Interest of Justice Read online

  The D.A. wasn’t touching this one. Actually, he’d gone too far and there was no road back. England didn’t bother to object to the speculation that the defendant was guilty. “No further questions, Your Honor,” the D.A. said. He didn’t simply take his seat, he fell into it.

  Mitchell turned to the victim’s parents and met their gaze. Lara felt the tightness move from her neck to her chest. The parents hadn’t moved. They were still sitting ramrod straight, their shoulders touching, their hands tightly clasped. They looked like statues, bronze replicas of suffering. They had as yet to realize the magnitude of what had just occurred.

  From the look on the face of the young man next to them, however, he had.

  “Very well,” Lara said, peering down at the witness. “You can step down,” she told him. Then she turned to the courtroom. “We will recess for fifteen minutes before I deliver a ruling. Mr. Mitchell, I’ll see you in chambers.” She tapped the gavel one time lightly and slipped from the bench. As soon as she was through the door, she pressed her fingers down over her face, pulling her skin, wishing she would wipe the stench of this off her face and hands. It was poison—clear and simple.

  She walked rapidly to her chambers. The D.A. was right behind her. She began speaking without looking back at him, and she entered her outer office with only a nod at her secretary. “Are you going to file on Madriano and Curtis?” she said, referring to the arresting officers. Not only had they beaten the defendant within an inch of his life, they had obviously perjured themselves the day before.

  The D.A. answered, “I assume. I haven’t given it much thought.” He appeared more concerned about his case, or what was left of it, than pressing charges against the officers.

  They were in chambers now and Lara stepped behind her desk, taking her seat and tossing her glasses, swiveling her chair to face the young D.A. “These officers should be prosecuted, relieved of their positions on the force, and frankly, taken out and shot. I’ve never seen such a fucked-up case in my life.” She was so angry that her hands were trembling as she fingered a piece of paper on her desk.

  The D.A’s chin jerked up in response, but he didn’t speak. It was obvious that he’d like to do the honors himself as far as the officers went. Crestfallen, he finally said, “He’s guilty, you know?”

  Lara didn’t respond to this statement. Her hands were tied. Even if she was to blatantly deny the defense’s motion to exclude the confession, any conviction would be overturned in appeal. “A layman would have no trouble figuring this one out. You simply cannot beat a person and then garner a confession.” She watched as the D.A. slid farther down in his seat.

  “You rule to suppress this, we’re dead meat,” Mitchell said. “He knows it,” he continued accusingly, referring to the defense attorney. “Our primary witness died last week. Without the confession…well, we’re looking at dismissal.”

  None of this was news to Lara. They’d been agonizing over this for three weeks. In a slurred voice on tape, the defendant had admitted the crime. The tape had suddenly ended. Lara was certain the defendant had collapsed from the injures inflicted by the arresting officers. They had worked the case all along, speaking daily with the family. They both were mature investigators with teenage daughters of their own.

  They had simply lost it.

  Without the eyewitness, and the absolutely vital confession, the prosecution had nothing. Lara had called Mitchell into chambers only to allow both of them a few minutes to accept the inevitable, present a unified front. The D.A. would withdraw the charges and regroup. If they took a case as weak as this to trial and ended up in acquittal, it was finished. They were better off withdrawing now and praying for more evidence to construct a more concrete case. The biggest problem was the public outrage sure to follow and the fact that a dangerous killer would be walking the streets while they built a better case. Instead of the public venting its anger on the real culprits in this case, the police officers, it would all fly in Lara’s face.

  “Are you going to withdraw today?” She hoped not. That would be the worst: for her to suppress the evidence and the defendant to walk out of jail a few hours later a free man.

  “I don’t know. England’s going to press for dismissal.” He leaned forward in his seat. Then he slapped back, throwing his hands in the air. “We have no case. We have shit…nothing but dog shit.”

  Lara stood to return to the courtroom. Mitchell took her cue and stood as well. A few seconds later, he was following her down the corridor.

