Chapter 8 - The Interrogation Room
The federal holding facility at the Roybal Federal Building in downtown Los Angeles does not care if your grandfather came over on the Mayflower or if your personal real estate portfolio encompasses three counties.
The subterranean interrogation suites in basement level two smell of damp concrete, floor stripper, and the unique, sour ozone of industrial air conditioning units that have not been serviced since the Clinton administration. There are no panoramic windows looking out over the Pacific. There are no velvet banquettes. There is only an eight-by-ten poured-concrete box, a stainless-steel table bolted to the slab with four half-inch anchor bolts, and two steel folding chairs that squeak with every shift of human weight.
Richard Sterling sat in the chair nearest the wall.
He had not been permitted to shower. His custom-tailored charcoal suit—the three-thousand-dollar garment he had smoothed with such arrogant satisfaction on Flight 402—was ruined, stained with the greasy gray water of the transit cell and torn at the left shoulder where a federal marshal had hauled him out of the transport van. His silk tie had been confiscated as a suicide risk; his gold Audemars Piguet watch sat in a plastic evidence bag three floors above; and his bare ankles showed beneath his trousers, his custom Italian loafers replaced by a pair of orange canvas slip-ons with worn rubber soles.
Across the stainless-steel table sat Assistant United States Attorney Marcus Vance and Special Agent Sarah Lin of the FBI’s Public Corruption Division.
Between them sat a heavy, military-grade Panasonic Toughbook laptop, its screen glowing with the monochrome green interface of an active Department of Justice evidence file.
"Let's go over the flight recorder data one more time, Richard," Marcus Vance said, his voice quiet, rhythmic, completely devoid of theatrical heat. "The digital audio system aboard the aircraft captured your voice at timestamp fourteen-thirty-two. Would you like to hear the playback?"
"My attorney..." Sterling croaked, his voice shredded from twenty hours of shouting into concrete walls. His lips were dry, cracked, flecked with white spittle. "Where is Harold? I have a right to have Harold Sterling in this room."
"Harold Sterling withdrew as your counsel of record forty-five minutes ago, Richard," Agent Lin said, sliding a single sheet of paper across the metal table. "He cited an unresolvable conflict of interest arising from his personal equity holdings in your secondary holding companies. You've been assigned a public defender from the federal panel. She’s currently reviewing the initial seventy-page complaint in the corridor."
Sterling blinked, his bloodshot eyes staring down at the signature line of the withdrawal notice. "Harold... withdrew? But he's my cousin. We share a family office in Delaware."
"Your family office in Delaware was placed under an emergency freezing order by the Chancery Court at seven o'clock this morning," Marcus Vance said. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on the steel table, his gaze locking onto Sterling’s twitching pupils. "The grand jury has added six counts of witness tampering and three counts of wire fraud to the original assault indictment. Your conversation with Mrs. Bennett during the descent—the offer of an eight-million-dollar equity bribe in exchange for her silence—was recorded by three independent civilian devices in rows one and three."
"It was an out-of-court settlement discussion!" Sterling yelled, his hands slamming down against the stainless steel, the metal handcuffs rattling against the welded center ring with a violent, sharp clink. "Civil parties are permitted to discuss settlement terms! That's protected speech under the federal rules of evidence!"
"Civil parties are permitted to settle lawsuits, Richard," Agent Lin said, her voice dropping into a register of icy, clinical contempt. "They are not permitted to offer commercial bribes to the victim of an active federal felony while the aircraft is in emergency descent. That is Title 18, Section 1512. Tampering with a witness, victim, or informant by corrupt persuasion."
She tapped the laptop keyboard.
The high-definition video from the passenger in 1A appeared on the display.
The image was crystalline—shot in 4K at sixty frames per second.
It showed Sterling standing in the aisle, his face twisted in that arrogant, petulant grimace, his right foot drawing back three inches before snapping forward with the precise, deliberate momentum of an athlete kicking a ball. It showed the heavy brass corner of my briefcase driving into the soft curve of my maternity slacks. It captured the sickening, wet impact of the strike, followed immediately by my sharp, agonizing scream.
And then, with terrifying acoustic clarity, it played Sterling’s voice:
“Oops. Should’ve moved when you had the chance.”
Sterling stared at the screen.
The color in his face didn't fade; it seemed to dissolve from within, leaving his skin the shade of wet clay. His mouth worked, his throat bobbing, but the polished, manipulative arguments that had carried him through thirty years of zoning boards and shareholder lawsuits died behind his teeth.
"The video has been viewed two hundred and forty million times worldwide, Richard," Marcus Vance said softly. "The President of the United States was asked about it during his morning press briefing in the Rose Garden twenty minutes ago. Do you know what he said?"
Sterling didn't answer. He couldn't. His body had begun to tremble with a continuous, low-frequency vibration that rattled his orange canvas shoes against the floorboards.
"He called it an act of cowardice that disgraced the corporate community of this country," Vance said. "He instructed the Attorney General to assign three additional trial attorneys from the Civil Rights Division to ensure that this case is prosecuted to the absolute statutory maximum."
Vance reached into his briefcase, pulled out an eight-page document bound in blue carbon paper, and laid it directly on top of the laptop keyboard.
"This is the plea agreement," Vance said.
Sterling looked down, his eyes scanning the dense, twelve-point font.
COUNT ONE: Aggravated Assault within the Maritime and Territorial Jurisdiction of the United States (18 U.S.C. § 113(a)(3)) — 10 Years.
COUNT TWO: Deprivation of Civil Rights under Color of Authority (18 U.S.C. § 242) — 5 Years.
COUNT THREE: Witness Tampering by Corrupt Persuasion (18 U.S.C. § 1512(b)) — 5 Years.
TOTAL RECOMMENDED CUSTODIAL SENTENCE: Twenty (20) Years, to be served at the United States Penitentiary, Lompoc.
RESTITUTION: One hundred percent forfeiture of all personal equity in Sterling Meridian Group, with fifty million dollars directed into the Maya Bennett Trust for Pediatric Trauma.
"Twenty years?" Sterling whispered, his voice cracking into a high, girlish shriek that bounced off the concrete walls. "Twenty years?! I'm fifty-two years old! That's a life sentence! I'll die in Lompoc!"
"You kicked a child, Richard," Agent Lin said, rising from her chair and looking down at him with an expression of absolute, unyielding finality. "You kicked an unborn baby while his mother was strapped into a seat thirty thousand feet in the air. The fact that you are walking into a federal prison instead of a state cemetery is an act of mercy that this office did not recommend."
She turned toward the heavy steel door, knocking twice on the observation glass.
May you like
"Take the deal, Richard," Marcus Vance said, standing up and closing his leather folio. "Or let twelve citizens from Los Angeles County watch that video on a forty-foot screen in the federal courthouse. You have until four o'clock."
The steel bolt slid back with a heavy, concussive thunk, and the two prosecutors stepped through the threshold, leaving the billionaire alone in the cold gray light of basement level two, weeping into his cuffed hands while the hum of the air conditioning ground on above his head.
