Motion to Dismiss by Jonnie Jacobs Page A

fingers twisted a handkerchief embroidered with tiny purple flowers. I wondered if it was hers or Madelaine's. Not that Madelaine would ever have use for anything as dainty and ladylike herself, but I wouldn't have put it past her to have a stash of them for occasions such as this.
    "'All kind of a blur,'" I repeated. "Yet you're certain you told Mr. Barrett, 'Stop. Let go of me?'" This had been her testimony on direct.
    "Yes."
    They weren't the exact words the neighbor had heard, which might work to our benefit at trial.
    "Certain you made it clear you weren't interested in having sexual relations with him?"
    She hesitated, then nodded emphatically. "Yes, I'm certain."
    "What did you do to resist?"
    "I don't remember exactly." Tears sprang to her eyes. She dabbed them with embroidered white linen, lilacs facing out.
    "Did you kick him?" I asked.
    Madelaine rose. "Your Honor, Defense knows that the witness doesn't have to offer physical resistance."
    "I'm just trying to determine what happened."
    Riley nodded. "I'll allow it."
    "I may have. I don't remember." Her voice wavered.
    "How about bites? Or scratches?"
    "I don't think so." She addressed her hands, which were folded in her lap. "He's so much bigger and stronger than I am. I was scared."
    "So it's conceivable Mr. Barrett might have thought you weren't resisting at all?"
    "He knew." She was crying harder now, but her voice no longer quivered with emotion. Anger had hardened it. "He knew how I felt, and he didn't care."
    Grady squirmed in his chair. "Not true," he muttered under his breath.
    "And afterward," I asked. "What then?"
    She dabbed at her nose. "What do you mean?"
    "What did you do after he'd ... completed the act?"
    Deirdre hugged herself, as if for reassurance. "I cried."
    "Did you say anything to him?"
    "Nothing important. It's like part of me couldn't believe what had happened."
    "Did he say anything to you?"
    She looked directly at Grady. Her eyes flashed anger and something else I couldn't read. "He just pulled up his pants and left. I've never in my whole life felt so ... so devalued."
    "When you finished crying," I said with a gentleness that wasn't entirely feigned, "what did you do then?"
    Deirdre shook her head in confusion. "I don't understand. I cried off and on the whole night."
    "Did you take a shower?"
    "Not that night, no." Her tone was wary.
    "Did you wash yourself?"
    "I might have."
    "But you don't remember for sure?" With most victims of rape, including date rape, there's a strong impulse to wash away the remnants of the crime. Even women who know they shouldn't destroy evidence succumb.
    "I was upset," Deirdre said.
    "Yet you waited until Tuesday to make a police report. Why is that?"
    "I was ashamed, frightened. I tried to forget about it, but I couldn't."
    "Did you tell anyone what had happened?"
    She shook her head. "Maybe you don't know what it's like, Ms. O'Brien. Being raped is an awful experience. It makes you feel worthless. Humiliated. You can tell yourself that it's no reflection on you personally, but it doesn't matter. I didn't want to talk about it with anyone."
    "Not even a friend? Your sister, perhaps?"
    "No." A thin whisper of a word.
    I stepped back. "I see."
    My tone was skeptical, as I'd intended. But there was a part of me that found Deirdre's testimony disturbingly convincing. She might well have been lying through her teeth, but my suspicion was that there was some element of truth there as well. And I had the sinking feeling the judge felt it too.

Chapter 9
    "You were too soft on her," Grady grumbled when we broke for afternoon recess. "You should have come down a lot harder, made her squirm."
    "I explained before, what we're trying to do at this point is lock in her testimony. We can discredit it later, at trial."
    He snorted in disgust. "If you'd nailed her today, we wouldn't have to go to trial."
    "It's your word against hers. That's something for a jury to decide, not the hearing judge."
    Grady shoved a hand into