The ADA sighed. “All right,” she said, “I’ll grant you the system isn’t perfect, but it does work.”
“I don’t doubt the system works,” countered the alleged victim. “I doubt that justice is always served.”
“For most people it is.”
“Perhaps. But Robert Willmont isn’t most people.”
“Mike Tyson was convicted.”
“Yes,” the woman conceded. “But I think he may have been convicted more because he was black than because he was guilty.”
“I’m good at my job, Mrs. Doniger,” Tess said. “Very good. I do my homework. I don’t make many mistakes. I don’t go into court unless I’m convinced I can win. It’s true that you can never totally predict which way a jury will jump, but my conviction rate happens to be a pretty decent seventy-three percent.”
The alleged victim looked over at the RTC counselor.
“I’ve known Tess for five years,” Azi said. “And even though, technically, she won’t be representing you, I don’t think you could be in better hands.”
“More importantly, Mrs. Doniger,” the ADA added, “if you don’t agree to testify, if we have to drop the charges and let him walk, it’s as good as saying that what he did to you is okay. Do you really believe that what he did to you is okay?”
There were tears in the blue-gray eyes as the alleged victim studied her hands, considering the truth of those words and agonizing over her decision. It seemed like a lifetime before she looked up at Tess.
“My name is Karen,” she said.
The accelerated pace dictated by the defense resulted in Tess’s having to lay off every other case in order to prepare for this one. Now, on the eve of the preliminary hearing, she was going through everything one more time, looking for flaws, loopholes, contradictions, anything that might cause a failure to secure an indictment.
“I thought I’d find you here,” Lamar drawled from the doorway. “Piling on the overtime.”
“Just a formality,” she assured him. “We’ve got more than enough for probable cause. What about your end?”
Lamar flopped into the chair across from her. “You know, every time I take on one of these investigations, I see it as a giant jigsaw puzzle. And I know that, as soon as I put all the pieces together, the picture will come clear. It’s what keeps me interested in the process. Only, in this puzzle, there’s a piece missing.”
“What do you mean?”
The big man scratched his right ear. “I don’t rightly know, it’s just this feeling in my gut that I’m missing something somewhere.”
Tess had learned to trust her investigator’s gut. “Like what?” she pressed.
“Like this whole thing doesn’t make any sense to me,” he sighed. “Because I believe Karen Doniger. I would stake my reputation on the fact that she’s telling the truth, that what happened to her happened exactly the way she says it did.”
“So?”
“So my gut says that Willmont just may be telling the truth, too.”
“Well, they can’t both be telling the truth.”
“That’s the point,” Lamar agreed, “isn’t it?”
“You know,” Tess mused, “there are some men who really don’t understand the word ‘no,’ or, more precisely, they don’t believe it can apply to them. For whatever reasons, they think of themselves as above rejection, which frequently makes them incapable of accepting it. It’s possible that Robert Willmont is one of those men.”
“Maybe,” Lamar said, but he wasn’t convinced.
“Look, the way Hal Sutton is rushing us, you haven’t had enough time to do your usual thorough investigation. We’ll get our indictment tomorrow, and then I’ll make sure you have enough time to pursue your elusive missing piece.”
“You like Karen Doniger, don’t you?” he asked.
Tess nodded. “Yes,” she answered. “I do like her. A lot. There’s something terribly vulnerable about her, and yet very brave. There’s a lot of pain there and you can almost see inside her as she struggles to deal with it.”
“Yes, I sensed that about her,” Lamar agreed.
“She’s such a private person, too, and I know this public invasion is going to be as dreadful an experience for her as the assault was, whatever the outcome.”
“That’s the part I hate the most.”
Tess smiled. “I do believe you like her a bit yourself.”
“She’s a real lady,” Lamar declared. “And the truth is, you don’t get to meet too many ladies in my line of work. It’s just that…”
“I know,” Tess finished for him. “There’s a piece missing.”
PART EIGHT
1992
There is no such thing as justice—
in or out of court.
—Clarence Darrow
one
The Honorable Oliver Wendell Washington was suffering from an acute case of gastritis. In fact, he had been suffering from just such attacks every single day since he learned that he would preside over the trial of The People v. Robert Drayton Willmont.
“Why me?” he groaned to his wife as he made his second dash of the morning to the bathroom.
“Because you’re a judge, I expect,” Thelma Washington reminded him through the bathroom door. “And someone obviously thought you were the right judge for the job.”
“I wish I was a janitor,” moaned the former Stanford University law professor.
“You do not,” she chuckled. “You’re just as pleasured as pie to be a judge.”
“No, my mama is pleasured as pie,” he corrected her. “It was her dream. She had it in her head from the day I was born that I was going to be a judge. That’s why she named me Oliver Wendell—so I’d never forget.”
“And you’ve done your mama proud.”
“You don’t understand,” he grumbled. “I’m up for reelection in November. If I make one mistake in this trial, lean too far in either direction, I can kiss Mama’s dream good-bye forever and probably send her to an early grave.”
“Early?” Thelma scoffed. “She’s eighty-eight, if she’s a day.”
“Maybe if I just lie down for a minute or two.”
