The Substitution Order, page 34
“They won’t find my prints,” I say, “because I’ve never touched any fake orders. So the commonwealth’s entire case will be—on its very best day—that three forged orders appeared, one in an envelope from Atlanta. Mr. Moore wasn’t in Atlanta, there’s no DNA, no prints, and Mr. Moore has consistently denied any involvement. Mr. Moore is an attorney and would realize that Judge Morris wouldn’t send a copy of his order to a jail, for gosh sakes. The charges will be dismissed as a matter of law, won’t even make it past a motion to strike. Suspicious for sure, but there’s no chance I’ll be convicted. The commonwealth can’t tie me to the orders beyond a reasonable doubt—you have to know that. It’s Criminal Law 101.”
“There’s also the search for Belarus on your computer. The police went back with a search warrant. Didn’t even have to do any forensics. That exotic vacation locale, which doesn’t share extradition with our country, was in your recent history. Not to mention that most of your clothes and possessions were boxed up, and your suitcase was packed.”
“Ward,” I say, “I know you think I’m either lying, or a druggie and a drunk, or a crackpot, and I realize this will piss you off, but the reason I searched for Belarus is because of the deposition in the civil case. It’s discussed on a court reporter’s CD. That’s a fact. Melanie Culp, the plaintiff, used a fake Belarus marriage to launder millions of dollars. The search is actually for Belarus records, not for Belarus houses or Belarus apartments. I’m at war with these assholes, Ward. At war. They did this. They’re trying to put me away for years and discredit me because I’m fighting them and finally making some progress. As for the clothes, I have to move out when my landlord comes to visit. He’ll confirm that I’m telling you the truth.”
“I’ll meet with Clay once more—as I’m ethically required to do—and see if he’ll still offer the original deal. After that, I’m done. You need to hire a new lawyer. I’d suggest Esther Mulberry or Jimmy McGarry. Maybe Joe Stone. Of course, you know the attorneys in Roanoke better than I do—assuming any of them will help you given how you’ve fucked everyone over and made us look like idiots. Have whomever you hire contact my office, and we’ll do an order substituting counsel.”
“Ward, I’m sorry, but I didn’t screw you or anyone else.”
“I should’ve quit you a long time ago.” He fixes me with a look that’s pure disgust. “This kinda shit makes all of us seem like crooks.” He stalks off and slams the door so hard that it doesn’t catch and bounces off the frame and comes to rest against the stop, wide open.
* * *
Esther Mulberry will tongue-in-cheek tell you that the only inheritance she received from her white furniture-dynasty daddy is her fancy last name and her stubby legs. “The rest is totally my mom—and thank my lucky stars for that.” The child of Trey Mulberry and Tia Alcorn, a black supervisor at his family’s chair factory, Esther was raised in Martinsville, graduated at the top of her class from Temple in 1989 and graded onto law review at Georgetown. Trey had an admirable heart, and when he—single and footloose at age twenty-five—discovered that Tia was pregnant, he happily married her and moved her and their dark-skinned baby into his mansion with the bowling alley and statuary garden.
The arrangement didn’t sit well with anyone in 1967 Southside Virginia, especially the country club crowd, who’d built their segregated Shangri-La to avoid exactly this kind of progress and paid steep dues each month to keep the coloreds in the kitchen and out of the damn swimming pool. Poor Esther—defiantly named after Trey’s grandmother—suffered a pendulum existence of wanton persecution and patronizing head pats until she left home for college at eighteen. By then, as Trey liked to say, she was tough as whitleather.
When the furniture industry went bust in Henry County and all the plants closed, when Tultex and DuPont and Bassett-Walker and Mulberry Furniture were chained and padlocked and the bankruptcy buzzards picked the remains clean, when the Roman-numeral heirs weren’t guaranteed a corner office or a trust fund, when the legacy ledgers went to red and Martinsville became a dust bowl, Esther Mulberry was long gone, working in the justice department for Bill Clinton, then George Bush, and after cashing out as a seven-figure partner at a powerhouse Washington firm, she—wealthy and well connected—relocated to Roanoke to be closer to her diabetic mom and penniless, alcoholic daddy, who died in 2014 but lived to see the local high school honor his daughter with the “distinguished graduate” award.
