Lieberman's Law (22 page)

Rabbi Wass had agreed to call the other congregations, the ones in Chicago that had been attacked, and suggest that they set up an overnight watch too. There was no guarantee that the terrorists or vandals would strike again or that if they did, they would strike at the same houses of worship.

But the interview with Jara Mohammed that afternoon had not gone well. Lieberman was not at liberty to divulge everything that was said, but he definitely did not rule out the possibility that Mir Shavot might be the object of another attack of the some kind. Leo Benishay was the only one in the room besides Lieberman who knew what had gone on in the meeting at the station where Anne Crawfield Ready had definitely identified the young woman, who had a lawyer present.

The lawyer was not an Arab. Lieberman knew her well. Her name was Charlotte Warren. She had represented members of various organized black groups, including Muslims, even Martin Abdul, many times over the past twenty years. Charlotte Warren was white, Southern white with a put-on Texas accent that she should have and could have lost forty years earlier when she passed the Illinois Bar and decided to represent and defend the victims and scapegoats of a racist society. Whenever she was interviewed by the press, which was frequently, she always managed to get in that phrase about the victims and scapegoats. Coming from a white-haired former Texan, it was always impressive.

What had been the temporary downfall of Jara Mohammed was her own uncontrollable anger. Lieberman, Faye Lasher, a new member of the State Attorney's office, and Ibraham Said had sat across from Jara Mohammed and Charlotte Warren, whose badly worn briefcase rested on the desk between them.

“We have a positive identification from a witness,” said Faye Lasher. “We have a photograph. We have your client with cause in a neighborhood where she says she has friends who were coming to pick her up at two in the morning, but whose names she can't remember. She can't even remember the day. We have a photograph of your client with a member of the Arab Student Response organization dressed like a skinhead coming out of the temple on the night of the attack. We have a witness, the one who took the photograph, who will testify to that. The witness has already identified your client in a lineup.”

Faye Lasher was well into her forties, tall, thin, black, and perfectly groomed, never appearing at the station or on duty in anything but well-tailored suits. Faye Lasher had ambitions that looked as if they were on the way to achievement when the city had a black mayor. Those ambitions looked even more promising when a white mayor was elected who was surrounded by white Irish faces. Faye Lasher almost certainly deserved promotion in the State Attorney's office. She was sharp, had an uncanny memory for what people said, details, and she was tough. Too tough. Many was the time, once in a while with Lieberman present, that an opposing attorney across the table would simply call off the interview and threaten to file a protest over Faye Lasher's threatening behavior. One of those who had never filed such a protest was Charlotte Warren. Lasher and Warren were, in fact, friends. Lieberman knew that Warren had more than once offered to take Lasher in as a partner. Lieberman also knew it was Lasher's determination to devote her life to putting criminals in jail that had stopped her. Her brother had been the victim of a gang shooting. Her mother and father had been mugged more times than she could count. She had cousins, aunts, uncles still in the city, living afraid, afraid of their own people.

This is what Lieberman had been remembering when Hanrahan had called.

“We want a confession, names,” Faye Lasher had said, sitting next to Lieberman, her hands folded, her long fingernails painted a serious blood-dark red.

“My client is innocent,” said Warren. “You give the charge. She pleads innocent. I really don't think we have anything to talk about here. You know and I know that a judge would probably throw this out, and a jury? We could sue the city for damages on behalf of a straight-A, University of Chicago graduate student in biology, with no record and no arrests, with the exception of the riot this morning in which she was a victim. We have photographs of my client's face. Just look at her.”

Jara Mohammed definitely had bruises on her face and a bandage firmly in place.

“Miss Mohammed believes that some of the blows struck against her were inflicted by the police. And what do you really have here? A photograph that could have been taken any time before the unfortunate attack on a house of worship and a date on it of the day it was printed—printed, Ms. Lasher, not taken. And your witness, to whom I would like to speak should you decide to arrest my client for a crime, is old and may be quite confused. And who knows, on the witness stand, that confusion might be even more evident.”

