“I think so. I mean, he looked really scared. I don’t know. I’ve only seen him a few times so I don’t know, but he seemed like he didn’t want to be there.”
I sat down and Sandy stood up and said, “Redirect, Your Honor?”
“Certainly.”
She stood at the lectern again, her back stiff and straight, her butt cheeks clenched so hard I could see the outline through her suit pants.
“Did anyone else take responsibility for the cocaine that night?”
“Umm . . . no.”
“Has anyone, that you know of, come forward and claimed this cocaine?”
“No. Not that I know.”
“Did Mr. Thorne ever mention any other person who would be getting any proceeds of the cocaine sale?”
“No.”
“Thank you, Mr. Willmore.”
The judge looked at me and I shook my head. Better to quit with a few good statements than risk Freddy saying something new against us.
“You are excused,” the judge said. “Next witness, Mrs. Tiles.”
The next witness was a lab technician by the name of Coltrane. He was a small, white, nerdy guy who looked like he might pass out as he was being sworn in. He didn’t look like a Coltrane.
Teddy leaned over to me. “I have to go to the bathroom.”
“Can you hold it just a little longer?”
“No. I have to go to the bathroom now.”
I rose, cutting off Sandy. “Your Honor, would it be possible to take a quick bathroom break?”
“Ms. Rollins, I would expect you to take care of those necessities on proper breaks.”
“It’s for Teddy, Judge.” I never called a client by the term “defendant” or by their last name in front of a jury. I always used their first names and the prosecutor was always the “government’s attorney”—a little trick to establish the power dynamic in the minds of the jurors.
He sighed. “Very well. Mrs. Tiles, let’s take a quick ten-minute break before continuing with Dr. Coltrane.”
The bailiff helped Teddy, and I went out back for a smoke. I sat on the edge of a large, solid-cement planter and lit a cigarette. I took out my phone and dialed Jack’s number, but he didn’t answer. Stefan answered when I called him.
“Hey,” I said.
“Hey.”
He sounded sad and I said, “What’s going on?”
“What do you mean?”
“I can tell, Stefan. What’s up?”
“Do you ever think maybe people don’t want to discuss every detail of their lives with you?”
“Easy. Who took a dump in your Cheerios?”
I heard the phone click as it was dropped or thrown, and then Stefan got back on. “Sorry. Not in the right mental place right now.”
“What’s going on?”
“Nothing.”
Marital discord in the Rollins home?
Shit. I needed to change my name. My maiden name had been Danielle Evelyn. Too bad—I liked Rollins. It rolled off the tongue easily.
“Come on, what is it?”
“We came to a compromise. I’ll be halting my doctorate until Jack’s out of the house. Then I’ll be going back to school. I mean, it’s the best we could both agree on, but I’m pretty bummed about it.”
“So don’t do it. Just finish.”
“That’s one thing I don’t think you ever understood about marriage, Dani. It’s a compromise. If you’re gonna make it, it’s a compromise.” He sighed. “So, how’s it going, anyway?”
“Shitty, Stefan. It’s going shitty. You should see the way some of the jurors look at Teddy. They’re supposed to be presuming he’s innocent but that certainly doesn’t apply.”
“No one said the system was fair, Dani. Just that we’re forced to live in it.”
I inhaled a puff of smoke and let it out through my nose. “It’d be nice to have you here.”
“Why?”
“I don’t know.”
We sat silently on the line—one of those awkward silences where you both have something to say, but neither person wants to be the first to speak.
“I better go,” he said.
“All right. Tell Jack to call me when you see him.”
I stomped out my cigarette, glanced at my reflection in a window to make sure I looked halfway presentable, and headed back into the courthouse.
47
Teddy had already sat down when I came back. He was tracing his finger along a carving on the tabletop that someone, probably in his spot, had whittled into the table: a heart with a knife through it.
“Can we go home now?” he asked as I sat.
“Not yet, buddy. Almost. This shouldn’t last longer than today.”
“And then we can go home?”
I stared at him a second and then cleared my throat and pretended to be looking at something on the legal pad in front of me. I scribbled a few notes and then pushed it away from me.
Coltrane would just establish that the drugs were in fact cocaine.
The next witness was Kevin and then Zamora, and the entire case hinged on what Zamora said. I slid something out of my bag and put it in my breast pocket. I tapped my pen against the table for a second and then rose and went over to Sandy and Double D, who didn’t seem to have moved at all during the break.
“I wanna talk to him.”
“To who?” Sandy asked.
“Zamora.”
She shrugged. “Feel free. He’s outside with a sheriff.”
I went out and looked around. Zamora was just stepping off the elevator followed by a sheriff’s deputy. I stood in front of the doors of the courtroom and folded my arms.
“I wanna talk,” I said.
“Don’t matter to me.”
I opened a door to one of the attorney-client conference rooms and held it for Zamora. He went inside and the deputy stayed out. I was relieved, because he wasn’t a client and the deputy had no duty to leave us alone. I shut the door behind me and sat down.
“What’re you gonna say up there today?”
