The Judge

CHAPTER 29

There comes a time when you are forced to take your chances. If you are lucky and blessed by wits, these moments occur only infrequently, snippets of panic in the middle of a trial. You try to minimize them, hedge your bets, cover your ass, but in the end you close your eyes and cross your fingers. One of these is about to happen in our case.

Jerry Franks dabbles on the edge of expertise in a dozen fields of forensics. He is master of none. His résumé has the substance of the Sunday comics. That his testimony is based on any organized body of knowledge is an item that must be taken on faith, like the beatification of the saints. He is, in short, the man you call when you wish to purchase an opinion. His credentials are not simply subject to question, they are for sale.

For all of these reasons Kline veritably gloats when I call Franks to the stand. In the war of “my expert is better than your expert,” anyone using Jerry Franks could be construed as mentally challenged.

While he may have mastered the jargon, his grasp of the science is not always there.

He is short and stout with tousled hair, what is left of it, and thick glasses in horn-rim frames. These are set with clear glass, like windowpanes, so that I have always assumed they are for effect. His sport coat is part of the uniform for court, corduroy that went out twenty years ago with leather-patched elbows, and pants so stiff with perspiration that they might produce dangerous vapors under the press of an iron. His black shoes are strangers to polish, with a hole in one sole that I have seen him display with pride when he crossed one leg in a hearing a year ago. He cultivates the image of the debauched professor, someone who you might guess has drunk his own juice from some lab experiment.

As Franks climbs toward the stand, Stobel says something to Kline and the two men actually laugh, so that there is no question as to the butt of their joke. Among lawyers in this town and the more perceptive jurors, Franks’s opinion on any subject is likely to carry the weight of helium. With a jury this is less certain, though a good attorney can usually cut him to shreds.

He is sworn and before I can reach the podium, Kline is on his feet objecting.

“Your Honor, we have received no report from this witness. No findings or written opinion,” he says.

“For a simple reason,” I tell the court. “Because the witness did not render one.”

I have given Kline a summary of Franks’s testimony, but only to a certain point, enough to make him curious and satisfy the elements of discovery.

“Well, can we at least ask the purpose of his appearance here today?” says Kline.

Radovich wants a sidebar. We huddle at the edge of the bench.

“What’s this about, Mr. Madriani?”

“Evidence relating to the calendar in the victim’s apartment, Your Honor.”

I have had Franks examine four or five items of evidence, the calendar being one among them, so that Kline could not focus on a single issue.

“What about the calendar?” says Radovich.

“There appears to have been some notations, impressions on the calendar that we believe are relevant.”

“Being offered for what purpose?” says Kline.

“To show that there was more written by the victim on her calendar for the date of the murder than has been revealed thus far,” I tell the judge.

“No wonder he didn’t provide a report,” says Kline. “Even if this is true, it’s hearsay.”

Unless we can fit Hall’s notation under some exception, Kline is right. He had to find an exception to hearsay himself to get the note on Acosta’s meeting into evidence, as an adoptive admission.

“The content may or may not be hearsay,” I tell him, “but the fact that there may have been other entries on the victim’s calendar for that date is not.”

The problem for Kline is that this, an additional meeting on the date of the murder, is certain to inspire assumptions by the jury that Kline cannot control.

“For that limited purpose,” says Radovich, “the witness may testify. But keep it tight,” he tells me.

I look at Franks on the stand. “Right.”

We back off. I see Acosta is sitting next to Harry at the table questioning him as to what is going on.

For all that she is not here in court today, Lenore is now increasingly at the center of our case.

It was as much tactics as loyalty that has kept me from calling her into court. What Kline thinks she knows, or has, is now his darkest dream, what I would not wish on anyone except an adversary at trial, something to keep him awake with angst in the night.

Without Lenore, I have had to back-fill and jury-rig to figure some way to get at the note that Lenore removed from Hall’s calendar, the fact that at some point the victim and Tony Arguillo had scheduled a date for that night. It is the reason for Franks’s appearance here today.

