The Lincoln Lawyer Collection

by Connelly, Michael

  Roulet leaned toward me and whispered, “What the fuck was that?”

  Without responding I turned my back to him and took a scan around the courtroom. It was almost empty. Lankford and Sobel had not returned to the courtroom and the reporters were gone as well. That left only a few other onlookers. They appeared to be a disparate collection of retirees, law students and lawyers resting their feet until their own hearings began in other courtrooms. But I was counting on one of these onlookers being a plant from the DA’s office. Ted Minton might be flying solo but my guess was that his boss would have a means of keeping tabs on him and the case. I knew I was playing as much to the plant as I was to the jury. By the trial’s end I needed to send a note of panic down to the second floor that would then echo back to Minton. I needed to push the young prosecutor toward taking a desperate measure.

  The afternoon dragged on. Minton still had a lot to learn about pacing and jury management, knowledge that comes only with courtroom experience. I kept my eyes on the jury box — where the real judges sat — and saw the jurors were growing bored as witness after witness offered testimony that filled in small details in the prosecutor’s linear presentation of the events of March 6. I asked few questions on cross and tried to keep a look on my face that mirrored those I saw in the jury box.

  Minton obviously wanted to save his most powerful stuff for day two. He would have the lead investigator, Detective Martin Booker, to bring all the details together, and then the victim, Regina Campo, to bring it all home to the jury. It was a tried-and-true formula — ending with muscle and emotion — and it worked ninety percent of the time, but it was making the first day move like a glacier.

  Things finally started to pop with the last witness of the day. Minton brought in Charles Talbot, the man who had picked up Regina Campo at Morgan’s and gone with her to her apartment on the night of the sixth. What Talbot had to offer to the prosecution’s case was negligible. He was basically hauled in to testify that Campo had been in good health and uninjured when he left her. That was it. But what caused his arrival to rescue the trial from the pit of boredom was that Talbot was an honest-to-God alternate lifestyle man and jurors always loved visiting the other side of the tracks.

  Talbot was fifty-five years old with dyed blond hair that wasn’t fooling anyone. He had blurred Navy tattoos on both forearms. He was twenty years divorced and owned a twenty-four-hour convenience store called Kwik Kwik. The business gave him a comfortable living and lifestyle with an apartment in the Warner Center, a late-model Corvette and a nightlife that included a wide sampling of the city’s professional sex providers.

  Minton established all of this in the early stages of his direct examination. You could almost feel the air go still in the courtroom as the jurors plugged into Talbot. The prosecutor then brought him quickly to the night of March 6, and Talbot described hooking up with Reggie Campo at Morgan’s on Ventura Boulevard.

  “Did you know Ms. Campo before you met her in the bar that night?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “How did it come about that you met her there?”

  “I just called her up and said I wanted to get together with her and she suggested we meet at Morgan’s. I knew the place, so I said sure.”

  “And how did you call her up?”

  “With the telephone.”

  Several jurors laughed.

  “I’m sorry. I understand that you used a telephone to call her. I meant how did you know how to contact her?”

  “I saw her ad on the website and I liked what I saw and so I went ahead and called her up and we made a date. It’s as simple as that. Her number is on her website ad.”

  “And you met at Morgan’s.”

  “Yes, that’s where she meets her dates, she told me. So I went there and we had a couple drinks and we talked and we liked each other and that was that. I followed her back to her place.”

  “When you went to her apartment did you engage in sexual relations?”

  “Sure did. That’s what I was there for.”

  “And you paid her?”

  “Four hundred bucks. It was worth it.”

  I saw a male juror’s face turning red and I knew I had pegged him perfectly during selection the week before. I had wanted him because he had brought a Bible with him to read while other prospective jurors were being questioned. Minton had missed it, focusing only on the candidates as they were being questioned. But I had seen the Bible and asked few questions of the man when it was his turn. Minton accepted him on the jury and so did I. I figured he would be easy to turn against the victim because of her occupation. His reddening face confirmed it.

