Mountain Justice

by Phillip W Price

  He sat back down behind his desk. “You ever had any dealings with the District Attorney for that circuit?” I shook my head.

  Carver looked to Andrews. “Can you tell us anything about the District Attorney over there in Gilmer?” he asked.

  “A little,” Andrews responded. “He was a cop in Jacksonville, Florida. Had been there for several years on the street. Then his mother took sick and he moved back to Georgia. He got a security job at the Atlanta Athletic Club. Mr. DA started law school while he worked there. Some folks say he was encouraged by our current governor.” Andrews paused for emphasis. “Anyway, he finished law school and went to work for the district attorney in Gainesville. When he had a chance, he ran for DA in his hometown. He won by a narrow margin. This is his first term.”

  Carver continued. “I don’t know much about him, either. His name is Gerald Mason. He won in the last election after the current DA was injured in a freak accident. Nothing sinister, but he wasn’t able to run again. Mr. Mason is concerned about the stealing of government funds by people from the courthouse. Money has gone missing, or something like that. You folks in the drug world don’t have to worry about stepping on toes. You can investigate what you see fit. In the regional offices, we have to have a request by a sheriff, a judge of a superior court, or the district attorney. The DA has given us a request, but it’s not a blank check. We have to stay within the boundaries of his request.”

  Carver looked at me pointedly. He went on, “But the DA has a reputation as a bull in a china shop. His circuit is three counties. He got elected by the people in the other two counties and got soundly defeated in Gilmer. Because of the split in the circuit, some people in government claim the DA’s allegations are political. He says there are lots of people in the courthouse involved. For all I know, Mr. District Attorney is as crazy as they come. Or he could be the lone voice of sanity in a crazy alternative universe.”

  I still couldn’t see what I brought to the table. “Sir, I was a Drug Agent. If this is some kind of financial investigation, I may be over my head.”

  Carver leaned forward. “This is more a case of tracking down the facts and putting them in a report. The DA says he can get the specifics of the finances figured out. What he wants to know, and we want to know, is who is behind this, and what is being done with public money. But we’ll get you any help you need once you get down to work. Just contact me when you think we need to send somebody over to help.”

  I leaned back in my chair. Carver was staring at me. I wasn’t sure what to say at this point.

  Carver seemed to know what I was thinking. “Something on your mind? Speak up, you’re among friends.”

  “Do you mind if I stand?” I asked. He nodded and I stood, walked to the window, and gazed out at the front parking lot, trying to see the future laid out ahead of me in Gilmer county. Shortly after, I turned back around. “Seems like this is a job for someone else. Hell, I can barely keep a checkbook.”

  Carver smiled. “For your age and experience, you get right to the bottom of things.” Carver stood up and moved beside me. “You have pretty good instincts. This case seems pretty simple on its face, but we are hearing rumblings that there is something deeper going on. That, in fact, the district attorney is not full of crap. I think there is something bigger going on and there is big money being diverted from the public coffers. Each county audit is vetted by the Georgia Department of Audits and Accounts, and they have expressed to me some concerns with the goings-on in Gilmer County. They can’t give me specifics, other than that the county is receiving federal grants that seem to pay for services that don’t quite pass the smell test.”

  “So, why not send in a team of Agents? Run a video camera up their ass and see what’s going on.”

  “We need more information before we do something like that. We need someone to find specifics that will get a bigger investigation kicked off. We are looking for someone who can dig around and see what is going on up there, someone who isn’t easily intimidated, and who isn’t afraid to rock the boat. And out here in the field, we have to rely on Agents to work on their own.”

  Carver placed his elbows on his desk, letting me take in the case he had just laid out. Walking back to my chair to sit down, I still couldn’t see how I was the best person for this job. A job that seemed to get more complicated as this briefing went on. Doubt must have been evident on my face because it didn’t take long for Carver to continue, in a reassuring tone. “Byrd, you were chosen for this job because you have expressed an interest in coming to the field. And I know you excel at working alone. I have looked over your evaluations while you were working on some very complex and dangerous investigations. I need you to be able to work on your own to burrow into whatever is happening up there. We know those boys can be ruthless, and you’ll need to be on your toes, but your undercover experience will keep you out of trouble.”

  I was thinking the only reason I was getting this case was because it was a dog. I couldn’t see this case going anywhere, and I couldn’t imagine that, in this day and age, the county officials were as corrupt as Carver seemed to think.

  Carver interrupted my thoughts. “But you aren’t entirely on your own. We’ll bring the full force of the State of Georgia to bear if you have a problem. Just take your time, scratch at the surface. Don’t take a sledge hammer to the problem.”

  Andrews interjected. “The other aspect that looms over all of this is the politics. We don’t want our Agents involved in political matters, but you can’t discount the fact that there are a number of powerful politicians in that area. We can’t go into anything in this area half-cocked. That’s where you come in.”

  I nodded.

  “The sheriff up there has served federal prison time. Got a pardon under President Carter and got elected sheriff three years later. The State changed the law to prevent someone being elected sheriff who has served time. But this man was already in office and can have the job as long as he continues to be re-elected.” Carver frowned and took a sip of coffee. “It falls to the GBI to try and clean this county up.”

