The Hate Crime Read online

  Connor shook his head and looked at his beer. “I know. I know what you’re saying. But this is different. I really feel badly for this person. I heard her story, and what she’s had to go through in her life. I just think that she’s worth a second chance. And you’re right, if the person who was threatening her was still on the streets, it wouldn’t do any good to actually try to get her off of this charge. She would just be right back on the streets, dealing, if that were the case. But that’s not the case. She has a chance. She has a chance to actually get out of the drug and prostitution life.”

  “Okay.” I took a deep breath. “Why not? After all, I might be representing a Neo-Nazi. I don’t know, however.” I shook my head. “No, I shouldn’t say that. I shouldn’t jump to conclusions that Heather’s boyfriend is a Neo-Nazi. I only know that he’s been accused of a hate crime. These are my first few cases, after what happened with my dad. I’m getting my feet wet.” I paused. “Alright, I’ll take Tina’s case. For you, buddy. Only for you.”

  “Thanks, buddy.” He clinked his glass with mine.

  I started to feel like I was a bit of a scold with everybody. Like I was trying to tell them how to live their lives. That was never my intention. I just hated when people did stupid things. Like Heather. She didn’t know this guy from Adam. Yet, she was willing to go ahead and hire me to represent him, and that was going to cost her a lot of money. If it was Heather herself who was charged with a crime, I would’ve given her a break on my rates. But it wasn’t Heather. It was her boyfriend. And not even that. I wasn’t going to give him a cut at all.

  “Nick, Jack, I think I have something for the two of you. I don’t know yet, though. I don’t know if I’m taking this case. But stay tuned.”

  “Why?” Nick asked. “What kind of case are you looking at?”

  “A guy in jail right now, his name is Beck Harrison. He’s been charged with killing a transgendered woman. I’m guessing that this transgendered woman is a friend of Heather’s. Anyhow, once I figure out if I’m going to take this case or not, I’m going to go ahead and give you the information, and you could maybe look at his background for me.”

  “You got it buddy,” Nick said. “Just let us know.”

  “I will.”

  Chapter 3

  “Okay,” Heather said to me when she came back into my office the next day. She had an envelope of money in her hand. “Here’s a down payment. I’ve been saving money, as much as I can. I wanted to use this money to go to college, to get my paralegal certificate, but I need to do this.”

  I looked in the envelope of money, counted up the money inside, and saw that it totaled $5,000 in hundred-dollar bills. I looked up at Heather. “Okay, I really don’t understand this. Seriously. Now you’re giving me your college money, all to represent this guy you don’t really know? You need to come clean with me about this. Who is this guy to you, really?”

  “I’m telling you, he’s really a guy that I like. I’m digging him. That’s it.”

  I pushed the envelope back to her. “You’re not gonna give me your college money. I told you, you can work off my fee.”

  “But that’s gonna take me years.” She twirled her long black hair around one finger and pursed her lips.

  I finally just sighed. “Okay. There’s something that you’re not telling me. There’s something about this guy that’s going to make you want to do all of this to make sure that he gets proper representation. You don’t have to tell me right now, but you’re going to have to tell me sooner or later, because I need to know. In the meantime, I’ll talk to him and see what he has to say. If I think that he’s worthy of my representing him, then I’ll go ahead and represent him. And I’ll do it pro bono. I’m not going to have you sacrificing your future to pay my legal fee. Harper requires me to do so many pro bono hours a year anyways. I might as well go ahead and knock them out with this case.” I didn’t tell Heather that I had planned to do my pro bono hours in by taking minor cases, not a murder case. What she didn’t know wouldn’t hurt her.

  She looked down at the floor. “You don’t have to do that.”

  “Of course I do. Listen, this obviously means a lot to you. I don’t know why, but it does. And I’m not exactly hurting for money. You have to remember that I settled that wrongful death case a few years back, so I still have millions of dollars in the bank. I can afford to take a pro bono case here and there if I believe in it. That’s the big caveat here. I have to believe in it.”

