Accomplice Liability

by Stephen Penner

  Lannigan stood up. Which meant Robyn had Samantha Keller. Brunelle had mixed feelings about that. The case against Keller was probably the weakest, at least so far. That, combined with her probable loyalty to Hernandez, meant she was the least likely to cooperate and the most likely to tell Brunelle to fuck off and take the case to trial. Part of him wanted to work collaboratively with Robyn, but another part of him wanted to see her mouth form the word ‘fuck.’

  When Brunelle shook himself back to his senses, Lindsey Fuller was at the bar next to Lannigan. Brunelle handed Lannigan the paperwork and prepared for the bail argument. Lannigan tripped on his words but managed to mimic Rainaldi, acknowledging receipt, waving reading, and entering the ‘not guilty’ plea. Brunelle asked again for a million dollars bail. Lannigan could barely form a coherent sentence. And Judge Jankowski set bail at the same amount as Rittenberger: $500,000. Next!

  Next was Samantha Keller. Robyn stood up and sauntered to the bar. Brunelle tried, but failed, to not look at her legs wrapped tightly in her suit skirt as she took her place next to him. The pounding returned to his ears.

  Somehow he managed to call the case and Keller joined her lawyer in front of the judge. Same song and dance, same arguments, same result. “Bail is set at five-hundred-thousand dollars. Other standard conditions.”

  Not bad, Brunelle figured. Three-fifths done and Robyn was in his rearview mirror. The problem was, Edwards was in his front windshield, and he was vaguely aware, amid everything else competing for his attention, that no one claiming to be Hernandez’s lawyer had arrived yet.

  “Wilkins!” the door guard bellowed. A moment later, a confident looking Nate Wilkins strolled into the courtroom. He took his place next to Edwards, and the judge began. Arraign, rinse, repeat. Bail was set at $750,000, reflecting Wilkins’ greater role in, if not the murder, then at least Hernandez’s general business. The proceedings had become rote. Everyone relaxed. Mistake.

  With four of the five arraignments finished, everyone knew who the last defendant was. The corrections officer at the door called out for “Hernandez!” before Wilkins was actually safely back in the holding area. When Hernandez stepped into the courtroom and saw a cocky, grinning Wilkins walking toward him, he only paused a moment before leaping on Wilkins and tackling him to the floor.

  “I’m gonna fucking kill you!” Hernandez shouted as he punched Wilkins repeatedly in the face, a staccato of blood and bone. “Kill you! You hear me? You keep your fucking mouth shut! Shut! Or you’re fucking dead!”

  Even as the guards pulled Hernandez off the bloodied Wilkins, he continued shouting, “Dead! You hear me? Fucking dead!”

  Hernandez was slammed into a chair and handcuffed behind his back. Wilkins was half-carried into the holding area, blood all down the front of his shirt. Brunelle suspected the arraignment would be delayed. But Hernandez’s attorney had slipped in during the excitement and announced his readiness to proceed.

  “Good afternoon, Your Honor,” the attorney called out. “Ronald Jacobsen appearing on behalf of the accused, Elmer Hernandez.”

  Brunelle winced and turned to see Jacobsen grinning at the bar. He was a partner at Smith, Lundquist, Jacobsen and Brown, one of Seattle’s many mid-sized corporate firms. Brunelle had dealt with him once when a white-collar criminal decided to hire a white-collar lawyer. When that case was over, Brunelle figured he’d never see Jacobsen again.

  “Don’t you have a polluter to defend or an orphanage to sue?” Brunelle asked under his breath.

  “I’m sure I do, Mr. Brunelle,” Jacobsen replied with that same money-eating grin. “But I got a taste for the criminal practice on our last case. Mr. Hernandez was referred to me by some other attorneys who have worked with him in the past.”

  “Laundering his drug money,” Brunelle quipped, although it wasn’t really a joke.

  “I look forward to battling you again, Mr. Brunelle,” Jacobsen said. Then he looked up again at Judge Jankowski. “The defense is ready to proceed with the arraignment, Your Honor, the earlier excitement notwithstanding.”

  The guards waited for the judge to authorize moving Hernandez from his secure chair to the usual defendant’s spot next to Jacobsen. He didn’t.

