10 Hard Lessons

Andrea took a deep breath before knocking on Jacquelyn's door.

Jacquelyn Wojciechowski was the Chief Public Defender for their district and therefore was Andrea's boss. She had a reputation for having a sharp tongue and taking no nonsense from anyone, but she'd earned a lot of respect rising to her current position. She was Andrea's mentor and role model, and Andrea sort of idolized her…

"Come in!"

…That didn't mean she wasn't still quite intimidating.

Virtually every flat surface of Jacquelyn's office was covered in papers. For anyone else, this would be a sign of great disorganization, but Jacquelyn could lay her hands on any document she wanted at a moment's notice. It just wasn't worth her time to make things look neater. She would, occasionally, construct a towering pile of papers for the interns to remove and file in order to keep the overall volume of paper from reaching critical mass.

Jacquelyn was typing away at her computer. She reached out behind her to grab a paper without taking her eyes from the screen. "Give me just one second," she said, laying the paper down and resuming typing.

Andrea felt like she never knew what to do with her hands in Jacquelyn's office. She would have honestly preferred to stand at attention; at least then she would have had a rule to follow. Hands clasped in front made her feel like a maid. Hands clasped behind made her feel like she was hiding something. Arms folded felt confrontational. Hands at her side felt aimless. She slipped her left hand into her pocket as she waited, hoping it would feel casual.

'Does everyone spend so much time thinking about this kind of thing, or is it just me?' she wondered. She wished she were the kind of person for whom that kind of thing came naturally.

Jacquelyn had once admonished Andrea for standing too stiffly. "It makes you look nervous, and that makes you look weak," Jacquelyn had said. "Casual shows confidence and confidence speaks strength and you need to look strong in this business!" It had been great advice for Andrea everywhere else, but it did make her very self conscious of her posture in Jacquelyn's presence.

Jacquelyn finished up her task and spun her chair around to face Andrea, crossing her hands on the desk in front of her.

"What's up?" she said.

"You asked to see me, Ms Wojciechowski?" said Andrea. It was quite the mouthful, and so most people either called her Jackie or Chief. Andrea suspected that the only reason that Jacquelyn didn't insist on her doing the same was that Andrea was one of the few people who could pronounce Wojciechowski correctly.

"That's right, Ms Mason, I did. Tell me about your case yesterday."

Hopefully that was all Jacquelyn wanted to talk to her about. Andrea was nervous that she might be in trouble for skipping out the day before. Or worse, that Jacquelyn had heard some rumor about Andrea fraternizing inappropriately. Hopefully she hadn't heard anything Madison had said…

"Of course, Ms Wojciechowski. Obviously the case didn't turn out as we had hoped that it—"

"That goes without saying," said Jacquelyn. She had a disconcerting habit of cutting you off mid sentence."What went wrong?"

"Well, I feel things were going well up until the closing argument, at which point the prosecution managed to—"

"That Wynn fellow, right?"

"—Yes, Ms Wojciechowski."

"Go on."

"...The prosecution managed to make a persuasive argument that undermined the credibility of my client's version of events."

Jacquelyn thought for a moment. "They figured the ex-con must have been lying, eh?"

Andrea nodded. "I'm afraid that's the size of it, ma'am."

Jacquelyn leaned back in her chair and cracked her knuckles.

"Not that I blame them. It was a pretty unlikely story. Guy was either a liar or 31 flavors of unlucky. So what would you have done differently?"

That was one of Jacquelyn's regular questions. She was a big proponent of self-reflection. Andrea had already given it a lot of thought. There was a lot that she could have done differently at the trial, but realistically, it wouldn't have changed the outcome. There was only one key decision certain to have changed things.

With a sigh, Andrea admitted, "We should have negotiated for a plea deal."

"Like…?"

"...Like you said we should, Ms Wojciechowski."

"Damn straight!" Jacquelyn said. While she hadn't told Andrea that she had to take a plea deal on the case, Jacquelyn had strongly encouraged it. Andrea had stuck to her guns, believing that it was still a winnable case. It was one of the reasons she had argued so hard with Kyle when he had said basically the same thing the previous day. One of the reasons.

Even though he wasn't here to hear her say it, it still stung to have to admit that he had been right.

Jacquelyn pinned Andrea with a questioning look. "So what ELSE did you learn from this case?"

"That I should trust your experience, not try to—"

"Nope, wrong!" Jacquelyn rocked forward again to thump her hand on the desk. The piles of paper jumped slightly. "You don't want to rely on me, you think I'm going to be holding your hand forever? You have to be able to trust your own judgment. The lesson you should learn from this, Ms Mason, is that sometimes trusting your own judgment will screw you over, and given our profession, that means screwing someone else over, too. You have to learn when to trust yourself and when to play it safe, and that's only going to come with practice, so learn quickly!"

