Jennifer prepared for Abraham Wilson's trial as she had never prepared for anything before in her life. She spent endless hours in the law library checking for procedures and defenses, and with her client, drawing from him every scrap of information she could. It was no easy task. From the beginning, Wilson was truculent and sarcastic.
"You wanna know about me, honey? I got my first fuck when I was ten. How ole was you?"
Jennifer forced herself to ignore his hatred and his contempt, for she was aware that they covered up a deep fear. And so Jennifer persisted, demanding to know what Wilson's early life was like, what his parents were like, what had shaped the boy into the man. Over a period of weeks, Abraham Wilson's reluctance gave way to interest, and his interest finally gave way to fascination. He had never before had reason to think of himself in terms of what kind of person he was, or why.
Jennifer's prodding questions began to arouse memories, some merely unpleasant, others unbearably painful. Several times during the sessions when Jennifer was questioning Abraham Wilson about his father, who had regularly given him savage beatings, Wilson would order Jennifer to leave him alone. She left, but she always returned.
If Jennifer had had little personal life before, she now had none. When she was not with Abraham Wilson, she was at her office, seven days a week, from early morning until long after midnight, reading everything she could find about the crimes of murder and manslaughter, voluntary and involuntary. She studied hundreds of appellate court decisions, briefs, affidavits, exhibits, motions, transcripts. She pored over files on intent and premeditation, self-defense, double jeopardy, and temporary insanity.
She studied ways to get the charge reduced to manslaughter.
Abraham had not planned to kill the man. But would a jury believe that?
Particularly a local jury. The townspeople hated the prisoners in their midst. Jennifer moved for a change of venue, and it was granted. The trial would be held in Manhattan.
Jennifer had an important decision to make: Should she allow Abraham Wilson to testify? He presented a forbidding figure, but if the jurors were able to hear his side of the story from his own lips, they might have some sympathy for him. The problem was that putting Abraham Wilson on the stand would allow the prosecution to reveal Wilson's background and past record, including the previous murder he had committed.
Jennifer wondered which one of the assistant district at= torneys Di Silva would assign to be her adversary. There were half a dozen very good ones who prosecuted murder trials, and Jennifer familiarized herself with their techniques.
She spent as much time as possible at Sing Sing, looking over the scene of the killing in the recreation yard, talking to guards and Abraham, and she interviewed dozens of convicts who had witnessed the killing.
"Raymond Thorpe attacked Abraham Wilson with a knife," Jennifer said. "A large butcher knife. You must have seen it:"
"Me? I didn't see no knife."
"You must have. You were right there."
"Lady, I didn't see nothin'."
Not one of them was willing to get involved.
Occasionally Jennifer would take time out to have a regular meal, but usually she grabbed a quick sandwich at the coffee shop on the main floor of the courthouse. She was beginning to lose weight and she had dizzy spells.
Ken Bailey was becoming concerned about her. He took her to Forlini's across from the courthouse, and ordered a large lunch for her.
"Are you trying to kill yourself?" he demanded.
"Of course not."
"Have you looked in a mirror lately?"
"No."
He studied her and said, "If you have any sense, you'll drop this case."
Why?
"Because you're setting yourself up as a clay pigeon. Jennifer, I hear things on the street. The press is peeing in its collective pants, they're so eager. to start taking potshots at you again."
"I'm an attorney," Jennifer said stubbornly. "Abraham Wilson is entitled to a fair trial. I'm going to try to see that he gets one." She saw the look of concern on Ken Bailey's face. "Don't worry about it. The case isn't going to get that much publicity."
"It isn't, huh? Do you know who's prosecuting?"
"No."
"Robert Di Silva."
Jennifer arrived at the Leonard Street entrance of the Criminal Courts Building and pushed her way past the people churning through the lobby, past the uniformed policemen, the detectives dressed like hippies, the lawyers identified by the briefcases they carried. Jennifer walked toward the large circular information desk, where no attendant had ever been posted, and took the elevator to the sixth floor. She was on her way to see the District Attorney. It had been almost a year since her last encounter with Robert Di Silva, and Jennifer was not looking forward to this one. She was going to inform him that she was resigning from Abraham Wilson's defense.
It had taken Jennifer three sleepless nights to make her decision. What it came down to finally was that the primary consideration had to be the best interests of her client. The Wilson case was not important enough for Di Silva to handle himself. The only reason, therefore, for the District Attorney's giving it his personal attention was because of Jennifer's involvement. Di Silva wanted vengeance. He was planning to teach Jennifer a lesson. And so she had finally decided she had no choice but to withdraw from Wilson's defense. She could not let him be executed because of a mistake she had once made. With her off. the case, Robert Di Silva would probably deal with Wilson more leniently. Jennifer was an her way to save Abraham Wilson's life.
There was an odd feeling of reliving the past as she got off at the sixth floor and walked toward the familiar door marked District Attorney, County of New York. Inside, the same secretary was seated at the same desk.
"I'm Jennifer Parker. I have an appointment with" "Go right in," the secretary said. "The District Attorney is expecting you."
