The Hate Crime

by Rachel Sinclair

  “Okay. I can already see how this is shaping up. His mother is schizophrenic, his father is imprisoned. What about his little brother, Matt? What’s going on with him? According to Beck, Matt’s been dealing drugs, and that was a reason why he confessed to the cops that he killed Adele. He said that the cops told him that if he confessed that they would not press charges against Matt. It turns out that Matt wasn’t even arrested for anything. Did you find anything out about him?”

  “Yeah. I did. Matt’s been going down the same road as his brother. He’s been dealing drugs, assaulting people, and he, too, has been involved in some hate incidents. He’s been involved in some incidents where he was caught tagging a highway underpass with Swastikas. He was also involved in an incident where he went to a dorm room of an African-American kid and put a noose on the door. So he’s going down the wrong path, to say the very least. But, at the moment, he’s not gotten arrested for anything major. Again, I only know these things because I know people on the street who know him. They even tell me all the things that he’s been doing.”

  “Good Lord, does Beck have any normal family members? Anybody who’s not in trouble?”

  “No. He doesn’t. At least, his blood family isn’t normal. He does have a half-sister, Charity, who seems okay. She’s on the dole with two kids, but compared to the rest of that clan, she’s a fucking CEO.” He laughed.

  I made a mental note to investigate Charity and see what she could tell me. “Now, Beck has told me that he’s a changed man. He told me that he was in the Aryan Brotherhood while he was imprisoned but that he doesn’t believe in that kind of philosophy anymore. Plus, he said he only joined the AB in prison because he needed protection from some black guys who were jumping him all the time. Do you know anything about that? From what you’ve found out, is that true? Is it true that he has renounced the ideology of the Aryan Brotherhood? Or, he never even really adopted it?”

  Garrett drummed his fingers on the table, while he seemed to contemplate what I was asking him. “I don’t really know about that. It seems that maybe he has, from what I gathered from the people who know him. He hasn’t really expressed any kind of hatred about other groups, and he hasn’t really participated in any kind of activities that some of his other AB brothers have on the outside. A lot of the hate crimes that you’ve been seeing around the country, more and more these days, is the work of not only the Aryan Brotherhood, but other members of the far right. The people who believe that America should be white, and feel that anybody who is not white really doesn’t belong in this country. He hasn’t really been hanging out with people like that.”

  “Have they been trying to recruit him, on the outside? I personally couldn’t see how Beck would be able to get away with completely renouncing the AB. After all, the AB spent 5 years protecting his butt in prison. I would imagine that they’re going to want loyalty on the outside as well. You don’t just leave an organization like that. Especially not when you go as whole hog as Beck did. I would imagine that they would be harassing him, at the very least. But, more likely, they’re probably threatening him. Threatening his life, threatening his family, threatening everything about him.”

  “That’s what I’m trying to figure out. Nobody’s talking about that.”

  “Well, then it makes sense that this happened to him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Think about it. What’s the best way to get back at somebody who’s refusing to join your gang, outside the prison? Besides, of course, killing that person?” I nodded my head. “I’ll tell you what the best way is of doing that. Maybe killing somebody and pinning it on him. Especially if that somebody is a part of a marginalized group, as Adele was. That would be my first instinct - look at somebody in the AB who had it in for Beck. Maybe the whole murder of Adele was some kind of ritualized initiation act. Kill the transgendered women, and pin it on somebody who’s renouncing our ideology. Two birds one stone.” I clapped my hands together as if I was getting dust off of them.

  Tom nodded his head. “I have to say that makes a lot of sense. I’m going to have to keep my ear to the ground, and find out who knows people from the AB who might know something about what happened to Adele. Although, I have to say, it’s going to be difficult trying to get people to talk about that. They’re pretty tight-lipped about the things that they do, and they’re very protective of one another. I don’t think I’m gonna find a snitch who’s going to tell me something like that. But I’ll certainly try.”

  “What else did you find out? About Beck or his family?”

  “Well, apparently, as I mentioned, Beck also has a half-sister. Her name is Charity Harrison. She was born while Beck’s father was serving one of his prison sentences. She lives in Raytown.”

  “And what does she do?”

  “She has two kids, so she’s a stay-at-home mom. But she’s living on the dole. You might want to give a shout-out to her, because she can probably tell you a lot about the family. Of all the Harrisons, I think that she’s the most normal. By normal, I mean that she’s not in trouble with the law. At least not yet.”

  I made notes. I thought that the most logical place to start looking for an alternative suspect would be in the AB. But at the same time, I kind of hoped that that was not the path I was going to have to go down. I certainly didn’t want them coming after me or my family. And I knew that they would do just that.

  “Okay, then. I’ll go out and pay a visit to Charity out in Raytown.”

  “Okay,” said Tom. “Now, I’m going to have to go ahead and do some background research on Adele. There might be something shady in her background that would help you out as well. I don’t know enough about her, but I’ll find out very soon.”

