Defending Turquoise (Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thriller Series Book 5) Read online

  Defending Turquoise

  A Thaddeus Murfee Legal Thriller

  John Ellsworth

  Subjudica House

  Contents

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Foreword

  Preface

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  Also by John Ellsworth

  Afterword

  Copyright © 2014 by John Ellsworth

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  For Turquoise, for the Dine

  Foreword

  Nowhere is the rate of sexual abuse higher than on the Native American reservations. It’s a matter of easily available statistics that will bear this out. Assaults often go unreported, as the general consensus among the tribes is that no one is going to do anything anyway. The literature brims with stories of assault followed by cursory investigations—if any—followed by files closed without prosecution.

  This novel is fiction and does not attempt to reconstruct any particular incident of abuse but is only my effort to step up and say, Hey, is anybody paying attention?

  —John Ellsworth, September 2014

  Preface

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the by-product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  If you would like to be notified of new book publications please sign up for my email list. You won’t receive email from me for anything but new book announcements.

  —John Ellsworth

  1

  In Flagstaff the flow of Mexican drugs never faltered. In late December a suitcase arrived by train, bound for Boston. A Mexican national named Hermano Sanchez had stuck the claim ticket in his hatband. It connected him to enough marijuana to supply homecoming at a small college.

  The suitcase rattled along the Amtrak conveyor belt while Queenie alerted and tracked along. Drug Task Force (DTF) agent Avram Goloff hit PAUSE. The conveyor lurched to a stop, Queenie went on point, and the suitcase was jimmied. DTF agents matched the contents in the luggage to the mahogany face in the waiting room, first bench, first Stetson. He had planted himself the closest he could get to the baggage window. On delivery, that suitcase would net him $1,000 and he wasn’t about to let it get away.

  Hermano was desperate for the money. It was needed back home to save his family from the cartels. Instead, he was ID’d where he sat nervously picking at a backhand scab while he waited for the luggage to emerge. DTF clamped him with handcuffs and hauled him away in the back of a black SUV.

  Hermano’s initial reaction was shock. He had been unprepared for the ubiquitous presence of American law enforcement. No one had told him they would be everywhere. No one had told him it would be like this at all.

  He was a stooped, thin little man with close-set eyes that crossed and uncrossed in a glance, stubby teeth, and hands hardened from years of digging trenches in the caliche of northern Mexico. On his head perched a straw Stetson knockoff from Taiwan, unfit for the swirling snow of Flagstaff winters.

  The next morning he appeared before Judge H. Ivan Trautman. Trautman was a man infatuated with religion. He bore precious little patience for sinners, and he had single-handedly populated an entire wing of the Winslow Prison with drug traffickers. He feverishly hated each and every one and refused to include them when he prayed his prayer list.

  Waist- and ankle-chained, Hermano shuffled up to the podium. The interpreter reported that Hermano was penniless.

  Charged with a crime for which he was facing twenty-five years without parole, Hermano was entitled to a free lawyer. Judge Trautman asked the clerk for the next name up on the list of attorneys accepting criminal appointments. That would be Thaddeus Murfee, said the clerk. Judge Trautman scowled. Were it not for the rotation, the judge would have preferred any lawyer over Thaddeus Murfee. But he was stuck this time. The case was trailed on the docket while the bailiff called Attorney Murfee to court. It was a short walk for Murfee. His office was just across the street in the Bank of America building.

  On that icy December morning the young, dark-haired lawyer, wearing a Brooks Brothers three-piece, glossy shoes, starched white shirt, and foulard necktie, sat opposite Hermano in the attorneys’ conference room off Judge Trautman’s court. The room was sweltering, thanks to the thumping radiator pipes. The room reeked of stale coffee from the abandoned Starbucks cups littering the table. At least coffee is allowed in the proud little Mormon’s court, Thaddeus noted. An oversight, surely.

  The interpreter, a female grad student at NAU in Romance languages, made it a threesome.

  Introductions were made and Thaddeus gave Hermano a friendly smile.

  “The court has appointed me to defend you. Do you understand?”

  Hermano listened to the interpreter and then nodded. “Sí, tú eres mi abogado, my lawyer.”

  “And I want to help you. The judge has set your bail at fifteen thousand dollars. That means you will need fifteen hundred dollars to bail out. Can you put your hands on that much cash?”

  He might as well have asked if Hermano would mind flying to the moon and back.

  His dark eyes glistening, the little Mexican shook his head. “I don’t have any money at all,” the interpreter relayed. “They gave me ten dollars for food when I left. Nothing since.”

  “The men who hired you to bring the drugs—--will they help you with money for bail?”

