The Lawyer's Lawyer

by James Sheehan

  “That doesn’t explain the knife with your fingerprints on it.”

  “No, it doesn’t. I can’t answer that question. All I can tell you is I never saw that knife and I certainly never held it in my hand.”

  * * *

  Jack met up with Henry in Oakville, which was only a half an hour from the prison. The status conference and any evidentiary hearing that might occur before Judge Holbrook would take place in Oakville, so Jack wisely decided to make it his headquarters even though he had not yet decided to take the case. Ron had a two-bedroom furnished condo available at the time for him and Henry.

  “I try to keep one open at all times for you, Jack, in case you want to come and visit,” Ron told him.

  The truth was that Jack had not been back to Oakville since he’d left two years ago. He’d tried to give Ron money for the place but Ron wouldn’t take anything.

  “I might be here for a month,” Jack said.

  “So what,” Ron replied. “I shouldn’t have let you pay me last time. What are you going to give me? Five hundred dollars? Seven fifty? I’m saving you up for when it really matters—you know, a hundred grand loan, maybe a hundred fifty. This is peanuts. I’m just making sure you stay committed to me for when I need you. By the way, since you’re thinking of representing this serial killer, don’t tell people you know me. It’ll be bad for business and possibly my health.”

  “I’d better keep a low profile here. People are going to be upset,” Jack said rather seriously.

  The three men were sitting in the living room of the condo. Ron jumped on the remark.

  “Upset? That’s the understatement of the year, Jackie Boy. Some people are going to want your hide. Danni will be in the front of the line in that group, by the way. And don’t come into The Swamp either. I’ll have to close the place down if you do.”

  Jack just looked at Ron for a second, not knowing how to take that last remark.

  “I’m just kidding,” Ron told him when he saw the serious look on Jack’s face. “I don’t give a shit what people think. You know that.”

  Then he was back to being a jokester again.

  “Henry, I’d drop him now. No percentages in being a friend of this guy. You can pick him up again when he moves back down to Pigeon Creek or wherever it is that he lives.”

  Henry laughed. Ron could make everybody laugh eventually.

  “I’m just helping him decide not to take the case,” Henry said. “Then I’m outta here.”

  “Everybody’s a jokester,” Jack said as Ron and Henry continued laughing. It was good for all of them because if Jack did take the case, they were all going to feel the pressure—Ron maybe worst of all.

  When Ron left, Jack got down to business with Henry.

  “I found something, something real substantial in Felton’s case files.”

  “What is it?”

  Jack went into his bedroom and came back with some papers.

  “This is the coroner’s report. Take a look at the description of the knife wounds on the woman’s torso.”

  Henry’s eyes scrolled down to where Jack was pointing. He read the description out loud. “The entry wound is approximately one-quarter inch wide at each entry point and extends into the body approximately three and a half inches again at each entry point.”

  “It’s the same description for the man’s torso,” Jack said.

  “So it was the same knife used on both.”

  “Exactly. And what kind of knife does that entry wound describe to you, Henry?”

  “Probably a stiletto. Maybe a dagger although a dagger might be in excess of a quarter of an inch wide.”

  “And you know the murder weapon they used to convict Felton with?” Jack asked excitedly.

  The light went on in Henry’s head. “A bowie knife. It couldn’t possibly have been a bowie knife. It’s at least an inch and a half or two inches wide. They convicted him with the wrong murder weapon.”

  “That’s right.”

  “Wait a minute, Jack. That just doesn’t make sense. Somebody would have had to figure this out on the way to trial. Somebody would have had to see that this evidence doesn’t add up. I mean the coroner would have had to blow the whistle.”

  “You’d think that would be the case unless they were all in on it.”

  “That’s kind of hard to believe: Everybody agreed to set this guy up. It’s crazy.”

  “Not if you think it through and I’ve been thinking about nothing else for days now. Let’s say just one person believes Felton is the murderer and goes about setting him up.”

  “Okay.”

  “He’s got Felton’s fingerprints. The investigative file says that two officers on the task force surreptitiously obtained his prints from a cigarette case earlier in the investigation. By the way, one of those officers was Danni.”

  “Okay.”

  “And he knows the killer used a bowie knife with a gargoyle handle when he tried to kill that girl who got away, Stacey Kincaid.”

  “You’re way ahead of me, Jack. I don’t know all these facts.”

  “Trust me, Henry. They’re true. And a bowie knife meets the MO of some of the other murders as well.”

  “Okay, I accept everything you’re telling me. Keep going.”

  “So he searches and finds the exact knife and buys it. When he gets called to the next murder, he plants the knife in the bushes outside the apartment before he even goes in so he doesn’t know he’s planted the wrong murder weapon.”

  “This is too much, Jack. You’ve been reading too many mystery novels. Nothing ever happens like this or at least I’ve never heard of it. What about the fingerprints? How does he get the fingerprints on the knife?”

  “You can transfer fingerprints, Henry. You can do it with Scotch tape as long as you have the fingerprints you’re trying to plant. And the cops can do it another way: They can just say these are the prints we found on the knife. I don’t think that happened in this case because too many people would have had to be involved.”

