by Scott Pratt
Caroline walks straight to Ray, reaches up, wraps her arms around his thick neck, and squeezes him tightly.
“You saved his life,” I hear her say through muffled sobs. “You saved Jack’s life.”
PART 1
1
The moment Katie Dean began to believe she’d been abandoned by God was on a Sunday afternoon in August 1992.
It was late in the summertime in Michigan. Katie, along with her mother and brothers and sister, had returned home earlier from the First Methodist Church in Casco Township. At seventeen, Kirk was her oldest sibling; then Kiri, sixteen; then Katie, who was just two months shy of her thirteenth birthday. Kody was the baby of the family at ten. They were gathered around the dining room table, waiting for Mother to bring the platter of fried chicken in from the kitchen.
The fresh smell of Lake Michigan floated through the open dining room windows, mingling with the sweet odors of chicken and garlic mashed potatoes. After lunch, Katie and Kiri were planning to pack a small basket with a Thermos of ice water, suntan lotion, and magazines, and hike to the sand dunes above the lake, where they would spend the afternoon lying in the sun and giggling about the Nelson boys, who lived just up the road. It would be their last visit to the dunes this summer. School was starting back the next morning.
Richard Dean, Katie’s father, sat listlessly on the other side of the table, staring into a glass of whiskey. He was thin and pale, with a thatch of dark hair above his furrowed brow. He was upset, but that wasn’t unusual. It seemed he was always upset.
Richard Dean was distant, as though not a part of the world everyone else lived in. He never kissed Katie, never hugged her, never told her he loved her. He was like a ticking bomb, always on the verge of another explosion. Katie’s mother had told the children that Father was sick from the war in Vietnam. She said he’d been wounded and captured by Viet Cong soldiers near the Cambodian border in 1970 and had spent four years in a prison in Hanoi.
Katie’s father didn’t have a job, but Katie knew the family lived off money he collected from the government every month. Her mother couldn’t work because she had to stay home and take care of Father all the time. He drank lots of whiskey and smoked cigarettes one after another; Katie had seen him lock himself in his room and not come out for a week at a time. Sometimes she’d hear him screaming in the middle of the night.
Father had picked them all up from the church parking lot just after noon. He didn’t attend church, but he drove the family there and picked them up every Sunday at precisely twelve fifteen. When Father pulled into the church parking lot earlier, Katie’s mother had been talking to a man named Jacob Olson near the front steps. Katie didn’t think there was anything unusual about it—Mr. Olson was a nice man—but as soon as Mother got into the car, Father lit into her. He called her a slut, white trash. He was yelling and spitting. The veins on his neck were sticking out so far, Katie thought they might burst through his skin. When the family arrived home, the first thing Father did was open a bottle of whiskey. He filled a tall glass and sat at the dining room table while Mother, Kiri, and Katie cooked in the kitchen and the boys went about setting the table. They all stepped lightly around Father. They never knew when he might strike, like a rattlesnake coiled in the grass.
Katie was still wearing the flowered print dress Mother had made for her out of material she bought from the thrift store in South Haven. It was Katie’s favorite summer dress, light and airy and full of color. She was looking down at the hemline, which crossed her thighs, trying to imagine the pink carnations coming to life, when Mother walked in carrying the chicken.
“Here we are,” Mother said. She had a forced smile on her face. She put the platter down in the middle of the table. Steam rose from the chicken, and through it Katie caught a glimpse of Father’s face. He was already halfway through his third glass of whiskey. His eyes had reddened, and the lids were beginning to droop.
“Chicken,” Father muttered into his whiskey glass.
“Goddamned fried chicken’s all we ever get around here.”
Mother attempted to remain pleasant. “I thought you liked fried chicken,” she said, “and I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t use that kind of language around the children.”
“The chiddren,” he slurred. “Probly ain’t mine anyway.”
“Richard!” Mother yelled. She rarely raised her voice; Katie shuddered. “How dare you!”
Father lifted his chin and turned slowly toward Mother.
“How dare me?” he said. “How dare me? How dare you, you bitch! How long you been screwing Olson, anyway?”
