"'Custody'?" I say. "You mean jail?"
"Yes. We've agreed that it will be the state work farm. Minimum security. He won't be far away."
"'Obstruction'? What did he do?"
Stern smiles. "Well, that was one of the morning's problems. He will admit he is guilty, that he willfully and knowingly obstructed justice in this case. But he will not go into details. I take it there is someone else he does not want to implicate, but candidly, he won't even say that much. Molto was not satisfied, but in the end, he knows this plea is as good as he is likely to do. So we have an agreement. Your father wanted me to tell you."
I don't hesitate. "I need to talk to my dad."
"Nat-"
"I need to talk to him."
"You know, Nat, when I first began in this line, I swore to myself I would never let an innocent man plead guilty. That resolve did not get me through my first year in practice. I represented a young man. A fine young man. Poor. But he was twenty years old with never so much as an arrest after growing up in the bleakest part of Kehwahnee. That fact speaks volumes about his character. But he was in a car with childhood friends, they were sharing a few bottles of malt liquor, and one of them saw a man who had two-timed his mother, and this young man had a gun in his pocket and shot this two-timer through the window of the car with no more reflection than it took to say the word 'dead.' My client had nothing to do with that murder. Nothing. But you know how things go in this process. The killer said his friends had been together in the car to help him hunt the decedent down. He told that tale to avoid the death penalty, which was being freely applied in this county in those days. And so my client was charged with murder. Better sense told the prosecutors my client was not involved. But they had a witness. And they offered my client probation for a lesser plea. He wanted to be a police officer, that young man. And would have made a fine one. But he pleaded guilty. And went on with a different life. And clearly that was the right decision. He became a tile layer, he has a business, three children, all through college. One of them is a lawyer only a little older than you."
"What are you saying, Sandy?"
"I'm saying that I have learned to trust my client's judgment on these matters. No one is better equipped to decide whether it is worth brooking the risks."
"So you don't think he's guilty?"
"I don't know, Nat. He is adamant this is the proper outcome."
"I need to see my father."
I take it that he has been down the hall in the witness room with Marta, and Stern wants to speak to him before I do. I help Sandy to his feet. I am alone only a few minutes, but I have started crying by the time my dad walks in. The startling part is that he looks better this morning than he has in many months. A self-possessed look has returned.
"Tell me the truth," I say as soon as I see him. He smiles at that. He leans down to embrace me, then sits opposite me, where Stern sat before.
"The truth," he says, "is that I did not kill your mother. I have never killed anyone. But I did obstruct justice."
"How? I don't believe you could have done that with the computer. I don't believe it."
"Nat, I'm three times seven. I know what I did."
"You lose everything," I say.
"Not my son, I hope."
"How will you support yourself afterwards? This is a felony, Dad."
"I'm well aware."
"You'll give up your judgeship, your law license. You won't even have your pension."
"I'll try not to land on your doorstep." He actually smiles. "Nat, this is a compromise. I plead guilty to something I did and serve the sentence, without risking conviction for something I'm completely innocent of. Is that a bad deal? After Judge Yee rules about whether all the computer evidence can come in, one side will have the upper hand and this kind of resolution won't be possible. It's time we get this over with and move on to the rest of life. You need to forgive me for all the stupid things I did in the last two years. But I did them, and it's not wrong that I pay this price. I can live with this outcome and you should, too."
We stand in unison and I hug my father, blubbering foolishly. When we break apart, the man who never cries is weeping, too.
Court is convened in a few minutes. Word of what is about to transpire has hit the courthouse, and the buffs and PAs stream into the courtroom, along with at least a dozen reporters. I do not have the heart to go in at first. I stand at the door, through the grace of the courtroom deputies, who allow me to watch the proceedings through the tiny window in the door. There is so much misery in this building, which is full of the anguish of the victims and the defendants and their loved ones, that I actually think the people who work here every day go out of their way to be especially kind to the people like me who, through no will of their own, are caught in the thresher called justice. One of them, an older Hispanic man, actually keeps his hand on my back for a second when the session begins and my father rises to stand between Marta and Sandy before Judge Yee. Brand and Molto are on Stern's other side. My dad nods and speaks. The prosecutors hand up papers, probably a formal plea agreement and the new charges, and the judge begins questioning my dad, an elaborate process that has been going several minutes already when I catch sight of Anna. I sent her a simple text-"My dad is going to plead guilty to obstruction to end the case"-only a few minutes ago. Now she is tearing down the hall, dashing in her high heels, with one hand at the V of her blouse, because her go-to-work underwear is not meant for running.
"I don't believe this," she says.
I explain what I can, and then we enter the courtroom arm in arm and proceed to the front-row seats still reserved for my father's dwindling family. Judge Yee's eyes flick up to see me, and he emits the minutest smile of reassurance. He then looks back down to the form book in front of him, which contains the required questions a judge must ask before accepting a guilty plea. Notably, Judge Yee reads the printed text without any of the grammatical errors that emerge when he is speaking on his own, although his accent remains strong.
"And Judge Sabich, you are pleading guilty to this one-count information because you are in fact guilty of the crime charged there, correct?"
"Yes, Your Honor."
"All right, prosecutors. Please state the factual basis for the offense."
Jim Brand speaks. He describes all the technical details concerning the computers, the "object" now present on my dad's hard drive that was not there when it was imaged in early November 2008. Then he adds that a night custodian in the courthouse, Anthony Potts, is prepared to testify that he recalls seeing my father in the corridors there one night last fall and that my father seemed to speed away when Potts observed him.
"All right," says Judge Yee, and looks down to his primer. "And, Mr. Stern, is the defense satisfied that the factual basis offered constitutes sufficient competent evidence to prove Judge Sabich guilty were the matter submitted to trial?"
"We are, Your Honor."
"Judge Sabich, do you agree with Mr. Stern about that?"
"Yes, Judge Yee."
"All right," says Yee. He closes the book. He is back on his own. "The Court wish to compliment all party on a very good resolution for this case. This case very, very complex. This outcome that defense and prosecution agree to is fair to the People and the defendant in judgment of the Court." He nods several times, as if to enforce that opinion on the reporters across from me on the other side of the front row.