Robert Di Silva was standing behind his desk, chewing on a wet cigar, giving orders to two assistants. He stopped as Jennifer entered.
"I was betting you wouldn't show up."
"I'm here."
"I thought you would have turned tail and run out of town by now. What do you want?"
There were two chairs opposite Robert Di Silva's desk, but he did not invite Jennifer to sit.
"I came here to talk about my client, Abraham Wilson."
Robert Di Silva sat down, leaned back in his chair and pretended to think.
"Abraham Wilson . . . oh, yes. That's the nigger murderer who beat a man to
death in prison. You shouldn't have any trouble defending him." He glanced at his two assistants and they left the room.
"Well, counselor?"
"I'd like to talk about a plea."
Robert Di Silva looked at her with exaggerated surprise. "You mean you came in to make a deal? You amaze me. I would have thought that someone with your great legal talent would be able to get him off scot-free."
"Mr. Di Silva, I know this looks like an open-and-shut case," Jennifer began, "but there are extenuating circumstances. Abraham Wilson was-"
District Attorney Di Silva interrupted. "Let me put it in legal language you can understand, counselor. You can take your extenuating circumstances and shove them up your ass!" He got to his feet and when he spoke his voice was trembling with rage. "Make a deal with you, lady? You fucked up my life! There's a dead body and your boy's going to burn for it. Do you hear me? I'm making it my personal business to see that he's sent to the chair."
"I came up here to withdraw from the case. You could reduce this to a manslaughter charge. Wilson's already in for life. You could-"
"No way! He's guilty of murder plain and simple!"
Jennifer tried to control her anger. "I thought the jury was supposed to decide that."
Robert Di Silva smiled at her without mirth. "You don't know how heartwarming it is to have an expert like you walk into my office and explain the law to me"
"Can't we forget our personal problems? I-"
"Not as long as I live. Say hello to your pal Michael Moretti for me."
Half an hour later, Jennifer was having coffee with Ken Bailey.
"I don't know what to do," Jennifer confessed. "I thought if I got off the case Abraham Wilson would stand a better chance. Hut Di Silva won't make a deal. He's not after Wilson-he's after me."
Ken Bailey looked at her thoughtfully. "Maybe he's trying to psych you out. He wants you running scared."
"I am running scared:" She took a sip of her coffee. It tasted bitter. "It's a bad case. You should see Abraham Wilson. All the jury will have to do is look at him and they'll vote to convict."
"When does the trial come up?"
"In four weeks."
"Anything I can do to help?"
"Uh-huh. Put out a contract on Di Silva."
"Do you think there's any chance you can get Wilson an acquittal?"
"Looking at it from the pessimist's point of view, I'm trying my first case against the smartest District Attorney in the country, who has a vendetta against me, and my client is a convicted Black killer who killed again in front of a hundred and twenty witnesses."
"Terrific. What's the optimist's point of view?"
"I could get hit by a truck this afternoon."
The trial date was only three weeks away now. Jennifer arranged for Abraham Wilson to be transferred to the prison at Riker's Island. He was put in the House of Detention for Men, the largest and oldest jail on the island.
Ninety-five percent of his prison mates were there awaiting trial for felonies: murder, arson, rape, armed robbery and sodomy.
No private cars were allowed on the island, and Jennifer was transported in a small green bus to the gray brick control building where she showed her identification. There were two armed guards in a green booth to the left of the building, and beyond that a gate where all unauthorized visitors were stopped. From the control building, Jennifer was driven down Hazen Street, the little road that went through the prison grounds, to the Anna M. Kross Center Building, where Abraham Wilson was brought to see her in the counsel room, with its eight cubicles reserved for attorney-client meetings.
Walking down the long corridor on her way to meet with Abraham Wilson, Jennifer thought: This must be like the waiving room to hell. There was an incredible cacophony. The prison was made of brick and steel and stone and tile. Steel gates were constantly opening and clanging shut. There were more than one hundred men in each cellblock, talking and yelling at the same time, with two television sets tuned to different channels and a music system playing country rock. Three hundred guards were assigned to the building, and their bellowing could be heard over the prison symphony.
A guard had told Jennifer, "Prison society is the politest society in the world. If a prisoner ever brushes up against another one, he immediately says, 'Excuse me.' Prisoners have a lot on their minds and the least little thing.
Jennifer sat across from Abraham Wilson and she thought:
This man's life is in my hands. If he dies, it will be because l failed him. She looked into his eyes and saw the despair there.
"Tm going to do everything I can," Jennifer promised.
Three days before the Abraham Wilson trial was to begin, Jennifer learned that the presiding judge was to be the Honorable Lawrence Waldman, who had presided over the Michael Moretti trial and had tried to get Jennifer disbarred.
At four o'clock on a Monday morning in late September of 1970, the day the trial of Abraham Wilson was to begin, Jennifer awakened feeling tired and heavy-eyed. She had slept badly, her mind filled with dreams of the trial.
In one of the dreams, Robert Di Silva had put her in the witness box and asked her about Michael Moretti. Each time Jennifer tried to answer the questions, the jurors interrupted her with a chant: Liar! Liar! Liar!
