“… go ahead.”
“We expect there will be sixty or seventy people in that factory and in the compound, and some of them will be civilian.”
“The workers?” the President asked.
“Yes, sir. It’s heavily defended outside, and that’s where most of the combat will likely occur. If we commission this force we’re ready to hire – these mercenaries who are ex-Shining Path, ex-Peruvian Army – they should be able to neutralize resistance rapidly and then empty the facility before they blow it up.”
“My Lord,” Campbell protested, but O’Connell waved him down as he kept his eyes on the screen.
“Sit, please, Mr. Campbell.”
On the TV set, the same shot as before played out, the hidden camera riding Reynolds’s coat as he got to his feet and walked back toward the fireplace before turning, showing the President in full form at the other end of the office.
“Sir,” Reynolds’s voice intoned, “these guys are good. They’ll get the job done, without question, and they’ll follow orders.”
“… vital, Barry. I won’t authorize this unless… surgical as we can make it.”
“It will be, sir.”
“… recommendation?”
“Depends on what you want to accomplish, sir. If you want to shut down that factory once and for all, devastate the leadership, frighten away anyone else who would set up such a large drug-making facility, and massively impact the heroin flow all at once, then I’d say let’s pay them and get it done. Seems a small sacrifice to make.”
As before, the President pushed away from his desk and disappeared out of the frame. Reynolds apparently sat back down on the couch and swiveled toward the desk, raising the level of the frame and revealing the chief executive with his back to the camera standing at the window overlooking the Rose Garden.
The frame lowered once more as the President turned, his head just out of the shot at the top, his voice suddenly clearer as he faced Reynolds. “Okay, Barry. You’ve got the green light. Officially this meeting never occurred, of course.”
“Understood, sir.”
“Now. Bring… over here and show me the details.”
The rest of the tape was an identical recitation of the logistics of the plan, a handshake, and Reynolds’s exit back through the west door of the Oval with a brief shot of the hallway beyond.
Jay stopped the tape, ejected it, and returned to his seat wholly distracted by the final frames of the tape, the same fleeting scene that had snagged his interest on the first viewing. He now recognized it.
Michael Garrity rose slowly to his feet, gesturing in the direction of the television.
“My Lord, this recording is obviously in direct opposition in meaning and import to the one Mr. Campbell first played. In Mr. Campbell’s version, President Harris is clearly guilty of ordering an act of torture and murder in his official capacity as President. In our version, he is clearly concerned about making certain no such actions are taken. Which one is correct, then?”
“Indeed, Mr. Garrity,” O’Connell said, “that appears to be the question.”
“Both of them,” Michael continued, “contain the very identifiable voice of the President, and both of them have the same voice identified as Mr. Reynolds, and therefore, it would seem, one must be real, and one must be fake. The point is, however, if one can be fabricated, so can the other. It is not a matter, My Lord, of which one is the real one so much as it is a matter of the demonstrated reality that either could be faked that should be important to the court. The extremely serious nature of what this Interpol warrant seeks to accomplish… namely the arrest of a former president… demands that supporting evidence be beyond serious question, and yet we have a clear demonstration that the voices can be faked, and thus neither can be accepted as conclusive without independently verifiable evidence.”
Mr. Justice O’Connell’s eyebrows suddenly came together as a flash of anger clouded his face.
“Mr. Garrity! Are you saying, sir, that the tape you’ve just shown this court was a fake?”
Michael hesitated, not expecting the onslaught.
“Yes, My Lord. My legal team retained last night the services of perhaps the best impressionist in Ireland, Mr. Byrne McHenry, a professional entertainer, and in only a few hours of work with an ordinary tape recorder he produced the sound track you heard in order to demonstrate…”
The explosion of sound from the judge startled everyone in the courtroom.
“THAT,” he sputtered, his eyes flaring, “is perhaps the most despicable act of purposeful misleading of a court I have ever experienced as a judge! Mr. Garrity, you may well stand to charges before the bar as a result of this dishonorable stunt. You’ve wasted the time of this court and attempted to use false evidence to sway us. SIT DOWN!”
Michael Garrity faced the judge calmly, still on his feet.
“No, My Lord, I will not sit down with your verbal indictment ringing in my ears.”
“YOU WILL SIT DOWN, SIR, OR BE HELD IN CONTEMPT!”
“I did not use false evidence, My Lord. I used evidence of falsity. There is a substantial difference.”
O’Connell had his gavel pointed at Garrity again, but he stopped short of verbalizing the blast he had planned, and instead replaced the gavel on the bench and sat back, shaking his head.
“Very well, Mr. Garrity, stand or sit or do whatever you like, but you’re little trick has backfired on you and your client. You have done precisely the opposite of what you intended, sir, because I shall now disregard your offered evidence as non-credible.”
Michael sat down slowly, his eyes tracking the judge.
“Mr. Garrity, this is very serious business, this action for perfection of a warrant and an order of extradition. It is serious business because of several factors. First, the Treaty Against Torture demands the faithful adherence of every signatory nation, and after dragging our lazy feet for over a decade, Ireland has finally ratified it as well. That means, sir, that no extradition treaty with Peru is needed. We have the treaty’s provisions for extradition, and they will suffice. It also means that a matter of a U.S. President ordering the killing and torture of individuals sets up without question a prima facie case for issuance of a corresponding Irish warrant for the arrest of the accused party. The treaty requires that the complained of action, in this case premeditated torture and murder by proxy, be a violation of the criminal law of the country considering extradition. Clearly these acts are crimes in Ireland. In addition, it is reprehensible that this involves a former U.S. President, since the United States bears much shame for dragging its feet for years on these matters even after it ratified the treaty. Its conduct during the Pinochet matter in England was unforgivable in my view. Washington sat by in stony silence when they should have been actively supporting immediate extradition. Why do I say this from the bench? Because it is the duty of each signatory nation to deal with matters under the treaty very rapidly. We must avoid even the appearance of foot-dragging or delayed compliance if international law is to have real meaning. Therefore, if I had the power to do so, I would not only order Mr. Harris arrested today, I would order him placed within that hour on the next transport to Lima, Peru, for trial. Unfortunately, our extradition procedures require additional steps, including a certification from the Peruvian government that there be no imposition of a death penalty. But, I am going to call a brief recess and study whether or not I can accelerate those procedures and extradite the man immediately through denial of appeal and perhaps some other legal method.”