The Advocate's Daughter (8 page)

Sean tilted his head. “I'd assumed the ‘victims' in your usual cases are taxpayers or shareholders.”

Hellstrom stroked his chin. “That's true these days, I suppose. But I was a public defender early in my career and handled many homicide cases.”

Sean gazed over Hellstrom's shoulder out the window. The sunny morning had turned dull gray. The tip of the Washington Monument peeked over a neighboring building. Sean's eyes shifted back to his visitor. “So why the break in routine, Mr. Hellstrom? What do you want?” Sean had never been one for pleasantries, but like so many things, they seemed even more pointless in the
After.

Hellstrom slouched back in the chair, paunch sagging over his belt. “In most of my cases,” Hellstrom said, drawing out the words, “I do the best I can for my clients. I turn over every stone, file a mountain of motions, and I eat, drink, and sleep their cases until trial. But I vowed to myself two things long ago, lessons learned early in my career.” Hellstrom looked Sean in the eyes. “First, if anyone's going to jail, it's going to be my client, not me. So no matter how badly I want to win, I always play by the rules. Second, if my client goes to jail, I don't take it personally. My clients are not my friends, not my family—they're my
clients.
”

Sean began to understand why they called him “the jury master.” His manner. Hellstrom had a homespun sincerity—he was a truth teller—and you
wanted
him to continue talking, telling you his story, dispensing his wisdom.

“This morning, one of the associates at my office sent me an e-mail that had a video clip of an interview you gave the press. I normally don't open these types of things.” Hellstrom pulled out a handkerchief and blew his nose loudly.

“You may be too young, but do you remember the days before we got deluged with all this YouTube and Internet crap? Anyway, this associate, a young guy fresh out of law school includes a note that says I really should watch it, so I did. And I was struck by your words about—no,
your faith
in—the system.”

Sean narrowed his eyes. “I'm not some naïve kid, Mr. Hellstrom, so please don't—”

“Of course not. But maybe I've been doing this too long, or it's the type of cases I handle, but I see things a little differently. I don't know what your experience was at the solicitor general's office, but in my practice there are some cases—usually the big ones—where the government can't see straight. Good people do strange things. Look at the Roger Clemens trial or the Ted Stevens and John Edwards cases.”

“So what's your point, Mr. Hellstrom?”

“Please, call me Blake.”

Sean waited for a response.

“My point,” Hellstrom said finally, “and the reason I came here today, is that I'm convinced Malik Montgomery is innocent.”

Sean scoffed and stood. “I think we're done here.”

Hellstrom held up his hands in retreat. “Please, Mr. Serrat…”

“If your client is innocent, I'm sure he'll be in great hands with you as his lawyer. I just don't see what you hope to achieve by—”

“I'm not sure myself why I'm here,” Hellstrom said. “It's the damndest thing. I just kept thinking of that video of you and something compelled me to walk over. Please, if you'll just hear me out.”

Sean gave an exasperated sigh and sat back down.

“You're not the decision maker, and the government's gonna do what it's gonna do with this case. But this is your daughter. And, unlike all the defendants I've ever represented, I've never felt the terror I'm feeling with Malik Montgomery. Nothing we say here goes beyond this room and I won't be telling anyone you spoke with me. I just ask you to consider something.” Hellstrom raised two fingers. “They have only two pieces of evidence as far as I can tell: One, Malik was at the Supreme Court the night your daughter was murdered. And two, her phone was found at his home.”

“No, that's not all,” Sean countered. “He lied. He lied about being at the scene of the crime. I know, I was there. Malik looked me in the eye and he lied.”

Hellstrom gave a sympathetic gaze. “More than a hundred people were in the court that evening for a reception. Malik should've told the FBI he went in to speak with your daughter, but by that point he was scared and knew the direction things were headed. Malik may be affluent, but he's still had to grow up in this city as a black man. He has good reason to fear the police.”

