I shook my head vehemently.
“No, the new low was when your boss came to my office yesterday and tried to bribe me with a briefcase full of cash,” I said. “And this—”
“That never happened,” Marcus shot back.
“You don’t know,” I said. “You weren’t in the room. But I refused to take his money, so he set this up.”
I pointed at the screen.
“How?” Marcus asked. “How did he set this up?”
“Good question, Mr. Haller,” Ruhlin added.
The tension in the room was palpable. The judge was angry. The Masons were angry. I had to somehow make sure this didn’t spill over into a mistrial.
“Judge, I don’t know yet,” I said as calmly as I could. “But this is a setup. That camera — whoever was holding it — was already in place when my investigator rolled up. That’s clear on the video. They were waiting and hiding. Why?”
The logic of what I said seemed to hit everyone in the room as they realized that my observation was correct.
“Another good question,” the judge said, turning her eyes to the Masons. “I seriously hope that what Mr. Haller is suggesting here is not the truth.”
“Your Honor, again, we had nothing to do with this,” Marcus said. “I can promise you that.”
“Can you promise that Victor Wendt didn’t have anything to do with it?” I asked.
The silence that followed that question was punctuated by a buzz from the judge’s desk phone. She answered and then said, “Ask for a marshal to bring him back.”
She hung up and looked at me.
“Your investigator is here,” she said. “I can assure you, Mr. Haller, that if he says the wrong thing, he’s going to jail.”
43
Cisco wasn’t exactly dressed for an audience with a federal judge. He was in faded jeans, boots, a tight-fitting white T-shirt, and a black leather riding jacket. He had gotten my message and obviously rode to the courthouse without any stops. I had known him for more than two decades and could read his face and demeanor. Judging by the way he raised an eyebrow when he saw me, he had no idea what he was walking into.
“Thank you, Deputy,” Ruhlin said to the marshal who had escorted Cisco in. “If you could stand outside the door for me, I would appreciate that.”
“Yes, ma’am,” the marshal said.
He stepped out and Ruhlin directed Cisco to take one of the chairs from the table and bring it over to the desk. I moved my chair to make room for him to slide into the line of men facing the judge.
“Do you know why you are here, sir?” Ruhlin asked.
“I sure don’t, Judge,” Cisco responded.
“Well, I can show you.”
“Please.”
Ruhlin once again cued up the video and she turned the laptop so Cisco could watch it. She kept her eyes on him while it played. Cisco was nodding his head before it ended.
“Okay, that’s me, if that’s what you want to know,” Cisco said.
“I know it’s you,” Ruhlin said sharply. “I want to know what you were doing there.”
“Well, I was following a lead. Turned out to be a wild-goose chase and... that’s it.”
“Do you know who that woman is?”
Cisco shook his head.
“Uh, not really,” he said. “She didn’t give me the chance to find out.”
“Are you telling this court that you didn’t know that she is a juror in this case?” Ruhlin asked.
Cisco’s head snapped back as if he had been punched in the jaw.
“Whoa, wait, no — in this case?” he said. “No, I didn’t know she was a juror.”
Cisco raised his right hand as if taking an oath to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
“We’ve been in trial all week,” Ruhlin said. “How could you not know her?”
“Your Honor?” I said.
“Let him answer the question,” Ruhlin ordered sharply.
“Judge, I wasn’t paying much attention to the jury,” Cisco said. “That’s not really my job. I wasn’t in court for jury selection, and during the trial I was dealing with getting witnesses to and from court and other duties. When she came to the door, she had a do-rag on her head and a robe, and I just didn’t recognize her.”
Ruhlin shook her head in frustration.
“Then what brought you to her door last night?” Ruhlin asked.
“I got a text,” Cisco said. “On WhatsApp.”
“It was encrypted?”
“Yes.”
“And that didn’t make you suspicious?”
“It did, but we get a lot of anonymous tips, Your Honor. I mean, that’s my job — to run these down.”
“And what did this tip say?”
“The texter said they had important information regarding a witness in the case. I responded and asked what witness, and the answer was Wiseacre, and that made it seem like it might be legitimate.”
“How so?”
“There’s a witness named Nathan Whittaker. He’s a coder at Tidalwaiv, and we learned that his nickname is Wiseacre. Whittaker, Wiseacre — it’s close.”
“I understand. Go on.”
“Well, seeing that nickname in the text gave it enough credibility that I decided I should check it out. I asked for a time and place to meet and I got that address.”
He pointed at the laptop screen.
“I asked for a name and the texter gave me Robin,” Cisco said. “No last name. I went over there at the meeting time, six thirty, as you can see, and the woman who answered the door said her name was Robin, but she didn’t know what I was talking about or why I was there. I didn’t recognize her and she apparently didn’t remember me from court. At that point I thought I had bad info or something and left.”
“And you didn’t tell any of this to Mr. Haller?” Ruhlin asked.
“He went home yesterday afternoon to finish working on something, so I just went to the meeting. I usually don’t bother him with stuff like this unless it pans out. This didn’t, so I didn’t even mention it. If she had told me she was a juror, I would obviously have sounded the alarm and said I was set up. But she didn’t, and I didn’t know about any of this till right now.”
Ruhlin stared at Cisco for a long moment, apparently trying to judge his truthfulness, before she finally spoke.
“Would you be willing to let me look at these texts you received?” she asked.
“Uh, sure,” Cisco said hesitantly.
He looked at me as he leaned to his left to reach into his back pocket. I nodded my approval even though he didn’t need it. He pulled out his phone, opened WhatsApp, and located the texts in question. He handed the phone to the judge, screen up. She took it, read the texts, and nodded.
“And you say this was encrypted,” she said. “It can’t be traced?”
“Well, when I realized I was at the wrong address, I called that number,” Cisco said. “The line was dead — number no longer valid. But I have a... friend who, uh, can run down numbers for me. I gave it to him and he said the text came from a burner phone. So, yeah, we’re not going to be able to trace it.”
“Okay, Mr. ... uh...”
“Wojciechowski — pronounced like ‘Watch your car key.’ My father always said that when people had trouble with it.”
“Thank you, Mr. Watch-your-car-key. I think you can go now. And can you ask the deputy marshal to step back in?”
“Sure, Judge. Thank you.”
The big man stood up and gave me a nod. He returned his chair to the meeting table on his way to the door. He left and the marshal came in.
“You can go now, Jaime,” the judge said. “Everything is fine.”