by Jae
"I withdraw, Your Honor," Kade announced casually. The jury had heard what she had meant to imply anyway. "Detective Carlisle, when you and your partner arrested the defendant, did you wear your badge, identifying you as a police officer?"
"Yes, I did. I showed it to Mr. Ballard right before I began to read him his rights," Aiden answered.
Kade looked at the gold shield proudly displayed on Aiden's breast pocket. "So, how likely is it that Mr. Ballard thought you were, as Mr. D'Aquino said in his opening statement, 'troublemakers' who wanted to cheat their way into the club?"
Aiden allowed a sarcastic smile to show on her lips. "Highly unlikely. He knew who we were and why we were there when he hit me."
"Was Mr. Ballard armed when you arrested him?" Kade asked.
"Yes, he was. He had a Sig Sauer tucked in his waistband, covered by his shirt, although he doesn't have the necessary license to carry a concealed weapon," Aiden emphasized.
"You and your partner, Detective Bennet, were the officers who questioned Mr. Ballard after he was arrested, is that correct?" Kade moved on to her next question.
"Yes."
Leaning one hand onto the edge of the witness-box, Kade half turned to look at Ballard. "What was the result of that interrogation?"
"Mr. Ballard was not very cooperative. He claimed not to know any of the victims, at least not their names. In the course of the interview, he became increasingly agitated, even aggressive. He jumped up and called me a 'fucking dyke,'" Aiden reported, satisfied that she finally had an opportunity to portray Ballard as the homophobe he was.
"Detective Carlisle, another question while I have you here as an expert... part of your training as a police officer were lessons in officer safety and weaponless self-defense, right?"
"Yes."
"You've also been the Academy's kickboxing champion, right?" Kade asked.
Aiden nodded in confirmation. "That's right. Twice," she emphasized. This was not the time for humbleness.
"And despite all that training, the defendant was able to hit you?"
Aiden gritted her teeth and swallowed her pride, trusting that Kade was aiming at something other than humiliating her in front of her fellow detectives in the gallery. "Yes, he was."
"Then, with firsthand knowledge of the speed and force of his attack, would you expect an untrained woman to be able to defend herself against the defendant?"
Ah, this is where she's going with this. Aiden almost had to smile.
"Objection, Your Honor!" The defense attorney stood once again to give voice to his protests. "Counsel's asking for an opinion."
"Sit down, Mr. D'Aquino. As Ms. Matheson established, Detective Carlisle is a trained police officer. The jury is entitled to hear her opinion. Objection overruled," Linehan decided.
Kade turned back toward Aiden, giving her a nod.
"No, there's not a doubt in my mind that an untrained woman would have no chance defending herself against him," Aiden answered clearly.
"Thank you, Detective. No further questions at the moment." Kade walked back to her table.
Aiden straightened and squared her shoulders as Victor D'Aquino approached the witness stand. "Detective Carlisle, you just told us that you've been hit by a suspect during arrest more times than you can count, correct?"
"Not literally, but it's been a few times, yes," Aiden agreed, warily wondering where he was going with this.
"Has anyone ever tried to draw a weapon and shoot you to resist arrest?" D'Aquino wanted to know.
Aiden nodded. "Once or twice."
"On the evening you arrested him, did Mr. Ballard carry a weapon?"
"Yes, although he –"
"A simple yes or no will suffice, Detective," D'Aquino interrupted before she could tell the jury again that Ballard had had no permission to carry a concealed firearm.
Aiden forced herself to answer calmly. "Yes, he did carry a weapon."
"But he didn't try to use that weapon against you, did he?"
"No," Aiden had to admit.
"Detective Carlisle, you mentioned in your report that you didn't arrest my client immediately when you saw him at the club, is that correct?" the defense lawyer asked.
Aiden gave a nod. "Yes. After I recognized him, I had to wait for backup and an arrest warrant."
"Is it not true that you came up to Mr. Ballard, not revealing yourself as a police officer but undercover as a customer who wanted to enter the club?" D'Aquino questioned her.
"I wasn't undercover," Aiden protested.
D'Aquino lightly tapped the witness-box in front of Aiden. "But your clothing and your behavior was such that Mr. Ballard could have assumed you were a customer?"
"That's possible the first time I approached him," Aiden admitted, "but –"
"Thank you, that answer is enough for me," the defense attorney interrupted, leaning against the witness-box. "Isn't it true that you first arrested another innocent man for the alleged rape before you set your sights on my client?"
Oh, now he's trying to make it sound like we arbitrarily arrested Ballard because we didn't like the color of his socks! Another innocent man? Come on! "We followed a lead and arrested a known sex offender whose description somewhat resembled that of Mr. Ballard, that's true, yes." D'Aquino was not happy with the answer, she noticed with satisfaction.
"Okay, let's back up a little, Detective. Were you assigned to the case initially?"
Shit! Although Aiden knew that she hadn't done anything wrong, she had hoped it wouldn't come to this. "I was the detective working the case from this first night on, yes," she answered, hoping D'Aquino would be satisfied with that.
