Should have packed an overnight bag. She had made a serious allegation and she sure hoped she could substantiate it.
“I’m going to allow a limited review of the underlying judgment based on these specific allegations,” Amagosian said. “The transcript of the evidence taken in the Hawaii trial is hereby admitted along with the legal pleadings previously marked. I’m going to allow the three witnesses you requested, Ms. Reilly. Mr. Riesner, you will have the opportunity to rebut with independent testimony.
“Now. Having said that, I am also going to find at this time that the judgment creditor, Mr. Potter, has made a prima facie case that the judgment is valid and enforceable. Therefore, unless the presumption of validity is overcome by some very clear and convincing evidence of fraud, Ms. Reilly, the judgment will stand.”
“I understand, Your Honor.” The burden was on her. The stone had to be rolled uphill. Fair enough.
“I call Mr. Byron Eppley to the stand,” she said, and Deputy Kimura went outside to bring him in.
Eppley didn’t look good. The hair growing halfway down his neck looked unkempt. He overflowed from the witness chair. He wore a wrinkled black T-shirt, and Paul hadn’t been able to talk him out of sandals so well-worn they had taken on the shape of his foot. He looked around the courtroom, blinking, and when his eyes fell on Atchison Potter, who surely should patent that look of burning malice, he recoiled visibly.
“Good morning, Mr. Eppley,” Nina said.
Eppley mumbled something.
“Please be sure to speak up so the reporter can hear you,” Nina said.
“Good morning.”
“You are here voluntarily today? You have not been subpoenaed?”
“Yes. No.”
“You are not being paid for your testimony today in any way?”
“Well, you paid for the plane ticket. And the room at the Royal Valhalla last night. The breakfast was included, I guess.”
“Other than direct travel expenses, did you receive any other payment from me or anyone associated with this trip?”
“No.”
“All right. You knew Daniel Potter in Hawaii?”
“Yes. We roomed together before he got married. We were close friends, in the same department at UH.”
“How often did you see him in the months prior to his death on February seven last year?”
“Pretty much every day once the Christmas break ended.”
“Were you acquainted during that time with Atchison Potter, Dan Potter’s father?”
“No. Never met him, though Dan talked about him.” Avoiding that territory, which could inspire a blitz of hearsay objections, Nina went on, “Did you meet Mr. Potter after Dan Potter’s death?”
“Well, I saw him at the funeral. Then one more time, at the place where I worked in Honolulu. He came in with another man and ate dinner at a table where I was the waiter.”
“How soon was this after Dan Potter’s death?”
“I can’t remember exactly. Several months, maybe four or so. I had heard from Jessie that . . .”
“Never mind what you heard. Mr. Potter was sitting at one of your tables?”
“Yeah. He ordered the chicken Caesar salad. No wine. Then when he was finished, he stopped me as I was clearing the plates and said he wanted to talk to me for a minute. We weren’t very busy. I said sure. He introduced himself and I thought I should have known, because he looked a lot like Dan.”
“Then what happened?”
“Well, I said I felt lousy about Dan’s de—passing, and how smart he was and a good friend. And Mr. Potter was nodding and looking sad. We talked about what a good guy Dan was. Then Mr. Potter says, ‘By the way, you never saw Dan sick during his last months, did you?’ And he said it in this sort of new tone that made me wonder what—”
“Objection. Speculation.”
“Sustained. Strike the last sentence.”
“So he asked you if you ever saw Dan sick—”
“Objection. Misstates the testimony.”
“Withdrawn. What did you answer, if anything, to that question?”
“I started to say—”
“Objection. Nonresponsive. It doesn’t matter what he started to say, unless he said it.”
“Sustained. What did you answer?” Amagosian said, looking up from his notes.
“Well, I didn’t get a chance to say anything.”
“Nothing?”
“Not right then. He holds up a finger and he says, uh, ‘I know your circumstances, Byron, and I’m going to help you because you were Danny’s friend. I’m going to leave you a tip that’ll help.’ ”
“He kept you from responding to his question?” Nina asked.
“He held up his finger. Like this.” Byron held up a finger and everybody looked at it. Big deal, Riesner’s expression said. It didn’t look like Byron had been menaced or threatened by that finger. Nina was getting more uneasy with each answer.
“And did you understand that the tip he was going to leave was a quid pro quo for—”
“Objection,” Riesner said. “His understanding of the words spoken is irrelevant. The point is, what were the words.”
“It goes to his state of mind,” Nina said. “When he accepted the tip.”
“His state of mind is irrelevant,” Riesner said.
“I’ll sustain the objection,” Amagosian said. It was a blow. Byron had never actually opened his mouth and told Atchison Potter flatly that his son had, in fact, been sick. Nina had prepped him so she knew this.
“So he gave you this tip?”
“He was sitting right at the table and he handed me this envelope full of bills.”
“How much was this tip?”
“Five thousand dollars cash.”
Nina paused. There were whispers behind her. The implication was clear, but implications weren’t going to get Jessie out of this judgment.
“Were you accustomed to receiving such large tips?”
