Final Exam: A Legal Thriller

by Terry Huebner

  “Well worth it. So, I hear you’re quite the TV star now. I didn’t see it myself, but a bunch of people here did, and I heard all about it. It sounded pretty good.”

  “Yeah, I guess it went okay. I didn’t drool on myself or anything. I would have preferred avoiding the home confinement, but the judge wasn’t going to go for that.”

  “Yeah,” Ken said, “sounds like he didn’t want to appear on Geraldo, so he gave a little something to everybody.”

  “Pretty much,” Ben said. “He basically called us into his chambers and told us what he wanted to do. I think he’d made up his mind before we ever walked into Court this morning.”

  “Figures. Did we learn anything new today?”

  “No, not really. I didn’t have much chance to talk to the prosecutor. The First Assistant, Bridget Fahey, showed up. I knew her from when I was back in the office. She’s a ball-buster.”

  “Most of those female prosecutors are,” Mark chimed in.

  “True enough,” Ken said, “but given that our client is a woman, they probably figured they needed to throw a woman prosecutor in there just to even their odds up with the jury.”

  “You’re probably right,” Ben agreed, “although Bridget Fahey isn’t exactly the type that would automatically appeal to women. Not that she’s not a good trial lawyer, but she can be a bit on the cold side. I know her pretty well, or at least I did years ago. You can’t turn your back on her, that’s for sure.”

  “Say,” Ken said, “did you hear any of McBride’s press conference?”

  “No,” Ben answered, “I’d forgotten all about it. I went over to the law school and the McBride thing pretty much slipped my mind.”

  “Well,” Ken said, “I didn’t hear it either, but I guess he put on a big dog and pony show without giving any details. You know, they can link her to the murder scene and shit like that. He promised they wouldn’t try the case in the media, which means they’re probably about to try the case in the media.”

  “I’ll have to make sure I get home in time for the news tonight,” Ben said. “Did you hear we got Wilson as the trial judge? We’re in front of him a week from Friday.”

  “No,” Ken said, “I hadn’t heard that. He’s about the best judge they’ve got down there in that division, so I’m not surprised he got the case. I never have appeared in front of him though. You know him, don’t you? That should probably be good for us. You wouldn’t think he’d recuse himself, would you?”

  “No, I don’t think so,” Ben said.

  Ben knew Judge William Wilson from his days in law school when he was a member of the Chicago College of Law Trial Advocacy Team. Judge Wilson served as the director of the Trial Advocacy Program at the law school and personally coached many of the trial teams as they prepared for various competitions. Ben made the trial team at the law school in the fall of 1991 and spent a good two months working almost every day with Judge Wilson and some other former team members as they prepared for a competition.

  “I haven’t really kept in close contact with anyone from the team like I probably should have. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen Judge Wilson since I was a prosecutor. I appeared in front of him a few times when I was subbing for other guys in the office back then, mostly on status hearings, and he never recused himself then. You know, it’s not like I’m close to him or anything. I know other people have appeared before him over the years and I don’t think he ever recuses himself. Besides, he’s not the kind of guy to give anybody any breaks if they don’t deserve them. He is the straightest of the straight shooters. If we have any edge at all, it’s in that he trained me as a trial lawyer and I know how he likes a case to be tried. That’s how I like to try cases anyway. That, and because he was probably the best criminal defense lawyer of his day, you know a defendant in his courtroom is going to get a fair shake. He knows the law backwards and forwards, no doubt about it.”

  “What do you think about the possibility of a preliminary hearing?” Ken asked.

  “I don’t know, probably not,” Ben said. “I honestly can’t imagine that McBride and Fahey are going to let us go to a preliminary hearing. Don’t you think they would seek an indictment first?”

  Under Illinois law, a defendant could request a preliminary hearing, sometimes called a probable cause hearing. The standard of proof for the prosecution in such a hearing isn’t a major stumbling block. All it requires the prosecution to present is sufficient evidence to enable a judge to rule that there is probable cause that the defendant has committed the crime in question and should be bound over for trial. Defense lawyers like it, even if they don’t expect to win, because it essentially gives them a free crack at some of the prosecution witnesses. It also gives the defense lawyers a good opportunity to lock in some of the testimony that the prosecution will ultimately need at trial.

  Prosecutors have the option of bypassing the preliminary hearing stage by going directly to a grand jury and seeking an indictment. Although the standards are basically the same, grand jury proceedings fall under the direct control of the prosecution. Potential defendants are not allowed to participate, unless they are called as witnesses, and even then, they cannot be accompanied into the grand jury room by their attorney. Grand juries are viewed by knowledgeable members of the defense bar as little more than rubberstamps for potentially overzealous prosecutors.

  “Yeah, I would probably seek an indictment,” Ken said. “I think that’s what would happen out here. What do you think, Mark?”

  “My view is the prosecutor isn’t going to let a case go to a preliminary hearing when he thinks he can get an indictment from a grand jury. They’ve got to be convinced they have something to gain from holding a preliminary hearing, and I can’t think of what it would be in this case. We don’t have to put on any evidence or call any witnesses, and we get a free shot at their witnesses. I don’t think they’re going to make Megan Rand look any more like a murderer by making her sit through a preliminary hearing. I think she’s probably a pretty sympathetic figure. No, I would think they would indict her.”

