“He killed Sample.”
“Maybe he did and maybe he didn’t, but you know what I mean. Whoever killed Lisa Farrow was one sick, cold-blooded son of a bitch. What he did to that woman and leaving that little girl in that house? It turned my stomach. Foster isn’t that kind of guy. You and I’ve both seen those guys and that isn’t Clarence. He’s a two-bit criminal. Tell me what you really want.”
“I need to know, Paul, is there anything in my father’s file that shows that he thought or knew that somebody else killed Lisa Farrow?”
Carter’s head rocked back. “Wait, where’s that coming from? Like who? Are you saying you think that Harker didn’t commit that murder?”
“No, but I need to know. Is there anything in that file that would indicate that my father thought that somebody else committed the crime?”
Carter was silent for almost a minute as he deliberated with himself over what to say. Finally, he broke his silence. “Your father knew that Foster had given a statement that wasn’t in the reports. He knew that Foster told Gage and Cleary that he was so drunk he didn’t know who committed that crime.” Carter hesitated before continuing, weighing his breach of attorney-client privilege. He could see that anguish building in Jamison’s eyes. “Matt, your father had no way of knowing what Foster did or didn’t do. Getting immunity for Foster protected him from a charge of being an accessory or maybe even aiding and abetting a murder. You know as well as I do that defendants seldom tell the whole truth to their lawyers. I would have done the same thing.”
“I can’t discuss everything with you, Paul. But I don’t think you would have done the same thing.”
“Meaning what?”
“Meaning if you had evidence Harker was innocent or didn’t get a fair trial, you wouldn’t have let him be convicted of a crime he didn’t do.”
First shock and then compassion crossed Carter’s face. “Matt, you think your father had reason to believe Harker was actually innocent?”
Jamison didn’t answer. Instead he said, “You going to show me my father’s file?”
“You know I can’t do that, Matt. I’ve already crossed too many lines. What I told you is between us. I’m not going to give you anything that might hurt my client. Don’t ask unless you’re willing to give immunity.”
“No immunity, but I’m not saying we’re going to do anything about Sample either. We’ll see.” Jamison stood up and threw a five-dollar bill on the table. “Thanks Paul, I owe you.”
“No, you don’t owe. I’m sorry I couldn’t help you more. Good luck, Matt.”
When he came back into the office Jamison had a note on his desk to see O’Hara. He walked down to find Ernie and O’Hara talking quietly. O’Hara said, “There were still blood and tissue samples from Harker, so I got what they said Andy would need for a DNA test. I checked and there wasn’t any immediate family. There’s a cousin who lives in Ohio. Apparently, Harker’s mother had a brother who had a son. I called. He wasn’t happy to hear anything about Harker but he said if we needed it he would give us a sample, so I made arrangements for that just in case. Anyway, it’s going to take a couple of days for the results to come back. But we have a little problem with the rest of it.”
Ernie interjected. “Yeah, I got the sample from Lisa, but Dolores isn’t around. House is locked up tight and there were some newspapers on the porch, so she hasn’t been there for a few days.”
“So, we get it from Tommy, her kid,” said Jamison. “That should do it. I don’t really want to talk to her anyway. You said her kid’s a lawyer in the public defender’s office in Sacramento. I’ll go with you. Maybe he knows something. He’ll know he’ll have to give us a sample one way or the other.”
Both investigators looked at each other. Ernie shrugged. “Suit yourself, but it isn’t necessary. I can do it.”
Jamison shook his head. “I need to get out of the office. Call ahead and make arrangements.” He picked up a vibe from Ernie that he wasn’t interested in company. “You got a problem with me going?”
“No problem.” Ernie glanced over at O’Hara. “Okay, I’ll make the calls.”
“Bill,” Jamison asked, “can you go back to Mike Jensen? I want to know exactly what he and my father discussed, and I want to know more about Cleary.”
“I don’t think he’s going to be very cooperative, Boss.”
“Use your charm.”
