Death's Witness (22 page)

P A U L B A T I S T A

Still smiling, the other man said, “Nice talking to you,” turned, and became involved in the conversation of the group behind him.

Sorrentino knew he meant what he said. But he also knew he wasn’t going to make a scene with Kate, or, for that matter, say anything to her directly. He would let her play out the evening.

He needed to rest, a primal instinct. His only hope was that the night would wind itself down by four.

It did. On Warren Street the air of what was now Sunday morning was almost cold. There was an autumn mist, even the smell of wet, decaying leaves. There were at least a dozen limou-180

sines and private cars parked on both sides of the street, most of them partially on the sidewalks. Jerry, Sorrentino’s driver, saw them first and approached through the crowds of drunk, high men and women leaving the restaurant. “The car’s just over here,” Jerry said. “Do you think we can walk to it? Or do you want me to pull it up?”

“Hell, Jerry, we’ll walk with you,” Sorrentino answered. Kate seemed disappointed.

The numbers of people and cars, the amount of traffic, on the streets of Manhattan at four on a weekend morning always amazed Sorrentino. Traffic on Warren Street was choked to a standstill with cars and garbage trucks. As Jerry—a skillful driver who knew Manhattan streets as well as anyone—made a U-turn and drove west toward the Hudson River to break from the traffic, Sorrentino let Kate lean luxuriantly against him. She was exhausted, at last.

He was quiet, thoughtful, tired, but patient. Although he was clear in his own mind that he didn’t want to see her again, he decided he would spend the night with her at the high room in the UN Plaza. There was never anything to be lost from the over-all fabric of a lifetime with one last fuck. Later he’d find some excuse to put her on an early Sunday shuttle to Washington.

But, in the jolting drive over the pitted streets of TriBeCa, SoHo, and the West Village, he also decided he had to learn more about a subject that had jarred his mind for hours. He said, “Are you with us enough to talk about Danny?”

D E AT H ’ S W I T N E S S

“Your Danny?” He had thought she would sound groggy. She in fact sounded alert.

“The same.”

“Nice man. Not bright. But nice.”

“You told me that he knew someone named Madrigal, remember?”

“I do.”

“Tell me more.”

“What did I tell you, exactly?”

“That you couldn’t understand this thing with Danny, why he
181

would get involved with a guy like Madrigal.”

“I remember. You cut me off. You didn’t want to hear more.

You were obsessed with getting in my pants. Remember?”

“Now I want to hear more.”

“Really, I don’t know much. Madrigal owns a bank, they say.

Oil wells, too. Farms in South America. He is one of these guys in the world who seems to have all the money in the world. He writes poetry in Spanish, people say. He wants to be Pablo Neruda. Eccentricity is one of the oldest covers in the world.

Somehow it happened that Danny, who thinks poetry is something that will never be as pretty as a tree, met Madrigal, and Madrigal began doing favors for Danny.”

“What kind of favors?”

“Oh come on, Vinnie. What kind of favors do you think? He gave Danny money. Not poetry.”

“And what did Danny do in return?”

“Introduced him to people. Danny knows lots of people. Bill Clinton, to name just one. Bill likes to meet nice foreign people who have money.”

“Who else?”

“Bill Frist. Dr. Frist always needs money to make sure we live in a country where people can pray.”

“Anybody else?”

Kate’s head was resting on Sorrentino’s chest, her face below his. Despite the long day and night, she smelled alluring, vibrant.

P A U L B A T I S T A

“You know,” she said, “another name I kept on hearing when I heard about Madrigal was Tom Perini.”

“How do you know all this? When did Danny tell you?”

“Danny told me none of this.”

“Who did?”

“Hutchinson. Little old Tim Hutchinson.”

“You know Hutchinson?”

Kate’s next words struck him. They drove home to him that Kate was more than a generation behind him and that she was a frank woman, as sexually active as a professional basketball
182

player. “I had a six-month affair with Hutchinson. He talks a lot.”

“Really? I know him.”

“I know you do. I heard you had him in tears. So did I.”

“Really?”

“He was a lousy lay. And he was a bag man for Madrigal and Fonseca. And for Perini, too, I’ve heard him tell. Timmy carried the money and used to brag about it in his lousy post-coital moods.”

“Jesus, what the Christ’ll you say about me?”

“Not that you’re a lousy lay.”

* * *

Sorrentino asked her nothing more about Fonseca, Madrigal, Hutchinson, or Perini. He now knew as much as he wanted to know. There was some set of connections from Fonseca to Hutchinson to Madrigal and to Perini.

