The Brass Verdict (21 page)

“I’m not really in the loop on that, Judge,” I said. “But I was shown a photograph of a man I assume they’re looking at as a suspect.”

“Really? What kind of photo?”

“Like a surveillance shot from out on the street. A guy, and it looks like he has a gun. I think they matched it up timewise to the shooting in the garage.”

“Did you recognize the man?”

I shook my head.

“No, the shot was too grainy. It looked like he might have had a disguise on anyway.”

“When was this?”

“The night of the shooting.”

“No, I mean, when was it that you were shown this photo?”

“Just this morning. Detective Bosch came to the office with it.”

The judge nodded. We were quiet for a moment and then the judge got to the point of the meeting.

“Okay, Mr. Haller, why don’t we talk about clients and cases now?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

I reached down and unzipped my bag, taking out the scorecard Lorna had prepared for me.

Judge Holder kept me at her desk for the next hour while I went over every case and client, detailing the status and conversations I’d had with each. By the time she finally let me go, I was late for my eleven o’clock hearing in Judge Stanton’s chambers.

I left Holder’s court and didn’t bother with the elevators. I hit the exit stairs and charged up two flights to the floor where Stanton’s courtroom was located. I was running eight minutes late and wondered if it was going to cost me another donation to another judge’s favorite charity.

The courtroom was empty but Stanton’s clerk was in her corral. She pointed with a pen to the open door to the hallway leading to the judge’s chambers.

“They’re waiting for you,” she said.

I quickly moved by her and down the hall. The door to the chambers was open and I saw the judge sitting behind his desk. To his left rear side was a stenographer and across the desk from him were three chairs. Walter Elliot was sitting in the chair to the right, the middle chair was empty and Jeffrey Golantz was in the third. I had never met the prosecutor before but he was recognizable because I had seen his face on TV and in the newspapers. In the last few years, he had successfully handled a series of high-profile cases and was making a name for himself. He was the undefeated up-and-comer in the DA’s Office.

I loved going up against undefeated prosecutors. Their confidence often betrayed them.

“Sorry I’m late, Your Honor,” I said as I slid into the empty seat. “Judge Holder called me into a hearing and she ran long.”

I hoped that mentioning the chief judge as the reason for my tardiness would keep Stanton from further assaulting my checkbook and it seemed to work.

“Let’s go on the record now,” he said.

The stenographer leaned forward and put her fingers on the keys of her machine.

“In the matter of
California versus Walter Elliot,
we are in chambers today for a status conference. Present is the defendant, along with Mr. Golantz for the state and Mr. Haller, who is here in the late Mr. Vincent’s stead.”

The judge had to break there to give the stenographer the proper spellings of all the names. He spoke in an authoritative voice that a decade on the bench often gives a jurist. The judge was a handsome man with a full head of bristly gray hair. He was in good shape, the black robe doing little to disguise his well-developed shoulders and chest.

“So,” he then said, “we’re scheduled in this matter for voir dire next Thursday — a week from today — and I notice, Mr. Haller, that I have received no motion from you to continue the matter while you get up to speed on the case.”

“We don’t want a delay,” Elliot said.

I reached over and put my hand on my client’s forearm and shook my head.

“Mr. Elliot, in this session I want you to let your lawyer do the talking,” the judge said.

“Sorry, Your Honor,” I said. “But the message is the same whether from me or directly from Mr. Elliot. We want no delay. I have spent the week getting up to speed and I will be prepared to begin jury selection next Thursday.”

The judge squinted his eyes at me.

“You sure about that, Mr. Haller?”

“Absolutely. Mr. Vincent was a good lawyer and he kept thorough records. I understand the strategy he built and will be ready to go on Thursday. The case has my full attention. That of my staff as well.”

The judge leaned back in his high-backed chair and swiveled side to side as he thought. He finally looked at Elliot.

“Mr. Elliot, it turns out you do get to speak after all. I would like to hear directly from you that you are in full agreement with your new attorney here and that you understand the risk you run, bringing in a fresh lawyer so close to the start of trial. It’s your freedom at stake here, sir. Let’s hear what you have to say about it.”

