The kids were gawking around, checking out the courtroom. One boy on the end, taller and handsomer than the others, smirked and muttered something to the boy sliding in next to him, who covered his mouth to keep from cracking up. The kid’s squinty-eyed amusement was so contagious Norcross felt himself starting to smile, which irritated him. The teacher glared down the row, and both boys stopped fooling around. Norcross pulled out a tissue and began cleaning his glasses.
Kids.
Lindsay and Jordan were basically driving him nuts. Jordan had made a friend at Crocker Farm Elementary, and her stomachaches were less frequent, but she wanted the same thing for dinner every night—spaghetti, nothing but spaghetti. She was going to end up with scurvy if he couldn’t get some fruits and vegetables into her. Out of the blue, it occurred to Norcross that she might tolerate spinach ravioli, and he jotted a note to himself on his yellow pad.
Lindsay, most of the time, was a force of gloom that hung over everything. She appeared to hate Amherst High and barely talked to him. He’d had to negotiate a rule about using her phone when they were eating dinner. No more than two texts. The judge was concerned, at first, that the group of students in his courtroom might include Lindsay, but she was not there. Some of them might know her, though, and presumably, they’d be reporting back on his performance.
“My first question for you, Professor, has to do with the fact that you have just sworn to tell the truth. Do you understand, sir, that if you deliberately lie to me in response to one of my questions, you can be prosecuted for perjury?”
Cranmer’s hand began to float toward his mouth, but he caught himself and lowered his fingers to the top of the witness box.
“Yes, I understand.” Cranmer cleared his throat again. “I certainly have no intention …” He looked over at Ames. “I certainly understand that I have to be completely truthful.”
“Good. Now I want to move on to what you will be giving up if you do plead guilty. You have certain rights at this moment that will be gone in twenty minutes or so, if you carry on with your intention to plead. I’m going to spell these rights out for you now.”
“Okay.”
“First of all, you have a right to a trial. If you choose to exercise that right, your trial will take place in the courtroom we’re in now. It will be prompt and public. Your jury will sit over there. …” Norcross gestured toward the oak-veneered jury box to his right. “And the witnesses will testify from the witness box where you are sitting now.”
“Okay.”
Cranmer seemed to be relaxing a little—probably experiencing the usual transition from the hairy prospect of doing something to actually beginning to do it.
It occurred to Norcross that, once Cranmer’s plea was in, he might give Claire a call and invite her out to dinner after work. They wouldn’t mention the case, of course, but she’d probably know what had happened through the Amherst College grapevine. The thought of this very pleasant possibility hit a bump when he remembered he’d have to come up with some last-minute arrangement for Jordan and Lindsay if he wanted to get away. Lindsay could manage on her own, but she resented babysitting Jordan, and he hated the thought of dealing with her mood of grievance. His brief, happy dream fluttered off.
“At this trial you’d have the right to be present, and to see and hear all the witnesses against you. Do you understand this?”
“Yes.”
As he ran down the first page of his notes, the judge wondered fleetingly whether Professor Cranmer enjoyed the same consolation and release from looking at his grotesque videos that he and Claire did from their times together. Of course, it couldn’t be remotely the same. He dismissed the idea and turned the page.
“You’d have the right to the assistance of your attorney throughout the trial and the right to have your attorney question all the witnesses offered by the government.” He raised his voice. “Everybody okay back there?”
The clique of students farthest from the teacher had been elbowing one another and passing a note, provoking faint titters. The kid on the far end gave Norcross a smart-aleck grin and held a thumbs-up, letting the judge know that, at least for him, everything was peachy.
Norcross turned to the teacher. “After this proceeding, my clerk can bring you all back to chambers for a few minutes, if you have time. I’d be happy to answer questions if your students have any.”
Ames, Campanella, Patterson, the reporter, the sketch artist, and even the two or three spectators in the courtroom all turned, following Norcross’s look, and stared at the students. They’d heard the giggling as well, and like Norcross, they didn’t seem to appreciate it.
