1
BEDAZZLE YOURSELF

The Honorable Elizabeth McDaniel took a deep breath of the heavy air in her stuffy courtroom on the second floor of San Francisco’s crumbling Hall of Justice at eleven-fifty a.m. on Monday, September sixth, 2022. “Nice to finally see you in person again, Mr. Daley.”

I nodded respectfully. “Thank you, Your Honor. It’s nice to see you, too. It’s good to be back in court. It’s been a long time.”

After two and a half years of handling most of her duties on Zoom during San Francisco’s seemingly interminable Covid winter, Betsy McDaniel was finally back in the courtroom that she had run with the efficiency of a Swiss train for almost thirty years. She had gone on senior status a few years ago to teach criminal procedure at Hastings Law School, travel with her grandchildren, and take pre-dawn Pilates classes at an upscale gym around the corner from her refurbished Victorian in Noe Valley. She couldn’t bring herself to retire completely, so she sat in for her colleagues from time to time at arraignments, preliminary hearings, and motions.

She tugged at her shoulder-length auburn hair and spoke in a voice that still bore a trace of her native Alabama. “Why are we here, Mr. Daley?”

“To discuss a motion to modify the terms of my client’s probation.”

“I don’t understand why the co-head of the Felony Division of the Public Defender’s Office believes that it is an appropriate use of this court’s time to reconsider a matter that I resolved last week.”

This isn’t starting well. “I will explain, Your Honor.”

She glanced at her watch. “I have a luncheon engagement in eight minutes.”

“I’ll be brief.”

I scanned the empty gallery where the retirees, homeless people, courtroom junkies, and other hangers-on had already departed to get in line at the few remaining sandwich shops across Bryant Street. The Hall of Justice was coming back to life after almost three years of Covid restrictions. The sixties-era edifice that was touted as a state-of-the-art facility when it replaced the old Hall of Justice in Chinatown had long-since passed its enjoy-by date. The courtrooms were still operational, the Homicide Detail was still ensconced on the third floor, and you could still pay your parking tickets in the lobby. However, the District Attorney, the Public Defender, the Southern Police Station, the Medical Examiner, and most of the administrative staff had moved to other buildings with functional plumbing. The old jail on the sixth and seventh floors had been mothballed and replaced by a newer building next door, and the cafeteria in the basement was a distant and not-so-pleasant memory. From time to time, the political class engages in discussions about replacing the obsolete monolith and its asbestos-laden walls, lead-based paint, and antiquated ventilation. Then again, those conversations have been happening since I first entered this building as a rookie Deputy P.D. almost thirty years ago. For now, plans for a new facility are on hold.

Judge McDaniel removed her reading glasses. “I don’t see your client, Mr. Daley.”

She isn’t here. “She’s on her way, Your Honor. She’ll be here momentarily.” At least I hope so.

“You’ve appeared in my courtroom more times than I can count. An experienced defense attorney such as yourself understands that I expect people to be on time.”

“I do, and I’m sorry. Ms. Diamond’s prior appointment ran late.”

She tapped her watch. “It’s eleven-fifty-eight, Mr. Daley. Your client has two minutes.”

“Understood.”

Judge McDaniel put on her reading glasses and typed away at her computer. I turned around and looked at the door, hoping that it would open. I watched the second hand on the clock wind its way around. At five seconds before noon, the door swung open, and my client marched down the aisle and took her place next to me at the defense table.

“Sorry I’m late,” she whispered.

I pointed at the judge. “I need you to apologize to her—right now.” I turned to Judge McDaniel. “Your Honor, Ms. Diamond is here, and she wishes to apologize.”

“Yes, Ms. Diamond?”

Debra “Dazzle” Diamond spoke in a confident voice indicating that this wasn’t her first time in court. “I’m very sorry, Your Honor.”

“Thank you. Please try to be more punctual next time.”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

I addressed the judge in a deferential voice. “May I have a quick word with my client?”

“You may.”

I pulled Dazzle aside, looked at her heavy makeup, sequined top, and leopard-spotted yoga pants. “I asked you to dress professionally.”

“Sorry, Mike. I have to go straight to work when we’re finished.”

“I’ve already explained to you that this is a longshot.”

“Understood.”

“Let me do the talking.”

Her full lips transformed into a pout. “Okay.”

I heard the judge’s voice behind me. “Mr. Daley?”

“Yes, Your Honor.” Here goes. “As you know, Ms. Diamond recently pled guilty to a charge of misdemeanor theft. In exchange for a suspended jail sentence, she agreed to make full restitution. Your Honor placed her on probation for a period of six months, subject to the condition that she would remain employed, forfeit her passport, stay in the Bay Area, have weekly check-ins with her probation officer, and wear an ankle monitor.”