  Tom and I talked to a little bit more about this and that. I knew that he was going to at least try to find something out about Baron that would help me out in my custody case. That would be the most helpful thing for me. At the moment, I was heavily involved with Beck’s case, mainly because I wanted to protect Heather. However, my personal feelings were that my custody case was the most important thing. I had to protect my family at all costs. Nobody was going to come in and take my daughter away from me.

  Nobody.

  Chapter 13

  I went to see Charity after I spoke with Tom. I made an appointment with her, and she told me that I could come by anytime. She explained that she was usually home. She sounded a bit apologetic, saying that she was looking for a job, but it was difficult to do with two kids at home. “The father’s not around,” she explained over the phone. “And it was the same father for both kids. Just in case you’re wondering.”

  “I wasn’t wondering, actually. That’s really none of my business.” I didn’t want to judge Charity before I saw her. She might end up becoming a good witness for me, and she hopefully had a lot of information about Beck that I needed to know.

  I got to Charity’s apartment, which was a run-down place that was built probably in the 1960s. Outside the complex were older cars, many from the 80s and 90s. There were very few cars that I recognized that would have been manufactured post-2010. I went to her apartment unit, and knocked on the door.

  Charity answered the door with a small child on her hip. The child was a blonde and blue-eyed little girl who was button cute. The kid was probably less than two years old. Behind her, on the floor, was a small boy about the age of three. He was playing with a train set on the floor, making choo choo sounds as he made the train go around and around the track.

  Charity herself was a very attractive young girl, probably around 20 years old. She was petite and thin, and had washed-out blonde hair that she wore in a ponytail. Her teeth were slightly oversized, as were her eyes and lips. She almost looked cartoonish, but she was pretty in her way.

  She smiled big, and motioned to a threadbare couch that was in the living room. “Have a seat,” she said in a slightly southern drawl. “I gotta put Heaven down,” she said motioning to the little girl. “It�
�s time for her nap.” The little girl clawed at Charity’s hair, and she started to cry a little bit. “She’s getting a little cranky.” At that, Charity disappeared into the bedroom, and came back out five minutes later.

  “Now, you wanted to talk to me about my brother, Beck, right?”

  I nodded my head. “Yes. As you know, he’s been accused of murdering a transgendered woman. I wanted to talk to you and see what kind of background you can give me on your brother.”

  “Well, good luck with that, I mean defending him.” Charity shook her head. “My brother has been in trouble for most of his life. As I’m sure you know. He went to prison when he was only 21. Rob One. He was in there for 5 years. Personally, from what my mother tells me, Beck probably shouldn’t have gone to prison for so long for that. However, he had a shitty attorney. The prosecutors were trying to get him to roll over on the person who put him up to it, who was kind of a known drug dealer in the area. However, Beck wouldn’t do it, and I think that the prosecutors wanted to punish him. That was the reason why he went down for so long.”

  “Who were the prosecutors trying to get him to roll on?”

  “His name is Larry Rodriguez. He’s still pretty known in the area, but, from what I understand, he’s dealing less now and he’s more into the sex trade. Although he does still do a lot of dealing.”

  Larry Rodriguez. I wondered if he was the same guy, who was Tina’s pimp and dealer. “Where is Larry now? What do you know about him?”

  Charity shrugged her shoulders. “Not much. From what I know, he’s being held in the jail. He got caught dealing, and with a gun. He was holding up another drug dealer, and that other drug dealer ratted on him. He’s a felon, he’s got a gun, and he’s dealing, so the feds are going to take a bite out of his ass. That is, of course, unless he decides to roll on somebody over him. Higher up on the food chain. And he’s the kind of worm who would do it, too.” She laughed. “I think Larry knows that he’s got protection on the streets, so he’s not really all that scared about snitching on others.”

  I wrote down what she was saying. I was going to have check out this Larry Rodriguez person, his background and everything. I didn’t tell Charity about my other case I had with Larry in the middle of it. Tina’s case. I had been working to get her to roll on Larry, but she still refused to do it. I was going to have to find some other way to try to get her charges reduced, or even dismissed. Having the charges dismissed, of course, would be the best-case scenario, but it was a scenario that I didn’t anticipate would become a reality.

  “What is it that you know about Beck which will be relevant to this case? Specifically, can you tell me how he feels about people who are transgendered or gay?”

  Charity looked like she was thinking on the question. She paused for a little bit. “Well, in answer to that question, I don’t think he necessarily has a problem with people who are transgendered or gay. I mean, I never heard him say anything about them.”

  “What about his being a part of the Aryan Brotherhood?”

  “What about that?”

