Death's White Horses: A Jeff Trask Crime Drama (Jeff Trask crime drama series Book 3)

by Marc Rainer

  Trask was satisfied. We'll save the rest for sentencing Freddy. You've done well. He concluded the direct examination.

  "And what role did the defendant Ramón Dominguez play in all of that?" Trask asked.

  "While El Verdugo—the executioner—Lazcano was alive, Ramón was the Zetas' second in command. After Lazcano was killed, he led them."

  "No further questions, Your Honor."

  J.T. Burns approached the lectern to begin his cross-examination. "That's quite a story, young man."

  The gavel almost exploded in Judge King's hand as she brought it down. "You know better than that, counsel. Ask a question. You can present your argument later."

  Good, Trask thought. She's not going to have any nonsense today.

  "Sorry, Judge," Burns said.

  He's off balance. Maybe he'll go fishing. He's really got nothing to work with here.

  "You say that you are the only survivor of this incident in which you were shot. Is that correct?"

  The interpreter translated the question.

  "As far as I know."

  "So we have only your word for that, given the fact that no other witnesses lived to tell the tale?"

  More argument, but I don't need to object to that. Freddy's doing fine.

  "There are photographs of the massacre at San Fernando, sir. Major Aguilar will testify about that."

  Nice work, Freddy. You asked for that, Burns.

  "You don't like Mr. Domínguez very much, do you?"

  "I despise him."

  Maybe a bit strong, but okay. 1f bias is all he's got to work with, Burns is dead.

  "That's about as biased as you can be, isn't it? You despise him? Do you hate him?"

  "Of course."

  Good. No hesitation, no apologies here.

  "Yet you ask us to believe everything you said, even though it comes from a mind filled with hate?"

  The gavel came down hard again. "Do you have something substantive to ask this witness, Mr. Burns, or do you intend to try and argue your case now?" Judge King asked, the anger evident in her voice.

  "Just one more question," Burns said. "Did you hate my client's brother, Vicente, like you hate my client?"

  "I did."

  "In fact, you hated him so much that you murdered him. Isn't that true?"

  Trask noticed that the judge was looking at him, almost inviting an objection. Not this time, Judge. He's asked for it, and we'll give him his answer. Let it stand.

  "I killed his brother. That much is true."

  Burns nodded, folded his papers, and returned to the defense table. He sat down next to Dominguez.

  "Redirect, Mr. Trask?" the judge asked.

  "Just a few questions," Trask said, returning to the lectern.

  "Freddy, where were you shot?"

  "In the head, sir."

  "Please show the jury your scar."

  The young man stood and pulled back the collar-length dark hair from the left side of his head. A wide, ugly scar ran from the back of his head past his ear, almost to the temple, mapping the track where the bullet had followed the shape of his skull under the skin.

  "Thank you. You admitted to having killed Vicente Dominguez, the Zeta they called The Rider?"

  "Yes."

  "Why did you do that?"

  "Ramón had a favorite way of killing his enemies. I saw him do it several times. He would prepare what he called a guiso—a "stew"—and would burn the victim alive in diesel fuel—"

  Burns was on his feet screaming objections.

  "Overruled, Mr. Burns," Judge King said. "You opened the door to this."

  "You were describing the defendant's stews, I believe," Trask said, returning to the redirect.

  "Yes," Freddy continued. "Vicente—The Rider—caught me trying to telephone the marines and warn them about a raid the Zetas were planning. He told me they were going to cook me in one of Ramón's stews. I had to kill him in self-defense and run for my life."

  "And how did you escape?"

  "Major Aguilar had told me about a fishing spot on Falcon Lake that he liked to go to when he was a boy. He told me to go there. He picked me up in a boat and brought me to America. The Zetas tried to stop us, but the Texas Navy sank their boats."

  Beautiful job, Freddy. We'll have to have Luis explain the "Texas Navy," but that's fine. Now Luis will take the stand with the credibility of a hero. He is one, after all. And thank you for not mentioning that I was in the boat.

