Naked Justice

Chapter 41

ORDINARILY, BEN WOULD’VE PREFERRED to start with the easy stuff and build to the hard, but in this instance, he knew he had to go straight to the heart of the matter, to undermine the impact of that last bit of testimony before it had a chance to make a permanent impression on the jurors’ perceptions.

“Let’s talk about Wallace’s last statement, Mr. Prentiss. He said, ‘You’ll regret this.’ Did he explain what he meant?”

“Well, no, but I had the definite impression—”

Ben stopped him cold. “Mr. Prentiss, I didn’t ask for your impressions. The judge has instructed you to stick to the facts. Please do so.”

Prentiss took in a deep breath. “All right. No, he didn’t explain what he meant.”

“So, he could’ve meant, say, ‘You’ll be sorry you didn’t get the girls ice cream, ’cause now they’ll be whiny all afternoon.’ ”

“I suppose that’s possible.”

“Or he could’ve meant, ‘You’ll be sorry you raised your voice in public, because now your approval rating will go down in the polls.’ ”

“If you say so.”

“The truth is, sir, you don’t know what he meant.”

Prentiss chose his words carefully. “Based upon everything I witnessed, I had the definite impression that he was threatening her.”

“Threatening what?”

“Threatening bodily harm.”

“That’s your guess, and I emphasize the word guess, based on what you know or think you know happened later. But in fact, as you testified, he had a chance to hit her—and he didn’t.”

“Well … not in public, no.”

“You don’t know for a fact whether he ever hit her at all, do you?”

“I heard the—”

“Once again, sir, I must ask you to stick to the things you have actually seen or heard. Did you ever see Wallace Barrett strike his wife?”

“No.”

“ ‘You’ll regret this.’ Did your guess about what this remark meant occur at the time, or only after you’d read in the papers that Barrett’s family had been killed?”

“Well, after I read what happened it seemed clear—”

“After you read the incredibly biased reportage suggesting that Wallace Barrett was guilty, which came before any evidence had been gathered or presented, you decided to jump on the bandwagon and reinterpret what you saw to cast him as a killer making a threat.”

“That’s not true. I saw what I saw.”

“The truth is, sir, you saw next to nothing. But to listen to you testify, you’d think you’d witnessed the murders themselves.”

“Objection!” Bullock shouted.

“Sustained. Mr. Kincaid, please control yourself.”

“Sorry, your honor.” Ben flipped to the next page of his notes. He was getting carried away, and he knew that always led to sloppy lawyering. It was just so frustrating. Barrett was being hung on a circumstantial mass of innuendo, supposition, and media bias. “Let’s talk about the incident you described involving Wallace’s daughter Annabelle.”

“All right.”

“Despite your best efforts to turn it into some hideous public child abuse, basically, what you witnessed was a mild spanking, right?”

“I wouldn’t use those words.”

“Well, was the contact intended as a punishment?”

Prentiss tossed his head to one side. “I suppose it was.”

“And where did he touch her?”

“On her little bottom.”

“Sounds like a spanking to me.”

Prentiss straightened in his chair. “Look, I don’t think you can write something like this off by calling it a spanking. When you hit a kid, it’s abuse, whatever your supposed motivation.”

“That’s your opinion.”

“Damn straight.”

“You don’t believe in corporal punishment.”

“No, I don’t.”

“But you must realize that many people, particularly people older than you, do. They believe it’s necessary to discipline a child.”

“Discipline.” He snorted. “That’s what parents always say to justify hitting their kids. Most of the time it’s just plain uncontrolled anger. Venting their temper on their children.”

“Still, there are times—”

“Look, mister, I’ve got two kids of my own, and I’ve been able to discipline them just fine, but I’ve never hit them. Never once.”

Ben swallowed hard. What a position he’d gotten himself into. He’d sooner die than strike Joey. But here he was coming off as the defender of corporal punishment. He could see the headlines: BARRETT ATTY FAVORS CHILD BEATING. “Mr. Prentiss, this is a murder trial, not a referendum on the propriety of spankings. I realize there are television cameras in the room and that creates a temptation to pontificate on important issues, but I’ll have to ask you to stop trying to promote causes and to limit yourself to answering my questions.”

“Fine.”

“When Wallace administered this disciplinary blow to his daughter’s bottom, did he appear to be acting out of anger?”

“Well, no, not particularly.”

“Did he appear to do any serious harm to her?”

“No, no.”

“After the spanking, did he continue to show hostility to her?”

“No. In fact, he picked her up and carried her to the car.”

“So your portrait of a man abusing his family really comes down to a man raising his voice and giving his daughter a mild swat on the backside.”

“I wouldn’t—”

“Thank you, sir. No more questions.”

Ben sat down quickly, hoping they could move to the next witness. To his dismay, the instant he sat, he saw Bullock rise to redirect.

“May I approach the witness?” The judge nodded, and Bullock handed what appeared to be a videotape to Prentiss. “Have you seen this before?”

“Yes.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a tape made in the ice cream parlor on March 11. We have a security camera behind the counter that tapes everything that goes on in the store. This particular tape displays the encounter with the defendant and his family that I just described.”

“Your honor, I move that this tape be admitted—”

Ben shot to his feet. “Objection, your honor! This is redirect. He can’t bring in new evidence.”

“This is in the nature of rebuttal,” Bullock explained. “I had hoped to avoid showing this to the jury”—I’ll just bet, Ben thought—“but now Mr. Kincaid has called into question Mr. Prentiss’s testimony. Was it a threat or a joke? Was it a spanking or a beating? The best way for the jury to determine the answers to these questions is to let them see what happened for themselves.”

“But your honor,” Ben protested, “this is duplicative. Prentiss has already testified to all this.”

“And the defense has disputed it,” Bullock answered calmly. “We now wish the opportunity to demonstrate that everything Mr. Prentiss has said is true and is in no way exaggerated.”

The judge nodded. “It’s a bit irregular, but given the circumstances, I’ll allow it. Have you got the proper equipment ready?”

Bullock nodded, and began setting up his VCR and television monitor in front of the jury box.

Ben collapsed into his seat. Damn! He’d been totally set up. Bullock had held back the tape, hoping to have a second shot, and Ben had given him his opportunity on a silver platter. Even if the tape showed nothing more than what Prentiss had already said, the jury would now hear it twice, instead of just once. It would be indelibly imprinted on their brains.

Ben sat down glumly as the lights dimmed and watched the grainy security video that was now being presented to the jury. He tried to focus, but one grim truth kept reasserting itself in his brain.

The first morning of trial had been a disaster for the defense. Or more to the point, for Wallace Barrett.