Leader of the Pack

by David Rosenfelt

  He takes about five steps toward the defense table, which leaves him about ten feet away, and he points to Joey. “This case is about this man, Joseph Desimone, who was rejected by a woman. So he killed her.

  “And the reason he was rejected? Because she wanted to make it work with her husband. So Joseph Desimone killed him as well.

  “In the Desimone family, men get what they want, by whatever means necessary. The son learned that from the father, who learned that from his father before him. It was a way of life, and it worked quite well for them.”

  Dylan then launches into a rehash of the evidence. It’s impressive, but not overwhelming. It’s either enough to leave some reasonable doubt, or enough to put Joey away for life. And for the life of me, I don’t know which.

  I stand to take my final shot at convincing the jury. “I can’t prove to you that Joseph Desimone did not kill Richard and Karen Solarno. I know that he didn’t, but that’s my knowledge, my judgment, not yours, and not anyone else’s. I wish I could prove it, but I can’t.

  “It’s very hard to prove a negative. Things have to break just right, and life usually doesn’t work that way.

  “But I also can’t prove to you that any one of the other criminals and gangsters that Richard Solarno dealt with didn’t kill him, and didn’t kill his wife. I can’t point to one and say, ‘he did it,’ or ‘they did it,’ because I just don’t know. And neither does anyone else in this courtroom.

  “That’s why you’re here, to make your own decision, but you do not have free rein. As Judge Henderson will tell you, you can only convict a defendant if you are certain beyond a reasonable doubt about his guilt.

  “So, in the absence of proof one way or the other, all you can do is weigh the factors. For instance, you can weigh the fact that Joseph Desimone had never once been charged with a crime. Never so much as arrested, never even a suspect.

  “This is no small feat, considering the reputation of others in his family. Because traditionally members of the Desimone family are suspected, and questioned, in regards to pretty much everything bad that happens in New Jersey. And sometimes with good reason.

  “But not Joseph Desimone. Never Joseph Desimone. Because everyone, including law enforcement, understood that while he was a member of the family, he was never a member of the family.

  “So we have Richard Solarno, a proven arms dealer, supplying weapons to people who wanted to purchase them in large quantities, and did not want to purchase them legally. What does this say about them? That they were just going to practice at the range, sort of like a hobby? Or that they were going deer hunting? Of course not. They wanted to use them for criminal activities; the very act of buying them was a criminal activity.

  “And a member of the Montana State Police sat in this chair and told you that Solarno double-crossed his customers, that they were so angry about it that they threatened to kill him. Who would be more likely to actually have done so? People like that? Or someone like Joseph Desimone, who never committed a crime in his life?”

  I launch into our assessment of the evidence that Dylan has summed up, exaggerating the success we had in refuting it. I don’t take too long in doing so; the jury has heard plenty for one day, and I don’t want them resenting me for delaying their naps.

  “Joseph Desimone has already lost too much of his life, time that can never be made up to him. But you have the power to say enough is enough, to stand up and say that we don’t take away a man’s liberty in this state, in this country, unless we know that he deserves it. We need to know it beyond a reasonable doubt.

  “I submit to you that the state has not come close to meeting that burden.”

  I head back to the table, and when I sit down, Joey puts his hand on my shoulder. “Thank you, Andy. I know this can go either way, but without you, I’d have no chance at all.”

  The relief effort was in high gear almost immediately, especially in the United States Private citizens flooded the Red Cross phone lines with donations and responded to media appeals for canned goods and supplies by dropping them off by the tons at selected locations.

  Corporations stepped up to the plate as well. Food and drug companies made enormous contributions, building supply companies followed suit, and airline cargo companies signed up to fly the goods in.

  The FAA and air traffic control system also geared up to deal with the special circumstances. Flights to that area of South America were increased tenfold, so flight plans had to be quickly signed off on. Customs inspections were relaxed; there was just no way to keep up, and delay was unacceptable.

  As is always the case, the true question would be whether this would be a short burst, or was everyone in it for the long haul. How long would the rest of the world be there, helping the victims of the Montaro Dam disaster?

  The media, while still covering it intensely, had subtly moved to the next phase. Not wanting to relentlessly paint only the grim picture, they were in the mode of splashing news of a single survivor found in the rubble, and parading on people to trumpet it as a miracle. They were desperate to find a feel-good story in the middle of a feel-awful situation.

  Among the many hundreds of airplanes landing daily from the United States and around the world, two in particular were carrying food rations. They were huge cargo planes, and the desperately needed rations could feed and provide water for ten thousand people for one week.

  The planes landed at the Lima airport, but such was the chaos there that they were on the ground for four hours before anyone paid attention to them, fourteen hours before the unloading process began, and almost thirty-six hours before they were empty.

  The pilots rested for much of this time, since they had a long trip back to the States, where they promised to load up again and be back.

  But once they took off, the trip wasn’t quite as long as advertised. Rather than flying directly back to the United States, one of the planes reported engine trouble.

  The two planes, professing a desire to stay together, diverted to a small airport in Guaranda, one stretched beyond its very modest limits by the impact of the ongoing crisis.

