The Indictments Read online

  THE INDICTMENTS

  a novel

  by

  William Eleazer

  The Indictments - Copyright © 2012

  By William Eleazer

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication (except for brief quotations in articles or reviews) may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without authorization by the publisher.

  This is a book of fiction. Names, characters, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Real places are occasionally used to give a sense of reality, but all events involving such places are fictional.

  ISBN (Digital Edition) 978-0-9824747-9-2

  ISBN (Soft Cover Edition) 978-0-9824747-8-5

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2012936134

  Published by

  Elex Publishers, Inc.

  5 Crescent Place South

  St. Petersburg, Florida 33711

  Contact publishers at www.elexpublishers.com or call (800)-546-ELEX (3539) for ordering this novel in soft cover (6 x 9, 332 pages)

  Cover photo of Forsyth Park Fountain by Gary Mazzie. Used by permission. For other work by Gary Mazzie, see www.garystravels.com

  Cover art by Adi S. Bustaman — [email protected]

  Printed in the United States of America

  First Edition

  Dedication

  As with my first novel, Savannah Law, this novel is dedicated to the citizens of Savannah, Georgia, the beautiful city that has inspired so many artists and writers.

  Acknowledgments

  My special thanks to Shelly Wilson, Bobbie Samford, and Erin Okuno for editorial assistance and advice, and to my wife, Jan, for more than I can explain in many words. And to Christopher Marlowe (1564-1593), who explained it all in just a few:

  “Whoever loved that loved not at first sight.”

  (On Peachtree Street NE, Atlanta, Georgia, Sunday, April 28, 1957)

  About the author:

  William Eleazer is the 2010 Gold Medal Winner for Adult Fiction for his novel Savannah Law, awarded by the Florida Publishers Association. He is a native of Springfield, Georgia, just 27 miles from Savannah, the locale for both Savannah Law and his latest novel, The Indictments. He earned a BA degree from Vanderbilt University, a JD degree from George Washington University Law School, and a Master of Laws in Litigation from Emory University. During his various careers, he has lived the lives of many of the characters in his novels: prosecutor, criminal defense attorney, trial judge, law professor, U.S. Marine---and poker player. He lives with his wife, Jan, in St. Petersburg, Florida.

  Table of Contents

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX

  CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FORTY

  CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  CHAPTER FIFTY-ONE

  THE INDICTMENTS

  “Evil doesn't die. It never dies. It just takes on a new face, a new name.”

  Tess Gerritsen, The Surgeon

  CHAPTER ONE

  August 21, 2007

  Scott saw it as soon as he unfolded the morning paper. It was in bold letters in the middle of the front page, along with a photo of the defendant.

  Harrison Conviction Overturned

  To Be Retried in Savannah

  A two-column article below explained that John Harrison, only son of former U.S. Senator David Harrison, had been convicted of armed robbery ten months earlier in the Chatham County Courthouse and sentenced to ten years confinement in the state prison. The reversal was due to a procedural error: ineffective assistance of counsel. Max Gordon, one of the best known and most successful criminal defense attorneys in the country, had been the lead counsel. Gordon was removed from the case just as it began and replaced with an attorney with no trial experience. It did not come as a total surprise to Scott Marino, but it was a great disappointment. Scott had prosecuted the case.

  Scott read the article again before turning to the other news. He was an early riser, and reading the morning paper at the breakfast table was a favorite part of his day, a ritual he rarely missed. He held a steaming cup of coffee in his right hand, occasionally taking a sip and pausing to smell the rich aroma. He turned the paper to the sports page and was reading the baseball results when the phone on a nearby table rang. His close friends always called on his cell phone, so he wasn’t surprised to find the call work related.

  “Good morning, Scott. This is Bill Baldwin.”

  “Well, good morning, Bill, long time no speak,” said Scott. Baldwin was a reporter with the South Georgia Times who had closely covered the Harrison trial. In the weeks afterward, he had interviewed most of the jurors and written a feature about their views. Scott was initially concerned when he heard about the interviews, but the ensuing stories were fair and mostly dealt with how the jury felt about being sequestered in a downtown Savannah hotel for almost a week. Baldwin had also interviewed Scott after the trial. Scott had a prosecutor’s natural reticence while in the presence of a reporter, but he found Baldwin to be a straight shooter who seemed without guile. This was their first contact in almost six months.

  “Do you have a comment on the reversal of the Harrison case?” Baldwin asked.

  “You mean I don’t even get a ‘How’ve you been?’ before you want me to write your story for tomorrow?”

  “Good point, Scott. Let me start again. How ya’ been?”

  “I’m doing OK, but my Braves lost again last night to the Reds, 8-7. How about yourself?”

