Blood and Justice: A Legal Thriller (Brad Madison Legal Thriller Series Book 4)

by J J Miller

“Did they know that you’d aired your concerns with the boss?”

  “I’m pretty sure they did, but I don’t know how.”

  “Did they confront you, Mr. Bowman?”

  “No.”

  “Did they threaten you?”

  “No.”

  “So even though they knew that you’d claimed they were engaged in illegal activity, they treated you no differently?”

  “Not in a way I could perceive. No.”

  “Did you ever put your suspicions to them directly?”

  “No.”

  “Yet you were convinced they were up to no good, weren’t you?”

  Chip paused for a moment, then leaned closer to the microphone to answer. “Yes, I was.”

  “You must have been worried that such behavior, if it were true, would cost you your job. Is that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Given the inherent dangers of your job, did you ever think their behavior might cost you your life?”

  “Yes, I did.”

  “Then it’s fair to say that you considered them a risk to your livelihood. Is that right?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “They posed a risk to your family’s future, didn’t they, Mr. Bowman?”

  I tried to get Chip to look at me. Winter was drawing him into a trap. But Chip kept his eyes fixed on Winter. It seemed he felt that being unreservedly honest, almost defiantly so, would help his cause, even though I’d warned him that such nativity could allow Winter to bury him.

  “Yes,” he said. “I wanted nothing to do with anything illegal. I wanted to work hard, earn my pay, and then go home.”

  “I see. Now, Mr. Madison has done his best to portray HardShell as a company run by pirates. Is that an unfair depiction, Mr. Bowman?”

  “In some ways, I don’t think it’s far from the truth.”

  “So, in some ways, you believe Bo Hendricks and Nathaniel Reed were modern day pirates, do you?”

  “They were mercenaries in every way. They’d been so for a long time. They didn’t see fit to respect the rules of the game. You can see that in their track record.”

  “I’m not sure what track record you’re referring to. Mr. Rollins speaks very highly of both men. He told this court that they were the first men he wanted on the team at HardShell. Despite Mr. Madison’s attempts to slur their reputation, no allegations of misconduct against them have been proven.”

  “They were sent home from Iraq in disgrace,” fired Chip.

  “Oh, you know that for certain, do you? Were you over in Iraq working for Fortis then, were you?”

  “No.”

  “Then what you are dealing with is no more than gossip, Mr. Bowman. Don’t you think people are innocent until proven guilty, Mr. Bowman?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “But you have judged your two co-workers without proof. You have more or less accused them of being criminals in this court.”

  “They rode fast and loose.”

  “And you didn’t?”

  Chip’s face went blank. He kept his mouth shut.

  “Correct me if I’m wrong, Mr. Bowman, but didn’t your boss see fit to reprimand you for shooting your mouth off about the rewards of robbing cannabis dispensaries?”

  “I misspoke. I was foolishly trying to appear tough in their company.”

  “Oh, so it’s different for you, is it, Mr. Bowman? Isn’t it true that you’re doing your utmost to cast your dead co-workers in the worst possible light in order to save yourself?”

  “No. That’s not true at all.”

  “It could be surmised that you are trying to blame them for their own deaths. Is that the truth, Mr. Bowman?”

  “No, it’s not. That’s absurd.”

  “Even though they were shot dead—executed—with your own gun?”

  “I can’t explain that.”

  “No, of course you can’t. Your memory has conveniently failed you just at the time when all the evidence tells us that you drew your weapon when Nathaniel and Bo were completely relaxed in your company, fired a bullet into Bo’s head and then another into Nathaniel’s.”

  “That’s not what happened.”

  “How can you say that? You can’t shed any light whatsoever on this diabolical act. Perhaps that’s because you don’t want to.”

  “If I knew what happened, I would tell you.”

  “Of course, you would, Mr. Bowman. But you were the one who planned that job. You were the one who had the most to gain by this crime. You got your two difficult co-workers out of the way and you made a fortune. Or so you thought.”

