She said, "Who is that guy, Randy Boggs?"
Nestor smiled in an unamused way and kissed her on the mouth. Then he said, "I'll call you." He picked up the bag and walked outside into the blast of humid heat, glancing at a tiny chameleon sitting motionless in a band of shade on the peeling banister.
7
If he didn't do this crime he didsomething.'" The man's voice went high at the end of the sentence and threatened to break apart. He was in his late forties, so skinny that his worn cowhide belt made pleats in slacks that were supposed to be straight-cut.
"And if he didsomething the jury says, 'What the hell, let's convict him ofthis.'"
Rune nodded at the taut words.
Randy Boggs's lawyer sat at his desk, which was piled high – yellow sheets, court briefs, Redweld folders, letters, photographs of crime scenes, an empty yogurt carton crusty on the rim, a dozen cans of Diet Pepsi, a shoe box (she wondered if it contained a Mafia client's fee). The office was near Broadway on Maiden Lane in lower Manhattan, where the streets were grimy, dark, crowded. Inside, the building was a network of dirty, green corridors.
The office of Frederick T. Megler, J.D., P.C., was at the end of a particularly dirty and particularly green corridor.
He sat back in his old leather chair. His face was gray and mottled and would make occasional forays into exaggerated expressions (wonder, hatred, surprise) then snap back into its waiting state of innocent incredulity, punctuated with a breathy, nasal snort.
"That's what I have to deal with." The bony fingers of his right hand made a circuit of the air as he explained the judicial system in New York to Rune. "The way the system works…" He looked at Rune and his voice rose in volume for emphasis. "The way the system works is that the jury canonly convict you for the crime for which you've been accused. They can't convict you because you're an asshole or because of the three guys you wasted last year or because of the old lady you'regoing to mug tomorrow for her social security check. Just for the particular crime."
"Got it," Rune said.
Megler's other set of bony fingers joined in. They pointed at her. "You get things like this true story. My client's arrested for killing some poor son of a bitch. An ADA – assistant district attorney – bless her young, virginal soul, brings him up on four counts. Murder two, manslaughter one and two, criminally negligent homicide. Those last three counts are what they call lesser-included offenses. They're easier to prove. If you can't get a conviction on murder – which is hard to prove to the jury – maybe you can get the manslaughter. If you can't get that maybe you'll get criminally negligent homicide. Okay? So. My client – who's got a rap sheet a mile long – had a grudge against the victim. When the cops arrested him based on an informer, he was in a bar in Times Square, where four witnesses swore he'd been drinking for the past five hours. The victim was killed two hours before. Shot five times in the head at close range. No murder weapon."
"So your client had a perfect alibi," Rune said. "And no gun."
"Exactly." The voice dipped from its screech and sounded earnest. "I grill the informant in court and by the time I'm through his story's as riddled as the vic's forehead, okay? But what happens? The juryconvicts my guy. Not of murder, which is what they should've done if they believed the informant, but of criminally negligent homicide. Which is total bullshit. You don'tnegligently shoot five bullets into somebody's head. Either you don't believe the alibi and convict him of murder or you let him off completely. The chickenshit jury didn't have the balls to get him on murder but they couldn't let him walk because he's a black kid from the Bronx who had a record and'd said on a number of occasions he wanted to cut the vic's spleen out of his body."
Rune sat forward in her chair. "See, that's just what I'm doing my story on – an innocent man got convicted."
"Whoa, honey, who said my client was innocent?"
She blinked and went through the facts for a moment. "I thoughtyou did. What about the gun, what about the alibi?"
"Naw, he killed the vic, ditched the gun, then paid four buddies a couple six-packs of crack to perjure themselves…"
"But-"
"But the point is not is he guilty? The point is you gotta play by the rules. And the jury didn't. You can only convict on the evidence that was presented. The jury didn't do that."
"What's so wrong with that? He was guilty and the jury convicted him. That sounds okay to me."
"Let's change the facts a little. Let's pretend that young black Fred Williams, National Merit Scholar with a ticket to Harvard Medical School, who all he's ever done bad is get a parking ticket, is walking down a Hundred and Thirty-fifth Street when two of New York's finest screech up behind him, get him in a choke hold then drag him to the precinct and book him for rape. He gets picked out of a lineup because they all look alike, et cetera, and the case goes to trial. There the DA describes to a predominantly Caucasian middle-class jury how this kid beat, raped and sodomized a mother of two.
Then a predominantly Caucasian middle-class witness describes the perp as a black kid with razor-notched hair and basketball sneakers and the predominantly Caucasian middle-class doctor gets up and describes the victim's injuries in horrifying detail. What the fuck do you think is going to happen to Fred? He's going to jail and he ain't gonna be just visiting."
Rune was quiet.
"So every time a shooter who Clocks some poor asshole five times in the head gets convicted by a cheating jury – i.e., a flawed legal system – that means there's a risk that Fred Williams is gonna go down for something hedidn't do. And as long as that's a risk then the world's got to put up with people like me."
Rune gave him a coy look. "So's that your closing argument?"
Megler laughed. "A variation on one of them. I've got a great repertoire. Blows the jury away."
"I don't really believe what you're saying but it looks like you do."
"Oh, I do indeed. And as soon as I stop believing it then I'm out of the business. I'll go into handicapping or professional blackjack. The odds are better and you still get paid in cash. Now, I've got some truly innocent clients arriving in about a half hour. You said you wanted to ask me about the Boggs case? Anything about that article I read this morning?"
"Yes."
"You're doing the story?"
"Right. Can I tape you?"
His thin face twisted. He looked like Ichabod Crane in her illustrated copy ofSleepy Hollow. "Why don't you just take notes."
"If you'd feel more comfortable…"
"I would."
She pulled out a notebook. She asked, "You represented Boggs by yourself?"
"Yep. He was a Section Eighteen case. Indigent. So the state paid my fee to represent him."
"I really think he's innocent."
"Uh-huh."
"No, I really, really think so."
"You say so."
"You don't?"
"My opinion of my clients' innocence or guilt is completely, totally irrelevant."
She asked, "Could you tell me what happened? About Hopper's death, I mean."
Megler sat back in a thoughtful pose. He studied the grimy ceiling. The window was open a crack and exhaust-scented April air wafted through the space and riffled stacks of paper. "The district attorney's case was that Boggs was in Manhattan, just driving through from, I don't know, up-state someplace. Some witness said Boggs was standing on the sidewalk talking with Hopper and then they got into a fight over something. Hopper'd just gotten home from work and had just pulled into the courtyard of his building on the Upper West Side. The prosecutor speculated it was a traffic dispute."
Rune's eyes made a sardonic circuit of the room. "Traffic? But he was on the sidewalk, you said."
"Maybe he parked after Hopper cut him off and got out of the car. I don't know."
"But-"
"Hey, you asked what the assistant district attorney said. I'm telling you. I'm trying to be helpful. Am I being helpful?"