Patterson’s eyes stayed on the kid at the end of the row for a few extra seconds. The silence in the courtroom deepened.
The teacher, Norcross noted now, had a stripe of pearl gray in the part of her dark brown hair. She stood with a slight grimace, pulling herself up on the pew in front of her. She must have been pretty once.
“Thank you, Your Honor.” The expression in her large eyes was grateful but tired. “That is very generous of you. Unfortunately, we may have to slip away. Our van is …”
“No problem,” Norcross said. “If you have to go, please make your exit as quietly as possible.”
Is this what being around kids did to you? Made you secondary? An aging facilitator of their pushy lives? After the death of his first wife, the possibility of children seemed unjustifiably risky. Now it struck Norcross that, even at its best, parenthood must be dreary and exhausting a lot of the time. And this is what Claire wanted, soon, as a condition to marriage? These thoughts, once more, flew by swiftly—sparrows shooting past a murky window.
He turned to Cranmer, who’d also been looking at the students.
“All right.” Norcross hiked himself up. “Let’s resume. As I was saying …”
The standard language of the plea colloquy unfolded smoothly: the defendant’s right to choose whether he would, or would not, testify; the fact that the jury would be instructed not to hold it against him if he remained silent; the burden on the government to convince twelve jurors unanimously, beyond a reasonable doubt, in order to secure a conviction.
“Do you understand, sir, that if you plead guilty, you will be waiving, meaning giving up—”
Cranmer broke in with something Norcross did not catch.
“Excuse me?”
“I understand what waiving means.”
“Fine. Do you understand that if you plead guilty you will be waiving all the rights I just described?”
“Yes.”
“Do you understand that if you plead guilty, there will be no trial, no witnesses, and no burden on the government to prove you guilty?”
“Yes.”
“Have you had sufficient time to discuss this plea with your attorney, Ms. Ames?”
“More than enough. Time hasn’t been the problem.”
“And are you satisfied with the representation Attorney Ames has given you?”
Cranmer looked over at his lawyer, then returned to the judge and nodded. “Yes, she’s been very patient. She’s been super.”
Cranmer was continuing to defrost. This was good. Judge Norcross moved forward, maintaining the steady pace, keeping the questions and answers rolling.
“Have you been seeing a doctor for any reason?”
Cranmer hesitated, glancing over at the reporter. “Yes, uh …” He sighed. “I see a psychiatrist once a week. Nothing other than that.”
“Has this psychiatrist prescribed any medication for you?”
“At first, yes, something for … I forget. I haven’t needed it for the past couple months.”
“Do you feel okay at this moment? Are you having any trouble understanding what is going on here?”
“No, I’m fine.” Cranmer twitched and snorted out something like a pained laugh. “I mean, I�
�m not all that fine, to tell the truth. I’d prefer to be just about anywhere else. But I’m physically and mentally okay, more or less.”
“It’s natural to be nervous. We’ll take our time to make sure you’re following everything.” Norcross turned over another page. The kids in the back of the courtroom had settled down. The one on the end was looking up at the clock. The plea colloquy was about a fourth of the way through.
“Has anyone threatened you, or any member of your family, in order to pressure you into pleading guilty?”
It was a standard question, straight from the outline, but it seemed to buffalo Cranmer. He started to answer, stopped, and stared blankly at the judge for a few seconds. Then he looked down, peering at a spot inside the witness box next to his right foot, as though he might find an answer to Norcross’s question there. The judge let the silence draw out for fifteen or twenty seconds—a long time in a hushed courtroom—and was just about to repeat his question when Cranmer looked up.
“I don’t exactly know what you mean by ‘pressure.’”
“Has someone tried to force you to plead guilty against your will by using threats of any kind?”
“My lawyer and I …” Cranmer glanced over at Ames, who maintained her poker face. “We discussed the consequences, you know, of my not pleading guilty. They looked really bad. I don’t know if that counts as pressure.”