Sean rolled his eyes. “I'm not going to get into a debate about race and the justice system. I think there's a much simpler reason why your client lied: he murdered Abby and deleted incriminating evidence from her phone, which was found hidden in his house.”

“Let's think about that one, Mr. Serrat. This kid's a Rhodes Scholar. A Georgetown Law graduate. And a Supreme Court law clerk. If he murdered your daughter, why the hell would he keep her phone? And why hide it at his home when he would know witnesses at the restaurant would place him as the last person seen with her? And if he was such a computer expert that he could wipe the phone clean, why would he be dumb enough to leave the device on so it could be tracked to his house?”

Sean shook his head. “They arrested him for a reason. And there is no one else who—”

“Do you know whether they even looked for anyone else? They arrested him the morning after you found your daughter and after questioning the kid all night. Just twelve hours later. Did you know your daughter was in a relationship that she was keeping secret? That someone had been harassing her? And that she was doing some type of confidential research project concerning nominees for the Supreme Court?”

Sean had heard some of this from Malik that night, but it was the first he'd heard of any research project. “All this according to who?” Sean asked. “Your client?”

At that Hellstrom made no reply.

Sean continued, “They looked for other suspects—and I'm sure that they're still looking.”

Now Hellstrom gave Sean a disappointed look.

“After an arrest, Mr. Serrat, the police tend not to look for other suspects. Old codgers like me use that kind of thing to show that even the police have reasonable doubt. If there's no doubt he's the one, there's no reason to look elsewhere.”

“Then tell me, why? What use would it serve to arrest the wrong man? Why not go after the
real
killer?”

Hellstrom held Sean's stare. “Now, Mr. Serrat, you're starting to ask the right questions.”

 

CHAPTER 17

Sean took a seat in the back of a lecture room in McDonough Hall at Georgetown Law. He looked down at the rows and rows of twenty-somethings transfixed by Jonathan Tweed. Tweed's secretary had said that Tweed was giving a guest lecture to a colleague's Constitutional Law course. In the nosebleed section of the hall, Tweed appeared much shorter than six foot two. But his boyish good looks were apparent even from this distance, if not from the gazes of the young law students attending the class.

“Professor Barnhizer asked me to talk today about freedom of the press,” Tweed said. Sean shook his head. Not a good day to hear about freedom of the press given the group that had been stationed outside his house.

Tweed considered the crowd. “But who would rather talk about something else—let's say, perhaps …
sex.
”

That elicited a low rumble from the students.

Tweed held a microphone and worked the room like a televangelist about to pass the collection plate. “No, I wouldn't want to disappoint Professor Barnhizer. How about we compromise? Let's talk about both freedom of the press
and
sex.”

The students clapped at this and someone whistled.

“Has anyone heard of an eighteenth-century journalist named James Callender?”

The room went quiet. All these years and things still hadn't changed since Sean sat in a Harvard lecture hall: the terror of the professor calling on you and—
gasp!
—you possibly not knowing the answer. The days when you knew it all or, at least, you needed everyone to think you did. The first time he saw Emily was in a classroom just like this one. Their first day of law school. Torts I. He remembered her sitting in the center row, center seat, leaning forward ready to take notes, while he staked out a spot in the back. He recalled her hair, pulled back into a ponytail. Her green eyes and full lips. She was the first to raise her hand and speak. He remembered thinking she was out of his league, better than him. And he was right. But he couldn't take his eyes off of her. After class he'd asked her to join his study group. “Who else is in the group?” she'd asked. Sean had smiled. “Just me…” Professor Tweed's voice broke the spell.

“If you think today's paparazzi is bad, well, they had nothing on the muckraker James Callender.” Tweed took a sip from a bottle of water. “He actually broke one of our country's first sex scandals. Anyone know the politician involved?”

The room filled with crowded chants of “Washington,” “Jefferson,” “Madison.”

“Getting close,” Tweed said. “Think the Federalist Papers.” He paced around, then stopped, and pointed to a student in the third row. “That's right, Alexander Hamilton. Our first Treasury secretary.”