"And on that evening, were you on duty?"
"No."
"You were called in for backup, then?"
"No." Aiden fought the urge to grind her teeth together.
Victor D'Aquino dramatically raised his eyebrows. "How come you appeared on Dr. Kinsley's doorstep on that night, then?"
"I heard about the assault on my police scanner, and since it was in my immediate neighborhood, I went to see if I could help," Aiden said, hoping he would leave it at that.
D'Aquino, of course, had other plans. "So, your eagerness to respond to that call had nothing to do with the fact that you knew the alleged victim, Ms. Kinsley, before that night?"
Aiden forced a wave of anger and panic back down. "No, it hadn't. If you had investigated that a little more thoroughly, you would know that dispatch never announces the name of the victim on the radio," she attacked the defense attorney. "I had no way of knowing who the victim was even if I had known her." It was the truth even though she'd had a bad feeling when she had heard the address of Dawn's apartment building.
"But you did, didn't you?" D'Aquino insisted. "You knew Ms. Kinsley before the alleged attack?"
"I heard Dr. Kinsley's lecture at a law enforcement seminar the week before her rape," Aiden answered, "together with almost every other SAD detective." She hoped the defense didn't know about her short visit in Dawn's apartment after their chance meeting at the grocery store even if their conversation had mostly been limited to their jobs.
D'Aquino nodded. "So Ms. Kinsley gave a lecture about rape?"
Aiden's brow furrowed. Where is he going with this? It looked as if D'Aquino had given up on making her look biased and was now trying to impeach Dawn's credibility. "Yes, she did," she answered cautiously.
"She makes her living dealing with rape?"
Aiden clenched her hands into fists behind the witness-box. Are you accusing her of anything here, you bastard? "So do I, Counselor," she pointed out, practically daring him to tell her there was anything wrong with how she earned her money and trying to draw his expected attack away from Dawn.
"You do..." Thoughtfully, the defense attorney tapped his finger against his chin as if he had just now remembered that he was questioning a sex crimes expert. "Then, with a professional background like yours – or that of Ms. Kinsley – you'd know what kind of behavior to
look for in a rape victim?"
"Yes, I do know that – it was exactly the kind of behavior Dr. Kinsley showed when I found her in her apartment that Saturday night." Aiden knew now what he was trying to do – implying that Dawn had faked the "symptoms" of a rape victim.
"And Ms. Kinsley also knows what kind of behavior a sex crimes detective would expect her to display if she had been raped, correct?"
"Objection!" Kade threw her pen onto the table and jumped up. "Defense counsel is trying to put the victim on trial, here. Your Honor, I respectfully request that you admonish Mr. D'Aquino for this behavior."
Aiden hid a smile. Kade looked like an avenging angel, her blue eyes glaring at D'Aquino in indignation.
"Approach the bench," Linehan ordered, clicking off her microphone so the jury couldn't hear what she said to the attorneys.
With various degrees of enthusiasm, Kade and D'Aquino made their ways toward the front of the courtroom.
Aiden let her gaze wander around the courtroom while she waited. Dawn's mother still sat in the first row, her face pale and her hand clamped around that of Lieutenant Vasquez. Aiden was glad that Dawn hadn't had to witness D'Aquino's implied accusations.
Finally, Victor D'Aquino returned to the witness stand. "Detective Carlisle, you testified that you heard Ms. Kinsley give a lecture, right?"
"Right." Aiden nodded, wondering what he was trying now.
"A lecture you were impressed with?" D'Aquino asked.
"Yes. Dr. Kinsley seemed very competent in her field of work." Aiden knew the defense lawyer wouldn't dare to pick up his line of questioning about Dawn's professional knowledge again after Linehan's admonition.
D'Aquino nodded. "So already knowing Ms. Kinsley and being impressed with her, wouldn't you say you were predisposed to believe her accusations against Mr. Ballard?"
Kade shifted onto the edge of her chair, ready to jump up and object again should the opportunity arise, but Aiden remained calm. "I would say that I'm predisposed to believe every woman who sits there trembling and beaten and tells me she has been raped."
"What happened to innocent until proven otherwise?" D'Aquino muttered loud enough for the jury to hear.
"Objection!" Kade stood, one hand on her hip. "Is there a question for this witness or is defense counsel already delivering his closing argument?"
"Withdrawn. No further questions, Your Honor."
Kade rose. "Redirect, Your Honor?"
The judge nodded.
"Detective Carlisle, as defense counsel just pointed out, you saw Dr. Kinsley before the night of October 6th, correct?" Kade laid her hand onto the smooth wood of the witness-box.
Aiden stared at her for a second. Now she's drawing attention to the same fact we wanted to distract D'Aquino from? But she trusted Kade and her abilities as an attorney, so she nodded willingly. "Yes."
