States of Grace

by Mandy Miller

  And then there are the ones like Zoe, rich, charged not with a garden variety crime, but with murder—one of the few no-bail offenses. Wealthy no-bail holds with high-priced sharks who donated to the judge’s last reelection campaign will likely get bond. Given campaign donations are well beyond my current means, whether Zoe gets one last taste of freedom pending trial is a crap shoot and might depend on whether His Honor had a successful bowel movement this morning.

  The polished brass plaque affixed to the front of the bench reads Hon. Michael C. Garrison.

  Shoot. Not Garrison.

  The docket pinned to the wall outside the courtroom lists Susan Childs as the presiding judge, a woman with a penchant for teary widow’s and orphan’s tales. “She must be sick or something, so Garrison’s covering. Just my luck!”

  Garrison’s a bona fide hard-ass. All well and good when I was an ASA. Not anymore. Once, at an event for his reelection, Garrison told me he takes no greater pleasure than “blowing up the world now and letting the bastards up in the appellate court sort it out later. In the meantime, I’d rather see an innocent man or two, or even a dozen, in jail than risk some violent thug walking out on my watch.” After gulping what remained of his martini, he added, “Got to err on the side of public safety, don’t we?”

  How am I going to stay in the game with Garrison in charge? No way the Slims will pony up any more cash unless I get their little princess out. Somehow what seemed like a clever, albeit ethically dubious, plan to climb out of the gutter, might all be for naught unless I can persuade Garrison that Zoe deserves bail.

  I prop myself up against the defense table to compose my thoughts, but a frantic wave from the back row of the jury box interrupts my train of thought. Zoe. She’s even frailer and wilder looking than when I saw her in the jail. Hair more matted if that’s even possible, skin so pale it’s ghostly. A crazy-eyed waif who looks like she should call a psychiatric hospital home, not a waterfront mansion. Hardly the poster child for the upstanding member of the community I need her to appear to be today.

  My path to the jury box is blocked by the bailiff, a burly, ruddy-faced man sporting a massive gun belt. The polished steel of a handgun, Taser, and handcuffs, glint under the lights, portending nothing good for the uncooperative.

  The bailiff steps back and gives me a once over. “Ms. Locke, I didn’t recognize you. I mean, it’s been some time since you’ve been down here,” he stutters, searching his lexicon for the appropriate thing to say, given the circumstances of my departure from the premises.

  I recognize his face. He’s one of the old-timers. He’s been around this place as long as the right to counsel, but I can’t remember his name. Shields? Shaw? Just another piece of the judicial jigsaw lost to time.

  “Yes, it has. And why haven’t you moved on upstairs to a trial court? Haven’t you been in this dungeon long enough?”

  He gives me a knowing half-smile. “It’s Shelton. And are you kidding?” he says, a bit too loudly. Whispering behind his hand, he adds “I like it this way. Seven in the morning ’til three in the afternoon. I tell ’em where to sit, when to stand, and when and where they can take a leak. Three o’ clock on the nose it’s off for eighteen holes and two cold ones before the sun sets. How sweet it is.” With finger and thumb, he rolls an imaginary cigar, his impression of Jackie Gleason right on the money.

  “Go on over and talk to your client, Ms. Locke,” he says, standing aside. “And, Ms. Locke, it’s good to have you back.” He motions to the still empty bench. “And best to keep your voice down, way down. The judge is about to come out and he can be a real prick, if you know what I mean?” He gives me an exaggerated wink, turns on his heel and proclaims, “All rise. The Honorable Michael C. Garrison, presiding.”

  The restless, scared, hopeful, and hopeless seeded throughout the crowd and the jury box stand in unison, although none knows which word will describe them by the end of the day.

  Judge Garrison bursts through a door behind the bench, black robe flapping. “Please be seated,” he says as the door sucks shut behind him, sealing us in for the duration.

  During his explanation of the morning’s proceedings, I take note of his use of the word “individual” as opposed to “inmate,” a rare concession of respect to the accused I must have heard a thousand times from him, but which strikes me now as more patronizing than sincere, given how few of them are anything other than guilty.

