Speak of the Devil (5 page)

She took the clear bag and smoothed it onto her desk. It held a picture of a smiling, beautiful woman. Anna’s stomach somersaulted. She’d passed that face in Jack’s hallway, hundreds of times. She’d secretly compared her own face to it. The photo was of Jack’s late wife.

“Oh my God,” she said. “What was Psycho doing with a picture of Nina Flores?”

“He wouldn’t say.”

“Does Jack know?”

“Not yet. I figured I’d give you two lovebirds a night off.”

Anna glanced at her watch. “We’ll tell him after the hearing.”

McGee nodded, and put his fedora back on. Although he didn’t need to come, McGee walked her to the courthouse.

• • •

C-10 was the sole courtroom on the lowest level of D.C. Superior Court. It was bigger than other courtrooms and accommodated a larger crowd. Every person who was arrested for a violation of D.C. law was processed here after their arrest. That often included hundreds of people a day.

A thin layer of grime covered every surface. Rows of unforgiving wooden benches were filled with families and friends, looking miserable and washed out under the fluorescents. Between them and the well of the court were two pointless walls of bulletproof Plexiglas. This barrier would stop only the most random of bullets, because there was a four-foot gap between the two Plexiglas walls, for the aisle that led from the audience to the judge’s bench. The Plexiglas was just barrier enough to tell the audience that the court didn’t trust them, without providing much protection for courtroom personnel.

Anna walked down the gray linoleum aisle toward the front of the courtroom. She tried to keep her thoughts on the case, but she kept circling back to the picture. Why would a thug be carrying a photo of a police officer, four years after her death?

She barely noticed the stench of the courtroom. The defendants were coming from a night in lockup: unshowered, hungover, or still drunk, often in clothes stained with beer, vomit, or urine. For the prostitutes who had to spend the night in skimpy clothing, the government provided Tyvek paper jumpsuits, dubbed “bunny suits.” The Marshals wore rubber gloves when they led the defendants in and out, and sprayed Lysol on the hard surfaces every thirty minutes or so. There were no windows in the basement courtroom and the ventilation system was either broken or disastrously weak, so the pungent air hung in a visible cloud, making everything appear grainy. Several audience members held the collars of their Tshirts over their noses.

An old lady reached out and grabbed Anna’s sleeve, pulling Anna from her thoughts. The old woman’s eyes were cloudy with cataracts. Her gnarled hands trembled.

“Excuse me, miss, can you tell me how much my grandson’s bail will be?”

Anna leaned down and whispered, “There’s no bail in D.C., ma’am. He’ll either be released or held pending a detention hearing. But I can’t give you legal advice, I’m a prosecutor. Do you know the name of your grandson’s lawyer?”

The old woman shook her head, looking lost. Anna asked her grandson’s name, then checked it against the lockup list at the prosecution table: He was charged with homicide—poor grandma. Anna wrote the defense attorney’s name and phone number on a Post-it Note, and went back to kneel beside the old lady.

“This is his lawyer, ma’am. I don’t see him here—he may be in the back talking to your grandson. If you don’t meet him today, you can call and he’ll explain everything to you.”

“Bless you, dear.”

“Thanks . . . take care.” There was nothing else Anna could say that would be useful. She was on the side that was trying to put this woman’s grandson in jail.

She went to the prosecution table and pulled her own defendant’s rap sheet out of the pile left by Pre-Trial Services. The table was covered with dozens of case jackets, each of which represented a person who had been arrested the day before and was being presented to a judge today. One overwhelmed prosecutor stood at the front of the courtroom, handling all the initial appearances except murders and first-degree sex offenses, which a specialized senior prosecutor like Anna would do.

During the presentment, each defendant heard the charges against him and got a lawyer assigned if he couldn’t afford one, which was the case for many of the defendants in the District. The C-10 judge made a preliminary decision, based on the charging documents, about whether to keep each defendant in custody or release him pending trial. If the defendant was held, a full hearing would be scheduled within a few days, when the government would present witnesses.

