Clifford Irving's Legal Novels - 01 - TRIAL - a Legal Thriller

by Clifford Irving

  Warren walked slowly to the rear of the courtroom where Johnnie Faye Boudreau waited for him in her cherry-red suit and white hat. She had just finished touching up her lipstick.

  "That was boring," she said.

  "I suppose so. What are you doing here?"

  "You're my lawyer, I came to watch you at work. When do you get to strut your stuff?"

  "After lunch. You'll be disappointed."

  "That remains to be seen. Let's go."

  "Where?"

  "Lunch."

  "No thanks."

  "That's dumb," Johnnie Faye said. "A lady and a client offers to take you to lunch, you should do it. I know you're not exactly crazy about me, but we're going to see a lot of each other. It won't hurt you to be civil. Besides, I want to find out how you're doing with your wife. And I want to talk about the case. My case."

  "I'm on this case now. When I want to talk to you about yours, I'll call you and we'll meet in my office."

  "You are mean," she said, touching his arm. Her lips made a little pouting motion, a moue. She was flirting with him, he realized. He could hardly believe it. His bile rose; he was ready to hit her.

  "You're insane," he said.

  Before he turned his back and walked away, he saw a quick and exacting look in her eye, the look that Clyde Ott may have seen more than once, or that she may have cast from a distance at Sharon Ott and then from more intimate quarters at her useful boyfriend, Dink. She could easily kill me. She's capable of it, he realized. Like them, I know too much. Then the expression vanished and her eye was as flat as stone. Her blue-gray eye.

  ===OO=OOO=OO===

  She was back in her seat at the rear of the courtroom for his cross of the widow Trunh.

  Warren was aware of time pressure, as if he were in a chess match and had squandered most of his allotted minutes with the opening moves. After voir dire he and Nancy Goodpaster had discussed the trial sequence. "I'll finish by Tuesday," Goodpaster promised, "so you've got until Thursday lunch break for your witnesses. The judge will charge the jury the minute you're done, and they'll start to deliberate right away. She'll keep them here as late as necessary on Thursday evening until they reach a verdict." Friday, the jury would decide on the punishment: life or death. On Friday evening Judge Parker would fly to Hawaii.

  Warren shook his head in disgust. "You're assuming they'll come in with a guilty verdict."

  Goodpaster nodded soberly. "Yes, I am."

  With all that in mind, and more, Warren stood and faced Mai Thi Trunh.

  The theft of Dan Ho's wallet was what turned simple murder into capital murder. The key to the widow's testimony was her statement that her husband had taken the wallet with him on the morning of his death. She hadn't seen him pick it up from the bureau and put it in his back pocket. "But he always did," she said, during Goodpaster's direct examination.

  Circumstantial evidence, a leap of logic leading to: if the wallet wasn't discovered at home, Dan Ho must have had it with him when he was murdered. But perhaps during the course of the day he had been pickpocketed, or inadvertently dropped it in the street. Who could prove otherwise? And perhaps Mrs. Trunh was mistaken. The wallet might still be in the house, under a pile of shirts or in a hiding place she didn't know of. She couldn't swear under oath that there was no such hiding place. Warren might move the widow to say, several times, "I don't know," or, "Yes, that is possible." On cross-examination you were permitted to lead a witness and seize control.

  But Dan Ho Trunh did take the wallet, Warren believed. Mrs. Trunh wasn't mistaken.

  "The defense has no questions," he said.

  "You may step down," Judge Parker said to Mrs. Trunh. She threw a brief smile in Warren's direction. Smart lawyering, counselor. And I'll make my plane.

  Nancy Goodpaster rose eagerly. "The state calls its last witness — Mrs. Siva Singh."

  Behind her eyeglasses the Indian woman looked nervous. That wouldn't hurt her, Warren thought. The jury could identify with nervous witnesses who were decent people and had become involved with a crime through no fault of their own. Goodpaster gave her some time to develop a rapport with the jurors, asking about her background and her family and her job. She had been born in Jaipur; she was forty-one years old and had two children. She and her husband had emigrated to the United States twelve years ago. They spent three years in Burlington, Vermont — "it was jolly cold indeed" — then moved to Texas. They owned the dry cleaners on Wesleyan. Her husband worked in the back. He also did tailoring. "Very fine work," she said, "at reasonable prices."

