“Not specifically, no.”
“Did you question any coworkers of Mr. Talbot about whether they saw bruising or other injuries on his hand around the time of the crime?”
“No, I did not.”
“So you never really looked beyond Mr. Roulet, did you?”
“That is wrong. I come into every case with an open mind. But Roulet was there and in custody from the start. The victim identified him as her attacker. He was obviously a focus.”
“Was heafocus orthefocus, Detective Booker?”
“He was both. At first he wasafocus and later—after we found his initials on the weapon that had been held to Reggie Campo’s throat—he becamethefocus, you could say.”
“How do you know that knife was held to Ms. Campo’s throat?”
“Because she told us and she had the puncture wound to show for it.”
“Are you saying there was some sort of forensic analysis that matched the knife to the wound on her neck?”
“No, that was impossible.”
“So again we have Ms. Campo’s word that the knife was held to her throat by Mr. Roulet.”
“I had no reason to doubt her then. I have none now.”
“Now without any explanation for it, I guess you would consider the knife with the defendant’s initials on it to be a highly important piece of evidence of guilt, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes. Even with explanation, I would say. He brought that knife in there with one purpose in mind.”
“You are a mind reader, are you, Detective?”
“No, I’m a detective. And I am just saying what I think.”
“Accent onthink.”
“It’s what I know from the evidence in the case.”
“I’m glad you are so confident, sir. I have no further questions at this time. I reserve the right to recall Detective Booker as a witness for the defense.”
I had no intention of calling Booker back to the stand but I thought the threat might sound good to the jury.
I returned to my seat while Minton tried to bandage up Booker on redirect. The damage was in perceptions and there wasn’t a lot that he could do with that. Booker had only been a setup man for the defense. The real damage would come later.
After Booker stepped down, the judge called for the mid-morning break. She told the jurors to be back in fifteen minutes but I knew the break would last longer. Judge Fullbright was a smoker and had already faced highly publicized administrative charges for sneaking smokes in her chambers. That meant that for her to take care of her habit and avoid further scandal, she had to take the elevator down and leave the building and stand in the entry port where the jail buses come in. I figured I had at least a half hour.
I went out into the hallway to talk to Mary Alice Windsor and work my cell phone. It looked like I would be putting on witnesses in the afternoon session.
I was first approached by Roulet, who wanted to talk about my cross-examination of Booker.
“It looked to me like it went really well for us,” he said.
“Us?”
“You know what I mean.”
“You can’t tell whether it’s gone well until you get the verdict. Now leave me alone, Louis. I have to make some calls. And where is your mother? I am probably going to need her this afternoon. Is she going to be here?”
“She had an appointment this morning but she’ll be here. Just call Cecil and he’ll bring her in.”