Today’s C-10 prosecutor stood in front of the bench, making a detention argument about a female defendant who was, oddly, sitting in a chair in the well of the court. On closer inspection, Anna saw that the woman was hugely pregnant and panting. She was in labor. Meanwhile, the prosecutor described how she threw a pan of boiling grease on another woman while on probation for another violent crime. The judge sent her to the hospital to have the baby and remanded her to custody after that. The deputies hurried the woman to the side door, where a paramedic stood, presumably with an ambulance waiting nearby. Anna sent up a quick prayer that they wouldn’t see that baby here in eighteen years.

She sat in the vestigial jury box—as far as she knew, there had never been a jury or a trial in C-10—and flipped through the criminal history sheet, looking for any information tying Psycho to Nina Flores. There was nothing she could discern from the report. She speculated: Maybe Nina had previously arrested him. Or perhaps he’d had something to do with Nina’s death, and the picture was a trophy.

As more defendants were processed, Anna pulled out her phone and cradled it discreetly on her lap. She went online and clicked around until she found a children’s book called
No More Frogs.
It was a parable about environmental degradation, but the title made it work for her purposes. She bought a copy and sent it to Jody.

“Lockup number ninety-two,” the clerk intoned. “Ninety-two” was the number written in thick black marker on her case jacket. Jose Garcia, aka “Psycho,” was the ninety-second person processed in the last twenty-four hours. Anna put her phone away and walked to the well of the courtroom. The regular C-10 prosecutor looked relieved that he would have a few minutes off his feet. Anna smiled sympathetically at him as he sank into his chair at the prosecution table. It wasn’t so long ago that she was a junior prosecutor on C-10 duty.

“Anna Curtis on behalf of the United States.”

“Steve Schwalm, from Office of the Public Defender, for the defendant Jose Garcia.”

Anna nodded at the defense attorney—she’d had some cases against him; he was an excellent lawyer. Despite the stigma associated with public defenders, D.C.’s Office of the Public Defender was one of the best in the country, with lawyers from top law schools tackling cutting-edge issues and getting outstanding results. But the stigma had power. Some defendants rejected their appointed defender and insisted on paying fifteen thousand dollars for a cut-rate private attorney. The public defender was almost always the better choice.

The deputy Marshals brought the defendant through the side door, and Anna looked him over. She would spend the next nine months thinking and writing and learning about him—but she would see him only rarely, during court appearances.

Jose Garcia, aka “Psycho,” didn’t look terribly threatening at first glance. He was slim and slight—maybe 5’5”. Anna was naturally three inches taller than him, five in her pumps. His hair was shorn tight to his head, like a soldier. He wore an orange prison jumpsuit and “pumpkin seeds,” flimsy orange prison sneakers. She hoped this meant his street clothes were bagged and in police custody, awaiting DNA testing. That was the way things were supposed to happen, but “supposed to” didn’t always play out in reality.

The man had a baby face, but had taken steps to look more menacing: lines shaved into his eyebrows, tattoos inscribed on his neck. On the left side of his neck was a skeleton hand in the shape of “the claw,” pinky and thumb up in a symbol that resembled a surfer’s “hang loose” sign. On the right side of his neck was a triangle made up of three big black dots. On the back was a large
MS
tattoo, elaborately drawn to look three-dimensional. Two tattooed teardrops dripped from his left eye, and more tattoos disappeared under his collar.

But the most disturbing thing about Psycho was his wide smile. The expression was so inappropriate for a shackled man being led into court, Anna wondered if she’d have to deal with an insanity defense. The judge noticed it, too.

“Would you like to share what you find so amusing, Mr. Garcia?” Judge Sofia Menendez asked. She was efficient and no-nonsense, a good match for this cattle call of a courtroom.

Psycho opened his mouth, but Schwalm grabbed him by the arm and whispered fiercely in his ear. Psycho nodded and closed his mouth, although he kept smiling.

“He’s just happy to be out of lockup and to have a chance to appear before you, Your Honor,” Schwalm said.

The judge narrowed her eyes skeptically, then turned to Anna. “What’s the government’s position on detention?”

“We’re asking for a B1A hold. The defendant committed a crime of violence.”

“Defense?”

“Probable cause hasn’t been established. According to the government, this was a brothel. There’s no evidence that Mr. Garcia wasn’t just a paying client, whose transaction was interrupted by three men who came to commit these alleged crimes.”

“Prosecution?”