  “Yeah, I think that’s right,” Ben said. “I stopped by the law school today and we’re going to have to subpoena all the records we can think of relating to Greenfield and every student he’s had for probably ten years. We should go back at least as far as when Meg and I were students there. I think the police have already taken some of his files, but I think we’re ultimately going to have to look at not only his personnel records, but also examine the grades he gave all of his students, whether he gave anybody any grades that cost them a scholarship, an award, or maybe even kept them from graduating. I know that’s a lot of shit, but if you think about it, there’s a lot of possible motives for some student to whack him. Not to mention the fact that there always could have been stuff going on in his personal life. So, anything we can think of in that regard, we should probably put in the document rider. Mark, can you get started on that?”

  “Sure,” Mark said.

  “Hey, by the way,” Ken said, “how did she handle her night in the joint?”

  “She said it wasn’t too bad,” Ben replied. “First of all, she didn’t get there until pretty late. Then they put her in the maternity ward over at Cook County Jail. I think it’s a separate building. She said she was in some sort of a dorm-type thing with a handful of other inmates. I don’t think it was staying at the Ritz-Carlton, but I don’t think it was nearly as bad as it could have been.”

  “No,” Ken said, “doesn’t sound like it. Sounds like the detective may have done you a favor.”

  “Yeah, I think he did. I think he figured she was getting out anyway, so why put her through the wringer just for one night. Not that home confinement is any bargain. I think that having that ring around your leg is no picnic. I think it probably has the effect of making you aware at all times that you’re not really free.”

  They talked for a few more minutes, mainly just bullshitting, before Ken signed off. Ben sent Mark home a little whil
e later and went back upstairs to work on some other stuff for awhile. He checked his voicemail again - four more messages from reporters. God, he thought, I hope they stop calling. It had been a long, long day and his brain felt fried. Meanwhile, many miles away, the Protector made plans.

  18

  Ben fumbled in his pocket for his keys and unlocked the door just as Libby headed toward him through the front hall and into the kitchen. The kids were already in bed.

  “Hey,” he said. “Did we make TV?”

  “Oh, you’ve been all over the place,” she answered. “You were on the six o’clock news, on all the local channels. I Tivo’d some of them for you, and you even made Fox News and MSNBC. Pictures of you at the Courthouse, but no sound, and MSNBC just talked about the story. It was kind of exciting.”

  “Did I look like a dufus, or what?”

  “No, you looked pretty good. You sounded serious and intense, maybe a bit too intense. You might want to loosen up a little bit, but overall, I think it was pretty good. You’ll see, I’ll show you.”

  Ben walked over and pulled open the refrigerator. “What did you have for dinner?”

  “Tacos. There’s some left in the refrigerator.”

  He turned and scowled. He found the Tupperware container with taco meat inside and put it in the microwave on one minute. He chopped up some lettuce and grabbed a package of shredded cheddar cheese out of the bin on the middle shelf and laid it on the counter. He took the bowl out of the microwave, the meat was sizzling and spitting, and he dumped the lettuce and cheese in the bowl and mixed it up.

  “Are you going to eat it right out of the bowl?” Libby asked.

  “Yeah, if I feel like it. It’s easier that way.”

  “Whatever.”

  He took a couple of bites and rummaged through a cupboard for the tortilla chips and a glass, which he filled with ice and root beer from a can in the refrigerator. Libby went back into the family room, and he joined her with his dinner a minute later. “What are you watching?” he asked as he sat down.

  “I just finished watching the news. You were on there again, but it was the same stuff as before. Nothing new.”

  “Did they show any of McBride’s press conference?”

  “A little bit, yeah. I’ll find it.”

  He stared at the screen as Libby replayed the news story from Channel 7 on Tivo. It started with a brief description from the anchor, then cut to maybe twenty seconds of the State’s Attorney, Richard McBride, at his press conference.

  “That’s Bridget Fahey to his right,” Ben said, his eyes not leaving the screen. After McBride, they showed a short clip of Ben outside the Courthouse, with Mark on one side and Megan Rand and her husband on the other.

  After the story ended, Libby hit the pause button and turned to him. “Was that her husband standing next to her?” Ben nodded and put another spoonful of the taco concoction into his mouth. “He is old,” she said. “He didn’t look very happy either.”

  “He doesn’t have a lot to be happy about,” Ben replied while chewing.

  “I can’t imagine sleeping with someone that much older than me.”

  “No,” Ben said after swallowing. “I can’t either. I mean, he’s older than your parents.”

  “Yuck,” she said.

  They spent the next half hour or so watching the other stories Megan recorded. They all pretty much showed the same thing. She tossed him the remote, which was typically his responsibility. He found Hardball on the Now Playing List on Tivo and hit the play button.

  “You wouldn’t believe the number of voicemail messages I got today.”

  “I bet the secretaries are loving that,” she said.

