Dark Justice
Page 24
I suddenly remembered seeing a Monty Python skit a long time ago. It was a skit where two men were playing hide and seek, and the man who was supposed to hide could literally hide anywhere in the world. It showed the man going to some remote location overseas, and the man who was supposed to find him somehow did find him just because he saw something insignificant - like a Coke can. The joke was that he knew just where to find the other guy just by seeing something that presumably didn’t really matter much at all.
I felt that way with this case. I was supposed to make sense of all these clues, yet there still wasn’t anything concrete that I could take to a jury. I couldn’t use the paternity test in court. I couldn’t really use Chris Warford in court, because I knew that he was just going to lie about what he did. I could use a forensic analyst who could testify that Carter was spoofed, and that was something. Other than that, though, I was only getting worthwhile testimony. That was all well and good, but if Jackson, Senator Nash and Art Loffino got up and lied on the stand, there was little that I could really do.
Now I had this letter, another dead end. And my mother, who was bringing up the Angel Eyes thing again.
“Dear, here’s the thing,” mom said. “One thing that you need to know about The Good, The Bad and The Ugly is that it wasn’t filmed here in America. It was set in America, and some of it in Mexico, as were all those movies with the man with no name. But they were called spaghetti westerns for a very specific reason.”
“I know, mom, I know. They were filmed in Italy. The director was Italian, Sergio Leone, as was the film score composer and most of the actors. So what?”
“And you got a letter from Rome, Italy.” She nodded. “Dear, you really should pay attention to the movie studio that put that movie out. I have a feeling that if you go over to that movie studio and look around, you’re going to find exactly what it is that you’re looking for.”
“Okay, mom, you got me. What is the movie studio that put that movie out?”
“Look it up,” she said. “Here’s my computer, you can borrow it.”
I booted up her computer and quickly navigated to the Wikipedia page that talked about that movie. I saw that the studio was called Cinecitta, and it was apparently the largest film studio in Europe. Fellini, Rossellini, Bertolucci, Francis Ford Coppola, Martin Scorsese and Mel Gibson apparently were amongst the luminaries who had made films with this studio.
I wasn’t getting it, though. My mother apparently knew something that I didn’t. “Mom, what are you getting at?”
She nodded her head. “I don’t really know. All that I know is that Chaz came to me, right in the middle of the day. He does that sometimes, you know. I’m sorry, I can’t predict when he’s going to communicate with me or why. But he told me that this film studio has the answers that you seek. So, I do believe that you need to go there and visit the head of the studio.”
“Mom, I can’t just-”
“You can just go over there and investigate this. Carter is the only case that you have so far, so you don’t have to worry about other clients and their cases being neglected while you’re over in Europe.” She smiled. “I think that you should take Declan, too, along with you. That boy is very handsome, and he’s absolutely smitten with you. I can tell, just by the way that he looks at you. I’ve never been looked at like that since…” She shook her head. “Since never, I guess. Sad, huh?”
“Yeah, sad.” I shook my head. “I might not have an entire roster of cases that I have to worry about, but Declan does. You forget, he’s an attorney who has been in private practice for quite a few years. He does personal injury cases, and I know that he always has hearings and depositions and all kinds of things that he has to attend to all the time. So, he can’t just up and go to Italy with me, mom. I’m sorry, I know that you like him. I like him, too. But I don’t think that my taking a trip to Europe with him will be in the cards.”
“Ask him. He’s working this case with you. Ask him. I predict that he’ll be willing to go with you, if you’re only going to be gone for a short period of time. Ask him.”
I sighed. “Okay, mom, I’ll ask him.”
At that, I looked up his phone number on my phone and dialed him.
“Hey,” he said, picking up. “Emerson. What’s going on?”
“Listen, I have to go to Rome. I got a mysterious letter from there, and my mom seems to think that I can find my answers for this case at the movie studio called Cinecitta. You ever hear of that movie studio?”
“Of course. It’s in Rome, and it’s one of the biggest in Europe, if not the biggest. All the greats have worked there. Why do you have to go there, though?”
“Uh…” How did I explain to him that mom’s spirit guide told her that that movie studio was the Rosetta Stone for this case? That I was going over there on a whim and at the advice of my kook of a mom who generally somehow knew things ahead of time? “I got a letter from Rome and-”
“And? Where was that letter postmarked?”
“Rome.”
“Rome. I see. Emerson, you do know that some 3 million people live in Rome? You’re going to have to narrow it down some.”
“Trust me, I would be more than happy to narrow it down. But I can’t. The person who sent this letter sent it from a post office, not from a residence. They also made it clear that they’re going to remain anonymous.”
I could hear irritation on the other side of the line. “What am I missing here? You get some letter from Rome, and that makes you think that you need to go to a large movie studio there?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Listen, don’t ask me more about why it is that I want to go to that movie studio. Please.”
“I’ll go with you,” he said. “I’ll clear my schedule. How long are we going to be there?”
