Fanatics (5 page)

1:42 P.M.

Flo Ott entered Kings County Criminal Court in downtown Brooklyn for a rearraignment hearing scheduled for a two o'clock start.

For an hour, she had to leave the threat to Cecil King's life entirely in Frank Murphy's hands, while waiting for the preliminary forensics report on Owen Smith's corpse, and now keeping a promise to a friend caught in impossible trouble.

A young woman named Annunziata “Annie” Agron had been arrested on a charge of armed robbery at an ATM machine on the corner of Seventh Avenue and President Street in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The arresting officers were William Patrick Magee and Antonio Francesco Dente, both patrolmen, both in their late twenties, both Staten Island residents.

Flo was attending the rearraignment, not in any official capacity—no one had been killed during the alleged armed robbery—but simply to observe as a friend and a potential character witness on behalf of one of the two tenants in her home's upstairs rental apartment: the accused felon of murderous intent, Annie Agron, a welfare department social worker.

At the initial arraignment, a few hours after Annie Agron's arrest, the court had assigned her a lawyer from the Legal Aid Society's pool, to ensure appearances were kept up, all formalities fulfilled.

The assigned lawyer had no time for preparation and not much attention span left by his seventh arraignment of the afternoon session.

He was a harried young man, another victim of case overload, bouncing breathlessly from arraignments to trials to prison cell visitations. No surprise then, when the patrolmen's version of Annie Agron's alleged armed robbery proved compelling. But at least the Legal Aid lawyer secured bail for his client, a not impossible task, since the accused had no prior criminal record, was a city employee, and a college grad.

Flo Ott's other tenant, Annie's roommate and partner, Betty Fitzgerald, was an experienced attorney, albeit a family-law expert, who'd never appeared at an arraignment or any other kind of criminal law procedure. Family law—separations, divorces, child custody suits—was her specialty.

Betty Fitzgerald had no idea at the time that Annie had been arrested, and when she found out that Annie's case at arraignment was referred on for trial consideration, she was desperate to find competent counsel. Flo Ott, their friend and landlady, recommended Robert J. Keating, Esq., Golden Bobby, the criminal defense bar's ultimate aureate mouthpiece. Golden Bobby owed Flo a favor. Earlier that year, she'd certified a fat-fee client of his for a cooperative witness protection program.

And Bobby was meticulous in repaying his business debts, particularly when the creditor was a prominent member of the law enforcement establishment. He stepped straight up to the plate for Annie Agron.

“Well now, Lieutenant!” Golden Bobby greeted Flo in the hall outside the hearing room for the rearraignment. “How's by you? What's happening?”

“Hi, Bobby.” Flo was no longer quite as amazed as she had been the winter before, when first meeting Robert J. Keating, Attorney-at-Law. She'd grown accustomed to his outsized presence, a sort of African Buddha, a bejeweled, mirthful, extramundane mass of a man: cappuccino-colored, six feet tall and, at about three hundred pounds, almost the same footage in circumference as in height. His shaved head, impeccable tailoring, and manicured nails projected a persuasive air of proximate perfection with the demeanor to match, as close to a resplendent demidivinity as one might ever expect to encounter in the criminal courts of New York City. On meeting Bobby for the first time, it was hard to know whether to genuflect, shake his hand, or kiss his ring—a platinum job set with a ruby at least the size of a plum.

Flo offered him her hand, and with two hands he raised it to his lips. His gold cuff links dazzled. “I'm so honored, Lieutenant”—his voice was
basso profundo
, his tone Sunday-church-choir jubilant, sincerity vitalizing every word—“that any friend of yours should become an esteemed client of mine.”

He smiled a broad smile, so warm it made Flo laugh as always, a smile that exposed his mouth full of lustrously gold teeth, as welcoming as a splash of Caribbean sunshine after a New York sleet storm. Golden Bobby earned his winning appellation.

He led the way for his new client, Annie Agron, and her partner, Betty Fitzgerald, all walking with dignity down the long hall to the hearing room.

Annie Agron had short, dark hair, a soft mouth, and sad brown eyes. She was wearing a gray flannel skirt, a navy blazer, a white blouse, and high-heeled black calfskin shoes. Except for the shoes, and the sad knowing eyes, she might have passed for an Upper East Side prep-school senior.