  Some jurors laughed.

  Pleased, Goodpaster got down to business. "Mrs. Singh, please tell us where you were on the evening of May 19."

  In the Wesleyan Laundry & Dry Cleaners. Her husband was there too, doing some rush orders for dry cleaning.

  "On that evening, did a Mrs. Rona Morrison enter your store?"

  Siva Singh described how Rona Morrison — "a satisfied customer for many years" — had come in to drop off her dry cleaning, exited, and a minute later, in the parking lot, screamed. Singh had hurried outside to find Mrs. Morrison on her knees by the side of a parked station wagon. After she had seen the bleeding body of a man inside the car, she had brought Mrs. Morrison inside and called the police.

  "Now let's back up a bit," Goodpaster said. "Did anything unusual happen prior to Mrs. Morrison's scream and your discovery of the body?"

  "Yes indeed. I was working in the back of the Wesleyan Laundry & Dry Cleaners when there was a noise, which I later understood had been a gunshot. I returned to the front of the store."

  "From behind the counter you had a clear view of the parking lot?" Goodpaster asked.

  "Quite clear."

  "Please tell the jury what you saw."

  "A man stood by the station wagon—"

  "The same station wagon in which you and Mrs. Morrison later found the body?"

  "The same. He was perhaps thirty or forty feet away from my point of observation. He seemed to be leaning in the window, or perhaps he had already leaned in the window and was just, how shall I say, straightening up from doing so. I am not precisely sure. Then he turned and ran away. Rather rapidly, if I may say so."

  "You may say whatever you please, Mrs. Singh, provided it's an accurate recollection." Goodpaster looked at her soberly, then asked, "When the man turned to run, did he turn toward you, or away from you?"

  "Most definitely toward me, so that I was given the opportunity to see his face."

  "You saw it clearly?"

  "Quite clearly."

  "Can you describe him to us, Mrs. Singh?"

  "He was about five feet nine or five feet ten inches tall, with long dark hair, and wore just a pair of trousers with a shirt. He wore no jacket. He looked to be poor and homeless. He was white, not black. He seemed most certainly to be Hispanic."

  Goodpaster hesitated a moment, and Warren wrote a note on his pad. He wondered again: who was the man in the parking lot? Weeks ago in the early evening he had made the rounds of all the shops in the mall, asking if anyone had seen such a man on the night in question. No one could recall anyone. Did anyone habitually hang around the mall at night? Just an occasional wino. None of the clerks or store owners remembered any one of them in particular.

  Siva Singh had seen someone, he didn't doubt it, but not Hector Quintana. Johnnie Faye had been in her car, and even if she had stepped out of it for a moment, there was no way she could be mistaken for a man. Some passerby, he decided, who had seen the body, become frightened, then bolted. Still, that didn't account for the missing wallet.

  "When the police came," Goodpaster asked, "what did you tell them?"

  "Precisely what I have told you. I narrated these events. I described the man I had seen running away so rapidly."

  "The following day, Mrs. Singh, when you were asked to appear at the Harris County Jail, please tell us what happened."

  Siva Singh described the police lineup. Six men were paraded before her. She
saw them full face and in profile for several minutes. She identified one of them as the man whom she had seen running away the night before.

  "You were certain it was the same man?"

  "Quite certain."

  "I have just one more question. Do you see that man in this courtroom today?"

  "I do indeed."

  "Point to him and describe him, please."

  She pointed toward the defense table. "He is wearing a white shirt and blue single-breasted suit."

  Goodpaster smiled in embarrassment, and said firmly, "Mrs. Singh, there are two men at the defense table wearing white shirts and single-breasted blue suits. Can you be more specific as to which one you saw in the parking lot?"

  The jury began to titter. From the back of the courtroom, Johnnie Faye Boudreau brayed a laugh. Judge Parker raised her eyes comically toward the ceiling.

