The woman in the church hat, the contractor in the vest, the retired JSO officer in the cap, the 22-year-old who had sent the video to Duvall's office, the woman in the red jacket who spoke at length about her brother's van. The headline on the third story was, "They stopped because it wasn't right. It ran on a Sunday." 6 weeks after the stop, Nadia and Ranata Voss returned to Riverside Memorial Gardens early morning again. The same eastern gate, the same path to section D, third row.
Ranata did not bring the photograph this time. She had had it framed and it was on the wall of her office. Now, the four of them, Atlanta, the courthouse 20 years ago. She brought flowers instead, not white roses, yellow ones, which their father had preferred. They stood at the marker.
Beloved father, patient man, exact in all things. 41 cases reopened, Ranata said quietly. 14 plaintiffs, three individuals in federal custody. One cooperative witness, one suspended officer reinstated. She set the flowers against the marker.
Partial, she said. Yes, Nadia said. It's always partial. That's why you keep working. The Rolls-Royce was returned to Nadia's storage facility eight weeks after the stop following completion of evidence documentation.
The insurance claim covered the interior damage and the quarter panel repair. The repair cost $114,000. The estimate had briefly amused her. The car was whole again, or close enough to whole. The dent in the quarter panel had been filled and repainted.
The interior had been restored by the same craftsman who had originally fitted it. They came from Stuttgart, which was either a detail that mattered or didn't, depending on what you thought about the value of things that could be replaced. She drove it back to Jacksonville once 6 months later for a function at the Hyatt. She parked it herself. She walked in.
No one who saw her in the lobby. A black woman in a charcoal blazer, natural hair pinned at the crown, carrying nothing but a phone and a small leather card holder with the off-white cards inside. Would have known anything particular about her. She preferred it that way. She always had.
Calhoun's trial was set for 14 months after the stop. Pre-trial motions were filed and argued. Discovery was contested. The defense challenged the authentication of the secondary recording device footage. The challenge was overruled.