Judgment Calls (11 page)

“Call Lesh,” I advised Chuck.

“No kidding. I had that lazy fuck Hitchcock on the Taylor case, remember?”

I always forget that cops know as much about the lives of judges as the trial lawyers do. I suspected they gossiped about the DAs as well. In this specific instance, Chuck had good reason to know about Hitchcock. He’d presided over the very complicated trial of Jesse Taylor, a case that had landed Forbes on the MCT. Taylor’s sixty-five-year-old girlfriend, Margaret Landry, confessed to Forbes that she and Taylor had killed a girl.

When I started at the DA’s office, Landry was the big talk around the courthouse. The local news covered the case’s every development. Most stories started with the phrase, “A Portland grandmother and her lover….” Headlines spoke of murderous Margaret. If you asked them, most people who followed the case would tell you they were fascinated that a sixty-five-year-old grandmother and hospital volunteer eventually confessed to helping her thirty-five-year-old alcoholic boyfriend rape and then strangle a seventeen-year-old borderline-intelligence girl named Jamie Zimmerman.

Forbes had stumbled into the case fortuitously. Landry initially told Jesse Taylor’s probation officer that she read about Jamie Zimmerman’s disappearance in the Oregonian and suspected her boyfriend’s involvement. At the time, Chuck was working a specialty rotation, helping the Department of Community Corrections track people on parole and probation. If not for the cooperation agreement between the bureau and DOCC, Taylor’s PO might never have told the police about Landry’s suspicions, because Landry used to call him at least weekly to try to get Taylor revoked. Her claims were always either fabricated or exaggerated.

Despite his hunch that Landry was at it again, the PO mentioned the tip to Chuck because this was the first time Landry had accused Taylor of something so serious as a murder. Chuck and the PO had followed up with several visits, and each time Landry changed her version of the events leading up to her accusation. The two men kept returning in an attempt to get her to admit that she was lying. But then she threw them for a loop: The reason she was sure Taylor had killed Zimmerman, she said, was that she helped him do it.

The continuing amendments to Landry’s story after she was arrested only served to whet the public’s appetite. She subsequently retracted her confession and accused Forbes of coercing the statements from her. But after she was convicted by a jury, Landry confessed again and agreed to testify against Taylor to avoid the death penalty. When Taylor was convicted and sentenced to die in one of Oregon’s first death penalty cases, she once again recanted.

By then, however, common sense had prevailed, the hype died down, and people realized that Margaret Landry’s confession spoke for itself. The grandmother who looked like Marie Callender was as deviant and sadistic as any man who comes to mind as the embodiment of evil. Last I heard, both Taylor and Landry were maintaining their innocence, and Taylor still had appeals pending.

At the time, the public interest in the Jamie Zimmerman murder was chalked up to tabloid curiosity. I didn’t see it that way; in my opinion, people were riveted because Margaret Landry scared them. When they saw her interviewed, they saw their aunt, the woman down the block, or the volunteer going door-to-door for the Red Cross. If she could abduct, rape, and murder a young woman, then locking our doors, moving to the suburbs, and teaching our children to avoid strange men would never be enough to protect us.

Chuck’s mind clearly had wandered in a different direction. “I had a hard enough time swallowing a death sentence on a case I worked on, but when it comes out of the court room of some ass like Hitchcock, I almost hope it does get thrown out.”

After decades without a death penalty, the Oregon legislature had approved one in 1988. The relatively gentle jurors of Oregon had delivered capital sentences to only a handful of people, and most people assumed that those defendants would die natural deaths in prison before Oregon’s courts would permit an execution to be carried out.

Despite the unlikelihood of an Oregon execution, handling murder cases in what was now theoretically a death penalty state still bothered Forbes and other people in law enforcement with mixed feelings about the issue. Like me, Chuck could not definitively align himself with either side of the debate. Unlike most knee-jerk opponents, he recognized that an execution could bring a kind of closure to a victim’s family that a life sentence could not. But he continued to be troubled by the role of vengeance and the inherent discrimination that too often lay at the heart of the death penalty’s implementation.

“Where is that case anyway?” I asked.

“Last I heard, Taylor hated prison so much he’d fired his attorneys and waived his appeals, but the State Supreme Court was still sitting on it. I almost hope they throw the sentence out. As long as the conviction stands, it’s still a win for us.”

