The Fifth Witness - Michael Connelly [76]
“Ladies and gentlemen, blood will tell,” she said. “Follow the evidence and it will lead you, without a doubt, to Lisa Trammel. She took Mitchell Bondurant’s life. She took everything he had. And now it’s time to bring her to justice.”
She thanked the jurors and returned to her seat. It was my turn now. I put my hand down below the table to check my zipper. You have to stand before a jury only once with your fly open and it will never happen again.
I got up and took the same spot in the well where Freeman had stood. I once again tried to show no sign of my still-healing injuries. And I began.
“Ladies and gentlemen, I want to start with a couple of introductions. My name is Michael Haller. I am counsel for the defense. It is my job to defend Lisa Trammel against these very serious charges. Our Constitution ensures that anyone accused of a crime in this country is entitled to a full and vigorous defense, and that is exactly what I intend to provide during the course of this trial. If I rub some of you the wrong way as I do this, then let me apologize up front. But please remember, my actions should not reflect on Lisa.”
I turned to the defense table and raised my hand as if welcoming Trammel to the trial.
“Lisa, would you please stand for a moment?”
Trammel stood up and turned slightly to the jury, her eyes slowly scanning the twelve faces. She looked resolute, unbroken. Just the way I told her to be.
“And this is Lisa Trammel, the defendant. Ms. Freeman wants you to believe she committed this crime. She is five foot three in height, weighs a hundred nine pounds soaking wet and is a schoolteacher. Thank you, Lisa. You can sit down now.”
Trammel took her seat and I turned back to the jury, keeping my eyes moving from face to face as I spoke.
“We agree with Ms. Freeman that this crime was brutal and violent and cold-blooded. No one should have taken Mitchell Bondurant’s life and whoever did should be brought to justice. But there should never be a rush to judgment. And that’s what the evidence will prove happened here. The investigators on this case saw the little picture and the easy fit. They missed the big picture. They missed the real murderer.”
From behind me I heard Freeman’s voice.
“Your Honor, can we please approach for a sidebar?”
Perry frowned but then signaled us up. I followed Freeman to the side of the bench, already formulating my response to what I knew she was going to object to. The judge flipped on a sound distortion fan so the jurors wouldn’t hear anything they shouldn’t and we huddled at the side of the bench.
“Judge,” Freeman began, “I hate interrupting an opening statement but this doesn’t sound like an opening statement. Is defense counsel going to hit us with the facts his defense case will prove and the evidence he has, or is he just going to talk in generalities about some mysterious killer that everybody else missed?”
The judge looked at me for a response. I looked at my watch.
“Judge, I object to the objection. I am less than five minutes into a thirty-minute allotment and she’s already objecting because I haven’t put anything on the board? Come on, Judge, she’s trying to show me up in front of the jury and I request that you take a continuing objection from her and not allow her to interrupt again.”
“I think he’s right, Ms. Freeman,” the judge said. “Way too early to object. I’ll carry it now as a running objection and will step in myself if I need to. You go back to the prosecution table and sit tight.”
He flipped the fan off and rolled his chair back to the center of the bench. Freeman and I returned to our positions.
“As I was saying before being interrupted, there is a big picture to this case and the defense is going to show it to you. The prosecution would like you to believe that this is a simple case of vengeance. But murder is never simple