In the suite at the UN Plaza they had sex again. It was so exciting, so moving, that it almost made him forget the multiple reasons he’d decided never to see her again. He slept fitfully from five-thirty to seven. He called Jerry, who was sleeping in the car and answered the cellular phone groggily. And he left her room without waking her.

16.

From the outset of jury deliberations Neil Steinman’s confidence grew. In fact, he felt confident from the moment he finished his last witness because he knew he had a surprise. When Judge Feigley looked at him expectantly to call his next witness, he answered, “The United States rests.”

He always relished the resonance of that statement. It was as though
he
embodied the United States. He was speaking for the United States. “The United States rests,” he repeated.

It was November 1, the eight-month anniversary of the start of the trial. Glancing behind him at the defense table, Steinman read on Sorrentino’s face an unfeigned expression of surprise. He saw on the faces of the other defense lawyers that they were looking to Sorrentino for the lead. The government’s resting was a surprise to them since its witness list still bore the names of seven other people. Steinman had added those names months before as stalking horses only. He never intended to call any of them—the names were there simply to elicit the kind of surprise he now had provoked.

His confidence surged immediately as Judge Feigley instantly said to Sorrentino, “Proceed with your case.”

Momentarily off balance, Sorrentino shuffled the edges of paper in front of him. “Your Honor, first I have motions to make for a directed verdict.”

“Make them, Mr. Sorrentino,” the judge’s voice resonated with
P A U L B A T I S T A

its Georgia accent. “I’ll excuse the jurors now. We’ll bring them back after lunch.”

Steinman saw that Sorrentino was struggling for time to break the invisible momentum. Sorrentino said: “Your Honor, with the Court’s indulgence, I’d like to suggest that the jurors be excused for the day and that we reappear tomorrow to argue the motions.”

“No way, Mr. Sorrentino. We don’t have the luxury of that kind of time. As soon as the last juror walks out this room—which will be sixty seconds from now—you start your arguments.”

184

Neil Steinman was delighted with the next exchange. Sorrentino said, “Your Honor, I’m not adequately prepared. I didn’t know the government was resting today. They had more witnesses on their list.”

“Mr. Sorrentino, you have had eight months to prepare. You begin talking as soon as the jurors leave.”

“Your Honor—”

“Not another word, Mr. Sorrentino, unless you want to waive your dismissal motions.”

Steinman watched as the twelve men and women walked docilely through the door to the left of Judge Feigley’s bench. She beamed her vast smile at them and then turned, her expression instantly altered to the somber, school mistress look she routinely used on lawyers.

As Neil Steinman recognized, Sorrentino was a seasoned pro who would gather himself rapidly. He did. He spoke for almost forty-five minutes, without notes, explaining why the judge should direct a verdict in favor of the Congressman. Although Steinman was impressed with the easy coherence of what Sorrentino said, he had no doubt about how Judge Feigley would rule. As Sorrentino spoke, she used a pencil to scratch a section of her scalp beneath her helmet of hair. It must have been a very bad itch, because she kept working away at it. At other times she seemed to be reading a newspaper behind the lectern in front of her. And she repeatedly fidgeted with the fluorescent reading D E AT H ’ S W I T N E S S

lamp that she kept illuminated to the right of her face through the trial. She never made a comment or asked a question.

When Sorrentino finished, the six other defense lawyers rose in turn. Before each of them started, the judge spoke into her microphone and repeated: “Now, I’ve heard everything Mr. Sorrentino has said. Please confine yourself to the areas that relate directly to your own client. Don’t repeat what I’ve just heard. I’ve been listening very, very attentively.”

Neil Steinman was again delighted because each of them began and ended their short speeches with the painful obse-185

quiousness that he felt characterized so much of what other lawyers did. He listened with contempt to the flow of trivia words:

“May-it-please-the-Court…Not one scintilla of evidence linking my client to any criminal wrongdoing…My client doesn’t even know what he’s here for…” In Steinman’s ears, it was nothing but pretentious cant. At least Sorrentino had the skill never to utter lawyers’ clichés.

When the last defense lawyer finished, Judge Feigley looked down at Steinman and said, in a soft tone magnified through the ornate courtroom, “Do you want to say anything, Mr. Steinman?”

He decided to make a bold stroke.

“No, Your Honor. There is more than enough evidence to let the jurors decide whether these men are guilty. You should not take the responsibility away from the jurors by directing a verdict in favor of any of these defendants.”

His bold stroke was rewarded swiftly.

“That’s quite right. The motions for a directed verdict are denied.”

Behind him he heard Sorrentino sigh audibly, disgustedly.

Judge Feigley heard it, too. “Mr. Sorrentino, be back here in forty-five minutes, at two-thirty sharp, with your witnesses ready to go.”

“Judge, could we have until tomorrow morning to pull our witnesses together?”

