Mountain Justice

by Phillip W Price

  “We are spinning in big circles. But I have a couple of leads I want to follow up on. There are a couple of areas in those audits that just don’t add up.”

  “Anything I can do?”

  “Could you get me a subpoena for records from a place in Gainesville that does all the work for the Water and Sewage Authority?”

  He found a form in a desk drawer. He filled in most of the blanks and handed it to me. “Get Rose to type up this letter for my signature,” Mason said.

  “Will this get me what I need?” I asked.

  He shrugged. “I don’t know. That thing is as worthless as the paper it’s written on. The only real power I have is from a subpoena. Subpoenas in Georgia, that are legal, are issued on an active court case or an active grand jury investigation. We don’t have either.”

  “So, bluff like hell?”

  “Yep. If they call, I’ll back you up as much as I can without losing my job,” he said as he sat back and smiled. “So, I take it from your request that the Water and Sewage Authority has become the focus of your investigation. Would that be accurate?”

  I shrugged. “That is how things are shaping up.”

  Mason nodded. “I had a little bird tell me that was where the investigation would lead. I don’t have anything else to back it up. I know the ‘three stooges’ make up the majority of the control of the Water Authority.”

  I waited for him to explain. “The Sheriff, the Judge, and the Judge’s daughter, Linda,” he continued.

  “I didn’t think the Sheriff had anything to do with the Water Authority.” I wondered how much Mason knew and hadn’t bothered to pass on.

  “Those three have a finger in everything. The Sheriff does whatever the Judge tells him to do. I have heard that, on occasion, he steps out on his own, but the Judge usually has to bail him out. Word on the street is that the Sheriff has worn out his welcome with the Judge.”

  “Why are they so tight, then?” I wanted to know.

  “I can’t say,” Mason said with a shrug. “I know the Judge represented the Sheriff in his federal trial. I think the Judge kept him out of serious prison time.”

  “I assume this was before he was appointed to the bench?”

  “Right,” Mason nodded. “Once the Judge got on the bench, he got the Sheriff out, got him pardoned, and got him elected back into office.”

  “The Judge must wield a lot of power in this county.”

  “He controls the voting in this county and has a good bit of power in the other two counties in this court circuit. And his control of the votes up here means he has power under the gold dome at the capitol.”

  “And by extension, the Sheriff has that power?”

  Mason looked over my shoulder, to make sure no one was listening in. “Like I said, he has a little something to do with anything the Judge has a finger in. And that includes the Judge’s wife, according to gossip around here.”

  I didn’t put much credence in local gossip. “Recently?” I asked.

  “No,” he replied. “Many years back. The Judge has had his share of girlfriends, as well. At least, that is the talk on the street.”

  “Is there anything to back any of that up?” I asked.

  Mason shrugged. “Who the hell knows? Talk is that when the Judge’s wife got pregnant, they called everything off. The Sheriff moved on to another Lawyer’s wife. Some might say he has a type.”

  “So, did they split before the Judge’s wife got pregnant, or after?”

  “Good question.”

  Rose called from her desk, “Mr. Mason, Linda Pelfrey is here to see you about a case.”

  Mason looked at me and lowered his voice. “Speak of the devil, and she appears. And knowing her, she’s probably here to talk about a case of the clap. Hang on, and I’ll introduce you. Three times divorced and runs with a rough crowd at night. They say she does some dope, too.”

  We both stood up and walked into the front office. Rose was at her desk. An attractive woman, blonde and tall, dressed in an expensive looking business suit, was standing near her desk. She glanced over at us as we came out of Mason’s office. Then she made a point of looking me up and down. She had cold, narrow eyes, like I had seen in strippers. I figured she was about thirty-five years old. Mason stepped over to her and shook her hand. “Linda,” he said. “What can I do for you today?”

  “I came to see if you have my discovery package ready for the Powell case. I need to go over what you have.” Then she turned to me. “Are you the GBI Agent my father has been talking about?”

  I introduced myself. “I hope what your dad has said is all good.”

  She shrugged. “He has his opinion, and I like to make my own.” She had an odd way of speaking, and I tried to figure out what was bothering me about it.

  “Well, I hope we can settle all this soon. I would like to get back to my regular job.”

  “If you’re in town for long, maybe we could have a drink?” she asked.

  She seemed to have a nervous twitch, shrugging her shoulders and grimacing. But it was the faint gray cast to the skin of her hands that made it all click. The grimacing, and even sticking out the tongue, are all physical signs of a disorder called tardive dyskinesia. A disorder I was all too familiar with thanks to my time working with meth users. And the gray cast to the skin was another tell-tale indicator. It was subtle, but the signs were there.

  I was non-committal. “Maybe. I thought this was a dry county.”

  She laughed. “Even in a place as dry as this, I’m sure we could manage to find a cocktail. I have a full bar at home.”

  I decided to get out of there before I got in more trouble. I nodded to Linda and said, “Nice to meet you.”

  I thanked Mason and then handed Rose the draft letter to go on official letterhead. Linda and Mason headed back toward his office, talking about some case waiting to go to trial. Before I headed out of the office, I told Rose I would see her tonight. Then I headed back down the stairs. I made a point of smiling from ear to ear when I saw the Sheriff at the bottom of the stairs. I tried to make it across the lobby, but he hailed me.

