We'll see," Victoria said. He held her gaze for another second. Then he nodded a single deliberate motion and stepped back. Dennis watched him go and then turned back to Victoria. "Do you know what's about to happen when Reese comes back in that room?
He's going to try to discredit the chain of custody document," she said. "He'll argue the access logs are system errors. He'll try to make the irregularities sound administrative and he'll be doing it in front of a jury that just watched him ask for a recess 30 seconds after I described them. Dennis almost smiled. Timing, he said.
Timing is everything, Victoria agreed. In trauma medicine and in courtrooms. The recess lasted 22 minutes instead of 15. When Carl Ree came back, something had changed about him. Not dramatically, but Victoria had spent enough years reading small physical shifts in people under pressure to notice it a slight stiffness in the way he carried his shoulders, a quality in his movements that suggested he had made several phone calls during those 22 minutes, and at least one of them had gone badly.
He had learned something he hadn't known before the recess. Victoria didn't know what, but she would find out. He came back to the podium and he looked at her and he said, "M Hayes, let's talk about your connection to the defendant." Victoria said, "I don't have one. You'd never met Ethan Cole before this case."
No. Never had any contact with him, his associates, or members of his affiliated community. Victoria understood the shape of this line of questioning immediately. If you're asking whether I'm connected to the Hell's Angels, Mr. Ree, I think you should ask that directly rather than architecturally. Two jurors blinked.
One of them, a woman in her 60s, with a focused expression of someone who had been paying extremely close attention all morning, made a small movement with her lips that might have been approval. Reese didn't react to the comment the way she expected. He didn't deflect. He looked at her directly and said, "Are you connected to the Hell's Angels, Ms. Hayes?" "I know some people," she said.
The same way an ER nurse who works in this city for 11 years knows people from every walk of life, including members of outlaw motorcycle clubs, including people from a wide range of communities. Yes. Were you asked to testify in this case by a member of the Hell's Angels? Victoria said, "I was contacted by the defendant's attorney, Dennis Marsh, who was sitting at that table. I was asked to review medical evidence.
I reviewed it. What I found is what I've described and the identity of the mutual contact who referred Mr. Marsh to you. Dennis was on his feet. Objection. Calls for speculation about third party communications protected under.
I'll allow it. The judge said, "M Hayes, do you know who referred your name to the defense attorney?" Victoria looked at the judge. I asked Mr. Marsh that question directly, she said. He told me it was a mutual contact and declined to specify further.
I accepted that answer because it didn't change the nature of the evidence I was being asked to review. Whitmore nodded. Continue, Mr. Ree. Ree took a step. Mr. Hayes, the jacket you were wearing when you entered this courtroom today, you're aware that it carries significant meaning within motorcycle club culture.
Leather jackets have a range of cultural associations. Victoria said, "Yes, this specific jacket, the one the court requested you remove." Victoria said, "You're going to have to ask a specific question, Mr. Ree. Is that jacket yours?" "Yes." "
How long have you owned it?" " 9 years." "And the name stitched inside the collar, Silver Angel. Is that a name you chose for yourself?" The room went very still.
Victoria said, "No." "Who chose it?" She looked at him. People who were in a difficult situation and needed a way to refer to someone they couldn't identify by name. Members of the Hell's Angels, people who were in a burning building, Victoria said.
I'm not aware of whether all of them held formal club affiliations. I was focused on other things at the time. Ree looked at the jury. You were present at the warehouse fire on Kelner Road 4 years ago. It wasn't a question.
He had done his homework during the recess or someone had done it for him. Yes, Victoria said. You entered the building? Yes. During an active structure fire, the fire was in its second stage.
The structural collapse hadn't fully, she stopped, redirected. Yes. During an active structure fire, loan? Yes. And rescued 12 individuals.
I helped 12 individuals exit the building, she said. There's a difference. What's the difference? Ree asked. Victoria looked at him.
Rescuing implies they couldn't have done it without me. Helping implies I provided something useful in a situation where they were already doing everything they could. They were fighting hard. I just knew the right direction. The woman in the jury box who had made that small movement with her lips earlier made it again.
Reese studied Victoria for a moment. She could see him recalibrating in real time trying to work out whether this line of questioning was helping him or digging something deeper that he hadn't planned to excavate. He made the wrong call. Mr. Hayes, he said, "Would it be fair to say that your history with the Hell's Angels, your having saved the lives of 12 members four years ago, creates a sense of personal loyalty, an obligation to assist them when asked?" Victoria looked at him for a long moment.
Then she said, "Would it be fair to say that saving someone's life obligates you to them or does it obligate them to you?" Ree opened his mouth. Victoria continued before he could speak. Because I came here today because the medical evidence in this case was wrong. I would have come here to say that if Ethan Cole had no connection to anyone I had ever met.
I would have come here if the defendant was a man I had never heard of, whose community I had no familiarity with, whose life had never intersected with mine in any way. Because what the evidence shows is what the evidence shows. And a young man is sitting at that table facing prison time for a version of events that his own body contradicts. She paused. My being in that warehouse four years ago is not why I'm here.