A Time for Mercy

by John Grisham

  “Was Kiera with you in the police car?”

  “I don’t remember.”

  “No further questions, Your Honor.”

  * * *

  —

  LOWELL DYER HAD never believed for an instant that he would have the chance to cross-examine the defendant. At every turn in the pretrial, Jake had indicated that Drew would not testify. And, most crafty defense lawyers kept their clients away from the witness stand.

  Dyer had spent little time preparing for the moment, and his trepidation was compounded by the fact that both Josie and Kiera had been so thoroughly coached they had actually scored more points than the D.A. during their cross-examinations.

  Attacking the witness because of his criminal record wouldn’t work. Drew had already confessed, and, besides, who really cared about a stolen bike and a few ounces of pot?

  Attacking anything in the kid’s past would backfire because it was unlikely that a single person on the jury had endured such a harsh childhood.

  Dyer glared at the defendant. “Now, Mr. Gamble, when you moved in with Stuart Kofer, you were given your own bedroom, right?”

  “Yes sir.”

  Nothing about the shaggy-haired kid suggested the title of “Mister” was appropriate. Dyer, though, had to play it tough. Being too familiar would be a sign of weakness. Perhaps using the title might make him seem older.

  “And your sister was just across the hall, right?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Did you have plenty of food to eat?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Did you have hot water for showers and clean towels and such?”

  “Yes sir. We did our own laundry.”

  “And you were in school every day?”

  “Yes sir, almost every day.”

  “And in church occasionally?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “And before you moved in with Stuart Kofer, I believe the family was living in a borrowed camper, is that correct?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “And from the testimony given by your mother and sister, we know that before the camper you lived in a car, in an orphanage, in foster care, and in a juvenile detention center. Anywhere else?”

  What a stupid mistake! Bust him, Drew, Jake wanted to yell.

  “Yes sir. We lived under a bridge one time for a couple of months, and there were some homeless shelters.”

  “Okay. My point is that the home Stuart Kofer provided was the nicest place you ever lived, right?”

  Another mistake. Do it, Drew! “No sir. A couple of the foster homes were nicer, plus you didn’t have to worry about gettin’ slapped around.”

  Dyer looked at the bench and pleaded, “Your Honor, would you instruct the witness to respond to the questions without expounding on his answers?”

  Jake expected a quick response, but Noose mulled it over. Jake stood and said, “Your Honor, if I may. Counsel described the Kofer home as ‘nice’ without defining what that means. I submit that any home where a kid lives with abuse and the threat of more is anything but ‘nice.’ ”

  Noose agreed and said, “Please continue.”

  Dyer was too stung to continue. He huddled with D. R. Musgrove and they again tried to find a strategy. He nodded smugly, as if he’d found the perfect line of questioning, and returned to the podium.

  “Now, Mr. Gamble, I believe you said that you didn’t like Stuart Kofer and he didn’t like you. Is that correct?”

  “Yes sir.”

  “Would you say you hated Stuart Kofer?”

  “That’s fair, yes sir.”

  “Did you want to see him dead?”

  “No sir. What I wanted was just to get away from him. I was tired of him beatin’ my mother and slappin’ us around. I was tired of the threats.”

  “So when you shot him, you were killing him to protect your mother and sister and yourself, right?”

  “No sir. At the time, I knew my mother was dead. It was too late to protect her.”

  “Then you shot him out of revenge. For killing your mother. Right?”

  “No sir, I don’t remember thinkin’ about revenge. I was too upset at the sight of Mom lying on the floor. I was just afraid that Stuart would get up and come after us, like he did before.”

  Come on Dyer, take the bait. Jake was chewing on the tip of a plastic pen.

  “Before?” Dyer asked, then caught himself. Never ask a question if you don’t know the answer. “Strike that.”

  “Isn’t it true, Mr. Gamble, that you deliberately and intentionally shot Stuart Kofer, with his own gun, one that you were familiar with, because he beat your mother?”

  “No sir.”

  “Isn’t it true, Mr. Gamble, that you deliberately and intentionally shot and killed Stuart Kofer because he was sexually molesting your sister?”