Cranmer’s uncertainty was plausible, but picky. Too much formal education and too little common sense sometimes gave a defendant like Cranmer problems entering into the alternate universe of the courtroom. Pressure in the context of a plea proceeding didn’t mean the same thing as pressure in the real world. Most defendants, even those who’d never graduated from high school, knew this instinctively. Norcross brought an edge into his voice, his no-playing-games tone.
“Every defendant, Professor, has to choose whether to plead guilty or to put the government to its proof at a trial. As with most decisions, there are pluses and minuses depending on which alternative you opt for. The process of making this particular choice is bound to be difficult. That’s not the kind of pressure I’m talking about.”
The atmosphere in the courtroom had tightened. The reporter was writing, quickly but soundlessly. None of the kids was squirming.
“When I say pressure, I’m referring to some external physical threat, or economic threat, or threat to your reputation perhaps, or a threat to harm someone dear to you. What I’m talking about is some effort to put you in fear in order to compel you to do something you wouldn’t otherwise do. Have you been threatened in that way?”
There was another pause while Cranmer checked on his shoe again. Finally, he looked up. “No, I guess, not that kind of threat. No.”
It was impossible to tell whether this answer meant that Cranmer truly didn’t feel pressured or was merely giving up and accepting the meanings that words took on in the world of the courtroom. Whatever intent was behind his answer, the words on the transcript would suffice to satisfy the court of appeals that Cranmer’s guilty plea was not the result of any improper arm-twisting, physical or psychological—at least not the type that might prompt a reversal and remand. That hurdle was behind them, and they could move on.
“I guess my next question sums it up, Professor. Is your plea of guilty here this morning entirely free and voluntary?”
Cranmer was staring again, and another long pause ensued. “May I talk to my attorney?”
Judge Norcross peered down at Linda Ames, who did not look remotely bothered. “Ms. Ames, would you like a short recess?”
Ames stood and shook her head. “I don’t think we’ll need one. If I could approach the witness box?”
After getting permission, Ames walked over to Cranmer. Norcross tapped a corner of the display on his video monitor to turn on the white noise—his clerks called it his “whoosher”—to allow Ames and Cranmer some privacy. Trying not to stare, the judge busied himself reordering his sentencing script and tearing a page off his bench calendar. AUSA Campanella sighed, looked up at the ceiling, and shook his head.
As far as Norcross could tell out of the corner of his eye, Cranmer was doing most of the talking, leaning to the side and partially turning his back to Norcross. Behind the gush of the audio camouflage, indistinguishable murmurs floated up to the bench. Ames, after listening without expression for about thirty seconds, put her hand on Cranmer’s shoulder, dropped her head, and said something back to him. Cranmer spoke more briefly and nodded.
Ames nodded back, turned to the bench, and raised her hand. Norcross switched off the white noise.
“We’re all set,” Ames said.
“Very good.” Norcross let Ames return to her seat and relaunched. “For the record, the defendant has consulted privately with counsel for approximately a minute. Professor Cranmer, are you satisfied that you’ve had a sufficient time to speak with your attorney?”
“Yes. Thanks. Thank you.”
“And are you ready to resume?”
“I am now. Thanks.”
“Is your plea of guilty here this morning entirely free and voluntary?”
“Yes. What I’m doing is entirely free and voluntary.”
Another check in the box for the court of appeals.
“Okay. We’ll move now to the next portion of this proceeding. I’m going to be asking you, Professor Cranmer, whether you did, in fact, commit the crime that you propose to plead guilty to. I do this in every case, because I would not want a defendant to plead guilty to a crime he did not commit. Do you understand?”
Cranmer took a deep breath and let it out. “Okay.”
