Rogue Lawyer полностью

I say, “He’s very lucky to be alive. They shot both dogs, didn’t they?”

“Who are these goons?” Thomas asks helplessly.

“The police, the good guys.” I then tell them the story of my client Sonny Werth, with the tank sitting in his den, and the lawsuit we won. I explain that a civil lawsuit is their only option right now. Their father will be indicted and prosecuted, and once the truth is finally learned—and I promise them that we will expose everything—there will be enormous pressure on the City to settle. Their endgame is to keep their father out of jail. They can forget justice for what happened to their mother. A civil lawsuit, one put together by the right lawyer of course, guarantees a safer flow of information. The cover-up is already under way, I say more than once.

They’re trying their best to listen, but they’re in another world. Who could blame them? The meeting ends with both women in tears and Thomas unable to speak.

It’s time for me to back off.

Uninvited, though it’s open to the public, I arrive at the large Methodist church just minutes before the service for Katherine Renfro. I find the stairs, climb up to the balcony, and sit in the semidarkness. I am alone up here, but the rest of the sanctuary is packed. I look down on the crowd: all white, all middle class, all in disbelief that their friend got shot seven times in her pajamas by the police.

Aren’t these senseless tragedies supposed to take place in other parts of town? These people are hard-core law-and-order. They vote to the right and want tough laws. If they think about SWAT teams at all, they think they’re necessary to fight terror and drugs in other places. How could this happen to them?

Absent from this ceremony is Doug Renfro. According to yesterday’s Chronicle, he has just been indicted. He’s still hospitalized, though recovering slowly. He begged the doctors and the police to allow him to attend his wife’s funeral. The doctors said sure; the cops said no way. He’s a threat to society. A cruel footnote to this tragedy is that Doug will live the rest of his life under the cloud of somehow being involved with drug trafficking. Most of these people will believe him and his denials, but for some there will be doubts. What was old Doug really up to? Surely he must’ve been guilty of something or our brave police would not have gone after him.

I suffer through the service, along with everyone else. The air is thick with confusion and anger. The minister is comforting, but at times clearly unsure of what has happened. He tries to make some sense of it, but it’s an impossible challenge. As he’s wrapping things up, and as the crying gets louder, I ease down the stairs and exit through a side door.

Two hours later my phone rings. It’s Doug Renfro.

A lawyer like me is forced to work in the shadows. My opponents are protected by badges, uniforms, and all the myriad trappings of government power. They are sworn and duty-bound to uphold the law, but since they cheat like hell it forces me to cheat even more.

I have a network of contacts and sources. I can’t call them friends because friendships require commitments. Nate Spurio is one example, an honest cop who wouldn’t take a dime for inside information. I’ve offered. Another guy is a reporter with the Chronicle, and we swap gossip when it’s convenient. No cash changes hands. One of my favorites is Okie Schwin, and Okie always takes the money.

Okie is a mid-level paper pusher in the federal court clerk’s office in a downtown courthouse. He hates his job, despises his co-workers, and is always looking for an easy way to make a buck. He’s also divorced, drinks too much, and constantly tests the boundaries of workplace sexual harassment. Okie’s value is his ability to manipulate the court’s random assignment of cases. When a civil lawsuit is filed, it is supposedly assigned by chance to one of our six federal judges. A computer does this and the little procedure seems to work fine. There’s always a judge you’d prefer, depending on the type of case and perhaps your history in various courtrooms, but who cares when it’s completely random? Okie, though, knows how to rig the software and find the judge you really want. He charges for this, handsomely, and he’ll probably get caught, though he assures me there’s no way. If he’s caught, he’ll get fired and maybe prosecuted, but Okie seems unconcerned by these possibilities.

At his suggestion, we meet in a seedy strip club far from downtown. The crowd is staunchly blue collar. The strippers are not worth describing. I turn my back to the stage so I don’t have to look. Just under the roar, I say, “I’m filing suit tomorrow. Renfro, our SWAT boys’ latest home invasion.”

He laughs and says, “What a surprise. Let me guess, you think justice will be best served if the Honorable Arnie Samson presides.”

“My man.”

“He’s 110 years old, on senior status, half-dead, and he says he’s not taking cases anymore. Why can’t we make these guys retire?”