  “No sir.”

  “Isn’t it true, Mr. Gamble, that you willfully shot and killed Stuart Kofer because you hated the man and you were hoping that if he were dead, your mother would get to keep his house?”

  “No sir.”

  “Isn’t it true, Mr. Gamble, that when you leaned down and put the barrel an inch from his head, that at that crucial moment, Stuart Kofer was sound asleep?”

  “I don’t know if he was sound asleep. I know he’d been movin’ around because I heard him. I was afraid he would get up and go crazy again. That’s why I did what I did. To protect us.”

  “You saw him asleep in his own bed, and you took his own gun and put it an inch from his left temple, and you pulled the trigger, didn’t you, Mr. Gamble?”

  “I guess I did. I’m not sayin’ I didn’t. I’m not sure what I was thinkin’ at that moment. I was so scared and I just knew he had killed my mother.”

  “But you were wrong, weren’t you? He didn’t kill your mother. She’s sitting right there.” Dyer turned and pointed an angry finger at Josie in the front row.

  Drew summoned his own anger and said, “Well, he tried his best to kill her. She was on the floor, unconscious, and as far as we could tell she wasn’t breathin’. She sure looked dead to us, Mr. Dyer.”

  “But you were wrong.”

  “And he had threatened to kill her many times, and us too. I thought it was the end.”

  “Had you ever thought about killing Stuart before?”

  “No sir. I’ve never thought about killin’ anybody. I don’t have guns. I don’t get in fights and stuff like that. I just wanted to leave and get away from that house before he hurt us. Livin’ in a car again was better than livin’ with Stuart.”

  Another one of Jake’s lines, perfectly delivered.

  “So, when you were in prison, you didn’t get into fights?”

  “I wasn’t in prison, sir. I was in a juvenile detention facility. Prison is for adults. You should know that.”

  Noose leaned down and said, “Please, Mr. Gamble, hold your comments.”

  “Yes sir. Sorry, Mr. Dyer.”

  “And you never got into fights?”

  “Everybody got into fights. Happened all the time.”

  Dyer was treading water and slowly drowning. Arguing with a sixteen-year-old was rarely productive, and at the moment Drew was gaining the upper hand. Dyer had been burned by both Josie and Kiera, and he preferred to avoid additional damage with the defendant. He looked at the bench and said, “Nothing further, Your Honor.”

  “Mr. Brigance.”

  “Nothing, Your Honor.”

  “Mr. Gamble, you may step down and return to the defense table. Mr. Brigance, please call your next witness.”

  At full volume, Jake announced, “Your Honor, the defense rests.”

  Noose flinched and appeared surprised. Harry Rex would later say that Lowell Dyer shot Musgrove a look of bewilderment.

  The
lawyers met at the bench where His Honor slid the mike away and addressed them in a whisper. “What’s going on, Jake?” he demanded.

  Jake shrugged and said, “We’re done. No more witnesses.”

  “There are at least a dozen on your witness list.”

  “I don’t need them, Judge.”

  “It just seems a little abrupt, that’s all. Mr. Dyer? Any rebuttal witnesses?”

  “I don’t think so, Judge. If the defense is finished, so are we.”

  Noose glanced at his watch and said, “This being a capital case, the jury instructions will take some time and we can’t get in a hurry. I’ll recess now until nine in the morning. Y’all meet me in chambers in fifteen minutes and we’ll hammer out the jury instructions.”

  49

  Lucien invited the team to his house for dinner and would not accept no for an answer. With Sallie gone, and with absolutely no culinary skills of his own, he had leaned on Claude to prepare catfish po’boys, baked beans, sweet slaw, and a tomato salad. Claude owned the only black diner in downtown Clanton, and Jake ate lunch there almost every Friday, along with a few other white liberals in town. When the café had opened thirty years earlier, Lucien Wilbanks was there almost every day and insisted on sitting in the window to be seen by white folks passing by. He and Claude shared a long and colorful friendship.

