Mystery Writers of America Presents the Prosecution Rests
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Authors: Linda Fairstein
Tags: #FIC003000
Compilation copyright © 2009 by Mystery Writers of America, Inc.
Introduction copyright © 2009 by Linda Fairstein
All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced,
distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written
permission of the publisher.
Little, Brown and Company
Hachette Book Group
237 Park Avenue, New York, NY 10017
Visit our Web site at
www.HachetteBookGroup.com
First eBook Edition: April 2009
Little, Brown and Company is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Little, Brown name and logo are trademarks of Hachette
Book Group, Inc.
The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and
not intended by the author.
Copyright notices for individual stories appear on page 421.
ISBN: 978-0-316-05333-4
Contents
THE PROSECUTION RESTS: AN INTRODUCTION
ABOUT MYSTERY WRITERS OF AMERICA
ALSO BY LINDA FAIRSTEIN
Killer Heat
Bad Blood
Death Dance
Entombed
The Kills
The Bone Vault
The Deadhouse
Cold Hit
Likely to Die
Final Jeopardy
ALSO FROM THE MYSTERY WRITERS OF AMERICA
The Blue Religion
(Edited by Michael Connelly)
Death Do Us Part
(Edited by Harlan Coben)
A
s a prosecutor in the great office of the New York County District Attorney for thirty years, I tried dozens of felony cases—murder,
rape, robbery, burglary, and assaults of every variety. I worked shoulder to shoulder with the smartest cops in the city before
ever taking the results of their investigations into the well of the courtroom and presenting the gathered evidence to a jury
of the defendant’s peers. My adversaries were among the most talented members of the defense bar, skilled in the art of advocacy
and the ability to communicate with those good citizens chosen to judge the fate of their clients.
There were powerful moments of eliciting facts from witnesses that established the necessary elements of brutal crimes, a
few terrifying occasions when the mendacity of my own complainants was exposed by the opposing counsel, the astounding triumphs
afforded to my colleagues and me when a revolutionary scientific technique called DNA analysis was first introduced to the
criminal courtroom in 1986, and every now and then a dazzling turn at cross-examination which nailed the hired gun, the expert
witness of an opponent.
My favorite moment in the trial was always the point at which I rested, at which I announced to the judge and jury that I
had completed the People’s case. It was the culmination of months of preparation and organization, mastering the facts and
scrutinizing the details, interpreting the alleles and loci of genetic fingerprinting, and packaging everything I could gather
to present to the jury in a logical, persuasive, and trustworthy fashion. Defense counsel had taken his best shot at my witnesses,
and might or might not go on to offer his own version of events, but my burden on behalf of the state had been satisfied.
The old maxim claims that a trial is a search for the truth. But as all the participants know, that search should have been
completed long before any of us walk through the courtroom doors to try to convince the jurors of our position. From the discovery
of the commission of the crime, police officers are charged with the responsibility of evaluating the evidence they collect—eyewitness
descriptions and circumstantial facts, and now the remarkable forensic tools that have so radically affected the criminal
justice system.
Then district attorneys are called in on the cases. We take our witnesses as we find them—some of them “innocent” victims,
but many of them flawed human beings—people who lie, cheat, steal, and have violated most of the other commandments before
they ever raise their hands and swear to tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Defendants are arrested and indicted,
hiring private counsel or assigned public defenders to represent them at trial. The search for truth goes on throughout the
entirety of the pre-trial period—lawyers for both sides seek testimonial, documentary, and scientific evidence to corroborate
their witnesses or exonerate those wrongly charged. Most of the time, I like to think, our system of justice has served us
well.
The Mystery Writers of America invited authors—bestselling storytellers as well as new voices—to explore the complicated characters
that inhabit the courtroom. In this wonderfully mixed collection of well-told tales, you’ll meet rogue lawyers and victims
who lie; people who want the system to work and those who use it for revenge or a more personal form of justice; the alibi
witness who is eviscerated on the stand and the killer who gets away with murder. These are stories about the criminal justice
system, and, may it please the court, I—for one—am grateful they are fiction.
I am delighted to offer the exhibits in this anthology to you as part of my case in chief. Again, it’s like my favorite moment
at trial. I’ve given you the best of my fellow MWA writers, and now I get to sit back at counsel table while you evaluate
the evidence.
The prosecution rests, but I hope your enjoyment of these stories is just beginning.
—Linda Fairstein
BY EDWARD D. HOCH
J
udge Bangor himself entered Harry Fine’s chambers a few weeks following Harry’s swearing in as the newest justice on the state’s
Court of Appeals. It was a snowy January morning with the windows tightly closed, and Harry’s first thought was that the Chief
would probably light up one of his cigars in violation of the building’s no-smoking rule.
“Harry, do you have a few minutes?” he asked, closing the door behind him without waiting for a reply.
Judge Bangor was the ultimate father figure, a stern but fair man who’d headed the Court of Appeals since Harry was admitted
to the bar a dozen years earlier. He was over six feet tall with snow-white hair and a commanding voice that had many attorneys
quaking in their boots and rushing back to the law library after a session with him.
