand. He has no idea where she and the others are, or when they’ll arrive. He glances at the gallery, hoping to see—what? He doesn’t know. No one in the audience can help him now. Not the press corps, which now includes some familiar faces from the national cable networks. Not his family members. Not the sheriff’s deputies the judge has placed to ensure order. Certainly not Day or Balzac or their cadres of associates, including Corey King, who’s shown up to watch Vaughn go down in flames. Not even Mick or Susan. Unless . . . It would be a dangerous move, he knows, because the testimony would only help to bury his cousin if, in the end, he hasn’t convinced everyone that the accident wasn’t Eddy’s fault. Still, he must buy time for Erin and Laurie to testify. And the theme of his defense—hell, the truth—is that Eddy didn�
��t do it.

  In for a penny.

  Vaughn turns to face the judge. “The defense calls Susan Klein.”

  Vaughn can hear the murmurs from the gallery. He turns to look at Susan and Mick, whose faces are painted with confusion. Finally, Susan shakes her head, stands, and walks toward the security door. The guard opens the door, and as Susan passes through it, she glances at Vaughn, who has no problem reading her thoughts: I hope you know what you’re doing.

  “Who is this witness, Mr. Coburn?” asks the judge.

  “My boss, Your Honor. Susan Klein of McFarland and Klein.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “She was on the train.”

  “You’re calling a passenger as a witness?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “Was she injured?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  “And she’s an attorney at your firm?” Regina Johnson tilts her head. “What am I missing here? An attorney representing a party can’t also be a witness in the case.”

  “Ms. Klein doesn’t represent the defendant,” Vaughn says. “I do.”

  “But you work at McFarland and Klein. Your firm represents the defendant, and Ms. Klein owns the firm.”

  Vaughn lowers his head, closes his eyes. Then he looks up at Susan. “I quit.”

  “What?” says Susan.

  “Are we good now, Your Honor?”

  Regina Johnson shakes her head back and forth, plants her elbows on the bench, and spreads her hands. “Good? That’s not a word I’d use about any of this. But if you’re asking me if you can proceed now that Ms. Klein no longer represents the defendant, you may.” The judge sits back in her chair, her face sending him the same message sent by his ex-boss: I hope you know what you’re doing.

  Vaughn spends a few moments having Susan explain for the record who she is, where she lives, and what she does for a living. Next, he has Susan establish that she was on Train 174 and asks her to explain what happened that day.

  Susan takes a deep breath. “I took an Uber from my apartment to 30th Street Station. I was late calling the car and got there just in time to catch the train. I sat in the second car, the quiet car, because I wanted some time to think, gather myself. You see, the reason I was traveling to New York was to see my mother. Our relationship is . . . not an easy one.” Susan pauses here and looks out at the gallery, where all the women who have mothers nod and smile.

  “My mother had invited me up to see her. She said she had something she wanted to discuss.”

  “Not to put the cart before the horse, but did you ever find out what your mother wanted to talk to you about?”

  Susan pauses and seems to look inward. Then she nods and says, “Her doctors found a spot, on her pancreas.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Please, when you’re ready, go on. Tell us what happened on the train.”

  “For the first ten or so minutes, nothing happened. We pulled out of the station, made our way through the city. The sun was shining into the car. People were reading newspapers, typing on laptops, sleeping, or listening to headphones. Then, in an instant, everything was chaos.” Susan describes the same nightmare scenario recounted by the earlier witnesses—the world turned on its side, people and belongings flying through the air, shattering glass, ballast stones ricocheting around the car. And when it stopped, the moaning and crying. Bones protruding from shredded clothes. Blood-soaked faces. People limping and crawling over the debris and one another. The blind woman shouting, “Clyde! Clyde!”

  “But her dog, the German shepherd, was gone,” Susan says.

  Vaughn pauses, looks around. The court reporter is crying. Some of the men are fighting not to. In the gallery, he’s sure, the same thing is happening. “Thank you,” he says.

  Judge Johnson turns to the prosecution table. “Questions?”

  Christina Wesley thinks for a moment, glances at Vaughn, who can see that her mind is spinning furiously, trying to figure out why on earth he’d have presented a passenger witness. Trying to decipher his angle—for, surely, there must be one. Finally, no other course left, she looks at Susan and asks, “Why are you here?”

  Susan leans forward on the witness stand. “To see that justice is done.”

  To everyone in the gallery, Susan’s words wrap themselves around Eddy Coburn’s throat like a hangman’s noose. Eddy feels it. Vaughn does, too.

  Judge Johnson waits for Susan to return to the gallery, then calls both attorneys to the bench. “Mr. Coburn, I have no idea what you’re up to. But if those people weren’t ready to crucify your client before, they sure are now. And none of what your witness said has any bearing on my decision whether to bind your client over for trial or not. Quite frankly, that little sideshow you just put on may be the worst case of legal malpractice I’ve ever seen.”