We do the thing regarding his credentials. This takes only a moment.

Kline wants to voir dire the witness as to expertise. He is allowed to ask several questions, and when he is finished he objects to the witness.

“He does not qualify as an expert. Not in the field of paper and impressions,” says Kline.

We get into an argument over this.

Franks has attended two seminars on the subject, one of them five years ago. He has dabbled, though he cannot tell the court that he has ever testified previously concerning the topic of indented writings.

Radovich cuts us off. He asks the witness a few questions of his own regarding his background and the technique of identifying impressions in paper. He finally concludes that the issue, the existence or nonexistence of indented writings, does not involve high science.

“If he were going to testify on the content I might agree,” he tells Kline. “But in this case, it’s a matter for the jury in ascribing the weight to be given to the witness’s testimony.”

Kline is not happy but he sits down. Franks hasn’t said a word and he is already mired in controversy.

“Mr. Franks, can you tell us whether you examined a calendar made available to you by the police at my request?”

“I did,” he says. “And I found-”

“Just answer the question.” I cut him off. Franks would like to cut to the chase, collect his fee, and get out.

I have the calendar brought over from the evidence cart, and Franks identifies it as the one he examined. I flip it open to July and place it on an easel in front of the jury, back far enough so that they would need binoculars to dwell on the incriminating note with Acosta’s name.

“I call your attention to July fifteenth and ask whether you specifically examined the calendar block, the white portion or space for that date on this calendar?”

“I did.”

“Can you tell the jury what type of examination you performed?”

“I was requested to examine the calendar for the date in question, to determine if there was any evidence of writings not otherwise visible. Indented or impressed writing.”

“And what is this, ‘indented writing’?” I ask.

“These are impressions or fragments of impressions left on a piece of paper by the pressure of writing on a sheet that was placed over it at one time and later removed.”

“Like successive pieces of paper on a pad?”

“Yes.”

“Were you able to determine the existence of such impressions on the calendar in question for the date of July fifteenth?”

“I was,” he says. “There appeared to be impressions of handwriting.”

“And were these decipherable?”

“Objection. Hearsay,” says Kline.

“The question was whether this intended writing was readable, not what it said.” I turn on him, and Radovich tells me to direct any argument to the bench.

“The witness can answer the question yes or no,” says the judge.

“Yes,” says Franks.

“The note was readable?”

“Yes.”

I turn away from the podium for a moment, considering ways to nibble at the edges.

“In examining the calendar, was there any way to determine what kind of paper the original note might have been written on, the paper that was removed?”

It always helps when you know what the evidence is before you go looking. Franks and I have worked on this. I told him what it was, and he contrived methods to discover it.

“There is some indication,” he says.

Kline is getting antsy.

“And what was that?”

“Examination under a microscope revealed the existence of some very fine mucilage.”

He loved the word and had to put it in, told me that it provided credibility.

“This mucilage was on the surface of the calendar for the date in question.”

“Mucilage?”

“Glue,” says Franks.

“Ah. What kind of glue?”

“Under intense light,” he says, “and with high magnification, I would say that it is very similar to what might be imparted by one of those yellow stick-on notes we all use.”

Under intense light and high magnification, bullshit is still bullshit and Kline smells it. He rolls his eyes and starts grousing at his table. He actually throws two pieces of paper into the air and lets them float back down onto the surface in front of him as if to make sure that the rules of physics are still functioning. He flashes Stobel a “can you believe it” look.

Harry has one of the stick-on notes, a sample, at the counsel table ready to hand to me, so I show it to the witness.

“That’s the kind I’m talking about,” he says.

Kline by now is convinced that this is an impossibility. He wants to look at this, and with Stobel at his side they stick it to a piece of paper, roll it with a thumb, and pull it off. Kline feels with his fingers for glue, and shakes his head. He holds it up to the light, looking for evidence of the glue.