The lawyers were playing lawyer, but Lieberman and Leo Benishay were aware of another dynamic. They could feel it, had felt it before in rooms just like this.

Jara Mohammed had her eyes fixed on Ibraham Said who did not turn away. Said was maddeningly passive. The young woman grew angrier as the lawyers sparred, battled, parried, and lunged. Both sides knew what the deal would be. Jara Mohammed would be interviewed on the record on the basis of suspicion of vandalism and possibly theft, destruction of property and whatever else Lieberman and Faye Lasher could come up with. She would deny all and offer nothing.

“We are engaged in a jihad to regain our homeland, a struggle in which all Arabs should participate,” Jara Mohammed said, looking directly at Said.

“In Muslim tradition,” said Said calmly, “there is a greater jihad, a personal struggle to conquer one's evil impulses. It is a lesser jihad to conquer others.”

Jara Mohammed gave the Muslim detective a look designed to dismiss his theory.

On the basis of the Anne Ready ID, they could probably hold Jara Mohammed for a day or two, but the case was circumstantial. Mrs. Ready's ID would probably not be enough and who knows when she took the photograph. She hadn't actually seen Howard Ramu clearly and she had not actually seen Jara Mohammed coming out of the temple.

“May I ask a question or two?” said Said calmly.

“No tape's running and I'll tell my client not to answer if I don't like the questions,” said Warren. “We want to be cooperative here and then we want to walk out that door.”

Warren touched Jara's arm on the table. She moved it away.

“You are a member of the Arab Student Response Committee,” said Said calmly.

“I am,” she answered.

“Response to what?” asked Said.

“As you know better than any in this room,” she said. “Attacks are made, Arabs are blamed for terrorist acts committed by others.”

“The World Trade Center explosion was an attack by Arabs,” said Said.

“The Jews have the Anti-Defamation League,” Jara said, now barely able to control her hatred directed across the table at Detective Ibraham Said. “They have the Jewish Defense League. We exist to counter unwarranted, unfounded attacks on Arabs. We are an official, recognized student organization at the university.”

“Howard Ramu was a member of the Arab Student Response Committee?” asked Said.

“You know he was,” said Jara.

“When he was found murdered, his head was shaved and he had a Nazi jacket in his closet,” said Said.

“Someone put it there,” Jara said. “Probably the Jews who killed him and the two other innocent Arab students.”

“The two others were innocent, but Howard Ramu was not?” Said said.

“Enough questions,” said Charlotte Warren, buckling her briefcase. “You booking my client? You not booking my client?”

“Traitor,” said Jara Mohammed, looking at Ibraham Said.

“Interview over,” Warren insisted.

“I would suggest,” said Said calmly, “that it is you who are a traitor to the cause of peace, that it is you and others like you who will cause more hatred of our people, who will take innocent lives.”

“If we do not act, we are ignored by the world,” Jara said.

“I advise you to stop now,” Warren said, letting her courtroom voice boom out in the small room, but her client was unable to stop, unwilling to stop.

Old police ploy: Get a fanatic angry and talking and they'll eventually, proudly talk their way into a confession.

Warren looked across the table at Faye Lasher who sat back, hands folded, and shrugged.

“It is you who are the traitor to peace,” Said repeated calmly, a calmness that clearly infuriated Jara Mohammed.

“Peace is treason,” she said. “What you have witnessed is only the beginning.”

“No more,” Warren had said, moving her face in front of her client's.

“If all we've seen is the beginning,” said Lieberman, “What's next?”

Jara, her lawyer's face before her, closed her eyes and nodded to her, indicating that she was now under control. She said nothing.

“No charges at present,” said Faye Lasher, “but your client is a suspect and certainly a material witness who was at the scene of a felony and was seen and photographed with a murder victim hours before his death. She will give a statement, formal deposition. I don't think Judge Brightbill will have trouble with that.”