Elliot leaned forward and spoke in a defiant tone.

“Judge, first of all, I am in complete agreement. I want to get this thing to trial so I can blow the district attorney here right out of the water. I am an innocent man being persecuted and prosecuted for something I did not do. I don’t want to spend a single extra day as the accused, sir. I loved my wife and I’ll miss her forever. I didn’t kill her and it pierces my heart when I hear the people on TV saying these vile things about me. What hurts the most is knowing that the real killer is out there someplace. The sooner Mr. Haller gets to prove my innocence to the world, the better.”

It was O.J. 101 but the judge studied Elliot and nodded thoughtfully, then turned his attention to the prosecutor.

“Mr. Golantz? What is the state’s view of this?”

The deputy district attorney cleared his throat. The word to describe him was telegenic. He was handsome and dark and his eyes seemed to carry the very wrath of justice in them.

“Your Honor, the state is prepared for trial and has no objection to proceeding on schedule. But I would ask that, if Mr. Elliot is so sure about proceeding without delay, he formally waive any appellate redress in this regard should things not go as he predicts in trial.”

The judge swiveled his chair so that his focus could go back on me.

“What about that, Mr. Haller?”

“Your Honor, I don’t think it’s necessary for my client to waive any protections that might be afforded to—”

“I don’t mind,” Elliot said, cutting in on me. “I’ll waive whatever you damn well please. I want to go to trial.”

I looked sharply at him. He looked at me and shrugged.

“We’re going to win this thing,” he explained.

“You want to take a moment in the corridor, Mr. Haller?” the judge asked.

“Thank you, Judge.”

I got up and signaled Elliot up.

“Come with me.”

We walked out into the short hallway that led to the courtroom. I closed the door behind us. Elliot spoke before I could, underlining the problem.

“Look, I want this thing over and I—”

“Shut up!” I said in a forced whisper.

“What?”

“You heard me. Shut the fuck up. You understand? I am sure you are quite used to talking whenever you want and having everybody listen to every brilliant word you say. But you are not in Hollywood anymore, Walter. You aren’t talking make-believe movies with this week’s mogulito. You understand what I’m saying? This is real life. You don’t speak unless you are spoken to. If you have something to say otherwise, then you whisper it into my ear and if I think it is worth repeating, then
I
— not you — will say it to the judge. You got it?”

It took Elliot a long time to answer. His face turned dark and I understood that I might be about to lose the franchise. But in the moment I didn’t care. What I had said needed to be said. It was a welcome-to-my-world speech that was long overdue.

“Yes,” he finally said, “I get it.”

“Good, then remember it. Now, let’s go back in there and see if we can avoid giving away your right to appeal if you happen to get convicted because I fucked up by being unprepared for trial.”

“That won’t happen. I have faith in you.”

“I appreciate that, Walter. But the truth is, you have no basis for that faith. And whether you do or don’t, it doesn’t mean we have to give anything away. Let’s go back in now, and let me do the talking. That’s why I get the big bucks, right?”

I clapped him on the shoulder. We went in and sat back down. And Walter didn’t say another word. I argued that he shouldn’t have to give away his right to appellate review just because he wanted the speedy trial he was entitled to. But Judge Stanton sided with Golantz, ruling that if Elliot declined the offer to delay the trial, he couldn’t come complaining after a conviction that his attorney hadn’t had enough time to prepare. Faced with the ruling, Elliot stuck to his guns and declined the delay, as I knew he would. That was okay with me. Under the Byzantine rules of law, almost nothing was safe from appeal. I knew that if necessary, Elliot would still be able to appeal the ruling the judge had just made.

We moved on to what the judge called housekeeping after that. The first order of business was to have both sides sign off on a motion from Court TV to be allowed to broadcast segments of the trial live on its daily programming. Neither I nor Golantz objected. After all, it was free advertising — me for new clients, Golantz to further his political aspirations. And as far as Walter Elliot was concerned, he whispered to me that he wanted the cameras there to record his not-guilty verdict.

