I, Michael Bennett

I looked at Judge Mary Elizabeth Fleming. Her colleague had been murdered by the homicidal maniac slime at the table five feet away, and here she was, making sure all the hairsplitting bullshit Perrine’s mouthpiece was spouting got its due? What a load of ripe horseshit trials could be. Sustained, my ass. Perrine was a stain.

Vogel frowned as he paced in front of me.

“Detective Be

“Credible information was provided to us by a confidential informant. We set up surveillance at the location where we were told he would be, but after he did not appear, we reevaluated our information and suspected that he was in town to attend the graduation of his daughter from NYU law school. As we attempted to arrest him, gunfire broke out from Perrine’s bodyguards, which then resulted in the death of DEA agent Hughie McDonough and NYPD officer De

Perrine’s lawyer popped up again like a polished, boyishly handsome target in a game of whack-a-mole.

“Again, Your Honor, I need to object. At this time, my client is on trial for the murder of one Scott Melekian, a waiter at Macy’s. There is nothing in the charges leveled against him here today for the murder of any law enforcement perso

“I knew we should have put the murders in sequential order, Mr. Boehme,” I said into the microphone. “Your client’s killed so many people, it gets quite confusing.”

Nervous chuckles erupted from the crowd, which would have been fine except for the fact that what I said was actually true.

“Your Honor!” Boehme said.

“Strike the witness’s last statement. Please just answer the questions, Detective Be

You’re right, I felt like saying. It’s a frigging farce.

The prosecutor approached the bench.

“Please, Your Honor. My witness is testifying to his whereabouts and the circumstances surrounding the death of Scott Melekian. That is, he’s trying to, but defense counsel is making it impossible.”

“The prosecution is right,” Judge Fleming said. “Do I have to remind our prestigious defense counsel that he will soon have his very own chance to cross-examine the witness? In the meantime, please do shut up and stop interrupting, Okay?”

That’s when Perrine popped up.

“Bullshit!” he screamed.

The table before him heaved up and slammed down as he kneed it. Boehme squinted up at Perrine in abject puzzlement. He looked like he wanted to say something to calm his client, but then thought better of it. He quickly turned his head downward, as if suddenly fascinated by the pattern in the government-issue carpet.

“Bullshit!” Perrine repeated. “These accusations are false, you lying maggot! This is harassment. This proceeding is illegal! I wish to speak to the Mexican consulate. I am not a citizen of this country. I am a Mexican national. Your laws have no authority over me!”

In a moment, no less than a dozen burly court officers, corrections officers, and U.S. marshals rushed forward from their stations. Perrine seemed to calm a little, then he feinted and broke through them, screaming, as he ran directly at me. Immediately, I stood and lifted the metal chair I was sitting on, able, ready, and oh so willing to crush Perrine’s skull with it and finish this crap once and for all.

But unfortunately, before I had the chance, the court officers were able to loudly tackle him to the carpeted ground. After a moment, you couldn’t even see Perrine beneath the crush of people on top of him. From the bottom of the pile, there were grunts and the click of metal as they cuffed his legs.

“You will regret this, Be

He was still screaming as they took him out by his hands and feet. There was dead silence in the courtroom as everyone looked at each other, trying to recover and catch their breath.

“On that note, I believe these proceedings are done for the day,” the judge finally said. “And defense counsel, tomorrow the defendant will be gagged as well as heavily shackled under my order. So I don’t want to hear the slightest peep out of you about it. And with the next outburst, I promise you, he’ll be tried in a cage.”

She brought down her gavel like a blacksmith hitting an anvil.

“This trial will proceed, so help me. This trial will proceed if it’s the last thing I do.”

CHAPTER 82

AT A LITTLE before 8:00 p.m., the Fifth Precinct evening patrol supervisor, Sergeant Wayne Lozada, and his driver, Officer Michael Morelli, parked in their favorite cooping spot, the southeast corner of Canal and the Bowery, facing the ramp for the Manhattan Bridge.

After Morelli put it into park, he lifted a massive binder from the backseat. He flipped through the NYPD Patrol Guide to the section covering the use of the Taser on emotionally disturbed people. Morelli, who was actually quite proficient in the use of the electrical device due to the neighborhood’s proliferation of nuts, didn’t really need to go over it but was brushing up for a sergeant’s test he was scheduled to take at the end of the month.

As Morelli studied, Sergeant Lozada idly listened to the fizz and pop of the radio as he stared at the monumental arch and colo

Lozada, who briefly had been a high school history teacher before becoming a cop, was an architecture buff. After he retired at the end of the year, he was thinking about starting a walking tour.

“You see that thing, Morelli?” Lozada said. “That thing was built by the same architects who designed the iconic New York Public Library. It’s called a triumphal arch, and this one was modeled in the tradition of both the Porte Saint-Denis in Paris and the first-century Arch of Titus in Rome. It was part of the City Beautiful movement, started by a bunch of rich folks at the turn of the last century who thought they could promote civic virtue and harmonious social order through beautiful public spaces and grandiose buildings.”

“Real nice, Sarge,” mumbled Morelli, who couldn’t wait for his long-winded boss’s retirement party. “Classy stuff, all right.”

“A hundred years ago, they erected stu

“I know, right? Exactly, exactly,” Morelli said, flipping a page in the gargantuan binder.

Lozada was still sighing when they heard the sound coming from somewhere off behind them.

“No, it can’t be,” Lozada said as the lazy ka-click ka-click ka-click ka-click came closer.

He glanced in the side-view mirror. A young Hispanic guy was walking up the sidewalk behind the cruiser, shaking a can of spray paint.

The guy stopped ten feet behind the cruiser and commenced painting. They watched in silence as he went to town, bombing the stone wall of the building they were parked beside.

Morelli and Lozada looked at each other for a moment, then broke into riotous laughter.

“Your iPhone charged, Morelli?” Lozada said, grasping the door handle. “Because I believe we either have a vandal with a serious vision deficiency or a contender here for world’s dumbest criminal.”