  “What time did you leave her apartment?” Minton asked.

  “About five minutes before ten,” Talbot answered.

  “Did she tell you she was expecting another date at the apartment?”

  “No, she didn’t say anything about that. In fact, she was sort of acting like she was done for the night.”

  I stood up and objected.

  “I don’t think Mr. Talbot is qualified here to interpret what Ms. Campo was thinking or planning by her actions.”

  “Sustained,” the judge said before Minton could offer an argument.

  The prosecutor moved right along.

  “Mr. Talbot, could you please describe the physical state Ms. Campo was in when you left her shortly before ten o’clock on the night of March sixth?”

  “Completely satisfied.”

  There was a loud blast of laughter in the courtroom and Talbot beamed proudly. I checked the Bible man and it looked like his jaw was tightly clenched.

  “Mr. Talbot,” Minton said. “I mean her physical state. Was she hurt or bleeding when you left her?”

  “No, she was fine. She was okay. When I left her she was fit as a fiddle and I know because I had just played her.”

  He smiled, proud of his use of language. This time there was no laughter and the judge had finally had enough of his use of the double entendre. She admonished him to keep his more off-color remarks to himself.

  “Sorry, Judge,” he said.

  “Mr. Talbot,” Minton said. “Ms. Campo was not injured in any way when you left her?”

  “Nope. No way.”

  “She wasn’t bleeding?”

  “No.”

  “And you didn’t strike her or physically abuse her in any way?”

  “No again. What we did was consensual and pleasurable. No pain.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Talbot.”

  I looked at my notes for a few moments before standing up. I wanted a break of time to clearly mark the line between direct and cross-examination.

  “Mr. Haller?” the judge prompted. “Do you wish to cross-examine the witness?”

  I stood up and moved to the lectern.

  “Yes, Your Honor, I do.”

  I put my pad down and looked directly at Talbot. He was smiling pleasantly at me but I knew he wouldn’t like me for very long.

  “Mr. Talbot, are you right- or left-handed?”

  “I’m left-handed.”

  “Left-handed,” I echoed. “And isn’t it true that on the night of the sixth, before leaving Regina Campo’s apartment, she asked you to strike her with your fist repeatedly in the face?”

  Minton stood up.

  “Your Honor, there is no basis for this sort of questioning. Mr. Haller is simply trying to muddy the waters by taking outrageous statements and turning them into questions.”

  The judge looked at me and waited for a response.

  “Judge, it is part of the defense theory as outlined in my opening statement.”

  “I am going to allow it. Just be quick about it, Mr. Haller.”

  The question was read to Talbot and he smirked and shook his head.

  “That is not true. I’ve never hurt a woman in my life.”

  “You struck her with your fist three times, didn’t you, Mr. Talbot?”

  “No, I did not. That is a lie.”

  “You
said you have never hurt a woman in your life.”

  “That’s right. Never.”

  “Do you know a prostitute named Shaquilla Barton?”

  Talbot had to think before answering.

  “Doesn’t ring a bell.”

  “On the website where she advertises her services she uses the name Shaquilla Shackles. Does that ring a bell now, Mr. Talbot?”

  “Okay, yeah, I think so.”

  “Have you ever engaged in acts of prostitution with her?”

  “One time, yes.”

  “When was that?”

  “Would’ve been at least a year ago. Maybe longer.”

  “And did you hurt her on that occasion?”

  “No.”

  “And if she were to come to this courtroom and say that you did hurt her by punching her with your left hand, would she be lying?”

  “She damn sure would be. I tried her out and didn’t like that rough stuff. I’m strictly a missionary man. I didn’t touch her.”

  “You didn’t touch her?”

  “I mean I didn’t punch her or hurt her in any way.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Talbot.”

