James Sheehan - The Law of Second Chances

“You’ll smell good after spending a day in here, Counselor. It’s a little bit different than a day at the office. The files are over here.”

He brought Jack to a door leading to a separate room in the right rear of the barn. The door had to be opened with a key, and when Wofford did so, Jack saw stacks and stacks of boxes in racks. The room was dark and obviously musty.

“There’s no electricity in here,” Wofford told him. “I’ll get you a lantern, a chair, and a cup of coffee. After that, you’re on your own. Just be careful opening boxes-you never know what’s living in there.

“I’ve got a meeting tonight in town, so I won’t be back until late. There’s a restaurant called Rooster’s right on Main Street. Maybe we can meet there first thing in the morning for breakfast.”

Jack hadn’t planned on staying another night. Hell, it was possible he’d be done in an hour. He didn’t want to bring any of that up with the judge, however, so he agreed with Wofford’s suggestion.

“That’ll be fine-about seven?”

“Make it seven-thirty,” the judge told him. “As you’ve probably noticed, I don’t get going as quick as I used to.”

Jack’s optimism was misplaced. Although the boxes were neatly placed on racks, the files inside were a mess. Cases were not separated or labeled. He had to go through every folder and every piece of paper. He had no idea how many pages were in the transcript or if the pages were stapled together-or if the document even existed. The lighting was terrible, and, as Wofford had predicted, from time to time a mouse scurried out of the box when Jack lifted the top. Jack was just glad that he hadn’t encountered a rat-yet.

The hours ticked past and the light outside was beginning to fade when he finally opened a box and saw a large folder labeled “Wilson.” He hesitated before opening it and said a little prayer. Another hour of this place and he’d be ready for a straightjacket. He opened his eyes and looked down. Within the folder, in a jacketed cover, was the transcript of Wofford’s recorded interview with James Vernon.

The next morning, Jack was a very conspicuous visitor at Rooster’s, sitting among the farmers as he waited for the judge to arrive. He’d taken a shower at the hotel that morning, but for the third day in a row he had to don the same clothes-clothes that had spent the previous day in Wofford Benton’s barn. That, however, actually made him fit in with the breakfast group. He stood out because he was a stranger.

Wofford came in about ten minutes after Jack and made the rounds of each table, shaking hands with everybody in the place.

“You can never stop politicking,” he said as he sat down at Jack’s table. “You forget to shake one hand and it could cost you a hundred votes in this town. Word travels like lightning.”

Ruthie, the waitress, came over and simply inquired if the judge was going to have “the usual.” Wofford nodded that he was. Jack had already given his order.

“Did you find anything interesting?” Wofford asked when Ruthie had left.

“I did,” Jack replied. “I found the transcript of your interview with James Vernon.”

“Well. .?”

“Well, Vernon told you that he was there when Clarence Waterman was murdered. Vernon claimed to have been there with two other guys he wouldn’t name, neither of whom was Henry Wilson. One of those other two guys supposedly slit Clarence Waterman’s throat.”

Wofford thought about what Jack had said for a moment. “It makes sense,” he finally said. “That’s why I called Vernon to the stand. I hope you noticed something though. Vernon told me he was there at the scene. He told Willie Smith, the prison snitch I called to the stand at trial, that he actually committed the murder. One of those statements is a lie, and James Vernon supposedly made both of them. Of course, Willie Smith could have been lying. It’s a problem with these criminals-they never tell the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”

“There was something else, Judge.”

“Really?”

“Vernon said that he also told Ted Griffin, his lawyer on the case he was in jail for, about the Waterman murder. Did you know Ted Griffin?”

“Yeah, I knew him.” Ruthie arrived with the food, and both men were quiet for a moment. Jack was careful not to press the judge. He wanted Wofford to stew over the information and come to his own conclusions.

“I guess I should have anticipated that Vernon might take the Fifth and should have had Ted Griffin ready to testify at trial. He’d have made a much better witness than that snitch I had to use-Willie Smith,” he said finally.

Jack was glad Wofford had seen the problem on his own. It didn’t matter what version of the story James Vernon gave Ted Griffin. It would have been dramatic and compelling testimony to have a lawyer on the stand telling the story after Vernon refused to testify, and it might have made the difference in the outcome of the trial. Jack had another issue he wanted to address, however, before coming back to the judge’s mistake.

“Judge, did you know that neither David Hawke nor his cousin was ever prosecuted?” he asked.

“Who are they?” the judge asked.

“David Hawke was the only witness who testified against Henry Wilson. There was no other evidence to connect Wilson to the crime. Hawke was a convicted felon, and he testified that he drove his cousin and Henry to Clarence Waterman’s house and waited outside while they went in and killed him.”

“I vaguely recall that now,” Benton admitted.

“So you didn’t know that Hawke and his cousin were never prosecuted?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“What I don’t understand is why Hawke would testify that he drove his cousin and Henry to Waterman’s house and waited while they killed him. It doesn’t make sense-Hawke implicating himself like that in the crime if he was actually innocent.”

Benton looked at Jack quizzically. “Are you a criminal defense attorney?”

“No, sir. I spent my career representing insurance companies. I’ve only taken up representing death-row inmates in the last couple of years.”

“I see-your personal penance for representing those insurance companies for so long?”

Jack smiled. “I guess that’s part of it.”

“Well, let me tell you something, son. In criminal law, sometimes you don’t have any proof and yet you know something’s there. You get a whiff of it in the wind.” Benton leaned forward and lowered his voice. “As I remember, David Hawke was a career criminal, a druggie-kind of like Henry, if you want to know the truth. The state had something on David Hawke, something we’ll never know about. They probably made a deal. That’s how he came to testify at Henry Wilson’s trial.”

“Would the state put on false testimony?”

“It’s never that clear-cut, Jack. They may have nabbed Hawke for something. He finds out about this murder case-there’s a grapevine in the criminal world that you wouldn’t believe-so he concocts a story to make himself a valuable witness. He implicates Henry and starts to negotiate with the authorities. The state looks at Henry’s record and sees that he’s a pimple on the ass of society, sees that he bought drugs from the deceased-and they run with Hawke’s testimony. Should they pause and say, ‘Wait a minute, this guy is a lowlife piece of shit-we shouldn’t use him to convict somebody else, especially in a death penalty case, without other corroborating evidence’? Yes, they should. Do they? Not usually. Prosecutors have agendas too, Jack. It’s just the way of the world.”

“About this transcript of your interview with James Vernon, Judge-what do you think I should do with it?”