Mafioso [Part 1]

by Nisa Santiago

  17

  1995

  Maxine fidgeted in her chair next to Fred Chesney, one of the best criminal attorneys in the city. She was quiet and nervous, dressed in a white top under a gray blazer and matching knee-length skirt. She looked sophisticated and innocent, playing the role of an intelligent young girl who didn’t get into trouble.

  This was the big day. A jury of her peers had finally reached a verdict, and in a moment, her fate would be revealed. Her trial had lasted a grueling two weeks, and the courtroom was semi crowded. The prosecutor, Natalie Knight, was an adept lawyer with a ninety percent conviction rate. She was a savage pit bull in the courtroom, calling Maxine everything from a baby killer to a common criminal, to which her defense attorney strongly objected.

  Fred and Natalie went back and forth in the courtroom with heated arguments. It was like Matlock. Fred presented Maxine to the jury as an educated, decent, and innocent college girl from a good Christian family who attended church regularly. He wanted the jury to know that she had no criminal record and had never been arrested. She had a bright future ahead of her; she was a law student herself, so why would she murder Sandy? Fred Chesney painted the perfect picture of his client to the jury. Almost made it look like she was Mother Teresa herself.

  But the prosecution had a motive for the attack and murder. Natalie Knight painted Maxine as a jealous bitch in love with a thug named Scottie, who would do anything and everything to keep her man. The prosecutor stated to the jury that Sandy’s pregnancy with Scottie sent the defendant over the edge, and she snapped. Sandy was a threat to Maxine’s relationship. Witnesses testified against Maxine and brought up the previous run-in between Sandy and Maxine at the bodega.

  Fred refuted the witnesses’ statements, saying Sandy was the aggressor that day, not Maxine. He said it was self-defense and that Sandy was a bully, even when she was pregnant. Maxine had the right to defend herself.

  It was a war, and Maxine’s freedom was on the line.

  Maxine took the stand in her defense. It was a risky move, but Maxine felt confident that she could persuade the jury and everyone else about that day. She wanted to tell them from her own mouth she was innocent. Her lawyer felt she would be okay on the stand since she was educated and smart. He questioned her, and she was coherent. No street slang came from her mouth, and she held eye contact.

  The prosecutor was hungry to sink her teeth into her. Natalie didn’t play nice. Everything about Maxine came into play, from her relationship with Scottie the drug dealer to her friendship with Layla. Natalie Knight explained to the jury that there was more to Maxine than met the eye. She grilled Maxine about the night of the murder. Why was she there? She opposed the self-defense theory, proclaiming that Maxine had been stalking Sandy.

  Her defense attorney immediately shouted out, “Objection,” and stated his cause.

  “Sustained,” the judge announced.

  The cross-examination from the prosecutor went on tirelessly, as Natalie tried to break down the defendant’s character. Time after time, Maxine’s lawyer would call out, “Objection!”

  Maxine testifying on the stand could have been a hit or miss to the jury, who sat there listening intently to everything being said. She wondered what they thought about her. Did she do a good job defending herself from the she-wolf that repeatedly attacked her character and was calling her a cold-blooded murderer?

  Now the trial was coming to an end, and Maxine wanted to jump through a window and fly away. She wanted to see daylight again. She had been locked down for several months. At her arraignment, the judge had denied her bail, and she had been remanded. It was a double homicide—a pregnant woman had been attacked and killed, along with the baby.

  Maxine glanced behind her and saw her parents in attendance. Seeing them always there brought a slight smile to her face. They’d been supportive of her since day one. They spoke out about her being innocent. They prayed every day and defended Maxine’s character being attacked.

  Also seated in the courtroom on the day of her verdict was Scottie. He looked handsome and confident that she would beat the charge and would be acquitted of murder. He’d hired the best lawyer for Maxine with his drug money. He wanted to show her he had her back fully. When the two locked eyes, he winked at her and smiled.

  The verdict came in after several hours of deliberation. This was it. They had a unanimous decision. The tension inside the courtroom was thick. The jury was back in their assigned seats, and none of them looked Maxine’s way.

