“What do you mean?” A look of anxiety filled his blue eyes - they were opened wide, and filled with fear. I could always read emotions, and that was what I read in those eyes – fear.
I cleared my throat. “I’ve been fired from my firm. What that means is that you’ll probably be dealing with a new attorney from now on. I’m very sorry. I probably shouldn’t have come to see you, because I knew that this was probably going to happen, but, deep down, I had hoped that I would be able to weather the storm. But, I got a call from my boss, and it’s the end of the line for me with that firm.”
He swallowed hard. I could see his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down, and, just like that, I saw tears forming in his eyes. Gone was the confident look on his face, and in its place was an expression of abject fear and rejection.
“I understand,” he said softly. “I’ve never experienced anybody who treated me with respect like you did when you visited me. I guess that I was just imagining that. I’d hoped that you might actually see me as a person, as nobody had ever seen me before. But I guess that you find me as hideous as everybody else does. I don’t blame you. You really don’t have to lie to me. I understand. I face rejection like this all the time. All my life, I’ve faced rejection like this. I hoped that you would be different, but I guess that I appall you as much as I appall everybody else around me.”
I wasn’t quite understanding why he was saying these things. Then I remembered - this was a kid who was so rejected by the world that he retreated to an online community where he could talk with other men who also felt rejected by the world. His self-esteem was less than zero. He obviously thought that I was making up a story because I didn’t want to take his case.
I shook my head rapidly. “No, no, no. It’s not like that at all. I promise you, it’s not like that at all. You see, what happened was that I had another client who was this rich guy and he insulted me, so I insulted him right back. And that guy got me fired. I found out about it after I left the jail a few hours ago, so I knew that I was going to have to come here and tell you about it. Please don’t think that I’m doing this because I’m rejecting you. Believe me, I would like nothing more than to stay on your case, and not just because of the publicity that’s surrounding it. I truly feel that you and I have a bond. I don’t find you hideous. I’m not appalled by you. I hope that you believe that.”
I could see in his eyes that my words were falling on deaf ears. He wasn’t listening to me. I knew that it was very difficult to overcome 16 years of a worldview where people constantly rejected you, starting with your own mother. You were going to inevitably see any kind of rejection as a personal one. This kid needed therapy to overcome his severe self-esteem issues. I knew that if, God forbid, he was convicted of this murder, he would never survive in prison. He didn’t know how to fight back. He was the kind of kid that if people were kicking him, he was just going to take it. Worse, he was going to believe that he deserved it.
I finally put my hand on his hand, a gesture that I thought was going to tell him that I really did want to be on his case. “Mr. Dixon, I wanted to give you the choice between keeping me as your attorney and going with the firm. Because I’m not working for the firm anymore, I have to go ahead and give you the choice between keeping me on or staking the attorney that they’re going to assign to your case. I don’t know who that attorney is going to be at the moment.”
He raised his head, and looked me in the eye. “You mean, there’s a chance I might be able to keep you on as my attorney? You mean, you’re not so repulsed by me that you would still consider defending me?” His eyes now showed a look of wonder in place of the anxiety that I previously saw in them.
“Yes. I would love to still be on your case. But I have to tell you that it’s not going to be easy to keep me on. You see, my old firm has many advantages that I’m not going to be able to give you. Your case is going to be expensive to try. I don’t quite know the exact number, but there will be thousands of dollars charged for investigation. I would have to hire an investigator, or do it myself, which you probably wouldn’t want, because I would have to charge you my hourly rate for doing that. There might be a charge for any witness that I’m going to have to depose. A deposition is basically getting the witness on the record before trial, swearing them in and getting their testimony. I might have to hire experts, depending on what I find out. My hourly rate is going to be $250 per hour. That’s going to be a cut for me, because I usually would charge $500 per hour, but I understand that you probably don’t have the money for that.
I guess what I’m saying is that my firm is willing to take you on pro bono. What that means is that you don’t have to pay anything to them. They have the money, the deep pockets, to be able to do something like that. I’m not going to have that same luxury. I’m going to have to go into practice on my own, which means that I can’t take a big case like this without getting money for it. I’m going to have to charge for everything, and it’s going to be expensive.”
To my surprise, his face brightened up as I was speaking. I thought that I would see the look of despair, but instead, there was a smile. “Is that all? You’re afraid that I won’t be able to pay you? If I can pay you, you can go ahead and take my case?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying to you. I would love to take your case, but I understand that you’re a young man of modest means, and it sounds like you don’t really have access to the kind of money that I’m going to need to try your case.”
He nodded his head. “That’s just what I was going to say to you. I was going to tell you that I do have the money to pay you. However much money you need, I have it. In fact, I even have enough money to bail myself out. How much do you think the bail is going to be, by the way?”
I was little bit stunned, and I didn’t say anything at first. “I don’t understand. You told me that you were poor, and I got the impression that you didn’t have access to that kind of money.”
