after the father found Jenkins taking pictures of his daughter at the
park. The girl remained clothed the entire time, but Jenkins had
manipulated her into various poses that revealed his Chester the
Molester ways. When the responding police officer perused the other
shots in the guy's digital camera, he found forty photographs of eight
different kids. Bent over, legs spread, fingers in their open mouths;
the details varied, but the gist was always the same. Jenkins admitted
to the officer that he used the pictures to pleasure himself sexually
and did not consider them to be art.
A single line at the end of the police report hinted at the problem
with the case: 'I decided to arrest the suspect for harassment, since
he touched the vie to achieve the desired pose, and such touching was
offensive under the circumstances.' It wasn't obvious what to charge
the defendant with, but I wasn't about to let a guy like Jenkins off
the hook with the misdemeanor of harassment.
I flipped through the penal code to confirm my recollection, but the
child sex abuse laws all required physical contact or at least nudity.
I reread the victim's statement. For the photograph of her straddling
the slide, she said Jenkins told her to climb up the ladder, then
pulled her feet on either side of the slide before she went down. She
said the slide hurt her skin and she didn't know why she couldn't keep
her dress beneath her legs. The officer noted some redness on the
backs of her thighs. Good enough for me. An assault on a
four-year-old is a felony, and I had an appellate case saying a red
mark is enough to get an assault charge before a jury, which I'd pack
full of parents. Jenkins could make all the arguments he wanted about
strict statutory definitions, but the charge would stick.
I sent a follow-up request to a detective I knew in the child sex abuse
unit asking him to run Jenkins's other photographs by the DARE officers
who worked the schools near the park. Even if finding the other kids
didn't lead to more charges, telling the parents seemed like the right
thing to do. They were probably convinced that the 'don't talk to
strangers' talk had been enough to protect their kids. It never is.
Thanks to a grand jury appearance and an overdue response to a motion
to suppress, I didn't finish reviewing the rest of the custodies until
nearly noon. I apologized to Alice as I put them on her desk. For her
to finalize the paperwork in time for arraignments, she'd have to work
through lunch.
'The least I can do is bring you something,' I offered. She told me it
wasn't necessary. If the attorneys here paid for lunch every time they
screwed over the staff, we'd all be broke, and they'd all be fat. But,
after the polite amount of argument, she accepted.
Alice estimated she had another hour of work, so I decided to take in a
quick run. Jessica Walters was also in the locker room and asked if I
wanted to join her for a loop around the waterfront.
Whenever I run with someone new, I let them set the pace. We were
clocking about an eight-minute mile, which was comfortable for me, but
I couldn't tell if she was holding back.
We crossed the Willamette over the Morrison Bridge, saving the
prettiest, downtown side of the loop for last. Once the noise of the
bridge was past us and we had dropped down to the river's edge, she
asked me if I had ever tried to run with the office's Hood-to-Coast
team.
The Hood-to-Coast is Oregon's annual relay race from Mount Hood to the
Pacific coast. At one time, there had been an official District
Attorney team. When Duncan found out that the members wore T-shirts
bearing electric chairs, one for each defendant the runner had placed
on death row, he pulled the plug.
I reminded Jessica that the group was no longer the official office
team, making no effort to hide my sarcasm.
'Whatever. Have you ever run with them?'
'I didn't think I was eligible.' My impression was that a team member
needed to have a reliable eight-minute mile, the ability and
willingness to drink mass quantities of alcohol, and a penis. Two out
of three didn't cut it. 'In any event, I figure you choose your
battles.' If I was going to become the office's rabble-rouser, it
wasn't going to be for the privilege of running with a group that likes
to polish off the day by watching each other light their gas.
We had started a subtle incline but hadn't dropped the pace. Jessica
didn't say anything until the path flattened out again.
'How's the evidence against Jackson looking?' she asked. She was
winded but could still get the words out.
I gave her the abbreviated version. 'I know the case is strong, but
ever since I issued it, I've been finding myself getting worried. Frist
thinks I might regret telling the defense about the affair.'
'It's your first murder case,' she said, 'so you're worrying more than
you need to. It's normal. You'll feel great by the day of trial.'
She was right. A case is always strongest at the beginning, when all
you've got is what the police have given you. As you move toward
trial, your job and the defense's is to pick, poke, and prod at every
last thread, any possible wrinkle that might turn out to be the glove
that won't stretch over the defendant's hand. But by the first day of
