The jurors seem relieved to get Arthur’s full attention again, even though they’re made uneasy by his evoking of a nearly barren planet. He asks them to imagine a world without bees, without pollinators, a silent world without the chirping of crickets, without birdsong, a monochrome world of plants that never flower . . . and bleaker yet, a toxic planet, massive crop failures, famine.
With a few brushstrokes, he conjures up a disaster scenario familiar to readers of apocalyptic novels — we’re asked to picture our great-great-grandchildren struggling to survive in pockets of civilization as desperate, armed mobs maraud and pillage and rape and murder.
“Mr. Khan railed about anarchy. We are not going there, he exclaimed. But if we can’t turn things around, that’s exactly where we’re going. The breakdown of civilization: that’s the anarchy we should fear, that’s the anarchy we must resist. And the trigger for that anarchy would be the mass extinction of pollinating insects. That’s your urgent, imminent peril, ladies and gentlemen, you can’t find anything more imminent than that, it’s going on now, and it’s accelerating like a runaway train.”
His deep voice fills this massive space: “There is no way out! Nothing has worked! Despite the pleas of scientists and the promises of politicians, despite school strikes, despite petitions and picketers and marches, the climate crisis accelerates. If all lawful options have been tried and failed, there’s no way out, ladies and gentlemen. There is no reasonable, credible, workable way out.”
He steps toward us, raises an arm as if to gather us into his embrace. “These men and women should not be prosecuted but applauded. The human testing program that Chemican tried to hide, the neural damage caused to Charlie Dover that they tried to bury — it’s out in the open now, thanks to the accused. It’s because of them we know that those allergic to Chemican’s ziegladoxin are in peril right now, not decades away. The threat is not just imminent, it’s immediate. And it’s nothing less than criminal that Vigor-Gro is still on the market. It’s outrageous that Chemican continues to deny the terrible dangers it poses, that they’re promoting it with full-page ads instead of issuing a worldwide recall.”
Grumbling from the Bee-lievers section has Judge Donahue squinting for culprits. Arthur just carries on, about the human health dangers Vigor-Gro poses. He doesn’t risk stepping into the quagmire of stats and actuarial science intended to prove there are other prospective Dovers out there. I don’t know if he understands those charts and graphs any better than I do.
But he pulls heartstrings, reminding the jury how the Niagara beekeeper broke down over the loss of her hives. “It wasn’t the money, she loved her honeybees, she’d become attached to them. But for Chemican-International, it was only the money, always the money.
“So it has been left to this band of environmental warriors to cut through the smog of greed and denial and inertia, and to shock the world into a stark awareness of the disaster that looms. Theirs was not a crime except by the words of the law. Theirs was a desperate attempt to save human lives. It was an act of courage and salvation.”
He might have quit there, on that dramatic flourish; instead his voice lowers, sharing, confiding. “Folks, we live in a time of mass confusion about what is true and what is not. A time when liars abound on the internet and liars dare to shout, ‘Fake news!’ Try to imagine the celebrations that would take place if my clients were found guilty: corks would pop in Kansas City, and at the head offices of the other pesticide corporations. Their ad agencies and lobbyists would gleefully proclaim that a Canadian jury has ruled in favour of the agrochemical industries and their products. We were right all along, they would say, our pesticides and neonics are harmless, we were victims of fake news.”
Arthur turns toward the Chemican group — the veep, the chief scientist, their portly lawyer. All wear scoffing expressions, the lawyer grinning. Not a good look, I think, from the jury’s point of view.
“It’s not hard to imagine them gloating, is it? In newspaper and TV ads, on Twitter and Facebook. And thus exonerated they will carry on with their false studies, shelling out bribes, hiring scientists to shill for them and perform as talking heads. And they’ll continue pumping out their toxic insecticides while forty percent of the million known species of insects face sudden extinction.”
He swings back to the jury. “Ask yourselves if in all good conscience you can reward this corrupt and dangerous mega-corporation with even a symbolic victory. You deny them that if you announce to the world that the accused deserve an acquittal.”
