Resurrection Walk

Bosch’s testimony came at a preliminary hearing on the case. After Teodoro was bound over for trial, he and his attorney negotiated a plea agreement. Bosch remembered it so well because Junior Teodoro pleaded guilty and got a term of five to seven years in prison for something that fifty years later was no longer a crime. Bosch had often considered how time changed something that was righteous back in the day into something far from it today. He thought about how that bust and the harsh sentence that followed had changed the course of Teodoro’s life. When Bosch was still with the LAPD, he kept tabs on him through the California law enforcement tracking system, running his name from time to time. The prison gate became a revolving door for Teodoro. Whenever Bosch looked him up, he was either back in prison or recently released and on parole. Fifty years later, Bosch was still haunted by his part in setting Junior Teodoro on that path. And that was his worry now — that his testimony under cross-examination might somehow contribute to Lucinda Sanz losing her bid for freedom and that it would haunt him for the rest of his days.

McPherson and Morris finished their whispered conference and McPherson reached down to a slim briefcase on the floor and withdrew a legal pad. She wrote a few notes on it and then placed it on top of the printouts, ready to take it all with her to the lectern. She glanced over at Bosch and caught him staring at her. Possibly sensing his alarm, she smiled. Of all his cases over the years, none had landed on her desk for prosecution, yet he knew she was a courtroom killer. So Bosch understood that her smile carried no warmth for him. It was the kind of smile a cat might offer a cornered mouse.

There was finally a call to rise from the courtroom marshal, and Judge Coelho took the bench. She noticed Bosch on the witness stand.

“Please be seated,” she said. “I see Detective Bosch is already in place, but before we begin cross-examination, we have some business to attend to.”

Rather than sitting down, Bosch turned to step out of the witness stand.

“That’s all right, Detective Bosch,” Coelho said. “This shouldn’t take long. You may sit.”

Bosch sat down, noting that she had called him Detective Bosch.

“Mr. Morris, I see you have expanded your team today,” Coelho continued.

Morris stood to address the court.

“Yes, Your Honor,” he said. “Assistant attorney general Margaret McPherson will handle the cross-examination of Mr. Bosch. She has expertise in the matters he testified to last week.”

“Well, that answers the question of whether there will be a cross-examination,” the judge said. “Mr. Haller, do you have anything you would like to bring to the attention of the court?”

Haller stood.

“Good morning, Your Honor,” Haller said. “As a matter of fact, I do. The petitioner objects to the addition of Ms. McPherson to the State’s team as a conflict of interest.”

Morris stood back up.

“Just hold it right there, Mr. Morris,” Coelho said. “What conflict is that, Mr. Haller?”

“Ms. McPherson and I were married at one time,” Haller said.

Bosch turned to check the judge’s reaction. It was clear she had not known of the marital history of the two lawyers before her.

“Interesting,” Coelho said. “I was not aware of that. When were you two married?”

“It was quite a while ago, Your Honor,” Haller said. “But there is an adult daughter and ongoing connections as well as ongoing upset over the dissolution of the marriage and its consequences.”

“How so, Mr. Haller?” the judge said.

“Your Honor, I believe Ms. McPherson harbors resentment over her career as a prosecutor for Los Angeles County being... thwarted by her relationship with me. I would not want that to interfere with my client’s ability to get a fair and impartial hearing on the facts of this petition.”

The judge turned her attention to Morris.

“Mr. Morris, are you attempting to inject outside conflict into this proceeding?”

“Not at all, Your Honor,” Morris said. “As I already stated on the record, Ms. McPherson is the expert on cellular data in the California Attorney General’s Office. Last year, in fact, she was hired away from the Ventura County prosecutor’s office because of her expertise in this field. This is an area of the law that is fairly new and that comes up frequently as alleged ‘new evidence’ in appellate and habeas briefs. This material was sprung on us last week, and with the continuance the court granted, I took it to our expert, Ms. McPherson, who has been analyzing the material in preparing for this witness’s cross-examination. There is no conflict, Your Honor. My understanding is that the marriage has been over for more years than it existed. There are no custody disputes because their one child is an adult and lives independently of her parents. There are no disputes at all, Judge. In fact, two years ago Ms. McPherson took a leave from the Ventura prosecutor’s office to provide legal help to Mr. Haller when he was charged with a crime.”