“Twenty dollars was the biggest tip I had ever gotten.”
“So the amount of the tip was entirely out of proportion to the services you had rendered as a waiter?”
“Definitely.”
“What if anything did you say upon receiving this large sum of money?”
“Well, I looked at him and I said, ‘Okay, what do I have to do for it?’ ”
“Did he respond?”
“He smiled and said, ‘We’ll be in touch.’ Then they left.”
“Was he subsequently in touch?”
“Not him specifically. One of his lawyers came over one night and handed me a subpoena to testify in the court case against Jessie. He said, ‘Now, as I understand it, you never saw Dan Potter sick. He never looked sick, never talked about being sick. Is that correct?’ ”
“And did you subsequently testify exactly that at the court trial?”
“Yes. I’m ashamed to say I did.” He looked directly at Jessie as he said this.
“And was that testimony truthful?”
“No.”
“Speak up, Mr. Eppley,” Nina said.
“No. I lied. The truth is that Dan really was sick. About two weeks before he died he told me one day in class that he was really sick and missed two days of school the week before. He thought he had appendicitis or something, and he had to go to the doctor. He told me it was the second time this had happened to him and the pain was excruciating.”
“And did you tell the judge in Hawaii any of this?”
“No. I knew what I was supposed to say.” Nina glanced at Riesner, who was smiling incredulously. It’s going to be a rough cross-exam, she thought.
And it was. Riesner got up and adjusted his lapels.
“Let’s start with the dinner,” he said. “Mr. Potter and his associate sat down at one of your tables and Mr. Potter identified himself and you talked about his son, Dan. Correct so far?”
“Yes.”
“Mr. Potter said he knew your circumstances and he was going to help yo
u because you were Dan’s friend.
Right?” Nina was checking her notes. That was exactly what Potter had said, so she couldn’t object.
“That’s right.”
“Did he help you?”
“Well, he gave me five thousand dollars.”
“Was that helpful to you?”
“Very. I needed it for tuition fees.”
“Did he say anything along the lines of ‘This money is a bribe for you to lie in court’?”
“No. But I knew he wanted something from me.”
“And how did you know that?”
“Because I said, ‘What do I have to do for it?’ And he said I’d be hearing from him.”
“So?”
“Well, I heard from him. I heard from his lawyer. I heard what I was supposed to testify.”
“Really. You heard what you were supposed to testify. The lawyer asked you if it was correct that you had no information that Dan Potter was ever sick—”
“Objection. Misstates the testimony,” Nina said.
The testimony was read back. Atchison Potter’s lawyer had been very careful to phrase the information in the form of a question.
Riesner barked, “And you lied to that lawyer, didn’t you!”
“A lie I knew he wanted to hear.”
“Move to strike that last remark! Speculation!” Riesner shouted.
“Sustained,” Amagosian said.
“You told him Dan Potter was never sick?”
“Yes.”
“That was a lie?”
“Yes.”
“All right. And then you repeated that lie in court? You perjured yourself?”
“I did. I’m very sorry I did.”
“But Atchison Potter never asked you to lie?”
“Not in so many words. C’mon, I knew. . . .”
“You’ve told us everything he said?”
“Yes.”
“How do you feel about Mr. Potter today, as we sit here in court?”
“I despise him,” Eppley said. “And I despise myself for getting mixed up in this.”
“You took his money but you despise him for trying to help you,” Riesner said as if to himself, shaking his head wonderingly.
“No editorial comments are necessary, Counsel,” Amagosian said.
“Sorry, Judge. It’s just—I’m afraid I was carried away with indignation. . . .”
“Move on, Counsel.”
“What did you do with the money, exactly?” Riesner said. “Did you deposit it in a bank account?”
“N-no.”
“Well, what did you do with it?”
“Kept it at home.”
“Let’s see, how much was your tuition for that semester?”
“Two thousand five hundred.”
“Did you pay it with that money?”
“Yes.”
“Did you pay with a check?”
“No. I paid a friend back some money I owed him and then I borrowed from him again. He wrote the check.”
“You paid your friend in cash?”
“Yes.”
“And how do we know that?” Riesner said. “How do we know any of this crazy story is true? How do we know you ever received any money from my client?”
“That’s why he paid cash,” Eppley said. “So it wouldn’t be traceable.”
“Sure. And that’s why you can’t show us a deposit slip, any record at all, to prove independently that you ever received this money?”
“There was another man there with him,” Eppley said stubbornly. Nina did the squirm thing.
“So, he’s here no doubt to prove your story since you acknowledge you’re a liar? What’s his name?”
“I haven’t got a clue.”
“What did you do with the rest of the money?”
“I spent it. On living expenses.”
“Paid for things in cash?”
“Right.” Eppley’s head was hanging low.
“You’re not exactly a solid citizen, Mr. Eppley, are you? Excuse me, got carried away, withdraw that question. Your family is from Tonga?”
“Yes.”
“You are a citizen, by the way? A U.S. citizen?”
“Yes.” Eppley gripped the witness stand and Nina thought, Oh, no.
