Chapter 8: Six Residents

Halina's POV

A homicide hold in Cook County ends in a hearing room.

The law says six residents must decide a death the Chief Medical Examiner won't.

They held ours on Tuesday morning in the basement of the morgue.

The long oak table had last been used for a budget fight.

A deputy at the door ran a coat-check rack for rifles, with paper tickets, and the rack was full by nine.

I counted a hundred and six people in the gallery.

Honore Street filled the left side in their church clothes.

The missing man's wife sat in the second row with a photograph of a ring, and Deloris sat on the aisle with her purse in her lap.

The Racine set and the Halsted set stood against the back wall, not touching.

My mother sat in the front in her good coat, with a thermos in her swollen hands.

I had told her not to come, and she had come.

The jurors took their places in a row of folding chairs.

They were a bus driver, a kindergarten teacher, a retired postal clerk, a barber, a nurse's aide and a college sophomore.

The county had drawn them by lot from the voter rolls.

None of them had asked to be there.

Dr. Pashek sat at the head of the table with his bow tie straight and a folder squared in front of him.

"We are here to determine the manner of death of a man killed at a Crack," he said softly.

"The Bureau's Directive is clear, and the county has relied on it for eight years," he added.

He called Reiss first.

I had not known he would.

Reiss came to the stand in his gray windbreaker with his tablet under his arm.

He put his hand on a Bible he did not look at.

"Inspector, does the Bureau's Directive 7 apply to Mr. Bayne?" Pashek asked.

"It applies to a death caused by a fold," Reiss said.

"And Mr. Bayne died at a Crack."

"Mr. Bayne died thirty minutes after one."

Pashek's pen stopped.

"The Honore Street Crack sealed at 9:04 p.m.," Reiss said. "My log says so."

"I'm reading from the crew lead's own entry," he went on. "Eleven folds, eleven tags, none alive."

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