  Heather sighed. “Okay. I’ll tell you the truth. But, I’m going to have to hire you for my own lawyer. Otherwise, I’m not going to tell you a thing.”

  I knew it. I knew that there was more to the story. “Okay. Out with it. You have to tell me why it’s so important that I represent this guy. There’s obviously something that you need to tell me, so go ahead. Once I get the whole story, I’ll be able to piece everything together, and I’ll be able to tell you how I plan to proceed on this. So go ahead.”

  Heather took a deep breath. “You’re not going to tell Harper about this, right? She’ll kill me if she finds out.”

  This wasn’t sounding so good. To say the least. “Go ahead, tell me what happened. Why do I have a feeling that this guy, this Beck person, has something on you?”

  Heather paused, looking ashamed. “He does. Harper knows that a few years back, when I actually first got put into jail for killing my mother, I was dating this guy by the name of Charlie. Charlie was a drug dealer. And he paid my lawyer fee back then. She knows that I had to pay him back. And the way that I paid him back was me bringing some drugs from over the border to him. I never got caught doing that, either.”

  “Okay. Go ahead. What is it that Beck has to do with any of this?”

  “Well, he has nothing to do with that. He wasn’t involved in the drug mule issues. I didn’t want to be involved with that either, but I had to do it for Charlie. I owed him all that money. I ended up paying Harper $20,000 for my murder case, and I didn’t have that. No way could I have gotten that money. So I had to pay him back by carrying drugs for him over the border. I told Harper about this. She gave me a lecture, but I think that she understood. She knew that there was no other way that I was going to be able to pay that back.”

  I sat there, looking at her. I was trying to figure out what this whole Beck thing had to do with the Charlie thing.

  “Okay,” Heather finally said. “Listen, I want you to know one thing. I have a mother. I have a birth mother. I didn’t even know about her until just recently. In fact, it was just a couple of years ago that I found that I was adopted. Well, I found out about it, because my birth mother actually was the person who was a key witness in my case. If not for her testifying, I would be in prison right now. What she did was very brave. I actually love her. I didn’t love my adoptive mom, because she was one cray bitch. But this one’s pretty cool.”

  “Okay. Go on and tell me what you need to tell me.” I found myself holding my breath, because I had a feeling that what she was going to tell me was bad. Very bad.

  Heather shook her head and looked down at the floor. “Well, she got sick. Very sick. I thought she was gonna die. They didn’t know what was wrong with her, but they weren’t doing much for her at the hospital, because she didn’t have insurance. They didn’t run tests and all that. She was just really tired all the time, and she had very bad headaches and her joints were aching really bad, to the point where she couldn’t even walk. I thought she was going to die. She needed money, and she needed it fast. She needed to be able to pay cash for all the tests that had to be run to find out what was wrong with her.”

  “Okay. Go ahead.”

  Heather was quiet for a few minutes. “I didn’t really know what to do, so I asked Charlie if he could help me out. He said he couldn’t help. He was done with me. He was done with me romantically, and he was done with giving me money, too. But he did give me Beck’s name.”

  “So Beck is a friend of Charlie’s, then? Is that what you’r
e telling me?”

  “Yeah, that’s what I’m telling you. He was a friend of Charlie’s. I don’t know what he did for Charlie, or if he did anything at all for him, but I do know that the two of them knew each other. And I needed money fast. I needed about $50,000, so that my mom could get testing done. I’m glad that I got that money for her. They found out that she has Lyme disease. That’s something that can kill you. She had to get treatment, and that cost even more money.”

  I didn’t know if I wanted to hear what it is that Heather did for that money. But yet, I knew that I was going to have to. “And what did you do for that money?”

  “I did a job. I did a job for Beck.”

  “And what was this job?” I didn’t want to hear her answer. I knew that it was going to involve something illegal, to say the very least. How else was she going to get that kind of money, in a short period of time?”