  The judge took over the courtroom with his gavel and authority. He gazed at the jury and asked, “Do you have a verdict?”

  The foreman of the jury stood up. “We do, Your Honor.”

  The judge was the first to see the verdict. His expression remained stoic.

  Maxine and her attorney were to stand as she was to be read her fate. The feeling of trepidation continued to balloon inside her. She gazed at the jurors, feeling her heart beat a million times per second. She felt it beat so loud that it almost drowned out what anyone else had to say. She said a quick prayer.

  “The Superior Court of New York, Kings County, in the matter of the people of the state of New York vs. Maxine Henderson, case number BA097345, we the jury in the above of title action find the defendant, Maxine Henderson, guilty of first-degree murder,” the foreman proclaimed.

  Maxine shrieked once she heard the word guilty. She was in absolute shock and denial. Her knees weakened, and she was about to hyperventilate. No, this wasn’t happening. How did they find her guilty of first-degree murder? She wasn’t a killer.

  Immediately, tears trickled from her eyes, and she looked to her attorney for an explanation. But he was equally shocked.

  Her parents cried in the courtroom. Her mother thrust herself into her husband’s arms and sobbed.

  Scottie’s heart dropped into his stomach when he heard the guilty verdict. If only the jurors knew Maxine like he knew her. But with a bloody gun on the scene, her fingerprints, motive, and the mystery woman that Maxine refused to give up, there was only so much a lawyer could do. He’d tried, and he failed.

  The self-defense argument didn’t ring true to the jury. Numerous people had testified there was another person at the scene, but Maxine swore it was only her. The jury saw her as a manipulative liar who went to seek revenge and ultimately she got what she wanted, which was to have the woman carrying her fiancé’s baby dead.

  Maxine was about to be taken away into state custody. Fred felt there was still a fight. He promised that they would immediately appeal the verdict to the local court of appeals. It wasn’t over.

  Maxine was a complete mess. Her tears came harder and faster, as her face flooded with anguish. She thought about suicide. There was no way in hell her life had been flushed down the toilet and she was about to serve time for a crime she didn’t commit. She couldn’t hug her parents or kiss Scottie goodbye. They placed her in handcuffs and shackles and escorted her into lockup.

  After the trial, a few jurors were interviewed, and they all said the same thing. Maxine’s fiancé Scottie sitting in the courtroom with his expensive jewels, diamond watches, and his urban gear screamed out drug dealer to them. He hurt Maxine’s case. If she was engaged to the drug-dealing thug, then the picture the defense was trying to paint of her was marred.

  At her sentencing, Maxine was told she would spend the next twenty-five years to life in prison. It was a compromised verdict. Because she had never been in trouble before and the crime was over her fiancé, some suggested that she wouldn’t be a complete threat to society.

  The judge felt she deserved a shot at rehabilitation; therefore, she didn’t receive life without the possibility of parole.

  Either way, Maxine felt her life was over. Twenty-five years was a long time. There was no more home, no more normal life for her. She was now an inmate—state property.

  18


  2014

  Rock didn’t know what happened to Black Sean and Rasun. He believed business went smoothly as usual. After the transaction, he celebrated with a few drinks at the strip club, made it rain on a few strippers, and later left with a voluptuous stripper named Candy for some extracurricular activities. In his personalized bedroom, they fucked passionately until they came and passed out, twisted together in exhaustion.

  The next morning, Rock was awakened to the cold steel of a pistol against his forehead and several niggas standing in his bedroom.

  He popped up wide-eyed. “What the fuck, yo! What y’all niggas want?” he hollered, panic in his voice.

  “Chill, nigga,” Meyer said.

  Bugsy said, “We came to talk.”

  “Talk about what?”

  “Tell the bitch to leave,” Meyer said of the butt-naked Candy sleeping against him.

  Rock quickly stirred her awake.

  When she finally opened her eyes, she too was devastated to see the sudden threat surrounding them. “Ohmygod!”

  Meyer yelled, “Bitch, get your shit and leave before you get murdered up in here!”

  The look on Candy’s face was one of candid fear. She leaped from the bed, hastily collected her things, and departed the bedroom faster than anyone could blink.