"Then unlike Officer Riley, who had never met Dr. Kinsley before and therefore had no frame of reference, as defense counsel pointed out, how would you describe your ability to assess Dr. Kinsley's appearance or behavior?" Kade asked.
Ah. Brilliant, Kade. Beating D'Aquino with his own weapons. "I would say that I should be able to assess her behavior fairly well," Aiden declared with confidence.
"And compared to that first meeting, how did she behave on the night of October 6th?"
"Completely different," Aiden said. "Her confidence and her sense of humor were gone. Something had scared and upset her deeply."
The defense attorney rose from his table. "Objection, speculation, Your Honor! I move to strike. The witness has no personal knowledge of whatever did or did not happen that night."
Kade turned toward the judge. "The People are not attempting to show precisely what transpired that night, Your Honor, but merely to determine that, in Detective Carlisle's expert opinion, something occurred which had a negative effect on Dr. Kinsley."
"Overruled. You may proceed, Counselor," Linehan ruled.
"Thank you, Your Honor. Detective, it has been stated that you did not reveal yourself as a police officer on your first meeting with Mr. Ballard. Is that correct?"
"Yes."
"Was it your intention to arrest him on this occasion?" Kade asked.
Aiden shook her head. "No. I was merely attempting to gain access to the nightclub as part of an ongoing investigation."
"I see. And, on the second occasion, when you were actually attempting to arrest him, did you reveal yourself as a police officer?"
"Yes, I showed him my badge and the arrest warrant and proceeded to inform him that he was under arrest," Aiden said firmly.
Kade nodded. "And it was at this point that he hit you?"
"That's right."
"Detective Carlisle," Kade paused for a second, letting the jury know with a meaningful glance that one last, important question was to follow, "having made, in your own words, 'hundreds of arrests,' do you believe that there is any way Mr. Ballard would not have known you were a police officer at the time of his arrest?"
"No, I don't see how."
With a brief nod, Kade stepped back from the witness stand. "No further questions, Your Honor."
"Thank you, Detective, you are excused," Linehan told Aiden.
On legs that felt as if they were stuffed with cotton, Aiden stood and walked out of the courtroom.
CHAPTER 18
"DETECTIVE Carlisle?"
Aiden looked up from the witness statement she had read and closed her highlighter when she saw that Dawn's mother and her quasi aunt were standing in front of her desk. "Mrs. Kinsley, Lieutenant." She gave the first woman a smile and the second a respectful nod. "What can I do for you?"
"We'd like to have a short update on the trial," Grace said while her police officer friend kept herself in the background. "How is it going in your opinion?"
Aiden rubbed the back of her neck, scanning the room behind the two women to see if Dawn had come with them. She hadn't seen Dawn since the beginning of the trial. While that might have been good for her job and her sanity, she had begun to miss her whenever her work left her time enough to think. "Well, Officer Riley's testimony didn't help our case – D'Aquino made him look like an absolute greenhorn, so the jury won't give much weight to whatever he testified to. Detective Okada's testimony about the execution of the search warrant guarantees us a conviction on the possession of stolen property charge but doesn't help much with the other charges."
Aiden knew that her own testimony had been a mixed bag, too. She was sure that the jury would believe her that she had no doubt that a rape had occurred, but with D'Aquino's continuing implications that Dawn would know exactly how to make her believe that...
"What about the DNA analyst and the fingerprint expert? Their testimony was good for us, right?" Grace fixed hopeful eyes on Aiden.
Aiden cleared her throat. "Well, not really, no. Ballard's fingerprints and his semen don't rule out the possibility of consensual sex, and that's what Ballard claims."
"What about the other two girls?" Grace asked.
"We have no DNA evidence on them, and their lineup identification of Ballard was a little shaky, but the fact that there are two other women who accuse Ballard makes the defense's theory that the victims are just too ashamed to admit to an affair with him a little less likely." Aiden knew that a lot rested on Dawn. Her testimony could be the deciding factor.
Del Vasquez nodded grimly. "So, a lot will depend on Dawn," she came to the same conclusion Aiden had.
Grace sighed and sank into the chair Aiden had moved out for her. "When Dawn decided not to become a cop, I always thought that at least my daughter would be safe from this kind of crime."
Del, who had silently taken position behind her, squeezed her shoulder.
Another deep sigh, and then Grace straightened and looked up at Aiden with a small smile. "At least she was lucky having you as the detective working her case... and as a friend. I know how comforting having one of those strong cop shoulders to cry on can be." She affectio
nately patted the hand resting on her shoulder.
"Oh, yes, that's us boys and girls in blue, always ready to lend a hand or a shoulder." Del smiled down at her.
Grace turned so she was facing her old friend. "Well, I'm glad that this time it was a girl in blue offering her shoulder. The last thing Dawn needs now is to fall in love with another cop. It would break her heart to lose another loved one to this job, to worry every time he goes to work, to jump every time the phone rings when he's out in the field. I wouldn't wish that for her." Grace's gray eyes were clouded over as she remembered her own pain.