“If you do,” Thelma declared, “you’re going to be late to court—and that’d be a mistake.”
“If I called in sick right now, before jury selection starts, they’d find someone to replace me.”
Thelma wagged her head. “I declare, I think I’d see a yellow streak running down your back—if your skin wasn’t so black.”
“But it’s the truth,” he insisted. “Look at me. I can’t get more than ten feet from the john.”
“Oliver Wendell,” his wife admonished in a voice that brooked no nonsense, “now you stop all that whining and be about your business. You’re a fair and impartial judge and everyone in this town knows it. That’s why you were given this case. And you’re going to do fine. But, just in case, I’ll pack the Kaopectate in with your lunch.”
Department 21 of the Superior Court, Criminal Division, was referred to by those who worked at Justice as the Glass Courtroom. Positioned at the end of the inner third-floor corridor, it resembled the other courtrooms in modest size and unimpressive style, with its center aisle, its gallery of uncomfortable flip-down spectator seats, its yellow wood paneling and Naugahyde chairs right out of the 1950s, and its California bear anchored beside the Stars and Stripes. And like all the courtrooms in the row, it was windowless. The one significant difference, and hence its sobriquet, was the ominous bulletproof partition—two thick panes of tempered glass bonded to fine wire mesh—that separated the spectators from the proceedings.
“Isn’t that a bit overdramatic?” Lamar observed when Tess told him where to meet her.
“I guess no one wants to take any chances on some weirdo with a water gun slipping through,” she said with a shrug.
But now, as the ADA threaded her way through the milling throng in front of Department 21, Lamar was nowhere to be seen. It was Thursday, June 4
, two days after Robert Willmont had won the California primary with a resounding eighty-two percent of the vote. All things being equal, the race for the nomination was over.
“Hey, Tess,” a reporter yelled. “What do you think your chances are of convicting the next President of the United States?”
“About the same as any other citizen,” she replied with a professional smile.
“How can you do this awful thing to such a fine man?” a woman in a faded housedress cried.
The ADA didn’t bother to respond to that. She showed her badge to the armed guards at the door and slipped inside the Glass Courtroom.
It was twenty minutes to nine. The left side of the gallery was already filled with members of the media and other interested parties. In less than half an hour, the seats on the right side would be taken by prospective jurors and the process of selecting the twelve, plus two alternates, who would decide this case, would begin.
Tess was wearing what she described as her jury suit—a classic gray gabardine with a gently fitted jacket and a slim skirt that was just short enough to attract the men but not short enough to distract the women, and expensive enough to establish the credentials, but not the extravagance, of a confident professional.
She laid her briefcase on top of the table to the right of the center aisle, closest to the jury box—which wasn’t really a box but two rows of chairs, the second row raised one step above the first—and began to pull out the various files and folders she would need, arranging them neatly in front of her.
The past month had been busy, to say the least. Not counting the preliminary hearing, the ADA had been in and out of court half a dozen times on motions, during which the judge had denied a motion to dismiss, upheld a motion to expedite, denied a motion to exclude, upheld a motion to disclose, and denied the application of Court TV to produce what would surely have become a summer spectacular.
All in all, Tess felt she had come out even. She settled down in her chair and opened one of the files. In it were the names of two hundred registered voters who had been summoned for jury duty during this calendar quarter and would be available for this trial, and it was this list of names that had occupied her overworked staff for the better part of two weeks. Finding out who they were and what they did and how they lived and what they thought was as crucial to a verdict as building the case.
As the jury-selection process began, the ADA would be searching for the right combination of men and women who would best be able to judge the testimony and weigh the evidence, and every scrap she could learn about each of them would help her in making that determination. While one or two staunch conservatives wouldn’t hurt her cause, and a Bible-thumper, a couple of radical feminists, and a senior citizen might help, the best she could hope to get were twelve open minds.
There were three specific things Tess looked for when she questioned a prospective juror—eye contact, straight answers, and the ability to listen. Karen was right about there being people who would refuse to believe that a woman could be raped, no matter what, and Tess was always on the alert to spot them.
Next to her own judgment, the ADA most trusted Lamar’s. The beefy cowboy would slouch in the chair next to hers, with his arms crossed over his belly and his leather-tooled boots sticking out from under the table, and pretend to doze. But each time she returned to her seat, a piece of paper would be waiting with either an “aye” or a “nay” scrawled on it.
Tess glanced at her watch and then over her shoulder. Lamar usually beat her into court—it was not like him to be late. In the five years they had worked together, she had come to rely on him, much like a security net, to catch her should she fall. An anxious frown crossed her face.
Hal Sutton chose that moment to enter the courtroom, flanked by a striking brunette in a Chanel suit, a good-looking African-American who reminded Tess of the guy on LA. Law, and a stocky man with a shiny head and brand-new wing tips that creaked with every step. Covering all the bases, she thought, the frown becoming a wry smile.
In addition to being a formidable trial attorney, Hal Sutton was a smooth, attractive, impeccably dressed man who belied approaching retirement by keeping himself in excellent physical condition. He was referred to, around Justice, as the Silver Fox. Male jurors envied him, female jurors fantasized about him. Robert Willmont couldn’t have made a better choice.
