Tim Green: False Convictions

Potter closed his eyes and mouth as if in prayer and stayed that way while he asked through pinched lips, “Is it possible the blood on my client’s knife came from a man outside the bar?”

Detective Billick sighed and waited until Potter opened his eyes before he said, “Yes. Possible.”

“Thank you,” Potter said. “I have no further questions.”

Dwayne felt hope glimmer like an unsteady match flame, but the district attorney was as sleek and mean as a battleship in her dark gray skirt and jacket, cruising forward without concern for anything around her. She was big boned, thick, and tall, but not unattractive at all, with short dark hair and bright red lipstick. Her voice was booming and strong, as certain as a concrete wall that steered you in its own direction.

The flame flickered out when the battleship maneuvered toward the bench and asked the judge if she could redirect the witness.

“You did damn good,” Dwayne whispered to Potter as the defense lawyer sat and slouched down low, still fuming. “What’s she doing now, though?”

“Piddling,” Potter said, snatching up his pen and resuming his doodles. Soon the image of the district attorney took shape, but instead of the dark serious suit, she wore a bikini made out of animal skins.

Dwayne rumpled his brow but didn’t ask more because the DA had begun to speak.

“How many knife fights a year in this town?” she asked.

“About three or four,” Billick said.

“Any at Gilly’s Trackside?”

“No.”

“Never?”

“Not in the eighteen years I’ve been on this force. It’s not that kind of place.”

“Did you go down there, to Gilly’s, and ask questions about a knife fight?” the DA asked.

“Of course. Yes.”

“Anyone know anything?”

“No,” Billick said, shaking his head and trying not to smile. “Just Chuck Willis, who said he saw a black man running past who ditched something in that culvert.”

“Anyone even hear about a possible knife fight? Maybe that same man running past and slashing out at someone?”

“Nope, and no one showed up at the hospital with a knife wound.”

“How about any kind of fight at all that night in or outside of Gilly’s?”

“No. None.”

“I have no further questions.”

Dallas, Texas

2009

CASEY JORDAN CHECKED her watch before hitting the curb, which sent a shudder through the battered Mercedes sedan. Her tires skidded on the grit as she rounded the corner of the old cinder-block gas station. She could hear the knocking of the engine all the way to the back door of her law clinic, remembering the day when the car had smelled of fine leather, not sour carpet and coffee.

Before she reached the rear entrance, the gray metal bathroom door swung open and a Latino woman emerged with a small child trailing a streamer of toilet paper. The woman said something in Spanish, and Casey offered a smile but shrugged, pointed to her watch, and hurried inside her office through the back door.

Stacy Berg, the office manager, appeared with a cup of coffee, a frown, and piercing dark eyes set in a mane of light brown hair thick as yarn. “Forget something?”

“I made some notes on the Suarez file I need for Nancy Grace,” Casey said.

“You know she’s half crazy?” Stacy asked and nodded toward her desk, which was really the old counter where the filling station had kept its cash register. “Speaking of that, Rosalita Suarez’s mother dropped off a chocolate icebox cake to celebrate your victory.”

Casey had exonerated Rosalita Suarez in a highly publicized murder trial on a charge of shooting the coyote who brought her across the border after he tried to rape her.

“And that guy called again,” Stacy said. “It’s in the middle of the pile.”

“What guy?” Casey asked.

Stacy rolled her eyes. “You know. That billionaire guy. How many billionaires do you know?”

“In Dallas?” Casey said. “Too many. Why don’t you call him back?”

“You think I care about money?” Stacy asked, raising her eyebrows and snorting. “I work here purely for the glamour.”

“I know,” Casey said, “you like the excitement, too.”

Stacy frowned. “I thought we help people?”

“I’m the woman to call if you shoot someone in the nuts,” Casey said. “What did he say?”

“Who?”

“Mr. Billionaire.”

“He wants to have dinner with you,” Stacy said. “I told him you’ve got to do Nancy Grace’s show, then you’ve already got dinner plans. I asked him if he’d like me to schedule something, trying to give him the hint that you’re busy, too, and don’t just drop everything because some billionaire’s got an itch.”

“The Freedom Project isn’t an ‘itch,’ ” Casey said. “It’s a foundation. And Robert Graham isn’t just some billionaire. He’s a philanthropist.”

“Did you know the angle behind all these rich people’s foundations is a bunch of tax write-offs and bullshit?” Stacy asked. “They like to ease their minds with cocktail parties and fund-raisers. Those Timberland boots and flannel shirts don’t fool me. He keeps a gold rod up his ass.”

Casey sighed and shook her head. “Call Mr. Graham back and tell him I’ll change my plans and ask him where he wants to meet.”

“You’re meeting José at Nick and Sam’s at eight,” Stacy said.

José O’Brien was an ex-cop who did most of the clinic’s investigative work. He had also been Casey’s on-and-off boyfriend. Right now, he was off after falling off the wagon once again.

“Apologize to José for me, will you?” Casey said.

“He’s a good guy, you know.”

“I know.”

“But you’re still mad.”

“I’m not mad,” Casey said. “He needs to pull it together and I don’t have time to play Mama.”

“That’s harsh.”

“Sometimes harsh is good.”

“Sorry,” Stacy said, pausing, “to pry.”

“Listen, Robert Graham is talking about a million dollars a year in funding if I agree to take on a couple high-profile cases for the Freedom Project,” Casey said. “Shouldn’t I find that the least bit appealing?”

Stacy nodded abruptly at that news, picked up the phone, and said, “I’ll tell Mr. Graham your schedule has opened up.”

WHEN THE SHOW ended, Casey chatted with Nancy Grace for a minute about her twins and hand-knitted blankets sent by fans before pulling the earbud free and unclipping the microphone. She thanked the studio hands and passed on the baby wipes the makeup artist offered her in the green room.

“I’ve got a dinner to go to,” she said to the makeup artist, checking herself in the mirror as she scooped up her briefcase. “It’s a little thick, but I’ll look like hell if I lose it all.”

As the security guard opened the door for her, he nodded toward her old blue Mercedes waiting by the curb and said, “Someone got your hubcaps.”

“Three years ago,” she said, her heels clicking on the sidewalk. “They went about two weeks after the hood ornament.”

While the restaurant puzzled Casey, she was thankful that Graham had at least chosen a place out near her condo. She got off the highway just two exits from where she lived and pulled up to the silver and neon spectacle of a Johnny Rockets hamburger joint. Inside, Graham sat in a booth with his back to the door, hunched over a milk shake. When he saw her, he jumped up and, with a flourish, offered her a seat opposite him, flashing a smile of strong white teeth that glowed amid the black razor stubble of his face and his dark brown eyes.

Despite the Dallas heat, he wore the same trademark flannel shirt, Levi’s jeans, and Timberland boots she’d seen him wearing as he leaned against a pickup truck on the cover of the May issue of Fortune magazine. Graham stood not much taller than Casey, but he carried himself upright with a wiry athletic frame that belied the white hair salting his unruly black mop. His florid cheeks spoke of outdoor activity, and he was mildly handsome without being pretty.