[Boston Law 01.0] Unlawful Deeds

by David S. Brody

  Jail time. That was the second time somebody had mentioned it, and Pierre’s thoughts turned to Valerie. If he went a day without seeing her, he felt empty. A weekend away was intolerable. How could he bear to miss months, or even years, or her life? To become a stranger to his little girl. Carla might understand, but how do you explain to a toddler that Daddy was going away and wasn’t coming back until ... until when? Until she was old enough to ride a bike? To read? To drive? He slumped into a chair and turned his glistening eyes away from Bruce and Callahan. Finally, he spoke. “What if we took it to trial?”

  “Well, I think your chances would be pretty good, as it stands now. But I’ll be honest with you Pierre; it’ll cost you a fortune. I charge two hundred fifty bucks an hour, and you’re probably talking close to a thousand hours. More if there’s an appeal. Not to mention other costs like expert witnesses and private detectives. So it could go as high as a half million dollars. And no guarantee you’ll win. And then they still might come after you on the RTC thing, because they’ll be pissed they lost.”

  Bruce spoke up. “You know what else, Pierre? Even if you’re acquitted, just being tried for murder will taint you for a long time. I mean, who’s going to choose to go alone with a suspected murderer into an apartment when there are dozens of other brokers around? Look, Pierre, I know the thought of jail time is scary, but if Mike can cut a deal for only short time and forfeiture of the property, that seems to be a better decision than risking a murder conviction. Not to mention the half million even if you’re found innocent.”

  “How much time are we talking?”

  “Is your record clean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Maybe six months, but that’s just a guess. More if their case gets stronger.”

  Pierre tried to picture the scene. Valerie, honey, Daddy has to go away for a little while. I’ll be back after Christmas, when the snow starts to melt.

  But what was his other choice? Valerie, honey, I’m sorry Sally’s mommy won’t let her come over to play, but you have to believe me when I tell you I would never try to hurt anyone, and I definitely wouldn’t kill anyone. Even if he were acquitted, the stigma of being arrested for murder would never fade. And it would attach to his children. No. He wouldn’t make his children pay for his mistakes.

  Pierre dropped his head onto the table, covered his face with his arms. There really was no choice. He would be miserable in jail, but at least they’d be able to lead a semi-normal life when he got out. But six months away from his precious girl was almost too much to bear.

  CHAPTER 46

  [June 25, 1990]

  Shelby arrived at her office Monday morning to find a message from Dominic Mazzutti on her desk. She reached over to pick up the phone and grimaced as her blouse rubbed against the back of her sunburned shoulder, courtesy of an unplanned nap on the beach in Newport, Rhode Island. She’d been having trouble sleeping since Charese’s death, and the Margarita-induced nap had been refreshing, although irritating—in addition to the painful sunburn, she had been forced to repeatedly resist the efforts of another resident of the beach house to spread ointment onto her burned skin. Why was it that a weekend at the beach caused otherwise mature men to revert back to their frat boy days?

  “Detective Dominic?” She surprised herself with the playfulness in her voice. She accepted the fact that men found her attractive, and was normally more careful about sending the wrong message. She quickly toned it down. “This is Shelby returning your call.”

  “Thanks for calling back, Shelby. I just wanted to update you. We found nothing at Prefontaine’s house Friday night. We’re sending some stuff over to the lab, but we’re not hopeful it’ll turn into anything. The car was clean, and so were his clothes. Either he was very careful, or he didn’t do it.”

  “What’s your gut tell you?”

  “I’ll be honest. Everyone thinks he’s the guy, what with the memo and the car match and the motive. But it doesn’t smell quite right to me for some reason. I mean, I watched the guy during the search on Friday, saw his wife and kid, saw where he lived. It’s a lot to risk, and for what? So the guy is having financial problems, but who doesn’t, you know? It wouldn’t surprise me if he did it, but I’m not sure, you know? What about you?”

  “I don’t know either. At first I didn’t think he had it in him, but what do I know? It’s not like I’m experienced in this kind of stuff. So I guess I defer to you. How about the other suspects?”