  “They will say they never knew me.”

  “Figures. Well, I can tell you up front, Judge Trautman won’t let you out without cash bail. He doesn’t release on your signature, nothing like that.”

  The little Mexican’s eyes filled with tears. “Maria,” he said through the interpreter, “I must get back to her with money to move her away! I can’t be kept here!”

  “Ask him about Maria, te
ll me her situation,” Thaddeus told the interpreter. She translated and Hermano responded with a rather long, involved tale. The upshot was that all normal commerce in the border town of Nogales had disappeared. All that was left were impoverished Mexicans, set to prey upon one another by the cartels. No one was safe there, not even the children, who were forced to join gangs or be raped. Maria was nine and she had already been threatened with sexual assault if she didn’t participate in drug trafficking. Hermano had stepped in and brought the marijuana up from Mexico in an effort to obtain $1,000 and move his family deeper into the Mexican interior, away from the hell of the border and the cartels. Only then could his family exist in any semblance of safety. He had served as proxy for Maria, who otherwise would have been forced to smuggle drugs across the border on foot.

  Thaddeus nodded and reached over and squeezed the little man’s shoulder. It wasn’t the first time he had heard such a story. Truth be told, it was commonplace. Starving Mexicans forced by drug lords to smuggle; high-risk ventures that more often than not ended in arrest. Whatever happened on the other end to the destitute Mexican families was of no concern to the American courts. Thaddeus knew this and wanted to help. He watched the little Mexican’s eyes cross and uncross and he knew the man’s life was hopeless, that he would likely never see Maria and his family again. Not in this lifetime.

  Then Thaddeus surprised himself. “Tell him that someone is going to make his bail. Tell him to come across the street to my office when they let him out this afternoon.”

  The interpreter hesitated. She had interpreted thousands of cases and knew it was unethical for a lawyer to expend personal funds for a client’s bail. She had never delivered such a message to a defendant. But in the end it wasn’t her call. She was only the messenger. So she passed along the information and immediately Hermano’s face brightened. His eyes regained some luster and he sat upright for the first time since arriving on American soil. Someone was actually going to extend a hand! He nodded and promised to appear when released. Handshakes followed and Thaddeus opened the door and told the deputy they had finished. The deputy took Hermano by the waist chain and escorted him out.

  “Are you sure about this?” the court reporter asked Thaddeus when they were alone.

  “What can I say?” said Thaddeus. “It’s one time too many hearing the same tale. Sooner or later, someone has to actually do something to help.”

  “I’m sworn to secrecy,” the court reporter said.

  “Everything you heard here is strictly confidential,” he agreed.

  “I know, I know. It’s nothing I would ever repeat anyway. I feel horrible for these people.”

  “That makes two of us,” Thaddeus said, and gathered his briefcase and topcoat.

  Judge Trautman was waiting. “Well?” he asked Thaddeus when he reappeared in the courtroom.

  “No conflicts, Your Honor. I accept the assignment.”

  “How very thoughtful of you,” the judge said with all the sarcasm he could muster.

  “About bail—”

  “Fifteen thousand, Mister Murfee, so save your breath. No reduction. Your man needs ten percent to lose the orange jumpsuit.”

  “I wasn’t going to ask for reduction, Your Honor. I was going to ask if he could be released to my custody. I’ll take responsibility for him.”

  The judge cocked his head. “I see. You must have discovered some way you’re related to Mr. Sanchez? That’s why you’re treating him like family? But the answer is no. You’ve been in trouble in here yourself and there’s no way I would release a prisoner into your custody. Is your own probation even up?”

  “One month to go.”

  “Get back to your office and focus on something else. We’re in recess. The clerk will give you an arraignment date.”

  Thaddeus began buttoning up his coat and avoiding all eyes.

  2

  He was twenty-nine and a criminal attorney achieving success after success. The angels had bent low and touched him with the gift of jury persuasion. He had won eleven difficult jury trials in a row and had won some regional fame in northern Arizona. For that, Hermano could be grateful. But Murfee came with his own baggage. While he now served on the State Bar Committee on Drugs and Alcohol, he had previously struggled with addiction. Beginning back in Chicago, following his daughter’s kidnapping and his own torture, problems had erupted. The four-year-old stopped talking. Sarai ceased acknowledging everyone. At first, the parents blamed the kidnapping. Then the mother blamed the father, whose money invited the kidnapping. The father fought back. The parents had taken to attributing blame late into the night. Doors were slammed and nasty words spoken. Hearts broke and silence settled over the small family like a gathering of dark spirits.