Sutton gave Tess a cordial nod as he and the others arranged themselves around the defense table to the left. Sitting by herself, Tess felt a little like David going up against Goliath, and she looked around again for the giant who was supposed to be on her side.
A few minutes later, the first group of some forty potential jurors filed into the courtroom. Tess heard them shuffling into their seats but she didn’t turn around. It was a superstition of hers—not to speculate about them as a whole, but one at a time.
At exactly nine o’clock, Robert Willmont appeared, dressed in a neat dark suit, a crisp white shirt, and a conservative tie. Accompanying him were his wife in tailored taupe, his mother in lavender lace, a slight man with thinning red hair, freckles, and glasses, and a middle-aged woman with gray hair wearing a black dress that was far too warm for the season.
The senator took great care to seat his aged mother in the first row of chairs behind the bulletproof window and give his wife a kiss on the cheek before he joined Hal Sutton at the defense table. The block of jurors took it all in. Tess smiled to herself. The show was on.
At ten minutes past nine, the bailiff stepped to the front of the courtroom and began his speech.
“All rise,” he intoned.
There was a general scraping of chairs and rustling of clothing as everyone stood.
“Department 21 of the Superior Court of the City of San Francisco is now in session. Case number 458-026, The People of the State of California versus Robert Drayton Willmont. The Honorable Oliver Wendell Washington presiding.”
With that, the door to the left of the bench opened and the former Los Angeles prosecutor, former San Francisco attorney, former Stanford law professor emerged. Swathed in his robes, the judge looked half again his already considerable size. His intelligent brown eyes revealed a mixture of resignation and discomfort, and his usually shiny black face had a definite gray tinge to it.
“I apologize for my tardiness,” Washington mumbled after clearing his throat. “Are the People ready, Miss Escalante?”
“The People are ready, Your Honor,” Tess said.
“Is the Defense ready, Mr. Sutton?”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
Washington nodded to the bailiff. “You may call the first name.”
The bailiff rotated a small black cylinder several times before reaching in and pulling out a slip of paper.
“Agnes McFaddan.”
A tiny woman in her seventies scrambled out of her seat and made her way to the jury box. Tess found the name on the list—unmarried, librarian, registered Democrat.
The ADA stood up, took a deep breath to quell the butterflies that always took flight inside her stomach during the first stages of a trial, and approached the woman.
“Good morning, Miss McFaddan,” she said with a pleasant smile. “How do you feel about being here today?”
The woman considered for a moment. “About the same as I felt all the other times.”
“How was that?”
“Proud to do my duty, sad to have to sit in judgment on a fellow human being.”
“And how many juries have you served on?”
“Four in my lifetime.”
“Do you remember what those cases were about?”
“Of course I do. It’s not something you can forget so easily.”
“Tell us about them,” Tess invited.
“Let’s see, one had to do with a young man accused of robbing a liquor store. There were three eyewitnesses—we had to convict him. Another was about a drunk driver who killed a little boy. I’m afraid we had to convict him, too. The third was about a man who
was supposed to have plotted to kill his wife, but the prosecution didn’t convince us he had done any such thing. And the fourth was about a woman who shot her ex-husband when he broke into her house. We acquitted her.”
“What do you think this trial is about?”
“I know what it’s about,” Agnes McFaddan declared. “It’s been in all the newspapers and on every television channel for weeks now, hasn’t it? Why, CNN devotes half an hour to it every single evening, it’s that important. This trial is about rape.”
“And how do you feel about rape, Miss McFaddan?”
“I think it’s a crime,” the prospective juror replied. “And I rank it right up there next to murder and kidnapping.”
“And how do you feel about the defendant?”
A big smile broke out across Agnes McFaddan’s face. “I think he’s a fine man, and a fine senator. I’m sure he’ll make a fine President.”
“I don’t think there are many here today who would disagree with you on that,” Tess conceded. “But the question is, would you be able to put aside your high regard for him as a politician and vote to convict him of the crime of rape if the evidence presented was overwhelming?”
There was another pause as the elderly woman pondered her response. Then she looked straight into the ADA’s eyes. “It would make me sad,” she said, and sighed, “but I guess I’d have to, now wouldn’t I?”
“Thank you, Miss McFaddan,” Tess said with a flash of white teeth. “I have nothing more.”
She turned to sit down and was delighted to find Lamar sprawled in the chair next to hers. On the table in front of her was a folded piece of paper with the word “aye” scrawled across it.
The bald, stocky man in the creaky wing-tip shoes was named Andrew Cardigan. He was one of an emerging breed of analysts whose advice on jury selection was being taken very seriously by defendants able to afford the high price tag.
He sat to the left of Robert Willmont, with his own stack of profiles in front of him, and continually passed notes across the senator to Hal Sutton and his assistants. In addition, two of Cardigan’s associates were stationed in the spectator section of the small courtroom, monitoring the responses of the jury pool and keeping constant, muffled radio contact with Cardigan by means of transmitters on their lapels and tiny receivers in their ears.
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