‘First,’ he said, ‘we’re going to need to put together a basic description of our cars, their capacity, speed characteristics, how they work, the engineering involved, the dangers involved in producing such machines, the safety measures we have built in to them, and a catalogue of our track record vis-à-vis safety.
‘Second, we need a full history of Formula One – the accidents that have occurred, what has been done to prevent them, why there are so few these days, the nature of their causes and what, when they do occur, should be the consequences to drivers and spectators.
‘Third, we’re going to need a full description both technical – and tactical – of what was involved in that corner, what the risks were, what Remy was attempting, what could’ve happened, what did happen, and why. We also need to hammer the point that this was completely unconnected with the incident in Montreal.
‘Fourth, we need a full analysis – effectively frame by frame – of what happened to Remy's car, why it didn’t perform as it should have, and how such underperformance caused the crash; we will also need to show how the car's behaviour during the impact and crash caused the injuries.
‘Fifth, to counter every tactic Sandy expects the prosecution might use, we need to trawl through instances where Ptarmigan's compliance has underperformed and infringed the rules, we’ve made a mistake, suffered an FIA intervention, been reprimanded, been fned or been charged with a crime. We need to show how Ptarmigan responded to each of these shortcomings and demonstrate the grown-up processes the team instigated to prevent a recurrence.’
‘Focusing on things like our “mistakes”, “shortcomings” and “underperformance” is all incredibly negative,’ Backhouse replied. ‘You make it sound like we were to blame. We should not make this overcomplicated. This was a racing incident. Pure and simple … It was one of those things.’
Straker replied. ‘I’m not assuming any blame at all; I just want to be sure that we get our retaliation in first. If, as Sandy says, guilt by insinuation is the likely direction of attack, let's pre-empt everything Gazdanov could possibly throw at us. If we do all that analysis, we ought to be able to undermine if not rebut any such accusation.’
‘How soon can we get access to Sabatino's car?’ asked the race engineer.
‘We won’t,’ said McMahon.
‘What do you mean?’
‘It's been impounded by the police. The court's going to appoint its own expert to investigate the wreckage.’
‘How on earth do we do our own assessment, then – put together credible conclusions – if we can’t see the damn car?’
‘We have all our telemetry stored in here,’ Straker replied indicating with a nod of his head the row of blank monitors down the long side of the motor home. ‘We’ll have to base our observations on that. We can also study the video footage we’ll have captured of the accident. That ought to give us a pretty good idea of what went wrong. If we can find out what did happen, we can then try and work out why.’
TWENTY-FOUR
Throughout the day the blanket of cloud over Moscow had been descending. Internal lights were needed in the Ptarmigan motor home, still parked out on its own at the Zhar-ptitsa Autodrom circuit. Activity in the mobile command centre was now frenetic. All the seats down the right-hand side were occupied, and most of the screens were lit. The team was busy building its body of data to try and prove how well-suited the Ptarmigan cars had been to the Zhar-ptitsa circuit. One group of Ptarmigan staff was collating all the telemetry on the car, not just during the race but throughout the preceding practice sessions. Another was studying the telemetry immediately around the crash. A third group was reviewing all the VT footage of the crash, taken from any angle: in the age of multiple on-board cameras, there was considerable coverage garnered from each of the leaders’ cars: Yegor Baryshnikov, Remy Sabatino, and Simi Luciano – the three drivers at the front of the race.
While this research was being gathered, Sandy McMahon sat at the end of the meeting table; working at a laptop, she was preparing the basic frameworks for the legal documents – witness statements and evidence – that they would be submitting to the court.
Straker picked up his phone and, to be sure of his privacy, went through into the private cabin at the front of the motor home. Breathing deeply, he made ready to call Dominic Quartano.
The telephone number pulsed out. Jean, the tycoon's indispensable PA, answered the call: ‘Mr Quartano's been waiting to hear from you, Matt,’ she said. ‘He's asked that Stacey Krall be on the call when you speak. Can I ask you to wait while I get her on the line?’
‘Of course,’ replied Straker, genuinely pleased that Quartech's in-house counsel would be involved. He liked Krall as a feisty operator; he would also appreciate her assessment of his findings as well as hearing her stress-test his conclusions thus far.
Seconds later Jean was back on the line. Krall was now in tow. ‘I’ll put you both through,’ said the PA and the line went silent.
‘Matt,’ came Quartano's well-rounded baritone. ‘I’ve been waiting to hear what you’ve found. I assume you’ve made contact with Brandeis Gertner?’
‘Sandy McMahon picked me up at the airport. She's been with me since I arrived.’
Krall asked: ‘Is she any good?’
‘Too early to say. We’ll know soon enough: we’ve had some hefty developments even since I got here.’
‘Such as?’
‘We went to see Tahm, in the cells under the Moscow Police HQ. He's in a dreadful state. His arrest and treatment since have affected him badly. We were granted no privacy; worse, we were supervized by a policeman throughout the meeting.’
‘What?’ blurted Krall. ‘Didn’t they know McMahon was his lawyer?’
‘Oh, yes, but it got worse than that. Every time we come across indelicacies like that, she declares resignedly: “This is Russia!”’
‘Holy crap,’ said Krall.
‘We’ve applied for bail, for Tahm and Remy, but I’m told we should have no expectation of it being granted.’
Quartano retorted: ‘Why ever not?’
‘Public opinion. In the light of the accident, it's toxic. While I was in the police station, I was even goaded by a policeman for merely being associated with the deaths.’
‘You’ve got to do whatever it takes to get Tahm out of jail.’
‘Of course, but I should warn you that Sandy's written bail off as impossible.’
‘Poor man,’ said the tycoon. ‘Presumably getting him out will depend on matters elsewhere; what are the other developments?’
‘We had a press conference sprung on us by the Ministry of Justice. Not even Brandeis had been informed, even though the authorities categorically know they are Ptarmigan's representative. That conference gave us several surprise developments. One is the altitude this incident has gone up the food chain of government: the minister of justice, himself, hosted the conference. Second, the minister has appointed the prosecutor general to take on this case.’
‘Holy cow,’ said Krall. ‘How does this case warrant that degree of overkill?’
‘Oh, it doesn’t stop there,’ agreed Straker. ‘The third googly was the location for the trial: the prosecutor general stated that it will be heard … in the Supreme Court.’
‘As the court of first instance?’
‘Indeed, while the fourth surprise is the timeframe. The trial's been scheduled to be held within four weeks.’