Ernie was unusually quiet on the drive to Sacramento. Tommy Sample, “Tom” as he now referred to himself, was in trial. He had asked why they needed a DNA sample from him and Ernie said it had to do with the murder of Richard Sample. He didn’t imply that Richard was Tommy’s father. He didn’t know what exactly Tommy Sample knew but he thought it was unlikely that Tommy thought Richard was his father as opposed to the Mike Sample listed on his birth certificate. He was pretty sure none of the rest of the history of the Harker case had been shared with Tom. He was more worried about the reaction of Jamison and whether he should say anything. He decided against it. He could be wrong although all his instincts told him he wasn’t.
Jamison and Ernie walked into the waiting room of the Sacramento Public Defender’s Office. They both stood out like a red light on a dark night. The people in the waiting area turned their heads away, reading “cops” simply from the way they looked. Ernie asked for Tom Sample and said they had an appointment. The receptionist said he was still in court and they might have to wait a considerable period, but they were welcome to have a seat. Both men decided to go to the courtroom, rather than wait.
Tom Sample was standing and speaking to the judge when they walked in. He began pacing behind the counsel table as he spoke. Ernie almost instinctively took in the features of people. Tom Sample was a little heavier than Jamison and his hair was lighter, but it was clear to Ernie that he was looking at someone who could easily pass for Jamison’s brother. Whether it was clear to Jamison he didn’t want to ask.
Ernie shifted his gaze to his left. Jamison’s jaw was locked tight and Ernie could see his face drained of color. Ernie whispered, “You want to wait outside?”
Jamison cleared his throat and wiped at his eyes. “No, I’m going to stay and watch. We need to get the DNA.”
Tom Sample finished and picked up his file while his client was led out the back door of the courtroom, presumably to a holding cell or a chain gang of other men going back to the jail from their court appearances. His eyes scanned the courtroom and stopped when he saw Jamison. Tom looked at him with a quizzical expression, and then dropped the file into his briefcase and walked toward the front door of the courtroom.
Jamison caught up with him. “Tom Sample? I’m Matt Jamison, Tenaya County District Attorney Office. My investigator contacted you about taking a DNA sample?”
Sample kept staring intently at Jamison. “Right, let’s go to my office and you can explain what all this is about.” He walked ahead while Jamison and Ernie followed.
Jamison and Ernie sat down in the small cluttered office. Files were stacked on the floor and on the side of the desk. “Not like the DA’s office, I’m guessing? Somehow the county always treats DAs a little better than public defenders, but I guess that goes with the territory. So, what have you got on my brother’s murder? It’s been a long time. And how is a DNA sample from me going to help?” Sample kept staring at Jamison’s face. “My mother told me that you talked to her. So why don’t you tell me what this is really about? She said you think Richard may have killed somebody. Is that it?”
Ernie started to answer but Jamison cut him off. “We have blood at a crime scene from almost thirty years ago. We need to know whether it’s Richard’s. The only way we can do that is to get a DNA sample from either your mother or you.”
“Richard didn’t kill anybody. I defend a lot of people, Mr. Jamison. My brother wasn’t a murderer.”
“We need to get the DNA sample to clear that up. Another man was convicted of the crime but questions have come up. The DNA will hopefully resolve them.
I wouldn’t have come to you except your mother wasn’t at home and we need the sample quickly.”
“My mother’s on vacation.” Sample didn’t offer information as to where. “This has upset her and I don’t want her bothered. I’ll give you the sample. You could get it anyway and I’d just as soon this was all done quietly. My brother’s history isn’t a job reference I want passed around.”
Sample pursed his lips before speaking further. “You’re Roger Jamison’s son, aren’t you? I knew your father when I was a boy. He was a friend of my mother’s. Maybe you didn’t know that. I studied some of his cases in my trial practice class in law school. He was a great lawyer. It always surprised my classmates that I knew him. It must be hard to stand in his shadow.”
Jamison didn’t answer immediately. “I got out of his shadow a long time ago, Mr. Sample. Let’s take care of the DNA. Ernie will swab the inside of your cheek.”