Next the judge outlined the schedule for submitting final discovery and witness lists. He gave us until Monday on the discovery materials and the witness lists were due the day after that.

“No exceptions, gentlemen,” he said. “I look dimly on surprise additions after deadline.”

This was not going to be a problem from the defense’s side of the aisle. Vincent had already made two previous discovery filings and there was very little new since then for me to share with the prosecution. Cisco Wojciechowski was doing a good job of keeping me in the dark as to what he was finding out about Rilz. And what I didn’t know I couldn’t put in the discovery file.

When it comes to witnesses, my plan was to give Golantz the usual runaround. I would be submitting a list of potential witnesses, naming every law officer and forensic tech mentioned in the sheriff’s reports. That was standard operating procedure. Golantz would have to puzzle over who I really would call to testify and who was important to the defense’s case.

“All right, guys, I’ve probably got a courtroom full of lawyers out there waiting for me,” Stanton finally said. “Are we clear on everything?”

Golantz and I nodded our heads. I couldn’t help but wonder if either the judge or the prosecutor was the recipient of the bribe. Was I sitting with the man who would turn the case my client’s way? If so, he had done nothing to give himself away. I finished the meeting thinking that Bosch had it all wrong. There was no bribe. There was a hundred-thousand-dollar boat somewhere in a harbor in San Diego or Cabo and it had Jerry Vincent’s name on the title.

“Okay, then,” the judge said. “We’ll get this going next week. We can talk about ground rules Thursday morning. But I want to make it clear right now, I’m going to run this trial like a well-oiled machine. No surprises, no shenanigans, no funny stuff. Again, are we clear?”

Golantz and I both agreed once more that we were clear. But the judge swiveled his chair and looked directly at me. He squinted his eyes in suspicion.

“I’m going to hold you to that,” he said.

It seemed to be a message intended only for me, a message that would never show on the stenographer’s record.

How come, I wondered, it’s always the defense attorney who gets the judicial squint?

Twenty-five

I
got to Joanne Giorgetti’s office shortly before the noon break. I knew that getting there a minute after twelve would be too late. The DA’s Offices literally empty during the lunch hour, the inhabitants seeking sunlight, fresh air and sustenance outside the CCB. I told the receptionist I had an appointment with Giorgetti and she made a call. Then she buzzed the door lock and told me to go back.

Giorgetti had a small, windowless office with most of the floor space taken up by cardboard file boxes. It was the same way in every prosecutor’s office I had ever been in, big or small. She was at her desk but was hidden behind a wall of stacked motions and files. I carefully reached over the wall to shake her hand.

“How’s it going, Joanne?”

“Not bad, Mickey. How about you?”

“I’m doing okay.”

“You just got a lot of cases, I hear.”

“Yeah, quite a few.”

The conversation was stilted. I knew she and Maggie were tight, and there was no telling whether my ex-wife had opened up to her about my difficulties in the past year.

“So you’re here for Wyms?”

“That’s right. I didn’t even know I had the case till this morning.”

She handed me a file with an inch-thick stack of documents in it.

“What do you think happened to Jerry’s file?” she asked.

“I think maybe the killer took it.”

She made a cringing face.

“Weird. Why would the killer take this file?”

“Probably unintended. The file was in Jerry’s briefcase along with his laptop, and the killer just took the whole thing.”

“Hmmm.”

“Well, is there anything unusual about this case? Anything that would have made Jerry a target?”

“I don’t think so. Just your usual everyday crazy-with-a-gun sort of thing.”

I nodded.

“Have you heard anything about a federal grand jury taking a look at the state courts?”

She knitted her eyebrows.

“Why would they be looking at this case?”

“I’m not saying they were. I’ve been out of the loop for a while. I was wondering what you’ve heard.”

She shrugged.

“Just the usual rumors on the gossip circuit. Seems like there’s always a federal investigation of something.”

“Yeah.”

I said nothing else, hoping she would fill me in on the rumor. But she didn’t and it was time to move on.

“The hearing today is to set a trial date?” I asked.