“In fact, you’ve just committed some more perjury, haven’t you?”
Eppley said nothing.
“You’re not a citizen, but you claimed you were when you applied to the University of Hawaii, didn’t you?” Riesner picked up a pile of official-looking papers. He passed some copies over to Nina and gave copies to the clerk and said, “Mark for identification.”
And then he gave the marked exhibit to Byron Eppley and forced him to admit that he had lied about his citizenship to get into the Applied Linguistics program at UH. Paul had his head in his hands. Obviously Eppley hadn’t mentioned this to him.
He hadn’t told Nina this either. She had asked him whether there was anything in his circumstances that could hurt him.
Eppley was a liar and his testimony was useless. And Riesner knew it. As a hound releases the mangled bird at the foot of his master, Riesner deposited Eppley, limp and half dead, in front of Amagosian.
Amagosian said to his reporter and the clerk, “Have the district attorney’s office look at this witness’s testimony over the lunch hour. I want a decision as to whether perjury charges should be brought against him before he leaves California. I want a copy of the testimony forwarded to the Circuit Court in Honolulu that originally heard this case. And I want a copy sent to the registrar’s office of the University of Hawaii. Ms. Reilly.”
“Yes, Your Honor?”
“I hold you responsible for keeping that witness here in town until a decision has been made whether to arrest him.”
“I will do what I can, Your Honor.”
“You have his return ticket?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t let him have it.” He looked at his watch. “We will take the morning break at this time.”
They all rose as he disappeared behind his private door. Eppley, dismissed, got up and left the courtroom, not looking at anyone.
“I’ll tear him apart,” Paul fumed in Nina’s ear.
“Shh.”
Riesner chose this moment to walk over to Nina and say, “Gotcha, you little bitch,” in a low voice. Paul grabbed him by his expensive lapels and pulled him close. Riesner let out a half-strangled chuckle. A flash memorialized them as a camera went off. Then Deputy Kimura appeared at Paul’s side, hand on his holster.
Paul let Riesner go. Riesner turned his back and went back to collect his client, dusting off his lapels. Laughing all the way, ha, ha, ha.
22
“CALL DR. JUSTIN Jun.”
Today Dan Potter’s doctor looked like a man who could stand up to some pressure, unlike Eppley, who had squished like a banana under a tank tread. Sporting a tailored suit, polished shoes, and an assured walk, he took on power and weight.
But Dr. Jun had a lot less on Atchison Potter. Eppley had been bribed. Jun had merely been subjected to a legal technique common to witnesses in default hearings: he had been distorted. His testimony alone wouldn’t overturn the judgment.
Eppley had been a stinging blow. Nina felt herself flinch as she mentally relived the savagery attending his demolition. The little guy often didn’t win, because often his witnesses were not impressive. Poor people seldom made it to adulthood without having at least one brush with the law that made them look like flakes or worse on cross-examination.
Mel Akers, her old boss back in San Francisco, used to say that poor people made poor witnesses. “Of course they do,” he would say in his soft controlled voice. “They have had poor educations, poor stability, poor pay. Worst of all, they’ve been involved with bureaucracies all their lives. The bureaucracies hound them as much as help them, and they document everything.”
So what if Eppley had lied to UH? Who knew what bureaucratic obstacles had stymied his
family when they tried to become citizens? He wanted a graduate degree. He lived in Hawaii. He couldn’t attend college without lying, so he lied. He accepted a bribe, yes, but he was trying to make that right.
Nina wasn’t angry at him, but she was angry.
She admitted it to herself. She wanted to win partly because she wanted to beat Riesner. It was personal. But angry lawyers make mistakes. She would have to be careful. Paul, sitting at her right again, rubbing a fist with his other hand, was angry too and wasn’t always careful. This worried her.
She took Jun through his education and experience as a gastroenterologist. Jun’s parents had come from Seoul before Jun was born. They had died soon after, but they had left Jun with an extended family who took good care of him. Jun had gone to Notre Dame.
First she established the approach that had been made to Jun by Potter’s Hawaii lawyer: that he was tangential; that the unspecified evidence that Jessie had caused her husband’s death was overwhelming; that he would be paid a high fee as an expert witness.
Then she took him through the two visits Dan Potter had made to him, the young man’s symptoms, and the tests he had run. Jun made it plain that he had observed Dan Potter in severe pain on two occasions.
“Now. With reference to the questions and your answers on page 34, commencing at line 13 of the trial transcript.” Jun read through the sequence from the Hawaii proceeding. Judge Amagosian and Riesner were also reading from their copies.
Nina quoted, “ ‘Question by Ms. Anzai: Well, it sounds like you performed every test you could think of on this young man, didn’t you?’ ”
“ ‘Answer by Dr. Jun: No. I performed the tests that I felt would be most likely to reveal the problem.’ ”
“ ‘Question: And all you found was this slight elevation in inflammatory parameters, as you put it?’ ”
“ ‘Answer: Correct.’ ”
“ ‘Question: But you say that this young man was in severe pain! Severe, right?’ ”
Writ of Execution Page 28