contact visit with a client.'
'Reception is on Third Avenue off the Justice Center lobby. When you come in, we're behind a desk. To the side of the desk, between the reception area where you can sit down and the elevators that go up to the jail, is a metal detector.'
'Okay, so say I come into the jail to visit a prisoner and I come up to your desk, what happens then?'
'I ask for your Bar card and I check your ID.'
'Then what?'
'You empty your pockets of any metal objects and you give me your briefcase to search, if you've got one. Then you go through the metal detector.'
'What time did Mr. Hayes come into the reception area?'
'Around one, I think.'
'Was he alone?'
McKenzie snorted. 'He had a circus with him--TV cameras, reporters shouting questions.'
'Did Mr. Hayes hold a press conference?'
'He answered a few questions. The reporters had him backed up against the reception desk. When it got too bad, he asked me to rescue him.'
'By letting him into the jail?'
'Right.'
'What did you do?'
'What I always do. I checked his ID and passed him through the metal detector.'
'Did Mr. Hayes have a briefcase?'
'Yeah, but I checked that, too.'
'Did you send the briefcase through the metal detector?'
McKenzie started to answer, then stopped.
'No, I don't think so. I think I just went through it.'
'What was Mr. Hayes doing while you were going through this procedure?'
'He was . . . Let me think. Yeah, we were talking.'
'About what?'
'The Blazers.'
'While you searched the briefcase?'
'Yeah.'
'So your full attention wasn't on the search?'
'Are you saying I didn't do my job?'
'No, Officer McKenzie. I know you tried to do your job correctly, but you had no reason to think that Wendell Hayes would try and smuggle anything into the jail, did you?'
'Hayes didn't smuggle anything in.'
'Did he go through the detector with all of his clothes?'
McKenzie gazed upward, trying to recall everything that had happened. When he looked back at Amanda, he was worried.
'He took off his jacket and . . . and he folded it up and handed it to me with his briefcase and the metal stuff in his pockets, like his keys and a Swiss Army knife. I kept the knife.'
'Did you search the jacket thoroughly?'
'I patted it down before I handed it back,' McKenzie said, but he did not look as sure of himself now.
'Were the reporters still milling around your desk?'
'Yeah.'
'Were they talking?'
'Yeah.'
'I was watching a TV news story about Mr. Hayes's death. The station had pictures of him going through the metal detector. Were they filming Mr. Hayes during the search?'
'I guess so.'
'So those bright lights were still on and there were a lot of other distractions?'
'Yeah, but I was thorough.'
'Think hard about this, Officer McKenzie, please. Did you hand back Mr. Hayes's jacket and briefcase before or after he was through the metal detector?'