“That was before my mom actually did come to see me. I couldn’t believe it when she came to see me. I didn’t think that she would. I didn’t think she cared enough. I still don’t think that she cared enough to see me, but she did want to tell me that I apparently have a Go Fund Me page. I don’t know who started it. It was some LLC that started it. I’ve never heard of it - Angel Eyes Inc. But the LLC started it with $5 million. Now, I know the rules of Go Fund Me, and I can’t use that money for anything but legal bills. But, I apparently can use the money to bond myself out, and to pay an attorney.”
I had to admit, that was something it never occurred to me. That, because this kid’s case was getting so much media attention, somebody might take pity on him and actually start a Go Fund Me page. That actually made some sense.
What I didn’t expect, however, was that the entity who started the page would put so much money into it. Who would do that for this kid? Just put that kind of money into a Go Fund Me for him? $5 million was a lot of money for anybody, let alone for an entity that apparently didn’t even know this kid.
“Do you know anybody who would have that kind of money who would do something like that for you? Anybody at all? What is your father’s family like, do they have money?” I wondered if the Angel Eyes LLC was really just a front for an individual, and I was going to have to find out who was behind this LLC.
He shook his head. “No. My father was a dock worker, he definitely didn’t have money. His family doesn’t have money either. My mother was able to live off my dad’s Social Security, but that’s about it. No, the answer to that is no. I don’t know anybody who would have that kind of money.”
Huh. I had to admit, that was a very strange thing. It was odd that somebody would just do that for him. Right off the bat, they went ahead and made sure that he had all the money he needed for his legal bills. Granted, I had no idea if he was going to even get a bond, but if he did, it was my experience that it was probably going to be $1 million or more. He might be denied bail, but I didn’t think so.
He wasn’t a flight risk. After all, he didn’t really have the money that was in his Go Fund Me account – that account was only for his legal bills. He couldn’t just get a plane ticket down to Mexico with that money if he wanted to. I was going to have to make the argument that he didn’t have the means to go anywhere. I hoped that that would be enough to get him out of this place.
“Okay then. Well then, you have a choice between keeping me on as your attorney, and going with my firm. It sounds like you have enough money to pay me, so the ball’s in your court.”
I knew that my firm wasn’t going to be happy, and that they were going to probably bring a lawsuit against me. They might actually have grounds for a lawsuit too, if they could show the judge that I lured Carter away from them in secret. They could make the case that I should never have come to see Carter in the first place, knowing what I knew about my encounter with Matthew Buchanan, and that I was probably going to lose my job. Now, here I was, talking to him without notifying the firm about what I was going to do.
I was doing everything wrong, and I knew it.
Yet, I also knew that a court wasn’t going to force Carter to stay with the firm if he didn’t want to. He had the freedom to choose whomever he wanted as an attorney. So, the upshot was that if he chose me as his attorney, I was going to be his attorney. I might have to deal with a lawsuit about it, but I was just going to have to cross that bridge when I came to it.
He smiled and extended his hand. “I choose you. I choose you to be my attorney. Like you told me, if I went with your old firm, I would probably be assigned some attorney that I don’t feel comfortable with. I feel like you and I see eye to eye, and, I like you. I have faith in you. I have a feeling that you’re not going to treat me like a number. I just have this feeling that I can put my life in your hands, and you’re going to take it seriously. So yes, I choose you.”
I smiled back. It felt good this kid was choosing me. It felt good that he was putting his faith in me. I knew that I was going to have to do all I could to make sure that I had earned that faith.
I knew that I was going to have to live up to his idealization of me.
I had never felt so much pressure in my entire life.
Chapter 11
August 26 - Five days after Addison goes missing
The next day was actually the first court date that I had for Carter. He was going to go before the judge and have his charges read to him, and, if possible, I was going to try to get a bond for him. I knew that getting a bond was actually a long shot. A lot of times, in murder cases such as this, there was no bond. If there was one, it was going to be sky high. He had $5 million in his Go Fund Me account, but would that even be enough? I had no clue.
I saw the prosecutor, Neera Tierdan, who was already there. She was waiting for me outside the courthouse, along with about 50 reporters with cameras. I tried to shove my way through the crowd of reporters, but they were shouting questions about what my legal strategy was going to be, and if I had any comments about my client’s guilt or innocence.
I wasn’t going to say a word to them. I never did. But that didn’t stop them from shoving microphones in front of my face.
As I headed into the court house, I saw that Grey was texting me. I was expecting that. The text said that Grey had sent another attorney over to see Carter that morning in jail, and that Carter had told that other attorney, Nicole Schwartz, that he was going to go ahead and stay with me. To say that Grey wasn’t happy about that was an understatement. The text said that I should expect a lawsuit against me, for luring away a client.
I didn’t worry about that. California was very favorable towards employees who were forced to sign noncompete contracts. The very concept of a noncompete contract was void in California. In other words, a company, or firm, cannot put a clause into the employment contract that says that you are restricted from working at a similar job after you leave their employ. In my case, my employment contract clearly said that attorneys who leave the firm were not allowed to take their clients with them, but I knew that that particular clause was going to be nonenforceable as well. The firm cannot restrict a client’s freedom to hire whomever they want as an attorney.