  “Objection!” I called out, getting to my feet. “Counsel is testifying.”

  “Sustained,” said Judge Birch, but Winter spoke over him undeterred.

  “All you had to endure was a bullet in the leg, fired by your accomplice, who made off with all the bounty for you to share.”

  “Counsellor!” said Judge Birch. “I ruled on the objection.” To the court reporter he said, “Strike Mr. Winter’s last outburst from the record,” before addressing Winter again. “Watch yourself, counselor. I will not have you ignore my rulings in my court!”

  “What he said is not true,” said Chip.

  Winter was unfazed by the drama he’d stirred up.

  “Understood, Your Honor. Mr. Bowman, you have painted your co-workers as reckless men capable of doing anything. Isn’t that a fair description of yourself?”

  “No, it’s not.”

  “Yet, you were the one found with traces of methamphetamine on your hands, weren’t you?”

  “For the life of me I can’t explain that.”

  “Of course, you can’t. But you’d have us believe that Nathaniel and Bo killed Iraqi civilians and planted weapons on them to cast them as armed hostiles, wouldn’t you?”

  “I happen to think that Bo and Nate were capable of doing such a thing.”

  “They were cut-throats then? Working in a cut-throat industry?”

  “Yes.”

  “And what does that make you, Mr. Bowman? Do you really expect the jury to believe that you’re the honest Joe of the bunch, a do-gooder who tried his darndest to behave himself while all around him chaos reigned?”

  “I don’t pretend to be a saint.”

  “No, you could never do that. No one would believe you. Mr. Bowman, Nathaniel and Bo trusted you with their lives, didn’t they?”

  “Yes, we all trusted each other like that. That’s what we do as a team.”

  “Yet you shot those two men in the most cold-blooded manner possible, didn’t you?”

  “No, I did not.”

  “And Nate shot you.”

  “That I can’t say, because I don’t remember.”

  “Well, that’s what the evidence tells us. That’s what the forensic analysis tells us, and that’s what those two men are telling us from the grave. You have offered nothing to make the slightest hole in the case against you. How can you expect a jury to swallow the lie that you had nothing to do with this heinous crime?”

  “I’m innocent.”

  “That’s what they all say, Mr. Bowman. Is that why you ran from the police when they came for you?”

  Chip struggled to come up with an answer. The foolishness of that decision was back to haunt him with renewed force.

  No answer came from Chip’s mouth. Winter didn’t even wait for a response. He just collected his documents off the lectern, tapped them loudly on the slanted wooden top, and turned for his desk.

  Leaving Chip speechless, Winter no doubt reasoned, spoke volumes.

  Chapter 40

  The next witness I put on the stand was Cliff Loda. As it turned out, his testimony added little to Chip’s cause. The jury got to hear that Nate had asked him to swap shifts with Chip, and that Nate and Bo had all but confessed to robbing a cannabis dispensary, but it seemed to come across to the jury as an overplayed act of misdirection on my part. Thankfully, Winter didn’t unearth the fact that Loda had lied his way into
HardShell. All he did was argue that Loda’s testimony amounted to yet more unfounded accusations against two dead men who weren’t on trial.

  Next up was Scooter Slovak, whose main purpose, from my end, was to vouch for Chip’s character, and the improbability of him committing a serious crime. Winter had thrown a lot of shade on Chip during his cross-examination, and it troubled me that the jury seemed to buy the skepticism Winter was selling about Chip’s standing, or lack thereof.

  I was pleased to see Slovak show up to court looking the part. He was dressed in a smart jacket and tie, and he displayed a kind of naïve goodwill as he approached the stand, nodding a greeting at the court reporter, the bailiff, the foreman—whoever caught his eye. I was relieved he didn’t include Judge Birch in his circle of welcome. Slovak’s positive energy was there, in the way he walked, in how he sat and took in his surrounds with bright-eyed wonder. Not that he was flip. All of it, it seemed, was just him being pleasantly dutiful.