Outside the public defender office, Jamison put his hands on the wall, breathing slowly. He had watched Tom Sample move around the courtroom. He recognized the mannerisms and the cadence of speech. He wasn’t angry so much as numb. One more fracture in his father’s pedestal. Thoughts of his mother flashed across his brain. What was he going to tell her? Then he thought about the man he had watched. What was he going to tell him? He realized Jensen knew, Cleary knew and Gage, his boss, knew. He suspected Ernie knew, and if Ernie knew then O’Hara knew. God only knew how many other people were aware. But it was clear what Cleary and Jensen had used against his father. It wasn’t just the tickets. It was the existence of a son he had kept in the shadows.
The two of them drove back from Sacramento, miles passed silently before Jamison blurted out, “You knew, didn’t you?” His voice was accusatory.
“Knew what?”
“Don’t screw with me, Ernie. He looks just like me.”
“I suspected. I wasn’t sure. I looked at his birth certificate. Dolores isn’t his grandmother like we were led to believe, and Richard wasn’t his father, he was his brother. I didn’t want to say anything. I figured it was best to let it stay buried if it could.” Ernie reached over and put his hand on Jamison’s shoulder. “I’m not sure what to say, Matt. What do you want to do?”
“Does he know?”
“You mean Tommy? I don’t know. The man listed on his birth certificate is Richard’s father, but he was long gone when Tommy came along. It wasn’t hard to figure out. But I doubt if anybody ever told him. I’m guessing he didn’t know. Whether he suspects now, I don’t know either. The DNA will tell us, I guess.”
While Jamison and Ernie were in Sacramento, O’Hara drove over to Mike Jensen’s house. He needed to know what Jensen was going to do. When he walked to Jensen’s front door, he heard, “It’s open.”
Jensen was sitting in the same chair he sat in each of the other times O’Hara had seen him, same glass with ice and bourbon, same overflowing ashtray. For the first time O’Hara saw a small oxygen cylinder on a little wheeled cart near the chair. It always amazed him that people would continue smoking even when they needed oxygen to breathe.
Jensen took a sip from his glass and inhaled deeply from the remains of a cigarette. The wheezing was noticeable as was the hacking cough that came with it as he blew out a stream of smoke. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t get up. So, Willie, what brings you back? You going to arrest me? Maybe you should just cuff me to my oxygen tank. I’m not much of a flight risk.”
“I’m not going to arrest you, Mike. But I need to know something. Have you called anyone about this?”
“Meaning have I called a lawyer or have I called Bill Gage?”
“I know you well enough, Mike, to know you haven’t called a lawyer.”
“No, I didn’t call Gage. What’s the point? I wouldn’t hurt you, Willie, and you’ve figured out that if any of this gets out a lot of people are going to get hurt. I’m no informant and I won’t live long enough for you to try to make me testify. Is that it? You want to know if I plan to admit that I hid evidence and covered up a murder? I’m not sorry about what I did. But I did it and I’ll face whatever the consequences are, but it won’t be in any courtroom. You won’t make me do that would you, Willie?”
“I wouldn’t, but I don’t control it.”
“Well I do. It’s got to end sometime, Willie.” Jensen’s hand moved under a folded newspaper and slipped out an old .38 detective special. He held it loosely, intently watching O’Hara.
O’Hara didn’t move. “Mike, I don’t believe you’d do anything that stupid.”
“Don’t worry, Willie. I’m not going to shoot you. But I will leave you with the mess.” Jensen shoved the short barrel into his mouth before O’Hara could react. The sound of the gunshot reverberated through the small room. O’Hara had risen slightly but sat back down on the couch, staring at the remains of a man he had worked with. He didn’t bother to check to see if Mike had been successful. It wasn’t the first time O’Hara had seen the results of a fellow cop swallowing a gun. He suspected it wouldn’t be the last.
Chapter 54
The news about Jensen shook Jamison. Without Jensen, all that was left was the DNA and the tapes. And a whole lot of still unanswered questions. He’d worked for a few days on an upcoming trial and tried to push the Harker case out of his mind. He wasn’t successful. He still didn’t know the DNA results. But there was one more person to talk to.
Jamison stood outside the entry doors to what was called impressively the Renaissance Plaza Building. But any renaissance was long past. The building could charitably be described as having “gone to seed” but it still held a group of tenants, mostly lawyers with marginal practices and one-person real estate operations that wanted to look more substantial than they were, at least if you only saw their address instead of what was at that address.