“No. Two-thirty. Sharp.”

P A U L B A T I S T A

* * *

By two-forty Neil Steinman’s level of confidence was ratcheted up to the next level. After the jurors settled in, their faces inscrutable as ever, Sorrentino rose and said, “The defense rests.”

Judge Feigley didn’t skip a beat. She moved methodically through each of the other lawyers, asking, “What is your position?” Each of them rested. She then directed at Sorrentino what actually appeared to be a warm, tolerant smile. “All right, then, Mr. Sorrentino, you have your wish. We’ll recess for the rest of the day, and the lawyers will be in my chambers at ten tomorrow
186

morning to discuss the jury instructions.”

Turning to the jurors, she intoned, as she had every day at the end of the trial, “Ladies and gentlemen, I thank you again for your patience. And again I caution you not to discuss this case with anyone, not the other jurors, not your loved ones, not anyone. Close your ears as well to any news broadcasts you may hear about this case and read no articles about it. I know it is a sacrifice, but you owe it to these defendants and to our system of justice to decide only on the basis of what you have heard and seen in this courtroom, free of all outside influences.”

* * *

The next morning was another success for Neil Steinman. He handed Judge Feigley a bound volume containing the seventy-five pages of jury instructions he and his staff had prepared months ago. Sorrentino, in contrast, handed Judge Feigley a mass of papers, unbound, not consecutively numbered, the result of a long afternoon and night of work at his office with the other lawyers and their secretaries. In the presence of all the lawyers Judge Feigley leafed through the government’s book and patted the plastic cover as if it were a present or a favored student’s A paper. Then she looked with real distaste at the pile of defense pages. She said, “I’ll review these for half an hour. Then I’ll see you ladies and gentlemen in the courtroom, with the jury, for your summations. And then I’ll charge the jury.”

D E AT H ’ S W I T N E S S

“When does the Court want to discuss the charges?” Sorrentino asked.

Judge Feigley responded, “We may not need any discussions, Mr. Sorrentino. I’ll review the proposals and pick the charges I deem appropriate. And you’ll have an opportunity to object if you wish. So will Mr. Steinman. I think we’ve all had too much discussion in this case. Let’s move on to the summations and let the jurors do their work.”

As Neil Steinman spoke through his six hours of summation, he sensed that he had never performed better. He knew his
187

strength was not the compelling style that Sorrentino had mastered and the other defense lawyers would awkwardly attempt to mimic. Instead, he believed his strength was in the steady persistence of sincerity, in creating a methodical, step-by-step weaving together of the evidence the jurors had heard for months. Steinman used charts and PowerPoint presentations summarizing the testimony of some of the central witnesses, blow-ups of financial documents, stock certificates, and airline tickets.

By the time he finished it was already five in the afternoon.

Judge Feigley recessed until ten the next morning, and Steinman was pleased with the quick exodus of reporters from the courtroom.

Later that evening he was even more pleased when he saw on television sketched portraits of himself making points to the jury. The television broadcasts said that “the jury was rapt” as Steinman described how the Congressman used his influence to secure federal assistance for waterfront and trucking companies, and the long-shoremen’s and teamsters’ unions, in exchange for stock in the companies for himself, members of his family, and his friends, for cash, for expense-paid vacations for himself and various women.

“Corrupted the political process…Made public service stink…Turned his Congressional office into a racketeering enter-prise…Allied himself with hoodlums, goombas, and scum…”

Steinman had used those words in his summation. They were repeated in the broadcasts. But what particularly pleased him were the reports describing the jurors’ attention as “rapt.”

P A U L B A T I S T A

And the next day Steinman felt that Vincent Sorrentino stumbled. Not that his suave delivery was off, not that he was any less effective than usual in attempting to make the jurors admire him: Sorrentino in fact was in control of all of the usual touchstones of his performance. In Steinman’s view, Sorrentino stumbled because he had picked the wrong theme to harp on. He asked the jurors to use their common sense.

“Common sense will tell you that Congressman Fonseca did exactly what a politician is supposed to do. He takes care of the people he represents. Of course he used his influence. He used it to save
188

jobs, to keep businesses running, to give thousands of New Yorkers, small businessmen, working people, a fair shake. That’s what politicians are supposed to do. Common sense tells you that. Not one of these companies collapsed, not one job was lost, all because Danny Fonseca did what a representative of the people is supposed to do.

He helped people. Why is he here, facing these charges? These people, my brothers and sisters at the prosecution table, why are they trying to destroy him? Use your common sense.”

Steinman gazed at the jurors as Sorrentino spoke. He had a sense that they were put off by Sorrentino’s approach, that they felt that Sorrentino was patronizing, selling them damaged goods.

