Obviously You Can't Interview A Dead Dude

I was sitting in my office yesterday Friday, cranking out some reports that had been floating around in folders with due dates that feel like they've been tattooed to my forehead. There is nothing like teetering on the edge of stressing out (just a wee bit) and having everyone and their mother trying to distract you without really meaning to...I think.

Let's see...I had offers to cut out after work on Friday to go drinking, grab dinner, there was constant badgering for not being interested in either, offers to go to a ball game, a party, endless talk about having kids and all the stress that they cause...I must say that working in an office with employees that have kids is the perfect birth control. Forget condoms and the pill...just stick a couple of our attorney/investigator parents in a room with you and let them regale you with their parenting horror stories and I guarantee you...no kids for as long as you work in the office.

I've seen murder books with less frightening shit than some of these parenting stories.

Ummm....what was I going to write about? Oh, yeah...

I REALLY just wanted to write my reports. I mean, I was totally in the zone, I had my I-Pod plugged into my radio, I had the calming classical music turned up....No, I'm not trying to sound like a pretentious asshole. The truth is I'm not a tremendous or very knowledgeable fan of Classical music but I'm learning to enjoy it AND I have found that listening to it while I'm writing reports is fantastic and really helps me focus my thoughts. Just a little "sumptin sumptin" for my fellow investigators...a report writing tip if you will.

Anyway, the point is that everytime I got into a good writing groove I was distracted by someone and if it wasn't someone, it was something....like the damn telephone. I really wanted to toss it out the friggin window but since my window doesn't open and my telephone is stuck in one spot I just had to imagine doing it (I think I imagined doing it about 5X). I had witnesses calling me asking if they really needed to come to court and then asking what would happen if they just didn't show up at an upcoming trial of the century. I asked all of them how they would feel if they had just a Bench Warrant with their name on it (they got the picture), I also had a murder client in jail who just likes to chat (I try talk to him about once a day for at least 15 minutes) but he kept calling (10X) for no reason than to fuck around with the phones or hear a friendly voice (I guess).

I also had the victim on a case that we had already gone to trial on, call me out of the blue last week.

Dealing with victims. Whew boy...it can be so unbelievably, fucking touchy sometimes.

I think that on almost ever investigation request I have received in the last five years, I have been asked or it has later been decided that I needed to make contact and interview the victim or victims family and friends (obviously you can't interview a dead dude).

I have a pretty good track record talking to victims and I have a million stories I could share about my experiences with victims on cases but I'll save some of those for another day.

The victim (Gloria, for this story) that called me on Friday was the victim of a DUI. Nobody was hurt or killed, but she and her family had about $6000.00 in property damage to their home. Gloria is a Spanish speaking woman in her mid 30's who lives with her husband and 15 year-old son, in a beat-up (but tidy) little house. Gloria and her husband are undocumented (Their son is a citizen) and they had owned this house for about 8 months. They had saved up for 5 years to buy it.

I interviewed Gloria about a few days before trial was scheduled to go, making it very clear that I was an investigator with the Public Defender's office and NOT the Fiscal. When I was finished and was getting ready to leave, Gloria asked me if she would have to testify...I explained that the defense would NOT be calling her to court but if she received a subpoena from the Fiscal...she was required to appear.

I remember that she was very hesitant to speak with me (the interview was completed in Spanish) at first but I was able to get her to open up a bit, talking about what it felt like to be a homeowner and she said she loved it. She was very proud of her home and felt like a real American, to able to say she owned her own home with her husband. I was also able to guess from her accent that she was from Zacatecas and this really threw her off...she was surprised that a person like me would know about the people of Zacatecas and we ended up talking about Mexican politics for a bit. Gloria said that nobody from the DA's office had come to her home to talk to them or leave a subpoena..I was REALLY surprised. Gloria said that she and her husband were almost finished paying off a loan that had taken out to pay for the damages in the accident and they didn't want to be involved with the criminal case if they could avoid it. I told them I couldn't make any promises they wouldn't be subbed in the next few days...this wasn't my last contact with her.

Come the day of trial and who do I see sitting in the courthouse and 8:00am? Gloria. She looked lovely in a dress that she had made a few years back. I didn't have much time to talk with her but she said that she didn't know what to do. I told her to check in with the bailiff in the courtroom when it opened up and then just wait outside till she was called in.

I was in the courtroom when she was called up to the stand by the DA. I was shocked to see that the DA was not using an Spanish interpreter. It took about 15 minutes of the most awkward friggin questioning in courtroom history for her to even identify our client. The other 30 minutes of direct was also unbelievably awkward and i have to say that I felt so bad for her. She was super nervous when I talked to her in Spanish outside the courtroom but when she was on the stand trying to speak in broken English...it was heart-breaking! Needless to say, except for the sympathy factor her testimony ended up being favorable to the defense.

The jury was out for about a 2 hours. Not guilty on all counts.

A few weeks later is when I received the telephone call from Gloria. She said she was just calling to find out what had happened on the case. When I told her...she got upset. She wanted to know why I had made her come to court and make her look like a fool only to have the jury come back with not guilty verdict.

Oh what a memory some people have...I reminded her that my office DID NOT subpoena her to come to court. She said she thought that we did. Gloria went on to say that the day before trial a woman called her on her home phone explaining that if she didn't go to court, she and her husband would be arrested and deported if they did not have proper documentation. I asked again if she or ANYONE in her family had received a subpoena and she said no. The phone call is all they got. Hmmm...that explains why they didn't know she spoke Spanish and needed an interpreter.

She apologized for accusing me, and then asked if I had the number for the DA's office so she could make a complaint. I told her I had something even better. The name and DIRECT number to the DA who handled the case and the name and DIRECT number to his supervisor. I told her if anyone asked where she got their numbers she was free to give them MY name and direct line.

I must say that I was really horrified by the actions of the DA's office but not surprised. Can you believe the shit they do to people sometimes? Even the people that the State is supposed to be representing?