Juvenile Crimes - Chapter 20
Alone In The Dark
Oregon, December 1, 1995, continued…
The phone line went dead as I sat there with the receiver in my hand, dumbfounded by the call. At least I know she is safe…
After pulling my senses together, I joined Keith and Rachel in the garage and went back to my pack of smokes. I told them all about it as I chain smoked. I called my mother, and she took the news about Tami pretty hard on my behalf, too. She tried to be helpful and supportive, telling me to “Just focus on your work.” It wasn’t bad advice, and it was really the only advice she could give, but it felt trite none-the-less.
We went out for another subdued dinner. Keith had tickets to a Portland Trail Blazers game that night, so he took me instead of Rachel and I was introduced to my first live NBA game. I had already become a big fan of Michael Jordan. During my third year of law school, Jordan made his comeback after his attempt at professional baseball, and I got hooked on watching the Chicago Bulls. I enjoyed the Trail Blazers game - my first of many to come - and it was a good distraction from my personal misery.
I decided to go back to Coquille a day early since I had a mountain of work waiting for me, as well as a lonely cat who would start acting out when I was away for too long. It was another long drive of deep thinking. This time, the fear-factor was missing since I knew that Tami was safe but absolutely gone forever. The gloom factor was strong.
Everything I thought I had earned, all that I had wanted for my life, was now gone. All I had was what was in front of me. My future was now an entirely blank slate, an empty page.
I knew full well that I was instantly in financial dire straits without any assistance from my would-be roommate. I would have to start doing the number crunch immediately to figure out how, or if, I could financially stay afloat. On the asset side, I had a law license and a job that was supposed to be all about ‘doing the right thing.’ The reality I had seen so far left me with a mixed impression – I was doing the right thing and being duly punished for it - but by my peers, not the bosses. I could only forge ahead and see where it led me. Monday, the meatgrinder would begin in earnest, ready or not.
All I had left personally was my honor and integrity, and there was no way I was ever going to lose those. If I did, I knew it would be the end of me.
Monday morning District Court was crazy as usual, and I was the sole prosecutor. Luckily, Sophie took good notes and had all the details of the plea offers and sentencings in her files, as well as notes of ongoing contacts with opposing counsels. That allowed me to get through the morning with less awkwardness than I would have otherwise had. A couple public defenders tried to test the waters with me by bullshitting about their plea offers, but I called them on it and stood firm to the deals in the folder. The morning of arraignments, pleas, and sentencings started at 8:00 and lasted about an hour and forty-five minutes.
As soon as I entered the D.A.’s office with my huge stack of files to drop off at one of the office assistant’s desks for refiling, Kevin approached me with a thin file in his hand.
“We’re all booked up this morning, so you gotta take this DUII trial,” Kevin said as he handed me the file.
“When is it?” I asked.
“Jury selection starts in 15 minutes,” Kevin replied with a grin.
“Say what?” I said while letting my face show my feelings. I couldn’t believe these assholes were doing me like this. “I’ve never tried a DUII case before, and this would be only my second jury trial ever.”
“Don’t worry about it,” Kevin replied reassuringly. “This one is as easy as they come. The guy was all over the road when he got pulled over, stumbled through the roadside sobriety tests, then he blew a point two-six.” Kevin was referring to the Intoxilyzer 5000, commonly known as a “breathalyzer,” test result of the defendant’s blood alcohol content, or “BAC”. In Oregon, the legal threshold of presumptive intoxication, and therefore guilt for DUII, was a .08% blood alcohol content. At .26% BAC, this defendant was over three times the legal “limit” – I put that in quotes because a person can be convicted of DUII if they are proven to have consumed an intoxicant and is impaired, even if they are below that .08 % BAC threshold amount.
“The suggested jury instructions are ready for you in the file,” Kevin continued. “All you gotta do is walk the arresting police officer through the reasonable suspicion for making the stop. Then go through the police report item by item and have him testify about how the defendant did on each of the roadside sobriety tests. When you get to the Intoxilyzer, walk him through the foundational questions – was the machine working properly, tested recently, etcetera – then get the BAC results admitted, and you should be golden. Should be a slam-dunk.”
“Okay,” I said with a hint of question in my voice. “This is with Judge Giovanni, right?”
“Oh, yeah,” Kevin assured me. “Right back to the courtroom you just came from.”
“Alright, better get to it then,” I said as I started to my far-down-the-hall office. Now, I had less than 15 minutes to skim through the police report to get up to speed on the case, go through proposed jury instructions so I know what I’m asking from the Court, and get my questions together for the jury selection process, which came first…