Vernon God Little

'Ladies and gentlemen of the jury,' says the prosecutor. 'Today we open one of the most cut-and-dried legal cases this state has ever seen. A person stands before you, having extinguished the lives of thirty-four decent citizens, many of them children – friends of his, even. A person who openly admits attending the scene of a high-school massacre, and who has been positively identified by eyewitnesses at the scenes of sixteen other capital crimes. A person whose childhood fantasies revolved around bloodshed and death. A person whose perverse sexual leanings link him inextricably to the other gunman in the high-school shooting. Ladies and gentlemen – today you will meet a person – and I use the term loosely – who, at the tender age of sixteen, has supplanted the notorious John Wayne Gacy, for the depth and boundlessness of his disregard for the most basic rights of others.'

He sweeps a hand across the crowd to my cage. Faces turn to take in my shiny head, my huge swimming eyes through the glasses. I stay impassive. The prosecutor smiles, as if remembering an ole joke.

'And you know,' he says, 'like Gacy – the boy cries innocence. Not of one crime, where maybe his identity could've been mistaken. But of thirty-four vicious slayings across this great state.'

Parts of my body have retracted by the time Brian takes the mound. He paces slowly around the open space of the court, nodding quietly to himself. Then he stops to lean on the jury bench, and looks into the air, reminiscing.

'Lord knows,' he says, 'it's a fine thing to relax in front of the TV after a hard day's work.' He rubs his chin, and strolls into the clearing. 'Maybe watch a movie.' A frown takes his brow. 'Must make life a little hard for the stars of that movie, though, having everyone recognize them on the street. Why do I mention it? I mention it because four-point-three murders happen every week across the region supposed to be my client's stomping ground. Four-point-three murders happened before the crimes of which he stands accused – four-point-three happened during his supposed reign of terror. And four-point-three are happening this week, while he's here with us.' He turns and stares at each jury member in turn. 'What we will discover, ladies and gentlemen, is that no allegation of murder existed against my client until the day his picture appeared on our TV screens. From that moment forward, virtually every murder in Central Texas and beyond has been attributed to him. That means all the regular murderers

took a vacation, and Vernon Gregory Little fulfilled nearly the whole published quota of murders, some of them occurring almost simultaneously, with different weapons, at opposite ends of the state. Please ask yourselves: how? By remote control? I don't think so.'

My attorney takes a walk to my cage. He looks thoughtfully at me, grabs one of the bars, and turns back to the jury.

'What I propose to show you during the course of this trial, ladies and gentlemen, is the breadth of human suggestibility. Media arrive at the scene of every murder, with a picture of one suspect alone: the defendant. And not just any media. Media under the direct employ of the man who most stands to gain from these proceedings. A man who has built an industry – no, a virtual empire – on the relentless persecution of this single, hapless youngster. A man who, before the tragic events of May twentieth, was nobody. A man you will meet, and judge for yourselves, during this trial.'

Brian saunters over to the jury, pulls his sleeve cuffs up a little, and leans intimately over their railing. His voice drops. 'How did this happen? Simple. Under the glare of camera lights, a confused and grieving public was offered the chance to be part of the biggest prime-time bandwagon since O J Simpson. "Is this the suspect?" they're asked. The face rings a bell. They've certainly seen him somewhere, recently even. Result? Even black witnesses to black

murders in black neighborhoods recognize this sixteen-year-old white schoolboy as the suspect.'

He scans the jury, narrows his eyes.

'Fellow citizens, you will see that this meek, shy young man, with no previous record of wrongdoing, had the misfortune of being a living victim of the Martirio tragedy. Events overwhelmed him at a crucial point in the delicate unfolding of his manhood. He was unable to properly articulate his grief, couldn't assimilate the fragmentation around him. I'll show you that the boy's only mistake – and it was a big one – was not crying "Innocent!" quickly or loudly enough.'