by David Ellis
“No, you’re not. You’re saying it wasn’t me.”
She looked at him for a moment. She moved to his ear. “Alex, you sit down and shut your mouth. Do not ever glare at me like that again with the jury present. Or I swear to God, I’ll go to the prosecutor right now and tell them all about Ronnie.”
She smiled at him, for the jury’s benefit, and tapped him playfully on the shoulder. “Okay?” she said sweetly. “Sorry about that, Ms. Stoddard.” She moved away from the defense table and the podium, into the well of the courtroom. She was trying to stand directly between the jury and Alex. She heard him take his seat behind her.
“Ms. Stoddard, you said that the officer had a radio in one hand, and as for the other hand, I believe you said, you thought he wasn’t holding anything. Isn’t it more accurate to say that you aren’t sure about that?”
“Umm.” The witness looked up at the ceiling, squinted. “I don’t remember seeing a gun in his hand.”
“Let me put it this way, Ms. Stoddard. Can you rule out the possibility that he didn’t have a gun in his hand? You can’t, can you?”
“Rule out the possibility.” She played with that. “I guess it was my understanding that he didn’t have a gun in his hand.”
“Your understanding.” Shelly looked over at the prosecutor. “Do you mean someone told you that?”
“Oh, jeez.” She sighed loudly. “Well—”
“Ms. Stoddard, do you remember when I paid you a visit?”
“Yes.”
“And I brought a gentleman with me.”
“Yes.”
“And didn’t you tell us”—Shelly made a point of retrieving her notes and reading from them verbatim—“didn’t you tell us that ‘he had a walkie-talkie in his hand, but I don’t know about the other hand.’ Isn’t that what you told us?”
She seemed embarrassed by the question. Shelly smiled at her with sympathy. She wasn’t trying to berate the witness.
“I said that?”
“I’m asking you, ma’am. Didn’t you tell us that you didn’t know about that other hand?”
“Well. It was dark.” She threw up her hands. “I don’t really remember that he had a gun, but I don’t have a real specific image in my head of that hand. It was more like—a big picture sort of thing? I saw a police officer chasing a guy. I guess on the specifics of whether that officer had a gun in his hand—I guess I’m not positive one way or the other.”
“You don’t know about that other hand,” Shelly summarized, tying the witness to precisely what she had told Shelly and Joel in her office.
“I guess I don’t, no.”
“Okay. Let’s move on then. You said that the officer ‘jerked’ before the shooting.”
“Yeah.”
“Would you mind, Ms. Stoddard, standing up and showing us exactly what you mean by that?”
The witness shrugged and got up. “Well, I guess it’s hard to replicate.”
“Sure.”
The witness feigned a quick spasm of her upper body. Her body seemed to rotate to the right. “It was like something surprised him or something.”
Ouch. Surprise was not the word she wanted to hear. “Looks like”—Shelly tried to replicate the witness’s movement—“looks like he was pivoting a little.”
“Maybe. It was really quick. I didn’t really analyze it.”
“Of course. You can take your seat, by the way, thank you. So, his upper body sort of twisted or moved or something.”
“Something like that, yes.”
“His feet were planted.”
The witness recoiled, as if she were being asked too much. She thought about it a good long while, moving her body slightly as she tried to reenact the image.
“I mean,” Shelly tried, “he didn’t jump backward or forward, did he?”
“No. He didn’t do that.” The witness sighed, and slowly nodded. “I guess you’re right. His feet didn’t move.”
“Okay, great.” Shelly squinted over the jurors’ heads as if she were trying to get to the bottom of this. “Seems like—you tell me—seems like when you just did that, it was sort of like a shiver that started from the left side of his body and moved to the right.”
“Oh”—she dropped her head back—“that sounds right.” She looked at Shelly. “I mean, ‘shiver’—it would be an awfully bad shiver.”