  Warren, the second man in the blue suit, had almost laughed too, but he clamped his lips shut to stifle it. Siva Singh and Hector Quintana were the only ones who neither laughed nor smiled.

  Mrs. Singh threw a hand to her open mouth and rose slightly in the witness chair. Then she tore her hand away and stabbed it toward Hector. "I am mortified! It is he! The man in the blue tie! I do not know the man wearing the yellow paisley."

  The jurors' laughter surged back for a moment, then ebbed away. The judge tapped her gavel.

  "Let the record reflect," Goodpaster said gravely, "that the witness has identified the defendant, Hector Quintana."

  "Let the record so reflect," said Judge Parker, nodding at the court reporter.

  Laughter can kill too, Warren thought.

  ===OO=OOO=OO===

  He rose to face Siva Singh. At first he kept a good distance away, stationing himself on the other side of the courtroom from the jury so that Singh, if she focused on her interrogator, would not be able to look directly at them.

  The key to any cross-examination was control. In direct examination of a friendly witness, a good attorney would efface himself and ask questions that allowed long answers. He wanted the witness to be in control, to elaborate, to mesmerize the jury and make them believe. Cross was more of a duel. One or the other, attorney or witness, would dominate. The most difficult witness to dominate was a sincere witness. You could too easily be embarrassed by that sincerity and appear to be a bully.

  Softly, softly, catchee monkey…

  He introduced himself to Mrs. Singh, even though he had already done so during his aborted interview at the Wesleyan Laundry & Dry Cleaners. "Please forgive me," he said pleasantly, "for confusing you today by wearing the same color suit as my client."

  "It is I who ask your forgiveness," Siva Singh said, blushing.

  "And you have it, ma'am."

  Singh smiled in gratitude. He saw that she had been frightened of him. And that was no longer true.

  "This isn't the first time we've met, is it?" Warren asked.

  "No."

  "I came to talk to you some weeks ago at your place of business, isn't that so?"

  "Yes, that is true," Singh said unhappily. She lifted her eyeglasses and scratched her nose.

  "I wanted to discuss this case, do you remember?"

  "At the time, that is what I presumed."

  "And you wouldn't discuss it with me, because you were under the mistaken impression that Ms. Goodpaster, the prosecutor, had forbidden you to do so. Isn't that true?"

  "That is so. I apologize, sir."

  "No, Mrs. Singh, again it's I who should apologize. I should have got Ms. Goodpaster to call you and explain that you were at liberty to talk to me. And then I should have gone to talk to you. But I was very busy. Please forgive me."

  Singh showed white and perfect teeth. Her dark brown eyes glittered.

  "Your eyeglasses are for distance, aren't they?" Warren asked, remembering how she had taken them off to reach into her pocketbook for Goodpaster's business card.

  "Oh, yes. And with them, if I may say so, I can see perfectly."

  "Can you see at a distance without them?"

  "Quite well."

  Warren frowned. "Were you wearing them on the night of May 19 when you saw the man leaning into the station wagon and then running away into the darkness?"

  "Indeed, yes, I was wearing them," Singh said gravely, "or I would not have seen him as clearly as I did."

  Warren thought for a moment, then moved a few feet closer to her.

  "Ma'am, what is your native language?"

  "Hindi," Singh said, a little surprised, and suddenly wary. "But of course as a child in Jaipur I learned English."

  "In school?"

  "Yes."

  "And you speak it perfectly. English English, not American English, correct?"

  The wariness vanished. "Indeed, yes," Singh said, smiling.

  "If you'd indulge me, ma'am, I'd like you to shut your eyes for a moment and then answer a question."

  Obediently, Siva Singh shut her eyes.

  Warren said, "As best you recall, how tall am I?"

  "Objection!" Goodpaster cried.

  Before the judge could rule, Siva Singh's eyes flew open.

  "Withdraw the question," Warren said.

  He began to move about the room, pacing. The eyes of the jurors followed him. He halted when he was close to the jury box.

  "Mrs. Singh, before the police arrived to talk to you on the evening of May 19, did you tell either your husband or Mrs. Morrison that you'd seen a man running away from that station wagon in the darkness?"

