dozen pages stapled together.
“OK, I think we’d better get a move on. We’re working on some research for the change of venue motion, but in the meantime we need to review the evidence.”
He handed copies of the report to Andi and Claymore.
“The case against you appears to be made up of the following. One: a statement of the alleged victim including the second of two photo line-ups. Two: a medical report about the victim’s physical condition right after she reported the incident. Three: police photographic evidence of same. Four, a DNA comparison between crime- scene DNA and reference samples taken from you and the alleged victim. Five: eye-witness evidence after the alleged rape that you were seen running from the crime scene. Six: your arrest record — six counts of rape. We may be able to block that, depending on how we want to fight the case, but in practice it was so high profile, every member of the jury is going to know about it long before they enter the courtroom.”
“I don’t know where they got this stuff,” said Claymore shaking his head, “I mean all that other stuff.”
“Some of it’s easy enough to demolish,” said Alex. “The witness who saw you running away is weak. But the real problem is the DNA and the medical and photographic evidence. The visible injuries to the girl make it hard to argue consent and the DNA makes it equally hard to deny that a sexual encounter took place.”
“I don’t understand how they could’ve got DNA evidence.”
“How do you mean?” asked Andi, suspicion creeping into her tone.
“I never touched her. I’ve never even
“All right,” said Alex. “We’ll go into that in a moment. But first let me make one thing clear: we can argue that the sex was rough but consensual or we can argue DNA contamination and see if we can come up with anything. But not both. We have to nail our colors to the mast quite early. In effect you’ve already committed us to saying that it’s mistaken identity because of what you told the police. Technically we can still change your story, but it won’t look good.”
“But why
For a few seconds they all avoided each other’s eyes as they realized what Claymore had been about to say.
Monday, 15 June 2009 — 13:00
“There goes Uncle Tom.”
There was mocking laughter and jeering as Elias Claymore shuffled his way to the end of the table.
“Watch where you’re sitting!” snarled the man next to him, as Claymore barely brushed against him when he sat.
Claymore tried to ignore the taunts. But when he raised the food to his mouth, he felt a sharp elbow in the rib cage, making him drop it. He knew that this was the test. If he showed weakness now, they would make his life a living hell. He had to stand up to the bullies before they saw him as easy prey.
“Look cut it out!” he shouted, leaping to his feet and turning to face his attacker.
The man rose to face Claymore. They were evenly matched for size, but the man was a lot younger and probably a lot fitter.
“You talkin’ to me
The words were backed up by an open-handed shove.
“Yeah you!” Claymore shot back, shoving the man equally hard.
Then the man took a swing at Claymore. Claymore ducked and dove in under the younger man’s guard, clamping on a side headlock and a hooking his right leg around the younger man’s left leg in a grapevine. The young man took a swing at Claymore with his left fist, which Claymore deflected with his open right. But he couldn’t avoid the younger man’s rabbit punch to the back of his head, a second before he swung the man round and grappled him to the ground.
At that point the whole place erupted into pure chaos as a nervous guard hit the panic button
Monday, 15 June 2009 — 16:35
“So when are you going back to LA?”
Alex was sitting with Juanita in the reception of their San Francisco office on the 15th floor of the Embarcadero Center. He had flown back that afternoon, after the consultation with Claymore, and was now briefing his paralegal on the background to the case.
“We’ve got the prelim in twelve days and I’m planning on pushing hard for a change of venue.”
“What are the chances?”
“Well the DA will fight us all the way. It’s Sarah Jensen. I don’t know if you’ve heard of her.”
“I’ve heard of her,” said Juanita. “Ventura County Domestic Violence section. The rumor mill says she’s got her sights set on her boss’s job.”
“And her boss has his sights set on Sacramento.”
“Exactly. Anyway, we already had a fight on our hands about Andromeda Phoenix taking second seat and we won that. But that’s ‘cause she didn’t really have a leg to stand on. That means she’ll be even
“Maybe you should step aside and let it turn into a catfight. Assuming she’s good enough.”
“Oh Andi’s good. But I don’t know if she’s fully-”
The phone rang. Juanita picked it up.
“Alex Sedaka’s office… oh hallo, Ms Phoenix… I’ll put you through right away.”
She put the call on hold.
“I could have taken it here,” said Alex.
“I need this phone free for other calls,” said Juanita in her sharpest tone. “This is an office.”
“Okay boss,” he said, with a smile, as he rose from his chair.
Juanita put the call through to his office before he got there, making sure that his phone was ringing by the time he went through the door.
“Hi Andi,” he said into the handset.
“Hi Mr Seda — Alex. Listen, I’ve been working here with the demographic department at my firm and we’ve been trying to figure out which are the best counties to try the case. We’ve come up with a list of counties based on demographic analysis and some public prejudice questionnaires.”
“And which counties are they?”
“Well the best is Alameda. I emailed a file over to you. Take a look at the demography. It has about 300,000 Hispanics to 200,000 African-Americans and half a million white non-Hispanics. It’s also got 350,000 Asians, who may or may not be friendly to Claymore. We’ll have to run some surveys to check that out.”
“Okay. But the 200,000 African-Americans won’t necessarily be too friendly to Claymore.”
“No, but I was thinking about this white liberal issue.”
“What about it?”
“Well, you can cherry pick the liberals at the voir dire.”
“Yes, but whatever cherry picking we try and do, the prosecution will do the opposite.”
“I know that. But it’s a question of how many liberals there are on the panel.”
“Yes, but like you said, Andi, there’s no such thing as a white liberal county.”
“Alameda’s the closest you’ve got. Don’t forget Berkeley right on your doorstep.”
“You could be onto something,” Alex conceded. “The trouble is, the prosecution has ten peremptories too — and they’ill fight us every step of the way.”
“Only if you tip your hand.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
