“And did you learn who owned the weapon?”
“Yes, it was registered to the suspect’s father, Bruce Colton. It had been kept in a safe with a combination lock in a home office.”
“What kind of combination lock are we talking about?”
“Electronic. It has a numbered keypad and you punch in a six-digit combination to open it.”
“I see. Did you learn through your investigation whether Aaron Colton’s father had shared the combination with his son?”
“His father told me he never shared the combination with his son.”
“Did his mother share it?”
“She said she never knew the combination, because she didn’t like having a gun in the house.”
“Did Aaron tell you how he got possession of the gun?”
“He did not. On the advice of his parents and attorney, he never agreed to speak to me about the shooting.”
“Then did there come a time in your investigation when you learned how he got the weapon from the home safe?”
“Yes.”
“Can you tell us how?”
“In reviewing the conversations the suspect had engaged in with Wren, I came across an exchange in which Wren revealed that she had accessed online records relating to the Colton family and from these had come up with a list of possible combinations to the gun safe.”
“I believe we have an exhibit to show the jury.”
After Ruhlin overruled an objection from the defense, Lorna put up a segment of an exchange between Aaron and Wren. It was a list of nine different six-digit numbers given by Wren to Aaron.
“Detective Clarke,” I said, pointing at the screen, “did this list supplied to Aaron by Wren include the combination to the gun safe?”
“It did,” Clarke said. “The fourth one down.”
“And what was the significance of that number?”
“It was the date that Aaron Colton’s parents got married — oh-five-eleven-oh-one.”
The courtroom was normally silent during testimony, but it seemed to get even quieter. To go still. It was as if no one took a breath. It was what they call a smoking-gun moment. And I needed to send the jury home with it. But when I glanced back to the clock on the rear wall of the courtroom, I saw that I had delivered the final punch too quickly. It was only 4:15 and I could not give the Masons the last fifteen minutes of the day to undo the damage I’d done to their case.
I turned and looked up at the judge.
“Your Honor, this might be a good point to break for the day,” I said. “But I would like the night to decide whether to continue direct examination of this witness.”
Before the judge could respond, Marcus Mason was on his feet objecting.
“Your Honor, counsel is stalling,” he said. “He is trying to prevent the defense from questioning this witness about the critical mistakes and biases that infected his deeply flawed investigation.”
I had to give Marcus credit. He knew his objection was going nowhere, so he was doing his best to plant seeds of doubt about Clarke’s testimony and give the jury something else to think about while sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic heading home.
“You’ll be able to do that tomorrow, Mr. Mason,” Ruhlin said. “The objection is overruled.”
The judge then dismissed the jury with the usual warnings about not discussing the case with others or reading or watching media accounts of the trial. The courtroom slowly emptied behind me as I took a seat next to my clients. Bruce Colton stood and leaned over the rail so he would be able to hear what I said. The first day was in the books. I felt good about it and told my clients so. I also told them that they each could expect to testify the next day.
What I didn’t tell them was that at least one of them wasn’t going to like the questions I asked.
31
Maggie was sitting in the dark when I got home. It was past eight. After court, I had gone out to Pasadena for a final pep-and-prep session with Naomi Kitchens. There was a slim chance I might put her on the stand the following afternoon and I wanted to go through my plan for her direct examination and warn her about what would likely be a tough cross-examination from one of the Masons.
Maggie was sitting in the living room, staring out the picture window at the lights of the city below. We had two soft armchairs positioned in front of the window with a small table between them for a wineglass for her. Some nights we watched the sun go down over the hills to the right as the lights of the Sunset Strip came up on the left. Most prominent in the view was the Sunset Tower, the art deco masterpiece that had stood tall on the strip for nearly a century.
“Hey, Mags, everything all right?” I asked.
“Why wouldn’t it be?” she responded.
“Well, you’re sitting here in the dark. All right if I turn on a light?”
She didn’t answer. I hit the wall switch that turned on the hanging light over the dining-room table. I put my briefcase down on one of the chairs and stepped into the shadows of the living room.
“What do you see out there?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said.
It seemed obvious she had dropped into one of the dark troughs that had been coming more frequently. The world around her seemed to be getting its momentum back while she remained behind with her pain. I bent down and kissed her on the cheek, then took the chair to her left. She had not pulled her gaze away from the window.
“What are you thinking?” I asked.
“Nothing,” she said. “Just watching the world go by.”
“Sorry I’m so late. I had to go up to Pasadena to see my witness.”
“The ethicist?”
“Yeah.”
She huffed in a way I took as sarcastic.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“No, what? What’s wrong with my witness?”
“It’s not your witness. It’s just the idea of an ethicist. I guess everybody should have one.”
I noticed the wineglass on the table was empty.
“You want a refill?” I asked.
“No, I already had one,” she said.
“Did something happen at work?”
“Nothing I can talk about. Just more of the same old, same old. Treachery and backstabbing in every office.”
I was actually relieved that it was a work situation that had her down and not the ongoing trauma for once.
“Come on, Mags, tell me what’s happening.”
“I don’t want to talk about it. You can read about it in tomorrow’s paper.”
“The Times? What are they going to say?”
Maggie blew out her breath and relented.
“It’s going to be a one-two punch. A story that says, based on unnamed sources inside my office, that I have been ‘incapacitated’ — that’s the exact word — since the loss of my home in the fires. And then, for good measure, there will be an editorial calling for me to step down if I can’t move on with my life. From the same editorial board that endorsed me for DA after the recall.”
“Fuck that.”
“That’s what I say. Fuck that. I’m not stepping down.”
“And you have no idea where this is coming from?”
“I have an idea, but nothing I can hang a hat on. I have enemies on the inside.”
“How did you hear about this? When?”
“When the reporter called me for comment. I was blindsided, all right, which is a sign that maybe I am incapacitated and should step down.”
“That’s not happening.”
“I know. I’m just saying that’s how it will look in the Times.”
“Then you have to go on the offensive, Mags.”
“You think I don’t know that? Mickey, just let me deal with it. It’s my problem and I’ll handle it.”