Tweed strutted back to the lectern. “In 1797, our friend James Callender wrote an exposé accusing Alexander Hamilton of financial improprieties while at Treasury. Apparently, Hamilton had been making payments to a shady character named James Reynolds and was accused of speculating on government funds. His honor challenged, Hamilton wrote a ninety-five-page response to Callender. His explanation?” Tweed gave a mischievous grin. “Hamilton said, ‘I'm not engaged in public corruption, I paid the money to Mr. Reynolds because, well, because I was being blackmailed for having an affair with Reynolds's wife.'”

Tweed scanned the crowd. “Not usually the best defense in the court of public opinion: ‘I am not a thief, just an adulterer.'” Another smile. “But that was just the beginning for James Callender. From there, Thomas Jefferson hired Callender to secretly write scathing stories about John Adams, Jefferson's opponent in the race for the presidency. Those stories landed Callender in jail in Richmond, Virginia, under the Alien and Sedition Acts—laws that made it a crime to criticize our public officials. Think about that, you could go to jail simply for criticizing the president. How do you think Fox News or MSNBC would fare?” Tweed touched his chin. “It doesn't sound so bad when you put it that way.”

More laughter.

“So then Jefferson is elected president, and he decides to pardon Callender and others who were convicted under the Sedition Acts. Now, here's where the story takes a strange turn. Callender gets out of jail and then asks the newly elected president for a job in the government, but Jefferson refuses. Callender doesn't like that and decides on a little revenge. He writes a story based on a rumor he'd heard while serving his time in that Richmond jail. He reports that Jefferson had a child with one of his slaves. A story no one believes, virtually ruining Callender. But it's a story most historians
now
believe is true beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Tweed let that sink in. “This vile man, this muckraker, used his words to shine a light on our public figures, and he went to jail for doing it. He died in disgrace for the Jefferson story. Why do I start this lecture about freedom of the press with Callender? Beyond illustrating that sex scandals in our fair city are nothing new, Callender shows that our founders and the framers of the Constitution struggled with the same tough issues we're going to discuss today.”

Tweed lectured for another forty minutes before dismissing the class. Sean waited as the students packed their laptops and the circle of after-class suck-ups surrounding Tweed dispersed. He then stepped slowly down to the front of the class.

“Impressive,” Sean said. “Not one student sleeping or surfing the Internet.”

Tweed looked up from stuffing papers into his satchel. “Sean, I didn't see you here. How are you? I hope you didn't sit through that entire lecture. I would have stepped out if I—”

“No, I enjoyed it. The students really loved it. I would have liked it even more if I didn't have several modern-day James Callenders outside my house this morning.”

Tweed raised his eyebrows and gave a sympathetic nod. “You here early for the vigil tonight? It's going to be a massive turnout.”

“No, I'm going to head home and get Emily and the boys—I don't want them to have to come alone.”

Tweed's expression turned curious. “So you just came by to say hi or…”

“Malik Montgomery's lawyer came to see me today,” Sean said.

“Blake Hellstrom? What did he want? He didn't have the balls to ask you to go to the prosecutors for leniency, did he?”

“It was a weird meeting.” Sean told Tweed about Hellstrom's proclamation of his client's innocence.

“Did he ask you for anything? I heard he lost a child himself. Tell me he didn't try to use that to—”

“He didn't mention losing a child, and he didn't ask for anything. He just wanted to talk. A private talk.”

Tweed turned and erased the white board. “He's a brilliant defense lawyer, Sean, don't trust him.”

“I didn't feel like he was playing me. He seemed—” Sean thought about it “—distraught.”

Tweed made no reply as he snapped on the caps to the white board markers, but his expression was skeptical.

“You know Malik Montgomery pretty well, right?” Sean asked.

“Yeah, I mean, he was one of my students.”

“But he was your research assistant, and you helped him get his clerkship?”

Tweed nodded.

“Do you have any doubts that he did this?”