Andrea nodded. It was good advice and a reminder that people were relying on them to be good at their jobs.

Jacquelyn's computer dinged and she leaned in to check the message. Andrea began to relax a little, hopefully a debriefing was all Jacquelyn had called her in for.

"So what's next?" she asked, typing a quick response.

"Oh!" The tension rushed back, and she continued, "I talked with Adams, and I've started the process of filing an appeal, so hopefully—"

"On what grounds?" Jacquelyn interrupted.

Andrea hesitated.

Jacquelyn spun back around and Andrea was once again under the spotlight of her full attention.

"You can't just appeal because you didn't like the way the first trial turned out. There has to be grounds to contest. I don't see any way you could have new evidence you didn't have yesterday, so that leaves a procedural error. And that means you think either Mr Wynn broke the rules… or you screwed up…" Jacquelyn raised a perfectly styled eyebrow. "So which is it, Ms Mason?"

"Well…" said Andrea, and hesitated again. Which spoke volumes. She knew the argument for an appeal was weak, but she wanted to try anyway. She hadn't expected that Jacquelyn was going to take such a personal interest. She hurriedly went on. "During his closing, Kyle—"

"Mr Wynn."

"—Mr Wynn did make statements that were close to misleading the jury as to the standard of proof, and it could well be argued that—"

"Did you?" interrupted Jacquelyn.

"...You mean did I object? …No, Ms Wojciechowski."

Jacquelyn nodded knowingly. "Because you knew it would hurt your chances in the original trial. I understand the thinking. If you had objected you'd probably be blaming yourself right now because you'd think that's why you lost the case. Another lesson to learn, you don't always know the reason why things happen, so don't put too much blame on yourself. But while it might have been the right move to win the trial, not objecting has screwed your appeal. Did the judge say anything?"

Andrea thought back to the judge's instructions. It was hard to remember everything exactly given the daze she had been in, but she remembered the important parts.

"The judge didn't address the remarks directly, but they did cover the proper burden of proof during their final jury instructions."

Jacquelyn clapped her hands together. "There you go, game over right there. Forget about the appeal, it's dead in the water. What's next?"

Andrea was reluctant to let go so easily. "I still think that—"

"I said forget it!" said Jacquelyn, and Andrea knew that the argument was over. Jacquelyn believed in reflecting on your mistakes, but after that she expected you to put it behind you and move forward. With as many cases as their office handled, you couldn't get bogged down in the past. "What's next?"

"Well Ms Wojciechowski, I've a number of upcoming cases from the general pool, I could discuss them with you in more—"

"Scrub 'em," said Jacquelyn bluntly. "We'll find a way to pick up the slack. You need to clear the decks. Something big is coming down the pipeline."

Andrea blinked. Was Jacquelyn really telling her to drop her entire caseload? That was… unheard of.

"I'm sorry… you need me to turn over ALL my cases…?" she said.

"Did I stutter?" Jacquelyn barked. "Get your paperwork and all your notes and turn them over to Madison before lunch, she'll help with the reassignments. And clear your calendar, any appointments you've made, someone else will need to handle them now."

Andrea's mind was whirling at the thought of everything she would need to do to allow the other lawyers of the department to take over from her. She thanked Jacquelyn and rushed to get to work. Before she made it to the door, Jacquelyn called after her.

"And you better get over to the precinct and tell Adams his appeal is canceled. I know you won't want to break that news to him over the phone. Better to do it face to face."

It was only when Andrea got to her desk that she realized that Jacquelyn hadn't told her anything about this 'something big'. She had to assume she would find out in time. Right now she had enough to worry about.

After a hectic couple of hours essentially dismantling her entire working life and turning it over to Madison, Andrea headed to the police precinct. Adams had been held in the courthouse jail during the trial, but now that he had been found guilty, they had transferred him to the precinct holding cells pending his transportation to the county penitentiary.

The precinct was bustling with activity, and it took a while for Andrea to go through all the red tape needed to meet with a prisoner. After her ID was checked, she was told to take a seat until someone came to escort her.

She almost thought that she had been forgotten before an officer poked his head into the room and called her name. Andrea stood and followed the officer to the interview room.

"Ma'am, before I allow you in, I have to remind you of the rules regarding meetings with prisoners. You will be afforded privacy while meeting with your client, but that does mean we may not be immediately aware if there is a situation. Please make sure you are aware of the duress alarm's location in case you need it. The duty office is just down the hall, so response will be fast but be sure not to hesitate in the event of a situation. I assume that you have your own recording device…"

It was a lengthier process than when visiting the courthouse cells, where they knew Andrea well enough to know she was familiar with the procedure. When the officer was finished, he unlocked the door and ushered Andrea inside.

Sat at the desk of the interview room looking extremely disheveled…

…was Kyle Wynn.

"Hey Blondie, bet you weren't expecting to see me again so soon."