  Bugsy tossed a few pictures onto the bed for Rock to see. A picture was worth a thousand words, and these images would start their conversation with Rock.

  Rock was taken aback by the images of Black Sean and Rasun stuffed into the back of their Tahoe, both with large holes in their heads.

  Bugsy said coolly, “I assume that we now have your complete attention.”

  “What is it that y’all want from me?”

  “It’s simple—your cooperation,” Bugsy said.

  “Y’all come into my bedroom uninvited and show me pictures of two of my regulars dead? What the fuck!”

  Meyer took a seat at the foot of the bed, making himself comfortable.

  Bugsy tossed an eight ball of their product toward Rock and said, “From now on, you cop from us.”

  “What?” Rock was baffled by their demand. “You know who I’m with?”

  Meyer said, “DMC, right? Fuck them niggas!”

  “Our product is far superior to DMC’s shit,” Bugsy said.

  Rock examined the eight ball and shook his head. “They’ll kill me.”

  “And who do you think we are? Some off-brand niggas that just came into town rolling the dice for fun? Nah, nigga. Check our fuckin’ pedigree—You need to be more worried about us than them clown-ass niggas. We’re official niggas rolling into your city, taking shit over. Put it like this—DMC is a mom-and-pop store, and we’re fuckin’ Wal-Mart, nigga, every fuckin’ where. Ain’t no stoppin’ us,” Meyer proclaimed.

  “We already infiltrated the police. Detective Jones, that’s Deuce’s main guy on the force. Am I correct?” Bugsy said.

  Rock slightly nodded.

  “And there’s Marty, the low nigga on the totem pole. There’s Jimmy, Deuce’s right-hand man, and then there is Jo-Jo and McCall, his top two enforcers. Deuce gets his supply from the Jamaicans in DC, and their product is low grade, and y’all have to cut it too many times to get a rise,” Bugsy said. “Should I go on?”

  “No,” Rock muttered, shocked at what they knew.

  Bugsy paused for a beat, allowing Rock to take it all in. “Listen, we’re not here to kill you. We just want to talk business. Simple. Our offer will be a lot more generous than Deuce’s. And you’ll be compensated for your time and loss of men. But most important, you’ll be part of a larger organization—one that comes with lawyers and political connections. Our organization takes pride in loyalty. We’re subtle, but swift with violence when we need to be. And when you’re with us, you’re with us, and we’re with you,” Bugsy said, sounding like he was trying to sell him a new car.

  Bugsy continued to sell a dream. “What you hold there will have your drug users swarming to get a taste.”

  Rock clutched the eight ball, looking at the heroin carefully. He knew there was no way out. Bugsy was giving him an offer he couldn’t refuse.

  Meyer said, “Deuce is on his way out, so now’s the time to get on board. Like Beanie Sigel said, you either get down, or you lay down.”

  “My mamma ain’t raise any fool,” Rock said, “so I’ll get down.”

  “See, I knew you were a smart man,” Meyer said.

  “One thing, though,” Rock said.

  “What the fuck you want, nigga?” Meyer asked, waving the gun at him.

  “Chill, Meyer,” Bugsy said. “Let him speak.”

  “Y’all gotta protect me from Deuce,” Rock stated. “He’s gonna come after me once he finds out about this, and he’s nobody to fuck wit’. I’m telling you, Deuce and his goons—they’re like nothing I ever seen before.”

  Meyer snarled. “Yo, y’all give this nigga too much fuckin’ credit in this fuckin’ town. If he was in New York, you know what that nigga would be? Dog food, nigga! He would be eaten alive by the real niggas in my town.”

  Bugsy said to Rock, “Let me reiterate to you, when you’re with us, you’re with us, and don’t worry about Deuce. He’s already being taken care of.”

  “It’s gonna hit the fan nasty and hard. Deuce ain’t gonna go down easily.”

  “Listen, you paranoid nigga, we done took down men much scarier and smarter than this Deuce muthafucka. I’m tired of hearing about this nigga like he some boogeyman that can’t die. Nigga, everybody bleeds when they get shot in the fuckin’ head!”

  “Meyer, chill,” Bugsy said.

