Saving Justice

by Peter O'Mahoney

  “There’s a bunch of people in the photo. Do you want me to name them all?”

  “Is one of them Mr. Fielding?”

  He paused. “Ok. Yeah. I forgot about that day, but I remember now. I saw him over the July 4th weekend. We partied together, but I wasn’t hanging out with just him. It was a party.”

  “On July 5th, did you talk to Mr. Fielding about setting up a doctor to make enough money to pay back your debts?”

  “Objection! Accusation!” Rollins shouted.

  “Sustained!” Judge Reed’s voice thundered through the courtroom. “Mr. Hunter! You will not interfere with the administration of justice through such outrageous questions. That’s your final warning. Another stunt like that and I will charge you with contempt.”

  “I withdraw the question, Your Honor.”

  Hunter turned his gaze to the jury and juror five in the back row nodded. It was a coincidence too big to ignore, and as much as the prosecution was trying to avoid it, the doubt was beginning to rise.

  “No further questions.”

  Chapter 24

  The foyer of the George N. Leighton courthouse was filled with echoing footsteps tapping against marbled floors, murmurs of lawyers and defendants negotiating, and the cries of victims and their families about the failures of justice. The inexhaustible line of people needing their day in court seemed to get bigger every year. It was a mess of noise, a confusion of sound, but Hunter didn’t want to be anywhere else. The building was his second home. A place to see justice served and integrity upheld.

  Hunter was exiting the building for the weekend, briefcase in hand, when he heard his name called out. He stepped through the doors into the cool breeze before he turned around to see who was following.

  Detective Regina Heart jogged through the doors behind him. Dressed in a suit with shoulder-pads, she moved through the exit with confidence and elegance. Her hair was tied back tightly, she wore thin glasses that made her face look long, and she walked with a waft of perfume following her.

  The Chicago PD detective looked like she’d taken on more than her fair share of trauma, but she worked for a purpose. In the sexual assault unit, she had found her life’s calling. A victim herself, she was determined to expose the predators of the world and not allow someone else to experience her pain.

  “Tex Hunter. We need to talk.” She was firm as she came up to him. “I know what you’re trying to do in that courtroom and I don’t like it.”

  “Are you on the witness list? I don’t remember seeing your name on there.”

  “I’m not on the list, but one of my colleagues is. She’s on the stand next week. She’s the detective that took the complaint and investigated the claims of sexual assault against Dr. Mackie.”

  “Ah. Yes. Detective Jessica Nam.”

  Heart nodded to her left, towards an empty corner near the outside entrance, away from the exits or passing foot traffic. Hunter followed her to the corner. The sound of the traffic hummed nearby, the sun was dipping beyond the horizon, and the breeze was gentle. The smell of cigarette smoke was strong, with a number of used butts near their feet.

  “I’ve been sitting in that courtroom listening to what you’ve had to say. What you’re claiming in court is ridiculous—someone like Joe Fielding wasn’t clever enough to tie his own shoelaces.”

  “You knew Fielding?”

  She looked around and didn’t see anyone within earshot. “I’ve investigated him in the past. He attacked a young lady on the street, she pressed charges and I took the report, but then she suddenly dropped them. I’d suggest she got paid by Fielding to drop the charges.”

  Hunter nodded. She’d given a whiff of information, a taste, to suck him in to try and get more information. He didn’t fall for the trap and waited for her to continue.

  “Listen,” she drew a deep breath. “If there’s one thing I hate more than sexual assault, it’s people lying about it. I can’t stand people using the system to get paid for false testimony. We have to be bigger than that.”

  “We can agree on that. It’s an abomination to lie about sexual assault.”

  “Then you’d also be aware that any lies will undo all the decades of progress we’ve made. We’ve worked so hard to develop an environment where people can confidently come forward with accusations of sexual assault. Times have changed.” She looked around. “The worst thing that can happen now is that we start having cases in court that people have lied about. That’ll destroy everything we’ve worked so hard to achieve. The media coverage here is too dangerous. If the media reported that a high-profile case like this was full of lies, then we’d go back ten years. It would destroy all the trust we’ve built, not only with the courts, but with the general public. The doubt around sexual assault claims would start to increase.”

