“No doubt he had run three blocks, placed it in the trash with his fingerprints and blood still on it, and returned in time to be there for your one o'clock walk.”
This was aimed at Wallace, but Cathy feels the need to defend herself.
“I know what I saw.” She points to Willie. “I saw him.”
I shake my head sadly. “No, Ms. Pearl, I'm afraid you have no idea what you saw.”
“Objection.”
“Sustained. Watch it, Mr. Carpenter.”
“Yes, Your Honor,” I say, “I will.” So I rephrase: “Now, Ms. Pearl, since it was light enough to see the defendant's face, and since he looked right at you, is it fair to say he could see your face?”
“Sure … I guess.”
“But he didn't try to hurt you? To do to you what you believe he did to Denise McGregor?”
“No, he just ran away.”
“Yet he should have realized that you could identify him, isn't that right?”
“I guess …”
“He would have known you could someday be an eyewitness, just like you are now?”
“I suppose so.”
“Maybe he had nothing to hide,” I say. “No further questions.”
Wallace gets up to rehabilitate her. “Ms. Pearl, when was the next time you saw the defendant after that night?”
“The next morning, at the police station. He was in the lineup. I picked him out right away.”
“With other men?”
Cathy nods. “A bunch of them.”
“And you had no doubt he was the man you saw in the alley the previous night?”
“No doubt. He was the one. I was positive then, and I'm just as positive now.”
Cathy leaves the stand. I definitely did not do enough to damage her. She seemed credible and has no reason to lie. If I were on the jury, I would believe her. And if I believed her, I would vote to convict Willie Miller of murder in the first degree.
I barely have time to reflect on how depressing the situation is when it gets considerably worse. Wallace tells Hatchet, “Your Honor, the state calls Randy Sacich.”
This is not good news; I've never heard of Randy Sacich, and witnesses that I've never heard of are the absolute worst.
“Your Honor,” I protest, “there is no such person on the state's witness list.”
Wallace nods. “We regret that, Your Honor, but Mr. Sacich only came to our attention late yesterday. Our people were questioning him this morning to confirm that he is a reliable witness.”
“Your Honor,” I reply, “I'm not sure our ‘people’ would come to the same conclusion as Mr. Wallace's ‘people.’ In any event, there should not be surprise witnesses before these people.” I point at the jury to show who I am referring to.
Hatchet sends the jury out of the room, and Wallace and I kick it around some more. Hatchet buys his position, and Sacich is allowed in. As the jury comes back into the room, I speak to Willie.
“Do you know who this guy is?”
“Nope.”
With the jury seated, Randy Sacich is brought in, and Willie stiffens in surprise. He leans in to me.
“He's the guy in the cell next to me.”
“Did you tell him anything incriminating?”
“What's that?”
“Bad. Did you tell him anything bad?”
Willie is wounded. “How many times I got to tell you, man? I got nothing bad to say.”
Wallace apparently believes otherwise. He takes Sacich through his connection to this case, which is basically one of geography.
“I'm in the cell next to his.”
Wallace continues, “And from this vantage point, are you two able to talk to each other?”
“Sure,” Sacich says. “Right through the bars.” He says this matter-of-factly, as though they live in suburbia and stop by to borrow cups of sugar.
“Did Mr. Miller ever mention the crime for which he is currently imprisoned?” Wallace asks.
Sacich nods agreeably. “Sure, he talked about it all the time. He didn't talk about nothing else.”
“Did he ever speak to the legitimacy of the charges?”
“Huh?”
Wallace rephrases. “Did he ever say whether or not he had done it?”
Randy responds softly, almost hard to hear. “Yeah, a bunch of times. He said he did.”
“Please speak up so that the jury can hear you, Mr. Sacich.”
As rehearsed, Sacich turns to the jury. “He said he sliced her up and watched her guts pour out.”
The jury recoils in horror from this, and there is an audible rumble in the courtroom. Hatchet bangs his gavel and demands quiet. He gets it.