“Stop it, Father,” Kirk pleaded from Katie’s left. Blond-haired and blue-eyed like Katie and Mother, Kirk was tall and paper thin, wiry strong but teenage awkward. Father whipped his head around to face Kirk.
“Watch your mouth, boy,” he said, “and don’t call me Father no more. Go look in the mirror. You don’t look nothing like me.”
He turned back to Mother.
“Does he, darling? None of ’em look like me. They look like … they look like … Olson!”
“Please leave the table if you’re going to talk like that,” Mother said.
Katie felt the familiar twinge of fear in her stomach. She watched as Father’s face gradually turned darker, from pink to purple.
“Leave the table?” Father bellowed. “You think you can order me around like a goddamned slave?”
“Please, Richard.” There was a look of desperation in Mother’s eyes.
“Please, Richard,” Father mocked her hatefully.
“I’ll give you please, by God, and thank you very much, too!”
Father stood on wobbly legs, knocking his drink over in the process. Whiskey spilled out and stained the tablecloth as he stumbled off toward his bedroom. The aroma filled Katie’s nostrils, sickening her. She hated whiskey. She hated everything about it.
Katie, along with the others, sat at the table in stunned silence, waiting for Mother to say something. She’d seen Father’s outbursts before—all of them had—but this one was worse, much worse and more vicious than any they’d ever experienced.
“It’s all right,” Mother said after what seemed to Katie like an hour. “He’s just not feeling well today.”
“He shouldn’t talk to you that way,” Kirk said.
“He doesn’t mean it.”
“Doesn’t matter. He shouldn’t do it.”
Katie heard heavy footsteps coming from the direction of Father’s bedroom and looked around. He was moving quickly toward them. He raised a shotgun, pointed it in Mother’s direction, and pulled the trigger. Katie thought her eardrums had burst. Mother went straight over on her back. A spray of pink mist seemed to hang in the air above the table. Katie’s joints froze. She urinated on herself.
She watched in terror as Father pumped the shotgun and swung it around toward Kirk—a second horrific explosion.
Then Kiri.
Then her …
2
As the bailiff calls criminal court into session, I look around the room at the anxious faces and feel the familiar sense of dread that hangs in the air like thick fog. Nearly everyone in the gallery has committed some transgression, some violation of the laws of man. It’s an odd conglomeration of check kiters, drunk drivers, burglars, drug dealers, rapists, and killers, all irretrievably bound together by one simple fact—they’ve been caught and will soon be punished. Less than 5 percent of them will actually continue to protest their innocence and go to trial. The rest will beg their lawyers to make the best deal possible. They’ll plead guilty and either be placed on probation or face confinement in a county jail or a state penitentiary.
The courtroom itself looks as though it was constructed by a humorless carpenter. The colors are dull and lifeless, the angles harsh and demanding. Portraits of judges, both dead and alive, adorn the walls behind the bench. There’s an awkward sense of formality among the lawyers, bailiffs, clerks, and the judge. Everyone is disgustingly
polite. The behavior is required by the institution, but beneath the veneer of civility runs a deep current of hostility borne of petty jealousy, resentment, and familiarity. I’m never comfortable in a courtroom. There are enemies everywhere.
Sitting next to me is Tanner Jarrett, a twenty-five-year-old rookie prosecutor fresh out of law school. He’s a political hire, the son of a billionaire state senator who will no doubt soon be a United States senator. Tanner looks out of place with his fresh face and boyish demeanor. He’s handsome, with well-defined jaws that angle sharply to a dimpled chin beneath inquisitive brown eyes and a thick mop of black hair. He’s bright, capable, and extremely likable. It seems he’s always smiling. Tanner will handle forty-seven of the forty-eight cases on today’s docket. He’ll resolve a few of them by plea agreement and agree to continue the rest. I’m here only to receive a date for an aggravated rape case that’s going to trial.
