The Alibi Read online

  “I was with Enzo at the time of the murder,” she said. “I told you that.”

  “Yes, you did,” I said. “You did tell me that. But I somehow think that Enzo isn’t exactly going to be an airtight alibi for you, no matter what you and he have cooked up as a story. If he tries to say that you were with him at the time of the murder, be prepared for the prosecutor to rip his story to shreds. Be ready for that, and, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but I have the feeling that the prosecutor is going to be able to shred that story about you being with him that night. Unless you were out with him somewhere, where people know the two of you, at the time of the murder. Then maybe that would be a different story. But to just tell me that you were at Enzo’s home with him isn’t going to cut it.”

  Gina stood up. “You don’t believe me. Well, then, maybe you don’t need to be my lawyer. Maybe I’ll find somebody else to represent me.”

  I leaned back in my chair. “Be my guest,” I said. I didn’t need the money, that was for sure. After settling that wrongful death case last year, and getting $5 million in the process, a million of which went to Harper, I didn’t have to take any case I didn’t want to take. That was liberating. I worried, when I left the Public Defender’s Office and my wife Sarah decided to divorce me, that I wasn’t going to make ends meet. That $5 million windfall from that case eased my concerns immensely. I wasn’t going to take cases that were dead-ends unless I truly believed in them. And, right at that moment, I wasn’t believing in Gina. Not at all.

  She sat back down. “I want you,” she said. “I want you to represent me.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “Why do you want me so much? Plenty of other attorneys are out there who will take your money. You and I are off to a bad start. Maybe your instinct is right – maybe you and I aren’t meant to be lawyer and client. No skin off my nose. Probably not yours, either.”

  “I got a recommendation,” she said. “From somebody who knows a friend of yours in Cameron. Nick Savante. I know a guy who knows Nick, and Nick says that you’re the best in the business.”

  I closed my eyes. Nick was the person who recommended me. “Who’s the guy who knows Nick?” I asked her. “What’s the name of the guy who gave you the recommendation?” I was going to have to pay Nick a visit to ask about this whole situation. I hadn’t seen him in awhile, and it was time for me to go and visit him anyhow. Might as well ask about Gina while I was there. It gave me a good excuse to make the drive to Cameron anyhow.

  “The guy who told me about you, the guy that knows Nick, his name is Joey Caruso. He’s a lifer there in the prison, but he’s one of Enzo’s best friends. He’s the one who gave me your name. I trust Joey. I know that he knows who’s on the up and up. And that’s what he says about you – that you’re on the up and up. He says that you won’t try to pad your billing with bullshit. He also says that you know your shit and that you’ll fight for every client. Even people like me, you’ll fight to make sure that I don’t serve a day in prison. So, yeah, I want you. Only you.”

  “Well, I don’t necessarily know if I want you,” I said. “As a client. Let me talk to Nick about this, and let me do some preliminary investigation into what you’re saying, and I’ll get back with you. In the meantime, if you want to go ahead and find different counsel, I’ll understand.”

  Gina screwed up her face and then looked out the window again. Her bright red lips were pursed. “You go ahead and look into it,” she said. “You’ll find out that I’m telling the truth. But go ahead and see for yourself. Go ahead and talk to Nick if you need to talk to him. He’ll tell you all about Joey Caruso, and you can even talk to Joey yourself. Then you can take me officially on as your client.”

  I nodded my head. “I’ll get back with you in a week or so and let you know my final decision about this. In the meantime, as I said, go ahead and look for other counsel. I can’t guarantee that I want this case.”

  At that, she stood up again and walked out of the office without another word.

  Gina left, and Harper came into the office. “How did it go?” she asked. “Sorry, I know that I was supposed to be around for intake, but I got caught up in traffic court, of all things.” She shook her head. “Always a line at traffic court.”

