The Chamber (Page 90)

Lucas Mann was seated on their side of the courtroom, though several rows behind Roxburgh and his boys. He casually read a newspaper, and waved to Adam when their eyes met. It was good to see him. He was starched from head to toe in wrinkle-free khaki, and his tie was wild enough to glow in the dark. It was obvious Mann was not intimidated by the Fifth Circuit and its trappings, and equally as obvious that he was keeping his distance from Roxburgh. He was only the attorney for Parchman, only doing his job. If the Fifth Circuit granted a stay and Sam didn’t die, Lucas Mann would be pleased. Adam nodded and smiled at him.

Roxburgh and his gang rehuddled. Morris Henry, Dr. Death, was in the middle of it, explaining things to lesser minds.

Adam breathed deeply and tried to relax. It was quite difficult. His stomach was churning and his feet twitched, and he kept telling himself that it would only last for twenty minutes. The three judges couldn’t kill him, they could only embarrass him, and even that could last for only twenty minutes. He could endure anything for twenty minutes. He glanced at his notes, and to calm himself he tried to think of Sam – not Sam the racist, the murderer, the lynch mob thug, but Sam the client, the old man wasting away on death row who was entitled to die in peace and dignity. Sam was about to get twenty minutes of this court’s valuable time, so his lawyer had to make the most of it.

A heavy door thudded shut somewhere, and Adam jumped in his seat. The court crier appeared from behind the bench and announced that this honorable court was now in session. He was followed by three figures in flowing black robes – McNeely, Robichaux, and Judy, each of whom carried files and seemed to be totally without humor or goodwill. They sat in their massive leather chairs high up on the shiny, dark, oak-paneled bench, and looked down upon the courtroom. The case of State of Mississippi v. Sam Cayhall was called, and the attorneys were summoned from the back of the room. Adam nervously walked through the swinging gate in the bar, and was followed by Steve Roxburgh. The Assistant Attorney Generals kept their seats, as did Lucas Mann and a handful of spectators. Most of these, Adam would later learn, were reporters.

The presiding judge was Judy, the Honorable T. Eileen Judy, a young woman from Texas. Robichaux was from Louisiana, and in his late fifties. McNeely looked to be a hundred and twenty, and was also from Texas. Judy made a brief statement about the case, then asked Mr. Adam Hall from Chicago if he was ready to proceed. He stood nervously, his knees rubber-like, his bowels jumping, his voice high and nervous, and he said that, yes, in fact he was ready to go. He made it to the podium in the center of the room and looked up, way up, it seemed, at the panel behind the bench.

The green light beside him came on, and he assumed correctly this meant to get things started. The room was silent. The judges glared down at him. He cleared his throat, glanced at the. portraits of dead honorables hanging on the wall, and plunged into a vicious attack on the gas chamber as a means of execution.

He avoided eye contact with the three of them, and for five minutes or so was allowed to repeat what he’d already submitted in his brief. It was post-lunch, in the heat of the summer, and it took a few minutes for the judges to shrug off the cobwebs.

"Mr. Hall, I think you’re just repeating what you’ve already said in your brief," Judy said testily. "We’re quite capable of reading, Mr. Hall."

Mr. Hall took it well, and thought to himself that this was his twenty minutes, and if he wanted to pick his nose and recite the alphabet then he should be allowed to do so. For twenty minutes. As green as he was, Adam had heard this comment before from an appellate judge. It happened while he was in law school and watching a case being argued. It was standard fare in oral argument.

"Yes, Your Honor," Adam said, carefully avoiding any reference to gender. He then moved on to discuss the effects of cyanide gas on laboratory rats, a study not included in his brief. The experiments had been conducted a year ago by some chemists in Sweden for the purpose of proving that humans do not die instantly when they inhale the poison. It had been funded by a European organization working to abolish the death penalty in America.

The rats went into seizures and convulsed. Their lungs and hearts stopped and started erratically for several minutes. The gas burst blood vessels throughout their bodies, including their brains. Their muscles quivered uncontrollably. They salivated and squeaked.

The obvious point of the study was that the rats did not die quickly, but in fact suffered a great deal. The tests were conducted with scientific integrity. Appropriate doses were given to the small animals. On the average, it took almost ten minutes for death to occur. Adam labored over the details, and as he warmed to his presentation his nerves settled a bit. The judges were not only listening, but seemed to be enjoying this discussion of dying rats.

Adam had found the study in a footnote to a recent North Carolina case. It was in the fine print, and had not been widely reported.

"Now, let me get this straight," Robichaux interrupted in a high-pitched voice. "You don’t want your client to die in the gas chamber because it’s a cruel way to go, but are you telling us you don’t mind if he’s executed by lethal injection?"

"No, Your Honor. That’s not what I’m saying. I do not want my client executed by any method."

"But lethal injection is the least offensive?"

"All methods are offensive, but lethal injection seems to be the least cruel. There’s no doubt the gas chamber is a horrible way to die."

"Worse than being bombed? Blown up by dynamite?"

A heavy silence fell over the courtroom as Robichaux’s words settled in. He had emphasized the word `dynamite’, and Adam struggled for something appropriate. McNeely shot a nasty look at his colleague on the other side of the bench.

It was a cheap shot, and Adam was furious. He controlled his temper, and said firmly, "We’re talking about methods of execution, Your Honor, not the crimes that send men to death row."

"Why don’t you want to talk about the crime?"

"Because the crime is not an issue here. Because I have only twenty minutes, and my client has only twelve days."

"Perhaps your client shouldn’t have been planting bombs?"

"Of course not. But he was convicted of his crime, and now he faces death in the gas chamber. Our point is that the chamber is a cruel way to execute people."

"What about the electric chair?"

"The same argument applies. There have been some hideous cases of people suffering terribly in the chair before they died."

"What about a firing squad?"

"Sounds cruel to me."

"And hanging?"

"I don’t know much about hanging, but it too sounds awfully cruel."

"But you like the idea of lethal injection?"

"I didn’t say I like it. I believe I said it was not as cruel as the other methods."

Justice McNeely interrupted and asked, "Mr. Hall, why did Mississippi switch from the gas chamber to lethal injection?"

This was covered thoroughly in the lawsuit and the brief, and Adam sensed immediately that McNeely was a friend. "I’ve condensed the legislative history of the law in my brief, Your Honor, but it was done principally to facilitate executions. The legislature admitted it was an easier way to die, and so to sidestep constitutional challenges such as this one it changed the method."

"So the State has effectively admitted that there is a better way to execute people?"

"Yes sir. But the law took effect in 1984, and applies only to those inmates convicted afterward. It does not apply to Sam Cayhall."