The Cat Dancers

3

It was late may, and the building-management gnomes who decided such things had turned off both the heat and the air-conditioning to save money, so the courtroom was unusually stuffy. Steven Klein, the local district attorney, was droning through the motions hearing on the minimart case, while Lt. Cam Richter and Sgt. Kenny Cox of the Manceford County Sheriff’s Office tried to stay awake in the back of the courtroom. The case was pretty much a slam dunk, what with the confession and the submachine gun, but with Justice Bellamy presiding, one never knew what was going to happen. And sure enough, the judge raised a hand to interrupt Klein. Cam knew that Steven hated that, and it showed immediately on the DA’s face. What came next got everyone’s undivided attention.

“Mr. Klein, I’ve been looking at the arrest reports for these two defendants. I see a problem here. A big problem, actually.”

“Your Honor?” Kelin said, pulling his reading glasses down his large nose. He was in his forties, abundantly fed, and still annoyed that the judge had interrupted him.

“You’ve stated that Mr. Kyle Simmonds, alias K-Dog, confessed to the minimart holdup at the time of his arrest in the motel room. But I notice that his Miranda statement was not executed until the SWAT team had both defendants back at the district station. This was what-forty-five minutes after taking them into custody?”

“They were Mirandized verbally at the scene by the arresting officers, Your Honor. They signed their paper once the deputies got ’em back to the district office.”

“Which arresting officer in particular Mirandized them?”

“Uh,” Klein said, looking sideways and behind him at Detective Will Guthridge. Will had been the supervising detective sent out by the district office when the SWAT team went in to take down the two robbers.

“The deputies who hooked him up, Your Honor,” Guthridge said. “It was a SWAT takedown. Really noisy in there.”

“Which specific arresting officer gave them their Miranda warnings, Detective? As in, a name, please?”

“I’ll have to find that out, Your Honor,” Guthridge said, popping out a flip phone and punching up his phone list. Cam looked sideways at Kenny Cox, his number two on the Major Criminal Apprehension Team. Kenny had his eyes closed and was shaking his head slowly from side to side. Oh shit, oh dear, Cam thought. Guthridge was bent sideways in his seat, talking earnestly, probably to someone in the Special Operations section. Cam leaned his head toward Kenny. “Who was the honcho on SWAT that day?” he asked.

“McMichael,” Kenny muttered. Cam groaned quietly. Then K-Dog took the opportunity to throw some shit in the game. He spoke up from the defendants’ table. “Nobody said shit,” he offered helpfully. “They knocked us on our asses, told us to stay down on the floor about a million times. They was all yellin’ and shit.”

“Ms. Walker,” the judge said to K-Dog’s court-appointed defense attorney. “Please instruct the defendant not to speak until I ask him to speak. Detective, what are your people saying? You understand I’ll want a live arresting officer standing tall, right here, under oath, stating that he gave the appropriate warnings, right?”

Guthridge nodded vigorously at the judge and kept talking. Cam nudged Kenny and asked him if he could call somebody and get this thing right. K-Dog’s motel room confession was all they really had on these assholes, because the fire at the gas station had eliminated both witnesses and any physical evidence. The crooks had also been smart enough to wipe down and then stash the TEC-9 behind an AC unit in the motel parking lot, so even though they could tie the gun to the crime scene, they could only tie it circumstantially to the two mutts. Even the probable cause to send the SWAT team in the first place had been something of a Slim Jim.

“They don’t love you at Narco-Vice just now,” Kenny said as he pulled out his own cell phone and hit a button.

Well I know, Cam thought. He saw Guthridge hang up his phone and turn around to look back at him. His expression begged for some cavalry on this one, which was definitely not an encouraging development.

“Detective?” Judge Bellamy was a good-looking woman in her forties, with snapping bright eyes and a notoriously healthy suspicion of cops and all their works.

“Still working on it, Your Honor,” Guthridge said, punching up another number on his phone. Cam realized that too many Manceford County irons had gotten into this particular fire. If no one stood up, they were going to have a real problem.