  “Not a biggie,” I said. “I think Gina’s lying about where she was and whether or not she did it. The only thing that’s making me think that I should go ahead and take this case is the fact that she apparently got my name from a good friend of mine. I need to go and see him and talk to him about Gina and this Joey Caruso guy. I’ve never heard of him, Joey Caruso, so I need to see if Nick knows anything about him.”

  Harper sat across from me and opened her mouth and shut it again. I could tell that something was on her mind.

  I waited for her to ask me about what was on her mind, but she shook her head.

  “What?” I asked her gently. “You look like you want to ask me something.”

  “No, nothing,” she said. “It’s none of my business.”

  “You want to know why it is that I apparently have a friend who knows somebody who would know someone like Gina.” I nodded my head as I saw her expression, which told me that I had hit a nerve. I still hadn’t told Harper about the guys. I didn’t quite know why I never told her about them. It was a sore subject for me, of course, but she and I were in business together. We were even talking about becoming partners. Her other partner, Tammy, was on board with my coming in as a partner and Harper, Tammy and I were having talks about doing just that. Yet, I was still hiding my past from all of them.

  “No,” she said, shaking her head, but I could read her better than that. “I wasn’t wondering about that.”

  I stared at her for a few seconds and then shook my head. “Okay,” I said, taking a deep breath. “I’ll come clean with you. You might want to fire me after I do, and, if that’s the case, I understand. But…”

  I felt nervous telling Harper about my stint in prison. I was totally innocent, but not really. I was innocent as far as not taking part in that armed robbery where the poor off-duty guard was shot, but I certainly did take part in many other crimes in my youth. I guess I didn’t really want Harper to know the kinds of people I knew. The kind of crowd I ran with. That was the embarrassing part, more than anything.

  At the same time, I felt ashamed for being embarrassed about the guys. Why should I apologize for knowing them? They were a part of me. They still were. That hadn’t changed. I was still just as tight with them, in my heart, as I ever had been. So why should I hem and haw and beat around the bush about the fact that I was good friends with four guys who were currently serving life sentences in prison? They were up for parole this year, too, at least Nick, Tommy and Jack were. Connor wasn’t, because he was the one who actually killed the off-duty guard.

  So, hopefully, Harper was going to actually meet the guys sometime soon. I might as well tell their stories. And, in the process, tell my own.

  She was still looking at me, searching my face, trying to ascertain what I was thinking. I finally bowed my head, took a deep breath, and decided to just come out with it.

  “I had a bit of a rough life growing up,” I said. “I never knew my dad. The reason I never knew him was because my mother had no idea who he was. Or who he could be. She was a drug addict and a prostitute. All of which would have been okay, I guess, even though she brought her johns home while I was in the next room, playing with my toy soldiers. But she eventually did marry, briefly, and that was how I got my name – Harrington. That guy, whose name was Steven Harrington, beat my mom and me, and put me in the hospital twice. I was only 10 years old at the time, and I ran away after the second time he put me in the hospital. I lived on the streets for a year, hiding out from my mother, but she tracked me down and put me into a reform school. Ozanam. You’ve probably heard about it.”

  Harper nodded her head. “Yes. I have.”

  “Okay. Well, I met some guys when I was at the reform school. Nick Savante, Tommy
Arcola, Jack O’Brien and his baby brother Connor. We became really tight and we committed a lot of crimes in our younger years. Nothing massive – some burglaries, some shoplifting, we stole a car or two. Mainly we stole the cars for joy-riding, although we stole one of the cars because we wanted to use it in a burglary. We were dumb kids, all of us from violent and broken homes. Just blowing off some steam, really. We needed the money, so we pawned the stuff that we stole from homes and stores, but the main reason why we committed the crimes we did was because we were pissed-off at the world.”

  I could tell that Harper knew where this was going. She didn’t say a word, though. She just stared at me, unblinking, her green eyes focused on my face. She put one of her hands on mine and squeezed it.