Betty Fitzgerald, on the other hand, looked like any other hard-nosed divorce lawyer, an avenging angel in a black pinstripe suit. “Annie never should've been arrested,” Fitzgerald said to Golden Bobby. “Forget referred to trial.”

“I've no objections to that,” he said. “Speaking purely technically, of course. Annie's so obviously innocent. It hurts me to know our criminal justice system—and even our New York's finest—could have made such a colossal blunder. I'm truly shocked.”

“Yeah, right,” Flo said. “Shocked. Now tell it to the judge, Bobby.”

2:05 P.M.

The hearing room, devoid of decoration save for two American flags, a New York State flag, and a New York City flag, had space for about fifty spectators.

The chamber was more than half empty. Present were defendants, a few family members, defendants' lawyers, and assistant district attorneys, these last mainly young men and women not long out of law school. All waited their turn before the judge.

The Honorable Lydia Compton was an African American woman in her mid-forties, a judge with an air of patience not unlike that of a presidential foreign affairs adviser, a thoughtful presence surrounded and harassed by ambitious generals and ignorant ideologues, each insistent on his own self-seeking position.

Judge Compton's patience would be put to the test this afternoon.

Recollections of a crime, in Flo's experience, seemed to acquire a dark indestructibility as infinite and as inescapable as memories are particular to the persons recollecting.

In this case, once Annie Agron's rearraignment hearing began in Judge Compton's court, the accused, and the two arresting officers, patrolmen Magee and Dente, had experiences to relate that were banking up all around them, a huge wave that seemed poised to break over their heads, certainly if Robert J. Keating, Esq., had anything to say about it.

Annie Agron, aggrieved, frightened, anxious, didn't even glance at the patrolmen who arrested her for armed robbery.

Officers Magee and Dente were both in uniform, caps off, and both appeared quite put-upon by this experience. Not only were they appearing in court, again, on their own time, no additional pay for the extra hour or so, but they were less than encouraged to find their perp now represented by the African Buddha Golden Bobby, every prosecutor's nemesis.

The courtroom surroundings, otherwise so ordinary for Flo Ott, on this occasion felt bizarre. Not the bewildering news and the absurd allegations, not the no-holds-barred procedural tactics Golden Bobby promised, but this. Detective Lieutenant Flo Ott, officer of the law, willing to act as a character witness for a criminal defendant. She might not have to say a word today, probably wouldn't even be asked, not at a rearraignment. But Flo's silent presence alone, seated with the defendant's team, spoke volumes. The judge and every assistant district attorney in the courtroom recognized and respected the homicide detective lieutenant.

Patrolmen Magee and Dente certainly knew exactly who she was, and they were less than pleased to see Flo pulling up a chair at the defendant's side, next to Keating, the criminal defense bar's bright, shining dazzler and a royal pain in the ass.

Almost a half hour after the scheduled time on the docket, the clerk called Annie Agron's case. Golden Bobby set aside his documents with a phlegmatic sigh and rose to face Judge Lydia Compton.

The judge said, “Are there any objections to starting now?”

Golden Bobby shook his head. “Absolutely not. Not as far as we're concerned.”

The young assistant district attorney, an Indian American woman named Uusha Chandra Roy, walked to the middle of the floor in front of the judge's bench. She was younger than any other lawyer in the room, a thin woman with a firm, confidently set expression that was belied by a mere shadow of hesitation in her dark eyes.

The judge addressed her: “Would the prosecution please restate the facts of this case?”

“The People maintain that Annunziata ‘Annie' Agron, on a Saturday morning, committed an armed robbery outside the ATM cash point on the corner of Seventh Avenue and President Street in Park Slope, Kings County. The victim was a seventy-eight-year-old woman in a motorized wheelchair who'd just withdrawn three hundred dollars. Patrolmen William Magee and Antonio Dente attempted to arrest Ms. Agron at the scene of the robbery and met with resistance. And so she is also guilty of assaulting a policeman in the course of his duty and resisting a lawful arrest.”

“And counsel for the defense says?”

“Not guilty. Not guilty in a million light-years. This is a Keystone—if you'll pardon the expression—Kops blunder of incredible proportions. Truly mythic, Your Honor.” Golden Bobby turned to the patrolmen and said, “You have my sympathies, Officers, you really do, arresting someone as innocent as…well, let's just say, as innocent as a vanilla ice cream cone.” Everyone appeared to ponder the exact implication of this unusual image. “The charges should be dismissed, Your Honor.”