A big, powerful note, but he doesn’t end on it. Once again, Arthur abandons his station, moves in on the jury. His voice lowers, intimate and sharing.
“Remember, it’s a serious offence to invade the secrecy of the jury room. Your deliberations are secret. No one may ever tell you what your verdict must be. No one may ever demand to know how you reached your verdict.”
He turns back to the Chemican team: “This is a crooked corporation.” Back to the jury: “Are you willing to deliver a verdict that exonerates them, a verdict that rewards greed and corruption and heartlessness? What precedent might that set? How would struggling future generations remember that?” Silence as he seeks their commitment. Some engage him solemnly, some nervously, some look away.
“But a decision that makes a powerful statement about the need for a worldwide ban on neonics — that’s a precedent that will cause the bells of justice to ring across this entire planet.”
A burst of applause from behind me, but Arthur waves the perpetrators to silence before Donahue can spoil the moment by griping at them.
“And should you, my friends, as I pray you will, render not guilty verdicts on every count, reflect on this: history may regard this trial as a turning point. If our planet survives and finds a path to recovery, those future generations — the children of the children of your children — will not only celebrate the outcome of this trial, they will honour those who had the heart and courage and sensibility to do the right thing.”
He bows to the jury, bows to the judge, returns to his table, and sits to raucous cheers from the back of the gallery. Miss Pucket bawls for order, but without much effect. The judge seems startled to see the time: it’s well past four thirty.
As court is adjourned, reporters barge their way to the door, followed by clamorous Bee-Dazzlers and gabbling Bee-lievers and a miscellany of other Torontonians hooked on this trial. The Chemican team toils along behind with stiff, artificial smiles. Out a side door goes Inspector Jake Maguire, leading the prosecution team.
It takes me a few moments of numbness to realize I’m a little shaken, a little teary, and I’m all alone in the dock. The other six plus Nancy are with Arthur, paying tribute.
He seems weary, so weary, and a little confused as he looks around for someone. When he locates me, his expression is like, how did I do? As if my opinion matters. But I blow him a kiss, and he looks relieved.
But it was Selwyn Loo he was looking for, and he starts on realizing that Selwyn, who has this ghostlike quality, is just behind him. Selwyn smiles broadly as they embrace but tears fall from his sightless eyes.
2
We gather at the Cameron for drinks to celebrate what may be our last evening of freedom. The lawyers were invited, but Arthur plans instead to join Azra Khan and his wife for dinner. Nancy expects to join them but dreads the prospect. Selwyn Loo wants to hang with his old clients, however, and is buying rounds. Tomorrow, he entrains to Ottawa to brief the government on climate crisis strategies.
None of us talk about the trial — it’s like a bad-luck superstition — but Doc is unusually gabby, full of himself now that his book’s final copyedit is done. Nancy shows a coolness toward him that hints they’re disengaging. Clearly, her emotional needs aren’t being met. Empathy is not Doc’s strong suit.
I finally ask her about the script for tomorrow.
“Bleak,” she says. “Th
e judge will veto the necessity defence. Jurors will either bow to her authority or be bludgeoned into submission. That’s typically what happens, but sometimes you get a stubborn holdout, someone made of metal. So you get a hung jury, a mistrial, a do-over. Occasionally, when the stars are aligned, you even get a rogue jury. Does this look like a rogue jury?”
Our responses are glum. “Definotly,” Ray says.
“Good luck tomorrow,” Nancy says. “Pray for that stubborn holdout.” She drains her final shooter and takes off.
3
Tuesday, June 4
“It is vital to remember that any sympathy you might feel for the accused must not affect your deliberations. Nor should any repugnance toward their beliefs or lifestyles.”
Judge Donahue’s smirk doesn’t get recorded on the transcript, nor does Nancy’s stink-finger under the table.
I confess I had fanciful notions of a twist in the plot: the judge would shock us, would be even-handed in addressing the jury, maybe slightly supportive. The reader would go, “Boy, I sure wasn’t expecting that.”