  “No problems, life’s treating me well, and I’ve been able to keep my editor happy. And to that end, let me ask again—what’s your comment on the reversal in the Harrison case?”

  “No comment.”

  “Scott, surely you must have a comment. That was a big case—every TV station in Georgia covered it from start to finish. Max Gordon, defending an armed robbery charge against the son of the next governor of Georgia. This retrial—”

  Scott interrupted. “Next governor? Maybe someday, but he lost, remember?”

  “Yes, and so does he. He thinks his son’s trial cost him the election.”

  �
�It may have. Not only because his son was on trial, but because the senator never once visited his son to show family support—he was out campaigning. Even your newspaper had an Op-Ed piece suggesting that. People look at that side of a politician. They expect fathers to support their children, right or wrong. He should’ve been at the trial.”

  “Can’t disagree with that, Scott. Now, how about a comment on the appellate court decision? Was it a correct decision? And the retrial in Savannah—when will it be? Who will defend, who will prosecute—and anything else about the retrial.”

  “You read the article in the paper today?”

  “Of course.”

  “Then you know as much as I do. That was the first I’d heard of the decision, which the article says was handed down in Atlanta yesterday. I’m sure our office got a copy of it shortly thereafter, but I was trying a nasty DUI case all day. Didn’t get a verdict until after six. I was pretty much exhausted and drove straight home. And I haven’t spoken with anyone else.”

  “OK, I understand. The wire report says the case was reversed because of ineffective assistance of the substitute counsel. What’s the story, Scott?”

  Scott knew the story well enough. As the prosecutor, he had seen Max Gordon, the paragon of arrogance, attempt to try the case without a qualified assistant. All he needed was a lackey with a Georgia Bar license, and Professor Denis Nolan had one. They were old friends from the time Nolan was practicing real estate law in Chicago before he joined the faculty at Savannah College of Law. Gordon saved him from being the fall guy for a major fraud committed by one of his firm’s partners, and it was payback time. At the trial, as was his style, Gordon set out to test the strength of the trial judge and take control of the courtroom. When he continued to defy the judge’s warnings to refrain from argument in his opening statement, the judge dismissed him. That left Nolan, who had never tried a criminal case—or any case—as defense counsel.

  “The ‘story’ is pretty simple, Bill. Nolan was what appellate judges call ‘a walking around violation of the Sixth Amendment’—completely incompetent. They had to reverse it.”

  “Some of the reporters covering the trial believed Gordon deliberately got himself relieved because he hadn’t been paid.”

  “No, no, not a chance,” Scott said. “Gordon’s not someone to even step into the courtroom before the money is in the bank.”

  “This retrial is going to be another media frenzy. Do you expect to be involved?”

  “I’m gonna fight like hell to be involved. It was my case, so why shouldn’t I retry it?”

  “Come on, Scott, that wasn’t your case until the lead prosecutor suddenly became ill, and Judge Desano wouldn’t grant a continuance. You just kind of fell into it. Trying that case as a senior clinic student was an emergency situation, and this isn’t an emergency.”

  “Right. And that was a year ago, and now I’m an assistant DA myself—and a pretty damn good one.”

  “I never said otherwise. And a modest one, too. But there’s going to be politics involved in this one, trust me. I’ve got it from a pretty good source that David Harrison is entering the U.S. Senate race next year. And he doesn’t want his Ivy League-educated son locked up in a Georgia prison while he’s on the campaign trail. He needs this case to disappear, and he has the money to hire the best criminal trial attorneys in the country. You know what that means—the DA will assign his best trial attorney to prosecute it. I’ve been covering trials in Savannah for fifteen years, and that’s the way it always works.”

  “So I’m it, right?” Scott laughed.

  “No comment,” said Baldwin, who now was also laughing. “Good to talk with you, Scott. I’ll keep in touch.”

  Scott finished his breakfast, grabbed his briefcase, and headed for the courthouse in downtown Savannah.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The news of the Harrison case reversal was already widespread when Scott arrived at the courthouse. When he entered, he was greeted by William Hunter, one of the security guards. Hunter was holding a copy of the morning paper in one hand and a magnetic security wand in the other. “Good morning, Scott. I see Harrison is coming back. You gonna try him?”

  “Don’t know. I hope so,” Scott replied.

  “How about the little round guy from Chicago, his defense counsel—think he’ll be back?”

  “Max Gordon? Don’t know that either, but I doubt it. Didn’t do much for him last time. I expect he’ll have one of the top locals, maybe Samarkos—or Jeff Brown.”

