“I told Beth about his call that night over dinner. Beth insisted that I telephone that boy first thing the next morning to tell him I’d represent him. She told me she’d manage with the babies while I was away. That I couldn’t let this boy’s life be ruined by an unjust conviction.

“So it’s thanks to Beth that I am standing before you to tell you all that Scott, well, he has been unfairly maligned and wrongly charged for a crime that he did not commit. Scott is innocent. Under our judicial system, he is presumed innocent. Unfortunately, long before the trial began, Scott’s good name was dragged through the mud. His reputation has been stained so deeply that I am not sure it can ever be washed clean.

“He has been suspended from the state swim team and barred from attending the national swimming championships. His Olympic dreams are in shambles. His college scholarship has been revoked. His sponsors have abandoned him. This boy’s life is in ruins due to allegations of a crime that he did not commit,” Quinn said.

“Let me tell you a little about Scott. He is nineteen years old and has already set half a dozen state swim records in freestyle. If that’s not enough, he’s come within a razor’s edge of setting national records. Some of our nation’s top swimmers and coaches have said that Scott has the potential to be ‘the greatest swimmer of his generation.’

“It takes a lot to reach this elite level. While all of us were fast asleep in our beds over the years, Scott has dived into the cold water of an Olympic swimming pool before dawn to swim for two hours. He’s been doing it since he was nine years old. Six days a week, forty miles a week. So it’s amazing to me that Scott has still had time for family, his church, and of course his studies.” Quinn put his hands in his pockets as he softened his voice.

“But that’s not all that he’s had time for. In a society in which young people are sadly all too often self-absorbed, Scott devotes his spare time to helping those less fortunate than himself, in his church and in the wider community. You will hear about Scott’s good works that attest to his true character. You will hear powerful forensic testimony from a world-renowned medical expert from Harvard who will tell you that there was no indication of force on the complainant’s body. You will see CCTV footage that shows Scott and the complainant enjoying each other’s company that night.

“The prosecution will not be able to offer you a scrap of actual hard evidence that Scott committed the crimes for which he is on trial. Here. In this courtroom. Why? Because there is no evidence. Not a shred. The prosecution may offer you innuendo and supposition, but it won’t offer you evidence. It can’t. Because my client didn’t do it.

“Scott has lost his college scholarship, his income, his place in the national championships. And now his very freedom is threatened. All due to unsubstantiated accusations. Rumor and innuendo.” Quinn’s voice filled with outrage.

“It is frightening to think that a promising young man’s life can be ruined by a baseless accusation. With no evidence,” he sighed. “I guess that’s the world we live in today. A world where accusations sway opinion. A world where evidence doesn’t matter. A world where a person is deemed guilty without any proof.

“Scott’s dad, Greg Blair, had his own Olympic swimming career cut short due to a shoulder injury when he was just twenty. He told me yesterday that the devastation he felt when he had to pull out of the Olympics was nothing compared to the day he saw his son hauled by police out of an Olympic swimming pool while training for the national titles. It was done in full view of media cameras to humiliate Scott. To give the false impression he was guilty.

“Scott’s hands were cuffed behind his back. He was frog-marched by police out of the pool in a dripping-wet Speedo and shoved into a police car while news cameras photographed him. The mob decided Scott was guilty without a shred of evidence. Not a shred.

“You the jury have the chance to rectify that terrible wrong that has been done to Scott, because Scott did not rape or sexually assault Kelly Moore. The prosecutor, Mr. Alkins, won’t be able to give you evidence, let alone evidence beyond a reasonable doubt, for the simple reason that none exists. Scott here, well, he did not commit these crimes. He is innocent.” Quinn paused to let the words sink in.

“There was no rape. No sexual assault. That’s just not true,” Quinn continued. “What did happen was that Scott and the complainant had consensual sex and the complainant regretted it afterward. Sure, Scott acted like a cad after their tryst by boasting about it to his friends. He was only eighteen at the time. Boys can be immature. To cover up for her embarrassment, the complainant claimed that what happened was against her will. It wasn’t,” Quinn said. “She was a willing participant. That’s why there is no evidence to prove her story. Scott is innocent of all charges.”

Rachel could tell that Quinn had gotten through to some of the jurors. It helped, too, that Scott Blair had sat contritely throughout his lawyer’s address with the slumped shoulders and shocked expression of the wrongly accused. His puzzled blue eyes matched the baby blue of his V-neck sweater. A couple of the jurors nodded to themselves as Quinn returned to the defense table, pausing to squeeze Scott’s shoulder reassuringly as his final words reverberated through the courtroom.

Quinn had sowed a kernel of doubt in the hearts of the jurors. Rachel expected that he’d cultivate that kernel through the trial until, by the time the jury went into deliberations, that kernel would have grown big enough for at least some of the jurors to fight for Scott in the jury room. All it took was one juror to get a hung jury, thought Rachel. Just one.

When the jury filed out for the lunch recess, some of the jurors seemed weighed down by the enormity of the task, discerning a needle of truth in a haystack of subterfuge and legal doublespeak. Rachel didn’t envy them one bit.

24

Guilty or Not Guilty

Season 3, Episode 6: Jury Duty

About six years ago, I was called for jury duty. It was not long after my marriage broke up. The divorce papers had been filed, but we were still unpicking the Gordian knot of our lives together.

It wasn’t so much about who got what. We were both flat broke. But who would keep Millie, our King Charles spaniel? How we would divide up the wedding presents? And who’d take over the loan on the car? And the apartment lease? Not to mention arranging a payment schedule for paying off our credit card debt.

My family was furious with me. They loved my ex. Still do. Mom invites him for Thanksgiving every year. Me she can take or leave. But Ted, he gets to sit at the head of the table and the menu is carefully planned with all his food preferences in mind.

Anyway, I had this awful job working the graveyard shift in a newsroom in the months after the breakup. I was permanently jet-lagged. Sleeping during the day. Working at night. If you’ve ever done that kind of job, you’ll know that after a while it grinds you into dust.

Then the letter arrived. Summoning me for jury duty. Some people will do anything to get out of jury duty. You wouldn’t believe the stories they’ll tell. I heard the wildest things the day I turned up at the courthouse for jury selection. One guy said he had a back condition that precluded sitting for long periods of time. Another said she had claustrophobia and would get panic attacks if she was locked in a small room. The really smart ones simply said they were not capable of being objective.

Me, I was excited. I wanted my Twelve Angry Men moment. I wanted to play armchair detective. To sway fellow jurors with my righteous indignation. Yup, as you can gather, I had no idea what I was getting myself in for.

I sat with the other potential jurors in a crowded room drinking cheap coffee in Styrofoam cups, hunched over our phones while waiting to go through the voir dire, which is the fancy Latin name for selecting a jury.

There was a unanimous groan when we were told that it was a financial crimes trial and not a murder case. “Fraud,” someone said with distaste. “I got fraud last time,” another potential juror complained. “What does it take to get murder?”

Whether murder or fraud, the fact was that for most of the jury pool, getting called for jury duty was a major pain in the ass. Most of them were hardworking people, juggling kids and minimum-wage jobs. Few of them were college educated. Most were struggling to get by. They needed jury duty like they needed a hole in their heads.

Eventually it was my turn to be grilled by the lawyers. I didn’t last long. The second the defense attorney heard I had two college degrees, he used a preemptory challenge to have me dismissed. He did the same for other college-educated potential jurors until he’d whittled down the jurors to those with little more than a high school education.