  I sat down. Minton did not bother with a redirect. Talbot was excused and Minton told the judge that he had only two witnesses remaining to present in the case but that their testimony would be lengthy. Judge Fullbright checked the time and recessed court for the day.

  Two witnesses left. I knew that had to be Detective Booker and Reggie Campo. It looked like Minton was going to go without the testimony of the jailhouse snitch he had stashed in the PTI program at County-USC. Dwayne Corliss’s name had never appeared on any witness list or any other discovery document associated with the prosecution of the case. I thought maybe Minton had found out what Raul Levin had found out about Corliss before Raul was murdered. Either way, it seemed apparent that Corliss had been dropped by the prosecution. And that was what I needed to change.

  As I gathered my papers and documents in my briefcase, I also gathered the resolve to talk to Roulet. I glanced over at him. He was sitting there waiting to be dismissed by me.

  “So what do you think?” I asked.

  “I think you did very well. More than a few moments of reasonable doubt.”

  I snapped the latches on the briefcase closed.

  “Today I was just planting seeds. Tomorrow they’ll sprout and on Wednesday they’ll bloom. You haven’t seen anything yet.”

  I stood up and lifted the briefcase off the table. It was heavy with all the case documents and my computer.

  “See you tomorrow.”

  I walked out through the gate. Cecil Dobbs and Mary Windsor were waiting for Roulet in the hallway near the courtroom door. As I came out they turned to speak to me but I walked on by.

  “See you tomorrow,” I said.

  “Wait a minute, wait a minute,” Dobbs called to my back.

  I turned around.

  “We’re stuck out here,” he said as he and Windsor walked to me. “How is it going in there?”

  I shrugged.

  “Right now it’s the prosecution’s case,” I answered. “All I’m doing is bobbing and weaving, trying to protect. I think tomorrow will be our round. And Wednesday we go for the knockout. I’ve got to go prepare.”

  As I headed to the elevator, I saw that a number of the jurors from the case had beaten me to it and were waiting to go down. The scorekeeper was among them. I went into the restroom next to the bank of elevators so I didn’t have to ride down with them. I put my briefcase on the counter between the sinks and washed my face and hands. As I stared at myself in the mirror I looked for signs of stress from the case and everything associated with it. I looked reasonably sane and calm for a defense pro who was playing both his client and the prosecution at the same time.

  The cold water felt good and I felt refreshed as I came out of the restroom, hoping the jurors had cleared out.

  The jurors were gone. But standing in the hallway by the elevator were Lankford and Sobel. Lankford was holding a folded sheaf of documents in one hand.

  “There you are,” he said. “We’ve been looking for you.”

  THIRTY

  The document Lankford handed me was a search warrant granting the police the authority to search my home, office and car for a .22 caliber Colt Woodsman Sport Model pistol with the serial number 656300081-52. The authorization said the pistol was believed to have been the murder weapon in the April 12 homicide of Raul A. Levin. Lankford had handed the warrant to me with a proud smirk on his face. I did my best to act like it was business as usual, the kind of thing I handled every other day and twice on Fridays. But the truth was, my knees almost buckled.

  “How’d you get this?” I said.

  It was a nonsensical response to a nonsensical moment.

  “Signed, sealed and delivered,” Lankford said. “So where do you want to start? You have your car here, right? That Lincoln you’re chauffeured around in like a high-class hooker.”

  I checked the judge’s signature on the last page and saw it was a Glendale muni-court judge I had never heard of. They had gone to a local who probably knew he’d need the police endorsement come election time. I started to recover from the shock. Maybe the search was a front.

  “This is bullshit,” I said. “You don’t have the PC for this. I could have this thing quashed in ten minutes.”

  “It looked pretty good to Judge Fullbright,” Lankford said.

  “Fullbright? What does she have to do with this?”

  “Well, we knew you were in trial, so we figured we ought to ask her if it was okay to drop the warrant on you. Don’t want to get a lady like that mad, you know. She said after court was over was fine by her — and she didn’t say shit about the PC or anything else.”