  Meyer was ready to hunt Deuce himself and kill him in a nasty way. It bothered him that the people in Delaware talked about him like he was a legend. He’d never heard the name in New York. As far as Meyer was concerned, Deuce was a weak nigga living on borrowed time. He was ready to become the star in town. He wanted muthafuckas to fear his name and status there like they did in NYC. Now he found his reason to be in Delaware. He was there not just for profit, but for recognition too. It was becoming an ego thing.

  With their business completed, the men coolly exited the bedroom, leaving Rock behind with a lot to think about.

  Immediately, Rock got up from his bed, locked his doors, and armed himself with several guns. He had just betrayed the devil he’d been dealing with. Deuce would find out everything somehow, and he would come for everyone, including him. Rock felt that the town would be turned into a war zone when these two clans inevitably clashed, and Wilmington would become a living hell for many people.

  19

  Rotting inside a female penitentiary for nearly twenty years gave Maxine a lot to think about. The reading of the guilty verdict replayed in her head over and over. That day defeated her both physically and mentally. She would never forget the look of heartbreak on her parents’ faces when the guards dragged her back into jail. Her folks were crushed; they cried too. Scott quietly walked out of the courtroom. Max guessed he too was shocked by the verdict.

  Maxine missed her parents so much. Early on in her sentence, they would come and visit her, but as the years went on, their visits dwindled. The farther south she was transferred, the more scarce the visitation had become. She had learned that her father had become ill. And she could do nothing for him.

  To escape the pain, Maxine had to become Max, and she had to forget about her previous life. Her alter ego surfaced, and violence and drugs became a way to escape. She went from a good girl to a hardcore bitch. For twenty years, the rage inside her boiled until her blood turned into hot, molten lava.

  While she remained caged, Layla started a family and became prosperous. Maxine always wanted that for herself. She wanted to give her parents grandchildren. She wanted the big, beautiful house with the white picket fence and green backyard, maybe with a pool and a few pet
s. She wanted a husband and a career. She wanted to live the American dream, but her conviction made sure it would never happen.

  Max sat on her cot staring at a picture of Layla and Scott together. She felt played and humiliated by them both. She ripped the picture in half and crumpled it in her fist. Now was the time. No more feeling sorry for herself and taking her pain out on the other inmates.

  With Shiniquia’s help, she would have her justice. One by one, Layla and Scottie’s kids would be knocked off, like their namesakes. First on her list was the youngest—nine-year-old Gotti. Max found it amusing and stupid that Layla would name all of her kids after legendary gangsters. How typical. Gotti. What a joke! Max figured since they wanted to name their children after gangsters, then they would die like gangsters.

  She remembered when the real John Gotti’s son, Frankie Gotti, was on his bicycle when he was accidentally mowed down and killed by a neighbor. This time, young Gotti’s death would not be an accident.

  Shiniquia joined Max in her jail cell. She took a seat next to her and slyly passed her a small stack of twenty-dollar bills. “All the payments are right on time from everyone.”

  “Cool.” Max counted the cash, and it was over three hundred dollars. “I got Mark bringing in another batch next week—same style, same way.”

  “Can’t wait. The girls are itching for another taste.”

  Mark was a dirty guard Max had under her thumb. For some extra cash on the side, he smuggled drugs into the prison for Max and Shiniquia to sell to the inmates. Mark also enjoyed the perks of being a male guard in a female prison.

  On the side, Max was pimping a few girls to the male guards, including Mark. It was easy money, since several guards, the majority of whom were white, had a penchant for black girls. Max figured out a way to benefit from both the drugs and the girls. Many girls got high, so she would give them a discount on the drugs she sold if they agreed to have sex with the guard that desired them. For a taste of narcotics, the girls would link up with the guard that favored them, and they would quickly have oral sex or fuck in a separate room while there was a lookout. Both parties would get what they wanted. Max even supplied the condoms, which she had someone smuggle in for her. The last thing she needed was for one of the girls to get pregnant by a male guard. If that were to happen, it would spark an investigation and turn everything topsy-turvy. She couldn’t afford any hiccups in her operation. She had worked hard to get where she was, and she had big plans.