  “That wasn’t excitement, Mr. Jacobsen,” Judge Jankowski declared. “That was assault, intimidating a witness, and contempt of court. You can acknowledge receipt of the information, waive formal reading, and enter a plea of not guilty, but you’ll do it from where you’re standing while your client remains where he’s seated. If you want to be heard on bail, I can’t stop that, but I wouldn’t expect a good result. Are you sure you want to proceed today?”

  “Quite sure,” Jacobsen answered without hesitation. He was dressed a step above his government-employed colleagues, in a tailored suit and designer shoes. His silk tie alone probably cost more than Brunelle’s entire outfit. And he wore it all very well, with an athletic frame and dark, thinning hair atop his 50-something head. “And I would like to be heard on bail as well.”

  Judge Jankowski scowled at Jacobsen for a few moments, then looked to Brunelle. “Proceed,” he instructed.

  Brunelle knew to do what a judge told him, especially a pissed off judge. He called the case, handed Jacobsen the paperwork, and asked for two million dollars bail, since Hernandez was the actual shooter.

  Jacobsen acknowledged the paperwork, and said “Not guilty” on behalf of his client. Then he started his bail argument. “The defense asks you to release Mr. Hernandez on his own recognizance, Your Honor. He has gone to the trouble and expense of hiring private counsel. This shows his commitment to taking this matter seriously. He is presumed innocent of the charges against him and we look forward to holding the state to its burden of proving every element of the charge beyond a reasonable doubt. He was born and raised right here in Seattle, so he is not a flight risk and he does not pose a threat to the public. Therefore, under criminal rule three-point-two, which presumes a P.R. release, he should be released on his promise to appear.”

  “He assaulted a witness in open court,” Judge Jankowski interjected. “My court.”

  Jacobsen raised a pointed index finger. “Allegedly assaulted, Your Honor.”

  Sometimes civil lawyers could be too clever for their own good. Civil practice was about deposition and bank records, trying to find some secret piece of information to trip up the other side with. Criminal practice was more real. Real victims, real blood, real consequences. And real assaults.

  Jankowski turned back to Brunelle. “What bail did you ask for, Mr. Brunelle?”

  “Two million, Your Honor.”

  “Bail will be set at four million dollars,” Jankowski ruled. “This hearing is over. Return the defendant to the jail.”

  Jacobsen opened his mouth to argue, but the opportunity was lost. The guards were hardly silent about ordering Hernandez to his feet and laying hands on him to make sure he complied. Brunelle quickly stepped away from the bar. His work was done, and if Hernandez decided to fight the guards, it could easily spill in his direction.

  As it turned out, Hernandez was perfectly compliant, and in just a few moments, the door to the holding area was closed and Jacobsen was left standing alone before the judge.

  “We’re done, Mr. Jacobsen,” Jankowski said.

  But Jacobsen regained his grin and replied, “For now, Your Honor.”

  Chapter 11

  Five defendants, one uncharged informant, and six defense attorneys. That was too much for even Brunelle to handle by himself. It was standard practice to assign two prosecutors to murder cases anyway. The only question was, who was going to be Brunelle’s second chair?

  Matt Duncan, the elected District Attorney, called a meeting to answer just that question. Brunelle would have preferred to make his own choice of who to work with on a complex, challenging first degree murder case. But that wasn’t how Duncan ran the office. And it was his office to run.

  So a few days after the arraignments, Brunelle found himself at a
mid-morning meeting in Duncan’s office, coffee and pastries on the conference table, and a view of Elliot Bay out the window. It was actually a nice environment for a meeting. And almost everyone in attendance was as pleasant as the surroundings. Almost.

  “So this one’s a little too much for you, huh, Brunelle?” Joe Fletcher jabbed as he lumbered in and threw himself in a chair opposite Brunelle. Fletcher had been at the office just about as long as Brunelle. Somewhere along the way, they decided they didn’t really like each other, although Brunelle couldn’t recall why. Fletcher seemed committed to it, though, so Brunelle never bothered trying to bury whatever hatchet had appeared between them. Which was easy enough, because Fletcher was pretty much a loudmouth jerk.