  Though he couldn’t cook he could certainly pour, and Lucien served drinks on the front porch and encouraged his guests to sit in wicker rockers as the day came to a close. Carla had managed to find a last-minute babysitter because she rarely had dinner in Lucien’s home and wasn’t about to miss the chance. Portia was equally curious, though she really wanted to go home and get some sleep. Only Harry Rex begged off, claiming his battle-hardened secretaries were threatening a mutiny.

  Dr. Thane Sedgwick from Baylor had just arrived in town in the event he would be needed to testify during sentencing. Libby had called him the day before with the news that the trial was moving much faster than anticipated. After a few sips of whiskey he was off and running. He said, in his thick Texas drawl, “And so I asked her if I would be needed. And she said no. She is not anticipating a conviction. Is she alone?”

  “I don’t see a conviction,” Lucien said. “Nor an acquittal.”

  Libby said, “At least four of the five women are with us. Ms. Satterfield cried all day long, especially when Kiera was on the stand.”

  “And Kiera was effective?” Sedgwick asked.

  “You have no idea,” replied Libby. This led to a long replay of the epic day the Gamble family had in court as Josie and her children tag-teamed through their sad, chaotic history. Portia set the stage for Kiera’s dramatic testimony about the father of her child. Lucien laughed when he repeated Drew’s testimony about the nice foster homes where he didn’t worry about getting slapped around. Libby was astonished at the way Jake had slowly brought out the details of all the miserable places the family had lived. Instead of dumping them all on the jury in his opening statement, he had carefully dropped one bomb after another, to great dramatic effect.

  Jake sat next to Carla on an old sofa, with his arm over her shoulders, sipping wine and listening to the different perspectives on what he had seen and heard in court. He said little, his mind often wandering to the challenge of his closing argument. He worried about resting his case so abruptly, but the lawyers, Libby, Lucien, and Harry Rex, were convinced it was the right move. He had lost sleep worrying about putting his client on the stand, but young Drew made no mistakes. All in all, he was pleased with the case so far, but he kept reminding himself that his client was guilty of killing Stuart Kofer.

  At dark they moved inside and settled around Lucien’s handsome teak dining table. The house was old, but the interior decorating was modern, with plenty of glass and metal and odd accessories. The walls were adorned with a baffling collection of contemporary art, as if the king of the castle rejected everything old and traditional.

  The king was enjoying his whiskey, as did Thane, and the war stories began, long tall tales of courtroom dramas over the years, all with the raconteur himself as the hero. Once Thane realized he probably wouldn’t be needed on Thursday, he poured another drink and seemed ready for a late night.

  Portia, being a young black woman who’d grown up on the other side of town, was not to be shut out. She told a startling story of a military murder she had worked on in the army in Germany. And that reminded Thane of a double murder somewhere in Texas in which the alleged killer was only thirteen.

  By 10:30 Jake was ready for bed. He and Carla excused themselves and went home. At 2:00 a.m. he was still awake.

  * * *

  —

  THE COURTROOM ROSE almost in unison to honor the appearance of Judge Omar Noose, who quickly waved them off and asked them to sit down. He welcomed the crowd, commented on the cooler temperature, said good morning to his jury and asked, gravely, if anyone had tried to contact any of them during the recess. All twelve jurors shook their heads. No.

  Omar had presided over a thousand trials, and not once had a juror raised a hand to admit that he or she had been contacted out of court. If there was contact, it would probably involve the payment of cash, something no one would ever talk about in the first place. But Omar loved his traditions.

  He explained that the next hour would probably be the dullest portion of the entire trial because, as required by law, he would instruct the jury. He would read into the record, and for the benefit of the jurors, the black letter law, the state’s statutes, that would dictate their deliberations. Their duty was to weigh the evidence and apply it to the law, and to take the law as it was written and apply it to the facts. Listen carefully. It was very important. And for their benefit, copies of the jury instructions would be available in the jury room.

