Truth or Nothing

I packed my things into a banker’s box. My framed law school diploma. My trial advocacy prize from graduation, with my name – David Hogan – emblazoned on the black acrylic. My Title 2C Criminal Code. The New Jersey Court Rules with “ROCCO” printed in indelible marker on the spine. The tools of the trade.

Rocco came around and stood with arms folded behind me.

“Jesus, kid. You’re going down hard,” he said. “It’s admirable of you to take a fall like this.”

I just looked over at him, saying nothing.

“Got everything?” he asked.

“I think so,” I said.

“Officer Niederman will see you out. Badge,” he said, holding out his hands.

I handed over my prosecutor’s badge, grabbed the box, and walked out of the office which had been my home away from home for over a year. Officer Niederman escorted me out to the hall, took my key swab, and closed the door behind me. I met Ernest Cannon in the hallway.

We took the elevator down and walked quietly out into the frigid November night. Ernest didn’t say a word as we crossed the street to his office. The streetlamps cast long shadows across the lawns and all along Newark Avenue.

All the lights were out inside Ernest’s Office. Ernest pulled out his keys and opened the glass door, leading us into a bare foyer, and back into an office that looked more like a cluttered two-bedroom apartment than a law office. The walls were covered with news articles from acquittals and celebrity scandals.

“You’ll be in that office there,” he said.

“I get my own office?” I asked.

“Don’t get too excited. This is a limited engagement,” he said. “We aren’t putting a name placard on the door for God’s sake.” Ernest paused as he walked away to add, “Once I’m better, you go back across the street where I found you.” I wondered what happened if he didn’t get better.

I put down my things on an empty desk and came back out to find Ernest had retired to his office. I stood in his doorway, looking at him, not sure what to do with myself. He sat at his desk with his head in his hands. “Well come the fuck in,” he said. “Did you want an engraved invitation?”

“What now?” I asked.

“Hell, if I know,” he said. “Scotch?”

“Sure,” I said.

Ernest stood up, tugged on his mustache, and stared at the liquor cabinet in the corner by his bookshelf. Ernest leaned with one hand still on his desk for support, and he briefly winced in pain. I’d read that testicular cancer could cause back pain. He selected a bottle of Macallan Double Cask 18-Year. He pulled out two glasses that said “Cannon” on the bottom. The first time he pulled on the cap, his face reddened, but it wouldn’t budge. The second time, he popped the top off, gave each glass a healthy pour, and handed one over to me.

“Welcome to the team,” he said, and we touched glasses.

“I’m not so sure about this,” I said.

“Wouldn’t have brought you over if I thought you were,” he said. “No one is ever ready to try a murder, kid. Might as well get it out of your system.”

“This is a mistake. I can’t beat Jeb.”

“Good thing you aren’t up against Jeb. It’s the devil himself you’ve got to worry about.”

“What do you mean?”

“What I mean is, what you are up against is your own doubts, the conscience of the community, the little voice telling you to cut and run, and the temptation to think it’s about you—when it hasn’t got a damned thing to do with you—what you are up against here is the devil himself—in all his lovely forms.”

I took a long gulp of Scotch.

“How am I supposed to prepare a defense? I’ve seen the evidence. It looks like an open and shut case.”

“Would you stop being a goddamn lawyer for one fucking second?”

I took another long gulp of Scotch and produced my glass for a refill, which Ernest poured, happily, nearly filling the glass to the brim, emptying what remained in his glass, and pouring himself one as well. This time he left the cap off the bottle.

“First assignment, go meet with Frank. Get to know your client. No judgments. No notepad. Listen to the man’s story. Get to know the guy. His life is in your hands now, after all.”

“Okay. I can do that.”

“Second assignment, you need to unlearn a lifetime of bad habits. Law school has muddled your brain and left you with a noggin like a bowl full of Swiss cheese. You’ve lost the ability to think like a human being. Like a juror. To speak plainly. To say what’s on your mind and in your heart, rather than some words you’ve rehearsed. You are no good to Frank or yourself if you can’t find your humanity again.”

“How do I do that?”

“Take a walk. Talk to people. Watch them. See how they relate to one another. You need to do this daily. Get those muscles strong. Because right now, the way you talk, it’d be better if you didn’t.”

“I get what you’re saying, but I don’t know if I agree with it—”

“Third assignment, you don’t say one goddamn word in that courtroom without conviction. If you can’t convince yourself of a thing, you don’t utter it aloud. Ever. From now on, it is truth or nothing. If the jury catches you being dishonest even for one second, catches you twisting the facts, or sees you trying to pull a trick on them—the trial is over. Your only job, from now on, is to convict yourself. To find the truth that you can believe. And to tell it. You speak what you know to be true and only what you know to be true.”

“Truth or nothing. Got it.” I nodded, but my mind was drifting.