“Okay, we’ll use your word. ‘Jerk.’ The officer jerked in a way such that he turned slightly to the right. Isn’t that what you showed us?”
“Yeah, that makes sense.”
“You said, Ms. Stoddard, that the witness had a radio in his hand.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t hear Mr. Morphew ask you which hand was holding the radio. It makes me curious.”
Morphew, at the sound of his name, looked up from his notes at Shelly with an expression that said, I’d object to the cheap shot but it’s not worth it.
“Left hand,” said Ms. Stoddard.
“Left hand. Radio in his left, right hand you’re not sure.” She did the twist again, though slower than the quick jerking motion the witness had described. “He jerked to the right, and his right hand maybe had a gun in it, maybe was free.”
“Correct.”
“You didn’t happen to see what his right hand did, when he jerked to the right?”
Stoddard was following Shelly’s right hand, which moved toward her right hip. She seemed to get the point, too. “No, actually, I didn’t specifically notice that.” She heaved a sigh. “I guess I wish I had taken notes or something.”
Some of the jurors smiled, so Shelly did as well. Shelly patted her right hip with her free right hand. “His holster was on his right side, wasn’t it?”
“Oh, wow. I have no idea about that.”
That was fine. That much could be easily established.
“And one more topic, Ms. Stoddard. The other officer? Do you recall that he was back at the car when the shot was fired? Back at his patrol car?”
“Yes.”
“Now, I assume you weren’t paying much attention to him while these events were taking place.”
“No.”
“When did you next become aware of him?”
“Oh, at some point after that, I saw him jogging down to the alley and he went in. Then he ran to the other officer and he held him.”
“Did you see him do anything else?”
“I think—I was going to the phone to call 911. But then I heard a siren, so I figured they already knew.”
“There was a gap of time there, when you weren’t watching.”
“That’s—that’s right, yes.”
“Thank you very much, Ms. Stoddard.”
Shelly took her seat. Alex leaned into her and said, “That last part was better.”
“Thanks.”
“You never at any time saw the officer brandish his firearm, did you?” Dan Morphew had barely waited for Shelly to make it to her seat to begin his redirect examination.
“No, I can’t say that I specifically recall that.”
“And you can’t sit here and tell us, with any certainty whatsoever, that the officer was even reaching for his weapon when the shot was fired.”
“No, I can’t.”
“Nor can you tell us what the officer was seeing if, in fact, he did reach for his weapon.”
“I couldn’t see what he was seeing, no.”
“You can’t tell us, for example, whether the officer—if in fact he did reach for his weapon—whether the officer did that because the young man in the alley had pulled a gun on him.”
“Objection.” For this one, Shelly stood. “That question assumes facts not in evidence, your Honor.” She pointed at Monica Stoddard. “This witness never said that a ‘young man’ pulled a gun or shot anyone. There has been no testimony about who did that shooting. This witness specifically said that this ‘young man,’ whoever it was, left her line of vision and did not return.”
“Oh, for God’s s
ake,” said Morphew, as if the point were elementary. “It’s an inference clearly drawn from the evidence.”
The judge stared at Morphew a moment. “The objection is sustained. Rephrase it, Counsel.”
Morphew adjusted his stance a bit to show displeasure, then framed his hands. “Ms. Stoddard, if we were to assume—assume—that Officer Miroballi was reaching for his weapon just before he was shot—you couldn’t tell us if he did that in response to someone pulling a gun on him.”
“No, I have no idea.”
“And we know that someone did shoot the officer, right?”
“Yes.”
“Thank you, ma’am. That’s all.”
“No recross,” Shelly said.
“Let’s take five minutes,” the judge said. “Mr. Morphew, do you have your next witness ready?”
“Judge, we do—could I beg for ten minutes?”
“Okay. Ten minutes.”
“Julio Sanchez,” Morphew said to the bailiff. Then he hustled out of the courtroom.