  When he had them thoroughly confused, Judge Noose began reading into his mike. Page after page of dry, verbose, complicated, badly written statutes that tried to define intent, murder, capital murder, murder of a law enforcement officer, premeditation, guilt, and justifiable homicide. They listened intently for about ten minutes, then began peeling off with glances around the courtroom. Some fought mightily to hang on every word. Others realized that they could read that stuff later if they wanted to.

  After forty minutes Noose abruptly stopped, to the relief of everyone. He slapped his papers together, squared them up nicely, smiled at the jury as if he’d done a fine job, and said, “Now, ladies and gentlemen, both sides will be given the opportunity to make closing arguments. As always, the State goes first. Mr. Dyer.”

  Lowell stood with great purpose, buttoned the top button of his light blue seersucker jacket, and walked to the jury box—the podium was optional at that point—and began. “Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, this trial is almost over and it has moved along more efficiently than expected. Judge Noose has given each side thirty minutes to summarize things for you, but thirty minutes is far too long in this case. Half an hour is not needed to convince you of what you already know. You don’t need that much time to decide that the defendant, Drew Allen Gamble, did indeed murder Stuart Kofer, an officer of the law.”

  A great opening, Jake thought. Any audience, whether twelve jurors in a box or two thousand lawyers at a convention, appreciates a speaker who promises to be brief.

  “Let’s talk about that murder. Tuesday morning, when we started, I asked you to ask yourselves, as you listened to the witnesses, if, at that horrible moment, did Drew Gamble have to pull the trigger? Why did he pull the trigger? Was it in self-defense? Was he protecting himself, his sister, his mother? No, ladies and gentlemen, it was not in self-defense. It was not justifiable. It was nothing but cold, calculated murder.

  “Now, the defense has had a field day slandering the reputation of Stuart Kofer.”

  Jake jumped to his feet, raised both hands, and interrupted with, “Objection, Your Honor. Objecti
on. I hate to disrupt a closing argument, Your Honor, but the use of the word ‘slander’ means the spreading of falsehoods. False testimony. And there is absolutely nothing in the record to even remotely indicate that any of the witnesses, for the State or for the defense, has lied.”

  Noose seemed ready for the interruption. “Mr. Dyer, I ask you to refrain from using the word ‘slander.’ And the jury will disregard the use of that word.”

  Dyer frowned and nodded, as if he was being forced to accept the ruling but didn’t agree with it. “Very well, Your Honor,” he replied.

  “Now, you’ve heard a lot from the three Gambles about what a terrible person Stuart Kofer was, and I won’t rehash any of it. Just keep in mind that they, the Gambles, have every reason, every motive to tell only one side of the story, and to perhaps embellish and exaggerate here and there. Tragically, Stuart is not here to defend himself.

  “So let’s not talk about the way he lived. You’re not here to judge him or his lifestyle, his habits, his problems, his demons. Your job is to weigh the facts regarding the way he died.”

  Dyer stepped to the exhibit table and picked up the gun. He held it and faced the jury. “At some point during that terrible night, Drew Gamble took this gun, a Glock 22, forty caliber, fifteen in the magazine, issued by Sheriff Ozzie Walls to all of his deputies, and he held it and carried it around the house. At that moment, Stuart was sound asleep on his bed. He was drunk, as we know, but the alcohol had rendered him helpless. A blacked-out drunk, snoring away, not a threat to anyone. Drew Gamble held the gun and he knew how to use it because Stuart had taught him how to load it, hold it, aim it, and fire it. It’s rather ironic, and tragic, that the killer was taught to use the murder weapon by the victim himself.

  “I’m sure it was a terrible scene. Two frightened kids, their mother unconscious on the floor. Minutes passed and Drew Gamble had the gun. Stuart was asleep, in another world. An emergency call had been made, the police and rescue personnel were on the way.

  “And at some point, Drew Gamble made the decision to kill Stuart Kofer. He walked to the bedroom, closed the door for some reason, and he took the gun and placed the barrel an inch or two from Stuart’s left temple. Why did he pull the trigger? He claims he felt threatened, that Stuart might get up and harm them, and he had to protect himself and his sister. He wants you to believe that he had to pull the trigger.”