“It was only a week ago, Mr. Daley. I am well aware of the conditions regarding Ms. Diamond’s plea agreement. Why are we here?”

“One of the terms of her probation is making it difficult for Ms. Diamond to perform her job. As a result, it is more challenging for her to earn a living and fulfill her obligation to make restitution.”

“Which term is that?”

“The requirement that she wear an ankle bracelet.”

Judge McDaniel’s Alabama accent became more pronounced. “Are you serious?”

“Yes, Your Honor.”

A rookie Assistant D.A. sitting at the prosecution table stood up and spoke. “We object, Your Honor. We resolved this matter last week.”

Yes, we did.

“Thank you,” the judge said to him. “I’ll let you know if I need anything more from you.” She turned back to me. “You’re down to thirty seconds. Give me your best argument, Mr. Daley.”

“As you know, Ms. Diamond is an entertainer.”

“I’m well-aware of that.”

There’s a little more to the story. Dazzle was a pole dancer at the Gold Club, an upscale strip joint down the block from Moscone Center in San Francisco’s gentrifying South-of-Market tech gulch between Union Square and the ballpark. The formerly scuzzy Gold Club now caters to the tech bros who work in the adjacent office towers and live in the nearby condos that used to be skid row. Dazzle was a single mother, a Daly City native, and a San Francisco State alum who once worked as a paralegal for a big law firm. When she was laid off during the economic downturn in 2008, she started dancing at the Gold Club and doubled her salary. From time to time, she supplemented her income by helping herself to extra gratuities from her customers’ wallets while they were distracted by her dancing skills. Her most recent theft was caught by her customer, who pressed charges. In addition to cutting a deal with the prosecutors, Dazzle persuaded her boss (who also happened to be her boyfriend) to let her keep her job if she promised not to do it again.

“Your Honor,” I said, “Ms. Diamond has found it difficult to perform her dance routines with an ankle monitor. It’s harder for her to keep her balance, and she has almost injured herself several times.”

Judge McDaniel’s eyes darted to Dazzle, who responded with a solemn nod.

I kept talking. “Moreover, Ms. Diamond’s tips have been lower because the audience members do not seem to be as, uh, engaged with her performance.”

The judge looked at Dazzle again. “Is this true, Ms. Diamond?”

“Yes, Your Honor. The ankle monitor is distracting.”

Judge McDaniel’s expression didn’t change when she deadpanned, “I didn’t realize that your customers focused on your ankle, Ms. Diamond.”

Neither did I.

Dazzle didn’t fluster. “You’d be surprised, Your Honor.”

“Yes, I would.” The judge turned back to me. “What are you requesting, Mr. Daley?”

“That Ms. Diamond be allowed to remove the ankle monitor while she is performing.”

“Denied.”

“But Your Honor—,”

She stopped me with an upraised hand. “Denied.”

I figured that was coming. I was packing my briefcase when I heard Dazzle’s voice.

“Your Honor?” she said.

Oh crap. I leaned over and whispered, “Let it go, Dazzle. We’re done.”

“No, we’re not.” She looked at the judge. “Your Honor, my act requires me to bedazzle the audience. I can’t do that with this thing on my ankle.”

“I’ve been told that you’re an exceptional dancer.”

“I like to think so, but the monitor is ugly.”

“Perhaps you could decorate it to match your costume.”

“I don’t wear a costume for most of my performance.”

That’s true.

Betsy McDaniel chuckled. “Bedazzle yourself, Ms. Diamond. Your motion is denied, and we are adjourned.” She didn’t wait for a response before she headed to her chambers.

I turned to Dazzle, who was still standing next to me. “Sorry. I tried.”

“You gave it your best shot, Mike. I’ll figure out a way to work around it.”

“Try to stay out of trouble, okay?”

“I’ll do my best.” She flashed the radiant smile that a generation of horny young tech nerds found irresistible. “You should come down to the club and see the show. I can get you free passes and drink coupons. You’ll like the buffet.”

Not a chance, although I have it on good authority that the chicken on the buffet lunch isn’t bad. “Thanks, Dazzle. I’ll let you know.”

As I approached my workmanlike office, I was met by the broad smile of my one-time client, and current secretary, executive assistant, process server, occasional bodyguard, and friend. Terrence “The Terminator” Love was a six-foot-six-inch, three-hundred-pound former heavyweight boxer and retired shoplifter who was sitting in his cubicle outside my office.

“Were you able to persuade Judge McDaniel to modify Dazzle’s probation?” he asked.

“Afraid not, T. She’s going to have to keep dancing with the ankle monitor.”

“She’ll adapt. Was she pissed off?”

“Not really. She knew that it was a longshot.” I winked. “She offered me free passes and drink coupons at the Gold Club. Are you interested?”