  “Mr. Slovak, what is your role at HardShell Security?”

  “I’m the chief financial officer. I’ve been there from the get-go. I’d worked with Mr. Rollins overseas, and when he told me his idea to start a security service dedicated to the cannabis economy, I thought he was really onto something. I never studied finance or anything, but I have a knack for figures. I came up with some financial services we could offer our clients, on top of taking their money and crops from point A to point B.”

  “What were they?”

  “The main difficulty our clients face is getting the cash that they have earned into safe, secure accounts that they can access anywhere. Because of the federal laws it’s actually very hard for legal cannabis businesses to do the kind of banking that the rest of us take for granted. You know, like being able to access your money via your phone. I set up a system that lets them keep their money safely tucked away yet freely available.”

  “Go on.”

  “I came up with the idea of getting these businesses into cryptocurrency banking.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “It’s essentially a financial system that exists outside the normal banking framework, and as such it’s safe from any laws. It’s accessible whenever the client wants, and it’s completely mobile and costless. There are minimal service fees—apart from the extra that HardShell charges—and you can move your money anywhere in the world, whenever you like. No foreign exchange rip-offs, no ridiculous fees that banks will charge you for doing the equivalent of sending an email.”

  “It’s cutting-edge banking?”

  “Yes, but anyone can do it. Except it’s not something everyone trusts themselves to do. And it takes time to learn it. That’s where I, we, come in.”

  “And so you offer a cheap, secure alternative to banks and credit unions?”

  “That’s right.”

  “Now that we knew where you fit into the operation, what about Chip? It was you who sought him out to join HardShell, wasn’t it?”

  “Yes, that’s right. We were growing fast and we needed someone to handle client liaison on a day-to-day basis. Quinn’s time was being spent on higher level stuff, and I was more and more focused on the finance side of things.”

  “Why did you think of Chip for this job?”

  “I knew he was a solid guy. And he was smart and personable. We needed someone to both deal with the clients and ride in the delivery vans.”

  “So you recommended that Quinn hire him?”

  “Yes. And he did.”

  “But Chip was not a perfect fit, by the sounds of things.”

  “Well, he was not like a lot of the other guys we had on board who were, what you might say, pretty spirited. He was more strait-laced.”

  “Which was why he was good for the client role?”

  “Exactly.”

  “But what about the fact that he shot his mouth off?”

  “When I say he was strait-laced, that’s actually relative to the other guys. Chip was a risk-taker but he was also a family man. As much as Chip could talk crap like the rest of them, he also talked about building a future for his girls. We all knew he was intent on banking as much money as he could for their education. No amount of money was enough, it seemed.”

  As soon as he said these words, Slovak knew he had overstepped. We’d gone through this in our preparation. I’d told him to never mention Chip’s hunger for money. And now he’d practically spelled out a compelling motive for Chip to carry out a daring robbery.

  The jury knew, everyone knew, that this was an inside job. And if Chip wasn’t the culprit, who could it possibly be? As much as I’d tried, I’d come up short. The bottom line was that I had to cultivate and preserve the image of Chip being the good, loyal employee. Now Slovak had just declared that he was both risky and ambitious. I needed to change tack.

  “Mr. Slovak, do you think Chip was capable of committing the crime he is charged with?”

  “No, sir. I do not.”

  “Why not?”

  “Chip just didn’t have the know-how to pull that off. I mean, why would he agree to be part of a plan that saw him get shot and risk taking the fall for murder and robbery?”

  “Well, his accusers say he probably thought he could get away with it.”

  “I can tell you that this was not in his nature. And besides, he was smart but he’s not smart enough to plan something like this. And he’s not dumb enough to allow himself to be blamed for it either. I think someone wanted the money and thought this was a good way to get him blamed for it.”

  “What skills are needed for Chip’s job?”

  “The kind of skills that only men with military training and combat experience have.”

