“Pins and needles, my friend.”
His expression revealed disappointment with my sarcasm. But he raised his hands in sudden exclamation. “See, because of the quality choreography accomplished by the attorney wizards—I’m thinking on both sides, accuser and accused—nobody knows what happened next. Well, the choreographers do, obviously. The lawyers. But not us, not Joe Q. All the public really knows is that Kobe went back to L.A. on a private jet and played more Lakers hoops. Over time, he got his full-on celebrity back. Got his endorsements back, or maybe he got new ones, better ones. Fair to say—and this is more personal opinion than fact—he even seems to have gotten his mojo back.” Sam glanced up at the TV, where Kobe was busy doing Kobe magic. “Man’s on Sports Center a lot. I know. I watch it almost every night. Play of the Night? Play of the Week? Mr. Bryant.
“And his pretty wife? Don’t forget her. She’s a victim in all this, too, right? Who knows, maybe she forgave him for what he did. Tabloids say she got a big ring for her pain and aggravation and humiliation. Mr. Bryant eventually got more rings of his own, too. Championship rings. And later on, he got himself an Olympic gold medal.
“The vic? I mean, if she was a vic. To be fair, we don’t actually know that, do we? By ‘we,’ I’m talking Joe Q. Since there was never a criminal trial, or even a trial of the civil complaint, we don’t know what really happened in that hotel room, do we? Other than adultery, I mean.
“Well, as far as I can tell, the alleged vic has disappeared. Hopefully—I’d like to think—voluntarily. Some cops have told me that they think the next time we see her will be when she shows up on Oprah or Ellen. Or as guest host on The View. But I don’t think that’s going to happen. I think the choreography that was put in place includes a prohibition against her ever performing in those particular venues. Anyway, for now? She’s history.”
I shrugged. The relevance continued to elude me. My fries were almost gone, which was even more of a tragedy.
Sam said, “Big picture? Ready? A cynic—you know, someone like you—might suggest that the entire order of events was . . . choreographed from the start. Not just the part we know about, the B before C. But also the crucial step, A, and the concluding step, D.”
Finally, I was hoping. The point.
“I promised you I would get back to A, didn’t I? So here goes. Remember O. J.? His acquittal?”
I groaned audibly. “Sam, please. No. Don’t make me—”
He held up an index finger. “Not what you think. Only one small point from that dark hole. Promise. Mr. Goldman, the father of one of the murder victims in the infamous Simpson murder case, waited until well after the phantasmagoric conclusion of the criminal trial to file his ultimately successful civil suit against Mr. Simpson. You recall?”
“Yes,” I said. “I do remember that.”
“When it’s done at all—the civil suit option—that’s the way it’s typically done. If a criminal trial ends with an acquittal, the victim or the victim’s family will take their pleas for justice to civil court. Like it or not, fair or not, for aggrieved victims the civil suit, with its lower threshold for culpability, often feels like a final chance at achieving something resembling justice.”
I could finally see where Sam was heading. I said, “But in the Cordillera case, the victim—”
“Alleged victim.”
“The alleged victim in Cordillera filed her civil suit while the criminal charges were still pending against Mr. Bryant.”
“Exactly,” Sam said. “For whatever reason, the alleged victim’s attorneys must have thought it wise to get an extra card in their client’s hand early on. But why would they think that? Were they anticipating losing during the criminal trial? Or were they, perhaps, seeking more leverage? Maybe, but what could possibly be more of an ominous portent to Mr. Bryant than a criminal conviction that promised significant incarceration?”
Ominous portent indeed. My friend was on a roll.
“The answer to that is ‘nothing.’ Which leaves me to speculate: Had the young woman’s lawyer wizards already decided that the criminal case against Mr. Bryant was about to . . . go . . . away? Had they already advised her, because the judge had ruled that her sexual behavior in the days before and after the rape was fair game in the trial, that she should never testify? We, Joe Q.,” Sam said in the voice of an over-the-top documentary narrator, “are left to wonder. I mean, what do we actually know? Well, all we can do is look at the public record to observe the sequence of the steps of the public dance that the lawyer wizards choreographed for their respective clients.
