'Two people have been victimized by this crime. The second victim is Lucas Smothers, a nineteen-year-old boy who never hurt anyone in his life. From the time of his arrest at the crime scene, when he was virtually unconscious, incapable of attacking anyone, the sheriff's department has not made one attempt to investigate the very real probability someone else was responsible for Roseanne Hazlitt's death.
'Instead, a boy who has never been arrested except for a traffic violation was put in a lockup unit with two psychopaths, written off as guilty by the prosecutor's office without even a preliminary investigation, and brought to trial after the prosecutor knew, knew, we had found witnesses who could prove Lucas Smothers could not have committed this crime.
'You'll hear from these witnesses, just as you'll hear about sheriff's deputies who either lost or destroyed crime scene evidence that may have told us who the real assailant was.
'The prosecutor, Mr Pomroy, once told me our legal system exists to give voice to those who have none. He's right. But it also exists to protect the innocent and to punish the guilty and to ensure they do not commit their crimes again. In this case, not only has an innocent young man been charged and brought to trial, the real assailant has been allowed to remain free, in our community, free perhaps, in the words of the prosecutor, to rip the life from the body of another woman.'
I talked about reasonable doubt, the lack of motive, the fact that some of Roseanne's friends who came from wealthy families (and I meant Darl Vanzandt) had never been questioned during the investigation. But at the moment when I mentioned the element of wealth, a strange division took place in the jury box. The eyes of the black and Mexican jurors remained fixed on my face, unperturbed at my words, while the gaze of four white, upper- income jurors shifted into neutral space, click, just that fast.
When we recessed, Marvin Pomroy passed the defense table and said, 'You stepped in the bubble gum on that last one, counselor.'
I rubbed my temple and looked at his back.
'What'd he mean?' Lucas asked.
'Don't tell a Republican the system that protects his money is corrupt.'
Marvin's first witness was Roseanne Hazlitt's aunt. She walked with a cane to the stand, her back bent at the spine. She seemed even more frail than when I had interviewed her at her house. Her hand quivered on the curve of her cane; deep lines fanned out from her mouth like those in a mummy; her eyes jittered with the rheumy death light of the mortally ill.
But her animosity toward Lucas flared in her words, stripped the obstruction from her throat, reached out like knots in a whip.
'Did your niece tell you she thought she might be pregnant?' Marvin asked.
'Objection. Irrelevant,' I said.
'Goes to motive,' Marvin said.
'Overruled,' the judge said.
'Yes, she did,' the aunt said.
'Pregnant by whom?' Marvin asked.
'Your honor, the victim was not pregnant. The prosecution is trying to introduce a nonexistent situation into the trial,' I said.
'Then bring that out in cross-examination. In the meantime, sit down and shut up, Mr Holland,' the judge said.
'She thought that 'un yonder made her pregnant,' the aunt said.
'You're indicating Lucas Smothers?' Marvin said.
'I'm pointing at the one right there beat her to death and y'all didn't have guts enough to prosecute in the first degree,' the aunt said.
'Objection,' I said.
'Sustained. Jury will disregard the witness's last remark,' the judge said.
But the pointed finger of accusation, the anger that seemed to indicate an unspoken knowledge about Lucas's guilt would not leave the jury's memory because of a judge's admonition. After Marvin sat back down, I rose and approached within five feet of the stand.
'Ms Hazlitt, I interviewed you right after your niece's death, correct?' I said.
'You come out to the house, if that's what you mean.'
'I asked you about someone she had slapped at Shorty's the night she was attacked, correct?'
'I told you she never hurt nobody in her life, too.'
'You surely did. Then you told me something like, 'It was them hurt her.' Isn't that correct?'
'I don't recall that.'
'Then I asked you who 'them' was, who were those other people who had harmed her in the past. Isn't that correct?'
'Objection, counsel's testifying, Your Honor. The witness already stated she didn't remember,' Marvin said.
'Where are you going with this, Mr Holland?' the judge said.
'The witness obviously has hostile feelings toward the defendant. However, in a previous conversation she indicated her niece had been injured in some fashion by people other than Lucas Smothers.'
'There's no evidence of this conversation. Mr Holland is putting words in the witness's mouth and then questioning her about them. It's bizarre,' Marvin said.
'I'll give you a short piece of rope, Mr Holland,' the judge said.
'Ms Hazlitt, did you tell me people other than Lucas Smothers had harmed your niece?'
'Objection, your honor. He's doing it again,' Marvin said.
'Sustained. Last warning, counselor,' the judge said.
'I apologize, your honor. I'll rephrase the question. Ms Hazlitt, did you indicate someone other than Lucas had harmed Roseanne in the past?' I said.
'I don't recall that,' the aunt replied.
'You didn't refer to her male friends as people who had 'gotten the scent of it', or as 'dogs sniffing around a brooder house'?'
Marvin was on his feet again, but the judge spoke before he could.
'That's it. Both of you approach the bench,' she said. She leaned forward and covered the microphone with her palm. 'You two guys are starting to piss me off, particularly you, Mr Holland. This isn't the trial of the century. You got problems with each other, settle them outside. And you, Mr Holland, either you join the Screen Actors Guild or put an end to these diddle-doo theatrics. Are we clear on this?'
At lunchtime Lucas, Temple, and I walked across the square to the Mexican grocery store and ordered takeout from the small cafe in back, then carried it back to my office. Vernon Smothers caught up with us on the sidewalk. He had put on a tie and coat and white shirt, and his face was sweating in the sun.
'What's going on? When you gonna put on them damn deputies destroyed evidence?' he said.
'I'll talk with you about it later, Vernon,' I said.
'That's my son. I'm supposed to figure out his trial by watching the evening news?'
I glanced at Temple. She touched Lucas on the arm and walked with him into the foyer and up the stairs of my building.
'I can't call the deputy I need. Why? I don't even know where she is. Why? She shot two guys out at the skeet club. You want me to go on?' I said.
I expected his face to tighten with anger, as it always did when Vernon heard something he didn't like. But he surprised me. He closed his eyes and rubbed his fingers hard in the middle of his brow.
'I screwed up again, didn't I? I should have listened to you and left things alone. I just ain't good at hearing what people tell me sometime,' he said.
'You were doing what you thought was right. It's not your fault, Vernon.'
He looked back at me uncertainly, as though I had spoken to him in a foreign tongue.
Upstairs, I stood at the window and looked at the courthouse square, the dust on the trees and the heat waves bouncing off the sidewalks. Lucas was eating at the side of my desk in his shirtsleeves, his cuffs rolled back over his forearms.
'Ms Hazlitt's testimony presents a little problem for us,' I said to him.