But not. She’s half an hour into her “charge” to the jury, as they call it, and she’s clobbering us. I can hear her thought processes: Finally, after four weeks of their shit, it’s my chance to teach those insufferable, self-glorifying peacocks a lesson.
I remember my first take on her, back in March: dropping a cold-hearted life sentence on a woman who shot her psychopathic partner. While I must take into account the jury’s recommendation of mercy, I am in no way bound by it . . .
“Fascist cunt,” Nancy had drunkenly hollered at her years ago. There’s no way that has helped our case, despite her formal apology. But our counsel have long written off this judge. It’s all about the jury now. We don’t want their mercy, we just want one stubborn holdout.
Over coffee this morning, Nancy confessed to be profoundly hungover. She overdid it last night at dinner with Arthur and the Khans: a healing of the many puncture wounds from courtroom duels. Her splurge was prompted by her marital war heating up again.
“Likewise, any feelings you may have about Chemican-International Ltd., positive or negative, must not prejudice your views.” Positive or negative? They have a choice? “The company is not on trial, despite the tireless efforts of defence counsel to persuade you so.” Donahue is in one of her rare good moods, finally getting the attention she feels she deserves — the media haven’t always been kind to her.
She recites what should be shining principles — onus of proof, reasonable doubt — with the machine-gun speed of a TV ad listing an erection pill’s side effects. She then reviews the evidence right up to how Jake Maguire and Gaylene Roberts took us down — “in a most resourceful manner, if you’ll forgive a personal aside.”
She details the evidence against each of us, saving me for the last — and for the worst, with my conniving ways. She seems to take special pleasure in reminding the jury how I was caught red-handed trying to flee the country with a phony passport. She lays into me for running while my confederates stood their ground, as if nobly facing the challenge. Methinks she really doesn’t like me, probably regards me as some kind of prima donna harlot.
Morning headlines have been personally embarrassing. Griffin Gave Levitsky Blank Cheque for Sex, Lawyer Claims. Inaccurately, but that was in a shitty tabloid. Other conservative media hailed Khan’s speech (“Anarchy, we’re not going there”) while the allegedly liberal media (i.e., a little less blatantly right-wing) was more impressed by Arthur’s call for a verdict leading to the banning of neonics.
Donahue doesn’t even go easy on Ivor and Amy, doesn’t hint the jury would be justified in letting them off. It might help those two if their lawyer brightens up. Nancy looks grim and depressed. On top of her divorce acting up again — over a nasty text about the depleted wine cellar — the word is out locally, via Doc, apparently, that she had a doubly adulterous one-nighter with Khan years ago. Not smart, Doc.
Mrs. Khan’s presence at last night’s dinner obviously factored into Nancy tying one on. Lucy and I have trouble conceiving the entity that is Azra Khan’s wife. Apparently she’s a clinical psychologist and is beautiful. I wonder if she knows Azra fools around. Or cares.
Post-dinner, Arthur joined the Khans on a visit to Azra’s mother, who (forgive me) has been dying to meet him. Arthur’s gesture was five-out-of-five thoughtful. Ten-out-of-ten.
Having disposed of us seven conspirators Donahue spends some time with Howie, summing up his “rather bizarre” testimony but not otherwise commenting on it. His credibility was for the jury to assess. Then she announces that’s it, she has concluded her review “of the admissible evidence.”
Here it comes.
“You will be aware that I have not touched on any testimony that relates to the alleged issue of necessity. I am bound to instruct you as to the essential elements of the offences charged and the legitimate defences, but not to defences that lack an air of reality. It is a matter for the court to decide whether such an air of reality exists, and I find it totally lacking. A conspiracy hatched and refined over several months cannot by the farthest stretch of the imagination be seen as an emergency response to an imminent peril.”
The jurors’ expressions range from impassive to confused to surprised to, in one case, pleased. Tax auditor Mabel Sims has “I told you so” written on her face as she nudges the woman beside her: Juror Eleven, well-to-do Joyce Evans, who has an acreage in Meadowvale and is on the SPCA board.