Before I can object, Franks takes care of this for me.

“Oh, you need a microscope.” He says this with guileless sincerity, to Kline, so that a couple of jurors actually laugh. Kline gives the witness a look as if the word cross had suddenly taken on a whole new meaning: three nails and two boards. He starts collecting venom for his cross examination.

“Now you said that the impression from this notation was legible. What technique or process did you use to read it?”

“I did it the old-fashioned way,” he says.

He pauses to look at me. For a moment I think he’s going to say, “I made it up.”

And then he says, “Oblique light.”

“Explain to the jury, please.”

“You take a bright light and shine it across the surface of the impression. Shadows appear in the indented areas of the paper, and if they are deep enough they become legible. There are other methods, some more sophisticated,” he says.

“I’ll bet,” says Kline.

I object to this, and Radovich admonishes him. Tells him he’ll have his turn.

“I can’t wait,” he says.

I ignore him.

“This oblique-light method worked?” I ask.

“It was sufficient for our purposes.”

“How many words appeared on the indented notation?”

“Objection,” says Kline. “Hearsay.”

“I’m not asking for content, just word count,” I say.

We are treading on the edge, and Radovich considers for a moment before he rules.

“I’ll allow it,” he says, “but nothing more.”

“Let’s see.” Franks counts with his fingers and I begin to wonder if he’s going to have to feel through the hole in his shoe if he gets above ten.

“Does the man’s initial and the time count, or just the name?” he asks.

“Objection.” Kline storms to his feet. “Move to strike,” he says.

“The witness’s comment will be stricken,” says Radovich. “The jury is to disregard it.” The judge gives me a look, eyes that burn. Then he turns this on Franks in the stand.

“Just answer the question,” says Radovich. “How many words? Anything beyond that and you’ll spend the night in jail. Do we understand each other?”

“Lemme see.” Franks starts counting again.

“Do we understand each other?”

“Oh, yeah. Sure.”

“Two or three,” he says. “Depending on how you count.”

Radovich looks as if he wants to reach out and hit him with the gavel.

“Your witness,” I say.

“Saved by the bell,” says the judge. A few jurors laugh at this.

Kline rips in like a shark with blood in the water.

“Isn’t it customary to take photographs when examining indented writing?” he says.

“Some people do,” says Franks. “I don’t.”

“Come now,” says Kline. “Isn’t it a fact that in order to read such impressions, photographs are necessary?”

“I can read them without it,” says the witness.

“And I’ll bet you speak in tongues, too,” says Kline.

“Objection.”

“Stick to questions,” says Radovich.

“So all we have is your word that these impressions existed? There’s no hard physical evidence that you can show to the jury, is there?”

“No.”

“How convenient,” says Kline.

“Is that a question?” says Radovich.

“Sure,” says Kline. He decides to get cute. “Isn’t it a fact that you found this, the absence of photographs, convenient?”

“In what way?” says Franks.

“Because if you were forced to produce photographs we could examine them. The jury could see them. Without them you can say whatever you want and there’s no way to question what you say. Isn’t that so?”

“There was a reason there were no photographs, but that’s not it,” says Franks.

In front of the jury it is like a dare, a test of his manhood. Kline has no choice but to ask why. He does.

“Photographs would have been inadmissible,” says the witness. “You said it yourself. The content of that writing in a photograph would have been hearsay.”

Kline stands in front of the jury box, hoist with his own petard.

“Well, the judge could have looked at them, behind closed doors.” Kline says this lamely, knowing that he’s just had his butt flamed. He retreats for cover, changing the topic to the glue.

“How can you be sure that what you saw on that calendar was glue from a stick-on note?”

“It’s what it looked like when I did comparisons.”

“Are you sure you didn’t sniff this glue?”

Franks actually says, “No,” before he realizes that this is a dig by Kline.

“I have no more use for this witness,” says Kline. He musters all the contempt possible in a human body and dismisses the witness with a gesture, the back of his hand.

