“What are you doing?”
I pushed him away.
“Stop touching me. We have new information we can’t bring up on cross.”
I focused on the judge.
“Any other witnesses, Mr. Minton?” she asked.
“No, Your Honor. No further rebuttal.”
The judge nodded.
“The witness is excused.”
Meehan started crossing the courtroom to Corliss. The judge looked at me and I started to stand.
“Mr. Haller, surrebuttal?”
“Yes, Your Honor, the defense would like to call D.J. Corliss back to the stand as surrebuttal.”
Meehan stopped in his tracks and all eyes were on me. I held up the tape and the paper Lorna had brought me.
“I have new information on Mr. Corliss, Your Honor. I could not have brought it up on cross.”
“Very well. Proceed.”
“Can I have a moment, Judge?”
“A short one.”
I huddled with Roulet again.
“Look, I don’t know what is going on but it doesn’t matter,” I whispered.
“What do you mean it doesn’t matter? Are you -”
“Listen to me. It doesn’t matter because I can still destroy him. Doesn’t matter if he says you killed twenty women. If he’s a liar, he’s a liar. If I destroy him, none of it counts. You understand?”
Roulet nodded and seemed to calm as he considered this.
“Then destroy him.”
“I will. But I have to know. Is there anything else he knows that could come out? Is there anything I need to stay away from?”
Roulet whispered slowly, as if explaining something to a child.
“I don’t know because I never talked to him. I’m not that stupid as to have a discussion about cigarettes and murder with a total fucking stranger!”
“Mr. Haller,” the judge prompted.
I looked up at her.
“Yes, Your Honor.”
Carrying the tape and the paper that came with it, I stood up to go back to the lectern. On the way I took a quick glance across the gallery and saw that Kurlen was gone. I had no way of knowing how long he had stayed and what he had heard. Lankford was gone as well. Only Sobel remained and she averted her eyes from mine. I turned my attention to Corliss.
“Mr. Corliss, can you tell the jury exactly where you were when Mr. Roulet supposedly made these revelations to you about murder and assault?”
“When we were together.”
“Together where, Mr. Corliss?”
“Well, on the bus ride we didn’t talk because we were in different seats. But when we got to the courthouse, we were in the same holding cell with about six other guys and we sat together there and we talked.”
“And those six other men all witnessed you and Mr. Roulet talking, correct?”
“They woulda had to. They were there.”
“So what you are saying is that if I brought them in here one by one and asked them if they observed you and Mr. Roulet talking, they would confirm that?”
“Well, they should. But…”
“But what, Mr. Corliss?”
“It’s just that they probably wouldn’t talk, that’s all.”
“Is it because nobody likes a snitch, Mr. Corliss?”
Corliss shrugged.
“I guess so.”
“Okay, so let’s make sure we have all of this straight. You didn’t talk with Mr. Roulet on the bus but you did talk to him when you were in the holding cell together. Anywhere else?”
“Yeah, we talked when they moved us on out into the courtroom. They stick you in this glassed-in area and you wait for your case to be called. We talked some in there, too, until his case got called. He went first.”
“This is in the arraignment court where you had your first appearance before a judge?”
“That’s right.”
“So you two were talking in the court and this is where Mr. Roulet would have revealed his part in these crimes you described.”
“That’s right.”
“Do you remember specifically what he told you when you were in the courtroom?”
“No, not really. Not specifics. I think that might have been when he told me about the girl who was a dancer.”
“Okay, Mr. Corliss.”
I held the videotape up, described it as video of Louis Roulet’s first appearance, and asked to enter it as a defense exhibit. Minton tried to block it as something I had not produced during discovery, but that was easily and quickly shot down by the judge without my having to argue the point. He then objected again, citing the lack of authentication of the tape.
“I am just trying to save the court some time,” I said. “If needed I can have the man who took the film here in about an hour to authenticate it. But I think that Your Honor will be able to authenticate it herself with just one look.”
“I am going to allow it,” the judge said. “Once we see it the prosecution can object again if so inclined.”
The television and video unit I had used previously was rolled into the courtroom and placed at an angle viewable by Corliss, the jury and the judge. Minton had to move to a chair to the side of the jury box to fully see it. The tape was played. It lasted twenty minutes and showed Roulet from the moment he entered the courtroom custody area until he was led out after the bail hearing. At no time did Roulet talk to anyone but me. When the tape was over I left the television in its place in case it was needed again. I addressed Corliss with a tinge of outrage in my voice.
“Mr. Corliss, did you see a moment anywhere on that tape where you and Mr. Roulet were talking?”
“Uh, no. I -”
“Yet, you testified under oath and penalty of perjury that he confessed crimes to you while you were both in the courtroom, didn’t you?”
“I know I said that but I must have been mistaken. He must have told me everything when we were in the holding cell.”
“You lied to the jury, didn’t you?”
“I didn’t mean to. That was the way I remembered it but I guess I was wrong. I was coming off a high that morning. Things got confused.”
“It would seem that way. Let me ask you, were things confused when you testified against Frederic Bentley back in nineteen eighty-nine?”
Corliss knitted his eyebrows together in concentration but didn’t answer.
“You remember Frederic Bentley, don’t you?”
Minton stood.
“Objection. Nineteen eighty-nine? Where is he going with this?”
“Your Honor,” I said. “This goes to the veracity of the witness. It is certainly at issue here.”
“Connect the dots, Mr. Haller,” the judge ordered. “In a hurry.”
“Yes, Your Honor.”
I picked up the piece of paper and used it as a prop during my final questions of Corliss.
“In nineteen eighty-nine Frederic Bentley was convicted, with your help, of raping a sixteen-year-old girl in her