“First, the stage is set with the dark prologue: whatever happened in the hotel suite in Cordillera. And then . . . criminal charges hang over the accused’s head.
“That leads us to A, when that surprise civil suit got filed, then B, when the alleged vic refused to testify and charges got dropped, then C, when Mr. Bryant quasi-apologized, and finally D, when the civil suit is . . . settled. Da, da, da, daaaa.”
One of the surprising things about Sam Purdy is that he’s a graceful dancer. I’d seen him bust it more than a few times. The man did not embarrass himself on a ballroom floor. He broke into a seated version of some dance moves right then. His shoulders swayed. He rocked his hips. “With me? It’s a one, and a two, and a three.” He paused, opening his eyes wide. His forehead is so big that for a moment the tableau looked like a couple of dark pool balls hard against the cushion of a pinkish flesh-colored table. “With a surprising little four thrown in at the end. All in all, a nice tight little legal shuffle. All choreographed, in advance, by . . .?”
I applauded gently. “The attorney wizards,” I said. I was finally catching on.
“Yessss. Not the court. No. Not the prosecutor. Not the cops in Eagle County, I can promise you that. Take it from me, cops don’t know these kinds of steps. To learn these kinds of steps, you need lawyers. The more wizardy, the better.
“And, oh yeah, that civil suit the accused filed? The one that started before the criminal case ended, the one that miraculously went away as part of the attorney tango’s final steps? Well, it turns out that the terms of that settlement—there had to be a settlement, right?—were never disclosed. I’m presuming that the alleged vic got a cash settlement of some kind. Big? Small? If I were a betting man, I’d put my money on big. But that’s a guess. All details remain undisclosed.
“Now, thing is, I don’t recall Mr. Bryant’s attorney, or the accuser’s attorney, reading another public statement at that point or holding a press conference to repeat the earlier contention that no money had been paid to settle the civil action. I actually went back and looked, but if Mr. Bryant or his attorney or her attorney released a second statement like that, I’m afraid I somehow missed it completely. May mean nothing, but I’m thinking if indeed no money had been paid to allow the civil suit to settle, it would have served Mr. Bryant well to issue another statement. From a purely public relations point of view. Experience has taught me that prominent people do pay heed to PR concerns.”
He gave me a moment to disagree. I didn’t.
He transitioned to full whisper. “Mr. Bryant’s earlier statement that no money was paid to that woman? I’m thinking it became, well, inoperative once the civil suit settled.
“And this is going to shock you, my friend, but I am someone who has dark private moments when I’m known to question the purity of the human heart. I, and I do feel some occasional shame about this, I have even had moments when I’ve believed that the lawyers in that case—Mr. Bryant’s lawyers and the alleged vic’s lawyers—may actually have arranged the whole darn thing in advance. Every last bit of it.
“Well, maybe not every last bit. Not all the steps, of course. Not the sexual indiscretion. That was ad-libbed by Mr. Bryant. And the sheriff in Eagle County was solely responsible for his bold move—arresting the celebrity. We can all agree that it’s not the same dance without those first notes being played.
“But the other steps? The c
ivil suit getting filed, the alleged vic refusing to testify in the criminal case, the nobody-bribed-anybody thing, Mr. Bryant almost apologizing, the suitable interval ensuing, the civil suit flying away on that private jet with Mr. Bryant, the possibility that money finally did change hands outside the public view, and then . . . no further public statements or quasi-apologies.
“What if those steps were nothing more than the public evidence of an elaborate exit strategy concocted far in advance by lawyer wizards who are very good at dancing just this side of . . . some important line?”
Sam gave me a moment to reply. I shook my head, declining the opportunity. “Do you know that one of Mr. Bryant’s own lawyers called the statement read by the accuser’s attorney—her client’s own statement—the ‘price of freedom’ required of Mr. Bryant by the accuser? She said ‘freedom.’ His own lawyer said fucking freedom.