It is the best he can do, given the anger that is welling up within him at this moment. His rage would be stratospheric if he only knew the truth. The impressions attested to by Jerry Franks are mythic. The content of the note, what we have agreed he would testify to if it came to that, would read, Tony A. 7:30.

It is short and crisp, a cryptic reconstruction by Lenore of what was on the paper that night, the best she can remember months after the fact.

“You’re out of your mind. Crazy,” says Harry. “Gonna lose your ticket. And the judge ain’t worth it.” Harry’s talking about Acosta. We square off in the corridor outside the cafeteria during a break, where I have finally told Harry the truth about Franks’s testimony. “This is not like you,” he says.

The fact that this could offend Harry’s sense of ethics for a moment has me wondering about my own moral center of gravity. Then I realize it’s not that I have done something wrong that bothers Harry, but that I might get caught.

It’s a gamble of some proportions, but not as great as Harry thinks. I have not shared some of the things I know, and others that I now suspect, with my partner.

“What are you gonna do next?” he says.

“Gall the next witness.”

“No, I mean for a living, after you get disbarred.”

I look at him and he is not laughing.

We push through the crowd in the corridor outside the courtroom, the end of our morning break. A news crew, cameraman, sound tech, and a reporter on the fringes are the first to see us. The reporter jockeys for an angle to herd us into one of the side corridors.

“Can we have just a minute for an interview?”

Harry and I are trying to pick up the pace to get away.

“No time now,” I tell him.

“The D.A. is saying that he’s going to subject the calendar to his own testing. Do you have any comment?” Lights in my eyes.

“We will expect him to share his results,” I say.

“You’re not concerned about this?”

“Why should I be? I know what was on that calendar.” At least part of this is the truth.

“Whose name was on the note?” By now there are more cameras, enough lights to film a movie, a growing throng so that they block our way.

“Follow the trial,” I tell them, “and you’ll find out. All will be revealed,” I say, giving them a deliberate sound bite so that several of them turn in front of their own cameras, to put a twist on it for a closer: “There you have it. .”

Out of the crowd comes a hand on my arm from behind. When I turn it is Gus Lano.

“Cute. Very cute,” he says.

The last thing I want is an argument here in front of the cameras with Lano.

“Now if you could tell me when you’re gonna call me?” He is almost polite in his inquiry.

“When I get around to it,” I tell him.

Lano has been cooling his heels in the outer corridor for two days now, under subpoena. I have told him he could be called at any moment. Tony is standing behind him over his shoulder, two bumps on the same log.

Lano waves a small paper envelope in front of my eyes, florid drawings in bright colors, a commercial jet superimposed over an exotic beach somewhere, a female bottom in a bikini poking over the wing tip, all the fantasies conjured by commercial art.

“Tickets to fly,” says Lano, “bags packed and downstairs. I’m outta here tomorrow night. Five o’clock flight.”

“We all have our problems.” I push by him and he grabs my arm one more time.

“Five o’clock,” he says. “You can call me next and get it over with.” He is serious. Lano thinks I will actually structure the order of my evidence to accommodate his vacation plans.

“If you like I can get an order from the court to have the marshal hold you.” I remind him that as a peace officer he is an attaché of the court and cannot leave until they are finished with him.

“My ass,” he says.

“It will be if you try to leave.”

Several of the cameras are now back on, capturing these last words for posterity.

“Excuse me.” I push through, Harry behind me.

“Are you a witness?” One of them asks Lano.

“Only because of the harassment and abuse of the defense. Figments of their imaginations. They are calling witnesses that have nothing to do with the case as a smoke screen.”

The reporters are eating this up.

He has an outstretched arm pointed in my direction as I walk away. “The defense in this case is grounded on the defamation of upstanding law enforcement officers,” he tells them. “People who risk their lives for public safety every day,” he says. “They are willing to do anything to win.” Lights are suddenly on my back, accusations I can do nothing about and would rather not hear. Lano’s impromptu news conference. I hear my name taken in vain one more time as Harry lets the courtroom door close behind us. The war of media spin is beginning to leave tractor marks on my face.