  Once back in session, Lara addressed the court. “After careful consideration,” she said, the weight of the words she was uttering causing her to compress in her seat so that only her head could be seen from below, “the defendant’s motion to suppress is granted.” She braced herself for the onslaught and continued, looking out over the courtroom, “From the evidence presented in this courtroom, the defendant was severely battered, the confession was issued under extreme duress and is therefore determined to be inadmissible.”

  England sprang to his feet. “We move for dismissal, Your Honor. Without this evidence the case against my client is non-existent.”

  The defendant looked up, a blank look in his eyes. Lara had read in the files that he was on psychotropic medication. The noise in the courtroom was getting louder with every second. The D.A. had turned around in his seat and was speaking with the victim’s family. The woman was crying, the father holding her head against his shoulder. He was whispering to her, stroking her hair, making a feeble attempt to comfort her. The victim’s boyfriend’s mouth fell open in shock and he jumped up. The D.A. yanked his jacket and he sat back down.

  Mitchell stood. “The people withdraw the charges, Your Honor.”

  Now the courtroom was in an uproar, and the defendant’s eyes were darting wildly around the room. Who would he rape or, God forbid, murder while the D.A. scrambled for more evidence? Lara thought. Was he thinking about it right now? Was his sick and tortured mind right this very minute hungering for another kill, his eyes searching the courtroom for another victim? Lara tapped the gavel loudly again and again, standing and leaning over the railing. The bailiffs started moving toward the victim’s family, eyeing them and then the defendant. Finally the noise died down and Lara took her seat. “Let the record read that the charges have been dismissed at the people’s motion,” she said, sighing deeply, keeping her eyes on the file in front of her. “The defendant is remanded into custody; however, the sheriff will be notified to release the defendant posthaste. Monies posted as bail shall be released in the appropriate fashion through the court clerk’s office. This court is adjourned.” She didn’t bother with the gavel. No one would have heard it anyway.

  Reporters were running from the courtroom, pushing and shoving one another to reach their editors. Lara was rooted to her seat, her eyes locking on the victim’s parents, her chest swelling with compassion. The D.A. was conferring with them, sitting next to them on the bench. The woman was holding a tissue to her eyes, then blowing her noise. People were leaving the courtroom; the court reporter was folding up her machine. All the police officers had vanished before the ruling. They weren’t stupid, Lara thought. They knew how it would fall. By tomorrow the D.A. would file charges against the two arresting officers. The bailiff was chatting with one of the clerks. England was packing his briefcase, his job over.

  Suddenly the victim’s boyfriend stood, his face a twisted mask of rage. “How could you do this?” he screamed at Lara. “He killed her. He raped her and killed her. He deserved to be beaten. He deserves to die.” He was panting, his face flushed crimson, leaning over the back of the seat in front of him. His eyes were enormous and blazing with hatred. A bailiff was rushing toward him, the D.A. trying to pull him back in his seat. “You’re letting him get away with this. Someone should kill you…rape you, strangle you. You fucking bitch…”

  The bailiff put his hands on the boy, and the two other bailiffs were moving in that direction. They were watching both h
is hands for a weapon. “Someone should kill your whole family…slaughter them…then you’d know about justice and your stupid laws. What do I have to do, kill the mother fucker myself? You’re not a judge. You’re no better than he is….”

  Lara just sat there, consumed with his sense of injustice. He had looked to the courts to avenge the death of the girl he loved and had met a brick wall of law. Those that should have upheld it had destroyed it. The bailiffs looked at her, waiting for direction. One nod and they would cuff him. They had him in tow and he was twisting, saliva dripping down one corner of his mouth, trying to wrench his arms away, ready to cross the floor and rip her apart with his bare hands. She shook her head at the bailiffs and left the bench. He had every right to vent his hostility. She hit the door and once through it, she leaned against the wall in the corridor, her eyes glazed and fixed, her chest rising and falling with the hatred that had been directed at her, so intense that she could feel the heat of it even now. She glanced up and down the hall, but all she could see was a misty fog of red. Images of the victim’s decomposed body appeared in her mind, and she tried to suppress them.