  “The media do love this case.” Hunter replied. “What are you asking me to do?”

  “I’m not asking you to do anything illegal. It’s just…” She looked around for any prying ears again. “I’d like a heads up if you think these witnesses and the defendant are lying about the assault.”

  “Then consider this conversation your heads up.”

  “Do you have evidence?”

  “We’ve got some, but we’re not presenting it to you. If we do that, you’ll tell the prosecution, and then we have no tactics left for the courtroom. I’m not falling for this good guy technique.” Hunter grunted as he began to walk away. “I’m not that gullible.”

  “Wait,” Heart reached out and grabbed his forearm. “Listen, the second we get any evidence that this is a set-up, I’ll convince the prosecutors to drop the case. There’s usually so little evidence in a sexual assault case that we can’t have people lying about these cases. If that starts to happen, we’ll never be able to get a conviction for any case. You’ve got to look at the big picture. This is bigger than just this case. If doubt starts to creep into the national psyche, then nobody is going to believe the victim. That can’t happen. Not now.”

  “The big picture? My big picture is that the prosecution is going after a respected doctor with a weak case full of lying witnesses.”

  “Two witnesses and a defendant that’s willing to testify is not a weak case. That’s a strong one for sexual assault. We had to take this to court. Please, at least talk to me about what you’ve got. Let me look into it.”

  “Alright. I get it.” Hunter said and ran his hand through his thick hair. “If the public starts to doubt sexual assault accusations, it’ll make it hard to land convictions in court. I get that. But I’ve got to defend my client.”

  “Let me work with you. Tell me what you know, and I’ll share anything I find. We’re on the same team here. If these witnesses are lying, I want them to be prosecuted. I’ll drag them into court myself.”

  “And if you investigate it and don’t find anything?”

  “Then I won’t say a word. I’ll have no involvement in the case unless I find something that can help you.”

  “How do I know you’ll keep your word?”

  “I’m a person of honor, Hunter. I wouldn’t be doing this job otherwise. I certainly don’t do it for the paycheck. And if you’re right, then I’ll owe you one. Anything to do with a case, I’ll help you out.”

  Hunter nodded. His play had worked. The detective was smoked out of the woodwork by the questions he presented on the stand. “We found that Fielding had paid an accuser previously. Also a doctor. The charges were later dropped when the accuser took a payout.”

  “A good payout?”

  “Enough to put a deposit on a house.”

  She nodded. “Name?”

  “Well…” Hunter hesitated.

  “Something like this going through court could undo a decade of hard work. The media love your cases, and if they get wind of this, they’ll run it on the front page. It’ll set the movement back years. I can’t allow that to happen.”

  “You give me something, and I’ll give you something. I need you to find Jo
e Fielding’s previous assistant. She disappeared a day after Joe went missing, and all we have is a name—Rebecca White. Fielding was a paranoid man, and covered all his tracks, and it looks like the assistant did the same. We know he had an assistant, but no one knows where to find her.”

  “I’ll contact my people on the streets. Consider it done.”

  “There is one person who knows this case is a set-up. I need your gentle touch to convince her to testify. If you can do that, I’ll give you everything I know.” Hunter nodded his response. “But you’re not going to like it.”

  “Why not?” She squinted.

  “Because the woman is your cousin.” Hunter stated. “The person you want to talk to is Heather Monroe.”

  Chapter 25

  Stacey sat in her empty house on a Friday night, a glass of wine on the table. Next to that was another empty bottle. There was a new red wine stain on the white carpet, but she didn’t care anymore. She used to yell at her husband if he wore his dirty work boots in the house, but now, she didn’t care at all. There were bigger things to worry about.

