CHAPTER THREE
Trevor Martin had done well for himself, Sarah reflected, as she sat opposite his massive mahogany desk on Monday, sipping the coffee his assistant had brought in. He could afford a three-office suite on the thirtieth floor of 600 West Broadway to house himself and his two associate attorneys. The associates were tucked into the interior spaces, but Trevor’s office overlooked San Diego Bay, now sparkling in the August morning as if the sun had thrown handfuls of diamond dust over the gray-blue waves.
“You aren’t going to like what I have to say about this case,” Trevor began.
“Try me.”
“Well, to get straight to the point, your client is as looney as they come. The court declared a doubt about her mental competency to stand trial a week after the preliminary hearing. Basically, she went straight back to her cell at the jail after the prelim, curled up on her bunk, and hasn’t spoken a word since.”
“Wouldn’t it be a bit of a shock to be held for trial on two murders, knowing she’s facing the death penalty?”
Trevor shrugged. “She’s a lawyer, herself. She had to know what was going to go down from the minute she pulled the trigger on Brigman.”
“Did she tell you she did it?”
“Of course not. She claims she left Brigman’s at 9:30 and went home to Pacific Beach. But that can’t be true because her cell phone shows her in Brigman and her ex-husband’s neighborhood at 11:15 p.m. Alexa had just enough time to kill Brigman and then drive over to Michael’s and shoot him.. She was between murders when Meggie called. And, as you probably know, the Glock .9 used to kill them both was registered to her.”
“How did she explain the cell phone evidence?”
“Not very well. She says she was driving around because she couldn’t sleep and was missing her children.”
“Isn’t that possible? They were little. She’d be likely to miss them.”
“Oh come on!” Trevor leaned back in his chair and shook his head at her stupidity. “In what universe does a woman with motive and opportunity just happened to be driving around the neighborhood of the two men she hates above all others at the very same time someone is using her gun to kill them?”
“What does she have to say about the gun?”
“That it was stolen. She claims she reported the theft to the police, but there’s no record of a police report.”
“How can you be sure there’s no report?”
“Preston Baldwin is the deputy district attorney who’s prosecuting the case. He’s the number three man in that office, and we go back a long way. He’s turned over all the discovery, and no police report.”
Sarah studied Trevor until he began to squirm in the silence. If you put an ill-fitting, thousand-dollar suit on a donkey and turned it into a person then added a beer belly, you’d get Trevor Martin, she reflected. He was thin, except for the paunch, in his late fifties, with a bulbous nose, and squinty dark eyes of an undefined color. He combed his sparse gray locks over Donald Trump-style and wore a suit that matched his hair. Everything about him said mediocrity. Sarah reckoned he’d earned his high-class address based on cunning and deceit and not on legal talent.
“You mean you’re conducting your investigation into your client’s defense relying solely upon the word of the man who’s prosecuting her?”
“Look, you’re making way too much out of this. I told you, Preston and I go way back. We’ve tried probably a hundred cases against each other. We socialize. In fact, I was at a barbecue at his house the night after the prelim. If that report had been in his file, he’d have turned it over.”
Sarah tried to keep her face impassive, but she could tell Trevor was becoming more and more agitated by her disapproval. He leaned over his desk and hissed, “Don’t waste your time on sympathy for this woman. She’s a consummate lying, manipulating bitch.”
“I’m sorry, did you just call your client a ‘bitch’? What about fiduciary duty and duty of loyalty to the client? Did you tell her you were partying with opposing counsel the night after she was bound over to face the death penalty?”
Trevor was incensed. “Don’t quote the Rules of Professional Conduct to me. I know them. But I also know how to survive in this town. My relationship with Preston Baldwin has lasted for twenty years. Clients come and go. As will Alexa Reed. No, I didn’t tell her Preston and I are friends. That’s my private life, and I’m not bound to reveal my private life to clients.”
