The Boys from Biloxi: A Legal Thriller (22 page)

A month later, two FBI agents paid a visit to Fats Bowman at the sheriff’s office. They had finally strung together the trail of robberies, and the first five victims had helped an artist prepare composite sketches of the gang of three. The woman, Karol Horton, stage name of Sissy, had been tracked to her last place of employment, Red Velvet. She was now deceased. Her sidekick, Jimmie Crane, was a convicted felon who had recently been paroled and had a Mississippi driver’s license. Address in Biloxi. He was dead too. They were looking for the third suspect.

For once, Fats was completely innocent and knew nothing about the robberies. Why should he? They took place in other states, far away from the Coast.

The third composite bore a close resemblance to Lance Malco’s son, but Fats said nothing. The FBI agents could flash the composite all over Biloxi, but the people who knew Hugh would not say a word. After they left, Fats sent Kilgore, his chief deputy, to talk to Lance.

Hugh got a job on a freighter hauling frozen shrimp to Europe and was not seen in Biloxi for six months.

1971 was an election year and Jesse Rudy wasted no time in announcing his candidacy for district attorney. In early February, he rented the VFW lodge and held a reception for friends and supporters. A large crowd showed up and he was delighted with the early support. In a short speech, he again promised to use the office to do what it was supposed to do: fight crime and bring criminals to justice. In broad strokes, he talked about the corruption that had plagued the Coast for decades and the casual attitude of law enforcement toward the rampant vice. He did not mention names because he didn’t have to. Everyone in the crowd knew his targets. The name-calling would come later; the speeches would get longer.

The
Register
covered the event and Jesse got himself on the front page for the umpteenth time in the past four years. Since Camille, no lawyer on the Coast had received as much publicity as Jesse Rudy.

Agnes had reservations about her husband seeking office again. The nastiness of his first race against Rex Dubisson was still fresh. The dirty tricks would long be remembered. The element of danger was always in the background, though rarely discussed. With Keith in law school, Beverly and Laura at Southern Miss, and Tim headed for college in the fall, the family budget was as strained as always. The DA’s salary was barely enough to handle four kids in college. The law firm kept them above water, so, she argued, why not concentrate on the practice and let Dubisson or someone else ignore the criminals?

Jesse, though, would have none of it. He listened to her
concerns, again and again, but was too focused on his mission. Since his defeat in 1967, he was more determined than ever to become the chief prosecutor on the Coast. Keith, still in his first year of law school, was of the same mind and encouraged his father to run.

After his announcement, Jesse met with the editors of the
Register.
The meeting did not go well, because of his aggressive approach. In his opinion, the newspaper had for too long sat idly by and ignored the corruption. It loved the crime. The murders, beatings, and burnings were always front-page news. When the mobsters went to war the
Register
sold even more, but it had rarely dug beneath the violence to explore its causes. And, it was too tepid with its endorsements. Fats Bowman was almost never criticized. Four years earlier the newspaper had endorsed neither Dubisson nor Jesse.

He showed the editors the infamous “I Was Raped By Jarvis Decker” ad that Dubisson had used in 1967. He reminded them of the judge’s comment of “I find these ads repulsive.”

“This was a false ad,” Jesse said, lecturing the editors. “We finally found this woman, this Connie Burns, who of course was not Connie Burns. It took me two years to track her down. Name’s Doris Murray and she admitted that someone from the Dubisson campaign paid her three hundred dollars to pose for the photo and tell her lies. It was a devastating ad. You were in court. You covered the hearing, but you didn’t do a damned thing to investigate the story. You let Dubisson off the hook.”

“How’d you find her?” an editor asked, somewhat sheepishly.

“Hard work. Shoe leather. Knocked on doors. It’s called investigative reporting, fellas. And if Dubisson tries it again this time, I’ll sue him even quicker. It would be nice if you guys would do some digging.”

After some more awkward conversation, the editor-in-chief asked, “So you want our endorsement?”

“I don’t care. It means little. You’re always quick to pipe up
with an endorsement for governor or AG or some office that means little to the people out there on the street, but you claim to be impartial in the local races. Looking the other way only encourages corruption.”

He left the meeting and considered it successful. He had made them squirm and stutter.

His next stop was a meeting with Rex Dubisson, a courtesy call with a purpose. With a couple of exceptions, the two had managed to avoid each other for four years. Dubisson was rarely in court, which was part of his problem, in Jesse’s opinion. He pulled out the Jarvis Decker ad and promised nasty lawsuits if the dirty tricks started again. Dubisson snapped back that the ad was accurate. Jesse launched into a near tirade and told the story of tracking down Doris Murray. He had an affidavit signed by her in which she admitted taking cash from his campaign in exchange for her photo and false story.

The meeting deteriorated and Jesse stormed out. His message had been delivered.

In their first race, Dubisson had the advantage of incumbency, name recognition, and plenty of money. Now, though, because of Camille and its ensuing litigation, the landscape had shifted, in more ways than one. Jesse Rudy was a household name and viewed by many as a gutsy and talented trial lawyer who fought the insurance companies, and won. In legal circles, the gossip was that his firm was doing well and he was making money. He had been campaigning for four years and had made plenty of friends. His partners, the Pettigrew boys, were from Hancock County and their family was well connected. The tragic death of their father in Camille had touched the entire community. Their popularity would be good for an extra thousand votes.