  I tune Garrison out, silently rehearsing my arguments about how Zoe’s a kid and hasn’t been in trouble before, has parents and a home, and is not a flight risk—oh, and just forget that she’s madder than a bag of cats. A voice keeps overwriting my thoughts, however, the voice of a prosecutor holding forth on the vicious nature of Sinclair’s execution.

  I suck in a deep breath and tiptoe over to the jury box. Shoulder to shoulder, shackled hands and feet, the defendants are packed in like rats on what looks more and more like a sinking ship with every “Bail denied” pronouncement from Garrison. A couple of the defendants are asleep, others are as agitated as bed bugs, their eyes shifting back and forth from the bench to their counsel to the ASA like spectators at a tennis match.

  I squeeze into Zoe’s row. She’s between two women, one skinny as a reed, the other obese with several chins and a shaved head. Both look uninterested, as if whatever is going to happen is a foregone conclusion. Zoe is one of only three whites. The rest are African American or Hispanic, evidence of the racial inequity in the system alleged by defense counsel I used to dismiss as specious.

  Wrists cuffed together, Zoe yanks on my sleeve. “You gotta get me out of here!”

  “I’ll do everything I can,” I say, glancing over my shoulder at Garrison to make sure he can’t hear us.

  Her wrists strain against the cuffs. “I can’t take it. I’m all alone in there, except for meals and showers, but that’s even worse. Everyone stares at me like I’m some kind of freak.”

  “Shh, Zoe, lower your voice.”

  She yanks on my sleeve yet again. “I need to tell you what happened, Ms. Locke.”

  I shush her again.

  She blinks hard to stem the torrent of tears threatening to breach their banks. “I’m afraid in there, Ms. Locke. It’s really scary.”

  I squeeze her bony forearm. “I know. And please call me Grace.”

  I scan the gallery for the Slims, my ace in the hole to persuade Garrison that Zoe comes from a stable home, but, more importantly, to make it clear she’s from a wealthy family, one that might be inclined to dig far into its deep pockets when reelection time rolls around.

  Floating above the mass of unremarkable faces, I spot Gretchen’s corona of blonde hair. But no Anton.

  “Shoot. The least he could do is show up for his only kid.”

  “What?” Zoe says.

  Garrison’s head pops up from behind a file. I thought I was saying the words to myself. Apparently not. He lowers his reading glasses and pins me with the same hollow stare with which he’s sent many a hard man away to prison, never to return, other than in a pine box. Garrison’s small and wiry, but his hyper-kinetic presence galvanizes everyone to look at me, the object of his irritation.

  I hold my breath. After a seemingly endless pause, Garrison pushes his glasses back up his nose, and resumes asking a defense attorney why he thinks his client, who has skipped bail on three separate occasions, deserves another chance at the “freedom enjoyed by the good citizens of Broward County.”

  Garrison gallops through the docket in alphabetical order, announcing a defendant’s name and charge, his words ricocheting off the walls. Defendants pop up like jack-in-the-boxes, and sit down just as fast, heads bowed by the realization that they won’t be seeing the sky without the benefit of chicken wire for a long time. He cautions those who have the ill-advised notion of saying anything in their own defense that everything is being recorded and, he narrows an eye, he can guarantee that it will be used against them. Ignorance of his warning merits a banged gavel and a
hard shove from the bailiff.

  Garrison had presided over bond court back when I took the ASA job Manny helped me get after I moved to Florida from New York. Garrison scared the bejesus out of me the first time I appeared in front of him. His rapid-fire dispensation of his version of justice is legendary, earning him the title, King of the Rocket Docket. As a rookie, I once watched him rule on two hundred and fifteen motions for bail in three hours. It was as if the State, the defense, and the accused weren’t even in the room. Rapists, murderers, drunks, and thieves, they all got the same fifteen seconds of His Honor’s time.

  After an hour, Garrison reaches surnames starting with the letter S.

  “State versus Zoya AKA “Zoe” Slim.”

  “Yes, Your Honor,” I say, feeling as if my shoes are on the wrong feet as I step up to the lectern on the left side facing the bench. The State’s lectern is always on the right.