66
Price
SHELLY CLOSED THE door behind her. She and Alex were in the evidence room on the side of the courtroom. The prosecution was in charge of custody of the evidence and brought it into the courtroom every day. It served as a confidential meeting place for an attorney and client with a short break.
“Sit there.” She pointed to a chair. She positioned herself on the table, which was holding various exhibits. “I am going to handle this in the way that I think is best. You can give me your opinion and I’ll take it under advisement. But I make the trial strategy.” She patted her chest. “If you don’t like it, you can fire me. Try. Tell the judge you want to fire me. See if he lets you, at this late date.”
“I told you,” he answered. “I won’t let you say that Ronnie or Todavia did this.”
“I haven’t. I’m laying the groundwork. We can decide later.”
Alex brought his hands to his face.
“These people want to execute you, Alex.”
He opened his hands, silently pleading. They stared at each other a moment before he finally spoke.
“I did it, Shelly. I’m the one who shot him.” He held up his right hand. “God as my witness. I shot him.”
His voice had a different quality to it. Deeper yet quieter, as if he were confiding in her. At that moment, she believed him. She had ample reason not to, but she did.
She moved to him, knelt down so she was face-to-face with Alex in his chair.
“I don’t care,” she told him. “Let’s put Todavia next to you in that alley. The jury will be happy to go that way.” She took his hands in hers. “Don’t you see this, Alex? At most, the only person who puts that gun in your hand is a homeless man with mental and social problems. I’ll do what I need to do to him. All you have to say is Eddie Todavia did it and”—she took a breath—“you could walk out of that courtroom.”
He pulled his hands away and got out of the chair, moving around her. He moved to the door and put his hand on it. “And then what?” he asked.
“Then what?” She got to her feet.
“I have more than myself to think about.” He turned around to her. “I accuse Todo of killing this cop and what happens to Angela? What happens to Ronnie?”
She nodded. “He’s a Cannibal, you mean.”
“Shit.” Alex shook his head. His face was crimson. A sheen cast over his eyes. “I just”—his voice cracked; he swallowed hard—“I just got away from this guy.” He began to pace the small room. “I can’t go back to that. You get me out of one death sentence and into another one.”
“I would take care of Angela.” The words startled her, both because she was acknowledging the possible outcome of this case and because—well, she meant it. Angela was not technically her flesh and blood but Ronnie hadn’t made that distinction, and so neither would she.
Alex, whether from relief or fear, broke down. He collapsed in the chair, head in his hands, and wept like she had never seen a boy cry. The tremble of his body, the sounds of anguish emanating from this boy, had the opposite effect on Shelly, emboldened her to action. She gave him his space, taking note of the time—they only had another minute or two, at most. Then she moved to him, knelt beside him again.
“I’m going to help you with Angela either way, Alex. Either way. I’ll do whatever I have to do to make sure that Eddie Todavia never lays a glove on your family.”
“One stupid mistake,” he said. She didn’t know what he meant. It was as if he hadn’t heard what she had said.
She wasn’t following. What mistake did he mean?
“What did you mean before?” she asked him. “You just got away from Todavia. What does that mean?”
It took Alex a moment to calm. He looked up at her, his face washed out, streaked with tears. “The car I hot-wired,” he said. “When I was a freshman?”
Right. Okay. Ronnie had helped Alex out of that. Saved his life, Alex had said. He had hot-wired the wrong guy’s car—
“It was Todavia’s car you took,” she said.
Alex nodded his head. “I didn’t know it was his. But I was the driver. I was the one everyone knew about. Man, of all people, I hot-wired the car of a C-Street Cannibal.”
“He was going to kill you,” she said. “Ronnie talked him out of it.”
“But nothing’s for free.”
“He put you to work for him. He made you sell drugs for him. Oh, Alex.”
Me and Alex is all good. Eddie Todavia had nodded at Alex when he said that yesterday. Alex had nodded back. Now she got it.
Alex opened his hands. “He beat the piss out of Ronnie and then he told me that if I would work for him, he’d let me skate.”