  Brunelle didn’t reply to Fletcher’s jab. He simply nodded in acknowledgement and decided that his paramount goal of the meeting would be to make sure he didn’t get paired up with Fletcher. Anyone would be better than Fletcher.

  Fletcher was the last one to arrive for the meeting, so Duncan closed the door to his office and took a seat at the head of the table. The attendees were Duncan, and a hand-selected few of his top homicide prosecutors: Brunelle, Fletcher, Linda Kirkpatrick, and Cameron McLain. Brunelle had hoped to see Michelle Yamata, his co-counsel on a couple of his prior cases, but no such luck. This was the old guard of the most experienced homicide prosecutors. It looked like Duncan was going to pair him up with someone old and experienced.

  “I think,” Duncan started, “we should pair Dave up with someone new and fresh.”

  Crap, Brunelle thought. But his spirits lifted when he realized ‘new and fresh’ excluded Fletcher. Still, he had his concerns.

  “Well, not too new or too fresh,” Brunelle said. “This isn’t a slam-dunk case. There’s no shooting on surveillance video or full confession on tape. We’re going to have to piece it together witness by witness, and we’re going to have to cut deals to do it. It’s a bit more complex than your typical murder.”

  “Exactly what I was thinking,” Duncan replied.

  Brunelle wasn’t sure what that meant. Was Duncan already backpedaling on ‘new and fresh’?

  Fletcher interrupted his thoughts. “So you’re gonna base your entire case on the word of the fellow murderers?”

  Brunelle shrugged. “I don’t have any choice. There aren’t any other witnesses. Everyone who saw it helped out in some way. That means cutting deals.”

  “No one is going to believe a bunch of snitches who are getting deals to throw one guy under the bus,” Fletcher scoffed. “Every defense lawyer in that courtroom is going to argue that every other defendant is lying. And they’ll all be right.”

  “Well, luckily,” Brunelle replied, “not all of the defense attorneys want to end up arguing anything in front of a jury. One of them contacted me before we even charged it so he could get a deal in place right away.”

  “Who was that?” Kirkpatrick asked. She was a straight shooter, no time for insults and jabs.

  “William Harrison Welles,” Brunelle practically groaned.

  “That guy is such a windbag,” McLain said. “But he’s not afraid of trial.” McLain was probably the quietest of the five of them. But a quiet lawyer still talks a lot. He’d been at the office a few years less than anyone else in the room, but had distinguished himself with a calm demeanor in even the most stressful situations, and a quiet command of the courtroom while in trial. Maybe that’s who Duncan had in mind. Brunelle could live with that, he supposed.

  “Oh, no doubt about that,” Brunelle answered. “Welles loves a courtroom. It just so happens, the least culpable of the group was also the smartest. She got him on board before we even knew who she was.”

  “No, I was thinking more about Nick Lannigan,” Brunelle continued. “He’s got one of them. The last place he wants to be is in front of a jury.”

  “Who’s Nick Lannigan?” Kirkpatrick asked.

  “Exactly,” Fletcher laughed. “He’s a nobody. He’s got no business being on a murder case.”

  “He’s a nice enough guy,” Brunelle defended him. “But yeah, he’s in over his head on this one. He might bluster a little bit, but there’s no way he doesn’t talk his client into a deal, even a crappy deal.”

  “Which is exactly what it’ll be,” Fletcher said, “since we know he’s scared of going to trial.”

  Brunelle supposed there was some truth to that. There probably shouldn’t be, but there was.

  “Who represents the main guy?” McLain asked. “The shooter.”

  “Ron Jacobsen,” Brunelle answered. If the others didn’t know a defense attorney—albeit small-time defense attorney—like Nick Lannigan, he doubted they’d know a corporate guy like Jacobsen. And he was right. Blank faces stared back at him.

  “Is he new?” Kirkpatrick asked. “I don’t recognize that name.”

  “Me neither,” McLain added.

  Fletcher just shrugged. He wasn’t the type of person to admit when he didn’t know something, even when that something was a someone nobody else knew either.

  Well, almost nobody else.

  “I know him,” Duncan announced. All eyes turned to the boss. “He’s a partner at Smith Lundquist. They mostly do civil litigation, a mix of insurance defense and plaintiff’s personal injury. They’ve sued the county a few times. Somebody tripping on an uneven sidewalk at a public park, stuff like that.”

