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Episode 37, originally published 21-Apr-97

The Wheels of Justice

As Jack Abbott pokes his head into Ashley's lab, a shadowy figure darts out of sight. "Sis?" he calls. No answer. "Ashley?" Again he gets no answer but apparently his sixth sense detected what we saw more clearly--that something is amiss. He flips on the lights and starts to look around. Huddled behind a file cabinet is a small-framed, nerdy looking man in a white lab coat who struggles to evade Jack's view. He has almost succeeded but as Jack begins to leave he starts to sneeze, and even though he muffles it in a handkerchief, Jack hears the noise and turns around. Taking a metal rod from a nearby rack, he rounds the file cabinet and confronts the man, who cringes. "What have we here?" Jack asks curiously. "Who in the blazes are you and what are you doing in this lab?" The man just stares back at him, frozen with fright.

Two uniformed Jabot Security men have joined Jack in the lab. One is handcuffing the man while the other, who wears white gloves, is removing items from the lab coat, placing them in plastic evidence bags. Ashley enters and tries to figure out what's going on. "Jack, what's going on here? Who is this man?" "Oh, dear me," the man says. "This is very embarrassing. I would really like to consult a lawyer, if you don't mind," he says. "There'll be plenty of time for that down at the station. We've called the Genoa City Police and they should be here shortly," the security guard tells him. Ashley looks at the evidence bags. "Jack, these are some of our latest formulas... and this one..." She looks perplexed for a moment, then opens the bottle to smell it. She raises an eyebrow as if impressed. "This is not one of ours... but it's really not bad! What IS going on here?" The man just shakes his head and buries his face in his hands. "I feel so guilty--this should never have happened. Oh dear, oh dear." Jack condescends to the man, "Caught in the act of industrial espionage? Or sabotage? Well, whatever it was, I certainly agree with you it should never have happened. Perhaps you should have thought about the guilt thing before breaking into our labs."

Genoa City Courthouse. Jack is on the stand. "Yes, those are the items that were recovered from the man's pockets," Jack testifies. "No further questions," the District Attorney says. The judge looks to the defense table. "Ms. Collins?" "No questions," Doris Collins answers. [Note: See AWO Episode 32 for the origins of Collins and Sons, Doris's law firm.] "Your Honor, the people rest," the DA says. Doris wheels herself out to the middle of the courtroom. "The defense calls Ashley Bladeson Abbott," she says. Everyone looks to Ashley, who seems surprised but comes forward. "Now, Ms. Abbott, you work at Jabot, in the lab in question, is that right?" Ashley nods, "That's right." "And what specifically does your job entail?" "Well, I arrive in the morning and work until late at night, mixing chemicals and trying to find scents that we could sell." "I enter into evidence defense Exhibit 1, a notebook of Ms. Abbott for last week." The judge looks to the DA, who offers no objection. "I call your attention to page 3. Would you say this entry is typical of your experiments?" Ashley looks at it for a moment and then says, "Well, not typical. For most of my experiments I don't actually take notes. But when I find something of sufficient interest, yes, this is the kind of notation I might be inclined to make."

"Would you read the notation aloud?" Doris asks her. "It says, `some red, a bit of blue, lots of yellow.'" "And red is--?" "Well, I can't say for sure--it would depend on the day." "Well, what would it have been for April 9?" Ashley shakes her head, "I don't know what you mean. I said it depends on the day." "Well, I've given you a specific day, so what is `red' for that day?" "It's whatever was in the test tube on that day." The judge leans over to Ashley and admonishes, "Ms. Abbott, please avoid evasive--" but Doris cuts in. "Your Honor, the defense does not object to Ms. Abbott's degree of precision on this matter. In fact, we believe she is doing the best she can," she explains. Ashley smiles feebly, "Thank you, Doris," she whispers. "Very well, then proceed," the Judge says apologetically. "We have no further questions at this time," Doris says. "No questions," the DA says. The judge says, "You may step down, Ms. Abbott. Call your next witness." "We call Neil Winters."