  She took a deep breath. “I helped him burglarize a jewelry store. In fact, Beck and a friend of his were the ones who actually planned it all out, and I actually did the deed. I stole a bunch of jewelry.” She looked down at the floor. “$1 million worth of jewelry. I got 10%. That was enough money to make sure that my mom got the testing that she needed, and the treatment that she needed, too. She’s alive now, but only because of that money.”

  That was disgusting to me, at least the part about her mother, who would’ve died if Heather didn’t knock off this jewelry store. What kind of a country allows something like that - if you don’t have money, you die? If you get sick, you get desperate enough to commit a crime to pay for the medical bills? But that was neither here nor there. “So, let me guess - Beck is threatening to turn you in. Is that what’s going on? If so, I don’t understand. He was the mastermind behind it. If he turns you in, then you’ll turn him in, and you both will go down.”

  “Yeah. But here’s the thing. Beck and his friend, okay I’ll go ahead and tell you his name is Fred Johnson, that’s not really his name, but that’s the name I want to give you, Fred and Beck have each other’s backs. They’re in it together. They’re tight. Nobody caught us. But the two of them are going to hang me out to dry. That’s what the problem is – I’m an outsider with them. Beck has already threatened me, telling me that he’s going to tell the authorities that I’m the one who knocked off the jewelry store. So, yes, he has something on me. He told me that if I can find him an attorney, and pay for it, that he’ll leave me alone. So that brings me to you.”

  I rolled my eyes. “So that’s the real reason why you don’t want Harper involved with this - because you know that she’s gonna smack you upside the head?”

  “Yeah. That’s actually the reason why I don’t want Harper involved. Although I think that she’ll understand. At least more than you apparently are. I told you, I did this for my mother. I saved her life. Doesn’t that mean nothing to you?”

  “Of course it does. But it doesn’t negate the fact that what you did was stupid. And now, here you are, being raked over the coals. And frankly, I’m kinda sick of taking these dog cases just because people are getting threatened. You’re not the first person who has come in here, asking me to represent them, just because they’re being blackmailed. I don’t like it.”

  Heather crossed her arms in front of her. “So does that mean you’re not going to take the case?”

  “What’s going to happen if I don’t?” I was inclined to turn her down.

  “If you don’t, then Beck’s gonna roll on me. And you’re right, he’s more liable than me, but with Beck and Fred backing each other up and hanging me out to dry, I’m probably gonna be the one who’ll be paying for this crime. That’s what’s going to happen. I would go to prison. And I’m going to have to pay back all that money I got from the jewelry store.”

  I sighed and shook my head. “No promises. I know, I know, you can be in big trouble if I don’t do this for you. Here’s the thing, though - if this guy is good for it, there’s little I can do for him but plead him out. I mean, I can try it, but if I do, chances are, he’ll be going down. Then he’ll hate me, and he’ll also hate you, and guess what? He’ll roll on you to get his revenge, because criminals are irrational like that, and they also look for ways to get back at us defense attorneys when things go south. Even if he’s not good for it, there are no guarantees. We could still lose at trial, and, once again, you’re back to square one. Either way, you’re going down. So-”

  “Just try, alright? Just go see him. See what he has to say. Then get back to me. In the meantime, I have some research projects due for Harper.” At that, she got up and walked away.

  Whatever. I was just going to have to see this Beck person and see what he had to say. This wasn’t exactly the way I envisioned coming back to my practice after being threatened with life in prison for the death of my father, but it was what it was.

