The damage, however, had already been done. The prosecutor finished up his presentation by calling two of the deputies who had fought with Matt while taking him into custody. Perceville did not even cross-examine them. The prosecution rested its case and turned the floor over to the defense.
"I request," Perceville told Judge Waters, "an evidentiary hearing on the admissibility of the cocaine and marijuana found in Mr. Tisdale's residence."
"On what grounds?" asked Judge Waters, although she already knew on what grounds.
"Officer Worthington and the other Orange County sheriff's deputies entered Mr. Tisdale's residence under the rule of consensual search. The scope of this search was to ascertain whether or not Mr. Tisdale was in residence at the time. Officer Worthington has testified that he opened sealed containers on Mr. Tisdale's furniture, containers in which he could not determine the contents through visualization and that were too small to reasonably conceal the object of the search — namely Mr. Tisdale himself. The opening of these containers constitutes a blatant Fourth Amendment violation and the contents should therefore be ruled inadmissible under the Exclusionary Rule. Furthermore, the larger amounts of cocaine and marijuana found in Mr. Tisdale's safe should also be ruled inadmissible under the Fruit Of The Poisonous Tree Rule, in that the warrant used to search Mr. Tisdale's house stemmed directly from the illegal search and seizure of the smaller amounts of cocaine in the bowls on his tables."
Judge Waters nodded thoughtfully. She looked at the prosecutor. "Counselor?" she asked. "I assume you have objection to Mr. Maywood's request?"
"Yes I do, Your Honor," he said. "Officer Worthington and the other deputies entered Mr. Tisdale's residence by consent of the housekeeping staff. It is true that their purpose inside there was to determine whether or not Mr. Tisdale was home and not to look for evidence of narcotic possession. However, Officer Worthington, being an experienced law enforcement professional, was able to recognize that the small silver bowls on Mr. Tisdale's tables were of the type commonly used to store drugs and drug paraphernalia. Officer Worthington has, in fact, testified that he has never seen such bowls used for anything but the storage of drugs and drug paraphernalia. It was therefore quite reasonable for him to open the bowls and examine the contents. He had reasonable suspicion that those bowls, which were in plain view and therefore covered under The Plain View doctrine, would contain illicit substances."
"Rebuttal, Mr. Maywood?" asked Waters.
"Indeed," Perceville said. "I will return to the fact that Officer Worthington was in Mr. Tisdale's house for the sole purpose of determining whether or not Mr. Tisdale was there. Despite what Officer Worthington's training and experience dictate, there was absolutely no reason for him to go opening sealed containers that were too small to harbor the five-foot eleven, one hundred and eighty-three pound man they were searching for. It doesn't matter that, in Officer Worthington's experience, such bowls typically contain drugs. As a California peace officer and representative of the government, he had no right to start opening Mr. Tisdale's belongings."
"All right then," Waters said after hearing this. "I find there is enough question about this matter for me to schedule an evidentiary hearing. We'll reconvene in two weeks and hash this all out then."
With a pound of her gavel, the preliminary hearing was put on hold.
Despite the legal troubles hanging over Matt and the distinct possibility that he might be incarcerated or pending trial on January 15, the day the tour was supposed to kick off, the band continued to put the production together as if they would be going ahead with it. They formulated a play list for the concert and began to put together what little choreography they imbibed in as far as lighting and stage set-up went. The production crew designed and built the stage and lighting sets they would be using and then went about the process of training the roadies to set it up and tear it down. Jake was set up with several language experts who would teach him to deliver his between song banter in whatever the native language of the venue happened to be. It was planned for Jake to learn several different phrases in Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, German, French, Dutch, Luxembourgish, Norwegian, and Swedish.
"Those foreigners love that crap," Crow assured him when the plan was announced. "They'll eat it up."
"Right," Jake said, thinking that his accent was going to sound horrible and that there was a distinct possibility he'd screw up at some point and either mix up his phrases, misspeak a word, or, worst of all, use the wrong language in one of the countries. He could imagine telling his Amsterdam audience how great it was to be there in Norwegian or Swedish. Nevertheless, he agreed to the language lessons and vowed to do his best.
On November 22, the day after Matt's preliminary hearing, the entire touring stage and lighting set was assembled for the first time in Intemperance's rehearsal warehouse. It looked familiar to them and that was for good reason. With only a few minor changes and upgrades, it was the same stage they played on during the recent It's In The Book tour. The roadies set up all of the band's equipment, amplifiers, effects pedals, and instruments and wired them into a soundboard. That was when Nerdly took over command of the operation. He was the one who dialed in their sound for each venue. His now-constant companion, Sharon Cohen, was at his side as he directed each band member to play this or that on their respective instrument or to sing into their microphone.
"He seems in a better mood today, doesn't he?" Jake asked Matt while Nerdly worked on Coop's drum set.
"Yeah," Matt said, puffing on a cigarette and taking an occasional sip from a glass of iced tea. "He actually had a conversation with me when we got here. And I haven't heard him whine a single time about having to go traipsing around the Eastern Hemisphere for four intercoursing months."
"You think he just learned to accept it?" Jake asked.
"No," Matt said. "I think that one of two things is going on here. He either thinks I'm going to be convicted and thrown in the joint so he won't have to go..."
"That's possible," Jake said. "It doesn't sound quite right though. Remember, he was still being a little bitch to us the last week or so, and that's when it really looked like you were gonna end up in the slam."
"Exactly," Matt said. "Which is why I think it's the second possibility that's actually going on."
"What's the second possibility?" Jake asked.
"Matt!" shouted Sharon from over at the soundboard. She was wearing a pair of baggy jeans and an extra-large sweater. A UCLA baseball cap was perched on her head.
"What?" Matt yelled back.
"Bill wants you to play a few riffs through the number one effects pedal."
"Aye aye," Matt said, snapping a mock salute at her. He snuffed out his cigarette and picked up a guitar pick. With his left foot, he stomped down on the first of the four effects pedals that were arrayed beneath his microphone stand. His chair was situated so he didn't even have to get out of it. "Coming at you!" he yelled at the direction of the soundboard. He then played a few repetitions of the main riff for Living By The Law, which utilized that particular effect primarily. The sound blasted out of the amplifiers, filling the small warehouse with heavy metal sound.
Sharon made a throat-cutting gesture and Matt stopped mid-riff, restoring silence after the briefest feedback whine.
"Hold there for a second," Sharon yelled at him. "He's gonna adjust the treble and tune down the volume a little bit."
"Fuckin' A," Matt said, setting the guitar back down in his lap. He looked at Jake. "The second possibility," he told him, "is standing over there next to Nerdly on the soundboard. I think he's playing hide the Vienna sausage with her now."
"Well... yeah," Jake said. "It's pretty obvious that something is going on between them. They're together every minute now and they go out almost every night from what I understand. But that's been going on for weeks too. Why would he suddenly get in a good mood today when he's been banging her weeks?"