Free Blind Justice by James Scott Bell Page B

um, I may have just a moment, Your Honor?”
    “You may not. Court is in session. Put that thing away.”
    “Jake!” Triple C cried as if he were being dragged out by the riptide. I disconnected and put the phone away.
    “All right,” said Abovian. “This is the time set for the preliminary hearing in the case of People v. Howard Patino. Is counsel ready?”
    Sylvia Plotzske stood. “The People are ready, Your Honor. However, we may have a disposition.”
    “Is that right, Mr. Denney?” said the judge.
    “Your Honor, if I may just confer with my client for a moment?”
    “Haven’t you done that yet?”
    “Not this morning.”
    “All right, you can have one minute.”
    I nodded curtly. How generous. One minute to get to the bottom of this thing. I put my hand on Howie’s shoulder and leaned in so no one could hear us. “Howie, I want you to tell me, once and for all, if you killed your wife.”
    He seemed shocked and as if he barely comprehended what was going on. “Yeah, Jake, it was my fault.”
    “That’s not what I asked you.”
    “I killed her, Jake. I killed her spirit.”
    Closing my eyes and feeling like I might explode, I whispered forcefully, “I don’t give a rip about her spirit, Howie! Was there someone else in the room with you when it happened? Did someone else kill your wife and stab you?”
    For a moment, Howie said nothing. Then his eyes went wild, like a character in an old haunted-house comedy who sees a ghost. Only this wasn’t funny. This was pure terror.
    Howie shot to his feet and started screaming at the top of his voice, “The devil! The devil! The devil!”
    And then he bumped me with his shoulder as he ran by. I fell back against the counsel table.
    Howie burst through the gate and ran up the aisle, screaming.
    The bailiff took off after him.
    Janet Patino yelled, “Howie!”
    Howie burst out the doors.
    I followed the bailiff.
    Lindsay Patino followed me.
    Out in the hallway people were watching the fleeing defendant as he ran wildly toward the courthouse doors. His cries got the attention of folks at the front desk, including a deputy sheriff. The deputy, linebacker size, jumped in front of Howie. The impact sent them both to the floor.
    The bailiff reached them and grabbed Howie from behind, lifted him slightly, and slammed him on the ground.
    Howie was crying and screaming and flapping his arms.
    The linebacker deputy, looking none too pleased, rolled on top of Howie and held him down as the bailiff reached for his handcuffs.
    He was bending Howie’s arm back just as Lindsay and I got there. Howie squealed through his tears.
    “Go easy!” I said.
    “Stop it!” Lindsay said.
    A third deputy had appeared and got his body between us and the handcuff party.
    “Back away,” he said.
    “I’m his lawyer,” I said.
    “Back away!”
    Howie’s pitiful, muffled moans sounded like a wounded animal’s.
    Lindsay tried to get by the deputy. He grabbed her arm and pushed her.
    “Let go of me!” she said.
    I took Lindsay by the shoulders and eased her out of the deputy’s grip. “It’s okay,” I said.
    “It’s not okay,” she said. “And you know it.”

    They got Howie, who was still crying softly, back into the courtroom. They kept the cuffs on him as they sat him down. The bailiff and the lineback deputy stood directly behind him as Abovian came back to the bench.
    He scowled at me as if I was the one who had been screaming. “I hope you will make it abundantly clear to your client,” he said, “that another outburst like that will result in his being shackled and gagged. Do you understand that? I am not kidding. I will slap a gag on his mouth so fast it’ll make your head spin. Is there anything about that you don’t understand, Mr. Denney?”
    “No, Your Honor.”
    “Talk to your client.”
    I leaned down to whisper to Howie. His chin was resting on his chest. “Did you hear the judge?”
    He nodded slightly.
    “You going to behave yourself?”
    He