  Chapter 4

  I got down to the Jackson County Jail to see Beck. I reviewed his file a little bit before I got there. From the Statement of Information, I understood that Beck apparently picked up a woman in a bar. This woman’s name was Adele Whittier, who was transgendered and working as a nurse at Truman Med. Apparently, Adele and Beck met at a downtown bar called the Zoo Bar, and the bartender, Quince Newton, told police that they left together that night. Apparently, Adele was a regular at the bar, so that’s how Quince knew who she was. She was the kind of person who would come to the bar early and sit at the bar and talk to the bartenders before the place got really crowded. Quince told the questioning Officer that Beck and Adele had been talking and flirting all night. They left the bar around midnight, and the next day, Adele’s body was found next to a dumpster in an alleyway by Beck’s apartment. She had been strangled, and the time of death was calculated to be between 1 AM and 1:15 AM on the morning of June 6. Because Beck was the last person to see her alive, and because Adele’s body was found in an alleyway by his apartment, he was charged with her murder.

  I had to admit that things didn’t look too good. He was the last one to see her alive, and her body was found by his apartment. At the same time, I knew that this was all circumstantial evidence. There apparently was not an eyewitness, and there was no murder weapon found. I was encouraged that there was a good possibility that I could probably convince the jury that he wasn’t the person who killed her.

  I had also looked through the statement that Beck had given to the police. Unfortunately, this was a hurdle I had to overcome. Beck had apparently signed a confession to the police stating that he killed Adele. Not that this was fatal. People signed confessions all the time when they didn’t really do it. There were many reasons why they would do something like that. I had to find out what kind of tactics were used - did the cops threaten him or bribe him somehow? I could show that the confession was somehow involuntary and I could get that thrown out of court. That was a heavy lift, however - police were allowed to use all kinds of tactics that skirted the line. They could lie to the suspect and leave him in a room without food or heat for 24 hours, and, still, the confession would be considered valid.

  But I wasn’t going to give up, not until I spoke with Beck and got his side of the story.

  I was a pro at these visits. From my years at the Public Defender’s office, combined with my years in private practice, I had done hundreds of jail visits. Maybe thousands. I had to admit, however, that I had done quite a few less visits in my private practice than when I was a public defender. Generally, people in jail cannot afford a private attorney. That was why my usual clients weren’t in jail awaiting trial - they generally were out on bail. I took quite a few drug dealers, white-collar criminals, even people who were involved in organized crime, because these were all people who could afford a private attorney at $400 an hour.

  Looking at Beck’s background, it seemed as if he probably wasn’t somebody who could afford my fee. He was working at a sanitation plant, which paid well enough, but not enough to afford to pay an attorney, any attorney, through a murder trial.


  So, if I liked the way this person talked, I would take his case on a pro bono basis. I would do that for Heather.

  But, if I didn’t like the way he talked, I probably would walk away. As I told Heather, dog cases are bad for everybody involved. They’re bad for the client, because they end up going to prison. They’re bad for the attorney, because the client usually ends up blaming the attorney for losing the case. And they’re bad for the court system, because dog cases end up clogging dockets needlessly.

  I waited to see Beck for about 20 minutes before he finally appeared. He was about 6 foot tall, extremely muscular, with tattoos all up and down both of his arms. His head was bald, and his eyes were light-colored. I noticed that several of those tattoos were Swastikas, and other symbols I knew were used by Neo-Nazis and white supremacists. I also noticed quite a few symbols that were used by the Aryan nation. I was something of an expert on symbols, because I had represented Neo-Nazis in the past.

  I had to admit that seeing him with all those tattoos made me immediately pre-judge him. This man was being charged with a hate crime. His background apparently was grounded in hate. That was something that Heather neglected to mention.

  It would’ve been nice to have known that coming in.

  He swaggered over to me. “S’up, dog?” he asked. His wrists were shackled, as were his ankles. “Guess Heather sent you here, huh?”

  “She did. I wanted to see you and get your story. I’m not going to promise you that I’ll represent you. But I guess that Heather feels threatened by you. She asked me to represent you, because she’s afraid that you’re going to roll on her for something. I have to admit that if Heather’s story is true, it doesn’t exactly endear you to me. I want to make sure that you know where I stand.”