Dark Justice

by Sinclair, Rachel

  However, Matthew found out that the drug trial had failed, and, since this company was mainly focused on that one drug, the stock in the company was going to plummet. Matthew called Andrew when he found out about the failed drug test, and told him to dump the stock, quickly. Andrew did just that when he got Matthew’s call, and Matthew sold all of his stock as well.

  The government had enough circumstantial evidence to charge Matthew in this case. I knew that. The circumstances were that Matthew and Andrew, like a couple of fools, dumped their stock right before the failed drug trial’s public announcement was made. The timing on the stock-dumping was just too suspicious. Plus, it was known that Matthew had privileged information about Hydrona’s drug trials, because he was close friends with a senator, also in hot water, who was privy to that information. Through all these connections, I knew that it was going to be a slam-dunk for the government, and that my client was probably going to go away for quite a few years.

  I was going to have to try to dismiss the case anyway by making the claim that the only reason why the government charged Matthew in this case was because his ex-wife had illegally taped his phone call to his brother and recorded him instructing Andrew to sell the stock. At the very least, I was going to have to make sure that that phone call was suppressed. California was a two-party recording state, which meant that both parties to any kind of telephone recording have to be notified that a recording was taking place. It was clear that Matthew’s ex-wife, Marley, broke the law when she tapped his phone and recorded him. In fact, what she did would be illegal in any state, as neither party – Matthew and his brother Andrew – knew that they were being recorded.

  It was going to be a slam-dunk to have the recording suppressed. What was going to be much more difficult would be to show that the government had charged Matthew just because of that recording. I knew that the government was not supposed to use that recording as a basis for arresting Matthew, yet I knew that it did. I knew that Marley had sent the recording into the government anonymously, and I strongly suspected that the government officials listened to it before they sent out their arrest warrant.

  As I got to the courthouse, I felt minor butterflies. I didn’t like this man. He was gruff, condescending, misogynistic, and just plain mean. He was the kind of guy that, if the judge refused to dismiss the case, he was going to lay into me. He was going to blame me, mainly because I was his lawyer, and he was the type who refused to take any responsibility for anything he did. Everything he did, all the trouble that he got into, was always somebody else’s fault.

  I also knew that he was going to go extra hard on me, just because I was a woman. He was the kind of guy who clearly believed that women had a certain place in society, and that place was not in a courtroom or in a boardroom. No. He clearly believed that a woman’s place was in the bedroom and the kitchen. At least, that was what I had gathered from some of the remarks that he had made about his ex-wives, and about women in general. He had talked, right in front of me, about how uppity women were displacing men in the workforce, and about how that was such a shame.

  He was 75 years old, which meant that he had come of age in the 1950s, at a time when women “knew their place.” He would talk about how much better our society was when there were structured gender roles - everyone knew their role in the family hierarchy, and there were no latchkey kids. There was a woman at home to make sure that the house was running smoothly, the kids were fed, and the man was serviced, both in bed and out.

  All that meant was that I should never have been assigned to be lead counsel on his case. Yet, Grey saw fit to do just that. I asked him why he would do something like that to me, and he said that a man like Matthew needed to be put in his place somehow, and he was not going to give him what he wanted, which was an older male lawyer. Grey simply wasn’t going to give Matthew the satisfaction of bullying him. So, he told Matthew that I was lead counsel, and he could take it or leave it. Matthew chose to take it, mainly because he had used our law firm for years – we did all of his divorces, we did all of his estate planning, and we did all of the advising about the legalities of his various business-related transactions. He was loyal to our firm, so he grumbled about the fact that I was his attorney, but he took it.

  Yet I knew he was going to be abusive to me when the judge inevitably said that he was was not going to throw the case out just because Matthew was illegally recorded.

  I really didn’t want to have to deal with Matthew today, of all days. Not when I had some serious things dumped on me just this morning. I knew that I was going to have to go see Carter after this hearing and get his story. I also knew that I was going to have to take custody of the two girls soon. I was also going to have to look for a new place to live.

  The bottom line was that I didn’t want to have to deal with Matthew on top of everything else, but I knew I had no choice. I had to do everything I could to help him win this case, even though I knew that if Matthew went to prison, it would be an act of justice. Matthew had spent his entire life cheating – I knew that he was cheating the IRS by not declaring income and that he had cheated all of his ex-wives by hiding assets from them. Now, here he was, finally being caught by the government on yet another shady act. As far as I was concerned, if he went to prison, he would finally be getting what was coming to him.

  Yet, I couldn’t really think that way. I had to put on my lawyer hat, and realize that I owed him a vigorous defense and zealous advocacy. That was what I was constitutionally required to give him. I was a professional and I took an oath to always give every client my very best representation.

  I got to the courthouse and took the elevator to the courtroom. Matthew was sitting there waiting for me and glaring at me as as I walked in. I had no idea why. I wasn’t late. I was well prepared for this hearing, having thoroughly gone over all the documents the night before. I knew my arguments inside and out, and I knew every case that I needed to cite as well. Inside and out. I had spoken with Matthew several times on the phone before the hearing, telling him what he should expect. In short, I had done everything that was expected of me.