  “You already told me the whole damn criminal justice system was involved,” Henry said.

  “Not at first. In the beginning it was perhaps only one man. Then the scenario changed. They had Felton in custody and the killings stopped. A couple of months passed. Everything was back to normal. What would you have done if you were the prosecutor and you suddenly discovered the evidence didn’t match up? Would you put somebody you were sure was a serial killer back on the streets to kill again? Would you put your community that had been living in terror for half a year in jeopardy again? Would you accuse a member of law enforcement of tampering with the evidence under these circumstances? Or would you just let it go—put Felton away and become a hero?

  “You know the prosecutor just puts on a case. Of course, she’s supposed to do it ethically, but it’s up to the defense to challenge the evidence. The public defender was probably clueless—just going through the motions.”

  “I still can’t believe this.”

  “Let’s look at it the only other way you can look at it. There had been eight murders before these last two, and the police never found a trace of evidence. That excludes, of course, the evidence they obtained from Stacey, the girl who temporarily got away. Then all of a sudden this mastermind killer drops a bowie knife with his fingerprints on it outside the scene of a double homicide where he used another type of weapon to do his killing. Does that make any sense whatsoever to you?”

  “No, it doesn’t.”

  Jack, who was already standing and walking around the living room as if it were a courtroom and he was pleading his case, went to the kitchen and pulled two beers out of the refrigerator, opened them, handed one to Henry, and waited. He could tell Henry was going over all of it in his head again, challenging every premise, filtering it through the mind of a criminal, until he arrived at the place Jack expected him to get to.

  “So I assume you have a person in mind who did all this?” Henry asked.

 
“I do.”

  “And who might that be?”

  “Sam Jeffries.”

  “The chief of police?”

  “That’s the one.”

  “I can’t wait to hear your rationale for this one, Jack.”

  “It’s very simple. Sam Jeffries was the head of the task force back then. His wife had been murdered by the serial killer two weeks before this double murder. The man could not have been in his right mind. He knew about the bowie knife. He knew Felton was a suspect: Danni had tried to get a search warrant for Felton’s apartment. And let me show you something.”

  Jack went in his bedroom and returned with a tape and popped it in the VCR. He and Henry watched a recording of Tom Felton’s arrest. It started out fine with Sam reading Felton his rights. Then it got ugly: Felton nodded, telling Sam he understood his rights, and Sam told him he had to respond verbally. Then came the part Jack wanted Henry to see.

  “I understand what you said to me but I’m innocent,” Felton replied to Sam’s prompting. “I didn’t kill anybody. You’ve got the wrong man.”

  “We’ll see about that, dickhead,” Sam answered. “You’re going down. And don’t be fooled: that cocktail they give you up in Raiford—it may be quick but it’s awful painful. They just paralyze you so nobody can tell.”

  “Wow!” Henry said when Jack turned off the VCR. “I see what you mean. That was one angry man there. So what are you gonna do with all of this, Jack? Most of it is supposition.”

  “I don’t think I have to do anything but prove that the weapon found with Felton’s fingerprints on it was not the murder weapon. At that point the court is going to have to set Felton free.”

  “So what was all that other stuff about?”

  “I had to convince myself that this is how it went down.”

  “Why did you go over it with me?”

  “Because if there were holes in my theory, you would see them.”

  “Let me say this: I don’t know if your theory is totally accurate but you have convinced me that the bowie knife was a plant, and it certainly wasn’t the murder weapon. So what are you going to do?”

  “I don’t know. After all this, I still don’t know that Felton is innocent. I know that he was framed. I just don’t know that he’s innocent.”

  “What happened when you went to see him?”

  “He proclaimed his innocence. He seemed honest and straightforward. He looked me right in the eye. I didn’t detect any fidgeting, eye blinking, nothing. Of course, psychopaths don’t display the symptoms that normal liars do.”

  “Well, if you don’t represent him, nobody is going to. And all this stuff that you just brought to my attention is going to die with him.”

  “I know, Henry. I don’t think I can let that happen.”

  “There’s something else that you need to at least consider. Actually, it’s someone else.”

  “You’re talking about Danni.”

  “I know it shouldn’t affect your decision, but—”

  Jack cut him off. “It blew my mind when I read the file. She was a big part of this case. Besides obtaining the fingerprints, she’s the one who interviewed the girl who identified the murder weapon in the previous attempted murder.”

  “The girl who was later killed?” Henry asked.

  “Yes. Danni testified about that at trial. Do you remember Hannah and Danni telling us about Hannah going to Colorado when she was a young girl?”

  “Yeah, I remember.”

  “She went there because the serial killer called Danni and intimated that he was going to kill Hannah.”

  “Jesus, Jack, she’s going to be livid if you represent this guy.”

  “I know, but what can I do? I can’t not represent him if I believe he’s innocent just because Danni is going to be angry.”

  “No, you can’t,” Henry said. Then he started chuckling to himself.

  “What’s so funny?” Jack asked.

  “I was just thinking that I’m glad I’m not you.”