“Certainly, Chief,” Harry said at once, rising from his chair. “What can I do for you?”
“Sit down, sit down!” He took the maroon leather armchair opposite Harry’s desk. “What I’m about to tell you is in confidence.
I’d hoped I wouldn’t have to tell you at all, but something’s come up which may require our action.”
“You certainly have my curiosity aroused,” Harry said with a smile.
“Did you ever wonder what prompted Colin Penny’s resignation, opening up the seat for you?”
“He said he wanted to spend more time with his family and maybe return to private law practice.”
Judge Bangor snorted. “I doubt if you’ll see him in a courtroom again, at least not in this state. Any sitting justices, especially
on the Court of Appeals, are open to bribery attempts. It goes with the territory in this state. Certain accusations were
made against Judge Penny, accusations that could damage a person’s career even if they went unproven. Rather than allow these
to be made public, we convened a secret session of the court—”
“A what?”
“Perhaps that is the wrong term to use. In any event, all five justices—including Judge Penny—gathered in private to examine
the charges and rumors circulating about his conduct. Much of the evidence concerned a large political donation, beyond the
legal limits, made by a lumber company that won the bidding to cull a portion of state forestland. Another bidder had sued,
claiming the winner had prior knowledge of the bidding. His claim was rejected by a lower court, but it was working its way
up to us. That was when Penny accepted a large political donation from the lumber company.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Harry Fine asked. There was something unsettling about the conversation and he wanted it to
end.
“Because it has become necessary, Harry. In our secret session we heard the case against Colin Penny and listened to his meager
defense. Then he left the room while the four of us discussed his fate. I must tell you, the vote to force his resignation
was not unanimous. Susan Quinn was on his side and spoke vigorously in his defense, but the vote was three to one, or three
to two if we count Judge Penny’s own vote. He was told he would have to resign.”
“He went along with that?”
“He had no choice. The reporter who had the story agreed to kill it if Penny offered his resignation. Otherwise it would have
been all over the papers.”
Fine shook his head. “Highly irregular,” he muttered.
“This is my court, Harry. I will do everything in my power to douse any flicker of scandal before it ignites.”
“You still haven’t told me why I need to know this.”
Judge Bangor paused and reached for a cigar in his breast pocket, then thought better of it. “The reporter who threatened
to break the story about Penny’s illegal contributions now says there is a second member of the court involved. I see us going
through this whole nightmare again. That’s why I’ve come to you.”
“Who’s the reporter?”
“Maeve McGuire. You’ve probably seen her bylines.”
Harry Fine nodded. “She’s a pretty good writer. Ran a short interview on me after my appointment last month.”
“I read it. That’s why you’re the perfect one to contact her.”
“Contact her about what? I can’t ask her to kill a story.”
“Of course not. But you can have a friendly conversation with her, find out what’s going on. All I have is a tip, and I can’t
pursue it personally for various reasons.”
“Couldn’t one of the other justices—?”
“Hardly! If the information she has is accurate, any one of them might be involved.”
“Surely not Susan Quinn!” The feisty brunette judge, only a few years older than Fine, had introduced him to his new position
by tutoring him in the arcane rituals of the Court of Appeals.
Judge Bangor shrugged. “It might be Quinn or Frank Rockwell or Zach Wanamaker. Find out what you can.”
“I doubt if she’ll reveal any big secrets, not to me at least.”
____
F
INE PHONED
M
AEVE
McGuire and invited her to lunch the following day. Not wanting it to appear clandestine in any way, he suggested they meet
at the Temple Bar, a restaurant across from the appellate court that was frequented by lawyers and judges. As the hostess
showed them to a table near the window, he saw Judge Rockwell at a nearby table, raising his eyebrows.
Maeve saw it too and commented, “Does he think he’s spotted a blooming romance?”
“I hope not. My divorce isn’t final yet.”
She was an intense, attractive young woman who rarely smiled even when joking. Harry Fine read her columns intermittently
and had seen her around the courts on occasion. He had consented to last month’s interview after winning the appointment to
fill Colin Penny’s term.
“I hope you phoned to give me the inside scoop on the appellate court,” she chided him now. “The word is that Bangor rules
with an iron fist.”
“You probably know more about it than I do,” he told her. “What’s the latest scandal?”
She shrugged. “One a year is quite enough. I assume you know about your predecessor.”
“Judge Penny? I’ve heard talk. I’ve even heard he might not have been the only one accepting illegal campaign contributions.”
“Tell me more!” she urged, flashing one of her rare smiles.
“I was hoping you could tell me.”
The smile faded as quickly as it had appeared. “Did Judge Bangor send you?”
“Let’s enjoy our lunch and not worry about who sent me.”
She shook her head. “Look, Judge Fine, I interviewed you for my paper, but that doesn’t make us lifelong friends. I have nothing
to tell you. As you probably know, I agreed to kill a story about Judge Penny because he resigned from the court. That was
a one-shot, and it won’t happen again. Anything more that I discover about illegal contributions or bribes will end up on
our front page.”