David Ellis - Breach of Trust

“Nobody knows us, is the problem,” Mac said, filling in for Charlie. “Willie Bryant was a state rep for ten years and secretary of state for eight. He’s been around the block with all these guys. The governor’s only had a year of being governor, compared to eighteen years in state government for Willie.” He shrugged. “Nobody knows us, is the problem, you wanna hear it straight. Only thing keeping us in the game is the cash.”

That sounded like an accurate assessment. Governor Snow was apparently outpacing Secretary of State Bryant in the fundraising department. It kept him viable and gave him credibility. The unions, presumably, would want to go with a winner. They pick a loser, then next time their endorsement is a little less important and, thus, so are they. That’s how I would view it, if I were making the decisions.

“What about the politics?” I asked. “Does one have better policies than the other?”

Both of these guys smirked. I could see it was an irrelevant consideration. Charlie said, “The unions want a Democrat, but it probably wouldn’t make much difference between the governor and Bryant.”

“They’re deciding next week,” Mac said. “Both of ’em. And my intel says both of ’em are leaning towards Willie.”

Chris Moody, back in Suite 410, had mentioned that Mac used to be a union official, before he joined up with Carlton Snow. Sounded like he still had his ear to the wall over there.

“So we’re down to last options,” said Charlie.

“So how does the governor win the unions’ endorsement?” I asked.

“Hey, Chief.” MacAleer got to his feet, addressing Madison Koehler, who was walking past the rope into our segregated spot in the back.

“Hey, Madison.” Charlie nodded.

“Gentlemen.” Madison set her purse on the floor next to her and took the seat opposite me, between Charlie and Mac. A waiter quickly came over. She ordered a glass of Cabernet. Then she looked right at me. “We already know how to win the unions’ endorsement,” she said. “We just need you to help us do it.”

The three male carnivores at the table ordered steaks of various sizes. Madison ordered a piece of fish. The Caesar salads and bottle of wine arrived as Madison laid out her game plan.

“The name Warren Palendech mean anything to you?” she asked me.

It did. I’d read about him the same day the papers covered Greg Connolly’s death. Justice Palendech was a member of the state supreme court until he died from a heart attack, at roughly the same time Greg Connolly was found on Seagram Hill, facedown and pants down, about ten days ago.

Ever the quick learner, I noted, “The governor appoints a replacement until the next election.”

“Exactly.”

“But that’s not much time,” I said. “The general election is this November.”

She looked at Charlie. “It seems our lawyer needs some schooling on the law.”

Apparently she knew something I didn’t, which wasn’t surprising when it came to the laws governing our elections. But I didn’t appreciate her comment and wasn’t going to bite.

“It’s too close in time to the next election,” she explained. “Not enough time for a primary before the 2008 general election. So the law says the newly appointed justice gets to stay on until 2010. That’s basically two years before he or she has to run in a primary. Two years of incumbency. Two years of fundraising as a sitting supreme court justice. That person is going to have a huge leg up.”

Okay, so it was a valuable commodity. I still wasn’t all the way there.

“The name George Ippolito mean anything to you?” she asked.

I laughed reflexively. Judge Ippolito sat in the trial court up in the city. I’d tried a couple of cases in front of him in my time, pleasant experiences none of them. He was what the ACAs called a “yeller.” The moniker said it all. His judicial temperament fell somewhere on the spectrum between Joseph Stalin on a bad day and a wounded grizzly protecting her young.

Madison couldn’t be thinking what I thought she was thinking.

“You know him,” she said. She didn’t show a trace of apology, or equivocation, in her expression.

“The governor’s going to appoint George Ippolito to the supreme court?” I asked.

“He’s considering it,” said Madison. “The word we have back is that he’s tough on crime. Does that sound right?”

I looked away, incredulous. I couldn’t believe I was hearing this. George Ippolito was not the dimmest judge I had stood before, but he was far from the brightest. And that was to say nothing of our state appellate court, which held several excellent jurists.

“I suppose,” I conceded. “Ippolito’s tough on anyone who gets within fifty feet of him.”

“No-nonsense,” she said.

“Unstable,” I answered.

“Independent.”

“Okay, but there are plenty of judges who are tough on crime. Why George-”

Oh. The picture was filling in now. Dots connecting. One plus one equaling two.

“Ippolito’s connected to one of these union guys,” I gathered.

“George Ippolito is Gary Gardner’s brother-in-law,” said Mac.

I suddenly lost my appetite for the Caesar salad. So this was how it would work: Gary Gardner gives the governor the endorsement of the laborers’ union, and the governor puts his brother-in-law on the state’s highest court.

The governor was going to sell a seat on the state supreme court.

“Have we offended your delicate sensibilities?” Madison asked.

Yes, as a matter of fact, she had. I wasn’t so naive to think that advancement up the judicial ladder was tied, in a direct linear fashion, to merit. Judges were elected in our state, after all; it was impossible to separate out politics. But this-this was too much.

On the other hand, my job wasn’t to talk Madison out of this. I wished it was, but in fact the opposite was true. I had to recover quickly here and get on board. If I started showing reluctance, they’d drop me like a bad habit.

“Look, I won’t lie to you,” I said, which felt ironic given my undercover role. “George Ippolito is a terrible choice for the supreme court. Terrible. But my point isn’t that I think that. It’s that everyone will think that. The bar associations will go ape-shit. Lawyers who practice before him do not hold him in high regard, let’s put it that way. I think there’ll be blowback.”

“So?” Madison challenged. “Governor Snow doesn’t need a bunch of lawyers to stop him from appointing a judge who’s tough on crime.”

It was a decent political response, I suppose. The public wasn’t fawning over lawyers these days. Going against them might be a badge of honor. It sounded like Madison had done some homework here. My reaction hadn’t really surprised her. She’d already begun formulating a response to any criticism.

“Aren’t there other judges tied to this union guy Gardner?” I asked.

“She didn’t ask you about other judges. She asked you about Ippolito,” said MacAleer, ever the loyal soldier. I recall about five minutes ago, this guy was calling her Queenie behind her back, and now he was kissing her rear end.

I didn’t have a rebuttal. And I had to continuously remind myself that it wasn’t my place to have a rebuttal. It was my job to go along, the FBI riding sidesaddle, with whatever criminal enterprise these guys could conjure up.

“Okay, it’s not my call,” I said. “What do you need from me?”

I noted a slight softening in Madison’s expression. “I need you to make the case for Ippolito,” she said. “Conduct some interviews. Draft an analysis. Whatever you need to do. Just come to the right conclusion and make it look convincing. Do you think you can handle that? I mean, after everything I’ve heard about you, this should be a walk in the park.”