Chapter 3 - The Courtroom Battle
The first court hearing was at nine the next morning.
We were there at eight.
Lena had three copies of everything.
The video on a USB drive.
The hospital records.
The photographs the police had taken.
The statement my son had given to the child psychologist.
"He’s remarkably calm for a seven-year-old who witnessed that level of violence," the psychologist had written.
"He understands exactly what happened.
He shows no confusion about who was the aggressor.
His primary concern is protecting his mother.
This is a child who has been living in a war zone for a very long time." I sat in the courtroom next to Dad.
My hands were shaking so bad I could barely hold the water bottle Lena had given me.
"What if the judge doesn’t believe me?" I whispered.
"Sarah," she said.
"We have a high-definition video with perfect audio.
We have medical evidence matching every blow on the video.
We have a seven-year-old witness who sent the video to the police himself.
The only way Michael wins this is if the judge is blind and deaf." Then the door at the back of the courtroom opened.
Michael walked in.
He was out on bail.
His lawyer had argued that he had no prior record, that he was a respected businessman, that he was not a flight risk.
The judge had set bail at fifty thousand dollars.
Michael’s parents had paid it before the sun came up.
He was wearing a suit.
His hair was combed.
The cut on his lip was almost invisible under makeup.
He looked like the man I had married.
Charming.
Handsome.
Successful.
He looked like a man who would never hurt anyone.
He saw me and smiled.
Not a nice smile.
A cold smile that said I know something you don’t.
He sat down at the defense table with his lawyer.
His parents sat behind him.
His mother looked at me with pure hatred.
His father stared straight ahead.
"All rise," the bailiff called.
Judge Alvarez entered.
She was a woman in her fifties with gray hair pulled tight and glasses on the end of her nose.
May you like
She looked tired.
Like she had seen every version of this story a hundred times.