Inside, the audience is milling, standing room only. I look at my watch and we are late. Kline is not at his table, nor is Stobel. Acosta is at ours, backed by a guard. I send Harry forward to chaperon. Something is up-it is in the air. One of the bailiffs approaches.

“They want you back in chambers,” he says.

I make my way down the corridor past the bench, wondering what intrigue of procedure Kline is up to now. My best guess, he is renewing his motion to reopen his case to call Lenore, some new evidence he claims to have discovered.

“They have been waiting for you inside.” It is a stern look I get from Radovich’s clerk when I show my face that is the first indication I may be wrong.

The minute I am through the judge’s door, I can feel that the air is heavy with a charge of electricity.

Radovich is behind his desk, brows knit and heavy, like images of God from the vaulted ceiling of some Renaissance chapel. Kline barely looks at me, and Stobel turns away.

“Mr. Madriani. I’m glad you could make it,” says the judge. This is clearly his party, and it has me worried.

“I’m sorry I’m late.” I offer some feeble excuse about cameras in the corridor.

“Never mind that,” says Radovich. “There have been some serious charges made. During the break Mr. Kline had one of his experts examine that calendar.”

All of a sudden there is a knot in my stomach the dimensions of a good-sized boulder.

“We are concerned,” says Radovich, “that they could not find any evidence of indented writing.”

I actually stammer in trying to speak, something Kline seems to enjoy, if a smile is an indication.

“How thorough could they have been in the time that they had?” I finally say.

“That could be it,” says the judge. “But I thought it was only fair to tell you that the people are making an inquiry in this matter.”

“Something for their case in rebuttal?” I say.

“That’s not what we have in mind,” says Kline. “I’m not worried about your witness. I suspect the jury can see through that for themselves. But suborning perjury is a more serious matter. Especially for an officer of the court.” Kline’s anger has laid quick roots.

“You’d better hope you can back that up,” I tell him. I take a step forward, in his face, as I say this. The best defense. .

“For your sake I hope that he cannot,” says Radovich.

There are a million reasons, I tell the judge, why impressions of writing may be transitory. If heavy items were laid on top of the calendar in the evidence lockup, or if it was folded or rolled, what was there when we examined it months ago might now be obliterated.

“I am told that a scanning electron microscope can detect impressions if they were there,” says Kline. “We will find out.”

“Enough said,” says Radovich. “We have a trial to finish,” he says.

Up from behind his desk, he does not give me a warm look as we exit his chambers, though he is careful not to linger behind to show favoritism with Kline or Stobel. If nothing else, my antics with Franks as a witness, I suspect, have now lost me the trust of this judge.

The first thing I notice about Tony Arguillo as he takes the stand is that the swagger is still in his walk. He knows that the note taken by Lenore that night has long since been destroyed. No doubt by now Kline has found some way to inform him that the impression evidence, if it exists, has its limitations. The contents that could point to Tony are hearsay and inadmissible. He has the appearance of the bullet-proof man as he sits in the chair and looks at me.

“Can you tell us what you do for a living?” I say.

“Police officer. Sergeant,” he says.

“You were one of the officers present in the alley the night the body of the victim was discovered?”

“That’s right.”

“Did you know her, the victim?”

Tony looks at me. He would no doubt deny this if he thought he could. Still, we have already established by other witnesses that Hall was a police groupie, with a long association with Vice and its members.

“We were acquainted,” he finally says.

“Professionally or socially?”

“Professionally.” He is not willing to cross this line.

“Did you ever go to the victim’s residence?”

“Objection. Vague as to time,” says Kline.

“Sustained.”

“Let’s just talk about the time prior to her death. At any time before she was murdered had you ever had occasion to be inside the victim’s residence?”