  Garrison leans back in his throne of a chair, chewing on the leg of his glasses, peering at me like a lab specimen. “Ah, Ms. Locke. We’ve missed you.” His obsequious tone might sound sincere to the ill-informed, but it makes me wish the ground would open up and swallow me whole, a reaction only magnified by a chorus of titters from the attorneys waiting in line behind me.

  “Excuse me, Judge,” the young ASA says, riffling through a stack of arrest reports to locate Zoe’s.

  I hold my breath. Unlike my colleague, I know what’s coming. Garrison’s going to crush the poor sod.

  “May I have a moment?” the ASA asks.

  And I’m not wrong.

  “No, you may not, sir. Ms. Locke, please proceed. Mr. State’s Attorney, you must be fully prepared when you come into my courtroom.”

  The ASA bends to pick up a pen from the floor, revealing one black and one brown sock. Whether the move is to stall, or simply to retrieve the pen, who knows, but it serves to draw even more ire from Garrison.

  “Mr. McNeil, you will not delay my docket. Ms. Locke, proceed. Let’s hear why Ms. Slim merits bail, why don’t we?”

  “May it please the court. My name is Grace Locke and I represent Zoe Slim.”

  Chapter 9

  Only eighteen. No criminal history, has ties to community, etc. The basic dog-and-pony show a first-year law student could put on. It’s all so predictable I’ve almost lulled myself into a stupor by the end of my presentation.

  Garrison listens, tapping his pen every time I pause to indicate I should hurry up.

  As much as it galls me, I’m forced to call Gretchen to corroborate everything I’ve argued, which sends the troupe of photographers, as rare to bond court as innocent defendants, into paroxysms, snapping shots of her gazing up at Garrison through librarian glasses I’d wager are clear glass. She’s chosen another demure beige suit, and repeatedly raises her left hand to wipe a tear from her smooth cheek, the huge rock on her wedding finger catching not only the light, but also Garrison’s attention. A little bling and a little blah, a nice touch, enough to show respect, but not enough to seem common.

  When she’s finished answering my questions, Garrison removes his glasses and gazes down at her, smitten. Exactly the effect I was hoping for. For my purposes. For now. Although I am somewhat appalled that I have seemingly been able to pull this off.

  Just as she’s about to step down from the stand, she gives Garrison the most angelic of looks, eyes ingenue wide, and says with a sweet Southern twang, “I assure you, Your Honor, that I will do whatever else you ask of me if you would, please, please, let my baby come home.”

  Garrison gives her the sweetest smile I’ve ever seen from a judge. “Thank you, Mrs. Slim, that will be all. You can step down, unless Mr. McNeil has any questions for you.”

  The words, “Go on, I dare you,” are on the tip of my tongue, but I bite my lip and pray that McNeil decides to have a whack at the dutiful, not to mention stunningly gorgeous, mother of the accused, which will do nothing more than irritate the gobsmacked Garrison.

  But no such luck.

  “No, sir,” McNeil says, with his own adoring smile angled in Gretchen’s direction.

  “You may step down, Mrs. Slim. And, again, thank you for being here today.”

  Every eyeball in the gallery is on her as she sashays back to her seat. I have to give it to her. Gretchen knows how to work a room.

  “Mr. McNeil, does the State have any witnesses or any evidence it wishes to present?”

  “Um, yeah. I mean— Yes we, I— I do,” McNeil says, adding, “Your Honor,” in an attempt to rectify his bungled response. “First, let me say that the defendant is charged with the most serious of offenses, that of first-degree murder.”

  I can’t resist rolling my eyes. Still, I was once in his shoes. A zealous new convert to the cause of justice. And it does feel good to believe you’re on the side of the angels. Even if it is an illusion.

  “And—” McNeil continues, but Garrison waves him off.

  “Yes, yes. Thank you for the statement of the obvious, Counsel. I am aware of how serious a crime first-degree murder is, and it was a very serious crime, even way back in the dark ages when I went to law school.”

  A collective chuckle from the gallery.

  McNeil straightens his tie. “The State calls Detective Frank Reilly of the Fort Lauderdale Police Department.”

