“This is the official recorder.”
“That’s fine. Yours is the official one. Mine is nothing special.”
“Turn off that recorder. It’s not permitted. You don’t record anything. Do you know to whom you’re speaking? Do you realize I have the full legal and prosecutorial power of the entire state of Florida behind me?”
“Yes.”
“That’s better. Now, do you know why I ordered you here?”
“I’m not certain, Mr. Moran. My hope was we could discuss some compromise regarding bail for my brother.”
He clinched both fists. “Wrong!”
She took his defensive attitude to mean he was still afraid of what the newspaper would print. That was good. If he was just going to play the harassment game, then she saw no point in trying to reason with him. One thing she had learned was you must stand up to a bully. “Then I guess I’m here because your case is falling apart.”
He came up out of his chair, pointed his finger at her, and commanded, “Turn off that recorder!” She didn’t move. Her expression was emotionless. He reached down and punched off his recorder. In a sudden movement, he reached across the table, grabbed her small device, and threw it hard against the wall. It shattered and fell to the floor. “That’s what you can do with your nothing-special fucking recorder!” He sat back down. “Let me see your cell. Does it record?”
She pushed her phone across the table to him. “Take a look, just a plain-Jane phone, no photos, no tunes, no Internet.”
He inspected the phone carefully and slid it back across the table to her. “Now let me see your purse.”
“My purse is private property. You’ve no right to search it—fourth amendment.”
“Give me your goddamn purse!”
She handed it across. He crudely turned it upside down and shook it, spilling everything hard out on the table. He shuffled through it. He pushed the mess back across the table, took a deep breath, and nodded okay. He clicked his recorder to rewind and then restarted. “Good afternoon, Miss Reid. Thank you for coming. Shall we begin?”
“You just smashed my recorder against the wall!”
He turned his head down to speak into his recorder. “What on earth are you talking about, Miss Reid? You’re certainly welcome to record this if you’d like, but I’ve never seen your recorder.”
“You just stood up, reached across, grabbed my recorder from the table in front of me, and threw it against the wall. That loud noise was the sound of my recorder hitting the wall. You used obscene language. Then you dumped the contents of my handbag harshly out onto the table.”
Moran’s head tilted slightly and he stared at her with narrowed eyes, wondering about what she just said. Then he continued, “We’ve prepared evidence here that details your interference in a homicide investigation. To start with, there’s the matter of your crude attempt to entrap and discredit a fine officer such as Sergeant Huress, but I’m willing to let that go. The more serious violation is that you’re interfering with the police and providing misleading and possibly illegal information to the newspaper. He rested one hand on the stack of papers. “These papers will be part of the official record. Reluctantly, I find that as a legal officer of the State of Florida, it’s my duty to present this evidence to the judge and bring charges against you.”
“I hate to put you to all that bother.”
He raised his voice, “And I hate to say you’re in a great deal of trouble. I’m afraid the penalties are quite severe.”
“You’re kidding, right?” She knew negotiating with this jerk would be impossible as long as he was playing his bully game. “That stack of papers there is a phony prop. Wouldn’t it be more effective if we worked together on this rather than playing silly power games?”
“You won’t think they’re so silly when you’re standing looking out between bars.”
“You’re right, I won’t. But jail won’t shut me up either.”
“It might be possible for me to overlook some of these charges, but you’d have to retract a few things, that is, correct the record.”
“What is it you want me to do?”
He grabbed up one of the top folders, reached across the table and shook it in her face. In a loud voice, “I want you to butt out and cease running around conducting your own damn investigation and giving information to the newspaper.”
She smiled. “No, seriously, what do you want me to do?”
That was enough, more than enough. He jumped up and quickly marched around the table to where she sat. She started to stand, but he put his hand firmly on her shoulder and pushed her back down. “Just sit right there. You don’t seem to realize whose ass is in the hot seat. Now you listen to me. You’re going back to that newspaper and tell them you made up the whole bunch of bullshit.”
“Mr. Moran, you just got up and walked around to my side of the table. That’s why your voice got louder. Then you touched me forcefully with your hand on my shoulder while you cursed at me.”
“Why do you keeping talking in a loud voice like that? You’re not even paying attention to what I’m saying.”
She pushed his hand hard from her shoulder. “Now do what I tell you and everything will be just fine. Walk back around the table and sit back down. I want to explain something.”
He was incensed. “I don’t know what you’re up to you little smartass but….”
“No, no, no. Save all the expletives. Now go sit down.”
She returned his stare. Then he stomped furiously back to his chair and stood breathing heavily with his arms folded across his chest.
She said, “Everything you’ve said the last few minutes was recorded.”
He looked at his recorder. “I can erase the tape. You’ll never get it.”
“No, not your recorder, my cell. It’s been on the entire time. A phone at the other end is receiving my call, and has a recorder attached to it. I’ve recorded everything you’ve said to me from the start. A homicide detective in Philadelphia taught me that trick.”
He looked surprised but recovered quickly. “To start with, I checked your phone and it was off. Even so, it would be illegal! You can’t record a phone conversation in Florida without the permission of all parties. It has no value whatever.”
“But I didn’t record a phone conversation. I recorded you in this room, face to face.”
“Well, finally I meet you and it turns out you’re not the smart gal everyone thinks you are. Do you know what you’ve just done? You’ve secretly recorded a Florida state attorney! Even the FBI can’t take such an audacious action without a warrant from a judge. You just outsmarted yourself. I now have immediate grounds for your arrest. Something I’ve been wishing for since you arrived in town. Thank you very much, Miss Reid. I believe we’re about through here.”
She just looked peacefully at him.
“So it’s a stupid trick you tried to pull, and it backfired.” He looked over at her phone, then at her and back to the phone. “Maybe you’re bluffing and didn’t record anything.”
She said nothing.
“Let say you actually did, and I don’t think for a moment that you did. Just hypothetically speaking, what would you do with it?”
“Well, you can’t charge me with secretly recording without entering the recording as evidence. So, we’ll let a jury listen to it. Remember, all of this is still being recorded—all the damns, smartasses, and dumb bitches. You’d need to explain your unprofessional behavior in a court of law and you’d fall flat on your hypothetical ass.”
The blood faded from his face, and he sank into his chair. In a weak voice he muttered, “I was wrought up. You got me agitated, that’s all. I’m not normally like this.” Then he leaned toward her. “Wait a minute. I see it all now, this is a trick.”