“Do you know of anybody who would be able to take heroin and shape it into a pill form that would resemble a Nifedipine pill?” Harper asked, already knowing the answer, but having to ask it anyhow.
Mom rolled her eyes. “Are you trying to piss me off now, Harper, because if you are, you’re doing a good job. If I don’t know nobody who’s gonna sell me heroin, then I wouldn’t know nobody who could shape heroin into a pill, now, would I?” She shook her head and took a sip of her whiskey. “I’m gonna take a hit. I can’t take this. I don’t even care if you guys don’t want me to or not.” At that, she lit up her rolled joint and inhaled, not even coughing a little bit when she blew out the smoke. “There, now I’m relaxed. You can ask me more questions. Go ahead. Ain’t nothing gonna bother me now.”
Harper glanced over at me, and nodded her head. “Olivia, thanks for seeing us. You’ve been very helpful, more helpful than you know.”
“I’m just telling you what I know, which ain’t much. Damien, why does that prosecutor have such a hard-on for me? I don’t get it. Tracy, he took the junk, he died. Simple as that, yet here I am, up for murder of the guy. I just don’t get it.”
“That’s what I’m trying to figure out as well, Olivia,” Harper said. “I know that Damien is going to be speaking with the prosecutor within a couple of days, trying to pick their brain as to why it is that they charged your case like this. Not that they’re going to tell us anything, but it’s worth trying to understand what they’re thinking.”
A kernel of a thought came into my brain about what the endgame was with the prosecutor’s office on this case, but it was just that. A kernel. I had to wonder if the fact that the guy was rich had anything to do with the fact that my mother was on the hook for killing him.
But, then again that didn’t make a lot of sense. So, he was rich, and his family was extremely rich. So what?
Actually, he wasn’t rich, come to think of it. He hadn’t been given his inheritance, unlike just about everybody else in his generation who was part of the Dunham family. That was still an oddity that stuck out to me.
We chatted with my mom for about another hour, just kind of shooting the breeze. I did my usual amount of fixing up around the house – unclogging her toilet, setting out mousetraps, fixing her washing machine, etc., while Harper and my mom shared a piece of pie.
Chapter 11
The next day, I filed a petition on behalf of Audrey Blackwood. I knew that it was going to be opening up a big fat can of worms, but I didn’t care. All that I really knew was that it was time that this guy, Michael Reynolds, paid at least a little bit for what he had had done to so many people.
After I filed that petition, I decided to go and pay a visit to the prosecutor for my mom’s case, Kevin Williams. I knew that he didn’t have court right at that moment, so there was a good chance that he was around.
I got to his office suite, told the receptionist that I needed to see him, and she told me to go on back. I went to his office, saw that his door was open, so I knocked lightly on the open door.
Kevin looked up from his desk and smiled. Kevin was a handsome black man with a bald head. He was a big guy, having played Division 1 football as a linebacker, but he wasn’t fat at all. I had to admit, as a man with a limited amount of fashion sense, I admired the sharp way that Kevin dressed. Nothing was ever out of place with him, and everything seemed to come together with whatever color combination he chose. He looked the part of a high-dollar attorney from a white-shoe firm, even though he was a prosecutor making around $70,000 a year, if that. Tailored suits, Italian wing-tipped shoes that he apparently shined every morning, gold cufflinks, and a perfectly folded handkerchief in his pocket. He also had a scent that was a part of his image, for he was known for wearing high-dollar cologne that wasn’t overpowering, just woodsy and clean.
He smiled broadly when he saw me. “Damien Harrington, where’ve you been keeping yourself? I haven’t seen you around in awhile.”
I smiled back. “Right. Well, I have this serious case with my mother, so I haven’t been going to my usual docket calls. I’ve been getting coverage for my docket calls. Don’t have time for those right now.”
