Defending Jacob(111)
“I stopped at my locker to put my stuff away, then I went to homeroom.”
“And the defendant was not in your homeroom that year, correct?”
“Yes.”
“Did you see him before homeroom that morning?”
“Yeah, I saw him at the lockers.”
“What was he doing?”
“He was just putting his stuff in his locker.”
“Was there anything unusual about his appearance?”
“No.”
“About his clothes?”
“No.”
“Was there anything on his hand?”
“There was a big spot. It looked like blood.”
“Describe the spot.”
“It was just, like, a red spot, like the size of a quarter.”
“Did you ask him about it?”
“Yes. I said, ‘Dude, what did you do to your hand?’ And he was like, ‘Oh, it’s nothing. Just a scratch.’ ”
“Did you see the defendant try to remove the blood?”
“Not right then.”
“Did he deny that the spot on his hand was blood?”
“No.”
“Okay, what happened next?”
“I went off to homeroom.”
“Was Ben Rifkin in your homeroom that year?”
“Yes.”
“But he wasn’t in homeroom that morning.”
“No.”
“Did that seem strange to you?”
“No. I don’t know if I even noticed. I guess I would have figured he was just out sick.”
“So what happened in homeroom?”
“Nothing. Just the usual: attendance, some announcements, then we went off to class.”
“What was your first class that day?”
“English.”
“Did you go?”
“Yeah.”
“Was the defendant in your English class?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you see him in the classroom that morning?”
“Yes.”
“Did you speak to him?”
“We just said hello, that’s all.”
“Was there anything unusual about the defendant’s manner or anything he said?”
“No, not really.”
“He didn’t seem upset.”
“No.”
“Anything unusual about his appearance?”
“No.”
“No blood on his clothes, nothing like that?”
“Objection.”
“Sustained.”
“Would you describe the defendant’s appearance when you saw him in English class that morning?”
“I think he was just wearing, like, regular clothes: jeans, sneakers, whatever. There was no blood on his clothes, if that’s what you mean.”
“What about on his hands?”
“The spot was gone.”
“He’d washed his hands?”
“I guess.”
“Were there any cuts or scratches on his hands? Any reason he might have been bleeding?”
“Not that I remember. I wasn’t really paying attention. It didn’t matter then.”
“Okay, what happened next?”
“We had English class for like fifteen minutes, then there was an announcement that the school was being put in a lockdown.”
“What is a lockdown?”
“It’s when you have to go back to your homeroom and they take attendance and lock all the doors and keep everyone there.”
“Do you know why the school gets put in a lockdown?”
“Because there’s some kind of danger.”
“What did you think when you heard the school was going into a lockdown?”
“Columbine.”
“You thought somebody was at the school with a gun?”
“Yeah.”
“Did you have any idea who?”
“No.”
“Were you afraid?”
“Yeah, of course. Everybody was.”
“Do you remember how the defendant reacted when the principal announced the lockdown?”
“He didn’t say anything. He just kind of smiled. There wasn’t much time. We just heard it and everybody ran.”
“Did the defendant seem nervous or frightened?”
“No.”
“At the time, did anybody know what the lockdown was about?”
“No.”
“Did anyone connect it to Ben Rifkin?”
“No. I mean, later that morning they told us, but not at the start.”
“What happened next?”
“We just stayed in our homerooms with the doors locked. They came on the intercom and they told us we weren’t in any danger, there were no guns or anything, so the teachers unlocked the door and we just kind of waited there. It was like a drill or something.”
“You had practiced lockdowns before?”
“Yeah.”
“What happened next?”
“We stayed there. They told us to take out our books and read or do homework or whatever. Then they canceled school for the rest of the day and we went home around eleven.”