Judge Lydia Compton was a portrait of patience and forbearance. “Okay, this time let's just try to flesh out the outline of the arrest, of the allegations and charges. Let's clarify all the details of exactly what happened.”

Assistant District Attorney Uusha Chandra Roy proceeded to pursue her presentation to its conclusion, unruffled, in spite of repeated headshaking, audible sighs, and occasional suppressed laughs from her opposing counsel, defense attorney Golden Bobby.

Briefly, the prosecution's case was a factual narrative without embroidery. Shortly after eleven a.m. Annunziata “Annie” Agron approached an ATM to withdraw cash, she claimed, to finish her Saturday morning shopping on Seventh Avenue. As she was going up to the cash point machine, the bank customer preceding her, Sadie Sienkiewicz, a seventy-eight-year-old arthritis sufferer in a motorized wheelchair, was attempting to pass by Ms. Agron on her way back onto the sidewalk, when she was held up by Ms. Agron, who was wielding a carving knife. Sadie Sienkiewicz, fearing for her life, gave Ms. Agron all the cash she'd just withdrawn for her Saturday morning shopping, three hundred dollars. Before Ms. Agron had a chance to flee the scene of her crime, an observant bystander waved to a police cruiser that was double-parked just across the street on the other side of Seventh Avenue, where Officer Dente had entered a Chinese take-out place, Madame Chang's, to pick up lunch for himself and his squad car partner, patrolman William Magee. Officer Dente was carrying two spring rolls, a pint of General Hsu lamb, a pint of sweet-and-sour chicken and shrimp, and a pint of steamed rice, as he was leaving Madame Chang's, and he observed his partner, patrolman Magee, approaching the altercation taking place outside the ATM point directly across Seventh Avenue. The patrolmen disarmed Ms. Agron and retrieved the cash, most of which was scattered over the sidewalk. As they were arresting Ms. Agron, she put up a violent resistance, inflicting damage on both patrolmen.

Golden Bobby shook his head. “I have a few questions, Your Honor, for patrolmen Magee and Dente. I may proceed, with the assistant DA's consent, I trust?”

ADA Uusha Chandra Roy nodded.

And the judge said, “Counselor, please proceed.”

Golden Bobby took a deep breath and said, “At what point did you surmise that this event was, shall we say, a stickup?”

Patrolman Magee said, “As soon as I saw the money flying around, sir, I got out of the car and went across to the corner. That's when I saw this knife she had.”

“Who had?”

“Annunziata Agron. Your client.”

“Can you describe the knife?”

“One of those big kitchen knives, sir. A really big one, the kind you carve up turkeys and roast beef with.”

“New or old?”

Patrolman Magee paused. Then: “New.”

“How could you tell?”

“It was wrapped up.”

“Wrapped up in what?”

“A package.”

“Describe the package.”

Patrolman Magee looked down at the floor. “Like the kind you get in a store.”

Golden Bobby smiled. “You mean, unopened and all enclosed in plastic bubble wrap?”

As a wave of laughter swept over the courtroom, patrolman Magee, his eyes still fixed on the floor, fell silent and nodded.

“And what,” Golden Bobby said softly, “did Sadie Sienkiewicz say about all this?”

“She said this other lady, Annunziata Agron, pulled the knife on her.”

“All wrapped up?”

Falling silent again, patrolman Magee nodded.

“And when,” Golden Bobby said, “did she pull the knife—before or after she spoke to Sadie Sienkiewicz?”

Patrolman Magee sighed. Then: “After Sadie Sienkiewicz ran into Annunziata Agron with her wheelchair. It was her new chair, sir, and she had trouble driving it. Agron shouted and dropped her ice cream cone on Sadie Sienkiewicz's head. Sadie Sienkiewicz was terrified and gave her a push, to protect herself, and she saw this huge knife come out of a shopping bag. Agron dropped her stuff, and Agron was picking the knife up from the ground there, and saying something, and Sadie Sienkiewicz was really terrified by this point, so she figured she'd better give her attacker the money before she got stabbed. She threw the bills at her attacker and the money was blowing all around when I got there.”