Guilty As Sin

JAYWALKER: Made a number of drug arrests?

EGAN: More than I can count.

JAYWALKER: What does it mean to “flip” someone, or “turn” someone?

EGAN: Those terms refer to convincing someone to cooperate, in the hope that he’ll be treated more leniently.

JAYWALKER: You’ve done that?

EGAN: Many times.

JAYWALKER: When in the course of a case would you try to do that?

EGAN: Any time after the arrest.

JAYWALKER: Sometimes right away?

EGAN: Sometimes.

JAYWALKER: Would there be any advantage to doing it right away?

EGAN: Sure, I suppose so.

JAYWALKER: What sort of advantage?

EGAN: I’m not sure what you’re driving at, Counselor.

Jaywalker loved it whenever a witness said something like that on cross-examination. He took it as a golden opportunity to testify, no oath required.

JAYWALKER: Here’s what I’m driving at. You make an arrest. Right there on the spot, you flip the guy, convince him to cooperate in order to stay out of prison. Then, before the word gets out that the guy’s been arrested, you have him introduce an undercover to his supplier to make a buy. The supplier doesn’t suspect anything because he doesn’t even know the guy got busted. Anything like that ever happen in your experience?

EGAN: Yes, I suppose so.

JAYWALKER: You suppose so, or you know so?

EGAN: It’s happened.

JAYWALKER: More than once?

EGAN: Probably.

So far, so good. But that had been the easy part, baiting the hook. Getting the fish to bite was another thing altogether.

JAYWALKER: And isn’t that in fact precisely what happened between Detective Pascarella and Clarence Hightower? Sometime in early September, say, Pascarella arrested Hightower, a man with an extremely long record who happened to be on parole. They both knew what that meant for Hightower. Pascarella offered him a deal, right on the spot. “Help us out by introducing an undercover to your man, and we’ll help you out.” Hightower, knowing full well that the alternative meant going back upstate, very possibly for the rest of his life, agreed. In other words, Pascarella flipped him right then and there. And Hightower delivered. It took him a lot of time and a lot of arm- twisting, but he delivered. He delivered Alonzo Barnett, didn’t he?

PULASKI: Objection.

THE COURT: On what basis?

PULASKI: This is all purely speculative.

THE COURT: Overruled. You may answer if you know, Captain.

EGAN: No, that didn’t happen.

JAYWALKER: How do you know?

EGAN: Several reasons. First of all, Hightower would have had to be registered as an informer. He never was. He’s not in the index. Second of all, I’ve spoken with Detective Pascarella, and he told me for a fact that it never happened.

JAYWALKER: So you suspected it, too.

EGAN: Now you’re putting words in my mouth, Counselor. What I mean is, we discussed the case in full. Detective Pascarella told me it began with an anonymous phone tip, that there was no informer involved. And I believe Detective Pascarella.

JAYWALKER: Is that the same Detective Pascarella who directed Investigator Bucknell to leave out the business about the eighth floor and change it to the twelfth floor?

EGAN: [No response]

JAYWALKER: The same Detective Pascarella who orchestrated a witness lying under oath in this trial in order to protect an informer who lived on the eighth floor?

EGAN: [No response]

JAYWALKER: Tell us, Captain Egan. Do you think Detective Pascarella would lie, or have someone else lie, in order to shield the identity of an informer?

EGAN: Yes. No. Maybe. I don’t know.

JAYWALKER: Well, isn’t that exactly what he did with respect to Jackson Davis and the eighth floor business?

EGAN: Only if you choose to look at it that way.

JAYWALKER: And how do you choose to look at it?

EGAN: Jackson Davis was and continues to be an extremely valuable confidential informer. Certain necessary steps were taken to protect him. Steps that in no way jeopardized your client’s right to a fair trial.

JAYWALKER: Suppose Clarence Hightower was an extremely valuable confidential informer. Might it not be equally reasonable to believe that Detective Pascarella would have taken certain necessary steps to protect him, too?

EGAN: Hightower was never an informer.

JAYWALKER: How can we possibly know that, if Pascarella lies to protect his informers?

EGAN: I don’t know how to answer that question, Counselor.

JAYWALKER: Well, maybe the jury will.

It was, as Judge Levine was quick to point out, a comment that was totally uncalled for, and she instructed the jurors to disregard it. But Jaywalker hadn’t been able to help himself. If Hightower, like Davis, had indeed been working with the task force while trying to get Alonzo Barnett back into the drug business, then Jaywalker had a beauty of an entrapment defense. But with Egan adamant that there was no truth to the suggestion, what was left for Jaywalker to do but rant? The whole thing reminded him of a paradox he’d heard as a young boy, back before he had any idea what a paradox was.

All Cretans are liars.

I am a Cretan.

Am I really?

Daniel Pulaski spent ten minutes on redirect, during which he elicited from Captain Egan his assurances that there was a big difference between protecting a highly valued informer like Jackson Davis and an absolute nobody like Clarence Hightower. Besides, Egan insisted, Pascarella never would have made up the stuff about the anonymous caller to shield Hightower. Why not? Because there’d been no reason to. And it would have been wrong. “Also,” Egan added, “that’s the kind of thing you can get into real trouble for.”

“No further questions,” said Pulaski.

“Any re-cross?” the judge asked.

“No,” said Jaywalker. He’d given up trying to crack Captain Egan. He’d even considered the possibility that Egan was telling the truth, that as far as he knew, Hightower hadn’t been an informer. Which narrowed things down to one remaining possibility.

As soon as Egan had left the courtroom, Pulaski stood and announced that the People were resting, having concluded their rebuttal case with a single witness. “Mr. Jaywalker?”

Meaning, does the defense rest, too?

“No,” said Jaywalker, rising to his feet. “The defense has a surrebuttal witness.” He loved that word, surrebuttal. It sounded devious and underhanded, kind of like surreptitious. He half wondered if he’d decided to drag the case out further just so he could hear himself say it.