Reprisal

always welcome to return from the ‘dark side’ to work with us.”

Zehra laughed. “Too much bureaucracy for me.”

He said goodbye with a little flip of his hand and left to meet with the defense lawyer on his case.

“Nice guy,” Jackie said.

“Most of the prosecutors are. We’ve got our problems; they’ve got theirs.”

“It’s busy today.” She squinted at the horde.

“Let’s look for our client, ‘World Premiere.’”

“Huh?”

“That’s his name.”

“Seriously?”

Zehra shrugged.

They walked to the public area of the courtroom and searched the crowd. Outside, in the hall, they called out his name. Zehra looked at her watch. “He always runs twenty minutes late so he should be here.”

“Ms. Hassan.” The slim black man strode toward them. He tipped from side to side with an exaggerated shoulder roll that matched the rhythm of his walk. The baseball cap, red and white, was too large for his head and turned at a precise angle to his face. He smiled at them, exposing a golden front tooth.

“World Premiere,” Zehra reached out her hand to shake. With some of the male public defenders, the black clients gave a ‘soul’ shake, with a turn of the wrist and a bump of the fist. None of her clients ever shook with her that way.

“W’as happ’n here, Man.”

“Well, you’ve got the Disorderly Conduct case. Nothing too serious.”

“Man … they should drop that! Jus’ a bad communication.”

“Could be, but the prosecutor won’t. Probably ‘cause it happened with an employee who works in the building. Prosecutors feel very protective of them.”

“Ahh … what I gotta do?” His red shorts and basketball shoes, matched the color of his tank top.

Zehra flipped open the thin file containing a Complaint and a single page police report. “It says you wanted your free bus card. When the clerk wouldn’t give it to you, you went off on her, yelling, screaming, and threatening to ‘kick her ass.’”

“Nah, nah … that ain’t it, Man. She went off on me. Tha’s the truth. Here, catch this: how could I go off on her if I jus’ finished my last class on Anger Management. Twelve weeks in them classes. I graduated, Man.” He leaned back in stiff pride and jerked his head once to emphasize his success. He crossed thin arms over his chest. The tank top he wore revealed the tattoos on his arms. Most were gang signs.

“And … that proves it?”

Yeah, it proves it!” He jerked his head again.

“Look, World, or should I call you World Premiere?”

“My mama named me World Premiere. Tha’s my name.”

“Okay. Look, how ‘bout I can get you ten days in the workhouse, stayed for six months?”

“I don’t gotta go?” His eyes focused on Zehra.

“Not unless you violate your probation.”

“Do it, Man. I ain’t got time for this bullshit. I got my bidness to take care of, and I gots to get back to the crib. My baby’s mama’s there.”

After he pled guilty and was sentenced, they both walked out into the hall.

“Hey, thanks,” World Premiere told Zehra. “You’re a good lawyer. I’ll ask for you next time.”

When he flashed the golden smile, Zehra saw a young boy trying to act tough but, in the end, a petty criminal. She liked him and hoped he could make something worthwhile out of himself before it was too late. “Yeah, do that. Good luck.”

“I kind of liked him,” Jackie said. “Awesome outfit. Who’s next?”

“Franklin Pierce Anderson.”

“Like the president?”

“Hey, I don’t think these names up. You can’t invent them.” They both laughed.

When Zehra went back into the courtroom, she spied him sitting by himself in the public section. “Mr. Anderson?”

A pale, white man stood and stared at them for a moment. When he recognized Zehra, he followed her out into the hall.

The toughest problem with this one would be his body odor. Could she handle his case without passing out?

She turned to face him. He said, “Isn’t there a place we can talk in private? I don’t feel comfortable with these …” he twisted his head as he looked around them. “Criminals.”

“Unfortunately, no. We don’t have an office here. We can move over to the side of the wall there,” Zehra pointed down the long hall. “To our ‘private’ office.”

“Well, all right.” He waddled along beside them. He wore a shirt that hadn’t been pressed in a long time. His shoes were untied.

Zehra smelled a faint, stale odor near him. She backed off to the usual two arms-lengths.

“This is very embarrassing,” Mr. Anderson said when they stopped. “Do we have to go into the court with all those other people?”

“We have to. There’s no other way.”

“I’ve seen on TV where the lawyer can take the case into the judge’s chambers for privacy.” He jiggled has face from side to side so that the old wire-rimmed glasses he wore, already a little loose on his nose, shook with his face. He implied in his tone that Zehra, as a public defender, wasn’t a good lawyer because she couldn’t “work” the judge.

“Doesn’t work that way here,” she told him.

He sucked in a deep breath. “Well … what should I do?”

Balancing his file on her left arm, she opened it and skimmed over the allegations. “You’re charged with Cruelty to Animals. The allegations are that you got mad at your kids, and to punish them, you took their gerbils and placed each one into an air gun. What’s an ‘air gun’?” She glanced at him.

“It’s harmless. It … it has a large barrel. It propels things with compressed air. Harmless.”

“Well, it says you shot the gerbils across the backyard into the neighbor’s yard. When the neighbor got upset, you retrieved the stunned gerbils, brought them back and drowned them in a pail of water in front of your kids.” She looked up into his small green eyes, waiting to see what he’d say in response.

“Yeah … I guess that’s about what happened. But I never laid a hand on the damn kids. Does it say that in the reports?”

“Uh …” Zehra pretended to read the police report. “Yeah, it doesn’t say that you hit the kids.”

“Isn’t that a defense?”

“No, it’s not a defense. Wanna tell me what happened?”

“Well …” he shrugged beefy shoulders. “That’s about it. They wouldn’t obey me. Thanks to the bitch, their mother, they’re totally undisciplined. I had to get their attention. If you don’t have kids, you wouldn’t understand.” He paused. “What should I do now?”

“If you plead guilty, I’m sure we can keep you out of the workhouse. However, in a case like this, the judge’ll probably want a probation presentence investigation before he orders the conditions of your probation.”

“Probation? For what? Some goddamn, filthy little rats? What the hell’s this country coming to? Naw, naw, I’m not gonna do it. We’ll go all the way with this one. I’ll appeal …”

“Mr. Anderson, calm down.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down, lady. This is my life we’re talking about. No one cares about me. About what I’m going through. It’s all about the damn rats!”

“Okay, okay. I’ll set the case for trial. Of course, you’ll have to come back again and sit through two to three days of a trial in front of a jury and listen to all these allegations, I thought you wanted privacy?” She let the words hang around Anderson’s neck.

“Two days, huh? I gotta come back?” His eyes shifted up and down the hall where other lawyers met with their clients. Zehra saw him shudder. “I’d rather if we could wrap this up today.” He raised a finger in the air. “I