Jeff Sherratt - The Brimstone Murders

PENAL CODE SECTION 187: Murder is the unlawful killing of a human being with malice aforethought.

Robbie Farris was in jail. He’d be there a long time and there wasn’t a whole-hell-of-a-lot I could do about it. His professor was dead and there wasn’t a whole-hell-of-a-lot I could do about that either.

I threaded my way up the Santa Ana Freeway heading for the L.A. County Jail, going at a good clip until a couple of lunkheads, discussing their fenderbender on the side of the road, had traffic snarled all the way back to the 710. They were hammering away at each other, but a few quick jabs from the bigger guy seemed to quell the debate. I crept by in my five-year-old ’68 Corvette, steaming. My pants were pressed, shirt only worn once, shoes halfway shined, and I was even on time, but now the traffic would make me late-again.

My client Robbie Farris-charged with section 187, one count-was waiting at the jail. He wasn’t going anywhere. But I hated being late. I’d have to do better with these minor imperfections. Racking my brain, I could only think of a few, but the peccadilloes were part of my personality, and we wouldn’t want to change that. My main fault-if it was a fault-had to do with women. The first thought that crossed my mind when I met a woman, any woman, young or old, was what it would be like to sleep with her. I don’t mean to imply that I’m obsessed with sex, and sex certainly isn’t obsessed with me. But when you are thirty-five and divorced, a healthy male with an active libido, isn’t thinking about sex normal? Contrary to my married friends’ fantasies, bachelor life isn’t all that thrilling. It’s just lonely.

It was a hot Monday morning in October, about nine a.m, and the prisoner I was assigned to represent, in all likelihood, would be behind bars until the new millennium. It wasn’t that I was such a lousy lawyer; in fact, I was damn good. It was just that Robbie Farris committed the crime, murdered his college professor, and now-after his conscience kicked in-demanded that I let him plead guilty.

After I’d agreed to take the case three days ago, I had a short phone conversation with Robbie. And after listening to his incoherent babble, I hung up and phoned the judge, Hissoner Abraham J. Tobias, the guy who assigned the case to me. I asked for a continuance of the arraignment, or to be more accurate, I begged. The judge gave me an additional two days, until next Wednesday.

From my discussion with Robbie, I gleaned that he had found Jesus. I guessed he figured he could score a few brownie points with the Lord by admitting his deed in open court. I tried to persuade him it wasn’t such a good idea. I told him it would be better to try to score a few brownie points with a jury, then if God wanted him to do life in prison, He’d let the jury know. What could that hurt? But Robbie was adamant and now my role would be to see that he got the best possible deal.

I figured, after meeting with Robbie this morning, going over the details of the arraignment and listening to his mea culpa for as long as I could handle the self-flagellation, I’d head over to the D.A.’s office and try to arrange some kind of plea bargain. But getting any kind of deal might pose a problem. When arrested, Robbie had been screaming, “God, take my wicked soul and cast it into everlasting damnation, for I have sinned. I have killed Professor Carmichael.” It was all on tape, and with a statement like that ringing in everyone’s ears, I wouldn’t have much to dicker with. The D.A. would know they’d have a slam dunk. Especially since, in addition to the taped confession, Robbie’s bloody fingerprints were all over the knife found at the scene. But protecting my clients’ rights and providing the best defense possible-for the guilty as well as the innocent-was my job, and I always did what I could.

According to the police report, the professor had been stabbed twenty-seven times. The first one, slicing his heart, killed him instantly. Robbie’s other stabbings were afterthoughts, a little something to remember him by.

After signing in at the Central Jail’s attorney entrance and being patted down, I was escorted along a dingy tile-lined hall and shown into an austere, cinderblock room reserved for lawyer/client conferences. The room had a single metal table and two chairs in the center. The table was bolted down, but the chairs were free to move about. Fluorescents flickered overhead, casting the room in a ghostly bluish hue. A strong smell hung in the air, the mingled odor of industrial strength disinfectants, cleaning soaps, and human anguish.

The guard, an L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy, a black guy with a cookie-duster mustache, gave the table a good shake, demonstrating its immobility. “Hey, O’Brien,” he said. “Don’t want shysters like you walking off with the table.” His face was filled with a tooth-flashing grin.

“The name’s Jimmy, but you can call me Mr. O’Brien,” I answered, pulling out a rusty steel chair and sitting down. “Hey, sport, chair’s not bolted down. Might be just the thing for my apartment. Goes with the rest of my stuff, ‘Early Incarceration.’”

“I don’t know what’s worse, you criminal defense lawyers, or your clients. One in the same, you ask me.”

“Nobody’s asking. How ’bout you go get my guy, okay, Flip?” Flip Wilson, a comedian, was the primetime rage of the moment, and without the mustache, the deputy had a strong resemblance to the TV star.

Within ten minutes, Flip returned with my client. Another guard accompanied him, a heavy white guy bulging out of his uniform. One more donut and bam, buttons would fly.

There was no mirth between Flip and me this time. It was routine, just the perfunctory securing of chains strung around Robbie’s torso to eyebolts embedded in the concrete floor. Robbie appeared washed out; his pallor had the patina of dry cement and unlike most young guys his age, he was lifeless and numb. A tall, lanky kid of nineteen, he had mousy hair, trimmed around the temples but long on top, the tip of which fell forward and curled into his gray vacant eyes. He wore the customary white jumpsuit with L.A. County Jail stenciled in India ink on the back. There were no pockets or belts for obvious reasons, and the jumpsuit was designed as a one-size-fits-all model. In Robbie’s case, the designer had failed. Robbie’s forearms dangled out of the sleeves. These jail guys have no sense of style, I thought, as I sat there looking sharp in my mod bellbottom slacks and tattersall polyester sports coat.

After a few moments of Robbie murmuring eerie prayers of contrition, bowing and raising as much as the chains would allow, I got down to business.

“Why, Robbie? Tell me why you did it.”

Robbie turned and stared at me, blinked once, and without an ounce of emotion said, “He was a heathen.” A chill hovered in the air.

“You killed him because you thought he was a heathen?” I asked.

“He had no right to life. Life is a gift from God, and he had to die.” Robbie’s demeanor was as cold as the steel chair I sat on. “He wasn’t a Christian.”

“He was Catholic,” I said, taking a wild shot. I wasn’t sure if the professor was a Catholic or not, but with his Irish name, it had to figure.

“That’s what I mean.”

“I’m Catholic,” I said. “You want to stab me, too?”

“If I was told to stab you, I would.”

“Someone told you to stab the professor?”

“Yeah.”

“Who?”

Robbie dropped his head and intently scrutinized his hands, folded on the table. “My friend, the only one I can talk to,” he finally answered.

So that was it. There was an accomplice. It could be a woman, maybe not. But whoever it was, it might be someone I could hang this on. Someone who was manipulating this poor unfortunate soul.