***

The truth is more elusive than it first appears.

A week earlier, Judge Almeida had called me into chambers about an old case on his docket. Elliot T. Price. Poor guy had been locked up on contempt for willful nonsupport for three children. I’d kept him there for three months without batting an eyelash. And I was proud of it too. Despite his worsening pulmonary fibrosis, which was claiming his life day by day.

I’d seen him coughing over the CCTV uplink at bail hearings, begging me and Judge Almeida to let him out. It had not affected me. Not for a minute. I stood up and said, “Judge, this isn’t a compassionate release hearing. The defendant hasn’t submitted one medical report for this court’s consideration. There has been no showing the treatment by the infirmary is inadequate. This man is in contempt. There are three mouths that aren’t being fed. We’d ask that bail be withheld.” Judge Almeida had denied bail. He’d listened to me.

Elliot wrote me every day. Alicia, our paralegal, brought me the hand-written notes. She giggled and rolled her eyes. It was our thing. Elliot’s notes pleaded that he didn’t have much time left and I’d got the wrong guy. Sure, I thought. He wanted me to look at the file. Our perp was a NASA Aerospace Engineer. He claimed to be a different Elliot T. Price. A mechanic from Englewood. Repairing carburetors and doing oil changes. He said he had terminal pulmonary fibrosis. Had no family. No one to bring him documents. But none of that was in the case jacket. And there wasn’t a shred of corroborating evidence to back him up.

A desperate act by a desperate man. Or, so I thought. Every day he wrote asking me to check the social security numbers. Swearing they didn’t match. I never did. I mean, what are the odds there are two guys named Elliot T. Price kicking around in New Jersey with social security numbers that are one digit off? That the cops who pulled him over missed it, booking missed it, the criminal investigators missed it, the grand jury unit missed it, and the detective investigators on Trial Team duty missed it too?

Turns out those odds are pretty good. Because eventually I checked. Just to confirm the guy was a nut job so I could stop opening his letters.

The strange thing is, even after I realized he wasn’t the guy, I waited two days before going to my supervisor to sign the release order and dismiss the charges.

Even when confronted with the evidence, I still didn’t trust it.

It was easier to believe the system had worked as intended. I must have checked those numbers at least a hundred times. To be honest, it was a stain on my record. An embarrassment. And it wasn’t even my mistake. I knew what I had to do, but something kept stopping me.

After I released him, I stood up before Judge Almeida and asked for no bail on a repeat shoplifter. That very same day. After that, he called me into chambers and gave me the speech. Her name was Terry Dickson. All I knew was she had a vicious drug problem and spent most of her time high on dope. And she couldn’t help herself from taking the five-finger discount at every gas station mini-mart in a 2-mile radius of the park where she camped out.

“There’s an old saying, ‘Never mistake law for justice.’ Ever hear it?”

“Can’t say I have, Judge.”

“Well, it is a saying.”

“By whom?” I asked.

“Some quack fantasy writer. It doesn’t matter. The point is that the law is impartial. But justice is blind.”

“I thought justice was getting what you deserve.”

“Far from it. Justice looks the other way. Ever see those statues of Lady Justice blindfolded? Of course, you have. Do you know what it means?”

I just looked at him blankly. It seemed like the kind of thing lawyers were supposed to know.

The Judge grabbed a baseball from off the dais behind his desk and started tossing it back and forth with me as we spoke.

“Long ago that blindfold stood for tolerance and mercy. In Egypt. In hard times. The oppressed blindfolded the Goddess Ma’at, so her sword would be withheld from punishing their trespasses. That part got lost in translation.”

The Judge sat back in his leather chair, behind his desk, and leaned back, as he continued our game of toss.

“I believe in accountability, not tolerance. One rule for everyone.”

“For your sake, son, I hope you never get what you deserve. I hope you get far better. Trust me, that blindfold is necessary.”

“Why is that?” I asked.

“Terry Dickson was a probation officer for ten years with pre-trial services in this very courthouse. Did you know that? She also has a daughter who lives with her on the streets. You probably didn’t know that either.”

“I understand, Judge,” I said.

“Do you?” Judge Almeida sat forward in his chair, staring intently through me. “Really? You have experience with that? With living on the street, with a hungry little girl?”

“I’m sorry judge. I didn’t know. Is there anything else, your honor?”

“Take a look at that ball. Do you see who it’s signed by?”

“Pete Rose?” I asked.

“Do you know who that is?”

“Not really.”

“Good old, Charlie Hustle. A Hall of Fame baseballer that liked to bet on himself. Look it up. Now, get back to the stables, young buck. And show some mercy.”

I turned to walk out of Almeida’s office, and he called out, “Mr. Prosecutor.”

“Yes, Judge.”

“You remind me of Charlie Hustle. You know what his claim to fame was?”