Norcross slipped a document out of his file and prepared to read from it. “The superseding information against you, as I mentioned before, charges knowing and intentional possession of child pornography. We will be going over your plea agreement in a moment, but my understanding is that, if you plead guilty to this charge and agree to the imposition of the sentence described in the agreement, the government, in return, will dismiss all the other charges contained in the original indictment. Is that your understanding, Professor?”
“Yes. My lawyer has been over that with me many times now.” He glanced at Linda Ames, who cocked her head to one side without changing expression.
“Okay. So the substituted charge against you is as follows.” Norcross nodded down at Cranmer, careful to make eye contact. “It’s a little long, so stay with me, okay?”
“I’ll try.” The judge could see Cranmer start to hazard a smile and stop himself.
“Okay. On or about May 17, of this year, in Amherst, within the district of Massachusetts, you did knowingly and intentionally possess one or more matters containing visual depictions that had been transported in interstate commerce”—Norcross paused, looked sharply at Cranmer, and continued—“the production of which involved the use of a minor engaging in sexually explicit conduct, all in violation of 18 United States Code Section 2252(a)(4)(b).”
A shuffling in the back of the courtroom told him the students were preparing to leave.
As requested, they were moving discreetly. When he glanced up, he saw the kid on the end, whose antics had been so annoying, lingering in the doorway with an intrigued expression. The situation had gotten his attention. Law school in his future maybe?
Norcross returned to the text. “The material knowingly and intentionally possessed by you portrayed sadistic and masochistic conduct and other depictions of violence and involved a prepubescent minor under the age of twelve years. The charged material you knowingly and intentionally possessed included, among other material, an approximately twenty-seven-minute DVD, entitled ‘Playing Doctor,’ which you had knowingly and intentionally obtained by placing a written order into the United States mail approximately one week earlier, on or about May 10.”
Norcross lifted his head from the document and faced Cranmer, deliberate
ly looking into his eyes to make sure that the defendant understood exactly what he was asking. “Now, Professor Cranmer. Are you pleading guilty because you did, in fact, commit this crime?” It was a simple question, but it was the critical point for the record.
The kid was still standing just inside the doorway, looking over at Cranmer. The teacher had the door propped open with her foot and was waiting for him with a long-suffering expression.
After a short pause, Cranmer nodded. “The DVD came to my house, yes. And I possessed it, knowingly and intentionally. I put it in a drawer, which is where they found it.”
Campanella swiveled his head sharply and gave a hard look at Ames, half angry, half inquiring. Ames ignored him, keeping her eyes on her client, but Norcross noticed a pale shadow bobbing along her jaw. Attorney Ames was grinding her teeth. The kid in the doorway turned and held his pointer finger up to the teacher.
“Right, Professor.” Norcross spoke with calculated patience. “You’re saying that you knowingly and intentionally possessed the physical object, the DVD. But for you to be guilty of this crime, you must have knowingly and intentionally possessed the child pornography. You must have known that the DVD contained the contraband, prior to, or at, the time it was seized. You must have knowingly possessed the illicit material itself.”
“Well, Your Honor, I didn’t, you know, actually have time to look at it before … you know …” Cranmer’s tone, to Norcross, seemed to be verging on the sarcastic. Time to take control.
“I’m aware of that. The government charges, however, that you knew the contents of the DVD because you had ordered it. You knew when it arrived that it contained child pornography, and you intentionally possessed that child pornography, knowing what it was.”
“Well, I guess there could have been something else on the DVD. What I’m saying, Your Honor …”
“There was also, according to the record, considerable additional child pornography on the hard drive of your computer, clearly evidencing—”
“What I’m saying, Your Honor,” Cranmer interrupted the judge, something Norcross always resented, and then compounded this sin by speaking slowly, as though the judge was a student who needed to be led by the hand, “is I knowingly and intentionally possessed the DVD. I did that.” He put his hand up to his mouth for a moment, then dropped it. “What happened before that, I’d been going through a tough time, and my memory is not that … you know.” Cranmer trailed off, apparently seeing something in the judge’s face.
The One-Eyed Judge Page 26