  “Do you think that he’s a true believer? Or do you think that he just joined that gang in prison simply because he needed protection?”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know about that. Our dad, I don’t know him all that well, because he’s been in and out of prison for most my life, but he’s kind of a white supremacist. No, strike that, he’s a Neo-Nazi. He’s a true believer. My mom is also somebody who doesn’t know Beck’s and my dad all that well. She dated him for just a few months. That’s how I came into the world. She wasn’t married to him or nothing like that. All she’s told me is that he’s a Neo-Nazi, and she never should’ve got involved with him. My mom, she’s not like that, that’s the reason why she could never stay with David, my dad. So, I guess an answer to your question is that I wouldn’t be surprised if Beck does hold those beliefs. But he’s told me that he’s not a racist. He’s told me that he just wanted to be a part of the Aryan Brotherhood gang in prison because he felt that he needed protection.”

  “That’s what he told me, too. That’s exactly what he told me.”

  “Then maybe you better believe him. Now, I can tell you a little something about that Adele person. The one that he’s accused of killing.”

  “You know her?”

  “I do. I knew her when her name was William. William Page. In other words, I knew her when she was a him. Now, even when she went by a boy’s name, and she did not start growing her hair out, wearing makeup, and dressing like a woman, I kind of knew that there was something off about her. Him at that time.” She chuckled. “I never know what to say about this.”

  I was a little bit surprised that Charity was familiar with Adele. Beck told me that he didn’t know Adele before he met her at the bar. I guessed it was possible, if a coincidence, that his half-sister would be familiar with her, when he didn’t know her from before. Then again, maybe he was lying to me about that. Maybe he really did know her from before.

  “Did Beck know her, too?”

  Charity shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know. I have no idea.”

  “How did you know her?”

  “She worked for a guy I used to know, his name is Jordan Kennedy. Actually, come to think of it, I do think that Beck and Jordan were friends. So yeah, I guess it’s possible that Beck knew Adele, back in the day before she became Adele. He might have known her when she was going by the name William. That’s possible.”

  “Jordan and Beck were friends?” This was becoming more and more interesting to me.

  “Yeah, I guess they were. I don’t think that they were necessarily tight, but they knew one another.”

  “What does Jordan do? When you say that Adele worked for him, what do you mean?”

  “Jordan’s a drug dealer. And, when I say that she worked for him, I mean that she was one of his dealers. She’s a nurse now, so I guess she’s trying to go straight.” Then she laughed. “But then again, she knows a lot about drugs, so maybe that’s why she became a nurse.”

  “When did she work for Jordan?”

  “She worked for him when she was young. Remember, she was a man back then. I think that she worked for him when she was around 16, 17. She was what, 26 when she died? So yeah, it’s been quite a while since she’s worked for him. But I know that she used to.”

  I made notes of this. I wondered if it had anything to do with her being murdered. It might. It might not.

  At this point, anything was possible.

  Chapter 14

  Our first shot in front of a judge was Beck’s initial appearance. It was the court appearance that had been continued from before, because Beck was looking for private counsel. That private counsel was me, so we needed to go back in front of the judge and try to get a bond reduction and see what I could do about possibly talking to the prosecutor about not charging this murder as a hate crime. If I could get them off the hate crime designation, then I would have an easier time in suppressing Beck’s white supremacist past, because his past would be less relevant. If there was one thing that I could do to help him, then that would be the first thing.

  I got there early to talk to the docket prosecutor, whose name was Molly Brighton. She was new, which was the reason why she was doing this particular docket.

  I went up and shook her hand, and introduced myself.

  She nodded her head. “You’re kind of a legend around here.”

  “I am? Why is that?” I had the feeling that being a “legend” wasn’t necessarily a good thing.

  “Because you walked down that murder charge. That was an exciting case. I mean, who knew that the governor’s wife would be involved in something like that?”

  “I don’t know, but she is. But you know she’s never going to serve time for it. Her lackey, Jacqueline Peterson, she’ll be the one to take the fall. One thing for sure, this spells the end of Governor Weston’s career. I don’t think that he can still claim to be a family values man, when his w
ife was having an affair, and she apparently murdered the person with whom she was having an affair. Governor Weston has his own skeletons. They haven’t come to light yet, but they will one day. They will. They always do, sooner or later.”

  “Well,” Molly said, “congrats on walking that case down. Now what can I do for you?”

  “I’m here on the Beck Harrison case. Now I understand that your office has plans to charge this murder as a hate crime, right?”

  “That’s what I think. I’m not sure about that yet. The higher-ups have not made a final decision on that.”

  “Well, I would suggest that your office leave that alone. I think that you know why this case was charged as a hate crime - you guys want to be able to bring my client’s membership in the Aryan Brotherhood into the trial. It’s hard to prove that a crime is motivated by hate, and you guys won’t be able to prove that my client had animus towards Adele just because she’s transgendered.”

  “Your client is a known Neo-Nazi.” It was obvious that this fact was the be-all and end-all for Molly.

  “Actually, he’s not. Yes, in prison he was a member of a white supremacist group, but he has not been active with them since he’s been out of prison.”

  “Once you’re in with them, you’re always in with them. It’s not something that you can just turn your back on. You can’t just get in with them in prison, and then get out and say ‘sorry I don’t want any anything to do with you.’ It doesn’t work like that.”