  He stood up, cutting an imposing figure at 6’3” and well over 200 pounds. “Little lady,” he said to me in his Texas drawl. “I’ve been sitting here waiting for you for the past 10 minutes. Where have you been?”

  I calmly walked behind the bar, and put my briefcase on the defense table in front of me. “Mr. Buchanan,” I began, “the hearing begins at 9:30. As you can see, it’s 9:15. We’ve talked about this case several times yesterday, and I have gone over all the documents that I need. I’ve reviewed all the relevant case law and statutes. I’ve prepared this motion to dismiss, I’ve talked to the prosecutor about it, and I’ve obtained all the evidence I need to present to the court today. I don’t really know exactly why you’re upset with me, but I’m doing all I can.”

  “You better do more. This is my life we’re talking about. If the judge doesn’t dismiss this case, I’m going to get your ass fired.” He shook his head. His face started to get red, and a vein popped out of his forehead. “That’s the problem with you women. You don’t see any problem whatsoever in keeping a man waiting. I suppose you were too busy putting on your makeup and doing your hair to make sure that you got here on time.”

  I sat down, feeling my blood boiling. I knew that he was going to bully me. I was just going to have to take it, at least for the time being. I knew that anything I said to him was going to just go in one ear and out the other, so it was just pointless to even say a word in my defense.

  I decided just to ignore him and do my job. That was the only thing that I could really do. I had had worse clients than him, considering that before I got this job, I was working for a small firm, doing criminal work. That meant that my clients were more common criminals - your low-level drug dealers, your burglars, your basic convenience store armed robbers. Two-bit guys who didn’t quite qualify for the Public Defender’s office, because their income was not quite low
enough, yet could barely afford our fee. Since I was used to representing guys from the street, I knew how to handle a difficult client.

  Nonetheless, this guy was really pissing me off. I hated rich assholes worse than anybody. I hated men who had just been given everything, and lorded it over people who they felt were somehow inferior. Matthew was just that kind of guy – his father was a wealthy man who had given him a loan of $10 million to start his business. He then took that money and went on to become a prominent hedge fund manager, focusing on pharmaceutical and tech companies. I knew that none of that would’ve been possible without his daddy’s money. Without his father’s largesse, he would have been lucky to have made a living selling used cars.

  “With all due respect,” I said, “I understand that your life’s on the line. I’m well aware that. Now, if you would just let me do my job, I’ll see if the judge will dismiss it. That’s all that I can do.”

  What I wanted to tell him was the truth. The case wasn’t going to be dismissed, because the state had too much on him. Even without the tainted evidence, the state had enough evidence to charge him with insider trading. The other thing I wanted to tell him was that he deserved anything that was coming to him. Not just because he was a rich bastard who was cheating the system, but also because a jerk like him should go to prison if he does something wrong. He was going to go to Club Fed anyways. Maybe he would get lucky and have a guy like Tommy Chong as his cellmate, like Jordan Belfort, a prominent Wall Street tycoon who ended up in prison for his shadiness and wrote a book about it, which was made into a movie directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio. That would be just this guy’s luck.

  The two of us sat down, and the judge took the stand. “Remain seated,” Judge Watkins said to all of us who were assembled in the courtroom. “I have before me the case of State v. Matthew Buchanan. It’s a motion to dismiss filed by the attorney for the defense, Ms. Emerson Justice. Ms. Justice, are you ready to argue your motion?”

  I stood up. “I am, Your Honor.”

  He looked at the prosecutor, whose name was Rashida Simpson. She was a beautiful African-American woman with a natural Afro and cocoa au lait skin. She was tall and trim and fit, and I knew that she ran marathons. We were friends on Facebook, and she was always posting about her marathon training. I admired her for that. I ran all the time, but I could never imagine running 26 miles at one time.

  I raised my eyebrows as she came to the bench. She smiled at me, and I smiled back. Then I looked behind me at my client who was still sitting at the defense table, glaring at Rashida and me. If I could read his mind, he was probably thinking something about how we women didn’t know our places. Rashida was also guilty, in his eyes, of lawyering while black. For guys like him, that’s the ultimate insult.

  I knew that the fact that Rashida was my opposing counsel was going to put even more pressure on me from Matthew. If I lost this motion, in his eyes, it would be somehow worse because I would have lost the motion to a black woman.

  Yet, I knew that that what was going to happen.

  “Ms. Simpson, are you ready for this motion?”

  “I am, Your Honor.”

  “Then this court will call the case of State vs. Buchanan.” Then he recited the case number. Rashida and I took our seats, and he invited me to argue my case.

  For the next half hour, I argued case law, the facts, and everything that was involved in this case. One thing about the legal profession, and motions in general, is that you can get case law to say anything you wanted it to say. For any point that you wanted to make, you could find cases that would be instructive. The Holy Grail was when they were completely on point.