  The report of engine trouble was bogus, and ultimately was not necessary, as no competent authority was available to pay attention to them anyway. They could have radioed in that they were diverting to the moon, and they wouldn’t have been paid any mind.

  Once on the ground, they simply waited for new cargo, cargo from a warehouse four hours to the north, cargo that had been accumulating there for over a year. It would take a full day to arrive, and then another to load.

  And then that cargo would be on its way to the United States.

  I don’t have the slightest idea what the verdict will be.

  Hatchet gives what I consider a fair charge to the jury, though I’m not pleased that he twice advises them that beyond a reasonable doubt does not mean beyond any doubt.

  They look serious and intent on what Hatchet is saying, but I simply have no clue as to what they’re thinking. It could be, “We’re going to right an injustice and get this guy out of prison,” or maybe, “I only wish we could give him a needle in the arm.”

  Usually I have a feeling one way or the other. That’s not to say I’m right; in fact, my feelings are wrong the majority of times. But I’ll have an expectation, based either in logic or hunch. This time I don’t.

  One thing that won’t be different this time is my behavior, as I make the transformation from lawyer to lunatic. While waiting for a verdict, I become ridiculously superstitious, and the rituals seem to increase with each trial.

  For instance, I will only get out of bed when the digital clock is set to an even number. I’ll only make right turns in the car; if I have to go left I make three rights instead. I won’t mention the word “verdict” to anyone but Tara, and if the phone rings, I’ll only answer in the den. I was in the den when I got the call telling me there was a verdict in the Willie Miller case, so that has become my lucky phone room.

  I may
have mentioned this before, but I have serious mental issues.

  Laurie handles me masterfully during these times; she stays as far from me as possible. She’s there if I want to talk to her, but I never do. While waiting for a verdict, I don’t want to be with anyone, including me. Unfortunately, no matter where I go, I always seem to be around.

  I watch television with the remote in my hand, fingers poised on the buttons. I don’t want to see any coverage of the trial, especially not legal pundits predicting the jury’s decision. So instead I see a lot of coverage of the disaster in Peru.

  During times like this I walk Tara maybe twice as much as usual. The weather doesn’t matter; in fact, I think Tara’s favorite thing is to walk in the snow. If Tara is nervous about the verdict, she’s hiding it well.

  I make it my business in situations like this to see my client every day. I can’t imagine how they can handle the pressure. I’m crazed, and my life is going to go on relatively normally no matter what the jury decides. The defendant may not have a life.

  Joey is holding up well. He asks me what I think the verdict will be, and he tells me he sees it as a fifty-fifty shot. I tell him I have no idea.

  Then he asks me if I think the verdict will come in quickly, and I tell him I have no idea.

  Then he asks me if a quick verdict would likely be good, or if a long one is more in our favor. I say I have no idea.

  Then he asks me what Laurie and Hike think, and I tell him I have no idea if they have any idea.

  It’s possible that my visits aren’t that helpful, but I really have no idea.

  The call Ryerson was waiting eighteen months for finally came. It was simple and to the point.

  “They’re in the air.”

  He didn’t have to ask if the cargo was on board, or if there were any problems for him to deal with. The caller would have said either of those things unprompted if that were the case.

  Absent a plane crash, very little could go wrong now.

  As soon as the call disconnected, Ryerson called Tommy Iurato and told Iurato to pick him up immediately. Iurato was there forty-five minutes later, and he and Ryerson then headed out to Teterboro Airport.

  The guard at the gate was expecting them, and he waved them out to the tarmac. They parked fifty feet from the private jet that was there waiting for them, engine running, and the pilot already in the cockpit.

  There was no real hurry, except a psychological one for Ryerson. He wanted to be there when the cargo planes arrived, wanted to watch as they were unloaded. He had worked so long and hard on this, planned so meticulously, that he just wanted to see it come to a satisfactory conclusion.

  The flight plan to St. Louis called for them to be in the air for three hours and forty-five minutes. They were gone for twenty minutes, when Ryerson noticed that there were no lights below them, and in the moonlight it almost seemed as if they were above a vast expanse of water.

  There are very few oceans between New Jersey and St. Louis, but it took a moment for Ryerson’s mind to compute what was happening. By that time Iurato had grabbed him and was breaking his neck.

  Iurato told the pilot he could go back to Teterboro. The original plan had been to drop Ryerson’s body into the ocean, but Iurato had received different instructions two weeks ago.

  The body would be found, and Carmine Desimone would be blamed.

  I’m watching the local morning news.

  It’s safe; I know I can watch it for as long as I want, secure in the knowledge that I won’t be forced to see anything of consequence. My mind can get lulled to sleep by weather and traffic, with a few robberies thrown in.

  There will be no news of the trial, and I won’t have to see any more depressing pictures from Peru.

  But suddenly, in the middle of all this comfortable banality, I’m looking at the face of Simon Ryerson, and below it is the legend of “Breaking News … Prominent businessman found slain in park.”

