65
ONE LOOK at his new lawyer was enough to make Rafael miss Duncan Riley. Robert Walker was dressed in a cheap suit that no longer fit, a light dusting of dandruff on the shoulders. His tie was loose, the collar of his white shirt frayed. Everything about Walker seemed sloppy; he utterly lacked the sort of high-end professionalism that Duncan had always conveyed.
Walker stayed seated as Rafael was brought into the interview room and sat down across from him. The lawyer had some papers in his lap; he continued reading for a moment before finally extending his hand.
“I’m here with some good news,” Walker said. “The DA’s put an offer on the table, a good one.”
Rafael hadn’t thought about taking a plea, not since the one conversation he and Duncan had about it, back when he’d told his lawyer to go to war. But looking at Walker, Rafael wondered if going to war was really still an option. “What’s the offer?”
“They’re willing to go down to murder two, sentencing recommendation of eighteen years. That means with good behavior you’d get out in fifteen. You go to trial, you’re looking at life without parole, meaning you’d go in knowing you never had any chance of coming back out. Given that the guy was an ex-cop, this is a hell of a deal.”
Rafael was skeptical. “Fifteen years in jail is a hell of a deal?”
“When you could be looking at life without parole, then yeah, a hell of a deal is exactly what fifteen years is.”
“But Mr. Riley thought he could get me off,” Rafael protested, feeling again the betrayal of losing the lawyer he’d believed had enough juice to beat the system.
“I’ll tell you, the last thing you want in your situation is some young-Turk lawyer who’s looking to make a name for himself while it’s your life on the hook. Even the best criminal defense lawyers lose a lot more trials then they win; that’s just a fact. I understand he was probably telling you what you wanted to hear, but counting on an acquittal isn’t realistic. You’re young; you take this deal, you can get out and still have a full life in front of you.”
“So you saying I should take the fifteen.”
“It’s fifteen with good behavior, but yeah, I definitely think you should take it. You’d be making a big mistake not to.”
Rafael wasn’t sure what choice he really had here. Fighting made sense only if he had a chance of winning, and he was no longer sure he did, not with this guy in his corner. “You don’t think you can win my case?” he asked.
Walker looked uncomfortable with the head-on question. “The witness against you is a former New York City cop. They’ve got a motive, they’ve got that you were right there when it happened.”
“My old lawyer thought he could win,” Rafael said again.
“Look, Ramón, I’ve met your former lawyer. He’s young, full of himself, never even tried a criminal case before. I understand he probably seemed impressive, his credentials and whatnot, but believe me, what you need is a lawyer who actually knows his way around the city’s criminal courts, who knows how things get done in the real world. That’s how come I was able to get you a good deal like this right off the bat.”
Rafael didn’t want to plead guilty to a murder he didn’t commit, could hardly believe he was even thinking about doing so. It hadn’t been that long ago that Rafael had been sure he was going to beat the charges, walk away, maybe even get some kind of apology. But he certainly didn’t like the idea of trusting this new lawyer who couldn’t even get his name right to win his case in court.
Rafael needed to think; he needed to get advice from someone. His mother and grandmother clung to the fact of his innocence, as if that were enough. Rafael had thought so too, at first, but no more: he knew that innocence was not sufficient protection. He would’ve liked to talk it over with Duncan Riley, but that option was gone now. That left only one person.
IT TOOK Rafael a day to find Armando, spotting him at the cafeteria with a couple other Puerto Rican men, including Luis Gutierrez. Rafael had been avoiding Armando since hearing his pitch, still wanting to get through Rikers without joining up with anyone. But he forced himself to go over and ask if he could talk to Armando alone for a minute.
Armando looked surprised by the request, but after a moment he nodded. A quick look and the other men at the table dispersed, Rafael then sitting down.
“I got something with my case; I don’t know who to talk to,” Rafael said. “My lawyer, he wants me to take a plea. Says I could get out in fifteen.”
Armando regarded him for a moment. “Fifteen on a murder, that’s pretty good,” he said. “You’d still have plenty of life left to live when you got out.”
“But I didn’t shoot nobody,” Rafael said. “This whole thing’s just a mistake.”
Armando smiled at this. “It’s not no mistake,” he said. “You still thinking about it like what the system wants is to find the truth. What they looking to do is lock our people up. Don’t matter what we did. What matters is what we are.”
Rafael didn’t want to believe that. He’d been actively fighting it off. But he could no longer pretend that his arrest was some misunderstanding that was going to be cleared up. He’d believed in Duncan Riley, but Riley was gone now. His new lawyer didn’t have any interest in winning; he just wanted to get the case over with as quickly as possible. If Rafael went to trial it would be his word against Chris Driscoll’s, and Driscoll was a white ex-cop. “So you think I should take the fifteen?” he asked Armando.
“It’s a long time; I feel you. But you go to trial on murder in the first, get life without parole, that means you going to die in prison. That’s the worst thing of all. And the fifteen don’t have to be hard years. You come in with us, follow the seven steps and become a brother for life, you’ll be taken care of. We got people everywhere.”
Rafael wondered if he could really spend fifteen years in the system without the protection of a gang. It was one thing to survive on his own at Rikers; a long bid at a maximum-security prison would be a whole different beast.
Armando leaned forward, looking into Rafael’s eyes. “I’m going to be taking a plea,” he said. “Doing seven. Longest stretch I ever done. But ain’t nobody going to f*ck with me while I’m in. It’s not just that; we get provided for too. You just tell me, hermano, you just say the word and I’ll make you one of us.”