"Before we begin. " she said, "I'd like the arresting report read into the record. Specifically the section stating that the complainant consented to contact with her animal. " She looked up. "Officer Britt, would you like to explain how that consent was obtained?
" Britt stood because standing was what the form required and for a moment said nothing at all. He'd rehearsed something over the weekend, not quite a lie, more a way of describing Saturday that left out the parts that wouldn't survive scrutiny. And he could feel the shape of it sitting in his mouth, unused. She reached toward the dog. He said finally, "I was assessing a threat.
" The witness statement on file says otherwise. Ava turned a page without looking up. As does the desk sergeant's notation requesting review of inconsistencies in your report. As does Officer Kowalski's incident log filed separately from yours, which I understand was completed the same evening. "People misremember things under stress, " Britt said.
"The witness was 30 ft away. She saw what she thought she saw. " She described the sequence in the same order twice, 6 days apart, without being shown your report first. "That's not usually how misremembering works. " Ava set the page down.
"I'll ask again. Are you telling this court that your account and Officer Kowalski's are both accurate given that they describe two different sequences of events? " Britt didn't answer right away. He looked briefly like a man doing arithmetic he already knew the answer to and didn't like. "Sam's account isn't wrong, " he said slowly.
"He just—he was standing farther back. He might not have seen the same angle I did. " "Was he standing far enough back to miss you placing both hands on the animal before it reacted? " Silence. At the liaison table, the woman with the unread papers had stopped shuffling them entirely, her pen hovered an inch above a legal pad forgotten.
Beside Britt, Kowalski shifted in his seat, and for one strange second Britt almost said something on his partner's behalf. He didn't have anything to do with the report, that was mine, the closest thing to an honest entrance he'd had all morning. It reached the edge of his mouth and stopped there. He looked at the table instead. "Your Honor, " Kowalski said into the silence.