While everybody was facing the judge, the door opened again and an elderly Korean man slipped in the back and took a seat by the door. It was Minister of Defense Lee. I’d made sure he was invited, although until this moment I wasn’t sure he was going to come.
Carruthers opened with a fierce glower and explanation that this was a highly unusual procedure that was essential for the pursuit of justice. He pointed at the camcorder and informed us that the proceedings would be taped and preserved in the event of a subsequent appeal. The proceeding would be treated as though we were in the courtroom. He informed us we’d be hearing classified testimony, and if a single word uttered in this room leaked out, there’d be another court-martial, and he’d personally chair it, and it wouldn’t be pretty.
Such was the judge’s manner that even Buzz Mercer gulped.
Then Carruthers pulled a wooden mallet out of a pocket and slammed his little desk two or three times.
Mercer was asked to move to a chair in front of the judge’s desk, where he was sworn in by the bailiff. The judge asked him a few introductory questions, like who was he, and what was his job, and what was his involvement with this case.
Eddie was seated in the corner of the room, and I kept my eyes on him, while his own kept wandering warily over to me. I could see he was curious, even nervous, about my role. I wasn’t here as an attorney, since I’d already recused myself. Nor was I a witness. I was here as a specially appointed military assistant to Judge Barry Carruthers.
We’d even sent a frantic query to the military’s review court in Alexandria, Virginia, about our intentions, and they’d responded that they’d never heard of anything like this being done before, but as I was a sworn officer of the court, there didn’t seem to be anything in the Uniform Code of Military Justice that precluded it. You can only have one judge in a criminal trial, but what law says he can’t have an assistant?
Since nothing about to be discussed had been made available through pretrial discovery to either side, or even to the judge, this really was an unprecedented thing. On the other hand, both Carruthers and I had worked in the SPECAT court, where extraordinary things were done as a matter of course to protect the country’s security.
Anyway, once Mercer had told everybody who he was, and about his involvement in this case, the judge turned the proceeding over to his specially appointed assistant. That meant he turned it over to me.
I said, “Mr. Mercer, could you please explain to the court the trail of events that led to your discovery that Chief Warrant Officer Michael Bales and Chief Inspector Choi Lee Min were operating as agents of North Korea?”
I thought Eddie was going to have a heart attack right on the spot. He started to stand up, and I’m sure he was on the verge of protesting, but Carruthers banged his mallet twice, hard, and Eddie fell quietly back into his chair.
I helped guide Buzz through everything. At key points, I made him slow down and explain how some particular deduction was made, or I made him provide more detailed explanations of some twist or turn in the investigation. It only got awkward when he kept bringing my name into it, which happened to be fairly often, as you might imagine. But again, I wasn’t here as an attorney but as a member of the judge’s staff, so there was nothing prejudicial about it.
It took about an hour to get it all out, and frankly every soul in that room, even Eddie, was completely mesmerized. The men and women in this room were hearing the intricate, blow-by-blow details of the largest counterespionage case in U.S. history. The public wasn’t even yet aware it’d happened.
When Buzz was done, there was this odd moment you wouldn’t exactly call a stunned silence. It was more like a bunch of people seated around a room staring at a bombshell that had just crashed through the ceiling, a not- yet-exploded one that you could hear ticking away. There was a communal reluctance to move, or breathe, or speak.
Then Eddie recovered his wits. “Your Honor,” he called out in an irritated voice, “do I get to examine the witness?”
“Of course,” Carruthers announced. “But this is a courtroom, so defense precedes.”
Poor Kip was frozen in his seat. I could see his eyes darting around as he wondered what he could possibly ask the CIA station chief who’d just fingered two of the prosecution’s witnesses as North Korean spies.
Finally he just shook his head. “I’ll reserve till cross-examination.”
That was actually a pretty smart move on Kip’s part. Let Golden take his best shots, then see what damage needed to be repaired.
Eddie stood up and paced around trying to look lawyerly. I wanted to remind him there were no TV cameras in this room, so just cut the bullshit. He eventually stopped of his own accord right in front of Buzz.
He somehow managed to make himself looked amused. “Uh, Mr. Mercer, I’m sorry. That was a very, very entertaining story, but I didn’t really hear you present any evidence that either Michael Bales or Choi Lee Min are agents of North Korea.”
Buzz said, “No, I guess I didn’t.”
“I didn’t think you did,” Eddie said, instantly agreeable. “What I heard was a wildly circumstantial story that could have two dozen different entirely plausible explanations. You’re a trained intelligence officer, aren’t you? Assumptions can be very dangerous in your line of work. Don’t you agree?”
Buzz was scratching his head and nodding. “Absolutely, Major. One of the most dangerous mistakes you can make.”
“And Michael Bales is not here and is therefore unable to defend himself, right?”
“That’s true,” Buzz said. “Just seems to have dropped off the face of the earth.”
“And Choi’s dead, isn’t he?”
“He is indeed dead,” Buzz said with all-too-apparent satisfaction. “Major Drummond’s co-counsel killed him.”
“So you’re asking us to take on face value that they were agents of North Korea. Isn’t that true?”
“No, I wouldn’t say that. I’d-”
There’s a lawyer’s dictum that you never, ever ask a potentially antagonistic witness a question you don’t already know the answer to. Eddie had done his best to avoid it, slickly using his first four or five questions to feel out what Mercer had, to narrow down the odds, but in the end he’d stepped blindly off the cliff. He’d violated that dictum. And he knew it.
But he wasn’t known as Fast Eddie for nothing.
“That’s all I have,” he quickly interrupted.
Buzz’s lips were still parted, and he looked ready to say something more – he obviously wanted to – so Eddie leaned toward him and fixed him with a perfectly evil stare. “I said that’s all I have, Mr. Mercer.”
Then Eddie stomped over to his seat. The only problem was, he’d already committed legal suicide.
Carruthers looked at Kip. “Do you have any questions?”
Maybe Kip would’ve gotten around to asking it anyway, but Eddie had just opened the doorway for him, so Kip stood up and smiled, and stepped right through.
“Let me start, Mr. Mercer, by congratulating you. As a soldier and an American, I’m deeply impressed by the service you’ve rendered.”
“Thank you, Captain.” Buzz nodded, playing his role to the hilt.
Then Kip looked over at me. “And you, too, Major Drummond. You’re a real hero.”
I mumbled, “Thank you.”
Kip grinned and then turned back to Mercer. “Now, I know you’re a very busy man, so I have only one subject of inquiry.”
“Yes?”
“Do you have any direct evidence that Michael Bales or Choi Lee Min were agents of North Korea?”
“In fact, I do.”
“And where is this evidence?”
“Actually,” Buzz said, pointing at the TV screen, “I brought along a videotape. We interrogated Mrs. Michael Bales, who also was an intelligence agent employed by North Korea.”
“Can we see that tape?” Kip quite naturally asked.
“That’s why I brought it.”