“The defendant was clearly with the other three men raiding the brothel,” Anna said. “Fifth paragraph, third line. ‘The defendant’s fingerprints were identified on a machete found by his feet.’ Sixth paragraph: ‘The man who was shot wore a trench coat, as did the men who fled. A similar trench coat was found in the bedroom.’ Four trench coats, four invaders. It’s our theory that the trench coats were worn to conceal their machetes, and Mr. Garcia was the fourth man raiding the brothel. Your Honor can also note the defendant’s tattoos. They’re symbols representing the gang MS-13, also known as the Mara Salvatrucha. The man who was shot had similar tattoos.”

“Is that in the
Gerstein
?” the judge asked. She was familiar with the gang; every judge in the District knew that MS-13 was one of the most violent gangs in America.

“Ninth paragraph. Detective McGee notes that the three-dot tattoo is a symbol of the three places to which MS-13 can lead a gang member: prison, the hospital, or the morgue. The MS and the claw are also symbols of affiliation with the gang.”

The judge’s pen moved on the paper. “I find there’s probable cause to believe the defendant committed the crimes charged. He’ll be held in jail pending a preliminary hearing, four days from now. I grant the government’s request that he have no contact with the victims.”

Anna wrote all this on the case jacket. When she looked up, she found Psycho aiming his weird smile at her. It was unnerving. She was accustomed to hostile glares, but the inexplicable grin felt more malevolent and feral. When she met his eyes, Psycho raised his upper lip a fraction, turning it into a snarl. She got the impression that he wanted to jump across the courtroom and tear her throat out with his teeth.

The clerk called lockup number 93. A deputy took Psycho’s arm and led him back to the holding cell. Anna shook off her unease.

In the hallway afterward, Anna spoke to the defense attorney. “Can we get your client in to talk?”

“I thought you’d be interested in that. I asked. He says no.”

“First one in the lifeboat gets the best seat. I can offer him a good deal.”

“He says he’ll never snitch. But I’ll try again. What can you tell me? What do you want to know from him?”

“Who were his accomplices, what were they doing? And this.” Anna took a copy of Nina Flores’s photo from the file. “I want to know where he got it, and why he was carrying it around. Even if he just gives me that, we’ll be off to a great start.”

“I’ll ask. If he changes his mind, I’ll call you.”

“Thanks.” Anna wouldn’t count on it.

Back at the U.S. Attorney’s Office, she headed to Jack’s floor. She had to tell him about Nina’s photo. But his office was empty.

“He’s in court all day, hon,” called Vanetta, his secretary.

Anna spent a few minutes chatting about Vanetta’s grandkids. But she felt uneasy as she walked away. She wouldn’t feel settled until she could ask Jack about the photo. He would have a logical explanation. He always did.

9

Howard University Hospital was a monolithic brick building on the south side of the college campus. Founded in 1862, it was initially called Freedmen’s Hospital and provided medical care for ex-slaves. Today, it was a comprehensive level-one trauma center. Anna knew and liked a lot of the staff, but visiting was rarely a pleasant experience. For her, a trip to HUH usually meant a victim was so badly injured that their first meeting had to take place in a hospital room.

McGee flashed his badge at the receptionist, who directed them to the seventh floor. Kerry Hughes was waiting for them there. The older African-American woman reminded Anna of a fireplug: short, solid, and ready for emergencies. Kerry was a SANE nurse—a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner—whose specialty was collecting medical and forensic evidence of sex crimes by examining the victim. She was bright, knowledgeable, and tireless. Kerry was the only SANE nurse in D.C., which meant she examined every rape survivor who came in for a sex kit. Anyone less dedicated would have quit years ago.

Kerry greeted them warmly and pulled them into an empty room where she handed McGee a small white box containing Tierra Guerrero’s sex kit. The kit included combings from the victim’s pubic hair, scrapings from underneath her fingernails, and long Q-tips that had been used to swab her orifices. A sex kit usually included the victim’s clothes, but there were none in this case because the victim had been naked when the attack began. McGee would send the box to D.C.’s new DNA lab for analysis.

Kerry handed Anna the SANE papers that contained her findings. Anna automatically turned to the third page and glanced at the gingerbread figurine, on which Kerry had marked X’s to indicate areas of injury. The figure had X’s on her face, neck, chest, arms, back, and buttocks.