19
WES FARRELL ATTAINED his eminent position as the district attorney of San Francisco more or less by chance. As a lifelong defense attorney, he had no record as a prosecutor. In fact, his notoriety stemmed mostly from a high-profile case he had won years before, for the defense, getting—unbeknowst to him at the time—a guilty murderer who happened to be his best friend, off with a clean acquittal. Beyond that, he had gained a certain hip cachet as a lovable oddball because of the themed T-shirts he wore every day under his business suit—and showed off regularly to friends, associates, and reporters. Today’s shirt read: “Smiling on the outside, berserk on the inside,” and it was indicative of, albeit slightly less offensive than, most of the others. More typical in terms of general sensitivity had been yesterday’s: “I hate being bipolar. It’s awesome!”
When friends had persuaded him to seek the office three years before against a heavily favored rival, he’d gone on the ticket, half as a simple acknowledgment of their belief in him, and half to strike a blow for what he called moderation in the face of a super-lenient prosecutorial culture that had essentially given up on trials in favor of plea bargains and counseling in lieu of the most toothless of punishments. At least, Wes had said, he’d put some bite back into the system. In a Farrell administration, violent criminals would be tried and, if convicted, do prison time. (Almost anywhere else, this would not have been considered a particularly aggressive stance for a prosecutor, but in San Francisco, it was considered right-wing extremism, and his nastiest detractors had labeled him Fascist Farrell.) In any event, fate played into his hands when his front-running opponent died the week before the election, and Farrell was swept to victory by a whopping ninety votes out of three hundred and fifty thousand cast.
But a cultural shift had to start at the top, and in spite of his campaign rhetoric, Wes in his heart was a very long way from being a hard-core law-and-order guy. After a lifetime at the defense bar, his sympathies had always instinctively gone to the accused. He believed there were reasons, and usually good ones, why people went bad.
But more and more lately, he found himself not caring about that. His job was prosecuting miscreants. Whether or not he understood them or their upbringing played very little if any role in the process.
In his first months as DA, on a very public stage, he had to figure out who he was, what he really believed. What had begun more or less as a parlor game—what if he humored some of his buddies and actually ran for DA?—had turned into the marrow of his existence. Now he was San Francisco’s chief prosecutor. He had a job that the people in the city he loved had elected him—albeit narrowly—to do. And gradually (some said glacially), he began to think and act like a DA, to the point where he often found himself in the middle of a prosecutorial moment without having decided to be there.
In the grip of just such a situation, he walked down the hallway when his official workday was done at a little past six o’clock, pausing just outside the front door to the Office of the District Attorney, Bureau of Investigations. Here fourteen inspectors worked under his nominal supervision, although, like most of the DAs who’d served before, he never exerted direct authority over any of these people.
He continued down to the parking lot, backed his tiny Smart car out of his assigned parking spot, and drove over to Waterbar on the Embarcadero. Leaving his car with the valet, he entered the restaurant and saw Frank Dobbins, his chief of investigations, sitting at the end of the bar next to an attractive Hispanic woman. She was probably around thirty years old, with sleek black hair and sparkling brown eyes, and though he would never use the word around any female of any age, the Neanderthal in him couldn’t help but notice that she was just plain cute. Low heels, terrific legs, a short plaid skirt, and a sky-blue cashmere sweater.
His casual talk with Abe Glitsky had gnawed at him all day long. The cases of inmates who had died or been injured in custody were perfect examples, he thought, where the district attorney had a moral obligation to investigate and, if warranted, prosecute—even if that meant prosecuting the sheriff himself. Like everyone else in the greater legal community, Farrell had been aware of the rumors and innuendo surrounding Burt Cushing and his troops, but also like everyone else, he’d found it easier to ignore the whole situation.
Cushing operated within his own little fiefdom. It was well ordered, efficient, and performed several important civic functions. And Cushing kept his nose clean everywhere else, so what would it profit Farrell or anyone else to hassle him? To make waves? Except—and this was the thought that had nagged at Farrell all afternoon—what if it were less about not making waves and more about rooting out criminal behavior within his jurisdiction and punishing those responsible for it?
Wes crossed the room to join Dobbins and the young woman. “Yo, Frank,” he said, then turned to the woman. “You must be Ms. Solis-Martinez.”
The woman gave him a bright smile and proffered her hand. “Maria T. Solis-Martinez, at your service, but please call me Maria, if you’re comfortable with that.”
“Maria it is,” Farrell said. “And I go by Wes. Have we met before?”
She nodded. “At my preliminary interview six months ago, when I flew up from L.A. We shook hands.” She pouted prettily. “You don’t remember?” Before Farrell could answer, she touched him on the arm and fetched another smile. “I’m teasing. Of course you don’t remember, and you’re forgiven. But next time . . .”