“Recap, Mr. Klein?” the judge asked. “You had no witnesses to the actual crime, the security-camera system and any potential on-scene physical evidence are toast, and the victims are all dead. Now, let me see. Besides the confession and a weapon found near the motel, you had one witness who stated, in effect, that he had been driven off the road by a small pickup truck resembling the defendants’ vehicle at the time of the fire in the gas station, correct?”

“Well, yes, Your Honor, but they admitted-”

“You see my problem, Mr. Klein?”

Klein pretended to be confused. “Uh, no, Your Honor, I-”

Guthridge closed up his cell phone again. “Detective?” the judge asked again, looking past Klein. Cam raised his eyebrows hopefully at Kenny, but he was shaking his head as he hung up. “That was Captain Wall at Narco-Vice,” he said quietly. “McMichael is ‘not available.’ And he reminded me that there was a Major Crimes detective on-scene.” He glanced over at the perspiring Guthridge. “He’s guessing nobody in the room actually did Mirandize either one of them.”

Cam grunted. The judge prompted Will Guthridge again, but all he could do was shake his head. Klein was shuffling papers on the table and trying not to look at Guthridge.

“Detective, you were at the scene of the arrest. Did you Mirandize these defendants?”

“I did, Your Honor, but not until the SWAT guys handed them over to me.”

“But it was a SWAT deputy who asked the all-important question, right?”

Will nodded unhappily.

“And you’re telling me you cannot produce an arresting deputy who verbally Mirandized these defendants at the time of the takedown?” the judge asked. “ Before the alleged confession?”

Cam didn’t like the sound of that “alleged” confession. “Not at the moment, Your Honor,” Will replied, clearing his throat. “But if I can have some time, I can reassemble the team, and-”

“The confession is out,” the judge announced. Bailiffs, half a dozen reporters, the attorneys, and a fairly large crowd of spectators all went silent in a collective wave of shock. The deaths of three people in a gas station robbery had been beyond big news both in Triboro and in Manceford County. Klein burst out with an indignant “ What?”

The judge looked surprised that anyone would be shocked by her decision. “Per the arrest report, they clearly got their Miranda warnings after the deputies took them back to the district office, but that same report says the confession was elicited at the scene of the arrest.”

Klein raised his hand, as if he were in school. “Your Honor? This is ridiculous. They spontaneously confessed to robbing the store.”

Spontaneously? Cam thought. Nice try, Steven. And, as Cam expected, the judge pounced.

“The Sheriff’s Office report says the deputy asked and the defendant Simmonds responded. That’s not spontaneous, Mr. Klein, especially if he was hanging by his thumbs at the time of the question.”

“These two started that fire,” Steven said, almost shouting. “Both of them. They robbed and shot the store clerk and then trapped two people in the van by shooting into gas pumps. I’m sure they were Mirandized. Every deputy in the county is trained to say those words any time he locks cuffs. It’s SOP. Hook ’em up, you say the words. They’d do it in their sleep.”

“They ain’t never said shit,” K-Dog piped up, sensing a real break here. “They was screamin’ and yellin’, ‘Get down, get down on the floor, assholes,’ stuff like that, but they ain’t never said no warnin’. I know what that shit sounds like.”

The judge glared down at him. “I’ll just bet you do, Mr. Simmonds. But at the moment, your prior experience with being arrested is not the issue here. One more time, Mr. Klein: Can you produce the arresting deputy who warned these individuals before the confession was taken?”

“I’m sure I can, if I can have a short recess here, Your Honor.”

No way, Cam thought, not with Annie Bellamy, who obviously knew what would happen if there was a recess. The deputies would go back to the station, get someone-anyone-on the SWAT team to do the right thing.

“Mr. Klein, this hearing wasn’t exactly a spur-of-the-moment affair. I’m seeing this in the arrest report you gave me, right? Do you want to nolle?”

Klein’s face was getting red. “Not yet, Your Honor,” he said. “I mean, I just can’t believe they didn’t warn them.”

K-Dog’s court-appointed defense attorney finally woke up to what was possible here. “Your Honor?” she said. Here it comes, Cam thought. Here it fucking comes.

“Yes, Ms. Walker?” the judge said wearily.

“Motion to dismiss, Your Honor? No confession, no physical evidence tying either defendant to the gun-there’s really no case.”

