The Brass Verdict

Elliot?”
    “Uh, no, I have not talked to him yet. I plan to try to do that later today. The person I talked to was involved in something a little less serious. A felony theft, actually.”
    “Okay.”
    She was growing impatient so I moved to the point of the meeting.
    “What I wanted to ask about was the police. You were right this morning when you warned me about guarding against police intrusion. When I got over to the office after leaving here, I found a couple of detectives going through the files. Jerry’s receptionist was there but she hadn’t tried to stop them.”
    The judge’s face grew hard.
    “Well, I hope you did. Those officers should have known better than to start going through files willy-nilly.”
    “Yes, Your Honor, they backed off once I got there and objected. In fact, I threatened to make a complaint to you. That’s when they backed off.”
    She nodded, her face showing pride in the power the mention of her name had.
    “Then, why are you here?”
    “Well, I’m wondering now whether I should let them back in.”
    “I don’t understand you, Mr. Haller. Let the police back in?”
    “The detective in charge of the investigation made a good point. He said the evidence suggests that Jerry Vincent knew his killer and probably even allowed him to get close enough to, you know, shoot him. He said that makes it a good bet that it was one of his own clients. So they were going through the files looking for potential suspects when I walked in on them.”
    The judge waved one of her hands in a gesture of dismissal.
    “Of course they were. And they were trampling on those clients’ rights as they were doing it.”
    “They were in the file room and were looking through old cases. Closed cases.”
    “Doesn’t matter. Open or closed, it still constitutes a violation of the attorney-client privilege.”
    “I understand that, Judge. But after they were gone, I saw they had left behind a stack of files on the table. These were the files they were either going to take or wanted to look more closely at. I looked them over and there were threats in those files.”
    “Threats against Mr. Vincent?”
    “Yes. They were cases in which his clients weren’t happy about the outcome, whether it was the verdict or the disposition or the terms of imprisonment. There were threats, and in each of the cases, he took the threats seriously enough to make a detailed record of exactly what was said and who said it. That was what the detectives were pulling together.”
    The judge leaned back and clasped her hands, her elbows on the arms of her leather chair. She thought about the situation I had described and then brought her eyes to mine.
    “You believe we are inhibiting the investigation by not allowing the police to do their job.”
    I nodded.
    “I was wondering if there was a way to sort of serve both sides,” I said. “Limit the harm to the clients but let the police follow the investigation wherever it goes.”
    The judge considered this in silence again, then sighed.
    “I wish my husband had stayed,” she finally said. “I value his opinion greatly.”
    “Well, I had an idea.”
    “Of course you did. What is it?”
    “I was thinking that I could vet the files myself and draw up a list of the people who threatened Jerry. Then I could pass it on to Detective Bosch and give him some of the details of the threats as well. This way, he would have what he needs but he wouldn’t have the files themselves. He’s happy, I’m happy.”
    “Bosch is the lead detective?”
    “Yes, Harry Bosch. He’s with Robbery-Homicide. I can’t remember his partner’s name.”
    “You have to understand, Mr. Haller, that even if you just give this man Bosch the names, you are still breaching client confidentiality. You could be disbarred for this.”
    “Well, I was thinking about that and I believe there’s a way out. One of the mechanisms of relief from the client confidentiality bond is in the case of threat to safety. If Jerry Vincent knew a client was coming to kill him last night, he could have called the police and given that client’s name to them. There would’ve been no breach in that.”
    “Yes, but what you are considering here is completely different.”
    “It’s different, Judge, but not completely. I’ve been directly told by the lead detective on the case that it is highly likely that the identity of Jerry Vincent’s killer is contained in Jerry’s own files. Those files are now mine. So