Conviction by Kelly Loy Gilbert

Author:Kelly Loy Gilbert
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-4847-1943-5
Publisher: Disney Press
Published: 2015-05-19T07:00:00+00:00

In his cross-examination, Mr. Buchwald rubs his hands together briskly and peers over his glasses at Officer Molson on the stand. The lawyer looks bright-eyed and alert; he practically leapt up when the judge gave him the go-ahead.

“June eighteenth,” he says. “Four years ago. The twenty-two-year-old son of Officer Isaac Willingham—a thirty-year veteran of your department—was accused of sexual assault. Is this correct?”

Officer Molson frowns. “He was cleared of—”

“It’s a yes or no question. Is this correct?”

“Yeah, sure. He was accused.”

“And yet no charges were ever filed. Is this also true?”

“Yeah, because—”

“The son of one of your colleagues was accused of rape and was never arrested, never investigated, and never formally charged with a crime. Is this correct?”

“He never—”

“Please answer yes or no.”

“Of course he was investigated.”

“Who did the investigating? Was it your department?”

He pauses. “Yes. That’s standard.”

“On August tenth, four years ago, did Officer Reyes Taser a woman’s young dog to death in front of her?”

“That dog was a threat.”

“The puppy’s mother tried to sue your department—”

“Pal, the puppy’s mother was a dog.”

You can hear someone in the audience snicker. Mr. Buchwald presses his lips together. “I don’t believe I finished my question. The puppy’s owner tried to sue your department because she said there was no threat whatsoever.” Mr. Buchwald leans closer. “Did Francisco Reyes attempt any other courses of action before attacking the dog?”

“It was his Taser. It wasn’t a gun.”

“Did he attempt to subdue the puppy in any other way first?”

“He didn’t have time for that. Look, this wasn’t some cute puppy. This was a pit bull trying to attack the neighbor’s kid, okay? But it wasn’t supposed to happen like that, and no one felt worse about it than him.”

“The dog was shot at a distance of approximately fifty feet from any human being. Is that correct?”

“I got no idea.”

Mr. Buchwald looks irritated, but he doesn’t press it. “In September, two years ago, was Francisco Reyes investigated for excessive use of force during the arrest of Jordan Dadier?”

“That was a DV suspect trying to cover his—”

“Yes or no, please, Mr. Molson.”

“He was investigated, sure. Then he was cleared. People say all kinds of things about us, but that doesn’t make them true.”

“Did Francisco Reyes receive two weeks’ paid leave from taxpayers while your department conducted an investigation into the incident?”

“That’s standard procedure.”

“Did your department appoint its own employees to conduct its own internal investigation?”

“Well, that’s how—”

“It’s a yes or no question.”

“Yes.”

“And he was found to have acted in accordance with department policy based on the results of that internal investigation?”

“Yes.”

“Was an investigation ever conducted by an outside committee?”

“Nothing like that was needed.”

“So, no?”

“No.”

“The night of January eleventh, did Francisco Reyes tell Mr. Raynor’s teenaged son, ‘If there was any justice at all in the world, you wouldn’t have come back here safe’?”

“I don’t remember exactly what—”

“But he said that? That he wanted Mr. Raynor’s sixteen-year-old son harmed in some way?”

“I don’t think he said it like that.”

“You’ve testified that Francisco Reyes was angry and that he got”—he lifts his fingers in quotation marks—“snippy with Mr.

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