Esther meets me on October 18 at the jail’s interview room. She’s already seated when I’m escorted—shackled and unshaven—from the pod to see her.
“This is quite an unexpected reversal, isn’t it, Kevin?” she says after the cop has left and we’ve made small talk for a few minutes. We know each other casually, and we worked together in 2013, represented codefendants charged with federal drug crimes. She’s wearing a neck scarf and a gray dress. She’s petite, maybe five-four, and every movement, every sentence, and every expression is badass serene, the demeanor you’d expect from someone who’s been threatened by Mexican crime lords, white-collar price-fixers and seedy West Virginia coal bosses—and thrashed them all.
“No doubt,” I answer.
She’s quiet for a moment. “I’ve reviewed your court files and spoken with Mr. Armstrong. Tell me your version of events, please.”
“How long do you have?” I ask.
“As long as we need,” she answers, and truly means it.
We discuss my situation for forty minutes. She sits primly, doesn’t take notes, and lingers on various pieces of my story, cross-examines me to see how well I’d fare at a trial. Her expression remains stoic and flat, never gives anything away. Occasionally, she asks a personal question: “Where did you finish law school?” “Are you and your wife on civil terms now?” “Did you enjoy being a lawyer?” “Why did you settle in Meadows of Dan, such an isolated place?”
I finish by assuring her that there is nothing—no DNA, no prints, no post-office video—to connect me to these forged court orders.
“What’re your expectations?” she asks.
“Same as most defendants, I’d prefer to be found not guilty. I’ll concede that there’s plenty of room for suspicion, lots of smoke, but there’s no fire, Esther, and no chance I’ll ever be convicted of these forgery charges, not unless Randy Clay’s sitting on mystery evidence we’re unaware of.”
“Randy Clay is sitting on a five-year mandatory minimum in your gun case and forty years in the distribution case. Would you agree, based on these recent developments, that he’s legally—and morally—entitled to withdraw his extremely fair offers on those charges?”
“I can certainly see why he’s upset.”
“So can I,” she says. “I may very well win the battle for you on the forged-order cases—I won’t have to do much more than sit there and make a motion to strike—but we risk losing the war and your catching five, six, seven years on the other charges.”
“Correct. Have you taken Clay’s temperature? How mad is he?”
She deflects the question. “Which do you value more? Your freedom or your law license?”
“My law license,” I answer. “I don’t have any way to support myself without it.”
“Evidently, you have fifty-one thousand dollars and change, though I’m speculating it might not be domestic and easily accessible these days.”
I smile. “Hard to live the rest of my life on fifty K.”
“So what’s the number, then? What’s my bargaining range?”
I understand her question and her strategy. “Start with three,” I say.
“Not enough,” she replies.
“I’d take up to five or six. That’s a long time to make sandwiches.”
“I’ll visit Mr. Clay as soon as I leave here.” She stands. “I’ll require a ten-thousand retainer. Any problems with the fee?”
“Well, as you mentioned, it might be a while before I can pay you in full. Unless the cops were unusually skilled with their search warrant, there should be seventy-five hundred of that fifty-one thousand hidden in my landlord’s barn. A down payment.”
“Well, let’s keep our fingers crossed that the police didn’t discover it—some observers might view it as road money, your transition cash for a sudden trip.”
“I’m curious. I’m in no position to take any of my drug cases to trial, and if I did plead not guilty, I don’t have much more than my raggedy word and a few coincidences, but I was wondering what you make of the Caleb Opportunity piece of my puzzle. You’re impossible to read. I’m confident you’ll go to the mat for me, but it’s always helpful if your lawyer actually believes in your innocence. Ward has always been, uh…skeptical.”
