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Back Brass Verdict Save as PDF
Chapters (64)
  1. PART ONE
  2. One
  3. Two
  4. Three
  5. PART TWO
  6. Four
  7. Five
  8. Six
  9. Seven
  10. Eight
  11. Nine
  12. Ten
  13. Eleven
  14. Twelve
  15. Thirteen
  16. Fourteen
  17. Fifteen
  18. Sixteen
  19. Seventeen
  20. Eighteen
  21. Nineteen
  22. Twenty
  23. Twenty-one
  24. Twenty-two
  25. Twenty-three
  26. Twenty-four
  27. Twenty-five
  28. Twenty-six
  29. Twenty-seven
  30. Twenty-eight
  31. Twenty-nine
  32. Thirty
  33. Thirty-one
  34. Thirty-two
  35. Thirty-three
  36. PART THREE
  37. Thirty-four
  38. Thirty-five
  39. PART FOUR
  40. Thirty-six
  41. Thirty-seven
  42. Thirty-eight
  43. Thirty-nine
  44. Forty
  45. Forty-one
  46. Forty-two
  47. Forty-three
  48. Forty-four
  49. Forty-five
  50. Forty-six
  51. PART FIVE
  52. Forty-seven
  53. Forty-eight
  54. Forty-nine
  55. Fifty
  56. Fifty-one
  57. Fifty-two
  58. Fifty-three
  59. PART SIX
  60. Fifty-four
  61. Fifty-five
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. ALSO BY MICHAEL CONNELLY

Favreau had texted me twice more during the last half hour of his delivery with reports of declining jury interest. They might have been eating it up at the start but now they were apparently full. Sometimes you can go on too long. Golantz had trudged through a full fifteen rounds like a heavyweight boxer. I was going to be a welterweight. I was interested in quick jabs. I was going to get in and get out, make a few points, plant a few seeds and raise a few questions. I was going to make them like me. That was the main thing. If they liked me, they would like my case.

Once the judge gave me the nod, I stood up and immediately moved into the proving grounds. I wanted nothing between me and the jury. I was also aware that this put me right in front and in focus of the Court TV camera mounted on the wall above the jury box.

I faced the jury without physical gesture except for a slight nod of my head.

“Ladies and gentlemen, I know the judge already introduced me but I would like to introduce myself and my client. I am Michael Haller, the attorney representing Walter Elliot, whom you see here sitting at the table by himself.”

I pointed to Elliot and by prior design he nodded somberly, not offering any form of a smile that would appear as falsely ingratiating as calling the jurors folks.

“Now, I am not going to take a lot of time here, because I want to get to the testimony and the evidence — what little there is of it — and get this show on the road. Enough talk. It’s time to put up or shut up. Mr. Golantz wove a big and complicated picture for you. It took him a whole hour just to get it out. But I am here to tell you that this case is not that complicated. What the prosecution’s case amounts to is a labyrinth of smoke and mirrors. And when we blow away the smoke and get through the labyrinth, you will understand that. You will find that there is no fire, that there is no case against Walter Elliot. That there is more than reasonable doubt here, that there is outrage that this case was ever brought against Walter Elliot in the first place.”

Again I turned and pointed to my client. He sat with his eyes cast downward on the pad of paper he was now writing notes on — again, by prior design, depicting my client as busy, actively involved in his own defense, chin up and not worried about the terrible things the prosecutor had just said about him. He had right on his side, and right was might.

I turned back to the jury and continued.