  “Nothing new. We’ve checked the car rental companies—nothing to tie either Jeffries or Krygier to the Grand Am. But it’s possible they rented the car under a false name; there were hundreds rented that weekend in the Boston area. We’re showing pictures of Jeffries and Krygier to the rental company clerks, but so far no match. And no gray Grand Ams stolen that weekend, although it’s also possible they “borrowed” a car for a few hours and returned it before the owner knew it had been taken. But neither of those guys seems to me like they would know how to hot-wire a car. I think if one of them did it, they paid a professional. We’ve got our sources checking that angle, too.”

  “Well, the video hasn’t turned up yet, as far as I know. I least I haven’t seen it on the evening news.”

  “Yeah. We went through her apartment; it wasn’t there. By the way, what does this do to Charese’s lawsuit?”

  “It’s pretty much over. Without her testimony, it’ll be hard to prove her case. Plus, who really cares anymore? I had trouble even getting her sister to come up and claim the body and pack up her personal items. Personally, I’m not psyched about fighting for a big judgment that would just go to her family. They sound like real jerks.”

  “Speaking of jerks, have you spoken to Jeffries at all?”

  Dom’s comment surprised Shelby. Dom didn’t really know Reese at all—did he respect her enough to simply subscribe to her opinion of him? “No. Since he’s a suspect I thought I should avoid him. Actually, Jennifer thought I should avoid him.”

  * * *

  An hour later, Dom phoned back. “Hey, I just heard something. Prefontaine hired Mike Callahan to represent him.”

  “I don’t recognize the name.”

  “You’ll be hearing it a lot if you stay in the DA’s office. He’s one of the best at negotiating plea bargains, cutting deals, that kind of stuff. I mean, he’s got cousins and brothers everywhere. And an uncle that’s a lawyer in your office.”

  Great. Another lawyer taking advantage of the system. Anybody out there become a lawyer because they care about justice? “I don’t know any Callahans working here.”

  “Not a Callahan. Reardon. Bobby Reardon’s his mother’s brother.”

  “Yeah. I know him. He’s one of the senior guys in Homicide.”

  “Anyway, the thing about Callahan is that he almost always plea bargains. He hardly ever goes to trial, mostly because the guys that hire him are guilty and are just trying to cut the best deal they can. So I’m not sure why Prefontaine would hire him if he was innocent.”

  * * *

  Pierre was trying to stay in his normal routine, to just live his life. He had spent the weekend with Carla and Valerie—alternating between rejoicing in their company and spiraling into periods of depression. Through it all, Carla was a rock. “We’ll get through this like we get through everything. This may go without saying, but in my heart I know you’re innocent. I also know that innocent men don’t normally go to jail in this country, especially middle class white men. The important thing is to keep living our lives.”

  And so on Monday morning, Pierre was in the office. There was plenty to keep him busy. First of all, Charese’s death meant he could finally sell her apartment. The police lines were down, and he was planning on spending the next few days painting the unit. Then he would list it for sale. Hopefully, within a couple of months, he would have a $35,000 payday. Blood money or not, it would stabilize their finances for at least a few months. He would simply have to hold on until then.

  In additi
on, there was plenty of work to do at Fenway Place. Pierre’s goal was to have 95 percent of the apartments rented by September 1, and the way to accomplish that was to invest some money into making the property more attractive to tenants. In a slumping economy, it was natural for landlords to cut back on repairs and maintenance of their properties. And Felloff had been no exception. The result was that vacancies had increased and rents had decreased.

  But, unlike other landlords, Pierre and Howie had the luxury of having purchased the project at a price that allowed them to pour money back into the property. Pierre’s theory was that people had to live somewhere, and a superior property would attract the best tenants at the highest rents. And Fenway Place, though a bit neglected, was a superior property; Felloff had thoroughly renovated it only three years earlier, and it offered many modern amenities that other apartment complexes did not.