“I don’t know. A week, maybe. Maybe not that long.”
“Sure,” he said. “It’ll be fun.”
Just then, I saw my mother sit straight up in her chair. She was no longer working on the astrological chart. She was looking at the ceiling, her eyes transfixed.
“Wait, wait, wait,” she said, gesturing to me. “I’m sorry, Addison, you can’t go to that movie studio just yet. I’m getting a message that you won’t be able to find anything out there until at least December. December 1 at the earliest, that’s the date that you’ll find your answers there.” She nodded her head. “If you go now, you’ll hit a brick wall.” She smiled. “Thank you, Chaz.”
I rolled my eyes. “Never mind,” I said on the phone. “False alarm. Looks like I need to go to that movie studio in December now.”
“What?” Declan said. “What are you talking about? Why December?”
“I don’t really know.” I felt embarrassed for jumping the gun like that. Worse, I really had no good explanation for jumping the gun. I only knew that my mother was getting some kind of other-worldly message that Cinecitta was not going to give me the answers I needed for four more months.
I heard Declan start to laugh. “You’re an odd one, Justice,” he said. “But I’m looking forward to trying to figure you out.”
We talked some more, and I hung up and looked at mom. “Okay. What the hell is going on?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know, dear. I wish I did. Chaz told me that you aren’t supposed to go to Italy just yet, and that’s all I know. He told me earlier that you should go and then he told me not yet. That’s all I know.”
I sighed. “Well-“
Just then, I looked at mom’s computer and saw breaking news.
There was a story about Addison having been pregnant. This was the first I heard, publicly, that she was pregnant.
But the story wasn’t that Senator Nash fathered her child.
The story was that Jackson Anderson did.
Chapter 35
Addison. November 29 - The First Day of Trial
I arrived at the courthouse, only to find that the circus had come to town. Right in front of the courthouse were throngs and thro
ngs of media outlets. There were reporters on the steps, their microphones in hand and cameras overhead. Satellite trucks lined the streets, and photographers were absolutely everywhere.
Also on hand were protestors. Lots of them. After word had gotten out about Senator Nash sleeping with Addison, and Jackson Anderson apparently impregnating her, there became an enormous groundswell in favor of my client, Carter Dixon. Everybody had an opinion on this case, and the prevailing theory, by half the country, was that Carter was railroaded and that Senator Nash or Jackson were the ones doing the railroading.
The pundits on the cable news channels were the ones leading the charge about this theory. “They obviously arrested this boy prematurely,” Anderson Cooper said on CNN. “The police really need to look harder at other suspects and people who might have had motive to have done this.”
“But Anderson,” a CNN contributor argued. “You forget that this kid’s hair was in Addison Wentworth’s bedroom. You forget that he wrote those heinous messages on that Reddit board. Explain those two things, and I might agree with you.”
Rachel Maddow also got into the act, featuring theories about the case each evening. She, too, thought that the cops jumped on Carter too soon and that a further investigation was warranted.
And so it went. 50% of the people in America, it seemed, thought my client innocent and was being set up. 50% thought he was guilty as sin. They read his Reddit posts, knew that his hair was found in her bedroom, and that was that. 100%, it seemed, had their minds made up about this case, one way or the other.
I had no idea how it was that I was going to get an impartial jury on a case that had drawn this much attention and passion on all sides. I was just going to have to try.
The protestors were holding up signs and chanting. “No justice, no peace, no justice, no peace! Free Carter Dixon! Free Carter Dixon!” They were led by a 20-something woman who was screaming into a bullhorn. “We’re tired of the rich and powerful making the weak do their dirty work! That senator is railroading that poor boy into doing his time for murdering his mistress! If it wasn’t him, it was that dirty movie producer! Carter Dixon is innocent!”
Then came the counter-protestors. “Carter Dixon is guilty! You’ve all read what he wrote on that website! It’s vile, disgusting and violent! He wrote about how he was going to kill her, and then he did!”
I walked towards the steps, and tried to worm my way, somehow, through the reporters, the protestors, the cameramen and the looky-loos - there were plenty of spectators along with everyone else - while fighting off shouted questions as I mounted the steps.
Everyone, it seemed, wanted me to give my trial strategy.
I looked around and saw Declan heading towards the courthouse as well, and he was much more forceful than me. I was trapped by the throngs of reporters wanting a statement, and Declan shoved everybody out of the way.
He finally reached me, and he put his hand on my arm. “Let her through!” he shouted. “Let her through! Let her through, or I’m going to call the cops!”
He physically shoved people out the way, making a path for me to get into the courthouse.
I finally arrived inside the courthouse, and I took a deep breath. Those reporters and crowds had rattled me, and I needed to not be rattled. That was what I desperately needed - to not be rattled.
“Thanks,” I said to Declan as the two of us went through the metal detectors and made our way to the lobby of the enormous courthouse.