  “GBI man. How come you tried to hurt one of my Deputies? That ain’t no kind of professional courtesy. I might just have to call your bosses in At-lanna.”

  I kept smiling. “I just talked to one of the Inspectors in Atlanta. He said you already called.”

  Sheriff Hodge’s eyes narrowed. “Well, how did that go?”

  I started to walk away. “Fine,” I said, “just fine.”

  I bounced out the front door and down the stairs. Shelia Haney had given me a list of recent expenditures by the county that exceeded ten thousand dollars. I had divided the results into two groups: the purchase of goods and the payment for services. I figured that purchases of goods would be the easiest thing to check up on. Goods would have to be delivered and inventoried until they were used. Services would be harder to track and would take more time.

  The first invoice to jump out at me was for 317,000 feet of one-foot-in-diameter PVC pipe that had been purchased by the Water and Sewage Authority about three years ago. The price tag was a whopping seven million dollars and some change. It had been purchased over a couple of years in blocks of about a half-million dollars at a time. The wholesaler was located in Chatsworth.

  I took GA 282 across the mountain to Chatsworth. This time, no one was following me. I found the warehouse that supplied pipe to the county just north of town on the way to Tennga. When I pulled into the lot, I was directed to a man named Ben Champion, who was the General Manager.

  Ben Champion was about my height but built like a fireplug. He had a cigar clamped in his teeth. When I introduced myself, he held the cigar in his left hand and shook with his right. I noticed the cigar was unlit and got the idea it never had been. I showed him my credentials, and he asked, “What can I do to help you, Agent Byrd?”

  I explained what I was looking for and noticed a sly smile. “I wondered if anyone would ever come asking about
that pipe.”

  “Why is that?” I asked.

  “About a month after we got paid for the first order, they tried to get us to take everything back and get a refund. And the refund they wanted was supposed to be made out to some other company. Not the county.”

  “But didn’t they buy pipe from you several times over the last two years?”

  He nodded. “They had us deliver the pipe to a supply company there in Ellijay. I heard that the supply company belongs to Mr. Mayfield, the Commissioner for the county.”

  “You mean there are sixty miles of pipe piled up at this supply business?”

  “No. I can’t say for sure what happened to the pipe. What I heard was that it was being sold off. But I can’t prove that.”

  “Hmm. Any reason you should suspect the pipe wasn’t used to put in a water line?”

  “If everything was legit, they were getting their water from someplace in Atlanta, is all I can figure.” He laughed.

  I was confused. “What are you talking about?”

  “They bought all that pipe. But no Ts or joins. They didn’t buy any of the standard reducers or any way to hook in a meter. Just pipe to run sixty miles in a straight line.”

  I nodded. “Are you the only place they could buy that stuff?”

  “Nope, but we are by far the cheapest in the region. That’s why the other counties buy their supplies from us. Gilmer County has only bought pipe from us. Nothing to go with it.”

  “Could they have already had the other supplies on hand?”

  “Sure. Or they could use a supplier out of Tennessee. I can’t say for sure that they are doing anything fishy.”

  “Can you remember the name of the company they wanted you to cut a refund check to?”

  “No. Some kind of holding company. Had a name that seemed familiar at the time, but I can’t remember it now.”

  I thanked him and walked back to my car. I had that funny feeling I had hit on something. But I just couldn’t get the puzzle pieces to fit. Even if they were using some friend to sell them the fittings at a higher price, why try to get a refund on the pipe and then continue to order more?

  I had some more digging to do with Shelia Haney. Then I remembered the address Shelia had given me for the holding company. She had called it LPC, and said they were here in town. I made it to my truck and checked out the map to find the address Shelia had given me. It was on the north side of Ellijay.

  I made it back to Ellijay in good time. Then I drove north from the square toward Blue Ridge. The houses I passed were nice and well kept. Occasionally a house had been converted to an office. When I came to the address Shelia had given me, that’s what I found. It was a medium-sized house that was probably fifty years old. It had been re-done and repainted. The yard had been carefully manicured, and the parking area was freshly blacktopped.

  I pulled into the small parking lot. There was a Mercedes SUV and a nice Honda in the lot. They were parked away from the door, like they were owned by employees. I leaned around in my seat to read the sign on the front. I couldn’t help but smile. The sign read, “The Pelfrey Law Group.” Then I saw underneath, in small print, “Linda Holding Company.”

  I decided to park across the street and use my binoculars to look the office over. Even fifty feet away, the binoculars allowed me to see details. I could see that the house had been extensively re-done, and what I could see of the interior, it looked very modern.

  I was getting ready to put the binoculars back in the console of my truck when I noticed something at the side door. There was a section of paint that looked stained. The stain was fairly large, about three feet wide. It looked like it had been cleaned, maybe even painted over. The house was a light green, and the stain looked to be too dark to cover easily. There were two small marks near the top of the stain, about four feet above the ground. Maybe where damage had been filled in.