After he left, Dubisson locked the door to his office and called Fats Bowman. They might have a problem.

During Jesse’s initial assault on the insurance industry, he met a young lawyer named Egan Clement. She was thirty years old and worked in Wiggins, up in Stone County, where her family had lived for the past century. Her father was the superintendent of education for the county and highly regarded.

Egan had never sued an insurance company before, but she had clients with property damage claims that were being ignored. Jesse took the time to walk her through the ins and outs of the litigation and they became friendly. He helped with her lawsuits and told her when to settle and when to go to trial.

Stone County had the smallest population in the Second District, and Dubisson had carried it by thirty-one votes. Jesse did not intend to lose it again. He startled Egan with the suggestion that she enter the race for district attorney. A three-way race would further dilute Dubisson’s strength and divert some of his attention and money away from Jesse. By running, she would gain name recognition, something every small-town lawyer needed. The deal was simple: If Egan ran and lost, Jesse would hire her as his assistant district attorney.

The deal was hardball politics, but nothing unethical. Jesse had seen Egan in action and knew she had potential. He also liked the idea of having a tough female prosecutor on his team.

In April, Egan Clement officially entered the race for district attorney. The deal was kept quiet, of course, and existed only by virtue of a handshake.

After his last exam in early May, Keith hustled home to jump into the middle of the campaign. Still motivated by the first loss, he had continually encouraged his father to run again. He had been bitten by the bug, loved politics, and was as determined as Jesse to win and win big. He toyed with the idea of another session of summer school, but needed a break. His first year had gone well, his
grades were impressive, but he would rather spend the next three months in the rough-and-tumble world of Coast politics.

He wrote the first campaign ads and had them ready to go when, and if, Dubisson started his direct mail mischief. They didn’t have to wait long. In the first week of June, the district was flooded with ads that repeated the theme of an incumbent “Tough On Crime.” There were the statistics boasting of a 90 percent conviction rate, and so on. There was a photo, an action shot of Dubisson in court pointing angrily at a witness, unseen. There were testimonials from crime victims expressing their unabashed admiration for the prosecutor who had put away the perpetrators. There was nothing original about the ads, just the usual slick offering from an incumbent DA. They were fair and balanced and did not mention either Jesse Rudy or Egan Clement.

The Rudy campaign countered quickly with a mailing that hit back, and hit hard. The ad listed seven unsolved murders in the past six years. Seven murders that were still in the “unprosecuted” category. The implication was clear: The DA wasn’t doing a very good job with the serious crimes. In all fairness, Dubisson couldn’t prosecute murders that law enforcement hardly investigated. At least five of them were gang-related, and Fats Bowman had never shown much interest when the mobsters were settling scores. But that wasn’t mentioned in the ad. It went on to list the crimes that had led to apprehension and punishment, with heavy emphasis on petty burglaries, small drug deals, domestic violence, and drunk driving. In bold print at the bottom was a tagline that would be remembered and repeated: “Rex Dubisson—Tough On Shoplifters.”

The following week, billboards along Highways 90 and 49 were converted to bold ads that read:
rex dubisson—tough on shoplifters
.

Any momentum the DA might have inherited due to his incumbency vanished overnight. He abandoned his “Tough On Crime” routine and struggled to find traction elsewhere. At a huge
July Fourth barbecue and political rally, Rex called in sick and missed the festivities. A handful of his volunteers passed out brochures, but they were heavily outnumbered by the Rudy people. Jesse gave a fiery speech in which he blasted his opponent for being a no-show. Going for the jugular, he introduced the one issue that still frightened every law-abiding citizen. Drugs were pouring into the Coast, marijuana and now cocaine, and the police and prosecutors were ignoring the trade, or profiting from it, or sleeping on the job.

Publicly, he never mentioned Fats Bowman and the nightclub crowd. A war was coming, but he would wait until he was elected to start it. Privately, though, he called them by name and promised to put them out of business.

Two weeks before the August primary, the Dubisson campaign came to life with radio ads touting his twelve years of experience. He was a veteran prosecutor who had sent hundreds of criminals to Parchman. Seven years earlier, in his finest hour, he had successfully tried and convicted a man, Rubio, who had killed his wife and two children. It was an easy case with plenty of damning evidence, one that a third-year law student could have won. But the jury returned with a capital conviction and Rubio was now at Parchman awaiting execution. For any DA in America’s death belt, there was no greater prize than sending a man to death row. In the ads, Dubisson crowed about the conviction and vowed to be there when they led Rubio into the gas chamber. In a state where 70 percent of the people believed in the death penalty, the ads were well received.

Fats Bowman then turned the money loose and Dubisson flooded the airwaves with TV ads. The Biloxi station was the only one on the Coast and few local politicians could afford it. By late
July, the Rudy campaign was almost out of money and could not answer the onslaught. The ads were thirty-second spots, professionally done, slick and convincing. They portrayed Rex Dubisson as a hard-charging DA at war with those sinister drug traffickers from South America.

To his credit, Dubisson stayed away from attack ads. He was convinced that another dirty trick would land him in court. Jesse Rudy was itching to go there and the negative publicity would only favor him. He and his team could only watch and cringe as Dubisson’s ads ran seemingly nonstop.