He shook his head, a broad smile on his face. “Don’t I know it. I’m so glad I don’t do those things anymore. I’m telling you, the plea docket was the ninth circle of hell. Anyhow, I know why you’re here. You want to know why I’m prosecuting your mama. Listen, I’m sorry about that, I really am. When this case was dumped on me, I asked the same damned thing. The only answer I got was that the district attorney wanted her prosecuted. That’s all I know, man. I wish I knew more.”
That didn’t sound right to me. “Kevin, the district attorney personally wants my mom prosecuted?” While that wasn’t necessarily unusual - technically, the district attorney wanted everybody prosecuted who was charged with a crime - it seemed unusual that the DA himself was personally involved in prosecuting my mother.
“Yeah, that’s what’s been coming down the pike on this one. I don’t really know what to tell you. You know that our policy, generally, is to speak with the victim’s family before dropping a case. Or to the victim, if the victim is alive. And, for some odd reason, Dr. Dunham’s brother, Robert, who is Dr. Dunham’s closest living relative, is adamant that the charges against your mom not be dropped. And if Robert Dunham speaks in this town, he’s listened to. I think you probably know that by now. I’m sorry, man, I wish I had better news for you.”
I sat down. “Kevin, I think you know that the case against my mom is weak tea to begin with. I mean, charging her with murder when your only evidence is that she possibly, maybe, got high with the guy?”
Kevin shrugged. “You shouldn’t be so surprised about that. That’s the new trend, my man, where’ve you been? People are being prosecuted for supplying drugs to a person who overdosed all over the country. And, if your mom was high on the stuff, and Dr. Dunham came over to her house, that’s circumstantial evidence right there that she gave him drugs. We can establish a timeline with Dr. Dunham’s wife that when he left the house that night, he was as sober as a judge. He left the house that night at 9:00, your mother’s statement to the police indicated that he arrived at your mother’s house at around 9:30, his home was almost exactly a half hour away from your mother’s home, so the chance that he picked up that heroin in between leaving his house and getting to your mother’s house is slim. The jury can ascertain from those facts that your mother supplied the drugs to Dr. Dunham.” He unwrapped a pack of gum and popped a stick in his mouth. “Besides, we only have to show that the two were getting high together for a murder charge to stick. With your mother’s UA, taken the next morning, that won’t be hard to do at all.”
I crossed my arms in front of me. “Kevin, again, all you have is circumstantial evidence. You can’t show that my mom supplied Dr. Dunham with anything. For all you know, he could have had the heroin in his pocket when he went to see my mom and he supplied her with the drugs.”
“You know, I would almost agree with you, except for the fact that the blood pressure medicine seized at your mother’s house tested positive for, you guessed it, high-grade heroin, the same kind of heroin that was found in the toxicology examination of the good doctor. Sorry, the evidence isn’t looking so good for you.”
“That was planted, plain and simple. I don’t know what the chain of evidence was when those blood pressure drugs were seized. I have no clue. You still don’t have anything too solid with which to charge my mother.”
“Tell it to the judge,” he said. “In the meantime, I can’t dismiss this case. I’m really sorry, I don’t want to do that to your mama, I know I wouldn’t want my own mama done like this, but it is what it is.”
“Okay,” I said. “I thought that I could talk some sense into you, but I guess I can’t right now. You’re going to end up dismissing this, sooner or later, mark my words. But thanks for your time.”
He nodded his head. “I do have an offer for you.
20 years, plead to man one. I can even talk to my boss about giving your mom 20 years, plead to delivery of a controlled substance, so she won’t have a murder on her record. At the moment, we’re going for felony murder, as the death occurred during the commission of a felony, the felony being the original delivery of a controlled substance. That’s second-degree murder she’s facing. You have an opportunity for a plea to man one or simple delivery of a controlled substance. I think you should take it myself.”
“Whatever,” I said. “I’m not pleading my mom to anything. Nothing. If you don’t dismiss the case, prepare to go to trial.”