  Pushing herself off the wall, she straightened her robe and shuffled down the hall. Twenty-five homicides had occurred the past weekend in Los Angeles. One weekend, she thought in despair. One lousy weekend and twenty-five deaths. The city was being buried in an avalanche of violence, and she had just set a murderer free in the community. “Great,” she said bitterly. “Just what you wanted to do all your life, Lara—set killers free, give them their walking papers.” Heading toward the door to her chambers, she stopped in front of her secretary’s desk.

  “Did you say something?” Phillip asked, spinning around from his word processor. He was a slender, well-groomed man in his late twenties with sandy blond hair and dove gray eyes.

  “What are you doing tonight, Phillip?”

  “Tonight? I-I have plans. Why?” he said self-consciously.

  Lara studied his face. She didn’t think she could handle eating alone tonight, going home to an empty house. All she needed was a little companionship, some light conversation, something to purge the day’s events from her mind. Before she could ask him to join her for dinner, he continued.

  “I’m seeing someone later, ah, about nine. But if you need something typed, I can stay late.”

  His face flushed. Lara wondered if he had a new girlfriend, or any girlfriend, for that matter. She’d never heard him mention anyone. “No,” she said, changing her mind, thinking she would try someone else, feeling foolish for even thinking of asking Phillip to have dinner with her. “Forget it. Go on home. It’s nothing.”

  “What happened in there? How did you rule?”

  “I suppressed the confession. The D.A. dismissed, so Henderson will walk.”

  “God,” he said, arching his eyebrows and resting his chin on his hands. “Because the officers beat him up, right? They really punished that guy, didn’t they? I guess they got carried away. The crime was heinous. You almost can’t blame them for what they did.”

  “Well, I hope they enjoyed punishing him,” Lara said flatly. “It might be the only punishment Thomas Henderson ever receives in this case.”

  With that, she entered her chambers and closed the door behind her.

  Chapter 2

  For over an hour Lara had sat behind her desk and stared into space. She’d given thought to calling the victim’s parents and telling them how sorry she was, explaining to them how she was left with no choice but to make the ruling she had. But she realized that would be inappropriate.

  Phillip buzzed her on the intercom. “I have the Daily News on line one. They’d like a statement from you about the Henderson matter.”

  “Tell them I’ve left for the day,” she said, knowing she was only stalling. She’d have to give them a statement tomorrow.

  Hanging her robe on the hook and grabbing her purse, Lara told Phillip good night and made her way down the back corridor to Judge Irene Murdock’s chambers. Lara spotted her head bent over her desk. “Still at it, I see,” Lara said, stepping into the room.

  “Oh, Lara,” Irene said, “you startled me.” She looked up and removed her glasses, tossing them on her paper-padded desk.

  Irene was approaching fifty but few would ever know it. She was tall and fashionably thin. Except for a few lines that shot down from her mouth and darted across her forehead, time had been kind. She wore her muted blond hair in soft feminine curls that framed and flattered her narrow face. Her lips were always lined and coated with fresh, moist lipstick, a bright coral, but her eyes held the key to her strength. They were an emerald green. “How did it go today?” she asked. “You know, the Henderson case?”

  “You haven’t heard?” Lara didn’t sit down. She leaned against the back wall. “The D.A. dismissed.” Raising her wrist, Lara glanced at her watch. It was after five o’clock. “Henderson should be walking out the door of the jail any minute. Free as a bird.”

  Irene didn’t respond. They had all anticipated that it would fall this way. She sat there studying Lara’s face. She had been on the bench far longer than Lara. As Irene had told her again and again, a judge’s role was to interpret and rule on the law. She couldn’t allow herself to become emotionally involved.

  “This was a rough one, Irene. The parents…the relatives…I can’t imagine how they feel right now. She was so young. And those frigging cops—”

  Irene cut her off. “Have you heard about Westridge?”

  Charles Westridge was a municipal court judge, known to be impassioned and ambitious. “No, tell me.

  “He filed today on the sheriff for violating court orders in releasing prisoners prior to the completion of their terms.”