Each dream was different, but they were all similar. In the last one, Abraham Wilson was strapped in the electric chair. As Jennifer leaned over to console him, he' spit in her face. Jennifer awoke trembling, and it was impossible for her to go back to sleep. She sat up in a chair until dawn and watched the sun come up. She was too nervous to eat. She wished she could have slept the night before. She wished that she were not so tense. She wished that this day was over.
As she bathed and dressed she had a premonition of doom.
She felt like wearing black, but she chose a green Chanel copy she had bought on sale at Loehmann's.
At eight-thirty, Jennifer Parker arrived at the Criminal Courts Building to begin the defense in the case of The People of the State of New York against Abraham Wilson. There was a crowd outside the entrance and Jennifer's first thought was that there had been an accident., She saw a battery of television cameras and microphones, and before Jennifer realized what was happening, she was surrounded by reporters.
A reporter said, "Miss Parker, this is your first time in court, isn't it, since you fouled up the Michael Moretti case for the District Attorney?"
Ken Bailey had warned her. She was the central attraction, not her client. The reporters were not there as objective observers; they were there as birds of prey and she was to be their carrion.
A young woman in jeans pushed a microphone up to Jennifer's face. "Is it true that District Attorney Di Silva is out to get you?"
"No comment." Jennifer began to fight her way toward the entrance of the building.
"The District Attorney issued a statement last night that he thinks you shouldn't be allowed to practice law in the New York courts. Would you like to say anything about that?"
"No comment." Jennifer had almost reached the entrance.
"Last year Judge Waldman tried to get you disbarred. Are you going to ask him to disqualify himself from-?"
Jennifer was inside the courthouse.
The trial was scheduled to take place in Room 37. The corridor outside was crowded with people trying to get in, but the courtroom was already full. It was buzzing with noise and there was a carnival atmosphere in the air.
There were extra rows reserved for members of the press. Di Silva saw to that, Jennifer thought.
Abraham Wilson was seated at the defense table, towering over everyone around him like an evil mountain. He was dressed in a dark blue suit that was too small for him, and a white shirt and blue tie that Jennifer had bought him. They did not help. Abraham Wilson looked like an ugly killer in a dark blue suit. He might just as well have worn his prison clothes, Jennifer thought, discouraged.
Wilson was staring defiantly around the courtroom, glowering at everyone who met his look. Jennifer knew her client well enough now to understand that his belligerence was a cover-up for his fright; but what would come over to everyone -including the judge and the jury-was an impression of hostility and hatred. The huge man was a threat. They would regard him as someone to be feared, to be destroyed.
There was not a trace in Abraham Wilson's personality that was loveable.
There was nothing about his appearance that could evoke sympathy. There was only that ugly, scarred face with its broken nose and missing teeth, that enormous body that would inspire fear.
Jennifer walked over to the defense table where Abraham Wilson was sitting and took the seat next to him. "Good morning, Abraham."
He glanced over at her and said, "I didn't think you was comin'."
Jennifer remembered her dream. She looked into his small, slitted eyes. "You knew I'd be here."
He shrugged indifferently. "It don't matter one way or another. They's gonna get me, baby. They's gonna convict me of murder and then they's gonna pass a law makin' it legal to boil me in oil, then they's gonna boil me in oil. This ain't gonna be no trial. This is gonna be a show. I hope you brung your popcorn."
There was a stir around the prosecutor's table and Jennifer looked up to see District Attorney Di Silva taking his place at the table next to a battery of assistants. He looked at Jennifer and smiled. Jennifer felt a growing sense of panic.
A court officer said, "All rise," and Judge Lawrence Waldman entered from the judge's robing room.
"Hear ye, Hear ye. All people having business with Part Thirty-seven of this Court, draw near, give your attention and you shall be heard. The Honorable Justice Lawrence Waldman presiding."
The only one who refused to stand was Abraham Wilson. Jennifer whispered out of the corner of her mouth, "Stand Up!
"Fuck 'em, baby. They gonna have to come and drag me up."
Jennifer took his giant hand in hers. "On your feet, Abraham. We're going to beat them:"
He looked at her for a long moment, then slowly got to his feet, towering over her.
Judge Waldman took his place on the bench. The spectators resumed their seats. The court clerk handed a court calendar to the judge.
"The People of the State of New York versus Abraham Wilson, charged with the murder of Raymond Thorpe."
Jennifer's instinct normally would have been to fill the jury box with Blacks, but because of Abraham Wilson she was not so sure. Wilson was not one of them. He was a renegade, a killer, "a disgrace to their race." They might convict him more readily than would whites. All Jennifer could do was try to keep the more obvious bigots off the jury. But bigots did not go around advertising. They would keep quiet about their prejudices, waiting to get their vengeance.
By late afternoon of the second day, Jennifer had used up her ten peremptory challenges. She felt that her voir dire the questioning of the jurors-was clumsy and awkward, while Di Silva's was smooth and skillful. He had the knack of putting the jurors at ease, drawing them into his confidence, making friends of them.
How could I have forgotten what a good actor Di Silva is?
Jennifer wondered.