Neil is sworn in and Doris resumes her quest for the truth. "Mr. Winters, I call your attention to the screen image now being projected on the wall. In particular, the two columns of numbers labeled `old numbers' and `new numbers'. Would you explain those?" "Well, sure. When the numbers in the old numbers column are mostly bigger than the numbers in the new numbers column, it means things aren't so good. And when the new numbers are big, it means things are better." "And when the numbers are up?" "Well, we write a report." "And when they're down?" "A report." Doris pulls out a page and says, "I'd like this added as Defense Next in Sequence." The judge nods. The DA shrugs and nods, too. "That's one of our reports," Neil volunteers helpfully. Doris nods, "Yes, it is. Just answer my questions please. Would you read the report?" Neil nods. "Alright, sure. It says `The numbers are up.'" "Go on," Doris says. "Well, that's all it says." "If I told you your wife says you didn't come home until late that evening because you were at work writing a report, would it surprise you?" "Well, no. It takes a long time to crank these out. You gotta look at both columns of the numbers and then you gotta figure out if there's a better way to express it. It can get tiring to read the same old presentations every day." "One more question," Doris says. "Do you know what happens to these reports?" "Sure. They go to marketing, to Jill Abbott, to Jack Abbott." "And those people do what with them?" Doris asks. "Objection!" the DA says. "The defense is lying to the witness." The judge looks up at the DA who continues, "She said she had only one last question and now she's trying to get in a second." Doris sighs, "Withdrawn. We're through with this witness." "No questions," the DA chants. "Call Ryan McNeil," Doris says.

"How many people work at Jabot?" Doris asks Ryan after her has been sworn in. "Well, I don't know. Lots. I bet more than a couple hundred." "I call your attention to this floor plan. Considering the average size office here for your lowest paid employee, how large a building would it take to house that many employees?" Ryan takes a pen from behind his ear and a notebook from his pocket and does some quick calculations. "That's can't be right," he mutters. He scratches it out and re-does the computation. "I don't know," he finally says. "You can't do simple math?" Doris asks. "Objection," the DA says. "I'll rephrase," Doris says. "Don't you mean," she says, "that the answer you got just doesn't make sense given what you know about the size of the Jabot building?" "That's right," Ryan says. "Either the building would have to be enormously bigger or most people would be sharing cubies somewhere--but I've never seen anything like that." "So the question remains," Doris begins, but he finishes, "Where do all those people who park in the parking lot actually go?" She nods. "I don't know," Ryan says. "But I'm not making this stuff up. Products do get sold and salaries do get paid!" "Yes, of course they do, Ryan," Doris says with s mysteriously pleasant smile. "But thank you for emphasizing the point." She turns to the witness and says, "I'm done with this witness, Your Honor." The judge eyes the DA, who shakes his head. "Defense calls Diane Jenkins," Doris says.

Under examination, Diane examines the blueprints of the lab. "That's an elevator shaft. What an odd place for one," she says. She continues eyeing the floorplan. "Strange, There are several of them leading in and out of many of the major offices in the building. "Ashley Abbott's lab?" "Yes." "Jack Abbott's Office?" "Yes." "Even Victor Newman's office?" Doris asks. "Yes, that's right," she says. "And the openings are not visible from within the offices?" Diane shakes her head. "No, I've seen the offices and there's no sign of any such openings. It's quite awesome. When this trial is over, I'm going to look up the architect whose name is on those plans and find out how he did it." "Thank you, Miss Jenkins. No more questions," Doris says.

The DA stands. "I have one or two questions for Miss Jenkins," he says. "The entrances are invisible to the rooms' occupants but there may be entrances that are more visible on other floors, isn't that right?" "Certainly." "And there may be a hidden way back into the elevators even at the floor where we found the defendant." "Oh, definitely. I only mean to imply that it wasn't surprising that Ashley did not know about the entrance." "Thank you, Miss Jenkins. No more questions." Doris wheels herself back out to the center and proudly announces, "Defense calls the defendant, Arthur Sanford."

Mr. Sanford takes the stand. "Mr. Sanford, where do you work?" Doris asks. He takes a deep breath and somewhat reluctantly says "Jabot Cosmetics." There is a murmur in the courtroom. "And what is your title there?" "Senior Chemist," he says. Another stir among the onlookers. "That's not possible. I'm the only one with that title!" Ashley says from the audience. The judge bangs a gavel and warns the court to avoid further such outbursts. "And what is your role as Senior Chemist?" Doris continues. "I oversee the development of new scents for Jabot, and..." He trails off. "Go on, Mr. Sanford," Doris says gently. "This is so embarrassing. I had hoped this wouldn't have to come out. But, well, every morning I add some food coloring to the chemicals our staff has worked up, and then I have them delivered up into Ms. Abbott's lab for her to `discover'." "So the scents that Jabot uses don't just come from pouring a few vials of colored liquid back and forth?" Doris asks. The man laughs momentarily and then stops abruptly as if suddenly realizing he's on display in a courtroom. "Uh, no, ma'am," he says in a somber tone. "This is serious science! It requires special machinery, safety equipment, computers. No, the vials are just `for show'. We could never make the Jabot board understand these matters--well, you know who they've got over there and what kind of training they have. So over the years, we detached the REAL business operation of Jabot from its public image."