  “But the sheriff’s under court order to release or close the jail down due to overcrowding. What does Westridge possibly hope to gain?”

  “Attention maybe. Press. Who knows? I’ve heard he wants my position, is planning to run against me next year. He reviews every one of my decisions and probably stands up and cheers every time I’m reversed on appeal.”

  Lara took a seat, shaking her head. “Don’t we have enough problems around here without going after each other? And the sheriff…that’s inane. I swear, Irene, it seems like the system is falling down around us. It’s like walking in rubble. The violence, the corruption, the ambiguities in the law…” Lara paused and then continued, “It gets worse by the second, and we’re simply powerless to stop it. Sure, those officers were assholes for what they did to Henderson, but the cops are walking time bombs. They’re just sick of it all. I mean, are we even civilized anymore? I’m not sure if you can call this civilization.”

  Irene looked at a spot over Lara’s head. “Aren’t you the voice of doom today?” Then she dropped her eyes to Lara’s and smiled. “Things are bad. But even at the end of the world, Lara dear, someone’s got to sit in judgment.”

  “Right,” Lara said, making a feeble attempt to return Irene’s smile. “I’d prefer it wasn’t me, though.” She added, “On a lighter vein, how about dinner tonight? I guess you may have plans with John, but…”

  Irene pushed the auto-dial button on her phone. While the rapid tones rang out, she said, “Let me call him. If he isn’t home, sure, I’d love to join you. To tell you the truth, I’m starving. I skipped lunch today.” A few seconds later, she was listening to her own voice on the answering machine. She left a message for her husband, a prominent physician, and then hung up. “John’s working too many hours, Lara. I have no idea why. Last year he told me he was going to scale it down, let his new partner carry more of the load, but he seldom comes home before eight o’clock every night. He’s—” Suddenly she stopped herself. Irene Murdock did not make a habit of talking about her personal life, not even to her closest friends.

  Now the roles were reversed, and Lara was watching the concern on Irene’s face. John Murdock was in his early sixties, and Irene worried about him all the time. There was a long history of cancer
in his family. His father and grandfather had died of it, plus several of his uncles, and just last year his brother had fallen victim as well. Even though Irene was a rock of strength and conviction, it was like she was waiting for the other shoe to fall, certain her husband would be next. A lot of people viewed her as strident and overbearing. Generally her speech was laced with all kinds of terms of endearment: honey, baby, darling, and dear. Lara knew she had cultivated this habit intentionally to tone herself down.

  Her husband was as docile as a lamb, a sweet, gentle man. She even towered over him in height, particularly with heels. There was never any doubt who wore the pants in the family, Lara thought.

  Irene closed the file in front of her and stood, collecting her briefcase and purse, and turning out the lights. She walked with long, rapid strides down the corridor, and Lara almost had to run to keep up with her.

  “I was thinking we could eat at Bob’s Big Boy,” Lara said, “What do you think It’s only a block away, and they have this great special.”

  “Lara darling,” Irene said, cracking a smile and turning to face her, “You’re incredible. No, I will not eat at Bob’s Big Boy. If you insist on your disgusting diet of junk food and greasy fried food, you’ll have to eat alone. I don’t know how you live like that. I really don’t.”

  “All right,” Lara said. “We can go to that new seafood restaurant down the street.”

  “Better,” Irene said. “I’ll follow you.”

  A few minutes later, they were both in their cars and heading up the ramp from the underground garage.

  It was late, but Lara was still awake. She’d been thrashing about in bed for hours trying to sleep, details of the Henderson case playing over and over in her mind. First, she heard her neighbors’ little terrier yelping. Then the other dogs on the block joined in, and Lara held her breath and listened, pulling the sheet up to her chin and staring at the ceiling. It was a quiet residential neighborhood in Irvine, but she was a woman who lived alone. She knew all the normal sounds of the night well: the ambulances and police sirens racing by on the nearby thoroughfares, the jets passing overhead, the occasional couple coming home from a late night and the familiar crank of their garage door. But when the dogs started howling, which they seldom did, it usually meant someone was out there prowling around.