Broken: A story of hope and forgiveness

by Kevin Mark Smith

  * * * *

  As Charles walked to the jail’s outside entrance, the only one that didn’t force him to traverse the hallways of the Sheriff’s Department, he rehearsed the verbal whipping he intended to give his former client. “I understand you need some legal assistance,” he said softly to himself. “The only help you’ll get from me is my relentless pressure on the DA to put your butt in prison for the next ten years of your life, you piece of garbage.” He wished he could be more threatening, but the last time he’d defended someone in Oklahoma for a similar case, aggravated battery with a vehicle, the sentencing guidelines had topped out at ten years for habitual offenders. Regrettably, the law didn’t view Thomas in that light yet, though he would’ve gotten a few extra years due to his previous DUI convictions if this case turned into a DUI-related offense, which he suspected it just might become, and would become if he had anything to say about it.

  Four years max, he thought, shaking his head. Pity.