  It’s no surprise as Reilly’s the lead detective on the case, but the mention of his name still sends a jolt of fear through me.

  On his way to the witness stand, Reilly passes so close I can smell the odor of cigarette smoke wafting off his shirt, the buttons of which gape, an unfortunate situation which would have been camouflaged if he’d worn a tie. His arms hang ape-like away from his sides, as if he’s still wearing the gun belt he had to check at the entrance to the courthouse. His square, stocky build suggests he may have had a muscular physique once upon a time, but he’s flabby now, wide-assed from years of sitting in a cruiser eating junk food.

  Reilly settles his girth into the witness chair and pulls the microphone close to his brushy orange mustache. He swears to tell the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, all the while glaring at me. I refuse to look away, however. He got the better of me before, but I won’t let that happen again.

  Preliminaries complete—name, title, length of service with the FLPD, and his assignment to the Sinclair case—McNeil turns to the day of the murder.

  “Detective Reilly, did you go to St. Paul’s on the morning of Monday, August 24th of this year?”

  “Yes. We answered the 9-1-1 call from the principal.”

  “And what did you find when you arrived?”

  “Mr. Sinclair in his office.”

  “What condition was Mr. Sinclair in?”

  “He was dead. So, not very good.”

  A burst of laughter from the gallery.

  Garrison bangs the gavel twice. “Order. There will be silence in this court.”

  “Please go on, Detective.”

  “Mr. Sinclair was behind his desk. He had suffered two gunshot wounds. One to the head, the other to the groin.”

  McNeil checks the shopping list of handwritten questions on his legal pad. “Detective, have you brought any photographs of the crime scene with you?

  Reilly holds up a manila envelope. “I have.”

  “Your Honor, may I approach the bench?”

  Garrison nods and McNeil steps forward to hand the photos up to the judge.

  I leap to my feet. “Objection, Your Honor. I have not had the chance to review the photographs, nor has counsel laid the proper foundation for their admission into evidence.”

  Likely, a baseless objection. Usually crime scene photos are for the jurors, to shock and horrify them into a conviction. These ones must be hideous if McNeil wants the judge to see them at this point. To seal his argument against Zoe’s bail. Still, I have to say something. I can’t sit here like a potted plant doing nothing. I have to make it look like I’m doing something to get Zoe out of jail. So, lack of foundation it is.

/>   McNeil gets out a “Your Honor,” before Garrison cautions him with a raised hand.

  Garrison glances at the motley assortment of inmates still in the jury box. “Ms. Locke, there’s no jury here. Save whatever objections you have for trial.”

  I lower my eyes in a contrived show of humility.

  “Nice try, however, Ms. Locke. I see you haven’t lost your flair for the dramatic.”

  Garrison wrinkles his nose at the stack of photos in McNeil’s outstretched hand. “If the top one is anything to go by, those are, indeed, quite stunning. Counsel, please hand the photographs to Ms. Locke to review.”

  Shocking is an understatement. In one shot, Sinclair’s lanky frame is sprawled back in a high-backed chair, pants at his ankles, black high tops poking out, arms hanging over the arms of the chair. A hole in his forehead the size of a golf ball crusted with dried blood. Another, a close-up, shows his head leaning against a bookshelf, its final resting place next to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary. I gag at another, this one of his groin, a gaping crater where his dick used to be, a fact not shared with the media. Not yet, anyway. When this gets out, it’ll be open season on Zoe.

  I return the photographs to McNeil, who hands them to Garrison. Halfway through the stack the judge’s jaw starts to drop, but he catches himself and clenches it shut. His eyes flick to Zoe, resting on her emotionless face for a beat, and back to the photos with a shake of his head.

  “Detective, was there anyone else in the office when you arrived?”

  “Yes. Mrs. Bannister, the headmistress at St. Paul’s, and a student, Serena Price. Mrs. Bannister said she heard screaming coming from the victim’s office, and went in. She said she found Sinclair dead and Ms. Price screaming.”

  “Who called 9-1-1?”

  “Mrs. Bannister. She stayed on the line with dispatch until the first uniformed officers arrived.”

  “Were there any other people in the vicinity?”