  "No further questions."

  December 2, 2013, 9:00 a.m.

  "The jury having returned guilty verdicts on all counts, including those of premeditated murder, we will now proceed to sentencing," Judge King said. "Mr. Burns, your objections regarding the scope of the government's aggravation evidence are overruled. The evidence is graphic, horrific, appalling. I concede all of that, but it is relevant, convincing and credible, and I am not going to allow your client to use the horror of his own conduct as a shield."

  Trask recalled Freddy and Luis to the stand, and the testimony about the other massacres at San Fernando and Cardereyta Jiménez went in as smoothly as had the initial testimony. Trask watched the jury, evaluating, reading their faces. I could put on more, but they've had enough. I don't want them to become numb to all this carnage. They're ready.

  "The United States rests, Your Honor."

  Burns had little to offer. Dominguez refused to testify, or Burns wouldn't let him. The usual mitigation specialists were absent, as Burns couldn't very well send amateur death-penalty abolitionist investigators crawling all over Mexico in the middle of a cartel war. There was a shrink who testified that the defendant suffered from a narcissistic personality disorder. Trask got him to admit that Dominguez shared that trait with about eighty percent of the world's criminals.

  "You may present argument, Mr. Trask."

  Trask summarized the evidence before the jury, beginning with the seventeen victims at the convenience store. He mentioned each by name, not pausing once to look at a note of any kind.

  "Ladies and Gentlemen, I would like to give you a similar list of each of the victims who fell to this man's brutality in Mexico, but the list is too long, and I could not begin to remember each of their names, or begin to know each of their tragic stories.

  "The death penalty should always be used sparingly, only when truly necessary, but the evidence in this case asks its own questions. If seventeen deaths are not enough, are two hundred? Three hundred? At what point do we say that the murder of this victim or that one does not justify the imposition of the ultimate punishment, but when we throw a few more bodies on the pile of this murderer's record, now we've had enough?"

  He left the lectern and walked back to his counsel table before he turned and faced the jury again.

  "If not now, ladies and gentlemen, when?" He let the question sink in. "When?"

  He knew what Burns would say before he said it. Having no facts from the case to work with, the defense counsel was left to make a philosophical attack on the death penalty itself. Trask pulled a transcript of Burns' last penalty summation from the box beside his table. I'll bet he gives this again, almost verbatim.

  "Ladies and gentlemen, search your memories to try and recall the last execution in this city. Odds are that you can't remember one. We don't undertake such things lightly. There have been terrible crimes, horrific crimes, senseless crimes committed without the smallest fragment of justification, and we have not inflicted death just because someone else did so. Is this really the case in which we should change course?"

  He's reading his own argument from the Moreno case! Unbelievable. Well, it worked that time, so why not?

  Burns rattled on, attacking again the bias and hatred that he claimed were held against his client by Freddy and Aguilar, a hatred he claimed was "born in the hot sands of Mexico and in the heat of warfare, where his client was not a bloodthirsty murderer, but a soldier in combat."

  "All we've heard about in this case is killing," Burns shouted.
"Killing after killing. Do you want to add your names to the list of those responsible for the killing of another human being? To lower yourselves and this government and this city to the levels of a murderer out of revenge? Each of you is better than that, yes, better than my client, but better than what the government is asking you to be. I ask you to activate that one thing in your sense of humanity that will prevent us from following down this inhumane path. When the government asks you to vote for death, they in effect ask you to personally throw the kill switch that will end the life of this man. And, ladies and gentlemen, for all his faults, he is a man, a human being."

  'Kill switch.' I can run with that.

  "Rebuttal, Mr. Trask?" the judge asked.

  Trask walked slowly to the lectern. He looked into the jurors' eyes. Good. Lots of eye contact. None of them are turning away. They actually want me to give them a reason.

