The Arraignment

CHAPTER TWELVE

Miguelito Espinoza, father of an infant and husband of the child-woman, is thirty-five, hard as a diamond, a tattoo chain of black ink around his neck, and on both arms Spanish gang graffiti in blazoned letters.

He has a slicked-back do with a net over it, pulled tight around the edges covering the tops of his ears. The man is dead in the eyes, and dark in more ways than his complexion as he sits there slumped down, one leg crossed over the other, cool, his chair pushed back from the table as if he is low riding on his way to hell.

He faces multiple counts of armed robbery, the theft of federal property, as well as possession. He faces twenty-five years on each count if they can prove that he was involved in the actual visa hijacking. He faces ten years on each count of possession for the three visas found in his closet.

We are seated on opposite sides at a steel table in one of the small lawyer-client cubicles in the Metro Detention Center, the white high-rise tomb downtown. There is a guard watching from outside the glass, his eyes constantly on the table between us so that nothing passes without his notice.

The place was a skyscraping joke when it was first put up a few years ago. The contractor stiffed the federal government on the concrete used to build it, so inmates pounding on the walls hard enough could punch holes and shimmy down their bed sheets to the ground outside. Guards were reduced to listening to the hammering from upstairs to pick up the direction in hopes that they could scurry out to the street before the tenants could rappel down their bed covers and hightail it. Since then, the government has hardened the cells, so now inmates would at least need a spoon to chisel their way out.

Espinoza is not impressed that I have come here. He is filled with questions. Streetwise, he is looking at this gift horse as if perhaps there is something in the package that may bite him.

“Why don’ you tell me who hired you, man?”

“I told you. Your wife, Robin.”

“Listen, man. Save the bullshit for your friends. Robin don’ know shit. You think I’m a fool? Robin’s a fuckin’ idiot. Where’s she gonna find a lawyer? She can’t find the fuckin’ phone book. And if she could, she couldn’t read it. Besides, she ain’t got the money to pay you. Look at your fine clothes, your little leather briefcase.” He says this in mocking tones, with the fingers of one hand idly pointed toward my case on the floor next to the table.

“Listen, man.” He sits up at the table, elbows on top, and leans close to me as if he’s about to explain the mysteries of life. “Look at me,” he says. “I ain’t talking to you ’til I know who you are. You got it?”

I shrug my shoulders. “Fine. I hope you like the accommodations.” I get up from my chair, grab my briefcase, and move toward the door.

“Hey, man. Where you goin’?”

“You said you don’t want to talk.”

He glances over his shoulder at the guard who starts to move this way to take him back to his cell.

“Sit down, man.”

“Not unless you want to talk.”

“Fine, man. Fine. We’ll talk. Relax.” He’s back, slumped in the chair, trying not to notice the guard and hoping he will go away.

“Sit down, man.” He taps the stainless steel surface of the table with two fingers, an invitation for me to join him again. Anything is better than the cell inside. “Maybe we can talk about the weather,” he says.

I take a seat, and the guard backs off and returns to his position against the wall outside, watching us.

“You gotta be cool,” he says. “Gimme a minute.” He is thinking, trying to piece together who would hire me and why. “I just wanna know who you are,” he says. “That’s all.”

“I told you.”

“You tol’ me nothin’. Who hired you?”

“What difference does it make as long as we get you out of here?”

His eyes darting around, thinking about this.

“Why would you do that?”

“Call it my civic duty,” I tell him.

His eyes read bullshit, but he’s afraid to say the word for fear I might get up and this time walk.

So instead he says: “Can you do that? Get me out?”

“I don’t know. First you’ll have to trust me. Tell me what’s going on.”

“Can you get me out on bail?”

“It wouldn’t be easy.”

“Then what the fuck good are you?”

“This close to the border and you charged with taking a truckload of U.S. visas, a judge might have a problem giving you bail.”

“What the fuck, you think I’m a flight risk?” He knows more lawyer lingo than half the attorneys I know.

“It’s not what I think that counts.”

“I don’ know nothin’ about it, man. Those fuckin’ passes. I don’t know how they got there.” He is sitting up now in the chair, dropping the detached demeanor, looking at me directly, trying to focus a shimmer of honesty in those dark, beady eyes.

“They were in your apartment. On your closet floor.”

“Only three of ’em, man. Where’s the rest?”

“Maybe they think you’re going to tell them.”

“How do I know? I mean, I don’t know shit.” He’s looking around, shaking his head, palms up and out, extended in the con’s perennial disclaimer, your average honest man filled with disbelief. “I’m sleeping in my bed, man, these assholes come in, fuckin’ flashlights in my eyes, put a shotgun in my face. Next thing I know, they’re pulling this shit out of my closet. I’m telling you, man. You know everything I know. I don’t know how they got there. Maybe somebody put ’em there, man.”

“Obviously. The question is who?”

“How would I know?”

“It’s your apartment.”