“But that was freshman year. You didn’t start selling until 2003, right? Sophomore year.”
“Todo got busted, like, a month after this happened. It bought me a year. Ten months. Whatever. But he had a good memory. He had moved out to the west side after he served his time. He said he could use a white kid to sell to the professionals that don’t want to come out to his ’hood to score. He also said he’d heard I had a daughter now.” He deflated. “I got the point.”
Shelly stood again, reached for the wall to steady herself. “So you started selling drugs to settle a debt to Todavia.”
He nodded. “I liked the money, too. I admit it. But yeah, that’s how it started.”
“And what Todavia said in court yesterday—you were ‘all good’—he was saying the debt was paid now. He screwed you in court so he felt he owed you one.”
Alex took a deep breath, settled now. “Yeah. I’m free of him now. You go after him, he’ll come back harder.”
“Was it Todavia in the alley with you, Alex?”
He looked at her with a look that told her she knew better. “C’mon, Shelly. You know it wasn’t.”
She did know. She had never truly thought so. She just liked the idea because it worked. It was convincing. But there was more here. You know it wasn’t, Alex had just said. Alex was admitting, without saying so, that someone was there. He was telling her they both knew who that someone was.
And truly, Shelly had known that, too. She had lived with the small residual doubt that Alex’s denials had given her. She had taken every morsel of rationalization she could to avoid what she knew to be true. Ronnie was the one in the alley.
A knock on the door. One of Morphew’s assistants poked her head in.
“One minute and we’ll be there,” Shelly said.
The door closed again.
“You were a confidential informant for Miroballi, weren’t you, Alex? The reason you met with him was you were trying to get him to bust Eddie Todavia. Right? Because if Todavia were arrested, you’d be free of your debt. That’s why you were meeting with Miroballi.”
Alex smiled. She couldn’t read the expression.
“Everything I say, you have a new story,” he said. “I guess that’s why you’re a good lawyer.”
Ano
ther knock on the door, and this time the assistant said, “We really need you out here, Counsel.”
“One second.” Shelly turned back to Alex as the door closed. “Listen to me, Alex Baniewicz. We are going to put Eddie Todavia in that alley with you. I will do that. I’ll make sure that kid never gets near you. You have my word on that. No one with any credibility is going to say that it wasn’t Todavia. I’ll make the jury believe that. And you don’t get an opinion on this.”
She opened the door and went into the courtroom, where all eyes at the prosecution table were fixed on her. Dan Morphew walked over to her and handed her a videotape and a file.
“We have a new witness,” he said.
67
Flipper
SHELLY LOOKED AT the videotape. It had a sticker on it that said DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS. She looked back up at Morphew.
“We took it last night,” he said. “They’re not family, Shelly, in case you were going to argue confidentiality. We checked the D.O.C. regs last night. Before we even looked at it. Ronnie Masters isn’t related to your client any more than the prime minister of Japan is.”
She opened the file folder. It was a plea agreement between Ronnie Masters and the county attorney.
“I told the judge about this,” he said. “I told him you’d want to see the tape right away. There’s a VCR back there.”
They went through the same door the judge used, passed his chambers, and went to another room where a television and VCR were assembled. While Morphew worked the machine, Shelly looked through the file. She saw the form signed last night by Ronnie Masters—signed by every visitor to a corrections facility, in fact—acknowledging awareness that the government could record conversations unless the visitor was either the detainee’s counsel or blood relation.
“Nobody really reads these things before they sign them,” she said, hardly even pretending to accept her own argument.
“That dog won’t hunt,” he said. “Here we go.”
He stepped back and the screen came alive. The hidden camera in the detention center was angled so that the person in clearest focus was the detainee, who sat in the same spot every time—the end of the table where the chain from the prisoner’s handcuffs was locked down. Smart. Guaranteed that you’d get the prisoner on tape clearly.