“What’s that, Judge.”

“He always slid headfirst. And despite being less talented than some in the league, he pulled an upset and made Rookie of the Year.”

“I thought you wanted me to show mercy, Judge.”

“Charlie Hustle never conceded a single play in his whole career. That I like.”

“How do you mean?”

“Charlie Hustle didn’t have an off switch. And he didn’t see where the game stopped. If you’re smart you will. But get it right. That’s the important thing.”

My mind slipped back to Ernest, who had not missed a beat.

***

“Truth or nothing. Got it.”

“That includes the hearing coming up with Judge Kennedy on your substitution into the case. When he asks if you want to do this and if you can handle it, you speak the truth—whatever that is—you hear me.”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“No. No,” Ernest said, slamming a fist on the desk. “Don’t guess. Never guess. It’s binary. It’s yes or it’s no. And you stand by your goddamn convictions. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Now you can’t deny reality. But you must figure out what that is. Don’t start with the evidence. Start with the witnesses. That’ll tell you everything. Don’t try to understand how this 25-year-old kid ended up with two bullet holes in his chest at a police lock-up. That’s a mirage. The witnesses have the truth. Follow their stories.”

“But I’ve seen the reports. Frank Murphy was there. It was his gun.”

“What?”

“I’m asking what the defense is.”

“I could tell you that. But you would never believe it. It’s your case now. You’re going to have to earn that one. Otherwise, you’ll never be able to sell it to a jury for God’s sake.”

Ernest put down his glass. He looked at me with great contempt, squinted, and started tugging on his mustache. He took a long swig of Scotch, swishing it around his mouth and across his gums before swallowing. He squinted at me with his one eye, and grimaced.

“I don’t see what our angle could be here,” I said.

“You haven’t seen shit. Stick around a while. You’ll see things that’ll make your hair stand on end. You’ll come to question reality. You think fiction is strange. Wait until you come face to face with the unvarnished truth.

“So, what now?” I asked.

“We get to work in the morning. Go home and get a good night’s sleep. It’ll be your last one until this trial is finished.”

What was I doing? Was I going to become this man? Drinking Scotch alone in his office at midnight, falling apart physically, a man’s life in his hands, tasked with indicting the entire system, living among old acquittals? For all his fame in legal circles, I didn’t know whether becoming Ernest Cannon was something to aspire to or run from.

I got up to leave. Ernest stood up, the starch of his shirt and the press of his designer suit still intact despite the hour. He briefly turned his back to me, grabbed the bottle of Macallan, and set it down on the desk between us. He stood there tugging on his mustache. Squinting. And a small grin spread across his pursed lips.

“Kid,” he said. “You weren’t my first choice. And I’ll be honest. You’ve got no idea what kind of shitstorm you’re heading into. But it does an old man’s heart good to think of one such as yourself having the courage to take this on. I’ve got respect for what you’re doing here, kid. Besides all that, you’re doing me a favor. And I won’t forget it.”

“You’re welcome, sir,” I said.

“Call me Ernest,” he said and then pushed the bottle across the desk. “And take this in your satchel. Trust me. You’re going to need it.”

As I put my hand on the neck of the bottle to take it with me, Ernest put his hand over the top—stopping me momentarily in my tracks—and locked eyes with me. “Son, you’re going to be a fine criminal defense attorney,” he said. And then he sat back down.

“Thank you, Ernest,” I said.

I’d said, ‘thank you,’ what, like a million times? But that thank you was filled with the most gratitude I’d ever put behind those words. Even if being a criminal defense attorney was the very last thing I wanted to do. Now or ever. But that’s how it goes, I guess.

Walking out, for the first time in my life, I felt like I was choosing something instead of simply being carried along. “There’s no going back now,” I thought. Things would never be the same if I took one more step down this path. My hands were shaking so hard it took two tries to open the latch on Ernest’s door.

And to be honest, which is something I was supposed to be practicing up on, I was feeling the Scotch.

As I walked under the streetlamps toward the parking lot, I could see the jail just across the street from the courthouse, which also housed the prosecutor’s office. Somewhere in that building, Frank Murphy was being held, all alone, in solitary confinement. Huddled in a cold, dark cell. And no one in the world believed in him. I knew a man like that once.

Something was bothering me. Something Jeb had said was in the arrest report. Frank Murphy had said, “I tried to save the kid.” Nothing else. Just that. That put him at the scene. Admitted to involvement. Any cop knows that the first rule of interrogations for a suspect is not to “self-snitch.” So why did Frank say anything? Why did he say that specifically? Who was that for?

I stopped under the hazy streetlamps. I pulled out Frank Murphy’s statement from the case jacket and read it for the first time.

Something told me it was going to be an even longer night than I thought. I pulled out the bottle of Scotch, took a long swig, and headed back inside to tell Ernest what I’d found.