  I didn’t feel like I could legally go on the property, so I used the binoculars to examine the wall. The two marks seemed to be about the size of my fingertip and appeared to be perfectly round. The stain was a different matter, oblong and wider at the bottom than the top.

  Then my eyes flew wide open. Blood is very difficult to hide with light-colored paint, and someone had done a hurried job of plugging the holes and slapping on paint. I realized the stain was probably blood. And after looking it over for a couple of minutes, I believed what I was seeing was where buckshot had hit the side of the building.

  CHAPTER 9

  CLOSING THE GAP

  I got out of the area after I noted both license plate numbers. I knew the crime lab could test and see if the stain was blood, which was my guess. But that would have to wait until I could develop probable cause for a search warrant.

  I found a place to look at my notes so far. I suddenly had a link to the most powerful politician in the circuit. Judge Pelfrey would be the one who could call the shots and make things happen, when necessary.

  I found a payphone and called the GBI Radio Room. I had the operator who answered the phone run the two license plates I had seen and quickly got a return that the Mercedes was registered to Linda Pelfrey. The Honda was registered to an Ira Freely with a Marietta address. My first thought was that Freely was a client, but then I remembered that one of the employees of the Water and Sewage Authority was named Freely.

  I dug around in my briefcase and found the list of employees Rose had given me. There he was, Ira P. Freely. He was listed as hired within the last year and was paid an average pay for a salaried employee of Gilmer County. I got back out of my truck and called the Radio Room again. I asked them to transfer me to the GBI Intelligence Unit. They put me in touch with one of the Senior Analysts, Valerie Thompson. Valerie was one of the best Analysts with the GBI. Shortly, I outlined who I needed information on and why I needed it. Valerie told me to call back in about an hour.

  I decided to get the letter from the DA and then get out of Ellijay. I got in and out of the courthouse without incident and then drove back toward Blue Ridge.

  Now I really wanted to talk to the people who laid all the water line. I was curious how all that worked without any of the necessary accessories. It was hard to believe that such a small county was pulling down so much in grant money, but politics made all things possible.

  When I got to a parking lot with a payphone, I repeated the ritual to get in touch with the Intelligence Analyst. I waited while the Secretary in Intelligence got her to the phone.

  “Anything?” I asked.

  “Probably more than you’re expecting. I was surprised myself. Mr. Freely has served federal time for fraud. Eighteen months back in 1989. Looks like it was involving a federal grant that he falsified documentation on. He isn’t wanted anywhere, and he isn’t on probation. It looks like the FBI were all over him at his last job in Alabama. I don’t have much more than that, except that the FBI called me as soon as I ran his name in the system. They told me the Case Agent in Mobile was happy to know where he was working.”

  “Did they give you any idea about whether they planned to indict him?”

  “No. They did say he has been involved in government grants all over the southeastern United States. If we have a local government who has hired him, he is either cooking their grant reports to make them look clean, or they didn’t bother to check on him at all before they hired him.”

  I thought about that one. “I’m guessing he was hired to cook the books. But in this county, it could be either. Can you get state tax records? Get an idea what he claims he earns each year?”

  “Not anymore. We used to be able to get them with no problem, but now we need a court order. Some politician got caught short, so the law was changed.”

  I thanked her for all her help. She had given me a current home address for Freely, so I decided to have a look at his digs. The address was to the east of Ellijay. I headed east out of town and started looking for numbers. I crossed underneath the parkway and was enjoying the scenic view of the rus
hing river. I had only gone a little over a mile when I saw the street number. I almost ran off the road.

  The house was a brand-new, huge two-story with what appeared to be a full basement. The back deck was cantilevered and hung over the river below. The house was surrounded by large trees that the builder had to work around to build the house. I pulled over just down the road and looked the house over with my binoculars.

  The house was on a carefully manicured lot. There was a three-car garage but few signs of a family. It made me think Freely lived alone.

  I wasn’t a realtor, but the house had to be worth more than a million dollars. It seemed Mr. Freely was being well compensated for his modest county job.

  I turned my truck around and headed toward my motel. As I passed a local hamburger joint, I saw Willie Nelson’s DNR truck. I pulled in and went inside to find him behind a plate with a hamburger steak hanging off the sides and a pile of french fries taking up the rest of the space.

  I slid into the booth onto the bench opposite him.

  “Mind if I join you?” I asked.

  Willie smiled. “As long as this date is dutch. How’s your case going.”

  I told him about some of the things I had discovered, leaving out anything to do with the murder of Harris. He slowed down a couple of times as he ate, but he didn’t make any comments. When I got around to mentioning Freely, he winked. “I think you have found the hidden treasure. You just need a little more to back this all up and you’re home free.”

  I shrugged. I knew I was a long way from a conviction. I might have enough to make an arrest, but that threshold was lower. Getting a conviction from of a jury was still some ways away.

  “They have you working late today?”

  Willie nodded. “We work whatever hours we’re needed. Same as the Troopers. I’m taking advantage of school starting back up. Nobody out on the lakes this week, so I can get some other stuff done before bear and deer hunting starts.”

  “I thought deer season was later in the year.”

  “You’re thinking about firearms. You can bow hunt beginning in early September.”