“I don’t do that stuff anymore.”

“Neither do I.”

He arched an eyebrow. “Did you ever?”

“It’s been a long time.”

“You didn’t go to strip clubs when you were a priest, did you?”

“Absolutely not.”

I was a priest for three years at St. Anne’s Parish in the Sunset. I decided to go to the seminary after my older brother died in Vietnam, and I was looking for answers. I enjoyed the spiritual and intellectual nature of the job, but I never felt qualified to save souls, and I was terrible at church politics. I threw in the towel and decided to go to law school, much to the chagrin of my father, a San Francisco beat cop who liked having a priest in the family. I still go to church every Sunday, but I like being a Public Defender a lot better. I don’t try to save souls anymore, but on occasion I save lives.

Terrence let out a throaty chuckle. He just turned sixty, the same age as I am. His boxing career ended after a handful of fights because he had a soft jaw and was too good-hearted to hit anybody too hard. The recovering alcoholic was my very first client when I was a baby P.D. A decade ago, I hired him as the receptionist at the two-person law firm that my ex-wife and I were running at the time as part of a probation agreement that I had brokered with none other than Judge McDaniel. Everything worked out pretty well. My ex-wife was now San Francisco’s Public Defender and my boss. Terrence hadn’t touched a drop of booze ever since. He became indispensable to our practice, and we took him with us to the P.D.’s Office when we moved back here.

“Anything I need to know?” I asked him.

“My retirement paperwork came in. Can you help me go through it?”

“Sure.” I grinned. “You aren’t really going to retire at the end of the year, are you?”

“Thinking about it.”

“Can I persuade you to stay another year or two?”

“I have a new granddaughter on the way. I’d like to spend some time with her. Besides, I thought you were going to retire at the end of next year.”

I pointed at the closed door to the D.A.’s Office. “Depends on whether the boss decides to run for another term. I promised to stick around if she does.”

“I thought that she was leaning against it.”

“She’s having second thoughts. What will it take to get you to stay?”

“Let me think about it.”

“Anything else I need to know?”

“The boss needs to see you.”

“Did she say what it’s about?”

“She needs you to pick up some cases. One of them is a murder trial.”

2
“GOOD NEWS AND BAD NEWS”

I knocked on the open door of the office next to mine. “You wanted to see me?”

“Yes.” The Public Defender of the City and County of San Francisco looked up from her laptop and waved me in. “I heard that you weren’t able to get Dazzle’s probation changed.”

“You can’t win them all.” If you’re a Public Defender, you lose a lot more than you win.

I took a seat in the chair opposite the mahogany desk that she bought on her own dime. Her window was caked in dirt. The walls were covered with photos of local politicians and awards. Her bookcases held dusty case reporters that she hadn’t opened in years. If she needed a citation, she looked it up online. Framed photos of our two children were displayed in a prominent spot on her credenza between stacks of files.

“How did Dazzle take the news?” she asked.

“Not bad.” I grinned. “On the bright side, she offered us free passes to the Gold Club.”

Rosita Carmela Fernandez flashed the magnificent smile that I still found irresistible almost three decades after we’d met in the file room of the old P.D.’s Office and twenty-seven years after we’d gotten divorced. “Pass.”

She tugged at the sleeve of her Dior blouse—an upgrade from the days when she wore faded jeans and denim work shirts to the office when we were young Deputy Public Defenders. At fifty-six, her jet-black hair no longer fell to her waist. Nowadays, it was cut into a stylish bob. A regime of Pilates, spin classes, and aerobics kept her fit. Her voice was a little raspier, and she measured her words a little more carefully after surviving two tumultuous election campaigns in San Francisco’s chaotic political system that our City Attorney once described as “like being in a knife fight in a phone booth.”

“Everybody okay?” I asked. We had reached the age where every conversation began with a check-in on Rosie’s eighty-seven-year-old mother and our two twenty-something children.

“Fine,” she said. “Mama’s arthritis is acting up, but the new pills seem to be working. Grace is wrapping up a movie. Tommy likes his classes.”

So far, so good. Rosie and I had met when I was a rookie P.D., and she had just been promoted to the Felony Division. She had spun out of a brief and unsatisfying marriage to a law school classmate. Our daughter, Grace, was born a year later. The demands of a baby, our jobs, and a new marriage collided, and Rosie and I called things off when Grace was two. Nowadays, Grace was a USC film school alum and a production supervisor at Pixar. She lived across the Bay in Emeryville with her fiancé, Chuck. Our son, Tommy (named after my dad), was a junior at Cal, my undergrad and law school alma mater. He came along a few years after Rosie and I split up. Rosie and I refer to our relationship as “ex-spouses-with-benefits.”