“Lots of people come and go,” he says. “Maybe they did it.”

“What people?”

He thinks for a second. You can read it in his eyes. He’s opened this door a crack, and now he wants to close it.

“Them.”

“Who’s them?”

“Fucking Immigration,” he says. “They’re always after me.”

“You’re saying the INS framed you? That they dumped the evidence onto the floor in your closet?”

“How do I know? Anything’s possible, man.”

“You’ll have to do better than that.”

He looks around, the gray cells moving at light speed now, sullen, thinking of new ways to lie to one more lawyer.

I tell him that if this were a state action, he would definitely have something to worry about. “It would be strike three,” I say. “I’ve seen your record. It’s not good. How does a lifetime behind bars sound?”

“But it ain’t no fuckin’ state action.” He takes solace at least in this.

“Maybe it is, and maybe it isn’t.”

Espinoza gives me a sideways glance. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It was federal property that went missing. But the fact that some of it turned up in this state, specifically on your closet floor, could make out a case for possession of stolen property.”

“They can’t do that, man. Can they?”

I make a face. Anything’s possible.

He’s up close at the table now. I have his undivided attention. “Tell me, man. Why would they want to do that to me?”

“Why not? You think they’re going to cut you some slack? In case you haven’t figured it out, they want to squeeze you, Miguel. I can call you Miguel, can’t I?”

He nods. “Why?

“Because they think you know something. They want you to roll over on some of your friends.”

“Who sent you?” he says.

“Are we going through that again?”

“I don’ know nothin’.” Just like that he’s back to low riding in the chair, only this time he has a hand up to his mouth, nibbling fingernails. From the tip of his tongue, he spits out the chewed-off remains along with the black crude from underneath. I watch him for several seconds as he sits there biting and shooting looks from beady little eyes in every direction as if the walls have ears. In this case, they may. I can’t be sure that our conversation is not being monitored. There are now in place what are called Special Administrative Measures. These permit federal prison authorities to listen in, even between lawyer and client in cases where national security is believed to be at issue. The fact that Espinoza is charged with the theft of a thousand high-tech visas to enter the country must have them wondering for what purpose these documents were stolen.

A tattoo across the back of Espinoza’s hand reads “Sangre” (meaning “blood”), in Gothic block letters like some ethnic mural on a wall in East Los Angeles.

“Even if they don’t turn you over to the state, the feds are not likely to go easy. In case you haven’t noticed, scrutiny at the borders has been turned up-just a notch.”

I emphasize the last few words. It takes him a beat or two to make all the intended deductions, then he looks at me. “No way, man.” Then he looks away as if this puts distance between himself and his own conclusions. “I ain’t no fuckin’ terrorist,” he says. “Maybe people once in a while. Sure I brought people across, sometimes. But, but not that shit. No way, man.”

“Maybe they don’t know that. We’re talking some risky stuff that went missing. These were not green cards knocked out on somebody’s home computer, Miguel. These were laser-etched visas with holograms. You know as well as I do they can’t be traced. The little camera they use at the border down at San Ysidro to shoot pictures and send them back to Virginia.” He follows my every word. Espinoza knows exactly what I’m talking about.

“You know the one, where they check to see if they’re forgeries. That little camera, and those people in Virginia, they wouldn’t be able to stop you if you had one of these cards at the border. They’d think you were just another honest citizen crossing over to do business. Bad people could bring a lot of dangerous shit into the country with cards like that.”

“That’s not…” He bites the next word in half.

“That’s not what? That’s not why they were stolen?”

All of this has him thinking of perils he’s never considered, looking down at the tabletop again and then back to me.

“Why, man? I mean why would they think I’m some fucking terrorist? There’s no evidence I ever did nothing like that.” He thumps the table with two fingers to make the point.

“Maybe they think you’re moving up in the world.”

“Hey, man, you’re fuckin’ with my head. That’s bullshit.” He turns away from me, the devil he doesn’t want to see or hear. But the thought has seeped into his brain where it now sizzles like corrosive acid.

“They can’t do that, man. That’s fuckin’ illegal. They got no fucking evidence. There are laws,” he says. “I am entitled…”

“Of course you can make all of those arguments,” I tell him. “But the people who sit on juries are a little uptight right now. If they think you might be that kind of a threat, well, they might just throw you in the can until sometime around the year when your grandchildren have children.”

I can tell that this is a sobering thought, one that has him forgetting for the moment who might have hired me and thinking instead about the sky outside-and how long it might be before he gets to see it again.

He looks at me, shiny brown eyes. “Whadda you want to know, man? Tell you what I can.”

“What do you mean you’re representing him?” Harry is looking at me as if I’m crazy, seated in one of the client chairs across from my desk in the office.

“I met with him over at the federal lockup late yesterday afternoon and told him I’d take his case.”

“Why? Did he give you a retainer?”

“We’ll have to work that out. Ever hear of a drug, street slang, something called Mejicano Rosen?”