  “What about the feds, sir?” I asked Carver. In the drug world, dealing with federal agencies was a necessary evil. I knew that, in the general investigative world, the feds were best kept at arm’s length.

  He shook his head. “Our friend DA Mason went to the FBI and raised hell with the Resident Agent in Charge in Gainesville. All he did was piss off everybody in the US courthouse. The FBI told him to call me. They said they couldn’t get involved without a clearer federal criminal offense. In other words, they want the GBI to make the case, and then they’ll come in and take the credit.”

  “So, cutting to the chase, what do I need to do in this case?” I asked, trying to make sense of it all.

  Carver summed it up for me. “We have a specific complaint. I want you to do whatever you need to address that. But use every opportunity to dig and see what else is under the surface up there. We know their law enforcement has been corrupted for too long. The DA seems to think it goes a lot deeper. Turn over the rocks and see what you find. Just remember that rocks can have snakes under them.”

  I looked to Carver. “I guess I need to figure out who is getting a payday they aren’t owed?”

  Carver nodded. “Yep. Follow the money. Nobody is crooked for free. They get into it for the money. Even the power brokers, at the end of the day, are in it for the money.”

  I started to stand, then a thought occurred to me. “So, the only reason I’m getting reassigned is my performance evaluations? That doesn’t sound right.”

  Carver picked up an envelope on his desk. He glanced over at Andrews and then passed it to me without speaking. It was a plain manila envelope with the address for the regional office and the return address was the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation.

  Pulling out the contents, a letter on TBI letterhead sat on top. Underneath was a stack of photos of a body. The crime scene was obviously outside. There were trees and undergr
owth in the background. The victim was a white male, probably in his twenties or thirties. As I went through the photos, I noticed the victim was wearing handcuffs and his arms were pulled behind his back. There was a shot of the victim’s face, and the numerous bullet wounds made his cause of death clear. Looking at the dates, I noted the photos were taken about a year and a half ago.

  The photos were followed by crime lab results from the TBI and a copy of an autopsy.

  Carver watched me. When I had finished scanning the photos and the lab reports, I looked up. Carver knew I was puzzled. “Is this all connected to the Gilmer case?” I asked.

  Carver nodded. “The main reason we wanted you to look into this is that the body you just looked at was your informant a couple of years ago. Name is—was—Justin Harris. He worked with you on that meth case you tried to make in Gilmer County. We opened him up as an informant in our office, and he worked with one of my Agents on some heavy equipment stolen from Murray County. Word was the equipment was stashed in Gilmer County.”

  I shrugged. “His lifestyle didn’t contribute to longevity.”

  I reexamined the pictures. I had seen a lot of death, but it always hit me a little harder when the victim was someone I knew.

  “He was shot in the face with a double-aught buck,” Carver informed me. “Dumped just inside Tennessee. Probably killed in the early winter. He was found in February of last year. Body was in decent shape, but figuring out a time of death was complicated. All the time outside, with the temperatures going up and down, make any kind of date you could take to court an impossibility.”

  I examined the crime lab results again. The official cause of death was listed as a gunshot wound from a twelve-gauge shotgun. The ammo was probably 2 ¾-inch buckshot. The pathologist found seven pellets in the body, but two of the lead pellets were unaccounted for. The shot pattern was consistent with a shot from about seven to ten feet away. Post-mortem lividity seemed to indicate the victim had been killed in one place and dumped in another. Indications were that the time between death and body dump had been about three hours.

  “So, how does a murder in Tennessee come into play in Gilmer County? I get that he was a documented informant for the Bureau, but does anything tie back to Georgia?” I was considering all the potential reasons why Harris had been handcuffed and that he had been dumped outside the State.

  Carver nodded. “Nothing we can charge anybody with. But there is one little detail that makes all of us question if him working with the GBI had something to do with his death.”

  “What?” I had an idea where this was going but didn’t want to believe it.

  “If you look closely at the photos, you’ll see he was wearing handcuffs,” Carver said.

  I thumbed back through the photos and found one that showed the rusty cuffs still attached to the wrists of the victim. The picture was a close-up of the serial number of the cuffs.

  “That number you’re looking at,” Carver said, “was traced back to the point of sale in Rossville, Georgia.”

  I nodded. There was a large police supply company in Rossville.

  Carver glanced over at Andrews. Andrews passed me a copy of an invoice he was holding. Before I could take it all in, Andrews said, “Those cuffs were sold to the Gilmer County Sheriff’s Office about five years ago. No way to prove whether they have been lost.”

  The pit of my stomach felt empty. I had been involved in investigations of crooked cops, but a group willing to murder was so much pulp fiction. “Not much to go on, but I’ll keep my eyes open.”

  Carver held up his hand. “There’s one other detail. We got a tip two months before the body was found. Scott will give you a copy of the report. The tip was on an anonymous line. The caller said the Gilmer County Sheriff killed this man and dropped him over the line in Tennessee.”

  I took a moment to let that sink in. “Damn,” I said. “I’m working a murder, too? Did the tip indicate any kind of motive?”