  They must have gone to Fullbright on the lunch break, right after I had seen them in the courtroom. My guess was, it had been Sobel’s idea to check with the judge first. A guy like Lankford would have enjoyed pulling me right out of court and disrupting the trial.

  I had to think quickly. I looked at Sobel, the more sympathetic of the two.

  “I’m in the middle of a three-day trial,” I said. “Any way we can put this on hold until Thursday?”

  “No fucking way,” Lankford answered before his partner could. “We’re not letting you out of our sight until we execute the search. We’re not going to give you the time to dump the gun. Now where’s your car, Lincoln lawyer?”

  I checked the authorization of the warrant. It had to be very specific and I was in luck. It called for the search of a Lincoln with the California license plate NT GLTY. I realized that someone must have written the plate down on the day I was called to Raul Levin’s house from the Dodgers game. Because that was the old Lincoln — the one I was driving that day.

  “It’s at home. Since I’m in trial I don’t use the driver. I got a ride in with my client this morning and I was just going to ride back with him. He’s probably waiting down there.”

  I lied. The Lincoln I had been driving was in the courthouse parking garage. But I couldn’t let the cops search it because there was a gun in a compartment in the backseat armrest. It wasn’t the gun they were looking for but it was a replacement. After Raul Levin was murdered and I’d found my pistol box empty, I asked Earl Briggs to get me a gun for protection. I knew that with Earl there would be no ten-day waiting period. But I didn’t know the gun’s history or registration and I didn’t want to find out through the Glendale Police Department.

  But I was in luck because the Lincoln with the gun inside wasn’t the one described in the warrant. That one was in my garage at home, waiting on the buyer from the limo service to come by and take a look at. And that would be the Lincoln that would be searched.

  Lankford grabbed the warrant out of my hand and shoved it into an inside coat pocket.

  “Don’t worry about your ride,” Lankford said. “We’re your ride. Let’s go.”

  On the way down and out of the courthouse, we
didn’t run into Roulet or his entourage. And soon I was riding in the back of a Grand Marquis, thinking that I had made the right choice when I had gone with the Lincoln. There was more room in the Lincoln and the ride was smoother.

  Lankford did the driving and I sat behind him. The windows were up and I could hear him chewing gum.

  “Let me see the warrant again,” I said.

  Lankford made no move.

  “I’m not letting you inside my house until I’ve had a chance to completely study the warrant. I could do it on the way and save you some time. Or . . .”

  Lankford reached inside his jacket and pulled out the warrant. He handed it over his shoulder to me. I knew why he was hesitant. Cops usually had to lay out their whole investigation in the warrant application in order to convince a judge of probable cause. They didn’t like the target reading it, because it gave away the store.

  I glanced out the window as we were passing the car lots on Van Nuys Boulevard. I saw a new model Town Car on a pedestal in front of the Lincoln dealership. I looked back down at the warrant, opened it to the summary section and read.

  Lankford and Sobel had started out doing some good work. I had to give them that. One of them had taken a shot — I was guessing Sobel — and put my name into the state’s Automated Firearm System and hit the lotto. The AFS computer said I was the registered owner of a pistol of the same make and model as the murder weapon.

  It was a smooth move but it still wasn’t enough to make probable cause. Colt made the Woodsman for more than sixty years. That meant there were probably a million of them out there and a million suspects who owned them.

  They had the smoke. They then rubbed other sticks together to make the required fire. The application summary stated that I had hidden from the investigators the fact that I owned the gun in question. It said I had also fabricated an alibi when initially interviewed about Levin’s death, then attempted to throw detectives off the track by giving them a phony lead on the drug dealer Hector Arrande Moya.

  Though motivation was not necessarily a subject needed to obtain a search warrant, the PC summary alluded to it anyway, stating that the victim — Raul Levin — had been extorting investigative assignments from me and that I had refused to pay him upon completion of those assignments.