her gavel, but instead of shying away from the four-letter barrage, the cartel head turned toward the heckler, his double-cuffed hands to his ear, as though he were a TV wrestler playing to the crowd.
Perrine looked thinner now than when I arrested him. A goatee enhanced the angles of his face. Even in his jumpsuit, he carried himself well-head up, broad shoulders back, an almost military bearing. Probably the only thing off about his elegant visage was the sharp bend in his nose, which I’d put there when I’d broken it for him.
Oh, well, I thought, smiling when I saw it. Even into charmed lives a little rain must fall.
Already some in the press were gushing about the man’s money and European taste and manners.
Despite his obvious elegance, I didn’t for a split second forget who we were dealing with here. I’d seen some of the videotaped beheadings and castrations he had ordered, and heard witnesses testify about several of the horrific murders he had personally participated in. In one instance, he had captured a rival drug dealer at a Chihuahua nightclub and killed all the members of his family one by one in front of the detained crowd. I don’t know which suit he’d been wearing as he poured a bottle of grain alcohol over the man’s wife and lit her up, but I’m sure it was haute couture.
Perrine was living proof that evil existed in the world. Excuse me for not giving a shit about his penchant for stylish cufflinks.
Perrine continued his strut to the defendant’s table, where his team of lawyers was waiting for him. The head of his defense team was an affable, bony, middle-aged Washington lawyer named Arthur Boehme. Tara had told me that Boehme had just completed successfully defending a hedge fund manager in an insider trading case for a fee that ran into the tens of millions. I’d read a
I shook my head as Perrine sat down beside him.
The lawyer very well may have gotten his wish.
Perrine leaned back and leisurely took in the courtroom, as though he were a VIP on a private architectural tour. He peered at the dark mahogany in the paneling, the milling in the high, coffered ceiling, the great seal of the United States District Court, set in heavy bronze above the judge’s bench. As he nodded with satisfaction at the august setting, another one of his lawyers, a tall, elegant ash-blond woman, sat down beside him. Perrine leaned in and spoke into her ear, a smile on his lips, his long finger wagging the air to emphasize some point he was making.
After fifteen minutes, the courtroom doors opened and a large group of potential jurors came in for the voir dire. Each candidate stated his or her name and occupation, and the lawyers from both sides took turns asking questions. They asked the candidates if they had any family members who were currently incarcerated, if they knew anyone in law enforcement. At one point, Arthur Boehme asked a hairdresser if she’d ever heard about the “alleged” Mexican drug cartels.
“Alleged” cartels, I thought, wanting to vomit. If only the thirty-five thousand people the cartels had killed in the decade-long Mexican drug war could be “allegedly” dead.
As the process ground on, I noticed something that I’d never seen before. After each potential juror gave his or her name, the lawyers on both sides started typing into laptops. Sometimes they’d read something, then tug at the questioning lawyer’s sleeve, and that person would be dismissed. After a while, I realized the lawyers were probably scouring social networking sites to find out about the candidates and their opinions. As a cop, I’d often do it to get a read on suspects and witnesses. Note to self: stay off Facebook.
After an hour or so, only three potential jurors had been selected-a female editor at a university press who lived in Flushing, Queens, a fortyish female occupational therapist from Staten Island, and a heavyset, smiley Hispanic guy who ran the food concessions at the Bronx Zoo.
I checked the time on my phone. I’d love to spend all day watching the total ridiculousness of these expensive lawyers, but it was my day off and I had places to go and multiple children to attend to.
As I stood, I exchanged eye contact with Tara where she sat with the other lawyers on the prosecution side. We’d already had a good laugh about her Saturday night antics. Apparently, she’d forgotten to read the “do not drink alcohol” fine print on some prescription meds she’d just taken and couldn’t apologize enough. I told her not to worry about it-with my ten kids, I was an expert at tucking people in.
Tara gave me a quick wave and a smile, and as I turned to leave, I caught Perrine out of the corner of my eye. He was turned around in his seat, facing me. We looked at each other for a beat. I thought one of my molars might crack as I smiled hard at this monster who was in the process of being brought to the justice he so richly deserved.
I yawned elaborately and waved bye-bye before I slowly headed for the courtroom door.
THE COURT OFFICER break room was in the Marshall Courthouse’s hot, musty basement, just off the north stairwell. At four minutes past 10:00 a.m., there were three officers there on break-a white, mustached twenty- two-year veteran officer named Tom Porte and two recent hires, Ronald Pinzano, a short and stout Asian ex- marine, and Stacy Mays, a young black man who’d become a father for the first time three days before.
The armed and uniformed men were used to frequent breaks and delays in the cases they were assigned to and were seated at a table playing a game of hearts when the door opened behind them. As they glanced up from their cards, they noticed a Hispanic janitor smiling at them from the doorway. If there was anything distinguishing about him, it was that he was short and very stocky. Clutched in his wide fist was a coffee mug with the words I SEE DUMB PEOPLE emblazoned across it.
“Help you?” Officer Mays said, eyeing him.
“May… I… use?” the janitor said in halting English as he gestured the mug toward the microwave in the break room’s corner.
The janitor nodded and grinned as he quickly crossed the room and put the coffee mug into the bulky old microwave. There were loud beeps as he pressed buttons, followed by a loud hum.
“Hey, buddy. How’s ol’ Pedro in maintenance doing?” Officer Pinzano said from the table. “Is he back from his knee surgery?”
The janitor turned, smiling blankly, and stared at the officer.
“Thank you,” he said, nodding. “Thank you. Thank you.”
“Thank you?” the pudgy Asian said, shaking his shaved head in disgust as he threw down a card. “These friggin’ illegals. This cat doesn’t speak word one of English, and here he is living high on the hog with a government union job. Hell, he probably makes more than us.”
“Speak for yourself, Ron,” Tom Porte said, raising a white eyebrow. “The way you sponge up the overtime, some of the judges around here make less than you.”
The janitor kept smiling as the microwave continued to hum. Two minutes passed. Three.
“Jeez, this guy is really frying that joe,” Mays commented as the bell finally dinged.
“You like that coffee
The janitor had his back to the men as he very carefully removed the cup from the oven. Next to the microwave, a radio played at low volume. The zany percussion of a xylophone, the familiar station ID of a local news channel, filled the small room as the janitor reached out with his free hand and turned it up.
The scalding oil made a crisp, sizzling sound as it made contact with the men’s skin. As Tom Porte screamed, the janitor stepped forward and nimbly removed the.38-caliber revolver from his holster and aimed the gun. Three shots and less than ten seconds later, all three men were down on the concrete floor, flailing in a mess of blood splatter and baby oil and fallen cards.
Officer Stacy Mays shook horribly as he bled out, his ruined head beating against the cement almost in time to