  Chapter Thirty

  The case management conference on Thomas Felton’s case was held in the courtroom in downtown Oakville at 9 a.m. on January thirty-first. Jack was present along with a lawyer from the attorney general’s office named Mitch Jurgensen, and ten reporters.

  Normally this would have been an informal affair but with the reporters in attendance, Judge Holbrook felt the need to go through the motions. He rescheduled the hearing from his chambers to the courtroom, and at the appointed hour he walked into the courtroom wearing his robe after the bailiff gave the order “All rise!”

  “You can be seated,” the judge said after sitting down. He was a good-looking man, probably in his early fifties, tall, with a full head of dark hair. Either he colored it or he was one of those rare people over fifty who did not have one gray hair on his head.

  Judge Holbrook was a circuit judge in the northern part of the county. He had been chosen for this case on the theory that a judge from the northern part of the county would be fairer or would at least appear to be more fair than a judge who presided in Oakville where the murders had occurred. Jack, of course, didn’t buy it for a second. He thought the Florida Supreme Court should have appointed a judge from a county far removed from Oakville. Unfortunately, time didn’t permit filing a motion to get rid of the judge.

  Jack had checked him out thoroughly, though. He wasn’t a great legal mind, but he wasn’t thought to be an ideologue either. Ideologues were the worst kind because they always knew what the truth was and what should be done rather than listening to the evidence and making a decision on the facts.

  “Be simple and direct with him,” one lawyer told Jack. “If you start throwing case law at him and arguing complex legal issues, he’ll shut down.”

  Jack had that advice in mind when the judge called on him to begin the proceedings. He also had a court reporter to transcribe everything that was said. And if the judge allowed him, he was prepared to make some statements in open court that would send the press corps into a frenzy. If Jack could have his say, what happened in this case was definitely going to see the light of day.

  Judge Holbrook unwittingly became a willing participant in Jack’s plan.

  “This is a case management conference in the case of State of Florida v. Thomas Felton. A death warrant has been signed in Mr. Felton’s case. He is scheduled to be executed on March fourteenth, approximately six weeks from today, and this proceeding is to determine if there are any further motions or appeals that counsel for Mr. Felton plans on filing. Mr. Tobin, are you here representing Mr. Felton?”

  “Yes, Your Honor.”

  “And who is representing the State?”

  “I am, Your Honor. Mitch Jurgensen from the attorney general’s office.”

  Jack had been back to see Felton one last time before making his decision to take the case and came away from that meeting as confused as he was after the first meeting.

  “He doesn’t act guilty, but I just don’t know,” he told Henry.

  “I don’t know what to tell you, Jack. With these facts, though, it’s hard to let the man just be taken like a lamb to slaughter.”

  “I guess you’re right, Henry. Now that I’ve seen what I’ve seen, I guess I can’t stay silent.”

  “Okay, Mr. Tobin,” Judge Holbrook said. “You know the drill. This hearing is for your client’s benefit. Do you have any post-conviction motions that you intend to file?”

  “Yes, Your Honor. As a matter of fact, I have a motion with me. It’s a motion for an evidentiary hearing and a new trial.”

  Jack handed the motion to the judge and gave a copy to Mitch Jurgensen.

  Judge Holbrook didn’t even glance at the written motion. He saw the reporters out there behind the bar whispering among themselves. He knew they were just chomping at the bit to find out what was in the motion. On the spur of the moment, he decided to give them something.

  “We’ve got some time, Mr. Tobin. Why don’t you tell us about this m
otion.”

  “Yes, Your Honor. I have attached to the motion the coroner’s reports on both murders. They were never admitted into evidence at the trial because the coroner testified in person, but he specifically stated that he was using his reports to refresh his recollection, and the record is clear that he had them in his hand when he was testifying.

  “I also have attached to the motion pictures that I recently took of the knife that was admitted into evidence as the murder weapon. It’s a bowie knife—a large bowie knife. As you can see from the pictures, I have a tape measure that measures the width of the knife at certain points and the length of the knife. I have also attached the transcript of the trial testimony in which the knife was referred to as the murder weapon. It is interesting, Your Honor, that the coroner never identified the knife as the murder weapon, and I have attached his testimony as well. One of the police officers who testified is the only person who identified the knife as the murder weapon. The coroner testified first, and he was long gone when that police officer took the stand—”

  “And your point is, Mr. Tobin?” The judge was getting frustrated, but that’s where Jack wanted him to be—focused on the bottom line. Not just yet though.

  “The public defender should have objected to the police officer’s testifying about the bowie knife being the murder weapon. The officer was not qualified to give that testimony.”

  “Ineffectiveness of counsel was raised in the first appeal, Mr. Tobin. Are you really arguing that your client is entitled to an evidentiary hearing because the public defender failed to make a technical objection? Because if you are, I’m ready to rule on that issue right now.”

  Now was the time. The judge was ready and so were the members of his audience.

  “No, sir, I’m arguing that the knife the police officer identified as the murder weapon was not the murder weapon and could not possibly have been the murder weapon.”

  That got the peanut gallery stirring. Judge Holbrook banged his gavel.