  Scott walked to the elevator waiting area, which was crowded with office workers holding coffee in paper cups, pastries on paper plates, and who-knows-what in small paper bags. Breakfast would begin when they got to their desks, and work would proceed about a half-hour later. They were a noisy group, waiting for their ride, but there was a sudden silence as soon as they stepped into the car for the ride up. This morning assembly of fast food junkies, who always arrived well-prepared to avoid the first thirty minutes of work each day, bothered Scott when he first went to work in the DA’s office, but he had come to accept it even though he still refused to join. Most were poorly paid secretaries or other state employees. It was, after all, a minor—perhaps necessary—perk. The work for the day always seemed to get done, and the early morning respite seemed to leave them in good spirits.

  Scott rode up silently with the crowd to his office on the sixth floor. Soon there was a call from Nick Cox, the District Attorney’s chief assistant and head of the felony section.

  “I guess you heard the news,” he said. “The Harrison case is coming back for retrial. Can you drop by my office this afternoon?”

  “Sure. What time?”

  “Early. Say one-thirty?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  ****

  When Scott walked into Nick’s office, the original Harrison case file, the trial transcript, the appellate briefs, and a twelve-page fax of the appellate court’s decision were sitting on his desk. Nick was tall and brawny, in his mid-forties, with a full head of hair that would have made him appear younger except for the early graying at his temples. He had been a prosecutor for almost twenty years and had a strong voice that gave him an easy command of any courtroom. He pointed toward the mound of papers and shook his head slowly.

  “That’s a lot of work to just trash and start over,” Nick said. “But you know the drill. I spoke with Will. He’s going to loan you to the felony section so you can try this case again.”

  “Will” was Will Draper, head of the misdemeanor section and Scott’s boss. Scott was pleased with the temporary transfer and the news that he would be retrying the case without even lobbying for it.

  “Thanks. When do you think we can get it scheduled?”

  “Not sure. Likely to be heavy media involvement again, and there may be some political considerations. There’s a pretty reliable rumor that his dad is going to announce his candidacy for the Senate in next year’s election. I need to run this by the DA, but he’s in Macon today and tomorrow for some meeting. There’s no hurry; Harrison’s still locked up. Let’s wait and see who crawls out of the woodwork to defend him.”

  “That’s fine with me. I’ve got a full load of misdemeanors that I’ll need to clear in the next two or three weeks.”

  Scott picked up all of the Harrison papers from Nick’s desk and returned to his office to read the appellate decision. He was anxious to find out exactly what the appellate court said in its reversal.

  There were no surprises there. While the news media had speculated that the court might overturn the decision because the presiding judge dismissed the defendant’s counsel, Scott was sure that would not provide grounds for reversal. The judge acted well within his discretion when Gordon continued his contemptuous conduct. What the appellate court found was that the dismissal of Gordon was proper, but continuing the trial with a totally unprepared and inexperienced counsel, was not. It was simply a case of ineffective assistance of counsel in violation of the defendant�
�s Sixth Amendment rights. Scott had to agree with that appraisal, but he felt there was something terribly wrong when the defendant wins by hiring a loser.

  He opened the file for a DUI trial scheduled for Thursday morning. He had tried over two dozen DUIs. Most were pretty routine, and some were quite boring. This one was a bit more interesting, because it involved a British tourist being defended by one of Savannah’s best defense attorneys. He began to reread the witness statements and make notes on a yellow pad. Soon there was a knock on his door. He responded without looking up.

  “Come on in.”

  The door opened, but Scott continued writing. When he finally looked up, his head jerked backwards. Standing in front of him was a stunningly beautiful young woman, dressed in a skin-tight, black leather skirt, and a silk, raspberry-colored, low cut blouse and matching heels. He stared for a moment, blinked several times, and finally words came. “May I help you?”

  “Yes, I’m Jessica Valdez. I’m a senior at Savannah Law. I’ve been told that I’m assigned to you for my internship in the Prosecution Clinic. Thought I’d stop by and introduce myself.”

  Scott paused for a long moment before responding. “Of course … eh … I was expecting you … I mean a student intern … but later this week.” He paused again. “We have a joint meeting of all the clinic students tomorrow afternoon on campus. I understood that the assignments would be announced then.” There was another long pause. “But you’re here now, and that’s fine. Please sit down.”

  Jessica took a seat just a few feet from his desk. She had aquamarine eyes and raven, shoulder-length hair. Her radiant olive complexion was model-perfect. She was, in one word, gorgeous; in two words, absolutely gorgeous. She crossed one ankle over the other and sat back in her chair. Her leather skirt ended above her knees.

  She stared at Scott, her eyes wide. “I saw you on TV during the Harrison trial last year. You were so cool. When the assignments were posted this afternoon, I was just so anxious to come and meet you. I’m really looking forward to working with you.” She smiled with glossy lips that matched her blouse and continued to focus on Scott with her beautiful eyes. She crossed her legs, and the leather skirt slipped higher.