  She closed all the doors to the rooms upstairs, and half of the doors downstairs. The house felt too big, too cavernous, without the children running around. The empty space wasn’t good for her mental health. She’d been passing out drunk on the couch most nights. She didn’t want to sleep in her bed without her husband there. Staying in the living room, she had a couch, which doubled as a bed, a bathroom in the next room, and the kitchen two doors away. Her own little apartment. She had barely left those four walls in weeks.

  Staggering drunk, she walked to the kitchen, and looked through the drawers. There were scissors, knives, many sharp objects. They all caught her eye. She liked sharp things. Time was counting down to her trial date, and she could feel the tension building. Her shoulders were tightening, her stomach constantly clenched, and her ankles hurt. She had never felt so bad, but she had also never drunk so much, nor eaten so little. She couldn’t hold the food down. Wine and ice-cream were just about her only sustenance.

  When night came again, when the darkness fell outside, she built up the courage to collect the mail that had piled up in the letterbox. She grabbed one of the kitchen knives, and opened the front door. She looked up and down the street, even though it was late. No cars. No movement. No threats nor any prying neighborhood eyes to judge her appearance.

  She stepped forward onto the porch, gripping the knife in her right hand. Running down the path, she threw open the letterbox, grabbed the fist full of letters, and ran back inside without looking back. She slammed the door tightly behind her, huffing long deep breaths. She locked the door, dead-bolted the top lock, and placed a chair under the door handle.

  After walking back into the kitchen, she placed the pile of letters on the table. Bills, advertising, nothing of note in the fist full of papers.

  Until the last letter.

  It had her husband’s name on it, but it was the business address in the top corner that made her heartbeat faster.

  “That can’t be right.” She whispered to herself.

  She stared at the letter for five minutes before she opened it. An invoice for services. Five hundred dollars. Payable by the end of the month.

  Her heart pounded against the walls of her chest.

  “Why was Carl talking to them?” she asked herself, but she knew the truth. There was no denying it. “Why them?”

  She raced to the desktop computer in the office, the one he used when working from home. She turned on the computer and looked at the website history. Her heart beat harder. The sickness washed through her again.

  “How could he? How could he go to them?” She asked herself over and over, becoming quieter each time. “Not them. Why did he go to them?”

  She knew things were bad in their marriage, she knew they were struggling, but she never expected he would go to her biggest rival. She never expected this level of betrayal. She checked the website history again. The questions he typed into the search engine confirmed her suspicions.

  She walked out of the home office and bumped into the wall. She stumbled, before moving back into the kitchen. Out of all the people they knew, out of all the choices, he had chosen them. That had to be deliberate.

  Carl had contacted Vandenberg and Wolfe Family Law Offices to discuss a divorce. The invoice was dated six weeks earlier. Only five days before she was charged with Joe Fielding’s murder.

  Her heart sunk. She gripped her chest. She couldn’t breathe. Was that what he wanted? To break up their family? She fell to the kitchen floor and cried.

  The idea of divorce hurt. It cut her deeply.

  But worse than that, worse than the heartbreak, was the suspicion it raised about the man she once trusted.

  Chapter 26

  Five am. Hunter snapped awake, his heart racing and traces of a cold sweat rolled across his forehead. His breathing was shallow and his heartbeat thundered in his ears. Even awake, his dream was still vivid—his sister, Natalie, on a murderous rampage, killing all the teenage girls from the local neighborhood. The look on the murdered girls’ faces haunted him. Their faces spoke of indescribable terror. She had slit their throats. Buried them in the woods. He could see it. He could feel their pain.

  He picked up his cell phone and rang the cell number he had for his sister again. It was disconnected. He called the café in Puerto Vallarta next. No answer. He’d left messages at the café before, many of them, but hadn’t received a call back. They said if he called again, they would block his number.

  She was refusing to talk, and refusing to even entertain his questions.