This was the location for the law offices of Walker Stevenson, formerly a judge of the Superior Court of Tenaya County, California, and now an attorney who couldn’t sit down at a legal function without someone bringing up that he was the one who disregarded the jury’s death sentence for Richard Harker. He had acted out of conscience when the mob was only interested in vengeance. To the uninformed and to those who did not have to take responsibility for sentencing a man to death, Walker Stevenson had committed the unforgivable. There would be no blood.
In the ensuing public furor and an election long on criticism and short on logic, Walker Stevenson lost his seat on the superior court. He now lunched in the back tables at bar functions with empty seats on either side of him, as close as you could come to being a legal pariah.
Jamison had debated talking to Stevenson but had decided he needed to know. Why did a highly regarded jurist set aside the death penalty in a case that cried out for the harshest punishment? It cost him his esteemed place in the legal community and relegated him to the bottom tier of lawyers. His act of conscience broke Walker Stevenson, and now the same case was breaking Jamison, although Jamison didn’t flatter himself that he acted only from a sworn sense of responsibility.
Jamison walked out of the sixth-floor elevator, the bronze-faced doors, which retained an air of tarnished elegance. The hallway was lit by sconces that had not escaped the ravages of time. Here and there bare candle bulbs glowed, their glass covers long missing. It wasn’t an appearance that invited confidence, unlike the rich carpets and paneled walls of uptown legal bastions. Jamison couldn’t help thinking that the price of Stevenson’s apparent act of judicial principle had been high.
The varnish on the office door was cracked with age. The frosted glass window inset into the door read “Walker Stevenson, Esq. Attorney at Law.” Jamison opened the door expecting to see the usual secretary acting as gatekeeper, but it was only one large room and sitting there staring at him was Walker Stevenson himself.
Stevenson didn’t react or even seem startled. Apparently, he was used to people simply walking in on him without an appointment. Jamison doubted that his schedule required much advance n
otice. “Judge Stevenson, I’m Matt—”
“I’m not a judge anymore, but thank you for the consideration. And you are Matt Jamison, man of the hour for the current version of the Harker case.”
“Yes, I mean, yes, I’m Matt Jamison.”
“What can I do for you, Mr. Jamison?” Stevenson spoke quietly, the weariness well-worn into him. “I’m assuming you’re here to ask the same question everyone involved with the Harker case gets around to asking: ‘Why?’ Is that it?”
“May I have a seat?”
Stevenson dismissively waved Jamison over to the only chair in front of the desk and moved the yellow legal pad in front of him. “Simple answer. I did what I thought was right. I did what I thought I could live with.”
“I understand.”
“I doubt that you do.”
Jamison shifted uncomfortably in his chair. “Judge Stevenson …”
Stevenson smiled. It struck Jamison that the smile was with the corners of his mouth turned down, but there was something about it that seemed to be hiding a more insightful rationale. Jamison waited politely and then asked, “Judge Stevenson, it’s important to me to know your reason. I can’t let the Harker case go.”
“You won, didn’t you? What is it that you can’t seem to accept?”
“I can’t accept that winning was the right result.”
“That never bothered your father. That’s why you’re here, isn’t it? Your father?” Stevenson’s eyes seemed to instinctively focus like those of a judge staring over the bench at a lawyer who was attempting to misdirect him.
Jamison didn’t respond regarding his father. “Judge, the Harker case didn’t seem like the kind of case to give mercy. You had to know when you refused to impose the death penalty that there would be a public furor.”
Stevenson stood up and walked to the single window behind his desk. “I’m not sure that I expected what happened, but I did know that I couldn’t live with the result otherwise. Every judge can count on his or her hands the cases that they never forget. They aren’t the big cases or the flashy rulings. They’re the cases where you wonder if you used your power wisely. They’re the ones that keep you awake at night because nobody knows but you. The public doesn’t understand that. Lawyers don’t understand that. Not even your spouse understands that. Because you don’t speak about it.”
Shades of Truth Page 35