The Lincoln Lawyer: A Novel (39 page)

“No, what’s the difference?”

“One’s a bottom-feeding, shit-eating scum sucker. The other’s a fish.”

“That’s a good one, Detective.”

He left me then and I stood there smiling. Not because of the joke or the understanding that Lankford had probably been the
one to elevate the insult from defense attorneys to all of lawyerdom when he had retold the joke to Booker. I smiled because
the joke was confirmation that Lankford and Booker were in communication. They were talking and it meant that things were
moving and in play. My plan was still holding together. I still had a chance.

E
very trial has a main event. A witness or a piece of evidence that becomes the fulcrum upon which everything swings one way
or the other. In this case the main event was billed as Regina Campo, victim and accuser, and the case would seem to rest
upon her performance and testimony. But a good defense attorney always has an understudy and I had mine, a witness secretly
waiting in the wings upon whom I hoped to shift the weight of the trial.

Nevertheless, when Minton called Regina Campo to the stand after the break, it was safe to say all eyes were on her as she
was led in and walked to the witness box. It was the first time anyone in the jury had seen her in person. It was also the
first time I had ever seen her. I was surprised, but not in a good way. She was diminutive and her hesitant walk and slight
posture belied the picture of the scheming mercenary I had been building in the jury’s collective consciousness.

Minton was definitely learning as he was going. With Campo he seemed to have arrived at the conclusion that less was more.
He economically led her through the testimony. He first started with personal background before moving on to the events of
March 6.

Regina Campo’s story was sadly unoriginal and that was what Minton was counting on. She told the story of a young, attractive
woman coming to Hollywood from Indiana a decade before with hopes of celluloid glory. There were starts and stops to a career,
an
appearance on a television show here and there. She was a fresh face and there were always men willing to put her in small
meaningless parts. But when she was no longer a fresh face, she found work in a series of straight-to-cable films which often
required her to appear nude. She supplemented her income with nude modeling jobs and slipped easily into a world of trading
sex for favors. Eventually, she skipped the façade altogether and started trading sex for money. It finally brought her to
the night she encountered Louis Roulet.

Regina Campo’s courtroom version of what happened that night did not differ from the accounts offered by all previous witnesses
in the trial. But where it was dramatically different was in the delivery. Campo, with her face framed by dark, curly hair,
seemed like a little girl lost. She appeared scared and tearful during the latter half of her testimony. Her lower lip and
finger shook with fear as she pointed to the man she identified as her attacker. Roulet stared right back, a blank expression
on his face.

“It was him,” she said in a strong voice. “He’s an animal who should be put away!”

I let that go without objection. I would get my chance with her soon enough. Minton continued the questioning, taking Campo
through her escape, and then asked why she had not told the responding officers the truth about knowing who the man who attacked
her was and why he was there.

“I was scared,” she said. “I wasn’t sure they would believe me if I told them why he was there. I wanted to make sure they
arrested him because I was very afraid of him.”

“Do you regret that decision now?”

“Yes, I do because I know it might help him get free to do this again to somebody.”

I did object to that answer as prejudicial and the judge sustained it. Minton threw a few more questions at his witness but
seemed to know he was past the apex of the testimony and that he should stop before he obscured the trembling finger of identification.

Campo had testified on direct examination for slightly less than an hour. It was almost 11:30 but the judge did not break
for
lunch as I had expected. She told the jurors she wanted to get as much testimony in as possible during the day and that they
would go to a late, abbreviated lunch. This made me wonder if she knew something I didn’t. Had the Glendale detectives called
her during the mid-morning break to warn of my impending arrest?

“Mr. Haller, your witness,” she said to prompt me and keep things going.

I went to the lectern with my legal pad and looked at my notes. If I was engaged in a defense of a thousand razors, I had
to use at least half of them on this witness. I was ready.

“Ms. Campo, have you engaged the services of an attorney to sue Mr. Roulet over the alleged events of March sixth?”

She looked as though she had expected the question, but not as the first one out of the shoot.

“No, I haven’t.”

“Have you talked to an attorney about this case?”

“I haven’t hired anybody to sue him. Right now, all I am interested in is seeing that justice is—”

“Ms. Campo,” I interrupted. “I didn’t ask whether you hired an attorney or what your interests are. I asked if you had
talked
to an attorney—any attorney—about this case and a possible lawsuit against Mr. Roulet.”

She was looking closely at me, trying to read me. I had said it with the authority of someone who knew something, who had
the goods to back up the charge. Minton had probably schooled her on the most important aspect of testifying: don’t get trapped
in a lie.

“Talked to an attorney, yes. But it was nothing more than talk. I didn’t hire him.”

“Is that because the prosecutor told you not to hire anybody until the criminal case was over?”

“No, he didn’t say anything about that.”

“Why did you talk to an attorney about this case?”

She had dropped into a routine of hesitating before every answer. This was fine with me. The perception of most people is
that it takes time to tell a lie. Honest responses come easily.

“I talked to him because I wanted to know my rights and to make sure I was protected.”

“Did you ask him if you could sue Mr. Roulet for damages?”

“I thought what you say to your attorney is private.”

“If you wish, you can tell the jurors what you spoke to the attorney about.”

There was the first deep slash with the razor. She was in an untenable position. No matter how she answered she would not
look good.

“I think I want to keep it private,” she finally said.

“Okay, let’s go back to March sixth, but I want to go a little further back than Mr. Minton did. Let’s go back to the bar
at Morgan’s when you first spoke to the defendant, Mr. Roulet.”

“Okay.”

“What were you doing at Morgan’s that night?”

“I was meeting someone.”

“Charles Talbot?”

“Yes.”

“Now, you were meeting him there to sort of size up whether you wanted to lead him back to your place to engage in sex for
hire, correct?”