  The criminal division of the prosecutor’s office was so large and dominant, the criminal guys like Brunelle—and Fletcher and Kirkpatrick and McLain—tended to forget the office had an entire civil division. But Matt Duncan was the lawyer for the entire county. The majority of his lawyers prosecuted crimes, but he also had lawyers who enforced zoning laws, negotiated labor contacts, and defended the county against lawsuits. The lawyers in the civil and criminal divisions didn’t interact very much, and there wasn’t usually a lot of transfer between the divisions, although every now and then a prosecutor would burn out on broken bones and recanting victims, or a civil attorney would get tired of motions for summary judgment and sanctions under civil rule 11. Yawn.

  Brunelle and the other criminal prosecutors didn’t need to know what was going on in that other part of the office. But Duncan did.

  “He’s a very zealous litigator,” Duncan went on. “He’s like a pitbull. Once he locks his jaw onto something, he doesn’t let go. He just files motion after motion after motion.”

  Brunelle nodded. That had been his experience as well.

  “Yeah, but criminal practice is different,” Fletcher said. “This isn’t a drug case where you can suppress evidence if the search was bad. It’s a murder. Bad guy shot dead guy. Simple.”

  “He’ll file the motions anyway,” Brunelle interjected. “Especially because that’s not how we do things on this side. He knows we don’t like paperwork. We like jurors and evidence tags. The last thing we want to be doing is responding to yet another motion to compel production of the receipt for the pen the detective used to take notes at the crime scene, or whatever.”

  Fletcher huffed. “Sounds like somebody needs to teach him how we do things.”

  Kirkpatrick disagreed. “No, we need someone who understands how he does things.”

  “And can meet him, blow for blow,” McLain added.

  “We need a criminal trial attorney with experience as a civil litigator,” Brunelle summarized.

  Duncan nodded and smiled. “Yes. We need Gwen Carlisle.”

  The other attorneys in the room exchanged blank stares and shrugs.

  “Who?” Brunelle asked for them all.

  “Gwen?” Duncan was surprised. “You don’t know Gwen Carlisle? She’s been doing burglaries for two years now.”

  Brunelle shrugged again. “Sorry. I guess I haven’t had a chance to get down there. It’s a pretty big office.”

  “How does prosecuting burglary cases make her indispensable to a murder case?” Fletcher questioned.

  Brunelle wondered the same thing himself.
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br />   “Because before that, she was the lead of our civil litigation team for five years,” Duncan explained. “She’s worked here for over ten years. Do you really not know her?”

  “Again, big office,” Brunelle defended. “If I don’t know everyone doing burglaries, there’s no way I know the civil guys.”

  “I think I saw her name on the phone list,” Kirkpatrick offered. “Didn’t she used to have a different last name? Flannigan or Flaherty or something?”

  “No, it’s always been Carlisle,” Duncan said. “She got divorced a few years ago, but she never changed her name.”

  Everyone waited a moment for Fletcher to make some inappropriate remark about divorced women. When he didn’t, Duncan finished his explanation of Carlisle’s qualifications. “She defended the county against three different lawsuits filed by Jacobsen’s firm. She won them all too. Then she turned forty and got a divorce. She wanted a change, so she asked to come over to the criminal side. Now she’s kicking butt at that too. She’s ready for something more than burglaries and car thefts. She’s ready for a murder case. And she’ll be ready for whatever bullshit Jacobsen tries to pull.”

  Duncan looked specifically to Brunelle. “Are you willing to work with her on this case, Dave?”

  Brunelle thought for a moment. Am I willing to work with a 40-year-old divorcée who can kick the lead defense attorney’s ass?

  “Yeah, I’m willing to do that.”

  Chapter 12

  The King County Prosecutor’s Office was indeed large, with well over a hundred attorneys and twice as many support staff, spread across several skyscrapers in downtown Seattle. Luckily, most of the criminal division was in one building, so Brunelle only had to go down three floors to introduce himself to Gwen Carlisle. He should have taken the stairs, but they were those ugly cement-and-metal emergency type, hidden behind fire doors at the end of the hallway. Much farther away than the elevator bank right outside the main lobby.