Maybe Chuck had finally taken a position on the issue after all.

“Hey, enough of this. Why don’t you head on home?” Chuck suggested.

“No, I’ll stay here. I’m OK.”

“You’ve got less sense than a thirteen-year-old. Do I have to talk to you like you talked to Kendra?” He counted the multitude of reasons I should go home on his fingers. “I probably won’t even do the search tonight. There was a shooting a couple hours ago up in north Portland, so the night-shift crime lab team is probably tied up out there. The car’s in the impound lot, so it’s not going anywhere. Go home. Vinnie misses you.”

Vinnie is my French bulldog. He moved in with me a couple of years ago, the day my divorce was finalized. He gets upset when I stay out late.

Chuck wrinkled up his face and pulled out his ears, like a mean-looking pug with bat ears. In other words, he looked like my Vinnie. “I can picture him right now. He’s going, “Mmm, these curtains taste good. This carpet looks a lot better soaked with a huge puddle of French bulldog piss.” ” For whatever reason, Chuck had decided that if Vinnie could speak he’d sound like Buddy Hackett.

“You’re right. I’m going home. And the search can wait until tomorrow. Don’t you work too late either,” I said.

“Aye-aye,” he said, waving his hand in a quick salute.

I stopped as I was walking toward the door. “Will you be able to get your car OK?”

“Yeah. I’ll get a patrol officer to take me out there.”

I turned around again at the door. He was making copies of the warrant. “Hey, Chuck.”

“Huh?”

“You’re really good at what you do.”

His face softened, and his eyes smiled at me. “Thanks. Back atcha, babe. Now go home. You’re only this sweet when you’re tired.”

I drove home smiling.

Five.

By the time I got home, it was almost midnight. Vinnie was waiting for me at the door, very disappointed. In my head, I heard Chuck’s Buddy Hackett impersonation, scolding me for being out so late.

I threw off my coat, picked him up, made all sorts of embarrassing cooing noises, and scratched him ferociously behind those big goofy ears. When the snorts began, I knew he’d forgiven me.

Vinnie’s basic needs are met when I’m gone. He has his own door in back that goes out to the yard. An automatic feeder keeps him portly. He’s even capable of entertaining himself. I’m pretty sure he thinks his rubber Gumby doll is his baby. But at the end of the day, he’s a momma’s boy and needs me to talk to him.

Between work, keeping in touch with the few friends who are willing to put up with me, and trying to burn off all the crap I eat, I have just enough time left for my chunky little pal. I have no idea how other people manage to be needed by whole other tiny little individual people and still maintain their sanity.

I went into the kitchen and checked the level on Vinnie’s feeder to be sure he ate. He had. He takes after me that way. Every little meat-flavored morsel was gone. I was sorry I missed it. Vinnie’s so low to the ground that he has to reach his neck up over the bowl and then plop his whole face inside to eat. Then he picks out all the soft and chewy nuggets from his Kibbles “N Bits. When those are gone, he eats the dry stuff. When he really gets going, he breathes fast and loud like an old fat man.

I must’ve been really hungry, because that mental image actually made me think of food. I was torn between the refrigerator and my bed.

I was leaning toward the latter when I noticed the message light flashing on my machine. I knew if I tried to sleep now, I’d be lying in bed wondering who called. I hit the Play button and unpeeled a banana that was turning brown and spotty on the counter.

“Sammie, it’s your old man. Are you there? I guess not. Glad to see you’re out and not sitting at home alone reading a book with that rodent you call a dog. Hi, Vinnie. You know I’m only kidding. You can’t help being ugly, little man.”

I love it that my father laughs louder at his own jokes than anyone else. I wonder if he knows the people doubling up around him when he talks are enjoying Martin Kincaid’s contagious delight with life and not the substance of what he’s saying.

“Anyway, baby, I hope you’re doing OK. You got a hot date or something? I was going to come by today and mow your lawn if it was dry again, but old Mother Nature, she had other plans. I went and saw a movie instead. I tell you, that Kevin Spacey is something else. You have to see this picture. OK, I don’t want to take up your whole machine. You’ve probably got all kinds of men trying to call you. Some real winners from down at the courthouse. I’m just giving you a hard time, Sammie. You know I’m proud of you. You’re a top-notch human being. Give me a call tomorrow if you’ve got some time. “Bye.”