  Hunter couldn’t get back to sleep. The nightmare that his sister was a killer was becoming too real. The previous day, he tried to see his father in the Cook County Prison and confront him with the new information, however, when he arrived, Hunter was told his father had been transferred to the prison hospital and wouldn’t be available for days. His father didn’t have long left. That was becoming clearer with each visit.

  His father had secrets, many of them, but it never crossed Hunter’s mind they would be family ones. If the new theory was true, on one hand, he admired his father’s sense of family honor, and his determination to protect his daughter at all costs. But on the other hand, he hated the idea that a serial killer was going free without punishment. He was torn between justice and family, integrity and honor, and he wasn’t sure where he stood.

  At five minutes past eight, after a number of coffees and an hour of morning news, Hunter’s phone rang. It was Detective Heart. She came through on her promise to find Joe Fielding’s previous assistant. Hunter and Jones had been searching for Rebecca White, however, she was going under a different name. Heart had all her details—name, address, date of birth, employment, and most importantly, her current whereabouts. Since Fielding’s death, Rebecca White had changed her first name to Becky and started using her mother’s maiden name, Bennett, on her identification. She’d deleted all her social media profiles, changed her cell number, and moved cities.

  There was seldom a quiet Saturday morning for Hunter. His usual routine was to grab a coffee and bagel from a coffee shop, one that he only visited on Saturdays, open his laptop, and begin work before most people had even thought about what to do with their weekends. There was always more work, always another lead to follow, always another client to protect.

  By 10am, Hunter was on the road again, pushing to find the next clue.

  The movie theatre in the small city of St. Charles, 45 miles west of Chicago, was the perfect place for someone to hide. Becky Bennett was thirty-five, had dark hair, and was clearly happy in her current employment at the front counter of the movie theatre. She had cut her hair, changed her glasses, and changed jobs since Joe Fielding was murdered five weeks earlier. She cut all ties with Fielding’s past, but there was still one friend in Chicago who knew where she was. And that was all Detective Heart needed.

  Hunter walked into the movie theatre
and to the front desk. Twenty-five years ago, the desk was innovative, sophisticated, and cutting edge, but in the years since it hadn’t been updated. However, the staff took pride in their place of employment, and it looked as if the theatre had only been erected weeks ago, in a retro-style to match the fashion of the 90s.

  “Hello, how may I help you?” Becky Bennett avoided eye contact as Hunter approached.

  The foyer around them was empty, with no movies near starting time. The carpet was off red and clean, the neon lights that lined the walls were slick, and signed movie posters of past blockbusters sat behind the counter.

  “One ticket to prison for perjury.” Hunter approached the counter, towering over the staff member.

  She raised her head and looked at him confused. “That’s not a movie here. I haven’t heard of that one. Are you sure you’re at the right cinema?”

  “It’s stars Joe Fielding.”

  She inhaled loudly, and then covered her mouth with her hand. It took her a moment to calm herself. “Ok. Listen, whatever Joe was involved with it doesn’t have anything to do with me. If he had debts, then I can’t pay them. His life wasn’t my life. Whatever you want, I can’t help you.”

  “My name is Tex Hunter. I’m a criminal lawyer and all I want is to talk to you, Becky. Or Rebecca White. Whichever name you wish to go by.” Hunter used a calm voice. “I need ten minutes of your time to talk.”

  Becky bit her lip and looked across to her colleague at the other end of the theatre. Her colleague was busy refilling the popcorn machine, but was eavesdropping on their conversation.

  “I can cover for you.” The other girl said, aware of the tension. “It’s quiet. There’s not another movie due to start for the next hour. Take your lunch break now.”

  Becky gulped, wiped her brow, and then stepped away from the desk, indicating for Hunter to follow her outside. She walked out the front doors of the cinema that led to a large open-air parking lot. Once outside, she looked up and down the street to see if anyone was watching, before continuing to the furthest corner of the building, to the place where the workers escaped to have a cigarette. Once around the corner, she stopped and turned to Hunter.