  In my case, of course, I had statutes to back up the fact that the phone call that was recorded by my client’s ex-wife should be thrown out for being illegal. That was an open and shut point. Much less open and shut was my arguing the fact that the cops would not have probable cause to have arrested my client without that phone call. I tried to make the point that the phone call was a poisonous tree, and anything that came from it was fruit from that tree, therefore the evidence should not just be suppressed, but the entire case should be thrown out because it was based upon a faulty foundation.

  When I took my seat, I felt that I did a pretty good job. Yet, I still saw Matthew glaring at me.

  I had no clue what more I was supposed to have done.

  Rashida took the floor next, and she was spectacular. All she had to do was lay out the fact that the circumstances in this case gave the government enough probable cause to make an arrest. She simply stated that Hydrona was within days of making an announcement about a failed drug test, and that, just a few days prior to this announcement, Matthew and his brother Andrew dumped all of their stock in the company. She showed that, prior to the stock-dumping, neither man had sold even one share of their stock.

  That was that. There was little arguing with the timeline. To say that the government had probable cause to arrest Matthew and Andrew would be an understatement. There was just no way that it could be a coincidence that both men decided to dump a stock that they had been holding onto for years, not even selling one share, right before an announcement that effectively put the entire company out of business.

  As soon as Rashida was finished with her rebuttal to my motion, Judge Watkins announced his decision. “Ms. Justice, while you made a good argument, your argument only covered, in my mind, the need to suppress the phone call that your client made to his brother about dumping the stock. That clearly was illegal, therefore that phone call will be suppressed. However, I found that the government had enough corroborating evidence to charge your client in this case. Therefore, your motion to dismiss is denied.”

  I nodded my head, but I could feel Matthew Buchanan’s eyes burning into me. He knew that his goose was cooked. In fact, if Grey didn’t have a talk with Matthew and encourage him to take a plea deal, any plea deal, then Grey would be committing legal malpractice.

  I stood up, putting my case law, my motion and my factual evidence into my briefcase. “I’m very sorry,” I said to Matthew briskly. I wasn’t sorry, of course. If I would have won my motion and the case was dismissed, I would have been sorry then, because it would’ve meant that justice was not being done. But I was happy with this outcome. The case needed to go forward. I knew it, and so did he.

  Matthew was sitting at his table, tapping his fingers impatiently on the wood. He was shaking his head. I could tell that he was ready to boil over.

  “Ms. Justice. I don’t know how you managed to ever pass the bar in this state. I don’t know how you could ever have gotten a job with such a prominent law firm as the one that you are working for. My five-year-old could’ve done a better job arguing this motion. I don’t know how it was that you were able to pass the bar or get a job with this firm, but I do know one thing. You are stupid, incompetent, and lazy. I’m going to talk to your boss, and demand your job.”

  I took a deep breath. What came out of my mouth next was probably something that I should’ve held back. Looking back, I should never have said anything. Yet, I just couldn’t handle this man telling me how dumb I was. How incompetent I was. Not when he was the one who was so stupid and greedy to have dumped the stock right before a devastating piece of news hit the airwaves. I mean, the guy was worth billions. He really couldn’t have swallowed a few million dollar loss, which was what he would have lost if he would’ve just been legitimate and aboveboard and held onto the stock and just took his lumps along with all the other investors? What did he think was going to happen when he did something like that? Did he think for a second that it was going be suspicious that he would completely divest himself of all the stock in this company right before this evidence came through to the public? Did he really think that just because he was a rich guy that he could just get away with anything?

  I knew the answer to that question. The answer to that was most likely a resounding “yes.” Guys like Matthew Buchanan did thi
nk that they were above the law. They thought that laws were for the little guys, not big billionaire whales like himself. I was tempted to remind him that Bernie Madoff was, at one time, a billionaire whale as well, and he was going to spend the rest of his life in prison for cheating a bunch of people. Granted, what Matthew did was less serious than what Bernie Madoff did. Matthew dumping the stock, really, if you thought about it, didn’t hurt anybody. The company was going down anyways, so him dumping all of his stock wasn’t going to make it go down any faster. Yet, at the same time, I knew why they had to have such a law in place – people just can’t get away with trading on their insider knowledge. That would mean that rich guys were in line before all the poor little Joes and Janes who have to go ahead and lose their shirt, because they don’t have the same information.

  I cleared my throat. “Mr. Buchanan,” I began, gritting my teeth. “I’m not the one who did something really stupid in this case. I’m not the one who dumped millions of dollars worth of stock, right before a company tanked. I’m not the one who’s worth $10 billion, and is so greedy that he can’t stand to lose any amount of money. I’m not the one who apparently thinks that laws do not apply to me. Who feels that the only people who should be prosecuted and go to prison for crimes are people who are beneath me. Quite frankly, I don’t look down on anybody, except for guys like you. I feel sorry for you, that you’re such a tiny little man that you can’t stand having a woman represent you. Personally, you’re going to go to prison, and I believe that that’s exactly where you belong. So just get used to it. Don’t worry, you’re going to go to Club Fed, but I think that a guy like you deserves to have an even worse fate than that.”

  At that, I took my briefcase, turned around, and walked out of the courtroom. I could hear Matthew yelling behind me. He was livid, and losing his temper, and he could not apparently hold anything back.