“Why don’t you wait and see?”
“Why don’t you just tell me?”
He grinned. “Nah, see, this time the law’s on my side. I’m their star witness against your boy.”
“You don’t feel any guilt that an innocent person might get convicted for something he didn’t do?”
“Shit, I don’t care if he did it or not. I’m getting cut a sweet-ass deal. Witness protection, the works, baby.”
“Witness protection? Not just for this case. Who else you ratting on?”
“Don’t worry ’bout it. Ain’t up to you.”
I nodded, looking down to his shoes—alligator leather, expensive, and without a scuff on them. My shoes looked like they had been on a marathon through a forest. Whoever said crime didn’t pay didn’t get out much.
“You and I both know he’s innocent, Salvador. Don’t do this to him.”
He rose. “Shit, girl, it’s done. Don’t care if he’s innocent.”
I waited until he was out of the room, took the digital recorder from my breast pocket and hit the “Stop” button.
After Coltrane, whose testimony only lasted ten minutes since I wasn’t denying the drugs were cocaine, Kevin got up there. I didn’t want a repeat of his emotional outburst at the preliminary hearing, so I kept my cross-examination minimal. A few questions about the gym bag and Teddy not playing sports: since Sandy hadn’t drawn much attention to the FHY logo, I treaded lightly. A few more questions about Kevin’s marijuana use, which he fully admitted and which caused Sandy to look like she was going to kill him. Guess she didn’t cover that little tidbit in his interviews.
After ten minutes I sat down. Kevin was too believable to allow him much more time with the jury.
After Kevin, Salvador was sworn in. He had the goofiest grin up there, as if he were the Lord’s chosen, doing God’s work here on Earth. He felt self-righteous about this whole thing, and that was the worst part of it: he
thought he was doing good.
Sandy asked his name and background and then paused a moment before going into the case. She was debating something, deciding which line of questioning to follow, and I didn’t know why. The events of that night were straightforward; what topics did she have to stay away from?
“Describe the events of April second, Mr. Zamora.”
“Yeah, it’s really simple. Like that dude, Teddy, called me up and said he had a bag for me. I told him cool and that was it. Then I called Detective Steed. I told him I had someone doing a sell, and he said he was interested in being there.”
“How did you know what Teddy was talking about when he called you?”
“He done it before.”
“How many times?”
“Five, six times I think.”
How could someone get up there and lie with a straight face like that about a kid? I wanted to run over and punch him in the liver. Instead, I had to do what I told my clients to do when they were upset and a jury was watching their every move: scribble down cuss words on the legal pad in front of you.
“So you knew him as someone who frequently sold narcotics to you?”
“Oh, yeah. Always coke. I told him we needed other shit, but he never messed with that stuff. Just the coke.”
“How did he make contact with you?”
“He’d call me.”
“Do you have evidence of these calls?”
He shook his head. “Nah. It wouldn’t do nothin’, anyway. He’d call from libraries or from like, 7-Elevens and shit like that.”
“And what did he say when he called you that night, April second?”
“Um, he just said how many kilos he had and that he’d find a ride down that night. That was it.”
“He didn’t say anything else?”
“Nope. That’s how it always was, though. He don’t talk much.”
“Do you remember the dates of the previous purchases of cocaine you made?”
“Nah. Like, every three months or some shit.”
Sandy, I could tell, grew uncomfortable with the profanity. Her back stiffened and her jaw muscles flexed. I wondered if I could get Salvador to explode on the stand in a flurry of expletives and make Sandy squirm.
“What would you do with the cocaine?”
“We had a guy who had the hookup in Phoenix. A stash house is what you’d call it. He’d take the dope and spread it around. I was just the delivery boy between Teddy and the guys. That’s it. I never sold the shit myself.”
“Did Mr. Thorne ever explain to you where he was getting the coke from?”
He shook his head. “Nah. I didn’t ask, neither. He would call, say how many kilos he had, and then tell me when he was gonna drop it off.”
“Mr. Zamora, we have charged Mr. Thorne with a serious crime. Your testimony here is helping our case against him. Are you absolutely certain it was Mr. Thorne who called you and told you he had the cocaine to sell?”
“Yeah, I recognize his voice from the other times.”
“And are you certain it was Mr. Thorne who showed up with the bag of cocaine on April second?”
“Yeah. Him and this other dude. But Teddy was holding the bag with all the coke.”
Sandy lifted the gym bag. “This bag?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you see the cocaine he was going to sell you?”
“Yup, the cops opened up the bag and I saw the bricks.”
“And is this,” she said, waving her hand over the bricks of cocaine, “the cocaine Mr. Thorne was going to sell you that night?”
“Yup, looks like it.”
“Thank you for your cooperation in this matter, Mr. Zamora.”
Sandy sat down.
So . . . that was what she’d been debating. Not a single question about how Salvador and Teddy had come into contact the first time.
I rose. “Mr. Zamora, how did you and Teddy first meet?”
“I don’t remember.”