“That’s serious stuff. It causes me to question Mr. Bryant’s sincerity. And it leaves me to wonder if the alleged victim actually knew when she told the DA she wasn’t going to testify—and if Mr. Bryant actually knew when he had his adversary’s attorney read that crazy-ass public statement—that all the attorney wizards on both sides had already determined that it would never go to civil trial. Maybe that they even knew the outlines of what a final civil settlement would look like.
“An authority as expert as Roy Black—You know Roy Black? He is himself one of those fancy attorney wizards. He said he suspects that just such a thing occurred. He actually called what happened ‘dirty.’ ”
Back to the Internet for me. If Roy Black said that happened, well . . .
“Wow,” Sam said, in what I hoped was conclusion, “now that would be some major choreography, wouldn’t it?”
Sam had no facts to support his theory, just supposition. His story sounded like a tale of lawyer wizards doing what clients, especially wealthy clients, paid their lawyer wizards to do. But there was an obvious question Sam wanted me to ask. He’d gone to a lot of trouble, so I asked it.
“Would that be legal? For the attorneys on both sides to get together and make all those arrangements without involving the prosecutors or the court?”
21
Sam puffed out his cheeks, leaving him looking not so much like a big chipmunk as an albino rhino preparing for a dive. He said, “Answering that is complicated. If one of Mr. Bryant’s buds—you know, a member of his crew—With NBA players, is it crew or is it posse? Ah, who cares. If, say, an employee of his approached the alleged vic and suggested that she possibly, maybe, could enjoy significant monetary advantages down the road were she to refuse to testify in the upcoming criminal case . . . well, that would be witness tampering.
“If, behind closed doors, Mr. Bryant’s lawyer wizards cooked up a slightly more vague but similar scenario with the alleged victim’s lawyer wizard, it’s . . . what? Is it witness tampering? Or is it damn good lawyering?” Sam said. “After all my years in criminal justice, I still get confused by those two, I admit.”
I leaned farther into Sam’s cave. Despite his campfire story, I remained uninterested in the cautionary tale of Kobe Bryant. Rich people and famous people have always had advantages in our legal system. My bottom line? If Mr. Bryant’s accuser was indeed a victim of sexual assault, I sincerely hoped she had found a constructive way to sublimate her trauma. If the undisclosed civil settlement helped, so be it.
But there were things I did care about. I rehearsed my next words in my head, praying that I could do a reasonable impersonation of actual indignation as I spoke them. I said, “This story? I’m assuming that you are telling me this story now because there was a rape Friday night, Sam? Right across the lane from our house. Is that the point of your story? Are you telling me that nobody in law enforcement has even informed me that there is potentially an accused sex offender living next door to my family? I have a wife and two young children, Sam. The police have a responsibility—”
“No,” Sam said. His voice was no longer a whisper. “I am telling you no such thing. Whatever happened across the lane from your home is not my case, it is not my jurisdiction, and I am in no position to reveal investigatory details or to confirm your speculation. Neighbor or not. But”—he lifted his index finger and briefly touched it to the end of his nose, leaving behind a toasted, buttery breadcrumb from his grilled cheese sandwich—“neither am I taking responsibility for any conclusions, however reasonable, you might reach on your own.”
“You think my conclusion might be reasonable?”
“May well be. What I’ve been doing here this evening is a result of some reflection I did after my time in church last Sunday. The good reverend left me thinking about the great value that can come from speaking in parables. One man’s experience, told properly, can be another man’s life lesson.”
I sat back as I pondered the Cordillera parable for any nuance I’d missed. “Sam, are you suggesting that no rape ever occurred in Cordillera? Is that it? That Kobe Bryant was somehow the victim in that fiasco? And that the same may be true here? Is that why I have nothing to worry about?”
“I never said you had nothing to worry about. And I don’t know the answer to the was-Mr.-Bryant-guilty-of-anything-more-than-adultery question. I can tell you it was my impression in the end that the outcome that was negotiated had more to do with Mr. Bryant’s future as a celebrity basketball star than it had to do with the alleged victim’s circumstances, or with justice.