Again Tony wants to consider this before he answers. It is the problem when you have no clue as to what the other side knows.

“It’s possible I was there,” he says. “I coulda been. As a cop you visit a lot of places. But I don’t have a specific recollection.”

“Is it possible that you were there more than once?”

By now Tony must figure there is some fact feeding this question, perhaps a nosy neighbor who has seen him on more than one occasion.

“I don’t know. Anything’s possible.”

“Indeed.” I say this as I walk away from the podium and Tony, my face toward the jury, an expression that says, “Let’s consider the possibilities.”

“You don’t have any specific recollection of such visits?”

He thinks for a moment, wondering what I may know, considers the safest answer, then says, “No.”

“Well. If you were there, is it fair to assume that these were professional visits and not social calls?”

“Right, they would have been professional.” This seems for Tony the only certainty.

“What would you have been doing there professionally?”

“If I have no specific recollection of being at her apartment, how am I supposed to remember why I might have gone there?” He looks at the jury a little nervously, then laughs, like the logic of this is self-evident.

“Is it possible you might have been there discussing cases?”

“Probably,” he says. “We both worked Vice.”

“Precisely,” I say.

There are certain taboos, questions I cannot ask Tony, that relate to my prior representation, questions of corruption that I skirt.

“When you were there, if you were there”-we continue to play this game-“is it likely you would have gone there with others besides the victim, or would you have been alone?”

“I can’t remember. Probably with others,” he says. This sounds better to Tony, more businesslike.

“Do you know, did the victim, did Ms. Hall, have your home telephone number?”

“How do I know?”

“Did she ever call you at home?”

He makes a face. Tony knows we have access to phone records.

“She might have.”

“Your home number is unlisted, isn’t it?”

“Yes.”

“So how would she get it unless you gave it to her?”

This stumps him for a moment. Tony in a quandary, darting eyes. Then he says, “She could have gotten it from the department, if she had a business reason.”

“Ah. Policy? To give out your number?”

“Sometimes.” He actually smiles, satisfied with a good answer; he knows I cannot check this out without more time.

“So your number could have been included in her personal phone directory?”

“I don’t know.”

“Unfortunately, nor do we. It seems the pages under the letter A were ripped from that directory.”

Tony looks at me as if this were an accusation. Kline is on his feet, about to object, when I turn it into a question.

“You wouldn’t know how this happened, the pages being ripped out?” I say.

“No. How would I know?”

“I thought it might be something else you forgot,” I tell him.

“Objection.” Kline shoots to his feet.

“Sustained. The jury is to disregard. Mr. Madriani!” says Radovich. He shakes the gavel in my direction. “Are you done with this witness?”

“Not quite, Your Honor.”

“Then get on with it, but be quick.”

“Sergeant Arguillo, can you tell the jury how they came to identify the victim in the alley the night she died?”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, as I understand it she was not clothed or carrying any form of identification. How did the police know who she was?”

“I don’t know. I’m not sure,” he says.

“But you were on the scene.”

“Right,” he says.

“You didn’t see the body? You never looked at the victim?”

“Maybe from a distance,” he says.

“So how did they identify her?”

“They had some trouble,” he says. “It took a while.”

“How long?”

“A couple of hours,” he says.

“And in the end how did they do it?”

“I think it might have been another cop,” he says. “Somebody from the department who recognized her.”

“But you had worked with the victim in Vice,” I remind him.

“True,” he says. “But I didn’t get a close look.”

The problem for Tony is that he is now victimized by his own conniving. It took time to call Lenore, to have her trek to the victim’s apartment, to look for a note and destroy it. Tony needed time. The only way he could buy it was to keep his colleagues in the dark as to the victim’s identity. Tony kept his cool, stayed mum at the scene, and used his cellular.

“So you waited for two hours in the dark, looking for evidence, knowing that the other officers could not identify the body, and you never thought to take a look yourself?”

“No,” he says.

“Did anybody order you not to look at the body?”