“But that’s not how it works,” Sarah said. “Our duty of loyalty is to our clients, not to the attorneys we try cases with. If you had a social relationship with opposing counsel, you should have told her.”
Trevor shrugged. “I can see you’ve got a lot to learn. This isn’t New York, Ms. Knight. We do things our own way.”
“This is beginning to sound like my meeting with Hal Remington.”
“Better not cross Hal if you want to work in San Diego.”
“Funny, that’s exactly what he said.”
Trevor leaned back in his padded leather executive chair and adopted a paternal tone. “If you want to go on some sort of crusade, claiming we’re all unethical, you’re welcome to do it. But remember, we’ve all been here more than twenty years, doing our jobs, and not getting into any trouble with the state bar. If you start accusing us of shafting our clients – even if we do – you won’t get to first base. Who do you think the state bar is going to believe? You and a string of convicted felons, complaining about their trial attorneys? Or us?”
“That’s the speech Hal Remington gave me.”
“And he was right on the money! Look, Ms. Knight. Alexa Reed was a washed up associate at Warwick, Thompson, and Hayes. She got herself pregnant twice without much time between babies to hide her incompetence and to give herself an excuse to leave the firm. Michael, on the other hand, was a brilliant young lawyer who made partner in four years.”
“Was he brilliant or just the son of a sitting United States Supreme Court justice who was a former Warrick, Thompson partner himself?”
“If I have to answer that question, you haven’t heard anything I’ve said so far. Anyway, Alexa gets herself knocked up twice. The firm lets her go; and then she files for divorce, claiming Michael beat her and persuaded the partners to fire her. Ronald Brigman did her psychological evaluation in the custody case and found she was lying about the beatings and about why she was fired. Based on those findings, Brigman decided to give primary custody of the kids to Michael. Not less than a month later, Brigman and Michael are dead, killed with the gun registered to Alexa, who claims she was just driving around aimlessly in the neighborhood when someone else used it. Come on, Ms. Knight. How much time do you think anyone should waste investigating this case?”
“As much time as it takes to get it right. Did you interview the children?”
“Meggie and Sam? Of course not. They’re only six and five.”
“And they were in the house when their mother supposedly shot their father. What if she didn’t shoot him, and the children are the missing to prove it?”
Sarah noticed Trevor Martin’s face begin to go dark red. Could he be on the verge of a heart attack? “Don’t be ridiculous. There’s no way anyone can prove Alexa Reed is innocent. Interviewing the children wouldn’t change a thing. Besides, Coleman Reed and his wife Myra took Meggie and Sam to D.C. to live with them as soon as Alexa was arrested. Justice Reed requested a protective order from the superior court to keep people like you from bothering them. You want to talk to the children? You’d better have an airtight reason. Look, Ms. Knight. Remember what Hal Remington said: don’t try too hard if you expect to work in this town. Just file a few in limine motions to make it look good, do some cross examination, and accept the inevitable outcome. This client is a guilty nut job and them some. You’re here to make it look good and get paid. That’s all.
“And by the way, this case is going nowhere fast at the moment because Alexa Reed is curled up in that catatonic ball in her cell. She wouldn’t talk to me, and I doubt she will talk to you.”
“So I gather there’s a hearing coming up to determine whether she is competent to stand trial?”
“Right. On September 3, the day after labor day.”
“And who is the psychologist who is evaluating her for that hearing?”
“Percy Andrews.”
“What didn’t you request someone out of L.A.?”
“Because I didn’t need to. Percy Andrews has been doing court appointed evaluations in this town for twenty years.”
“And that’s my point. Isn’t it a conflict of interest to have him evaluating the woman accused of killing a colleague?”
His mouth became a tight line and he stood up abruptly. “I’ve got another appointment coming in ten minutes. I’ve given you all the help I can. And I’ve warned you. If you have any questions after you go over the file, you can call me.”
But not bloody likely you’ll answer, Sarah thought as she shook hands and left his office.
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