Due Justice

Chapter 15

Tampa, Florida

Tuesday 9:00 a.m.

January 12, 1999

By Tuesday, my patience was exhausted and my annoyance level off the charts. I’d spent the weekend alternately in front of the television or the newspapers and trying to reach Carly. The news was all about the upcoming Gasparilla festivities, Tampa’s version of Mardi Gras. Carly was nowhere to be found.

Jones v. General Medics started promptly at 9:00 Tuesday morning, as the judge promised, and I was in no mood for nonsense. The case was scheduled for three weeks on my docket, but the way jury selection was going, I was sure it would take three months. Just great. Three whole months of Christian Grover. I couldn’t wait. Voir dire dragged on through 12:30, and we broke for lunch.

When I came back to my chambers for the lunch recess, there was a message from Carly. The message said “don’t worry I’ll be back soon.”  No number. I asked Margaret, my secretary, whether she had talked with Carly and how she sounded. Margaret said someone else had taken the message and I asked her to find out who. She looked at me quizzically, but knew better than to argue. She said she’d let me know.

As Margaret was leaving my office, she said “by the way, the CJ called. He wants to see you this afternoon when you recess for the day.”  Interesting. He’s staying late to talk to me. This can’t be good, I thought. More than that, it promised to be a pain in the ass. Maybe I’d recess early and get out before he came by.

I also had a message from Mark, Carly’s brother. Thinking he might have heard from Carly, I called him back. He was out and I left another message. In private practice, I used to bill for telephone tag. Now, it just takes up my time and makes me irritable.

Just before we reconvened after lunch, my secretary came to tell me that she’d asked around and no one remembered taking the message from Carly. She seemed puzzled and promised to keep trying.

Before bringing the venire back into the courtroom, I strongly admonished both lawyers, on the record. “Gentlemen, I’ve had enough fooling around in this case already. So there hasn’t been a breast implant case in the country that’s been tried in under four weeks. This one will be the first. When we get started, I will finish voir dire myself. When we have the jury, Mr. Grover, you may give your opening statement. You have twenty minutes. And” . . . I looked at Grover steadily, “there will be none of your infamous shenanigans or I’ll mistry this case so fast you won’t know what hit you.”

I turned to O’Connell.  “Mr. Worthington,” I said, just as sternly, “you’ll have twenty minutes for your opening and we will get our first witness on today.”

I addressed my bailiff before either man could say a word and instructed him to bring in the jurors. Once the panel was seated, I apologized for keeping them waiting and told them that we would finish the case in three weeks. I asked the few relevant voir dire questions I thought had been missed, gave the lawyers their preemptories and finished the selection in ten minutes flat. I instructed the jury, asked them to give the matter their undivided attention and we got down to work. Appealable error be damned.

Grover has a reputation for outrageous behavior in the courtroom, and he doesn’t care whether his verdicts get overturned on appeal. I was surprised when he delivered a colorful, but proper, opening in nineteen minutes. As O’Connell concluded his opening remarks, I could see Grover’s mind and attention were elsewhere. I couldn’t fault him for that; my mind wasn’t on the trial either.

I asked Grover to call his first witness. The trial proceeded quickly through the afternoon hours and we recessed at 4:30. I admonished everyone to be back in the courtroom promptly at 8:30 the next morning and left the bench. I couldn’t remember a thing that had been said by either side, and I hoped the jury was paying closer attention.