  “Chip has those, obviously.”

  “He has them in spades. He’s a professional. Both as a soldier and as a HardShell employee. He’s not a mercenary.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The rest of the guys at HardShell, I’m sorry to say, would sell their mothers and aunts for a buck. Chip was never so ruthless. He was an outsider at HardShell to some extent. And believe me, that’s a good thing. It’s a compliment.”

  “Do you believe this crime was an inside job?”

  “Objection,” said Winter. “Calls for speculation.”

  “You Honor,” I said. “Mr. Slovak knows HardShell better than just about anybody. He knows all the systems and how the teams go about their work. He is not someone plucked from the street. He classifies as an expert witness, surely, and as such his opinion holds weight.”

  Judge Birch ran his hand slowly over his mouth and looked down at his notes. “I must agree, Mr. Winter,” he said. “Overruled. The witness can answer the question.”

  “Do I think it was an inside job?” asked Slovak. “Yes, I do. But that said, I can think of one other possibility."

  “What’s that?”

  “That it was carried out by personnel from a similar company who had inside help.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “The rivalry between HardShell and Bravo is pretty fierce. I bet certain people from Bravo would do anything to see HardShell go down.”

  “Thank you, Mr. Slovak.”

  On that note, I ended my direct examination. The jury looked as though there was so much more to this case than they thought. And that augured well for Chip. Slovak had done his job after all.

  Chapter 41

  Winter stood at the lectern with his hands clasped behind his back, staring pensively at Slovak. After a few moments, he released his right hand to dab a finger gently at the witness.

  “Mr. Slovak, you think a good deal of the defendant, don’t you?”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “You say he’s honest?”

  “I do.”

  “Trustworthy?”

  “Yes.”

  “Decent?”

  “Yes.”

  “A man of principle and integrity?”

  “Yes. I would say that.”

  “This court has heard
of instances of the defendant’s behavior being anything but principled. You do know what I’m referring to, don’t you?”

  “Yes. He shot his mouth off once or twice. But, like I said earlier to Mr. Madison, we are not all one shade of color. Chip has his flaws but he’s as decent a man as I have ever known.”

  “A decent man, who declared that he would be inclined to hold up a cannabis store at gunpoint. You call that decent?”

  “I—”

  “Do you regard that as decent behavior?”

  “Not really.”

  “I take it that by that you mean no?”

  “Yes. I mean, my answer is no.”

  “And when the defendant tried to run from the police when they came to arrest him… That was the act of a man with integrity, was it?”

  “That’s not for me to say.”

  “You can’t have it both ways, Mr. Slovak.”

  “You can’t have it one way, either, Mr. Winter,” said Slovak with an even, firm tone to his voice. His sudden steel jolted somewhat against the well-presented, amenable guy-next-door disposition he’d displayed to date. And the jury noticed it, big time. “It seems to me that you want to demonize him. I’m offering some balance.”

  Winter’s face went red. I imagined it must have been a combination of fury and embarrassment at Slovak’s challenge. He dropped his eyes to the lectern to consult his notes, or at least pretend to.

  “Mr. Slovak, it would be fair to say that you are particularly loyal to the defendant, is it not?”

  “He’s someone who I think has a lot to offer.”

  Winter’s question raised a small red flag. Where was he going to take this loyalty line of inquiry? I’d deliberately avoided any reference to the fact that Chip had saved Slovak’s life. I wanted that to stay buried so the jury wouldn’t be tempted to frame Slovak’s praise of Chip as blind loyalty. I’d gambled on Winter not digging that deep.

  “But you have done him a few favors, haven’t you?”

  And now I was about to lose that gamble.

  “Nothing anyone wouldn’t do for a friend,” replied Slovak.

  “Ah, but not everyone lends their friends a great deal of money.”

  I felt relief that Winter had taken a different tack, but I wasn’t happy that Chip had failed to mention anything to me about Scooter lending him money, which, I was just learning, was not an insignificant sum.