I leaned back and looked behind us and then took a quick glance around the courtroom. I gave a phony smile and nod to a lawyer I saw in the spectator section, then turned back to Maggie.
“Where’s Bosch?” I asked.
“I don’t think he’s going to be here.”
“Why not? He’s completely disappeared in the last week.”
“He’s been working on something. He called yesterday and asked if he had to be here for this and I said he didn’t.”
“He’d better be working on something related to Jessup.”
“He tells me it is and that he’s going to bring it to us soon.”
“That’s nice of him. The trial starts in four weeks.”
I wondered why Bosch had chosen to call her instead of me, the lead prosecutor. I realized that this made me upset with Maggie as well as Bosch.
“Listen, I don’t know what happened between you two on your little trip to Port Townsend, but he should be calling me.”
Maggie shook her head as if dealing with a petulant child.
“Look, you don’t have to worry. He knows you’re the lead prosecutor. He probably figures you are too busy for the day-to-day updates on what he’s doing. And I’m going to forget what you said about Port Townsend. This one time. You make another insinuation like that and you and I are going to have a real problem.”
“Okay, I’m sorry. It’s just that-”
My attention was drawn across the aisle to Jessup, who was sitting at the defense table with Royce. He was staring at me with a smirk on his face and I realized he had been watching Maggie and me, maybe even listening.
“Excuse me a second,” I said.
I got up and walked over to the defense table. I leaned over him.
“Can I help you with something, Jessup?”
Before Jessup could say a word his lawyer cut in.
“Don’t talk to my client, Mick,” Royce said. “If you want to ask him something, then you ask me.”
Now Jessup smiled again, emboldened by his attorney’s defensive move.
“Just go sit down,” Jessup said. “I got nothing to say to you.”
Royce held his hand up to quiet him.
“I’ll handle this. You be quiet.”
“He threatened me. You should complain to the judge.”
“I said be quiet and that I would handle this.”
Jessup folded his arms and leaned back in his chair.
“Mick, is there a problem here?” Royce asked.
“No, no problem. I just don’t like him staring at me.”
I walked back to the prosecution table, annoyed with myself for losing my calm. I sat down and looked at the pool camera set up in the jury box. Judge Breitman had approved the filming of the trial and the various hearings leading up to it, but only through the use of a pool camera, which would provide a universal feed that all channels and networks could use.
A few minutes later the judge took the bench and called the hearing to order. One by one we went through the defense motions, and the rulings mostly fell our way without much further argument. The most important one was the routine motion to dismiss for lack of evidence, which the judge rejected with little comment. When Royce asked to be heard, she said that it wasn’t necessary to discuss the issue further. It was a solid rebuke and I loved it even though outwardly I acted as though it were routine and boring.
The only ruling the judge wanted to discuss in detail was the oddball request by Royce to allow his client to use makeup during trial to cover the tattoos on his neck and fingers. Royce had argued in his motion that the tattoos were all prison tattoos applied while he was falsely incarcerated for twenty-four years. He said the tattoos could be prejudicial when noticed by jurors. His client intended to cover these with skin-tone makeup and he wanted to bar the prosecution from addressing it in front of the jury.
“I have to admit I have not had a motion like this come before me,” the judge said. “I’m inclined to allow it and hold the prosecution from drawing attention to it but I see the prosecution has objected to the motion, saying that it contains insufficient information about the content and history of these tattoos. Can you shed some light on the subject, Mr. Royce?”
Royce stood and addressed the court from his place at the defense table. I looked over and my eyes were drawn to Jessup’s hands. I knew the tattoos across his knuckles were Royce’s chief concern. The neck markings could largely be covered with a collared shirt, which he would wear with a suit at trial. But the hands were difficult to hide. Across the four digits of each hand he had inked the sentiment FUCK THIS and Royce knew that I would make sure it was seen by jurors. That sentiment was probably the chief impediment to having Jessup testify in his defense, because Royce knew I would find a way either casually or specifically to make sure the jury got his message.
“Your Honor, it is the defense’s position that these tattoos were administered to Mr. Jessup’s body while he was falsely imprisoned and are a product of that harrowing experience. Prison is a dangerous place, Judge, and inmates take measures to protect themselves. Sometimes it is through tattooing that is designed to be intimidating or to show an association the prisoner might not actually have or believe in. It would certainly be prejudicial for the jury to see, and therefore we ask for relief. This, I might add, is merely a tactic by the prosecution to delay the trial, and the defense firmly stands by its decision to not delay justice in this case.”
Maggie stood up quickly. She had handled this motion on paper and therefore it was hers to handle in court.
“Your Honor, may I be heard on the defense’s accusation?”
“One moment, Ms. McPherson, I want to be heard myself. Mr. Royce, can you explain your last statement?”
Royce bowed politely.
“Yes, of course, Judge Breitman. The defendant has begun to go through a tattoo removal process. But this takes time and will not be completed by trial. By objecting to our simple request to use makeup, the prosecution is trying to push the trial back until this removal process is completed. It’s an effort to subvert the speedy trial statute which since day one the defense, to the prosecution’s consternation, has refused to waive.”
The judge turned her gaze to Maggie McFierce. It was her turn.
“Your Honor, this is simply a defense fabrication. The state has not once asked for a delay or opposed the defense’s request for a speedy trial. In fact, the prosecution is ready for trial. So this statement is outlandish and objectionable. The true objection on the part of the prosecution to this motion is to the idea of the defendant being allowed to disguise himself. A trial is a search for truth, and allowing him to use makeup to cover up who he really is would be an affront to the search for truth. Thank you, Your Honor.”
“Judge, may I respond?” Royce, still standing, said immediately.
Breitman paused for a moment while she wrote a few notes from Maggie’s brief.
“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Royce,” she finally said. “I’m going to make a ruling on this and I will allow Mr. Jessup to cover his tattoos. If he chooses to testify on his behalf, the prosecution will not address this issue with him in front of the jury.”
“Thank you, Your Honor,” Maggie said.
She sat down without showing any outward sign of disappointment. It was just one ruling among many others and most had gone the prosecution’s way. This loss was minor at worst.
“Okay,” the judge said. “I think we have covered everything. Anything else from counsel at this time?”
“Yes, Your Honor,” Royce said as he stood again. “Defense has a new motion we would like to submit.”
He stepped away from the defense table and brought copies of the new motion first to the judge and then to us, giving Maggie and me individual copies of a one-page motion. Maggie was a fast reader, a skill she had genetically passed on to our daughter, who was reading two books a week on top of her homework.