Steinman had a sense, in fact, that the jurors reacted more positively to his straightforward, grinding, steady approach.

His settled conviction that the jurors were more sympathetic to him than to the defense side was only reinforced when the other defense lawyers rose in turn. Attempting to mimic Sorrentino, they trailed off into histrionics, shouting, finger-pointing. The jurors’

expressions, to Steinman’s trained eye, appeared to glaze over.

One of the other lawyers even pulled the stunt of throwing a copy of the indictment in a trash can, a stale trick, Steinman thought, as creative as a Catskill comedian cracking jokes about his wife.

Steinman experienced a rush of still more confidence when, the summations over, Judge Feigley began reading the instructions to the jury. This was a role she loved: she was able to exercise the rhythmic inflections of her voice by reading from a prepared script.

D E AT H ’ S W I T N E S S

That script was Steinman’s. The judge read, virtually verbatim, from the neatly bound jury charges he and his team had prepared. In fact, it seemed as though the material Sorrentino and the other defense lawyers had cobbled together was not even on the bench with her.

* * *

Over the next three days, as the lawyers, the reporters, the defendants, and the hard core of spectators waited for the jury, Steinman was convinced that the jury was taking time not because of indecision but because the case was complex, there
189

were many defendants, and there were sixty-six separate counts.

As he told Kiyo Michine and the other lawyers who waited with him, it was a positive sign that every time the jurors asked for a read-back from the trial they asked for testimony from the government’s best witnesses and for a rereading of parts of the instructions that related to technical issues, such as the meaning of an overt act in a conspiracy rather than the elemental question of what the word “conspiracy” meant. “These are good issues for us,” he told his assistants. “They’re deeply into this.”

“But it is taking time,” Kiyo Michine said quietly, in those decisive, well-stated tones that always irritated Steinman.

Late in the afternoon of the third day, he was handed a typed letter signed by Vincent Sorrentino. The two of them had long ago stopped even saying hello to each other in the courtroom or the halls of the courthouse. The letter was handed to Steinman as he leaned against the big prosecution table, joking with the staff members who surrounded him, everyone relaxed because Judge Feigley was never present in the courtroom unless the jury asked for a read-back of portions of the testimony or the instructions.

“Well, well, well,” Steinman said as he held the letter and then handed it to Kiyo. She read it in two seconds. “Looks like Sorrentino feels the same way about this that I do,” he said.

“Will you see him?” Kiyo asked.

“Sure. I will pay any price, bear any burden, to ensure the survival of liberty in the free world.”

P A U L B A T I S T A

Trim, olive-skinned, formal, Kiyo never pretended to enjoy Steinman’s sense of humor. “Do you think he wants to discuss a deal for his client?”

“No, Kiyo. I think he wants to make me a partner: Steinman

& Sorrentino, Attorneys-at-Law.”

“When should we meet him?”

“Later,” Steinman said. “I want him to think a little more about his problems. Let some hair grow on those problems. Tell him that after the jury quits for the day he can meet me in the fourth-floor conference room at the office. You don’t mind talking to
190

him, do you? And then arrange with security to have a pass for him.”

He watched Kiyo as she walked through the courtroom toward the hall. She was all slim elegance—a green dress, gleaming black hair, slim, shapely rear. He remembered how intensely he had wanted to have her eleven months ago when she was assigned to work for him on this case and how much he had come to resent her aloofness, her cool demeanor, her prim, well-spoken eloquence.

* * *

It was seven-fifteen when Sorrentino entered the windowless conference room. Because Steinman was a meticulous lawyer, he’d spent half an hour with Kiyo and two of his other chief assistants discussing and planning how they would react to what Steinman was certain would be an overture from Sorrentino to negotiate a deal and a plea before the jury came back with its guilty verdict. Steinman, who had the approach of a pedagogue, encouraged them to talk about various alternatives; and then, just before Sorrentino arrived, said that he would take the position that the two nonnegotiable points would be that the Congressman would have to resign and to plead guilty to three counts, carrying a term of twelve years.

Sorrentino was alone. He sat on the side of the table opposite Steinman, Kiyo, and the others. He placed his half-glasses on the table’s surface. “I thought it was time we should have a discussion, and I appreciate your arranging this for us.”

D E AT H ’ S W I T N E S S

Kiyo was startled by Steinman: his suit jacket off, his tie undone, he leaned sharply forward and said, “Cut the small talk, Mr. Sorrentino. This isn’t the Congress of Vienna. You wanted to see
me
. You tell
me
what’s on your mind.”

Sorrentino didn’t visibly react to Steinman’s words or his physical thrusting forward. “Julie Perini has asked me for help. She has asked me to represent her.”