Harry shakes his head. “Heard of Maui Wowee. Hawaiian Sensimilla. It’s the same stuff,” he says. “Potent. And I’ve heard of black tar and white china, angel dust, snow, B.C. bud, baby-T…”

“What’s baby-T?”

“Another word for crack,” he says.

“Where did you hear all of this?”

“Some of us lead less sheltered lives,” says Harry.

“But you’ve never heard of Mejicano Rosen?”

“Your Spanish sucks,” says Harry. “Sound like some Jewish dry cleaner in Tijuana.”

“Do me a favor? See if you can run it down for me?”

“Where?”

“I don’t know. Start by asking around wherever it is you lead this less sheltered life of yours. Maybe over one of your card games on Thursday night with that vice cop and the deputy D.A.”

“Oh, right. What am I gonna go over there and yell, ‘Hey guys we have a client running some stuff outta Mexico and we’d like to know what it’s worth’?”

“Try the library. Take Marta with you. Maybe there’s something on Lexis-Nexis? An article or an appellate case that mentions it.”

“You’re wasting my time. Why don’t you just ask your client?”

“Espinoza did the limit. He’s not going to tell me anything more unless he gets awfully lonely in the jail. I get the sense he doesn’t trust me that much.”

“Can’t understand that. Just cuz you’re trying to pump him for information in a double murder involving a friend without disclosure?”

“Hey. I’m not even sure he’s going to let me represent him.”

“Did you happen to mention Nick? Tell him about all the blood on the sidewalk in front of the federal courthouse, the fact that Metz, who was shot with Nick, mentioned Espinoza’s name?”

“We didn’t have that much time.”

“I see you were too busy listening.”

“Lawyer’s job,” I tell him. “Hearing the heartache.”

“Makes you wonder how they ever came up with the word mouthpiece,” says Harry. “When exactly are you going to break this little tidbit to your client, the fact that you’re hoping he runs in the same circles with the people who killed Nick, so maybe he can give you a reference you can pass along to the cops?”

“Look at it this way. I could be giving him a wonderful case on appeal. That’s more than the federal public defender can offer. I’ll tell him when it becomes necessary.”

“Oh, good,” says Harry. “Then maybe they’ll just suspend your license instead of disbarring you. How can you be sure he didn’t have a hand in doing Nick himself?”

“Your friend with the D.A. said he was under federal surveillance at the time.”

“He said he thought he was. There’s a difference.”

“He did admit that he knew the people who pulled the number down in Tijuana, the ones who held up the delivery van and took the visas. Of course he had nothing to do with it.”

“Of course.”

“And he gave me a name. First name only.”

“What else did he tell you?”

“Some information as to where this person might be found.”

This does not excite Harry.

“It could just be coincidence. Espinoza says he was a high roller out of Mexico, flashy dresser. He says the man always had a large roll of cash and he seemed to be calling the shots. His name was Jaime.”

Harry looks at me out of the corner of one eye. “So?”

“Metz, that morning in my office, told me one of the Ibarra brothers was named Jaime.”

“So was Jimmy Stewart,” says Harry. “Maybe they should dig him up and look for visas.”

I ignore him. “It does beg the question: why he would flop in a flea house like Espinoza’s apartment?”

“I’ve seen the place. He says this Jaime and some friends stayed with him for a few days. I tried to get a fix on when this was. He said he couldn’t remember exactly, but it was last summer. It was definitely after the van carrying the visas was knocked down in Tijuana. He says these guys must have left some of them behind. Of course, then he fell into his own pit.”

I can tell by the look that Harry is curious, but he doesn’t want to encourage this.

“He got his stories screwed up and let slip that some of the visas were supposed to be used for getting stuff across the border. What he called Mejicano Rosen.”

Harry muses for a moment. “Did you consider the fact that this man deals in flesh? A labor contractor working the Mexican border. Maybe this Rosen is a person? Different kind of contraband,” says Harry. “Besides, what makes you think any of this is true? Dollars to doughnuts, he pulled the trigger on Nick.”

“No. That he didn’t do.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he wasn’t available for the shooting. He was in Mexico.”

Harry looks at me.

“Sarah goes to school with a boy whose father works one of the border checks at Immigration. We got to know each other during basketball last season. I called him late last week and told him I had a client, and I needed to know if the man was in the country or not during a period of time. He told me there was no way to check, that they don’t usually take down passport numbers. I told him that on this guy they might, to check anyway. He did. Espinoza used his passport, not a visa, to cross the border at Tijuana four days before Nick was killed. He didn’t return until five days later.”

“How would they know that?” says Harry.

“I figured if the information from your friend over cards was accurate, and the feds had Espinoza under surveillance, they’d have him on a ‘watch list’ at the border. They did.”

I had no intention of getting involved with Espinoza until I could verify that he had no hand in killing Nick. That would have been a little too messy. As it is, I am walking the edge.