The only problem was that I did lure Carter away from the firm, in a way, so it would be more of a grey area. If I would’ve done everything aboveboard, which would be to tell the firm what I was doing, and given them a chance to make their case to Carter, at the same time that I was making mine, then everything would’ve been okay. But I didn’t do things in that way – I didn’t tell them that I was going to go see him at the jail, let alone give them a chance to try to retain him.
No matter. If I was going to be in trouble with them, I was going to be in trouble with them. I did what I thought was right, I had a bond with this kid, and I really wanted to make sure that he felt comfortable with his counsel. I couldn’t guarantee that to him if he stayed with the firm, and that was that. Not that I had anything against Nicole Schwartz – she was a very good attorney herself – but, at the same time, I couldn’t guarantee that she would treat this kid as something other than a number.
I sent a short text back to Grey, telling him that I would call him later, and then I went up to the bar to make sure that Carter had the best chance possible of getting a bond. I looked over it at him, and he was standing there with his hands in shackles, wearing his orange jumpsuit. He looked like the scared kid that I first saw when I came into the jail. I could see that there was a faint bruise on his eye, and that concerned me.
The judge called the case to order, he read Carter his charges, and then I decided to go ahead and make an oral motion for a bond for Carter. “Your Honor, I would like to ask for a bond for Mr. Dixon. He’s not a flight risk, as he doesn’t have any money to go anywhere. Not even to Mexico. I would also bring to Your Honor’s attention that, thus far, Ms. Wentworth’s body has not been found. I would submit to Your Honor that this case should not have been charged as a murder so soon after Ms. Wentworth went missing. At the most, this crime should have been charged as a kidnapping, not a murder. If it would’ve been charged as it should’ve been, my client would be eligible for a bond.”
Judge Hammer looked at Neera. “Ms. Justice makes a point. I’ve been following along this case, and Ms. Wentworth has only been missing for the past three days. It is unusual that this office would immediately jump to a murder charge under the circumstances. As far as I’m concerned, there’s not been enough investigation to know whether Ms. Wentworth is alive or dead. So why would this office put the cart before the horse like that?”
Neera glared at me. She knew that I made a point. She knew that her office jumped to a murder charge because of public pressure and because Art Loffino, the studio head at Janus Pictures, the studio producing Addison’s latest film, is the father-in-law of the Los Angeles Chief of Police. Art wanted Addison declared dead so that he could void her contract and get a new actress for his film, and he pressured his son-in-law, Jeff Pappas, to get it done. The prosecutor’s office certainly wasn’t charging this as a murder because their investigation warranted it.
“With all due respect, Your Honor, we have evidence that Ms. Wentworth is no longer alive. It is true that we have not found a body, but as you know, that’s not always necessary to charge a case as a murder.”
Judge Hammer nodded his head. “Oh, I see. What you’re trying to say is that your office was under a lot of pressure to file a murder on this case, considering who the victim is. And I know, I know, there was a copious amount of Ms. Wentworth’s blood found at the scene. But I fail to see how the fact that a copious amount of blood was found at the scene definitively proves that Ms. Wentworth is deceased.”
“That’s exactly why we decided to go ahead and charge this as a murder. There was so much blood in her bedroom, the crime scene, that there was no other conclusion but that Ms. Wentworth could not possibly still be alive after having lost that much blood.”
At that, Judge Hammer just si
ghed. “Okay, I guess you know what you’re doing. But I agree with Ms. Justice here. In my view, this case should have been filed as a kidnapping. Therefore, I’ll go ahead and set a bond for Mr. Dixon. His bond will be $1 million cash.” Judge Hammer then went on to give the conditions of his bond, including that Carter was not to cavort with felons, he was going to have to give a periodic urinalysis, he was not to catch another felony or another crime in general while he’s out on bond, and that he was to wear an ankle monitor at all times.
Neera opened her mouth to object, then she looked over at my client. I knew what she was thinking. There was no way that this kid had $1 million. She didn’t know what I knew – that he didn’t have $1 million to spend on himself, but he did have $1 million to spend on legal fees, including a bond. He had more than enough money for that.
“No objection, Your Honor.”
I smiled, happy that I was able to make sure that Carter bonded out of jail. I worried about that bruise on his eye. I was going to have to talk to him later, after he went home, and find out exactly what was going on with his jail situation. I was worried, because I knew that someone like him would be a target. Not only was he meek and insecure, but he carried himself in such a way that you could tell that he was not at all confident.
Plus, he was famous. I had watched enough 24-hour news channels over the past few days to see that, every few minutes, Carter’s mug shot was shown for the world to see. His name was on everybody’s lips. This case had garnered worldwide attention, too – out of curiosity, I accessed news channels from other countries, and saw that his story was splashed everywhere. China, France, Russia, England, Australia - just about everywhere, people knew the name of Carter Dixon. So, considering the fact that Carter was so famous, I knew that other inmates would be itching to bump him off so that they, too, could be famous.
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