There is an uproar again as people watching the trial begin to whisper about the significance of what they've just heard. "So would I be right," Doris asks, "to conclude that you had stolen the business of Jabot?" "No ma'am! The business is still right where it always has been. We've just kept it from being run into the ground, that's all! I admit we do manipulate the money and equipment a mite, but not for any sinister reason. Do you know how late those people upstairs come in? Or how long their lunch hours are? Or what goes on their expense reports. There are only about 8 or 10 of them, all so full of pomp they are. Steal it? No. We've kept the company alive." "So the upper floor has no effect on the company at all?" Doris asks. "Well, I wouldn't say that. It took us a while, but we figured out how to harnass it. We use it for marketing."

"For marketing?" Doris says, trying to sustain the jury's sense of surprise about all this. "Can you explain that?" "Sure, I think so. You see, people who buy our products--well, they like to think that if they add a little dab of cologne they'll be able to get a job anywhere, you know? I mean, it's ridiculous--no company could work that way. In fact, we tried to hire actors to pretend to do that on TV but they said it was unethical. They compared it to saying smoking was healthy, if you can believe that! Anyway, we decided to just let the upper floors continue to operate--you know, like as if life were that simple. And we just photograph them now and again, for use in our advertising. It worked out well because for some odd reason I don't think any of those people ever watch TV, so they never saw themselves. But most regular have probably seen the campaigns--``Buy Jabot and the whole office will want to sleep with you.'' or ``With Jabot, it's mailroom to board room in 2 weeks ... or less.'' and my personal favorite ``People who use Jabot products command larger offices.'' They're very highly rated."

There's a chuckle from the audience and also a few of the jurors. Doris waits for it to subside before getting serious again. She rolls herself in close to him and takes a serious tone. "So when you were found in the laboratory..." "Yes, well. I'm afraid I was just checking the fluid levels on the test tubes,... and bringing by another scent for Ashley to `discover'." He shakes his head sadly. "I have to say these things, you understand, to clear my name. But, you know, this is not going to be at all good for the company. And I'm very sorry about that. When the truth gets out about this, ... Oh, my word, I just don't know what it's going to do to our image."

The judge says, "Ms. Collins, do you wish to move to dismiss the charges?" "I have one more question, Your Honor," Doris says. "Very well," the judge says, "but you've already made your case." "This is more of a personal curiosity question, Your Honor. But if I don't ask now, it'll be hard to get the answer. Mr. Sanford, on the night that Victor Newman was shot, was anyone from your office present at the scene?" A burst of commotion starts in the courtroom but it falls immediately back to a hush as he seems about to answer. "I'd hoped you'd not ask that. Yes, one of our employees was very disgruntled that night and did sneak up there in one of our secret elevators. We fired him, of course. But we just couldn't come forward--it would have exposed everything and risked the whole company--just as I've put the whole company at risk by getting caught now." "So Mari Jo Mason..." "Well, she's innocent. Just caught in the wrong place at the wrong time, and driven a bit crazy afterward by the pressure everyone was putting on her, I suppose. She saw our employee, but I'm sure she later realized she couldn't prove it and that no one would believe her. By the time we realized she was going to have it pinned on her, she was already in too deep for us to intervene. Since then, we've written to her any number of times at the sanitarium and tried to explain, but apparently it's common for people there to have proof--even letters in writing like ours--of shadow organizations, secret conspiracies, and the like. So no one has ever paid attention when she's tried to get herself cleared."

"Thank you, Mr. Sanford," Doris says as she draws herself back so that she can address the entire court. "At this time, the defense moves to drop all charges." "The people concur," the DA says. "Very well," says the judge. "The charges are hereby dropped." The judge bangs her gavel. "You're free to go, with our apologies, Mr. Sanford... Mr. Sanford?" She looks around but he is not there to hear, having disappeared already--perhaps by some unseen passage.


That's all for this episode. Hope you learned something. Don't miss Episode 38!
If you missed any older episodes, see the index.

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Copyright 1997, Kent M. Pitman. All Rights Reserved.