  “About as much as you’d expect. If this doesn’t slow down, we’re gonna have to figure out some other approach. Phil’s been looking into that automated answering system for the phones, but I’m not sure he was quite ready to bite the bullet on that yet. But unless all these calls slow down, we’ll have to figure out something or the secretaries will never get any work done.”

  “So how’s Meg holding up?”

  “Not bad. They stuck her in the maternity ward last night, so she had it pretty easy. Now that she’s out, it should be a lot easier.”

  “Well, yeah, but she’s got that home monitoring thing.”

  Ben explained how the system worked and that Meg would probably have a little bit more freedom than she might originally expect, especially if she cleared the trips ahead of time.

  “Still, it’s like being watched all the time,” Libby said.

  “Yeah. I suppose it is, but it’s a pretty big house and the perimeter is big enough so she can go out in the yard and even down to the neighbors if she wants to. This time of year anyway, it’s probably not as bad as it could be.”

  “You know, her husband is probably kind of glad she’s got the home confinement because now she’s stuck back living at home with him.”

  Ben looked over at his wife and scooped up the last remnants from the bowl and stuffed them into his mouth. That hadn’t occurred to him. “Maybe you’re right,” he said.

  “Is he going to be a problem?”

  “Probably, but I’m trying to put him in his place right away by establishing some ground rules. I doubt he’ll follow them.”

  “Guys like him never do.”

  19

  Ben and the team spent the next few days getting the discovery requests together, focusing first on subpoenas and their document riders. Some of the subpoenas were duplicative. Greenfield’s phone records, for example, were undoubtedly obtained already by the prosecution and should be produced during discovery, but Ben sought them anyway for a couple of reasons. First, he might be able to obtain them sooner by serving subpoenas himself. More importantly, it served as a check on Bridget Fahey and her willingness to produce evidence in her possession as required by the Code of Criminal Procedure. The subpoena to the law school included a very broad document rider designed, in part, to test the limits of the school’s cooperation. Sensing some difficulties ahead, Ben decided to drive downtown and serve the subpoena on Dean Freeman himself.

  He reached the parking lot at the law school by eleven-thirty. The attendant now recognized him and gave him a friendly wave whenever he arrived. Once inside, Ben went directly to the Dean’s office to serve his subpoena. Finding no one in the Dean’s office, Ben left the subpoena with Freeman’s secretary.

  Ben took the stairs back down to the first floor, where he found Charles Powell sitting at his station at the security kiosk. “Hello, Charles,” Ben said reading the man’s nametag and extending a hand. “My name is Benjamin Lohmeier. I represent Megan Cavallaro in the Greenfield murder case.”

  Powell took his hand and replied, “I know who you are, counselor. I’ve seen you on TV. What can I do for you?”

  “I was wondering if your boss is around. I’d like to speak to him.”

  A few minutes later, Roger Tierney emerged from around the corner and Ben greeted him with a handshake. A moment later, the two men were off to Greenfield’s office on the elevator.

  “Tell me about your security system,” Ben asked as they got off on Greenfield’s floor.

  “Sure,” Tierney said. “You were a student here, right?” Ben nodded. “Well, if you were a student here, things haven’t changed much. Down on the first floor, there are only two entrances, one in the front and one in the back. People can enter and exit the building through the circular doors at the front on the Adams side. There’s another entrance in the back of the building, but you can only leave through that door. It’s locked if you try to get in from the outside.”

  “Unless, of course, you happen to come up when someone else is leaving and they let you in that way,” Ben said.

  “Yes, I suppose that’s true too. Other than that, there’s no other way to get in or out of the building. As you know, there are ten stories to the building, plus the concourse on the lower level. There’s no outside entrance or exit from any locatio
n other than those I’ve just described. Other than the loading dock, of course, but there’s no real public access to that.”

  “But you have security cameras,” Ben said. “What do those cover?”

  “As you may have noticed,” Tierney said, “we have cameras posted at each entrance/exit, outside the elevators on every floor and at various locations on every floor of the building.”

  They reached Greenfield’s office and stopped outside the door.

  “Would there be a way to get to this office without being seen on one of those security cameras?” Ben asked.

  “No, I don’t think so, but I know what you’re thinking, and the police have thought about it too, and the cameras don’t help you.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because, unfortunately, the cameras recycle in a seventy-two-hour timeframe, and the police have concluded, I guess in conjunction with the medical examiner, that Professor Greenfield was killed more than seventy-two hours before the discovery of the body and our accessing of the security tapes.”

  “In other words,” Ben said with a grimace, “at any given point in time, the security cameras only have the last seventy-two hours of material on them?”

  Tierney nodded. “That’s right. As you recall, Professor Greenfield was found on January 2nd in the late morning. That means the security tapes only go back to that same time period on December 30th. By that time, the building was already closed for New Year’s. Any video taken prior to that time was already taped over.”

  “Shit,” Ben said. “Is that common knowledge? I mean, does everybody know that the security tapes only get the last seventy-two hours?”

  “Don’t think so. I’m not sure it ever came up before this. You see, security cameras are only designed for a kind of real time look at what’s going on in the building. Also, we use it to try and protect against the theft of materials from the library. To tell you the truth, that’s probably the primary concern. You don’t expect much violence in a law school with a bunch of law students around.”