  "Indeed, I told my husband. My customer Mrs. Morrison was much too upset to talk to. I would describe her as hysterical."

  "I would appreciate it," Warren said gently, "if you would just answer my questions without adding your impressions. If the question calls for a yes or no answer, just answer yes or no."

  "Forgive me," the Indian woman said.

  "Nothing to forgive, ma'am. It's a common mistake. Now, before the police came, you told your husband you had seen the man running away. Did you at that time describe the man to your husband?"

  "No, not then. Later I told him that—" She stopped, biting her lip; she had almost done it again. Warren gave her a reassuring look.

  "Did you describe him to your husband later, after the police had gone?"

  "Yes."

  "In detail?"

  "Yes, I believe so."

  "Do you recall what words you used when you described him to your husband? Just answer yes or no, ma'am."

  "Yes."

  "Please tell the jury what you said to your husband, Mrs. Singh."

  Thankful not to have to respond yes or no, she thought a moment, then looked at the nearest juror and said: "I told my husband that the man was perhaps five feet nine inches tall. That he had long dark hair. That he wore just a pair of trousers with a shirt. That he did not wear a jacket. That he appeared to be a poor and homeless fellow. That he was white, not black. That he was most certainly Hispanic, and that I had never seen him before in my life."

  Warren waited as long as he dared for it to register.

  Then he said, "Mrs. Singh, aren't those just about the exact words, with the phrases in exactly the same order, that you used to describe this man to the police when they arrived?"

  "Perhaps. That may be so," Mrs. Singh said.

  "I can ask the court to provide you with a copy of your statement to the police. It may refresh your memory. Would you like me to do that, Mrs. Singh?"

  "That is not necessary," she replied.

  "Are they just about the same words and the exact order of phrases?"

  "Most probably," Singh managed.

  "And in this courtroom today, when the prosecutor asked you to describe the man you saw running away from the car in the darkness, didn't you use the exact same words and order of phrases that the police copied down as your sworn statement?"

  "Most probably," Singh said again.

  "Do you have a copy, either here or at home, of your sworn statement to the police?" />
  "Yes."

  "Have you memorized it? Word for word? Phrase for phrase, in the right order, so that there would be no discrepancies?"

  "I don't understand," Singh said helplessly.

  "Would you like the court reporter to read back my question?"

  "No."

  "Then please answer it, ma'am. If you can."

  "I cannot," Singh said.

  "Why not?"

  "I did not memorize it, sir. But I studied it."

  He had got away with that last one, he realized, breaking the cardinal rule of never asking a hostile witness a question that began with why. But no matter how she answered, she had still memorized. That she was a hostile witness Warren had never doubted. The creed of all courtroom combat was: if you are not for me, you are against me.

  He moved to the other side of the courtroom, next to Hector Quintana. The jurors' eyes followed him carefully.

  "Mrs. Singh, when you talked to the police and described the man whom you saw running away, you said: 'I thought he might have been Hispanic' — isn't that so? Just yes or no, please."

  "Yes."

  "And then to my colleague, Ms. Goodpaster, earlier today in this courtroom, didn't you say: 'He seemed most certainly to be Hispanic'?"

  "Yes."

  "And a few moments ago, when you were relating to the jury what you told your husband, you said: 'He was most certainly Hispanic.' Didn't you, Mrs. Singh?"

  "I may have done so."

  "Isn't it a fact that with each description, as time moves on, you grow more positive?"

  "Objection," Goodpaster called out sharply, a little desperately. "Badgering the witness!"

  "Overruled," Judge Parker said, to Warren's surprise. "You may answer, Mrs. Singh."

  "I do not know the correct answer," Singh said.

  "Isn't it a fact," Warren said quietly, "that when you saw the defendant sitting in this courtroom today, that was the precise moment you decided that the man you saw running away from the car was definitely a Hispanic?"

  "That is not actually a fact," she said, glowering.

  "What is a Hispanic, Mrs. Singh?"

  "A person from Latin America, sir."

  "How would you describe such a person physically?"