  In the two weeks since they had purchased the property, Pierre had used rental income from the project to paint the vacant apartments, sand and polish the hardwood floors, and install tasteful window blinds. He had also hired a landscaping company to keep the grounds neat and attractive, and had worked out a deal with the local cable TV company to provide basic cable services to all the tenants at the landlord’s expense. And it seemed to be working. He had already rented a couple of apartments for July 1, normally a slow period in a college town like Boston. And he had gotten decent rents.

  Pierre grabbed a calculator and worked through some rough calculations. If he could reach his goal of 95 percent occupancy, and if he continued to rent the apartments at the same price as the new tenants were paying, the property would be worth close to $8 million. That was a full fifty percent more than they had paid for it. Pierre calculated his share of the profits—$1.3 million.

  Unless the RTC found out about the affidavit and made him forfeit it all.

  CHAPTER 47

  [July 19, 1990]

  “Hi, Mike. This is Bruce Arrujo. Have you heard anything?” Charese had been murdered just over a month ago.

  “Nothing earth-shattering. The police haven’t come up with anything new. I think they’re getting close to the point where they’ve got to make a decision.”

  “How strong do they think their case is?”

  “Well, I sent over the partnership agreement to establish the attorney-client relationship, and they conceded that the privilege exists. So they know their case isn’t great. My sense is that if they thought they had enough to get a conviction, they would have arrested Pierre already. They don’t like to make an arrest and then lose at trial—it’s bad publicity for the DA, and he’s got an election coming up. And it’s not like there are crowds of people demanding justice for the victim in this case. So it looks pretty good for Pierre.”

  “Did they pick up on the RTC fraud angle?”

  “Not yet. I don’t think they even know about the affidavit. I think what’s happening is that I’m dealing with the state on the murder case, and all they care about is state law. It’s really only the Feds who would care about the RTC fraud. The state people probably have never heard about this whole RTC bidding procedure, so it hasn’t even occurred to them to look for the fraud. And the Feds aren’t involved in the murder investigation, so they’re not around to tell the state people what to look for. And I’m sure not gonna tell them. So, like I said, things are looking pretty good.”

  Bruce pounded his fist into his thigh. Damn. “Yeah, that’s really great news.” Idiots. That’s why they couldn’t get jobs in the private sector.

  * * *

  Bruce dug through his Fenway Place file, searching for a name. There—Andrea Cameron. He walked to a pay phone on the street corner and dialed her number.

  “RTC. Andrea Cameron speaking.”

  “Hi. I don’t want to give you my name, but I think you should look into the Fenway Place auction. The guy who won the bid was in cahoots with the developer, Sebastian Felloff. The Suffolk County District Attorney’s office has a copy of their partnership agreement.”

  CHAPTER 48

  [August 6, 1990]

  Jennifer Palmer had called a meeting for Monday afternoon to discuss the Charese murder case. Shelby was invited along with Dom Mazzutti and the Division Chief, a tall black man with eyes that seemed to miss nothing. They sat around a fake mahogany conference table cluttered with legal pads and soda cans.

  Jennifer got right to the point. “Charese Galloway was murdered June 16, more than seven weeks ago. It seems to me that this investigation has hit a dead-end. We’ve got a possible car match on Prefontaine, and we’ve even got motive and opportunity, but I don’t think it’s enough to get a conviction without the lawyer’s memo. Everybody agree?”

  Dom and the Chief nodded. Shelby appreciated that Jennifer waited for her nod before proceeding. “So it seems we have three choices left. One is that we can just keep digging for evidence and hope something comes up. Dom, where are you on new leads?”

  Dom shifted uncomfortably. “Nowhere, unfortunately. We’ve checked the surveillance cameras in the office buildings and convenience stores to see if they picked-up the car. No luck. We’ve questioned every prostitute we can find to see if they saw anything. Nothing. We searched the neighborhood dumpsters and the ones near where Prefontaine lives. Lots of trash, but no evidence. We searched his house and car. Nothing. We’ve looked at the hired killer angle. None of our sources have heard anything. Something else may come up, but I have no idea what or when it might be.”

  “So if we find something new, it would just be dumb luck.” She smiled at Dom as she said it, as if to make sure he didn’t take it personally.