He smiled a disarming smile and a small chuckle came out. “I wish I could, Harrington. Believe me, I wish I could dismiss it. But I can’t. Higher-up orders and all that. Sorry, man, I hope we can still be friends even after I put your mama in prison. It’s nothing personal, you know.”
“Of course, it’s nothing personal,” I said. “And I hope that you don’t take it personally that I beat your ass in court on this.”
He nodded his head, still smiling. “I would expect nothing less. Anyhow, let’s exchange our discovery and see where the chips fall.” He nodded his head, and I got up to walk out.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll get you my discovery and my expert witness designation within a couple of weeks. You do the same.”
“See you Harrington,” Kevin said. “Wish I could have helped you more.”
“Be expecting a Motion to Dismiss and a Motion to Suppress. I don’t believe that there was probable cause to give my client a UA, let alone for the search and seizure of her home.”
“File it, and I’ll see you in court.”
“I will.”
I didn’t say anything more, but just walked out. I shouldn’t have been angry with Kevin, but I was. He was the face of the prosecution, the face of the government, the same government that was trying to put my mom away on a BS charge.
I couldn’t get around that.
Chapter 12
The next week, I got into court on my Motion to Dismiss and Motion to Suppress. It was a long-shot, but I had to take it. From the evidence, I saw no reason why my mother would have been given a UA. Her dirty UA ostensibly gave the cops a reason to search her home, but even that shouldn’t have been the basis for the search and seizure, because it wasn’t illegal for her to have been high in her home. No law against that.
I got into the courtroom, and Judge Watkins and Kevin were there waiting for me. Judge Watkins smiled at me. “Hello, counselor, I understand that you have some motions for me to entertain?”
“Yes, I do, your honor. I have a motion to suppress the heroin that was found in my mother’s medicine cabinet. As you can read in my motion, the police did not have probable cause to arrest my mother at the time that they seized the pills in her cabinet that tested positive for heroin. I also have a motion to suppress the UA that was given to my client. If these items are suppressed, then I’m going to go ahead and ask for you to rule on my Motion to Dismiss the case.”
I looked over at Kevin. “This is your last chance to not humiliate yourself. You do know that this case is going to be an uphill battle for you, anyway. It’s going to be hard to show that my client gave him the drugs that he died from.”
“Dream on, Harrington. Sorry, but I’m not buying what you’re trying to sell. And I told you, once before, that I can’t possibly move off of my offer for this case. 20 years in prison, and I can possibly move the charge down to a 20% charge. That would take some maneuvering, I’m not going to lie, but I can try.”
This actually was a different offer than the one he offered before. Before, he simply said 20 years. In the state of Missouri, second degree murder, which was what my mom is being charged with, was an 85% charge. That meant that if you get convicted of second degree murder, you served 85% of your prison time. That was the way it was with what was called the seven deadlies in Missouri – rob one, murder of any kind, arson one, forcible rape, forcible sodomy were among the deadly sins in Missouri. If he was willing to deal my mom’s sentence down to a 20% crime, to where she was only going to have to serve 20% of her crime, typical for a first time down situation, then he must have known that his hand was weak.
I felt more confident after he made that offer. I knew that I could go for the jugular on this one.
“No thanks,” I said to Kevin. “In the meantime, I have my motion to suppress the heroin that I need for the judge to hear.”
Judge Watkins nodded his head. “Go ahead, counselor, hit me with your best shot.”
I cleared my throat, and glanced at my mother, who was sitting at the defense table with Harper by her side. She looked terrified, her rheumy and blood-shot blue eyes wide.
“Okay,” I said. “Here are the facts, as Mr. Williams knows, and so do you, your honor. But the officers in this case, Officer Conrad and Officer Black, appeared at Ms. Ward’s residence at her behest. She called 911 when she woke up to find her friend, Dr. Tracy Dunham, deceased on her couch. When the paramedics arrived, so did Officers Conrad and Black. At that time, they did not have probable cause to arrest my client. In fact, they didn’t have probable cause to give her a UA, either. They didn’t know at that time how Dr. Dunham died, and, even assuming that my client was high on drugs at that time, which she was not, but assuming that she was, the Officers still didn’t have probable cause to arrest her because they could not have known that Dr. Dunham had died of a drug overdose. Indeed, my client was not arrested that morning, even though her UA returned a result that indicated that she was taking opium during that time.”