“When I do try to understand it? The Cordillera saga? I keep coming back to the attorneys’ choreography. At the end of the day that case—a case at its heart about rape, a felony—was resolved without the involvement of the police or the prosecutors or the court. What started off as The People of Colorado v. Kobe Bean Bryant was ultimately resolved by some lawyer wizards who decided that”—Sam’s voice changed in tone right there—“justice would best be served if the public never knew what the fuck really happened. Because of the agreements those attorneys reached behind closed doors, it’s most likely that the rest of us will never know what happened between Mr. Bryant and the woman in that hotel room. Crime? No crime? Rape? No rape?
“People who cross paths with the alleged victim in the future will never know whether she was a victim of an assault or if she was a gold digger. Other women who cross paths with Mr. Bryant will never know whether to fear Mr. Bryant as a potentially violent sex offender or to sympathize with him as the victim of a well-played extortion. Which is, I imagine, exactly the way that someone wanted it.”
“Mr. Bryant?” I said.
Sam finished his beer. “One has to decide, I think, who would have had the most to gain, or to lose, by any continued public disclosure of the facts of the case. Whose future would be most damaged by continued exposure? By an eyewitness’s account, a second-by-second account, of the sexual, or violent, encounter that occurred in that hotel room.”
“We’re not talking about justice anymore, are we, Sam?” I said.
He wiped his mouth with his napkin. He missed the crumb on his nose. “Nah. Not so much. When someone is as prominent as Mr. Bryant, the accusation of sexual assault alone can cause a shit storm that will do as much damage as any truth-seeking prosecutor. Justice? It becomes a casualty, a secondary consideration. Protecting potential future victims? An afterthought.”
I sat back a little. But I kept my voice low. “Sam, I do want to know what happened across the lane from my house last Friday night. Was there a rape? Is that what you’re telling me?”
Sam sat back for a moment. When he leaned forward again, all the theatricality was absent from his delivery. “I do not know what happened between Mr. Kobe Bryant and the young woman in that hotel suite in Cordillera. Was it a rape? Or was it a consenting act between two adults? I do not know. The statements made by the two parties available in the public record are contradictory. And—”
“Like you, Sam, I don’t know what happened in that hotel room in Cordillera. Perhaps though, unlike you, I won’t lose any sleep t
rying to find out.”
“You interrupted me,” he admonished. “What I was about to say is that neither do I know what happened in the house across the lane from yours last Friday night. Was there a rape? I do not know. Was there some form of sexual communion between two consenting adults? I do not know that, either. When all is said and done, I expect that any public statements of the only people who were in the guest room in your neighbor’s home will be contradictory.”
Sam knew about the guest room. Was that a slip, or was he telling me something?
He said, “Let that fact sink in, Alan. You . . . may . . . never . . . know. You will likely never know.” Sam gave me a good half minute to allow all the ambiguity to settle. “Reflecting on Cordillera for another moment? Technically? That was an accusation of acquaintance rape. Acquaintance rape is a bitch,” he said. “I’ve investigated more of them than I want to remember. Sometimes I think I know what really happened between the two people involved. Other times, I don’t. But truth? Truth is damn elusive.
“Down the road, I expect that if it turns out that what happened Friday night was an acquaintance rape, the rape kit may provide some illumination. But not confirmation. I certainly expect that if DNA is tested, those results could shed further light, too. A positive result on a tox screen? That could be a game changer, too. Hard to say—there are often arguments of extenuating circumstances in these affairs. A man could always contend that taking any drug found in the woman’s system was her idea.”
I said, “I’ve always gotten the impression that you could tell, that at some point during an investigation you made some determination about who should be believed.”
“I wish,” Sam said. “Sometimes the facts are the facts. Both the man and the woman tell basically the same story. One looks at those facts and says, ‘See, I was raped.’ The other looks at those facts and says, ‘See, we had sex.’ ”
He sat back. “You know Devil’s Thumb?” he asked. “Above Chautauqua?”
The Last Lie Page 17