“You ever heard of Catalon Chemical?” she asks. “The Chinese company?”
“No,” I answer.
“A brazen theft,” she says. “The governor handed 1.4 million of taxpayer money to these characters so they’d locate a business in Appomattox. North Carolina had already discovered they weren’t legitimate and basically warned Richmond not to trust them. The Catalon website was a cut-and-paste joke, and a few keystrokes and minor due diligence would’ve uncovered their cyber-ruses, fake addresses and many aliases. Yet you can go online and see the picture of beaming state and local officials giving away the giant check and cutting the ribbon with scissors the size of pruning shears. The scammers are right there in the photo—doesn’t matter. Catalon took the money and vanished to China. Gone.”
“Damn,” I say.
“I’m open-minded about how much subterfuge there is in the world. I’ve seen captains of industry and major corporations get looted for millions, and we’ve all seen the almost-daily media reports about spectacular hacks and data breaches—those are just the tip of the iceberg, because most companies and branches of government aren’t anxious to broadcast their failures. So, sure, Kevin, it’s possible that devious people routinely intercept state-board e-mails and use them to their advantage. But like you said, I assume we’re past the point of trying to sell a white-haired-mystery-man defense to a jury.”
“Yeah,” I agree. “There’re all kinds of reasons for me to avoid a trial, but I’m happy to learn that you’re at least willing to consider the slim possibility I’m not a liar or a lunatic. Just make the best deal you can for me.”
“I will.”
“Esther,” I say as she’s collecting her purse and briefcase, “I want this to go quickly. Before I caught these new charges, we’d tentatively discussed my pleading this week. The sword above my neck and the uncertainty and worry are additional punishments. Also, I want full credit for accepting guilt and not wasting the commonwealth’s time and money. If Clay will package this, I’m willing to waive indictment on the new warrants and fast-track my cases as needed.”
* * *
I return to the pod, where I use the public phone to call Melvin.
“Where in blue blazes are you, Kevin?” he immediately asks. “Sounds like you’re at a party or a bar.”
“Well, you’re sort of correct,” I say. “I’m behind bars.”
“Christ, Kevin. Enough’s enough. What is it this time?”
“A completely false forgery charge. I’m innocent.” I’m aware that the conversation is being recorded. All jail calls are monitored.
“Yeah,” Melvin snorts. “You and everybody else in there.”
“The house is in perfect shape, clean and organized. You’ll be pleased. Yard is mowed, fences are repaired. I’ve finished almost every word in the Gardner Turman story; the file’s on the computer, the hard copy’s in a fireproof cabinet. I’d already started moving and packing my stuff so I’d be out of your hair by the twenty-fourth, but I was arrested before I could finish. Sorry to ask, but maybe you could just store my clothes and my few knickknacks in the guesthouse for a while—I’d be glad to pay you for the space. There’s chicken scratch in the barn, but the birds still have enough to eat in the yard and pasture. The horses are fine; they have plenty of grass, though they’ve become spoiled to a sweet-feed treat most days. My dog is gone. The doors should be locked, and your key’s with a Patrick County cop named Darrell Pruitt. I won’t be coming back anytime soon. I’m sorry, and I’m sorry for the trouble and confusion. Sorry to disappoint you. You’ve been a great friend to me, Melvin. I wish this were ending differently.”
“I hope you can finally get straight and become Kevin Moore again. I do. But we understand each other: I’ve carried more than my fair share of the load, and the favor bank is empty.”
“Yes. And thank you.”
“Okay,” Melvin answers, and, as usual, disconnects abruptly.
Next, I phone Blaine at the restaurant, but I keep the call brief. He’s still spooked, still scared. He’s never experienced any repercussions from his years of online tomfoolery, never seriously considered that a real brick-and-mortar jail might be lurking amongst the coding if an e-adventure falls apart.
“I’m in the Martinsville jail,” I alert him. “Nelson okay?”
“He’s here with me. I’m takin’ good care of him. Anything I can do to help you?”