There was another sudden silence in the courtroom, and then Klein popped up out of his chair. “Your Honor, a motion to dismiss is beyond ridiculous. We know these defendants committed this crime. We know-”

“Here’s what I know, Mr. Klein,” the judge said patiently. “Per your own report, they weren’t Mirandized before that confession. What you say you know is based on a confession that no longer exists.” She prompted him again. “Nolle, Mr. Klein?”

Cam wanted to throw a rock at Klein. For God’s sake, Steven, say yes, he thought. Bring it back under another charge. Don’t get all hung up on this Miranda thing. But Klein was a mule sometimes, and today was apparently going to be one of them. He shook his head angrily.

The judge stared down at Klein for a moment, her own anger now evident. “Okay, Mr. Klein,” she said finally. “Try this: I am dismissing all charges, due to lack of evidence. With prejudice, Mr. Klein, because I don’t really think you had quality probable cause to make these arrests in the first place.”

“Good God, Your Honor-” Klein began.

“This isn’t church, Mr. Klein, so God has nothing to do with it. You should have pulled it when I gave you the chance- twice.” Bang went the gavel. “Bailiff, this court is adjourned.”

Cam was stunned. Charges dismissed? He was dimly aware that the entire courtroom was buzzing all around him. Toss the confession, okay, but remand until they could go back, dig up some more evidence. These two guys had long sheets and directly relevant priors. They had the submachine gun, and the vehicle, although the CSI people hadn’t done much with either of them because of that confession.

But dismissed? Kenny looked like he wanted to go up there and rip the judge’s throat out. Will Guthridge was also standing now, shouting something at the judge.

The judge, who had stood up to leave, reached for the gavel and started banging it on the bench to drown out the rising protests. Sit down, Will, Cam thought, before you get in any deeper. The two punks were looking at their court-appointed attorneys to see if they had heard it right, too.

“Order!” the judge shouted over the commotion in the courtroom. “Detective, get control of yourself!”

“Goddamn it, Your Honor, I-”

“Shut up, Detective. You’re the one who screwed this up, so just sit down and be quiet for a minute.” Guthridge sat down abruptly, his face bright red, much like Klein’s. Still standing, the judge pointed the gavel at Steven like a gun. “Mr. Klein, you have something further?”

Guthridge started to get back up, and Cam winced when the gavel banged down yet again. The young detective slapped his notebook down on the table and subsided. Klein, who had also started to get up, sank back down into his chair.

“Mr. Klein, your principal evidence was tainted and is not admissible. Your probable cause was a Kleenex. Good enough for Judge Barstow, maybe, but not good enough for me. You want to appeal my ruling, you go for it, but in the meantime, I want these defendants released.”

“Your Honor, these are career criminals,” Klein protested. “They are most definitely flight risks. They-”

“They are released. The charges are dismissed. Evidence, Mr. Klein. That’s what we’re all about in here, in case you’ve forgotten.” The judge swept the courtroom with those snapping eyes, as if daring anyone to challenge that principle. She saw Kenny Cox sitting in the back and glared at him. “You should have sent Sergeant Cox there. At least he knows how to rig an arrest report.” She paused for a moment as Kenny met her eyes, then banged the gavel again. “You don’t have any evidence, Mr. Klein. Now, like I said: We’re done here.”

The judge left the courtroom and Cam rubbed the side of his face as he sat there, considering the disaster. He deliberately did not look at Kenny, not after the judge’s last remarks. Almost three years ago, Kenny had been accused of playing fast and loose with an arrest report to cover up a similar error, and the accuser had been Bellamy. The facts regarding the incident had been murky, but Bellamy had forced the sheriff to suspend Kenny for three months without pay, in return for not charging him with evidence tampering and maybe even perjury. It had been nasty in the extreme, and if today’s case hadn’t been so high viz, Kenny would never have shown up today, and certainly not in front of Bellamy. Kenny’s hatred for Bellamy was palpable, and Cam could just about feel his sergeant’s anger radiating.

His cell phone trembled in his pocket. That will be Himself, he thought, and now comes the fun part. He saw Will Guthridge talking earnestly to Steven Klein as some excited media types were shouting questions at them from the press box.

“Okay, let’s go,” he said to Kenny. “See if we can unscrew this mess.”