Shelly shrugged. “Maybe we should give Sanchez the benefit of the doubt. He didn’t know Alex. He admitted that. He didn’t know Alex. Maybe he assumed Alex was a bad guy. Maybe he thought this was some kind of rough street justice. I’m not a cop and I don’t live in their world. What matters, though, is that Sanchez’s deliberate unwillingness to involve himself in this confrontation proves my point even more. This whole thing was a setup. Miroballi finds the guy he wants to eliminate, and just before he does so-just when he has his target pinned down, helpless and injured in a dark alley-he calls in, ‘Suspect is armed.’”
She flapped her arms. “Sure. Of course. Suspect is armed, so when I shoot him, I can claim self-defense. But what does Miroballi need to make this happen? He needs a second, unregistered firearm. He needs a couple of packets of cocaine. Nothing that would be hard for a cop to get hold of.” She wagged a finger. “That gun that we have seen in this case wasn’t fired, but it was going to be fired. It was going to be fired right after Ray Miroballi killed Alex. He was going to kill Alex, then put a gun in his dead hand and fire it into the wall. Then Miroballi has an airtight justification for killing Alex. He was chasing a perp who was carrying drugs. The perp fired at him. He fired back and killed him. All of this happening in a deserted downtown on a very cold and dark February evening. And if it hadn’t been for Ronnie Masters tossing a bottle to distract him, his plan probably would have worked.”
She flipped her hand. “Let’s go back to Sanchez now. We know he heard a gunshot and did nothing. We know he eventually ‘jogged down’ to the alley. Then, of course, he saw something he never expected to see. He saw his partner lying dead. So then he calls it in. But what about this unregistered firearm sticking out of Ray Miroballi’s belt, or tucked in his jacket, or wherever it was? And what about these packets of cocaine Miroballi brought along to plant?”
She shook her head. “No. No good. Those can’t be found on Miroballi. That wouldn’t just make Miroballi look bad. It would make Sanchez look bad. So he tosses them in the general direction of where Alex ran. He tosses the gun. He tosses the cocaine. That story, at least, could sell. Then he waits for the cavalry to arrive.”
She looked at the prosecution. “Mr. Morphew has a rebuttal. He gets the last chance to talk to you. Let’s hear what evidence he has to prove I’m wrong. Because he has no evidence that puts that second gun in Alex’s hand, or Ronnie’s hand. He has absolutely, positively no explanation for that second gun-or for that matter, for the cocaine. What-we’re supposed to believe what Ray Miroballi said? Sanchez didn’t see any cocaine. He knew what his partner was doing. This whole thing was a setup, I’ll say it again, and we know why. Ray Miroballi was undeniably guilty of sex with a minor-a simple DNA test of Ronnie, Miroballi, and-well, me, would prove that. And he knew that. This is a man who would lose his job, and maybe his wife, and be on the hook for child support. He couldn’t have any of that. Easier just to kill the boy who you think is your son. Kill the boy and get on with your life. And since you’re a cop, it’s easy enough to set the whole thing up.”
She looked down and lowered her volume. “The reason we’re still here-the reason this case is still going on-is that the person who died was a police officer.”
She was referring to the prosecution as well as the judge, who in Shelly’s estimation should have directed a verdict of not guilty after the state closed its case. Judge Dominici lacked the fortitude to make the tough call, and so did Elliot Raycroft.
“But this case has nothing to do with cops. This isn’t about sending a message to police, one way or the other. This is about a man looking to commit a cold-blooded, premeditated execution who happened to wear a blue uniform. And since no one else has the courage to do the right thing, I’m asking you to do it.” She looked at the jurors’ faces. “All of you know that Alex acted in self-defense. But you don’t even have to go that far. All you have to find is that the prosecution has not proven, beyond a reasonable doubt, that Alex didn’t act in self-defense. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is an easy call.”
She walked over to Alex and put her hands on his shoulders. “One man already tried to take away Alex’s life. I’m asking you to give him his life back.”
79
Paul Riley pushed the remaining half of his dinner away. “Well, Shelly Trotter, I have to tell you that I’ve seen quite a few cases in my time, and heard lots of interesting stories about people’s lives, but-”
“I’m topping the charts.”
“Hey.” He shrugged. “All’s well that ends well.”
It had ended rather well, she would have to say. The jury had returned a verdict of not guilty by reason of self-defense after four hours of deliberations. Alex had slept in his own home for the last two nights. His legal problems were over. He had already pleaded out his drug case with the U.S. Attorney, and now his murder charge was beaten. There was always the possibility that the county attorney would charge him for extorting Ray Miroballi, but there would be no way to make that case. Alex hadn’t admitted to that on the stand. He had testified, when pressed by Dan Morphew, that he had never asked Ray Miroballi for money, and there was no one alive to refute it. And she was relatively sure that the county attorney would never have the appetite to prosecute Alex for that, anyway.
Ronnie Masters had not been entirely forthright in his plea agreement with the county attorney. It was debatable whether he had lied about a material fact, which is what would be required to tear up the plea agreement, but at a minimum he had omitted some important facts, which would be grounds itself. In the end, however, all legal technicalities aside, Ronnie had simply helped Alex after the fact in a crime for which Alex had been acquitted. And the county attorney had suffered some embarrassment. Elliot Raycroft had informed Shelly yesterday that he considered the matter closed with regard to Ronnie.
Did her father have a hand in that? She had to concede the probability. This was different from dropping the charges in the middle of a cop-killing trial. This was a fairly technical application of the law concerning a broken plea agreement, which was not particularly interesting fodder for the press. The media had been far more fascinated with the facts that Ronnie disclosed on the stand than in whether he had technically played loose with the county attorney. This gave plenty of leeway for Raycroft’s office, and for whatever reason-a political favor, the desire to put the entire affair behind them, or the feeling that the interests of justice did not require charging Ronnie-Raycroft was taking a pass.
“I can’t thank you enough for everything you did, Paul. Your advice. Your firm’s financial support. You have been wonderful.”
He responded in typical fashion, deferring the praise. She saw something more, too. Paul was trying to read between the lines. This, she knew he was thinking, sounded an awful lot like goodbye.
He clapped his hands together. “So what are your plans now?”
She hadn’t thought that far ahead. “I was thinking about going back to the law school.”
“Mm-hmm. That’s where your heart is, I suppose. You could stay with us. Run our pro bono program full-time. Christ knows, we need someone to do it.”
She smiled at him. “That’s very kind of you-”
“Make three times the money and do a lot of the same stuff.”
She looked down. “I think you hit on it. The school is where my heart is.”
That, she was sure, was something Paul Riley could understand. The law was his passion, too, even if it took a different form. She missed that place dearly, she now realized. She missed Rena, the students, their fresh idealism and commitment.