  "Kill switch. Mr. Burns mentioned a 'kill switch.' He says we are better than this. He mentions the 'kill switch' because he knows that each of you shudders at the idea of throwing one. He's right—very right—to mention that switch.

  "It's important to mention that 'kill switch' because, ladies and gentlemen, each of you with an ounce of humanity has a 'kill switch.' It is your 'kill switch,' however, that actually kills the temptation to do violence against another human being. You learned it as a young child when your parents taught you how cruel it was to do violence against another living thing, how evil it was to cause pain to your brother or sister, or even to the family puppy or kitten.

  "It is your 'kill switch,' then, which gives you the respect for human life and makes you a member of civilized society. Unfortunately, there are those who do not have that restriction on their personalities. There are evil men in the world like Ramón Dominguez. So when you find yourselves brushing up against that civilized reluctance to kill, the repulsion that naturally should boil up in you at the very idea of taking another life, please remember at that very instance that all the evidence in this case has shown that this man does not feel that same reluctance. That is the difference between him, and you. Remember that he has shown, time after time after time after time—I could repeat that phrase once for every victim, but we'd be here for days—that his 'kill switch' has no off position, but instead is always set on 'kill.'

  He is, genetically, a human being, but he is missing that essential piece of humanity that Mr. Burns is speaking to when he asks you to spare him."

  Trask walked back to his table before turning and facing the jury one last time. "I can speak no more for the victims of this murderer. That task now falls to you."

  The jury would be out for a while deliberating. Trask elbowed his way through the crowded hallway, trying to reach the sanctuary of the office space reserved for trial preparation by the United States Attorney. The courthouse was packed with interested spectators, attorneys, and security personnel, and there was the usual crush of reporters clamoring for a statement.

  "You folks know that you're supposed to contact our public affairs officer," he said, shoving at least three microphones out of his face with a single sweep of his hand.

  "C'mon, Jeff, you know that if the jury comes back with the death penalty, it will be the first capital sentence in this town in decades. Give me a quote."

  Trask stopped and looked at the reporter from The Post. He thought about saying something, but thought better of it. I should just shove on past, get to the prep tank. He looked at the man, half-smiled, and shook his head.

  "You just asked those people to kill a man, Trask. You can't actually believe that's something civilized people should do. You can't believe that's justice."

  Trask froze in his tracks, and turned to face the reporter.

  "Now you're questioning my ethics and my own motives and beliefs, Rafferty, so I'll answer you. That defendant in there got his due process of law, more than he was ever actually entitled to. Don't you dare imply that I asked for the death penalty just to put some kind of notch on my gun. I don't need one. Capital punishment should always be the last resort, used only when we are certain as a society that it's appropriate. I'd never ask for it if I didn't think it was justified."

  "So you're that sure? You're willing to let your own judgment play judge, jury and executioner?"

  Trask stared hard, burning fires into the reporter's eyes with his own. "Rafferty, I couldn't say this to the jury. It would have been the truth, but not allowed under the law. There are times when the law is an ass, and some of those times the rules still have to be followed. But you're not a juror, and we're not in that room anymore, so make no mistake about it. If the jury comes back with a death verdict, and after all the appeals run out," he lowered his voice to a measured growl, "once they strap that monster to the gurney in a death chamber, if they ask me to push the plungers, I'll jump at the chance, and never think twice about it afterward. He actually deserves a lot worse. I'm only sorry that we're too civilized to give it to him."

  One of the television reporters stuck a microphone back in his face. "Just one question, Mr. Trask. I know that you're a student of legal history. If you had to compare this trial to any in the past, which one do you think of?"

  Trask thought for a moment. "Nuremberg."

  Waldorf, Maryland

  December 4, 2013, 6:38 p.m.

  "Congratulations, Jeff. This has been a long road for you, hasn't it?" Sivella asked, switching the empty beer mug with a full one.

  "Too long, Will. As usual, I had a helluva lot of help."

  "I think they were all happy to give it."