  “Your Honor, I—”

  “I’m ready to rule, Mr. Coburn. Unless you have some more witnesses to reinforce the prosecution’s case.”

  Vaughn glances through the glass wall to the gallery, where he sees Tommy and Erin walking in. “I do have more witnesses, Your Honor. But they won’t help the prosecution one bit.”

  Judge Johnson purses her lips. This isn’t what she wanted to hear. “I set aside the whole morning for this matter, Mr. Coburn. That’s the only reason I’m going to let you continue. But I warn you. You keep this train moving in the same direction, and you’re going to crash your client just as surely as he crashed the 174.” Regina Johnson looks at the court reporter. “That last part isn’t for the record. Understand?” The court reporter nods.

  “Call your next witness, counselor.”

  37

  FRIDAY, AUGUST 1, CONTINUED

  Vaughn looks behind him, ecstatic to see Erin standing by the open door to the hallway. She looks exhausted but manages a smile. He nods, amazed at her guts and determination for crossing the state twice, overnight, to retrieve their key witness, save their case, save his cousin.

  Vaughn announces Laurie’s name and glances at Balzac, whose eyes widen and then narrow into a glare. Laurie walks through the gallery, making sure not to look at Balzac, and passes through the security door into the well of the courtroom. She takes the witness stand, then swears the oath, keeping her eyes glued to Vaughn the whole time.

  Vaughn begins his questioning by walking Laurie through her background—where she was raised, where she went to college and law school. When he asks her where she works, she answers, “The Balzac Firm,” and this generates interest in the room, including from the judge.

  “You work for Mr. Balzac?” Regina Johnson asks from the bench. The judge is acutely aware of Balzac’s presence, and of Day’s; they’re the most powerful gods in the city’s P.I. pantheon. She’s surely mingled with them at bench-bar conferences and charity events. Both of them have no doubt contributed to her campaign for the judgeship.

  “Yes, Your Honor,” Laurie answers.

  “Well, I hope you do a good job, because he’s watching,” Judge Johnson says, and Laurie gets a sick look on her face.

  “Your Honor,” Vaughn says, putting an end to the exchange, “I’d like to begin the heart of the testimony by showing a minute of crash video.”

  Regina Johnson rolls her eyes. “Haven’t we all seen enough newsfeed, Mr. Coburn? Is another run-through really going to be helpful?”

  “I think it will, Your Honor. And it’s only a minute.” Vaughn is playing fast and loose here. First, he’s misled the judge into believing that she’s just going to see familiar footage. Second, he’s putting the cart before the horse with respect to getting the video on the record. The right way to do this would be to have Laurie lay the foundation for the video’s admissibility before playing it. But he doesn’t want to tip his hand as to what’s coming because he wants to take no chance of Regina Johnson excluding it before it’s shown.

  “All right, then. Let’s get it done.” The judge has her bailiff set up the big screen again.

  When it’s ready, Vaughn hands up the
memory stick, and the bailiff starts the video. The railroad track is the first thing that comes into view, taken from sixty feet above. In the distance, the train enters the curve, rounds it, and moves into the straightaway. After a few seconds, it passes directly below the camera and speeds down the track. In the distance sits the TracVac.

  Vaughn sees a frown form on Regina Johnson’s face. It’s dawning on her that she’s seeing something vastly different from what has been aired before. She pulls her eyes from her screen just long enough to glance at Vaughn, then looks back at the video.

  Vaughn turns his seat and looks out the corner of his eye into the visitor’s gallery. Everyone is leaning forward in their seats. Mouths are agape. Eyes wide open, or clenched shut. He hears someone start to cry, probably a crash victim.

  “Oh, no!” someone behind him shouts.

  “My God!”

  “No, no, no!”

  The voices are raised now, and Vaughn knows they’re seeing the locomotive crash into the TracVac, watching the cars behind it fly from the tracks, landing every which way.

  As the screen goes black, Vaughn turns his head to Christina Wesley, who looks confused. He sends her a message with his eyes: I told you this isn’t what you think. He holds her gaze for a long moment, then addresses the court.

  “That’s the end of the recording, Your Honor.”

  Regina Johnson is silent for a moment, then asks, “Do you mind telling the court what we just saw?”

  “The train crash, Your Honor. Actually, the train crashing.”

  “And you got this how?”

  “That’s what the witness will testify to.” Then, without waiting for more from the court, Vaughn addresses Laurie. “Please explain to Her Honor how you obtained this video.”

  Laurie takes a very long, very deep breath. “I was at work late one night . . .”

  Balzac is glaring directly up at Laurie, his teeth bared, looking like he’s ready to smash through the glass, race to the stand, and tear her apart. But she stays strong, and it doesn’t take long to tell the tale. How she went into her boss’s office late one night to deliver a legal brief. How the computer screen came on when she laid the brief on the desk, probably because she bumped the computer mouse. How she watched the video, uncomprehendingly at first, then in horror.