James Sheehan - The Law of Second Chances

“I’m going to take the case,” Jack told Henry at breakfast.

“Really?” Henry said. “So Joe Fogarty confirmed what Tillie said?”

“Who’s Joe Fogarty?” Jack replied.

“I gotcha. Well, I’m glad you made the right decision, Jack.”

“I’m not so sure it’s the right decision.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Well, my source didn’t give Benny the Good Housekeeping seal of approval. I’ve still got my doubts about him. But like you said, he deserves a defense.”

“Speaking of which, Jack-now that you’re Benny’s lawyer, just how are you going to defend him?”

“That’s the part I haven’t figured out yet.”

After breakfast, Jack called Bruce Sentner and told him of his decision.

“I’ve got a stipulation for substitution of counsel prepared. If you can be available to sign it, I’ll file it today. Can you have the file ready?”

“Jack, this is government,” Bruce responded. “We don’t usually work that fast. However, since it’s you, and you’re taking this file off my hands for God knows what reason, I think we can accommodate your request.”

His second call that morning was to Luis.

“I’ve decided to represent your son,” he told his old friend. There was a long pause. Jack could tell Luis was trying to get his emotions in check.

“Thank you, Jack,” Luis finally replied. “I’ll never forget this. I’ll be indebted to you forever.”

“Don’t thank me yet, Luis. And don’t get your hopes up too high. I can’t change the facts. All I’m doing is agreeing to give Benny the best representation I can. He may still be convicted.”

“I know all that, Jack. I also know you’re putting your reputation on the line. I’m trusting God on this one. God brought me to you.”

Jack wished he had that kind of faith.

“Luis, do me a favor, will you?”

“Sure, Jack. Anything. You name it.”

“Go visit your son.”

“Do you think he’ll talk to me?”

“I think it’s worth another try.”

“Okay, I’ll do it.”

On Saturday morning, with Benny’s file in hand, Jack and Henry left for the airport. Jack couldn’t wait to get back to Bass Creek.

Jack and Henry pored over Benny’s file on the flight back, and Jack kept reading through the police reports at home that evening until a vague picture of what happened started to form in his mind. Still, he had lots of questions he couldn’t answer. He shared his bewilderment with Henry, who came over on Sunday morning to work with him.

“I’ve read this file over and over again, Henry, and things just don’t make sense.”

“Take me through it, Jack. Slowly.”

“Okay. Do you remember the credit card incident?”

“Yeah. Carl Robertson’s girlfriend, Angie, reported a credit card missing.”

“My hunch is that Benny was the guy at the bar that night who tried to hit on Angie. Actually, he wasn’t trying to hit on her at all-he was stealing her credit card.”

“Very good, Jack, you’re starting to think like a thief.”

“Don’t give me too much credit. I’m going to get lost here very shortly. Okay, Angie was at the bar that night with this Lois Barton woman, the one she was having an affair with.”

“Yeah, I remember. That was the best part of the whole story.”

Jack ignored Henry’s feeble attempt at humor. “Lois then followed Benny out of the bar.”

“Yeah. So?”

“So, I think Lois was part of this robbery and murder of Carl Robertson.”

“How do you figure that?”

“Lois was definitely setting Angie up-pumping her for information about Carl. If you recall, Angie admitted to Nick Walsh that she told Lois about Carl bringing her ten thousand a month.”

“That makes sense. She and Benny were probably partners.”

“Yeah, but here’s what doesn’t make sense, Henry. If Lois and Benny were in cahoots with each other, what was Benny doing stealing Angie’s credit card? And what was Lois doing leaving Angie and following Benny out of the bar, never to be seen again?”

Henry didn’t answer right away. He had to think about that one for a minute. Jack was right. Things didn’t seem to make sense. “They probably weren’t partners when Benny stole the credit card. Lois probably saw Benny lift the card and followed him out of the bar and sometime after that they decided to team up to do this robbery. That’s the way criminals meet sometimes.”

“You know, Henry, I thought about that. Here’s what bothers me, though. This is a one-man job, and it’s not a hell of a lot of money. Why cut somebody you just met into a job you had been setting up?”

“Maybe the robbery was Benny’s idea,” Henry offered. “Maybe she just told him about Carl and the money, and he came up with the rest.”

“Possibly,” Jack said pondering. “But that’s not Benny’s M.O. A robbery like this was a little out of his league. And Lois had to be thinking about the robbery all along. She wasn’t pumping Angie for information without some sort of plan.”

“Yeah, I think you’re right,” Henry replied. “I’m just offering possibilities.”

“And why, if this was a simple robbery, did Benny shoot Carl?”

“I don’t know.”

“And where was this Lois on the night of the murder?”

“You’re batting a thousand, Jack. I don’t have a clue as to that one either.”

Jack still wasn’t through asking the questions that were bouncing around in his brain. “And why did the police all of a sudden stop looking for Lois Barton?”

“I think I can answer that one. They had Benny, and they had a pretty airtight case against him. If they kept looking for her and didn’t find her, a good lawyer like you could blow a lot of smoke with any new evidence they came up with about her. My guess is that they won’t even mention her when they present their case against Benny.”

“And dare me to bring her up.”

“Exactly.”

“Because if I bring her up, what good does it do me? Benny is still guilty, even if he had an accomplice.”

“I don’t know what to say, Jack. There’re a lot of things that don’t add up, and I don’t think we’ll ever find the answers.”

“Wait a minute-aren’t you the one who got me into this?”

“Well, yeah, but I didn’t necessarily think you were going to be successful. I just wanted Benny to have the benefit of your representation.”

“Thanks a lot, Henry, I appreciate that.”

“No problem, Jack.”

Jack spent Sunday afternoon at his office preparing a subpoena for Carl Robertson’s estate to produce his entire financial records for the five years prior to his death. It was a fishing expedition. He had no idea what he was looking for or what he might find. It was just standard procedure to gather as much evidence as possible. He also subpoenaed Carl’s telephone records for the last six months of his life. According to the police reports, Angie had mentioned a telephone call and Carl’s writing two words, Gainesville and breakthrough , on a notepad. Maybe the telephone records would tell him something. Again, it was a long shot.

As well as the subpoenas, Jack also prepared a motion asking the court to enter an order requiring Carl Robertson’s estate and the telephone company to produce the information immediately. He needed as much time as possible to have an expert go through the records, process it all, and tell him what it meant. Bruce Sentner had mentioned that Judge Langford Middleton would not continue the case until a later date under any circumstances, so Jack couldn’t ask for a delay. He could request records, however, and when the parties balked, protesting that they couldn’t produce them on such short notice, he could let the judge arrive at the obvious conclusion that a short delay was needed. There was more than one way to skin a cat.