“No.”

“You simply chose not to?”

“Right,” he says. This does not fit the image. A nearly naked young woman, even in death a feast for an army of male eyes, ogling cops from three jurisdictions, and Tony doesn’t take the time to look.

“Were you there in Ms. Hall’s apartment that night?” I ask. “The night she was killed?”

“That’s a lie,” he says. As a witness, Tony is too hot by half.

“Objection. Vague as to time.” Kline understands the question. Tony does not.

He suddenly senses that he has overreacted, but in doing so, has conveyed more than he intended.

“Rephrase the question,” says the judge.

“Sorry,” I say. By now I am smiling at Tony, who is looking red-faced.

“Did you have occasion to visit the victim’s apartment that evening or in the early-morning hours following her murder? In your official capacity?” I add.

“Oh,” says Tony. “Yeah. I was one of the cops-officers-who was directed to the scene after her body was found.”

“After she was identified?”

“Right.”

“And who directed you there?”

“Lieutenant Stobel. He was in charge.”

“And what did you do once you arrived at the apartment?”

“Canvassed for evidence. Talked to neighbors. The usual.”

I turn from him for a moment.

“Can you tell us, Sergeant, how it is that your name came to appear in a note stuck to the victim’s calendar for the date of the murder?”

There is commotion in the courtroom, jostling bodies in the press rows for a better angle to see the witness.

“Objection!” Kline is on his feet as if propelled by a skyrocket. “Assumes facts not in evidence. Outrageous! Can we approach?” he asks the judge.

“Sustained,” says Radovich. “To the bench,” he says, eyes like two blazing coals, aimed at me.

“You,” he points at me before I get there, “are trying my patience,” he says.

“We request an admonishment, before the jury,” says Kline. He’s gauged the judge’s anger and will take advantage where he can get it.

“Where is this going?” asks the judge.

“We have a right to ask whether he met with the victim that night before her death.”

Kline argues that there is no basis in the evidence for such a belief.

“We should be allowed to ask the question,” I insist.

Radovich mulls this momentarily as we both eye him.

“One question,” he finally says, “but no innuendo.”

Before I am back to the rostrum he is giving the admonition. “The jury is to disregard the last question by the defense counsel as if it had never been asked.”

He gives me a nod, like ask your question.

“Sergeant. Did you have a date with the victim, Brittany Hall, on the evening of July fifteenth, the night that she was murdered?”

“No,” he says. Tony seems at a loss as to how to play this, whether indignation or detached professionalism, and so the denial comes off as something less than emphatic.

“Are you sure?” I say.

“Objection. Asked and answered,” says Kline.

“Absolutely.” Tony answers before the judge can rule, and Radovich lets it stand.

“And to your knowledge, your name did not appear on a small Post-it note on her calendar for the date in question?”

The inference here is slick, the jury left to wonder if Tony did not remove the note himself, once he reported to the scene.

Kline shoots to his feet, an objection at the top of his lungs.

“Your Honor, I’m asking him if he knows.”

“Sustained,” says Radovich. “I’ve warned you,” he says. He’s halfway out of his chair up on the bench, the gavel pointed at me like a Roman candle about to shoot flaming colored balls.

“No. There was no note,” says Tony.

“Shut up,” says Radovich.

Tony hunches his head down into his collar, like a turtle shrinking into its shell.

“You don’t answer a question when I’ve sustained an objection.” He would add, “you stupid shit” but the collection of bulging eyes in the jury box has curbed his temper.

“The jury will disregard the question, and the answer,” he says. “Both are stricken.”

The only one foolish enough to speak at this moment is yours truly.

“There is a good-faith reason for the question,” I tell him.

Radovich looks at me as if there is nothing this side of the moon that could possibly justify what I have done after his earlier admonition.

“There is evidence, a basis upon which I have pursued this question.”

He sends the jury out. Radovich looks at me, fire in his eyes. “In chambers,” he says. “And it better be good.”