“Actually, it’s the city attorney because it’s a misdemeanor charge. But they’ve got nothing to support it. You were doing your job with full First Amendment protections. Myron’s here and ready to go to war. I told the prosecutor, you arraign this reporter on that charge and that man over there will hold a press conference outside the courthouse within the hour. And it won’t be the kind of press her office wants.”
“Where’s Myron now?”
I scanned the crowded rows of the gallery. I didn’t see Myron but motion caught my eye and I thought I saw someone duck behind another person as though bending down to pick something up. When the man came back up, he looked at me and then shifted behind the person sitting in front of him. He was balding and wore glasses. It wasn’t Myron.
“He’s around somewhere,” Marchand said.
At that moment I heard my name as Judge Crower called my case. Marchand turned to the bench and identified himself as counsel for the defense. A woman stood up at the crowded prosecution table and identified herself as Deputy City Attorney Jocelyn Rose.
“Your Honor, we move to drop the charge against the defendant at this time,” she said.
“You are sure?” Crower asked.
“Yes, Your Honor.”
“Very well. Case dismissed. Mr. McEvoy, you’re free to go.”
Only I wasn’t. I wasn’t free to go until after a two-hour wait to be bussed back to the county jail, where my property was returned and I was processed out. The morning was gone, I had missed both breakfast and lunch at the jail, and I had no transportation home.
But when I stepped through the jail exit I found Myron Levin waiting for me.
“Sorry, Myron. How long were you waiting?”
“It’s okay. I had my phone. You all right?”
“I am now.”
“You hungry? Or you want to go home?”
“Both. But I’m starving.”
“Let’s go eat.”
“Thanks for coming for me, Myron.”
To get to the food quicker we went just over to Chinatown and ordered po’boy sandwiches at Little Jewel. We grabbed a table and waited for them to be made.
“So, what are you going to do?” I asked.
“About what?” Myron asked.
“The LAPD’s flagrant violation of the First Amendment. Mattson can’t get away with this shit. You should hold a press conference anyway. I bet the Times will be all over this. The New York Times, I’m talking about.”
“It’s not that simple.”
“It’s very simple. I was on a story, Mattson didn’t like it. So he falsely arrests me. It’s not only First Amendment, it’s the Fourth as well. They had no probable cause to detain me. I was doing my job.”
“I know all of that but the charges were dropped and you’re back on the story. No harm, no foul.”
“What? I spent a night in jail where I was backed into a corner with my eyes open all night.”
“But nothing happened. You’re okay.”
“No, I’m not okay, Myron. You try it sometime.”
“Look, I’m sorry for what happened, but I think we should roll with it, not inflame things any further, and get back on the story. Speaking of which, I got a text from Emily. She says she got some good stuff from UC–Irvine.”
I looked across the table at Myron for a long moment, trying to read him.
“Don’t deflect the conversation,” I said. “What is it really? The donors?”
“No, Jack, I told you before, the donors have nothing to do with this,” Myron said. “I would no sooner let donors dictate what we do and what we cover than I would let Big Tobacco or the auto industry dictate to us.”
“Then why are we sitting on our hands on this? That guy Mattson needs to be raked over the coals.”
“Okay, if you want to know the truth, I think if we make a stink about this it could come back on us.”
“Why would that happen?”
“Because of you. And me. You are a person of interest in this case until we know otherwise. And I’m the editor who didn’t yank you off it when I should have. If we go to war that’s all going to come out and it’s not going to look that great, Jack.”
I leaned back and shook my head in impotent protest. I knew he was right. Maybe Mattson had known he could do what he did because we were compromised.
“Shit,” I said.
Myron’s name was called because he had paid for lunch. He got up and got our sandwiches. When he returned I was too hungry to keep talking about the issue. I had to eat. I mowed through half of my po’boy before saying another word. By then, without the edge of hunger in my anger, my desire for a constitutional battle with the LAPD had waned.
“It’s just that I feel like this is where we’ve come to,” I said. “Fake news, enemy of the people, the president canceling subscriptions to the Washington Post and New York Times. The LAPD thinks nothing of just throwing a reporter in jail. At what point do we take a stand?”
“Well, this would not be the time,” Myron said. “If we’re going to take that stand then we have to do it when we are one hundred percent clean, so there are no comebacks from the police or the politicians who love seeing journalists thrown in jail.”
I shook my head and dropped the argument. I couldn’t win and the truth was I wanted to get back to the story more than I wanted to take on the LAPD.
“All right, fuck it,” I said. “What did Emily say she has?”
“She didn’t,” Myron said. “She just said she got good stuff and was heading up to the office. I figure that after we finish here we’ll go meet with her.”
“Can you drop me at my apartment first? My car’s there and I want to take a shower before I do anything else.”
“You got it.”
My phone, wallet, and keys had been confiscated during the booking process. When they had been returned upon my departure I stuffed them back into my pockets in a hurry because I wanted to get out of that place as soon as I could. It became clear that I should have looked more carefully at the key chain when Myron dropped me off in front of my building on Woodman. The key to the front gate was on the ring, as well as the key to the Jeep, a storage locker in the garage, and a bike lock. But the key to my apartment was missing.
It was only after I rousted the live-in property manager from a post-lunch nap and borrowed the management copy of the key that I got into the apartment. Once in, I found a copy of a search-warrant receipt on the kitchen counter. While I was in a jail cell the night before, Mattson and Sakai were searching my apartment. They had most likely used my trumped-up obstruction case as part of the probable cause for the search. I realized that was probably their goal all along. They knew the case would get kicked but they used it with a judge to get into my home.
My anger quickly returned and again I took their action as a direct assault on my rights. I pulled my phone and called the LAPD’s Robbery-Homicide Division and asked for Mattson. I was transferred.
“Detective Mattson, how can I help you?”
“Mattson, you better hope I don’t solve this before you because I will make you look like the piece of shit you are.”
“McEvoy? I heard they turned you loose. Why are you so mad?”
“Because I know what you did. You booked me so you could search my place, because you are so far up your ass on this case you wanted to see what I had.”
Looking at the search-warrant receipt I saw that they did not list a single item being taken.
“I want my key back,” I said. “And whatever you took from here.”
“We didn’t take anything,” Mattson said. “And I have your key right here. You are welcome to come by anytime and pick it up.”