“Anything new on the wedding?” I asked.

“Nothing at the moment,” Rosie said. “All systems are go.”

Good. Grace and Chuck had been engaged for almost three years. We had postponed their wedding twice because of Covid. We were scheduled to give it another try in December.

After the divorce, I spent five years working at a big law firm at the top of the Bank of America Building to pay the bills, alimony, and child support. Rosie started her own criminal defense practice and took me in after I got fired for not bringing in enough clients. We’d been working together ever since—first at our two-person firm around the corner from the old Transbay Bus Terminal, and, more recently, back here at the P.D.’s Office. We were co-heads of the Felony Division for a few years before Rosie ran for P.D.

Time for business. “Terrence said that you wanted to see me.”

Her expression turned serious. “How’s your time?”

“I can tear myself away from my administrative responsibilities if you need help.”

As the co-head of the Felony Division, I spent most of my time working on budgets, assigning cases, supervising younger lawyers, and handling bureaucratic matters. Once or twice a year, I stepped in and worked on a trial.

“I need you to take over Rolanda’s cases,” she said.

Uh-oh. “Is she okay?”

“Yes.” She lowered her voice. “Good news and bad news. The good news is that she’s fine. The bad news is that some of her bloodwork is a little off and her blood pressure is up, so the doctor wants her to go on bedrest until the baby arrives.”

Rolanda Fernandez was the co-head of the Felony Division. She was also Rosie’s niece and, I suppose, my ex-niece. Like Rosie, Rolanda graduated from Mercy High School, San Francisco State, and Hastings Law School. She and her husband, Zach, yet another lawyer, were the proud parents of Maria Sylvia Teresa Fernandez Epstein, an energetic two-year-old. Rolanda was on maternity leave when Covid hit, and she had worked primarily from home since then. She was six months pregnant with their second child, who was due in December.

“Whatever you need,” I said.

“Good.” Rosie eyed me. “You’re going to have to take the lead on the Jones trial.”

“Fine.”

Our client, Reggie Jones, was a homeless man who lived under an overpass leading to the new Salesforce Transit Center. In March, he was charged with killing a crypto entrepreneur during a botched robbery in Salesforce Park, an upscale urban oasis on the fourth deck of the new bus terminal. According to the cops, Reggie got into a fight with the decedent, Tyson Gore, who was walking through the park on his way to his multi-million-dollar condo across the street in the swanky Millennium Tower. Reggie allegedly pushed Gore over a railing and into a construction zone four levels below. Reggie claimed that he passed out from a night of drinking and didn’t attack Gore. Gore’s wallet was found in the bushes where Reggie was sleeping.

She eyed me. “Trial starts in three weeks.”

“I’ll request a delay.”

“Reggie wants to move forward. Rolanda has everything ready to go. She’s available on Zoom and will get you up to speed. Nady is second chair.”

Excellent. Nadezhda “Nady” Nikonova was one of our best young attorneys. “Maybe Nady should take the lead,” I said.

“She doesn’t have time. She’s in trial for the next two weeks.”

“Who’s the investigator?”

She frowned. “It was Tom Eisenmann.”

Eisenmann was an experienced investigator who had died of Covid. I asked Rosie if anybody else was available.

“We’re a little thin.” She rattled off the names of four investigators. Two had Covid, the third had retired, and the fourth had given notice.

“I need to hire Pete,” I said. “Do we have budget to pay him?”

“I’ll find the money.”

Good. My younger brother, Pete, was a former cop who had been a private investigator for almost thirty years. “Thanks.”

“I don’t want you and your brother playing cops-and-robbers, Mike.”

I pretended to cross my heart. “We’ll be good, Rosie. I promise.”

She responded with a skeptical expression. “I’ve also asked Nady to step in as acting co-head of the Felony Division to help you with the admin stuff until Rolanda returns.”

“Thanks. Does Rolanda’s situation impact your decision about running for another term?”

“I haven’t decided.”

“You’re going to have to decide before Rolanda returns to work.”

“I know.”

For three years, Rosie had maintained that she would not run for a third term. Although she wouldn’t admit it to anybody but me, she was discreetly setting the stage for Rolanda to succeed her. There was no guarantee that Rolanda would win the election, of course, and there would be allegations of nepotism and other political considerations to overcome. On the plus side, there was no question that Rolanda was qualified, and she inherited her aunt’s political instincts.

I smiled. “As we have discussed, I will postpone my retirement if you decide to run. On the other hand, Terrence may be a tougher sell. He seems determined to retire.”

“I’ll keep working on him.” She grinned. “I can always find another defense lawyer. It will be harder to replace Terrence.” She shooed me out of her office. “Get out of here and call Rolanda.”

“I will.”

“Mike?”

“Yes?”

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