Judge Leonard Green takes his seat at the bench. Green is mid-sixties, tall and lean, with a hawkish face and perfect silver hair. He moves with the effeminate gait of a drag queen onstage. He’s as pure a son of a bitch as I’ve ever known, and he hovers over us from his perch on the bench, scanning the crowd like a vulture searching for carrion. Green could just as easily give my trial date to Tanner and let him pass it along to me, but since I’m handling the case for the district attorney’s office, the judge insists I appear in court. He knows I have no other reason to be here, but he won’t call the case early so I can go on about my business. He’ll make me sit here for hours, just because he can. If I leave the courtroom, he’ll call the case and then hold me in contempt of court because of my absence. Such are the games we play.
Green leans to his left and whispers in the clerk’s ear. She shakes her head and whispers back. I notice a look of concern on her face, a look I’ve seen hundreds of times. It means that Green has spotted a potential victim and is about to indulge his ever-present, masochistic need to inflict pain or punishment on an unsuspecting victim.
“Case number 32,455, State of Tennessee versus Alfred Milligan,” the clerk announces.
I turn to see Alfred Milligan, who appears to be in his late- fifties but is probably at least ten years younger, rise from his seat in the gallery. Milligan looks like so many others inhabiting the seemingly bottomless pit of criminal defendants. He’s decimated by a lack of nutrition, probably caused by a combination of poverty and alcohol or drug abuse. He uses a cane to walk. What’s left of his black hair is greasy and plastered to his forehead. He’s wearing what is most likely his best clothing, a black T-shirt with “Dale Earnhardt” written in red across the front and “The Legend” written in red across the back, and a pair of baggy blue jeans. He saunters to the front of the courtroom and looks around nervously.
“Mr. Milligan, you’re charged with driving under the influence, seventh offense. Where’s your lawyer?” Judge Green demands.
“He told me he’d be here later in the morning,” Milligan says.
“Mr. Miller represents you, correct?” The judge is talking about Ray Miller, my friend, and there’s a gleam in his eye that tells me he’s about to exact a little revenge. Judge Green hates Ray, primarily because Ray isn’t the least bit afraid of him and lets him know it on a regular basis. They’ve been feuding bitterly for years, but lately it has seemed to escalate. Two weeks earlier, my wife and I were dining with Ray and his wife at a restaurant in Johnson City when Ray spotted Judge Green eating by himself at a table in the corner. Ray walked over and started an argument about the judge’s practice of locking the courtroom doors at precisely nine o’clock each morning and jailing anyone who arrives late. The conversation grew heated, and with everyone in the place listening, Ray called Judge Green a “bully in a black robe.” He voiced the opinion that the judge had probably been beaten up by bullies as a boy and now used his robe to seek symbolic vengeance whenever the urge struck him. I told Ray later that his indiscretion could cost him dearly. His response was, “Screw that limp-wristed faggot.”
Green turns back to the clerk. “Has Mr. Miller notified the clerk’s office that he would be late this morning?”
The clerk shakes her head sadly.
“Then he’s in contempt of court. Let the record show that Mr. Miller has failed to appear in court at the appointed time and has failed to notify the clerk’s office that he would either be absent or late. He is guilty of contempt of court in the presence of the court and will be taken to jail immediately upon his arrival.”
Just as I’m about to say something in Ray’s defense, Tanner Jarrett stands suddenly and clears his throat.
“Excuse me, Your Honor,” Tanner says. “Mr. Miller called me early this morning. He’s filed a motion on Mr. Milligan’s behalf, and we’re supposed to have a hearing today. But since the court doesn’t typically hear motions until after eleven a.m., Mr. Miller told me he was going to take care of a matter in Chancery Court before he came down here. I’m sure that’s where he is.”
“He’s supposed to be here, Mr. Jarrett,” the judge snarls. “Right here. Right now.”
“With all due respect, Your Honor, the state isn’t ready for the hearing now. I told my witness to be here at eleven o’clock.”
“Sit down, Mr. Jarrett,” Green says coldly. He turns his attention toward Alfred Milligan, who has been standing silently at the lectern. “Mr. Milligan, your case is continued. The clerk will notify you of the new date. You’re free to go.”