  Trask just nodded. Lynn smiled at him from the next bar stool and tapped his mug with one of her own, winking at him.

  Dixon Carter patted him on the back from stool on the other side. "That's truly one for the history books. I never thought I'd hear that verdict in this town," Carter said.

  "Dominguez wouldn't have gotten it if he didn't deserve it," Barry Doroz said, leaning around Carter from the other side. "And he still wouldn't have gotten it without our favorite prosecutor." He held his glass up in a salute.

  "Thanks, Bear," Trask said. He heard a commotion near the front door of the bar.

  Luis Aguilar and Freddy were being ushered in by Wisniewski and Randi Rhodes. The bar erupted in applause.

  "I'm the designated driver tonight," Randi said. "Besides, they didn't know how to find the place."

  Trask pulled a disc from his jacket pocket.

  "Uh, oh," Doroz said. "Here we go again."

  "Not this time," Trask said. "Willie, I need your help a second with the jukebox."

  Sivella followed him over to the machine and opened it. "Put it in this slot here, Jeff."

  Trask stepped back while Sivella closed the Wurlitzer. The bartender nodded, and Trask pushed the button.

  The sound of thundering tympani filled the bar, quietening the crowd. The drum strikes were repeated, followed by chords from trumpets and French horns.

  "What kind of song is that?" Sivella asked. "Sounds like the theme from the Olympic games or something."

  Trask walked over and faced Luis Aguilar. He came to attention and saluted the major. "He knows," Trask said.

  Aguilar came to attention, returning the salute.

  "Aaron Copeland," the major said. "Fanfare for the Common Man."

  Nuevo Italia

  Michoacan, Mexico

  January 13, 2014

  Captain Jorge Lopez of the Mexican marines halted his convoy on a side road and watched as more than a hundred pickup trucks rolled out of the town. Each of the trucks carried several armed men, standing in the truck beds and shouting in celebration. They had just pushed the Knights Templar Cartel out of one of their strongholds in their war-torn state on the Pacific coast.

  "Should we stop them and disarm them, Capitán?" a lieutenant asked over the radio.

  "No. Let them pass, Felipé. They are on their way to Apatzingan. If they are able to repeat their success here and kick the cartel out of that town, t
hen the most corrupt state in Mexico may actually be the first to see peace again."

  "But these are nothing more than unorganized vigilantes, sir."

  "No, they are much more than that, Felipé. They are men, and they've come to take their country back. We will wait in reserve. If they need help, we will be their cavalry. Have your men stand down for now. They can use the rest. They will need to be fresh. We have new orders. There are reports that we've located Chapo Guzmán, and we're heading to Mazatlán."

  Capital Kill (Book One in the Jeff Trask Series)

  A few short blocks from the safety of the museums and monuments on the National Mall, a ruthless killer prowls the streets of Washington DC. Federal prosecutor Jeff Trask joins a team of FBI agents and police detectives as they try and solve the series of brutal murders. As the body count rises, the investigation leads to a chilling confrontation with the leader of an international drug smuggling ring, and no one is safe, not even the police.

  Reviews of Capital Kill:

  "Jeff Trask is an Assistant U.S. Attorney who becomes embroiled in a high-stakes international case … Characters are well developed. The streets of Washington, D.C. come alive; those who have lived or worked in the nation's capital will recognize Rainer's cunning use of seedy locales to give the action in the book a realistic tone. Trask, an engaging main character, works to find out who is behind the heinous murders plaguing D.C. Despite being extremely intelligent, he comes across as an everyman. The book's intense action, realistic tone and memorable characters will keep readers engrossed in this thriller with a superb payoff." Kirkus Reviews

  "Marc Rainer has joined the ranks of trial attorneys turned fiction writers with Capital Kill, a legal thriller. Rainer introduces us to what may be the most diabolically inventive method of homicide since the south end of King Edward II met the north end of a red-hot poker. The climax is a blockbuster - it's as good as anything I've read in courtroom fiction." The Reporter