  Two things immediately come to mind, equally silly. First, I want to point at the screen and say, “Hey, I know that guy!,” even though I really don’t. Second, I wonder why TV newswriters feel compelled to use words like “slain.” Who talks like that? I’m in a profession that deals with murders and murderers all the time, and I’ve never heard anyone outside the media use the word “slain.”

  My mind belatedly clicks out of idiot mode and into normalcy. I need to analyze what this could mean to Joey’s case. I’d had no way to get Ryerson’s name before the jury; Dylan successfully argued lack of relevance, and Hatchet was correct to agree with him.

  So I have to figure out if this can somehow give me an opening. Even when a case has gone to the jury, if some extraordinarily compelling evidence is discovered, they can be brought back in to hear more testimony.

  In the field in which I have unfortunately and sporadically chosen to work, very little surprises me anymore. And I am not particularly surprised that Ryerson has been killed, since I’d learned that he had eliminated Carmine Desimone and effectively taken over the family.

  Mafia chieftain, for all the power that the office provides, is not a safe occupation. If they call you “Don” something, and your first name isn’t Donald, you need to watch your back. If you’re a crime boss applying for life insurance, you should lie about your occupation, because otherwise the premiums themselves will kill you.

  It’s quite likely that someone was getting revenge for Carmine, and maybe for Nicky Fats. Or it could be another coup in progress, with another boss moving in.

  But what does surprise me is that the body was found at all. No jogger in the park stumbled across Jimmy Hoffa, and no one is about to find Carmine Desimone. Yet Ryerson was found in a place that made the discovery inevitable. Whoever did it wanted the world to know that it was done.

  I have no way of knowing whether the killing means that whatever major operation Ryerson was working on has been completed. It’s likely that either it has, or he is no longer integral to its success.

  It also makes me wonder on some level if what he was doing could have had something to do with the situation in Peru. Two things are true. One is that I do not believe in coincidences. The second is that I had gone years without hearing the word “Peru,” then I learned that Ryerson was going there, and now a disaster there is all over the news.

  Having said that, I have no idea how a dam failing and destroying lives and property could benefit Ryerson financially. Of course, what I haven’t learned about him could fill books. For example, I know that he’s a businessman, and I know the breaking-news writers called him a prominent businessman, but I, and probably they, don’t have the slightest idea what his business is.

  All we really know at this point is that he was “slain.”

  Sam Willis calls with the news that his hacking efforts have alerted him to the fact that Tommy Iurato is flying to St. Louis tomorrow morning. He’s flying first class. “Don’t these people ever fly coach?” Sam asks.

  “Crime pays, big guy.” The St. Louis trip is interesting to me, since we had earlier learned that Ryerson had made some trips there in the past year. But for my purposes, I don’t view this as a big deal; if there’s a connection between Iurato flying to St. Louis and Joey Desimone, I certainly can’t see it.

  “You want me to follow him? I’ll be careful this time; I learned my lesson.”

  “Sam, if you follow him, you’re fired from the team.”

  “OK.”

  “Sam…”

  “I won’t, Andy. I promise.”

  I’m satisfied with that, so I settle down to spend the rest of the day watching television and dreading a verdict phone call. I go even nuttier in the time between hearing that the jury has reached a verdict, and my actually hearing what that verdict is. It is the most helpless feeling imaginable, knowing that the boat has already sailed, but not knowing where it’s going to arrive.

  CNN does a special at four o’clock on the disaster in Peru, focusing on the rescue effort. Apparently, they mus
t have decided that constant normal coverage isn’t sufficient; they have to do some “special” coverage.

  I decide to watch it for twelve minutes, until the Knicks game starts. For some television reason NBA games set to start on the hour always start twelve minutes after the hour.

  It’s about eight minutes into the CNN special when I see the footage of planes landing in Peru with supplies, with the announcer talking over it about the huge amounts of money contributed to the rescue effort. And just like that, everything clicks into place.

  Don’t you love when that happens?

  I call Cindy Spodek on her cell, and dispense with the usual banter. I’m sure she can tell by my tone of voice, and certainly by my words, that this is important.

  “Cindy, we need to have another meeting.”

  “What for?”

  “I know what’s being done, and I know who’s doing it.”

  “Is this about trying to get something for your client?” she asks.

  “Of course. But it goes way beyond that.”

  “OK,” she says. “Who do you need there? Givens certainly, but I doubt Beall will come in from Washington. Maybe video him in? And I’ll video in as well.”

  “Beall is a must; this most concerns him.” I think for a moment about whether I want Givens there, who annoyed me the last time with his mocking description of my session with Nicky Fats. Then with another jolt I realize what bugged me so much about it, and I say, “Givens needs to be there also. He’s going to make the trade I just thought of.”

  “What trade?”

  “You’ll know soon enough,” I say. “Noon?”

  “Noon it is.”

  With the fake mechanical problem miraculously fixed, the two planes took off from Guaranda.

  They were completely loaded down with cargo, almost eleven hundred metric tons’ worth, which meant they were carrying far more weight than they brought in on their “relief” mission.