  “So,” I said. “The guys, the other guys, decided that they were going to hold up a liquor store. I wasn’t involved in it. They didn’t even tell me that they were doing it. I guess that the reason why I didn’t partake in the festivities was because I was against actually robbing people. I thought that that was too risky. There were too many chances that something could go horribly wrong. Which it did. There just happened to be an off-duty security guard there at the store, and the guy was packing. When the guys were cleaning out the cash register, the guard got his gun out and pointed it at Connor. Connor panicked and got his own gun and shot the guard in the leg. Just shot him in the leg. It shouldn’t have been fatal, really. However, the guy ended up dying from a MRSA infection he got while in the hospital. That meant that everybody’s charges were upgraded to felony murder.”

  “Anyhow, I wasn’t involved. However, it was known to the police that I ran with the guys, so they put me into a lineup. I looked pretty similar to Tommy Arcola. We both had long curly hair and olive skin. Both of us skinny, both of us about the same height. An eyewitness identified me as the guy who drove the getaway car. That was actually Tommy. The funny thing was, Tommy was also identified as taking part in the robbery, by the same eyewitness. Tommy actually was in the robbery, but that eyewitness didn’t identify him as the getaway driver. The upshot was, all five of us went on trial for that robbery and felony murder, and we all five of us were convicted in separate trials. All of us got life in prison with the chance of parole except Connor. He got life in prison without the possibility of parole.”

  Harper’s eyes were big now, and she was staring at me with tears in her eyes. “Go on,” she said. “Oh, Damien, I can’t believe that happened to you.” She shook her head and looked down. “How did you-“

  “Get out? Well, I broke out, actually, and I’m living on the lam.” I put my finger to my lips. “Shhhh. You don’t know this, but my real name is actually Donny Moore, and…” I smiled when I saw that Harper was actually believing that. “No, really, I got out of prison through the Innocence Project. See, I became a jail-house lawyer, and I was winning new trials for guys. Winning appeals for them. So, the Kansas City Star came to interview me, and I told the reporter at that time that I was completely innocent. That I had nothing to do with the robbery.”

  “That newspaper article drew the attention of the Innocence Project lawyers. They came to see me in prison and I told them my story. I was assigned a lawyer by the name of Chuck Riegel, and Chuck worked his ass off to get me a new trial. They found the car that was used in the robbery, tested it for DNA, and found that my DNA wasn’t in the car. My DNA wasn’t in that liquor store, either. That was enough evidence to get me a new trial. Then, I got this kick-ass, take-no-prisoners Public Defender to try my case. That was Colleen Sutton. That’s how I first came to know her. She tried my case, got a not-guilty verdict, and, well, I got out of prison, rocked my SATs, went to college, hard-rocked my LSATs, got into UChicago law school and here I am.”

  “And what about the others? They won’t be eligible for parole for quite a few years, right? They have to serve 85% of a life sentence, which is calculated to be 30 years. That means that they’ll be eligible in about 8 years.”

  “Well, right. But their sentences were commuted to 20 years, all except for Connor. The reason why their sentences were commuted to 20 years was because my lawyer, my Innocence Project lawyer, went to the press about our case. It looked bad that the guys were sentenced to life in prison when the only reason why the victim died was because he got an infection in the hospital. And Chuck was able to show that this robbery was never meant to involve a weapon - the guys didn’t bring a weapon onto the premises, only Connor did, and he came in after the robbery was already in progress. So, it really would have been a second-degree Robbery if not for that. Plus, they were all so young when it happened, and they were absolutely model prisoners behind bars. Absolutely stellar. I guess that the governor was tired of hearing about our case, so he commuted the sentences down.”

  “Really? I’m surprised that the governor would do something like that.”

  I smiled. “Well, I might have had a hand in that. I actually had pretty good grounds for a lawsuit against the prosecutor’s office after what happened to me. They were so aggressive, too aggressive, and they ignored some inconsistencies in the statement of the eyewitness who fingered me. I also suspected that they suppressed evidence that would have exonerated me. I was ready to go to the media, ready to splash my story far and wide.”