I’d finished my banana by the time he hung up. The length of my father’s phone messages correlates directly with how lonely he is in his empty house. My mother died almost two years ago, just seven months after doctors found a lump in her right breast. As much as I wish I had never married my ex-husband, the marriage had at least brought me back to Portland, so I was here for my mother’s last few months.

In retrospect, it was quick as far as those things go, but at the time it seemed like an eternity. Mom was as tough a fighter as they make, but in the end the cancer was too much even for her. People like to say that my father and I are lucky that she passed quickly, once it was clear that treatment was futile. Maybe I’m selfish, but I don’t agree.

Since Mom died, I’d spent more time with my father as he adjusted to life as a widower. He was doing as well as could be expected under the circumstances. He retired from federal employment as a forest ranger last year, so he has a good pension and reliable benefits. Without a job to go to, he now finds comfort in his routine. He goes to the gym, takes care of the yard, watches his shows, goes target shooting, and plays checkers with his ninety-year-old next-door neighbor.

I see my dad at least every weekend. We usually catch a movie and then wind up talking for a few hours afterward. Grace comes with us sometimes. So does Chuck, when we’re getting along. I think it makes Dad happy to see me with friends he’s known and liked since I was a kid. He never did like Shoe Boy and thinks most of my lawyer friends are snobs. Too bad I didn’t inherit his good judgment.

It was much too late to call him back, so I got ready for bed, snuggled into the blankets, and picked up a mystery I’d started the week before. Vinnie followed me into bed, lying by my feet on his stomach with all four legs splayed out around him like a bear rug. I only made it through a few pages before I nodded off and dropped the book on my face. There’s a reason I only read paperbacks.

The sun shining through my bedroom window woke me the next morning before the alarm. It was a nice change from a typical Portland February, when the excitement of the holidays is over and the endless monotony of dark, wet, gray days makes it hard to get out of bed. It was just after six o’clock, leaving me enough time for a quick run before work. I hopped out of bed, pulled on my sweats and running shoes, and brushed my teeth before setting out on a four-mile course through my neighborhood.

For the first time since October, I was able to look around clearly at my neighborhood rather than squint through a steady fall of drizzle. As I ran past the coffee shops, bookstores, and restaurants along the tree-lined streets of my historic neighborhood in northeast Portland called Alameda the brisk dry air stung my cheeks and filled my lungs. Running clears my head and helps me see the world in a better light.

I finished up my fourth mile about a half hour later, and hung on to my good mood while I listened to a block of “Monday Morning Nonstop Retro Boogie” in the shower. One of the benefits of living alone is that you can belt out the entire Saturday Night Fever sound track in the shower if you feel like it, and no one complains, even if you sing like me.

Grace had recently convinced me to trade in my usual shoulder-length bob for a wispy little do. When she dried it at the salon, my hair looked like it belonged on one of the more glamorous CNN anchors. When I tried it at home, I ended up looking like a brunette baby bird. It wasn’t too bad today, so I spruced it up with gel and slapped on some blush and eyebrow pencil. I caught a quick look in the mirror. At five-eight and through with my twenties, I still have good skin and a single-digit dress size. Not bad. By the time I was done, I had time to catch my regular bus in to work.

Southwest Fifth and Sixth Avenues constitute Portland’s bus mall, carrying thousands of commuters from various communities within the metropolitan area through downtown Portland. I hopped out at Sixth and Main and walked the two blocks to the Multnomah County Courthouse on Fourth, stopping on the way to fill my commuter’s mug at Starbucks with my daily double-tall nonfat latte.

I was running a few minutes shy of the time the District Attorney liked us to be here. But I was well ahead of the county’s newest jurors all summoned to appear for orientation at 8:30 a.m. and the county’s various out-of-custody criminal defendants scheduled for morning court appearances.

I’m not sure which way it cuts, but I have always found it odd that the criminal justice system throws jurors and defendants side by side to pass through the courthouse’s metal detectors and to ride the antiquated, stuffy elevators. In either event, I beat the crowd and didn’t have to push through the rotating throng that would be huddled outside the doors of the courthouse for the remainder of the day trying to suck down a final precious gasp of nicotine before returning to the halls of justice.