I sit there seething impotently as Milligan walks out of the courtroom. Nothing would please me more than to jerk Green off the bench and give him the ass whipping he so desperately needs and deserves. All it would cost me would be my job, my law license, and a few months in jail. I stare up at Green, hoping to catch his eye and at least give him a silent look of contempt, but he ignores me and begins calling cases as though nothing out of the ordinary has happened. I’m afraid for Ray. I wish I could go out into the hallway and at least call him, but I know if I do, Green will call my case and do the same thing to me that he’s just done to Ray.
Ray walks through the side door a little before ten. As soon as Green sees him, he stops what he’s doing and orders Ray to the front of the courtroom.
“You’re in contempt of court, Mr. Miller,” the judge says triumphantly. “I called your case at nine o’clock. You weren’t here, and you hadn’t notified the clerk’s office of your absence as required under the local rules. Bailiff, take Mr. Miller into custody. His bond is set at five thousand dollars.”
Ray is wearing a brown suit. His hair is pulled back tightly into his signature ponytail. He looks up at the judge with hatred and defiance in his eyes. I can see the muscles in his jaw twitching, and his complexion is darkening noticeably. I immediately begin to hope he has enough sense to keep his mouth shut. He’s helpless right now. There’s nothing he can do. But if he stays calm and doesn’t do or say anything stupid, he can take up this fight later. If he does it right, he’ll be exonerated and the judge will be the one who has to answer for his actions. But if he says something he shouldn’t …
At that moment, Ray speaks. “I’ve been right about you all along, you gutless piece of shit. I hope you enjoy this, because from this day forward, I’m going to take a special interest in you. You’d better grow eyes in the back of your head.”
“Cuff him!” Green yells at one of the bailiffs, who has sheepishly walked up behind Ray and is reaching for his arm.
“Keep your fucking hands off me,” Ray growls, and the bailiff takes a step back.
I stand and walk to my friend. I take him gently by the arm and begin to steer him toward the hallway that leads to the holding cells. “C’mon, Ray,” I say calmly. “This only gets worse if you stay.” He comes out of his rage, and his eyes settle on mine. The rage has been replaced by desperation and confusion.
“I’m going to jail?” he asks in a tone that is almost dreamy.
“I’ll go to the clerk’s office and post your bond as soon as I can brea
k away from the courtroom,” I say. “You’ll be out in an hour.”
“I’m signing an order suspending you based on your threat, Mr. Miller,” Judge Green says as we walk out the door. “And I’m reporting you to the Board of Professional Responsibility. You’ll be lucky if you ever practice law again.”
3
Six months later, I’m sitting on a metal stool in the death row visitor’s section of Riverbend Correctional Facility in Nashville. Riverbend is what they call a state-of-the-art facility. It’s sprawling and modern, but my experience tells me the place is misnamed. Men who spend time in a maximum security prison do not come out “corrected.” They come out more cunning.
On the other side of a thick pane of Plexiglas is thirty-eight-year-old Brian Thomas Gant. I was appointed to represent Gant nearly fifteen years ago. He was my first death penalty client, accused of murdering his mother- in-law and raping his five-year-old niece. There was no forensic evidence against him—DNA testing hadn’t yet become the gold standard—and seemingly no motive for the crime. But the niece, a youngster named Natalie Booze, told the police that the man who raped her “looked like Uncle Brian.” The police immediately focused their investigation on Gant, and the girl’s story quickly changed from “looked like Uncle Brian” to “was Uncle Brian.” He was arrested a week after the crime was committed. I did the best I could at trial, but I couldn’t overcome the young girl’s testimony. He was convicted of first-degree murder and two counts of aggravated rape a year after his arrest. He’s been on death row ever since.
After her uncle was shipped off to the penitentiary, Natalie Booze had a change of heart. She told Gant’s wife that she wasn’t sure it was Uncle Brian. It happened so fast. She was asleep when the rapist came into her room. It was dark. The account was completely different than what she’d testified to at trial. It didn’t matter, though. Gant’s appellate attorneys asked Natalie to sign an affidavit swearing that she now believed she’d been mistaken when she identified Brian Gant at trial. She signed the affidavit and the attorneys filed it. Both the prosecution and the appellate courts ignored it.