  “Yeah.”

  “Thanks, Dom. So that’s one choice—hope we get lucky. Second choice is to do nothing and just let Prefontaine walk. If we choose this we’re making a tacit statement that we think he’s innocent. Dom and Shelby, you guys know this case best. Dom, what’s your gut tell you?”

  He exhaled. “I think Prefontaine did it. At first I didn’t think so, but then when I saw Arrujo’s memo, I started to go back and forth. And when he hired Mike Callahan as his lawyer, that sealed it for me. The thing is, it just doesn’t smell like a random homicide to me. And that leaves us with our three main suspects. It could be that either Jeffries or Krygier did it—or, more likely, hired someone to do it—but I still put my money on Prefontaine. There are too many things that otherwise have to be chalked up to coincidence: the car match, him being downtown that night, his financial situation. Not to mention the lawyer’s memo. It all seems to fit together. Unless someone was framing him.”

  “Like who?” Shelby knew that Jennifer would not let a statement like that go by unchallenged.

  “Again, could be Jeffries or could be Krygier, although Jeffries seems less likely to me because the video hasn’t turned up.”

  “Any evidence to support a frame-up theory?”

  “No.

  Shelby spoke up. “I’m not sure I buy the frame-up theory anyway. I mean, there’s no way Krygier or Jeffries could have orchestrated the lawyer’s memo, right? Or Pierre being downtown that night. Which, by the way, seems a little strange—why is Arrujo socializing with Prefontaine if he’s worried Prefontaine might be planning a murder?”

  Jennifer responded. “Well, we all know lawyers that would dine with the devil in exchange for a large retainer. I don’t think there’s anything to that. But I agree with you on the frame-up theory; I don’t see any evidence for it. So, Shelby, bottom line—who do you think killed Charese? Dom’s already given us his opinion.”

  Shelby had thought about little else over the past seven weeks. If Pierre was the killer, letting him go just because they couldn’t put the Arrujo memo into evidence made her want to quit and go find a new career. The law was supposed to be a search for justice, not a contest between lawyers over who could find the most loopholes. How could she dishonor her family’s death by devoting her life to a judicial system that let yet another killer go free on some technicality? She
had not taken a job in the DA’s office to be part of a system where rules were more important than truth.

  Yet she wasn’t convinced they had discovered the truth. Pierre could have committed the murder, but was she so certain of it that she was willing to send him to jail for the rest of his life? To destroy a family, much as hers had been destroyed? The words of one of her law professors kept coming back to her: Our judicial system is based on the tenet that it is better to let ten guilty men go free than to put one innocent man in jail.

  She took a deep breath. “I’m sorry if this sounds like an over-analytical response, but this is where I am: My guess is that Pierre Prefontaine murdered Charese. But if I were on a jury and heard this evidence and had to decide if he was guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, I’d vote for acquittal.”

  Jennifer immediately tested Shelby. “Even if the lawyer’s memo were part of that evidence?”

  Shelby knew she couldn’t back down. A man going free because of reasonable doubt was different than a guilty man going free because of a technicality. “Yeah, even with the memo as evidence, I think I’d still have too much doubt to vote for a conviction.” She half-expected the ghosts of her family to pop into the room and condemn her, but the only voice she heard was Jennifer’s.

  “All right. I agree with Shelby—no jury would convict on this evidence, especially since we can’t introduce the lawyer’s memo. But both Dom and Shelby think he probably did it, so I’m not thrilled with the thought of just letting him walk. That leaves us with our third choice—take our pound of flesh by nailing him on this bullshit little RTC fraud thing. It’s not much, but he did lie when he signed the affidavit, and that’s a federal crime. It’s better than letting him walk, and maybe we get lucky and he blabs to his cellmate or something. Comments?”

  The Division Chief spoke for the first time, his voice rich and deep. “That’s fine with the DA. He’s not under any pressure to solve this case—most people have already forgotten about it. Plus he scores a few points with the Feds. So it’s your call, Jennifer.”