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Are you now under the influence of alcohol, drugs, or any licit or illicit substance that may impair your judgment or decision-making?
No. I was answering the questions as I stood at counsel table, wearing a dark suit with a Tommy Bahama tie, palm trees swaying incongruously down my chest, a poor choice in retrospect. I’d never forget the pattern because it was all I stared at during the colloquy.
Are you now being treated for a mental illness?
No. I remember answering and trying to look at the judge, seated on the dais in front of the seal of the Commonwealth on the paneled wall. Shame prevented me from meeting her eye or anyone else’s, in a courtroom full of people who knew the Devlin family, among the most prominent in the county.
Have you been able to consult with your lawyer in responding to the charges?
Yes. My lawyer was Angela Martinez, one of the best criminal lawyers in the state, hired by my parents. Assistant District Attorney Pete Deegan also knew my father, since both were big-time Villanova boosters. The Commonwealth had offered me a plea deal that was more than fair, one year in jail.
Do you understand the charges against you?
Yes, I answered, an eye on the bailiff standing at the side door, a lean, older Black man whom everybody called Mack. He looked down at his polished shoes during the proceeding, as if to save face for my family.
Has anyone used any force or threats against you in order to coerce you to enter this plea?
No. I felt my mother’s eyes on my back. I couldn’t bring myself to turn around, and I knew exactly what she would look like in the gallery behind me. I could always read her expressions; the lifting of her right eyebrow, the wrinkling of her nose, the pursing of her lipsticked lips. Today, she would feel mortification for her, and pain for me.
Has anyone made any promises of benefit to you in order to entice you to enter this plea?
No. The pews were packed with lawyers carrying boxy trial bags and cumbersome exhibits mounted on foamcore. They were about to continue a weeks-long negligence trial over an Amtrak train crash,and I’d heard them greeting my father, surprised to find that his younger son was the defendant today.
Do you understand that you need not enter a plea of guilty, but may plead not guilty and go to trial?
Yes. The negligence trial had attracted the press, and a sketch artist set up wide pastel chalks and a pad of brown paper. Later, my parents would pressure the media not to run a story about my charges, and they would agree. It would be as if my wrongdoing never existed, the blessing-and-curse of privilege.
Do you understand that if you proceed to trial, you would have to be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt and if the Commonwealth cannot prove you guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, you must be set free on these charges?
I answered,Yes, then Judge Rati-Jio came to the main question:
How do you plead, guilty or not guilty?
Guilty, I answered, but I spoke too softly for the court reporter, her manicured hands halted over the stenography machine.
Mr. Devlin, could you repeat that for the record? How do you plead? Guilty or not guilty?
Guilty!I called out, my own judgment against myself echoing in the courtroom. The jury condemns you in a trial, but when you enter a guilty plea, you condemn yourself, in public. It was utterly the way I felt inside. I wasguiltyto the core of my very being.
Judge Rati-Jio asked a few more questions, and I answered on autopilot. I thought I might faint from guilt, if such a thing were possible. I was wrong, I was guilty, and I would pay for my crime. I entered the plea because I wanted to take responsibility in front of my family, even in front of my God. I hadn’t had a drink since it happened and I was going to prison, where I belonged.
A uniformed cop came toward me and clamped steel handcuffs onmy wrists, which locked with a grim click, and I turned to meet my father’s eye.
My father looked back at me, so deeply agonized that his expression seared into my brain, to be recalled this very moment. It was the exact same expression I’d seen on his face this morning, when he thought I’d relapsed.
Tears came to my eyes. My sobriety was the only thing I was proud of, and I wanted my father to know I stayed sober. John might think it didn’t matter, but nothing mattered more to me.
I knew that whatever trust my father had in me was gone forever.
Chapter Eight
I pulled out of the Runstan lot, hit the road, and got my head back in the game. I was guessing that if Lemaire was dead, whoever he was working with would’ve abandoned his maroon Volvo, and sooner or later, the car would find its way to an auction lot. Meanwhile I knew a guy who got a heads-up on new inventory coming to the auctions, since I went to him for my own cars.
I called him, and he picked up after one ring. “Hey, Patrick.”
“Yo, TJ,” Patrick said, in his gravelly voice. “How’s the Maserati?”
“Beyond.”