“Maria,” he said. “Got it, now and forever.” But how, Farrell wondered, could Dobbins have reached her so quickly? Wes had talked to his chief investigator about this idea only a few hours ago. “Do you still live in L.A.?” he asked her.
“No. I knew that Frank had me on his short list, and I wanted to get out of L.A. anyway, so I packed up and moved here a couple of months ago. Job or no job. I figured it would happen if it was meant to be.” Her bright smile flashed again. “And here I am.”
Farrell beamed back at her. “Like magic,” he said.
“If I may be so bold . . .” Dobbins leaned in, breaking up the lovefest, and moved things back to business mode. “Maria and I were talking about the job, Wes. She agrees it might be right up her alley, and she’s interested, but I told her you could fill her in a little more.”
The waiter came over, and Farrell ordered a beer, then turned his attention back to the young woman. “Frank may have already told you that another inmate died in jail the other night. That’s the latest in a string of deaths in the jail this year. On top of a large number of overdoses and inmates who appear to have been assaulted. He was number ten this year.”
“This year? Was he autopsied?”
“Absolutely. Cause of death was ‘natural causes.’ His heart simply stopped. It’s stressful getting arrested. It could have happened.”
“All right.” Maria crossed her arms, her brow furrowed. “But here we are, so something must be bothering you.”
“This latest guy got my attention, but I’m more immediately concerned with a guy named Alanos Tussaint, who died in jail last month. Poor guy fell down and bumped his head.”
“He bumped his head and died? That was a hell of a bump.”
“Right. A significant bump. Anyway, it seems there was some question about Mr. Tussaint’s death. In the early stages of the investigation, another inmate told the SFPD cops that a guard had gone off on Mr. Tussaint and beaten him to death. The next time the inmate got interrogated, he changed his story, saying he’d gotten it wrong. The guard had hit Mr. Tussaint a couple of times in self-defense, but it wasn’t really a beating. And since there were no other witnesses, the case never got off the ground. It obviously wasn’t much of a priority. I’ll take responsibility for that, since assigning priorities is my job. But the fact remains. Bad stuff is going on at the jail, and it needs to end. We were hoping to bring in somebody from the outside who’s unknown around here. Frank thinks that ought to be you.”
Maria nodded. “I’m flattered and very interested, but I’m a little concerned how the rest of your office is going to take it.”
“How’s that?” Farrell asked.
“If I come on, it kind of implies that whoever handled those cases didn’t do a thorough job, doesn’t it? If somebody like me got ahold of one of these—say Mr. Tussaint—on the rebound, whoever had it first won’t be happy. Plus,” she added, “if we’re going to question our inmate witness again, he’s probably already been talked to, or worse, by the guards. That’s why he recanted, obviously. They threatened him. So you’ll have to get him protected and out of the population, and as soon as you do that, you’re in the sheriff’s face. All on the off chance that this guy might have seen something he wants to talk about again, something that might get him beaten or even killed.” She paused. “I’m just saying that this doesn’t strike me as a casual decision. You’re opening a big can of worms.”
? ? ?
ANOTHER ROUND OF drinks later, the conversation turned to the overdoses. “Black heroin in the jail,” Farrell said. “How do you think it got there?”
“How do you think it got there, sir?” asked Maria.
“There had to be guards involved. But as Frank here will tell you, he’s already talked to the sheriff about it. Mr. Cushing, too, was appalled by the evidence of drugs in jail, but he was pretty sure it was some of the defense lawyers or shrinks visiting their clients or patients, since it couldn’t be any of his guards, and the family and friends didn’t get any physical contact with the inmates. The lawyers and psychiatrists, they hide it anywhere—briefcases, pockets, you name it.”
Maria chuckled. “He didn’t really say that? Professional people were bringing it in?”
“Sure. They have no respect for the law, those guys. Some of the lawyers—I bet you didn’t know this—accept payment from their jailed clients in drugs, then sell it to their other clients out on the street.”
“Sure, I’ll bet that happens all the time,” Maria said with heavy irony. She turned to Wes expectantly. “So . . . what do we do now?”
“Well, if you’ll take it,” Wes said, “I’m offering you a job as a DA investigator. You have a police background, you speak Spanish, and Frank tells me you’re perfect for the job, which he never says about anybody. But this first assignment is going to be absolutely confidential and, frankly, damned dangerous. We want to get you inside the jail to find out what’s happening to these people. I want to be sure you’re okay going after these guys.”
“Are you kidding?” she asked. “It would make my year. We’re the good guys, aren’t we? If we don’t have the guts to take on the bad guys, who will?”
Wes nodded appreciatively and looked over to Dobbins. “That sounds like the right answer to me, Frank. How about you?”
“It’s why I called her in,” Dobbins replied.
“All right, Maria.” Farrell held out his hand. “Welcome aboard.”