After catching a quick bite to eat after the first day of the trial, Aruin decided to make one last appeal to reason with Cdr Reynolds.

She tapped her comm badge. “Aruin to Reynolds. Do you have a few minutes to chat?”

Reynolds’ voice came out of her combadge’s speaker a moment later.  “I do; where should we meet?  Or would you prefer to speak over combadges?”

“Your office? In, say, 5 minutes?”

“I’ll see you then.  Reynolds out.”

Aruin arrived and chimed the door to his office.

“Welcome, Commander,” Reynolds said, standing.  “How can I help you?”

“So lets do a deal, let justice be served, sure, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to let my 2 clients go down for crimes they didn’t commit or even witness.”

“What’re you thinking?”  Reynolds asked.

“Drop them both down to 1 count of evidence tampering for the failure to log Vaalk removing the prisoners from their cells. I’ll have them amend their plea, and we can put this sorry busy behind us.” Aruin offered.

Reynolds thought for a moment, then shook his head.  “I can’t drop it down that far; that would be setting a terrible precedent.  Wallace and Olgierdsson sat by and let a junior officer beat 7 prisoners in a closet in the brig of Starfleet vessel; they’re getting slapped with more than just evidence tampering.  But, given the guilty plea by Vaalk, I’ll drop the abuse of prisoner and conspiracy to abuse charges as a part of any deal we make,” the prosecutor countered.

“Alright, we agree on that at least. Whats your counter?”

“One count each of evidence tampering, and one count each of conspiracy to contravene Starfleet orders,” Reynolds replied.  “By failing to log and report, they also violated regulations on brig operations.  Best I can do.”

“Alright. Sentencing recco’s? I don’t want either of them doing prison time. They’re kids who made mistakes. Demotions and official letters of reprimand on their records?

Reynolds thought for a moment.  “Plus one year’s probation, mandatory retraining, and mandatory transfers off of the Culver City with the condition that they cannot serve together again for a period of five years.”

“Pssssssshew, yeah, you know what, that works for me. Let me going talk to my clients, I’ll let you know what they say.” Aruin replied. It was better then prison for a few years or getting dishonorable discharge.

((TAG))