“You are not to give thought to the necessity issue or anything you heard relating to it, whether from the Crown, the defence, or their expert witnesses. Your verdict, guilty or not guilty, must be based solely on admissible evidence adduced in this room. It must not be affected in any way by feelings of sympathy or antipathy for any person or cause. As an example, any compassion you feel for Mr. Charles Dover is wasted because his evidence is irrelevant.”
There’s something wrong with this picture. How can Donahue just blatantly order the jury to suppress normal human feelings? How does a judge get to dictate to a jury what they’re allowed to consider? Didn’t Donahue hear our lawyer proclaim that the jury is a bulwark against oppression? The people, not the government, not the judges, not the politicians, have the final say.
“You have sworn to give a true verdict according to the evidence.” A quick look at Arthur, her nose twitching, as if it smells the enemy. “You have not sworn an oath to resist anarchy or cause bells to ring across this planet.”
Nancy does a gag reflex — I can’t be sure if it’s faked or real. I scan my fellow future inmates. Nobody seems too distressed, except Okie Joe maybe, who’s built a thriving business and has a gaming app that could break out of the pack. Doc looks totally cool with doing time, his quest for martyrdom paying off.
Donahue’s next bit is to review counsels’ final arguments. She quotes almost verbatim Azra Khan’s cartoon sketches of the fumbling schemers in the dock. She rhetorically applauds his sarcastic critique of Arthur’s “deep conspiracy to use the Earth Survival Rebels as unwitting pawns.”
Arthur’s pitch gets a less stellar review. Conveying skepticism with arched eyebrows she lightly touches on his notion of a planned insurance fraud. With a baffled frown, she struggles with the concept that Howie Griffin somehow granted consent to our “attack” on the plant.
Arthur’s consent defence was “an unseemly diversion long on speculation and short on proof.” She hammered the last nail in with “I daresay you will have little difficulty disposing of it.”
There she goes again, telling the jury how to think. No wonder Dickens’s exclamation still rings true: the law is an ass.
Nancy’s jury speech gets even shorter shrift, maybe two minutes. I sit there stunned, wondering if Ivor and Amy are doomed too.
Donahue assumes a weary tone as she starts to wrap up with mantras about reasonable doubt and presumption of innoce
nce. She’s like, Do we really have to go through this charade when everything’s so cut and dried?
Other housekeeping chores include reminding the jury their decision has to be unanimous and that sentencing is the sole prerogative of the court. They can come back to ask questions or have testimony read back to them. They will be put up in a fine Toronto hostelry if they can’t agree on a verdict today (which, her hearty tone hints, is as unlikely as little green people rappelling to the courthouse roof from a passing asteroid).
Donahue glances at the clock. Nearly noon. “Before you begin deliberations, please enjoy coffee or tea in the jury room while I ask counsel if I have covered all bases.”
The jury is barely out the door when Arthur’s on his feet, indignant, demanding the judge recall them and brief them fully on our defences. Donahue’s instructions were one-sided and illiberal, her view of necessity repressive. He storms about how it’s unheard of for a trial judge to strip the defence naked.
I shiver at that concept. After a month-long trial, this is where we find ourselves, exposed right down to our furry little pubes, denied even a thread of reasonable doubt.
“Thank you, Mr. Beauchamp.” Polite, smiling. “Ms. Faulk, do you have anything to add?”
“Yes, M’Lady, with all due respect you failed in your duty to warn the jury it would not merely be risky but ridiculous to convict Ms. Snider and Mr. Trebiloff.”
“Thank you. Mr. Khan?”
“The Crown is content.”
“Very well. The jury will be advised they can now commence their deliberations. Now, as to the matter of whether bail should be continued while we wait for the jury’s return . . .”
Khan jumps in. “The Crown has no objection to a continuance of bail for all accused as long as they remain in the courthouse while the jury is in session.”
“Very well. The matter may be moot in any event should they return before dinner.”
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