Episode 12 (aka Elderly Clients)
<-- 29 March 2004 -->
On her way into court, Alice passes a homeless man who opens doors for pedestrians for change. When a businessman refuses to tip the homeless man, Alice intervenes and realizes that the homeless man is Monty, one of Alice’s former law school professors. Later, Alice buys Monty a coffee and he tells her about his fall from grace.
When she gets to Old City Hall Alice finds Graham Berlett, on trial for assaulting his 4-year old son. The charge stems from an incident at a city park when Graham tried stopping his son from falling off a slide but let his fear and panic turn to rage and carelessness. Graham complains to Alice that his wife Kathy is leaving him and moving to Vancouver with their son.
Elliot meets with his client Curtis Boyd, on trial for assaulting the spoken-word artist Poppa Doggy at an outdoor concert. Standing with Elliot and Curtis is Pete Scozyk, the P.I. Elliot uses from time to time. Curtis insists that he was misidentified by the Crown’s witness and that he is completely innocent. He used to run with a bad crowd but not anymore – in fact, he was at home when the incident occurred. Pete tells Curtis that the reason the witness picked him out of a photo line-up is that she was in one of Curtis’ high school classes and she probably recognized him and inadvertently fingered him. Bad luck. “Bad luck loves me like I’m it’s mother,” Curtis sighs. When Poppa Doggy takes the stand, he claims that black people dislike him because they think as a white rapper he’s infringing on their culture (Curtis is black). However, he is not able to identify the person who attacked him, because he claims to have been grabbed from behind. When the eye witness Shaniqua is waiting in the hallway to testify, Pete pretends to make chit chat with her and asks casually if the man she ID’d is in the hallway – despite Curtis sitting nearby, Shaniqua says she doesn’t see him. When Shaniqua takes the stand, Elliot points out to her that she went to high school with Curtis. She begins laughing, remembers Curtis from French class, and immediately announces that her ID was wrong. Curtis is acquitted.
Alice meets in the cells with Mira Pashek, who is accused of assaulting the mother of her ex-boyfriend Ivan. When she broke up with Ivan and his “crazy” mother began to stalk her – Mira insists she was only defending herself. When Alice tells Mira that Ivan is here to bail her out, Mira refuses - she wants nothing to do with the mother or the son. Alice talks to Ivan briefly and immediately dislikes him but he is her only option for bail.
James meets in a cell with Gabe Michaels, a former friend. Gabe used to be an undercover cop but now he’s a drug addict with violent tendencies. He is in jail now for assaulting a drug dealer. When James leaves Gabe antagonizes a group of cellmates, hoping to start a fight.
In Graham’s trial, Kaye calls a witness who saw Graham become angry and lose his temper when his son refused to come down from a slide. When Graham reached for him the boy fell. Alice challenges this witness for her judgmental perception of Graham’s parenting abilities. Graham’s wife Kathy takes the stand and testifies to Graham’s history of losing his temper. Alice objects but loses a motion on similar fact evidence. Kathy is allowed to testify that when Graham panics he loses his composure and lets his angst turn to violence. Graham testifies that he reacted only out of concern and had no intention to harm his son. Although Judge Serkies does not have enough evidence to convict, she harshly reprimands Graham and insists that he seek treatment to deal with his volatile temper.
When Ivan shows up in bail court to act as Mira’s surety, Mira loses her temper. Alice is confused but Crown Munoz explains that Ivan actually assaulted and harassed Mira recently and Ivan is currently violating his no-contact order just by being in the courtroom. Ivan’s mother Eva enters the courtroom to find her son being arrested, and immediately begins spewing rage and threats at Mira. Terrified of Eva, Mira begs to stay in jail.
In Mental Health Court, James tells Gabe’s story. A former undercover cop, Gabe’s career ended years ago when he came face to face with a man ready to kill him. At the last second the gun jammed and although Gabe survived, he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder and since then his life has been in steady decline. He has left his family and let his life turn to nothing. Gabe doesn’t want to be helped, he wants to be left alone to destroy his life. But against Gabe’s wishes, James, acting on a promise he made to Gabe’s family, insists on helping. Gabe is sent away for psychological assessment.