“Give me a few minutes alone with my client and we will be ready for cooperative and voluntary deposition,” said Warren. “Is that all right with you, Miss Mohammed?”

Warren had tried to pry her client's eyes from Ibraham Said, who still sat passively.

“I am a practicing Muslim,” said Said. “I believe in and live by the tenets of my religion.”

“And I am a practicing Palestinian and I live by the tenets of history,” Jara Mohammed said, appreciably calmer.

And so it had ended. Jara Mohammed had walked. And when the three policemen and Faye Lasher had left the room, Benishay had repeated Jara Mohammed's words, “What you have seen is only the beginning.”

“I'll work on that,” said Faye Lasher, who was distinctly taller than any of the three policemen.

“Ibraham,” Lieberman said. “A cup of coffee?”

People passed them in the narrow corridor leading to the steps of the Clark Street Station.

“Some other time soon. Jara Mohammed's father and most of her family were murdered,” said Said. “Murdered by a crazed Jew in Israel. Only she and a younger brother survived. Nothing will change her. Not the law and not the word of Allah.”

Said walked away.

Less than an hour later, Leo Benishay and Lieberman set up the meeting in Lieberman's house. They could have gotten Maish or Yetta to sit with Barry and Melisa, but since the threat to Barry in the park, Bess had been reluctant to leave the children. Abe had assured her that the problem had been taken care of, and she believed him, but still … And so they were all sitting in the Liebermans' dining room drinking coffee and downing rugalah from the T & L. The pile had gone down and Lieberman had been more than tempted. He had once reached for one of the delicacies while talking about the plan. Bess had reached out and taken his hand in hers to block the move. Lieberman had been resigned, his cholesterol temporarily thwarted.

It was basically settled when the call came from Hanrahan and Lieberman had excused himself saying that the call was related to their problem and he had to go immediately. Bess reminded him to take his heavier jacket. The night had grown cold.

Lieberman arrived first. The little park was empty. He sat on a bench covered with graffiti. The concrete wading pool was dry, the rusting swings shook and squealed with each pass of the wind. Lieberman was glad that he had taken his heavy jacket. He also had his blue watch cap in his pocket but he would not put it on unless his ears became seriously cold. A new gust of wind came and the seesaw clunked gently against the dirt.

There was an apartment building at the end of the park which nestled in the L of two streets, neither of which was heavily trafficked at this hour. At the other side of the park was a small empty lot where a sign had stood for years claiming that the choice piece of land with the park on one side and the el train on the other was for sale.

Lieberman knew the park. He knew the neighborhood. He also knew what to expect from the three figures that emerged around the apartment building and headed slowly toward him as he sat. There were two working night lamps, chipped black iron, in the small park. The bulbs were out on the rest of the nightlights, and the park district would be in no hurry to repair them only to have them knocked out by a rock or a bullet within a few days.

The three young men coming toward Lieberman were black. They were very young and they wore zippered jackets, the color of which was hard to see in the dim light. An elevated train heading north rattled by. Lieberman didn't look at it.

The three young men stood in front of Lieberman who remained seated.

“You got Alzheimer's or something, old man?” one of the young men said. Lieberman could see now that the oldest of them was probably no more than fifteen or sixteen.

“No,” said Lieberman. “Thank God, so far I've been spared that and there's no history of it in my family.”

One of the boys put his foot up on the bench, his shoe almost touching Lieberman.

“Then you are fuckin' nuts or lost,” said the one who was doing the talking.

“Nope,” said Lieberman looking around. “This is where I want to be.”

“You heard of the RP Headhunters?” asked the young man.

The third boy sat at Lieberman's side, his arms folded, looking directly at the man.

“I've heard,” said Lieberman, shrugging slightly. His arms were crossed over his chest and his legs were closed protectively.

“This is our territory. Our park,” the speaker said. “The sun goes down and its ours. You hear what I'm talkin' about?”

“My problems include arthritis and cholesterol,” said Lieberman. “I see fine. I hear fine. It's in the genes.”