  “The head of the prosecutor’s office wanted to cover up what had happened, and he was in tight with the governor at that time. I told the prosecutor’s office that I would keep quiet if the governor agreed to commute the sentences of at least Nick, Tommy and Jack. I tried for a commutation for Connor as well, but the governor wouldn’t go that far. I took what I could get, and that was the real reason why the governor commuted their sentences. But don’t tell anybody that. That arrangement was strictly confidential”

  “I won’t say a word, of course,” Harper said.

  She looked stunned. She was still gripping my hand and she still had tears in her eyes. “Wow. I never imagined that something like that had happened to you. I mean…” She shook her head. “I mean, I guess it’s guys like you that make this job worthwhile, huh? To be given the chance to give an innocent man another lease on life – that’s why we do what we do. That’s why criminal defense is a calling. Yeah, we get the scumbag clients, like Erik Gregorian, and we do our best to make sure that they’re unleashed back onto the streets. But, every so once in a while, you get a case that makes you realize why you chose this profession. For Colleen, I’m sure that that case was yours.”

  “For me, it was Darnell Williams. He’s an African-American boy who was accused of murder, a murder that had been committed by his arresting officer. There have been others. I would like to think that cases like Darnell and cases like yours make this job completely worthwhile. That they cancel out the bad guys that we end up releasing back onto the streets. That’s what I would like to think in my head.”

  I nodded my head. “Well, now you know where I’m coming from. Now you know why I have committed to this job with a passion. Because you’re right – that old axiom about it being better to release 100 guilty men then to see one innocent man go to prison is right. When you are the one innocent person who is serving a life sentence, well, you couldn’t imagine anything worse than that.”

  “And I guess that Nick is in Cameron. Is that right?”

  “Yeah. Cameron. All the guys are in Cameron. I still go up there to visit them, at least once a month. Nick, Tommy and Jack are all up for parole this year. Connor isn’t, and he won’t be. He’s serving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.”

  “Hmmm,” Harper said. “How old was Connor when he was convicted?”

  “Only 16,” I said. “And, I know, I’ve done the research. There have been some promising Supreme Court cases that have come out in the last few years about sentencing juveniles to LWOP. One case, Miller v. Alabama, ruled that mandatory LWOP sentences were unconstitutional when applied to juveniles. Another, Montgomery v. Louisiana said that the Miller case applied retroactively. But those cases don�
�t apply to Connor, unfortunately. He wasn’t mandatorily sentenced – the jury had discretion, and they were the ones who decided that he deserved LWOP. It’s not right that he’s in there for the rest of his life. He’s now 32 years old, and he hasn’t caused a lick of trouble inside. He hasn’t so much as participated in a fist-fight in prison. He was just a scared kid when he was sentenced. Just a scared kid who wanted to show his big brother that he could be useful. He was only supposed to be the lookout, but he decided that he wanted to actively participate. That was why he ended up in that liquor store with that gun at that time. One stupid, brash decision by a 16-year-old who knew nothing but violence his whole life, and, just like that, he finds himself locked up until he dies.”

  “There are studies about juveniles,” Harper said. “There are also cases coming out all the time. Let’s keep an eye out on any Supreme Court cases that might apply to juveniles who weren’t mandatorily sentenced to LWOP. Or, better yet, why don’t we find a good attorney who specializes in this type of case to see if there is anything that can be done to have Connor’s sentence commuted to life in prison with the possibility of parole.”

  I nodded my head. “I’ve been on that for awhile now. I’m always doing research on it. I can’t imagine Connor having to remain in prison once the guys get out. It’s bad enough that he’s in there now, but it’s not as bad because his brother and two of his best friends are serving time with him. But once those guys get out and he’s still in there…” I shook my head. “I just can’t imagine how he’s going to react to that. Believe me, I’ve been working every angle to try to get him out of there with the other guys. That Miller case is fairly recent – 2012. The Montgomery case was decided in 2016. I’ve been on the lookout for cases that might be winding their way through the courts that would apply to guys like Connor. I keep hoping that something might turn up.”