  Carver looked grim. “The tipster said it was over one of the targets you were going after in the meth trade. Supposedly, this informant was lining up someone with big connections.”

  I nodded. “They always are. Nothing else?”

  Andrews smiled. “We still can’t establish jurisdiction. And the tipster didn’t leave a name, so the information is just about worthless.”

  I shrugged. “I guess nothing is ever simple. So, do we have any kind of request on this, or is this part unofficial?”

  Carver cocked his head to the side. “Son, in the GBI, nothing is unofficial. Let me worry about getting an official request if you start to make any headway. The Director can get the request we need from the Governor.”

  Andrews pointed back into the office. “We have some of the best homicide investigators in the State of Georgia working out of this office. If you get anything they can use to open a case, our office will be all over it.”

  Carver nodded. “You’ll get the chance to work plenty of homicides in this office. But for now, just nose around. You’re a new face to everyone up there. Don’t worry about being a pain in the ass, just get in there and see what you can find out.”

  Andrews moved on to the logistics. “I got the Inspector to approve for you to stay in a motel up there while you get this case going. I would guess you can get somewhere on this in a week. Maybe two weeks if you start getting into anything.”

  Carver was looking out his office window. “I saw your truck outside, and it might be handy to be operating out of an undercover car right now. I don’t want you being tailed all around. Happened to the last Agent we assigned to a corruption case in Gilmer. They used an unmarked car, but it was very obvious.”

  My state-issued car at the time was a Ford Expedition I had driven undercover. I assumed I would be waiting for a fleet car since, at the time, Regional Agents usually drove the Ford Crown Victoria with the police package. The car had a police radio which was concealed with only a microphone coming from under the seat. I had made a point to hide anything that would make it obvious that the car was related to law enforcement. The antenna was covert and the blue lights and siren were also hidden. All GBI Agent cars are assigned undercover license plates, but over the years I had accumulated a couple of valid out-of-state license plates, too. I had a feeling that any advantage I got early on would be beneficial.

  “I still have my undercover driver’s licenses and a credit card to go with one of them. I’ll check in under that name when I get a motel room.”

  Carver gave me a pointed look. “These folks may all seem like a bunch of good ole boys, but don’t underestimate their capacity for survival. Keep your guard up, and call if you need anything. Seriously, day, night, or weekends; we will be available.”

  Andrews gave me a firm handshake and said, “Good luck. Dig in and see what comes up. And remember that we are right here waiting to help you, if needed.”

  Carver grabbed my hand next and pumped it. “Remember the skills you learned working undercover. Just be sure to watch your back.”

  Andrews’ usual smile seemed to dim for a second. “But for your safety, I want you to call in to the Headquarters Radio Room every evening. If we haven’t heard from you by seven p.m., someone will come looking.”

  “Thanks,” I said, turning to leave.

  Carver wasn’t satisfied. “Don’t forget to check in. That area is not covered by the GBI radio system. Do you have a cell phone?”

  I shook my head. “Nope. Most of the areas I have been working didn’t have coverage, anyway.”

  Carver nodded. “I get that. The Bureau still hasn’t gotten around to getting one for all the SACs. It won’t matter anyway. There is no cell phone coverage up that way. Runs out by the time you get to Jasper. You’ll have to call the Radio Room by phone or call the local State Patrol post by radio. You’re not going to have a lot of backup. Stay safe, Danny Byrd.”

  I nodded to them both and walked out into the hall. I kept rolling over Carver’s last statement in my head. Y
ou’re not going to have a lot of backup. That was beginning to sound like an understatement.

  CHAPTER 3

  GETTING STARTED IS

  SOMETIMES THE HARDEST PART

  The next day was a beauty. The North Georgia mountains can be breathtaking. August was the beginning of fall in some parts of the country, but rarely in the South. This year, the trees were starting to turn colors early, with deep reds and golds broken up by the occasional evergreen. Fall would be incredible.

  As I drove my government ride across the mountains from Atlanta toward Ellijay, I couldn’t help but be in good spirits. I had felt gloomy when I started, but the scenery really perked me up. The farther north I drove, the more awesome the scenery became. The Zell Miller Mountain Parkway followed an undulating valley from its first mile post up through the center of North Georgia before it turned east and paralleled the North Carolina border. The Parkway bisected Gilmer County through the middle, running north and south.

  Driving long distances, which is a routine for any state officer, gave me time to think. On the drive up the highway, I mulled over what Will Carver had said. Harris was an informant for the regional office before I met him, and our contact had been very limited. I wasn’t surprised he had dropped out of touch with Region Eight. Informants frequently dropped out of sight for extended periods. It was unfortunate no one in his life cared enough to raise an alarm when he went missing. I had worked alone for the better part of the last three years, and I had thought about the consequences of being killed in some remote spot without anyone to come looking for me. I felt a responsibility to try to get justice for Harris. Harris wasn’t someone I would describe as a good guy. He had three drug charges pending and one burglary charge. His mother died and his sister turned her back on him by the time he dropped out of high school.

  Shaking off the musings about Harris’ dark past, I continued to drive until the highway became a veritable roller coaster, up and down hill, twisting and turning.