“Just look after the dog. I’ll be fine. Don’t worry.”
I hang up and join a scrum of prisoners watching a western on the communal TV. Out of nowhere, the man beside me asks if I know “a white dude named Hines. They call him Ace.”
“Sorry, I don’t,” I reply.
“I was just wonderin’. You favor a man what used to run with him.”
I nap on the floor, and my dinner includes a half-pint of off-brand whole milk. I haven’t bent and separated a glued, waxy carton spout since elementary school, and the nostalgia distracts me for a moment, blotting out the bars and voices and smells.
* * *
At six-thirty, I’m shackled again, and I trudge and jangle to the interview room, a guard at my elbow. My orange jail slides are too large for my feet, and I lose a shoe and have to stop and backtrack and slip it on. The lighting in the room is poor. There’s a crumpled silver-and-white gum wrapper on the floor. A couple of tiles—replacements—are brighter than the rest. Esther is standing in a corner, her belongings on the battered table. “I think we have a deal,” she says.
I don’t sit, either. “So what is it?”
She tells me the numbers.
We’re both quiet, but she never breaks eye contact. “That’s almost too generous,” I say.
“Well, Kevin,” she smiles, “it’s why you hired me.”
“Do you trust Clay?” I ask. “I don’t know him. He has a solid name with the bar; I’ve never heard of him pulling anything dishonest.”
“Not sure how much it matters—there’s no opportunity for dishonesty once we sign a plea agreement. Everybody’s locked in.”
“What about the Feds?” I ask. “Maybe that’s what’s in the weeds. Maybe they’re planning to charge me too.”
“I’ve got a call in to the U.S. attorney’s office in Roanoke. Anthony Giorno’s a straight shooter. He’ll tell me if they have any interest, but this seems far too small for them.”
“The Feds are prone to grandstand, and they love to perp-walk white-collar defendants so they’ll appear evenhanded.”
She scowls. “When I was a Fed, I took a measure of satisfaction in convicting white-collar criminals because, one, they were guilty, and two, their crimes usually impacted thousands of innocent people, right down to the fixed-income retirees whose IRA accounts went to junk thanks to stock fraud, or the miners who contracted cancer after their greedy employer cut corners on safety and environmental regs.”
“Sorry,” I correct myself, “but we need to have them sign off as well. The orders were mailed, and there you go, that’s a favorite tactic of theirs, and the moment I plead here, if we’re not careful, Uncle Sam will tag me with three counts of mail fraud, and I’ll catch more felonies and more time.”
“I understand. Anthony will work with us. We occasionally shared western Virginia cases when I was in Washington, and he’s a quality man. I’m not worried about federal charges. Not at all. This isn’t even a blip on their radar.”
“Are we missing anything?” I press her. “Maybe Clay plans to indict me for other charges. And the Patrick County prosecutor is on board? Stephanie Katt is her name. I hear she’s very bright and a killer.”
“I appreciate the backhanded compliment, but the offer isn’t so incredible as to seem like a trap or tease to me. And yes, I’ve reached out to Mrs. Katt, and she’s in agreement.”
“We need to sew it up like nobody’s business. Sorry to be paranoid, but we should include language about the deal covering crimes related to, or in any way connected with, any and all forged court orders—”
“I’ve done a plea agreement or two,” she interrupts. “I understand the intricacies. This isn’t my first trip to the opera.” Her stolid expression doesn’t change. She doesn’t appear offended by my reminding her of legal basics. “Oh, wait. Okay. ‘Any and all’? Hmmm. There were two matching release orders discovered in Martinsville, yet only one so far in Patrick County. Odd, now that I think about it. Perhaps there’s another shoe to fall, and we need to account for a fourth fake release order?”
“Couldn’t hurt,” I answer, my head bowed, the words directed at the floor. “Things often come in pairs. Things can be delayed in the mail. Or temporarily misplaced in the shuffle at a hectic office.” I act guilty and chagrined, communicate that I definitely need immunity for another forged order.