She hesitated but then nodded.

“Please answer verbally,” the judge told her.

“Yes.”

“Would you say that practice is a safety precaution?”

“Yes.”

“A form of safe sex, right?”

“I guess so.”

“Because in your profession you deal intimately with strangers, so you must protect yourself, correct?”

“Yes, correct.”

“People in your profession call this the ‘freak test,’ don’t they?”

“I’ve never called it that.”

“But it is true that you meet your prospective clients in a public place like Morgan’s to test them out and make sure they
aren’t
freaks or dangerous before you take them to your apartment. Isn’t that right?”

“You could say that. But the truth is, you can never be sure about somebody.”

“That is true. So when you were at Morgan’s you noticed Mr. Roulet sitting at the same bar as you and Mr. Talbot?”

“Yes, he was there.”

“And had you ever seen him before?”

“Yes, I had seen him there and a few other places before.”

“Had you ever spoken to him?”

“No, we never talked.”

“Had you ever noticed that he wore a Rolex watch?”

“No.”

“Had you ever seen him drive up or away from one of these places in a Porsche or a Range Rover?”

“No, I never saw him driving.”

“But you had seen him before in Morgan’s and other places like it.”

“Yes.”

“But never spoke to him.”

“Correct.”

“Then, what made you approach him?”

“I knew he was in the life, that’s all.”

“What do you mean by ‘in the life’?”

“I mean that the other times I had seen him I could tell he was a player. I’d seen him leave with girls that do what I do.”

“You saw him leave with other prostitutes?”

“Yes.”

“Leave to where?”

“I don’t know, leave the premises. Go to a hotel or the girl’s apartment. I don’t know that part.”

“Well, how do you know they even left the premises? Maybe they went outside for a smoke.”

“I saw them get into his car and drive away.”

“Ms. Campo, you testified a minute ago that you never saw Mr.
Roulet’s cars. Now you are saying that you saw him get into his car with a woman who is a prostitute like yourself. Which
is it?”

She realized her misstep and froze for a moment until an answer came to her.

“I saw him get into a car but I didn’t know what kind it was.”

“You don’t notice things like that, do you?”

“Not usually.”

“Do you know the difference between a Porsche and a Range Rover?”

“One’s big and one’s small, I guess.”

“What kind of car did you see Mr. Roulet get into?”

“I don’t remember.”

I paused a moment and decided I had milked her contradiction for all it was worth. I looked down at my list of questions and
moved on.

“These women that you saw leave with Mr. Roulet, were they ever seen again?”

“I don’t understand.”

“Did they disappear? Did you ever see them again?”

“No, I saw them again.”

“Had they been beaten or injured?”

“Not that I know of but I didn’t ask.”

“But all of this added up to you believing that you were safe as far as approaching and soliciting him, correct?”

“I don’t know about safe. I just knew he was probably there looking for a girl and the man I was with already told me he would
be finished by ten because he had to go to his business.”

“Well, can you tell the jury why it was that you did not have to sit with Mr. Roulet like you did with Mr. Talbot and subject
him to a freak test?”

Her eyes drifted over to Minton. She was hoping for a rescue but none was coming.

“I just thought he was a known quantity, that’s all.”

“You thought he was safe.”

“I guess so. I don’t know. I needed the money and I made a mistake with him.”

“Did you think he was rich and could solve your need for money?”

“No, nothing like that. I saw him as a potential customer who wasn’t new to the game. Somebody who knew what he was doing.”

“You testified that on prior occasions you had seen Mr. Roulet with other women who practice the same profession as yourself?”

“Yes.”

“They’re prostitutes.”

“Yes.”

“Do you know them?”

“We’re acquaintances.”

“And do you extend professional courtesy to these women in terms of alerting them to customers who might be dangerous or unwilling
to pay?”

“Sometimes.”

“And they extend the same professional courtesy to you, right?”

“Yes.”

“How many of them warned you about Louis Roulet?”

“Well, nobody did, or I wouldn’t have gone with him.”

I nodded and looked at my notes for a long moment before continuing. I then led her in more detail through the events at Morgan’s
and then introduced the video surveillance tape from the bar’s overhead camera. Minton objected to it being shown to the jury
without proper foundation but he was overruled. A television on an industrial stand was wheeled in front of the jury and the
video was played. I could tell by the rapt attention they paid to it that they were enamored with the idea of watching a prostitute
at work as well as the aspect of seeing the two main players in the case in unguarded moments.

“What did the note say that you passed him?” I asked after the television was pushed to the side of the courtroom.

“I think it just said my name and address.”

“You didn’t quote him a price for the services you would perform?”

“I may have. I don’t remember.”

“What is the going rate that you charge?”

“Usually I get four hundred dollars.”

“Usually? What would make you differentiate from that?”

“Depends on what the client wants.”

I looked over at the jury box and saw that the Bible man’s face was getting tight with discomfort.

“Do you ever engage in bondage and domination with your clients?”

“Sometimes. It’s only role playing, though. Nobody ever gets hurt. It’s just playacting.”

“Are you saying that before the night of March sixth, you have never been hurt by a client?”

“Yes, that’s what I am saying. That man hurt me and tried to kill—”

“Please just answer the question I ask, Ms. Campo. Thank you. Now, let’s go back to Morgan’s. Yes or no, at the moment you
gave Mr. Roulet the napkin with your address and price on it, you were confident that he would not be a danger to you and
that he was carrying sufficient cash funds to pay the four hundred dollars you demand for your services?”

“Yes.”

“So, why didn’t Mr. Roulet have any cash on him when the police searched him?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t take it.”

“Do you know who did?”

“No.”

I hesitated for a long moment, preferring to punctuate my shifts in questioning streams with an underscore of silence.

“Now, uh, you are still working as a prostitute, correct?” I asked.