Declan and I had been dating, exclusively, since the night that he had come over with the chicken. I had to admit, if it weren’t for his support, I didn’t think that I could have handled the last few months. This case exploded, absolutely exploded, in the media after the Jackson Anderson pregnancy story and the Senator Nash Addison-as-mistress stories hit the airwaves.
Suddenly, I found myself becoming famous. I became the second-most famous attorney, right behind Michael Avenatti, even though I never did any interviews or news programs. I never wanted to tell the media anything about the case, because I didn’t want to get into trouble.
The fact that I wasn’t a public figure, because I refused to make myself one, didn’t really matter. I was doxed, as my address was made public, and it wasn’t long before my brand-new condo was overrun with media and curious onlookers. I got more than one death threat. The overall tones of these threats were along the lines of “you’re representing an animal. You deserve to be gutted just like that actress was.” And “if Carter Dixon goes free, you will die.”
I got the cops involved after I started to receive threats. I wasn’t just afraid for my own life, but for the lives of Arabella, Luna and my mother. They were all innocent parties, and they were all vulnerable.
Arabella, for her part, wasn’t at all afraid. “Just try me,” she said. “Anybody who wants to kidnap me will get my boot in their nuts. I’ll cut a bitch.”
My mother was similarly defiant.
The cops told me that, unfortunately, when it came to a case like this, death threats were common. As far as they knew, nobody actually had ever carried out a death threat made against a famous person, but if I wanted a 24-hour bodyguard, I was entitled to one.
I reluctantly decided not to get additional protection, but I was very, very watchful of the girls and my mother. Declan was as well.
My life turned into an absolute circus these past few months, and Declan kept me sane. He kept me sane through the move to the larger condo. He kept me sane through the new home study that I had to go through. He kept me sane through the adoption proceedings that I had instigated for the girls.
Most of all, he kept me sane through the craziness that had become my life once the case exploded around the world. It was a huge case to begin with. Add in a presidential candidate and prominent studio head into the mix, and, just like that, our case was absolutely everywhere.
I took a deep breath as I got into the lobby of the courthouse and made my way to the elevator. The media people weren’t allowed inside the actual courthouse, thank God. I had fought against cameras being allowed in the courtroom, and I won that fight. The media wanted the entire trial to be filmed and broadcast, but there was no way that I wanted even more publicity than I was already getting.
I waited for Carter in the lobby. I worried about him, so I sent Declan back out into the scrum so that he could usher Carter safely in the door. If I was being harassed by the mob outside, then Carter certainly was going to be as well.
Five minutes later, Declan appeared with Carter in tow. Carter was dressed in an ill-fitting suit and a cheap tie. I knew that he still didn’t have money to spend on himself - he didn’t really have access to his Go Fund Me money except for use on his legal bills. He was still just a 16-year-old broke kid who supported both himself and his drunk mother with his meager salary as a grocery store cashier. He had a haircut, but that was cheap, too, so his brown hair was sticking up and choppy.
Poor Carter looked terrified. His shoulders were slumped and he was shaking all over. He approached me, and I took his hand and looked him right in the eye. “We got this,” I said, although I wasn’t feeling it. “You trust me?”
He nodded his head wordlessly, but I could tell that he was near tears.
It broke my heart.
I had been working with him, one on one, preparing him for his testimony in this case. We went through hours of practice testimony, and I met with him every time I found out something else on his case. We had spent hours together over the past few months, and I had gotten to know him, and he had gotten to know me, as well. We had bonded, and I felt extremely protective of him.
To say that I was under a ton of pressure in this case would be the understatement of the year. I really liked this kid. I found him to be very kind, very respectful and very smart. I wouldn’t mind him dating Arabella, not that there was any interest there, but that was how much I liked this kid.
If he went to prison for murdering Addison, I was going to be devastated.
I got up to the courtroom and saw that it was completely full. There wasn’t a single seat that was unoccupied.
I didn’t know who all the people were in the stands. I knew that most reporters weren’t able to get inside the courtroom, and no recording devices of any kind were allowed. The only thing that was allowed as a sketch artist who was going to sketch the proceedings. I knew that every news channel in the world was going to be breathlessly broadcasting those sketches while the few reporters who managed to score a seat in the courtroom would be reporting every detail.
The prosecutor, Neera Tierdan, was already there, as was her second-chair, Daniel Coleman. Neera was probably considered to be the top prosecutor, so that was why she was assigned such an enormous case.
I wasn’t at all confident in my case. I did all I could - I talked to as many witnesses as I could, including Addison’s parents and siblings in Brooklyn and the family members of Katie Wylder. They really weren’t any help to my client, but I did think that it was odd that her family didn’t seem more torn up about everything. They had just lost their daughter and their sister, yet all of them seemed like nothing had ever happened.
In the end, it didn’t really matter. I never got a good answer for why it was that Carter’s hair was in Addison’s bedroom. No matter what I did, no matter where I looked, I couldn’t figure that one out.