The main courses came. Annie’s cannelloni looked as other cannelloni does but smelled better than most. My chicken Taipei had the same two ingredients that elevated the mussels to gourmet class— ginger and honey. There was also some peanut and soy in there. A little corner of Thai paradise.
“That man you’re defending who did the terribly clever things with the apartment building,” Annie said. “He’s got the money, he and his partner, and what they did was illegal, and I don’t understand why you have to defend their illegal acts.”
“First,” I said, “a quote.”
“Lawyers are always quoting somebody or other.”
“From a playwright.”
“Playwright doesn’t necessarily make it gospel.”
“Robert Bolt wrote this in his play about Thomas More,” I said. “A Man For All Seasons.”
“Right, I saw the movie,” Annie said. “Paul Scofield played More. Got an Oscar.”
I said, “More was the Lord Chancellor, and in one scene he’s having a conversation with this very idealistic guy, More’s son-in-law, I think. More says to the son-in-law something like, ‘I know what’s legal, not what’s right, and I’ll stick to what’s legal.’ So the son-in-law thinks he’s got More in a corner, and he says,‘Then you set man’s law above God’s.’ More comes right back. ‘Not far below,’ he says, ‘but let me draw your attention to a fact. I’m not God.’”
Annie worked some cannelloni on her fork. I drank from my glass of Vouvray. Nothing like a few lines from the theatre to dry a man’s throat.
“Where’s this Robert Bolt stuff taking us?” Annie said. “I already know you’re not God.”
“You don’t have to say it so emphatically.”
Annie patted my arm. It was a pat that meant state the point.
I said, “A guy in my job can’t think about idealism, playing God, or anything in that vein. That’s what Bolt was talking about. A criminal lawyer deals with facts and law and the system.”
“This is beginning to sound familiar from past lectures,” Annie said. “The adversarial system. Presumption of innocence. Da-dah. Da-dah. Da-dah. What am I leaving out?”
“No fair sneering. It’s a nifty system. Only one thing wrong with it.”
“Yeah,” Annie said. “You’re in it. Which I think is why we’re having this little heart-to-heart.”
I took a bite of my chicken, drank some more wine, and pressed on.
“The thing wrong,” I said, “is the system is tilted badly against the people accused of the crimes.”
“Your noble clients.”
“Noble doesn’t come into it.”
“Right there we agree.”
I said, “Stick with me a minute. All the machinery gears up to put the accused guy on trial. There’s the cops and the crown attorney, medical experts, forensic scientists, court officials, God knows who else, dozens of people all lined up on the same side. That’s one tilt. Okay? But something else works against the accused guy, more fundamental even.”
I stopped talking. Annie chewed away on her cannelloni. When Cam Charles paused for dramatic effect, people sucked in their breath and made sounds of awe and exclamation. I couldn’t get a rise out of the woman in my life. I was also developing a dose of Cam Charles envy.
“The something else more fundamental,” I said, “is a bias.”
Annie nodded. It looked to me like the nod of someone who’s turned out the inside lights.
I said, “The defendant is protected by what you mentioned earlier, the presumption of innocence. The court has to presume he didn’t do what he’s charged with until the crown proves it.”
“Beyond a reasonable doubt,” Annie said.
“Neat. You’ve been listening.”
“Like I said, I’ve heard some of this before.”
“But even with the presumption of innocence, there’s this bias built into the system.” I was talking slowly, like a lecturer addressing a class of jerks. I stepped up the pace. “It’s a bias to get a guilty verdict. That’s why everybody’s sleuthing and investigating and questioning and keeping files and policing and prosecuting. To convict the guy.”
Annie waited until her mouth was free of cannelloni.
“I’m in favour of that,” she said. “Especially where the guy’s ripped off a company for two million or so with a dishonest scheme. Arkansas?”
“Oklahoma,” I said. “But you’re leaving something out. There has to be a voice speaking against the bias I just told you about.”
“A mouthpiece. Is that where the odious term came from?”
“It isn’t odious,” I said. “Listen, someone has to argue for the accused guy, one single voice that tries to make sure all that massive machinery on the other side doesn’t screw up. That’s where the defence lawyer comes in. He speaks against the bias. It’s his duty.”
“Duty to whom?” Annie said. “A bunch of guys you admitted yourself were more than likely guilty?”
“Not just to the clients,” I said. “To society.”
That rang pompous.
“A duty to everybody who might some time get pulled into court,” I said.
That rang lame.
“A duty to the system,” I said.
“You make it sound like the garbageman,” Annie said.
“It’s a dirty job, but somebody’s got to do it?”
Annie took a little wine.
She said, “I suppose the part that really bugs me about you acting for these terrible people, you like it.”
Annie had her hand up as a signal I shouldn’t interrupt.
“Even if you are right about the bias and the lonely voice of the defence lawyer and all that romantic stuff,” she said, “it seems, ah, unseemly you should get such a kick out of being on the side of crime.”
“First,” I said, “I don’t defend crime. I defend people, and all of them happen to be innocent at the time they retain me.”
“What’s second?”
“You’re right,” I said. “It gives me a boot, the whole courtroom process, me and my client against the machinery.”
“Hopeless.”
“That’s your rebuttal?”
“I’m regrouping my forces for a return engagement.”
Annie had polished off the dish of cannelloni. My own plate was strewn with chicken debris. On the other hand, I’d made the larger dent in the Vouvray.
Annie said, “One thing in favour of your current client the musician, from what you say, he doesn’t seem to be a threat to society or its money.”
“On the contrary, Dave’s the victim of the piece.”
“That’s novel for you,” Annie said. “What’re you going to do for him?”
“Make a call or two.”
“Who on? The porn mogul, right?”
“Yeah, my sparring partner, Raymond Fenk. Just a small matter of a pickup from him is all.”
Did dissembling come that easy to