At that, Kevin interrupted me. “Your honor, Mr. Harrington is giving you a false narrative here, all right? The officers had every reason to suspect that Dr. Dunham had died of a drug overdose, which gave them probable cause to take Ms. Ward into custody at that time. When she was given a UA, which indicated that Ms. Ward was high on some kind of opium at that time, those officers really had probable cause to arrest her.”
I cleared my throat. I was itching for a fight. “With all due respect, what gave those officers the indication that night that Dr. Dunham had died of a drug overdose? There was no way that anybody could know how he died until they autopsied him and did a toxicology examination. For all those officers knew, Dr. Dunham died of a heart attack, which would mean that even if my client was high on heroin, which she wasn’t, but even if she was, there wasn’t a reason to arrest her that night. You cannot arrest somebody simply for being high in their home.”
Judge Watkins looked at me. “True, you can’t arrest somebody for being high, but you can arrest them for drug possession. Once the officers saw that your client was possibly high, and they gave her a UA to confirm it, it was incumbent upon them to search your client’s home and person to see if she had drugs. You can’t very well argue that the officers couldn’t arrest your client just because she was high, and then tie their hands to search for the drugs that she took that night, drugs that would be the basis for a proper arrest.”
I knew what he was getting at, and he wasn’t wrong. If the officers suspected that my mother was high, then that gave them suspicion enough to try to find the drugs that made her that way. But I wasn’t having it.
“Your honor, they didn’t arrest her that night, and that’s the point. They didn’t arrest her, because they had no reason to arrest her. All that she was doing that night was minding her own business in her home, in her castle, so anything that she was doing in the privacy of her own home was not the business of anybody else. And-”
Judge Watkins was stuck on the idea that if there were drugs at my mom’s house, that meant that the cops had a reason to search. “But counselor, if she was minding her own business in her own home, and that home had contraband, then the police officers were acting within their purview to search. And, your client consented to the search.”
That was the sticking point, I had to admit. My mother consented to the search. “Your honor, my client is unsophisticated. She di
dn’t know the ramifications of allowing a search of her premises. Moreover, she had no indication that she was in any kind of trouble. She wasn’t under arrest. She wasn’t in custody. She just saw that two officers showed up at her door, she thought that they were there only to question her about how Dr. Dunham died, and the officers never told her that they even suspected her of playing a role in his death.”
“Yes, but your honor, they did give her a UA. That should have given her reason to believe that something was in the air,” Kevin said.
“Again, she wasn’t under arrest. In fact, the officers did not arrest her until months later, after Dr. Dunham’s post-mortem showed that he died of a drug overdose and my client’s UA showed that she had opiates in her bloodstream at the time he died. No probable cause to arrest means no probable cause to search. If the officers would have told my client that they suspected her of playing a role in Dr. Dunham’s death or that she was in custody, she would not have willingly consented to a search of her premises. As it was, she thought that there wouldn’t be any harm in letting them search, because she had no idea that she would be in trouble.”
It looked like the judge was considering my argument. He put his hand to his chin and tapped his pen on the bench.
I decided to press on. “Your honor, it cannot be said that an officer can come into a private home and just search that home without having a suspicion that a crime had been committed, and then use the fruits of that search to charge somebody with a crime. They must first have probable cause that a crime had been committed before they can search.”
“And they did have probable cause that a crime had been committed because the defendant’s UA showed that the defendant was high on opiates,” Kevin interjected. “Since she was high, it followed that she possessed drugs. That gave the officers a reason to search for those drugs.”
Until Proven Guilty Page 9