I stepped between him and the lectern and stared into his eyes. “You’re a drug smuggler, right? Not a drug dealer?”
“That’s right.”
“Pretty successful drug smuggler, from what I hear.”
“Yeah, I do a’ight.”
“How many times have you smuggled drugs to that stash house in Phoenix, do you think?”
“I don’t know. Too many to count.” He was almost glowing with pride.
“Would you say you’re the most successful drug smuggler in this state?”
You could always rely on pride to give you the answers you were looking for.
“Most def.”
“What were your impressions of my client the first time you met him?”
“Don’t know. Nothin’ really.”
“Nothing stuck out to you about him?”
“I thought he might be retarded.”
“You thought he might be retarded. So, how does someone who is mentally incapacitated to the level of a child meet up with the most successful drug smuggler in the state?”
I sneaked in the “to the level of a child” and was waiting for the objection, but it never came.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t remember.”
“Oh, but that seems like such an interesting story. You don’t think it’s odd that you don’t remember how you met the one mentally disabled kid in the country who magically has access to dump-truck loads of cocaine?”
“Objection, Your Honor,” Sandy said.
“Sustained.”
I moved closer to Zamora. “What are you getting in exchange for testifying against Teddy?”
He looked toward Sandy.
“Don’t look at her. I asked you the question. What are you getting?”
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sandy give him a slow nod.
“They dismissing my case and putting me in witness protection.”
“Wow. A free pass for the most successful drug smuggler in the state. That is quite a bargain for testifying against a handicapped kid, isn’t it?”
He didn’t say anything, though he certainly looked like he wanted to. He had probably been instructed that he couldn’t discuss anyone else he would be testifying against.
I’d played with him enough. Time to pull out the big guns.
“Mr. Zamora, you know my client is innocent, don’t you?”
“I don’t know that.”
“Really? You’ve never said to me that he’s innocent?”
“No.”
“We just had a conversation outside, do you remember that conversation?”
“Yeah,” he said, shifting in his chair. “You asked me a buncha questions and I said I didn’t know.”
“That’s it? That’s all you said?”
“Yeah.”
I took out the digital recorder from my pocket and hit “Play.”
What’re you gonna say up there today?
Why don’t you wait and see?
Salvador looked like he needed a new pair of underwear.
“Objection!” Sandy shrieked. “Approach.”
I stopped the recording and we came up in front of the judge. Sandy started in without taking a breath.
“Your Honor, she recorded a conversation with my witness without telling me and without telling him. I need a copy of the recording and notice of her intent to use it, at the very least. She can’t just spring it on the jury out of nowhere.”
“It’s impeachment evidence, Your Honor. I can spring it anytime.”
Roscombe thought about it a moment and said, “It is impeachment evidence if he contradicts his earlier testimony. And I’d like to hear it myself. I’ll allow it.”
Whoa. Did hell finally have a snowstorm? Did piggies finally join the ranks of their fowl brethren? I couldn’t quite believe he’d actually ruled in my favor on an issue. I turned back to the jury and hit “Play” again.
The rest of the recording played out to them, and when it was over I turned to Zamora and said, “You kno
w this boy is innocent, and you’re still testifying to put him away. Hope the witness protection is worth it.”
I sat down. A little more dramatic than I normally liked, but it served my purposes. Besides, Zamora never actually said Teddy was innocent: that’s just how I liked it framed for the jury. Really all he did was hint that he knew more than he was letting on, so I didn’t want to overplay my hand.
I glanced at Sandy, who sat there staring into Zamora’s eyes like a witch about to cast a curse. I couldn’t even imagine the hell she had in store for him when this was over.
She rose. “You never actually said he was innocent, did you?”
“No,” Zamora said. “Because he’s not. I was just playing with that attorney. She came to my house and pissed me off. I’m telling you, though, that dude, Teddy, called me up a bunch of times and said he had coke. I don’t remember how we met. I think it was through one of my guys who works in Salt Lake at a lab or some shit. But it was him.”
Sandy slowly looked back at me. “No further questions, Your Honor.”
I watched the jury. They didn’t like Salvador.
I looked at Teddy who was staring down at his shoes and rocking back and forth restlessly. I put my hand on his back and for the first time in the trial felt like we might actually have a shot at this thing.
48
We took a break for a late lunch. We had blocked out two days for this trial, but it looked like it would finish by this afternoon, which wasn’t unusual on a Roscombe jury date. The one thing I could say about Roscombe was that he was efficient.
I bought a sandwich from a café up the street and sat at the counter by myself. I didn’t feel like eating, and just stared at the tuna fish in my sandwich and wondered what the little guy had been like in life.
The trial had gone as well as could be expected. I caught their star witness lying on the stand. He didn’t exactly say what I made it sound like he said on the recording, but he certainly didn’t say Teddy was guilty either. Hopefully, it would be enough to raise reasonable doubt with the jury. But it was never certain: he was a black kid being tried by an all-white jury in a county known for racial tension. We were playing roulette justice.
I pushed the sandwich away and wished I could have a beer instead. Then my phone rang. It was Jack.
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