  Many nights, they arrived home separately, sometimes very late. Sometimes one or both smelled of expensive fragrances not their own. Sometimes they were addled with alcohol. Thaddeus went down the black hole first, drinking heavier and staying out sometimes all night, when no good is ever done. Frustrated and frightened, she changed the locks early one evening and wouldn’t allow him back inside even as he stood beneath their window and begged forgiveness. She had turned her back and returned to bed, pulling the pillow over her head and crying into its cool side. A conservatorship for his assets was established. A mutually agreed separation followed.

  His life in disarray, Thaddeus fled Chicago.

  Arriving in Flagstaff, he had wrangled admission to the bar and had made a go of it for six months. But then the roof caved in. After his arrest for drunk driving and assault on a police officer, his case was assigned to Judge H. Ivan Trautman. The angry zealot had yanked his driver’s license and consigned him to six months probation. A public censure in the State Bar Journal was printed and distributed to 250,000 lawyers in Illinois and Arizona. Plus he had suffered a thirty-minute harangue by the judge in open court, while the young attorney’s peers smirked and poked each other. Judge Trautman seemed not to notice.

  Thaddeus had some days later cried with relief when the State Bar intervened and helped him get medical treatment for his drinking. Ever since treatment, he had remained clean and sober, the picture of a moth who had singed his wings at the flame. Now he spent noon hours in AA meetings, talking recovery. His law practice once again flourished.

  3

  When Judge Trautman asked if his own probation was up, it left Thaddeus’ face burning. This time no one was laughing, all eyes were downcast. Even for his competitors it was too much to watch the judge slice and dice what little self-respect remained. He hurried for the double doors, fighting down the urge to break into a run.

  He was determined to get Hermano back to his family. After lunch, Thaddeus went to see the prosecutor. Her name was Roslin Russell—everyone called her Wrasslin for her propensity for throw-downs in the courtroom. Would the prosecutor sign an agreed order reducing the bail to a signature bond? Laughter erupted from Wrasslin and she hit her desk hard enough to cause her secretary to ask if everything was okay in there.

  “We’re fine,” said the prosecutor. “Just lost it a second. Thaddeus, get the fuck out of here. That guy had enough pot to fog up the city and kill mosquitoes. There’s no way I’m agreeing to a signature bond. He’ll flee to Mexico and never come back just as soon as he walks out.”

  Thaddeus shook his head. “I get that, but Hermano has a nine-year-old daughter who will probably be sexually assaulted if he doesn’t get back pronto with a thousand bucks. Can’t you give someone a break just this one time?”

  “Why don’t you just plead him instead?”

  “What are you looking for?”

  “Three years, no good-time, five years probation.”

  “What the hell good does that do? He doesn’t go home for three years!”

  “Hey, you asked, I’m telling. No bail reduction, no probation without incarceration on the front end. Fifty pounds, Thaddeus.”

  “Your offer is rejected.”

  Thaddeus stood and bega
n buttoning his coat. “I’ll go give him the bad news.”

  “Doesn’t he have anyone from Sinaloa who’ll make his bail?”

  It was snarky, Sinaloa being the drug capital.

  “Cartel contacts? LMAO. This guy’s as green as they come.”

  “Lucky he has you then. With your help he’ll only wind up doing five years, ’cause you’ll be bullheaded enough to take it to trial and lose and then Judge Trautman gets to blow the fuck out of his life and give him a maximum sentence. Poor schmuck. You were just leaving, please.”

  “Thanks for nothing.”

  “Anytime, friend. Go see your boy and give him the news. And why sweat it anyway? The state is paying you a hundred fifty an hour for your services. You’ll make out.”

  “Right.”

  “Oh, and one more thing to remember.”

  “Yes?”

  “It ain’t the last drink gets you drunk, it’s the first. Stay sober.”

  “Oh, so now you’re an addiction expert? Any other super powers we should know about?”

  Which is why Thaddeus paid the bail. Out of his own money. He knew it violated several ethical rules. He knew he was in deep trouble. But he did it anyway.

  Just before five o’clock a bedraggled Hermano Sanchez appeared in the waiting room of Thaddeus’ office in the Bank of America building. Thaddeus was down at the Sunshine Cafe with a client. He never saw Hermano walk past on his way down to the Greyhound station. Nor would it have made any difference in the ultimate outcome: Hermano Sanchez was a homing pigeon on a straight-through to Nogales, where he would again enter the fight for the safekeeping of his little family. He was gone, Christine told Thaddeus back at the office. Long gone. Did he say anything? “Gracias. He said gracias.”

  Thaddeus’ heart flip-flopped. He had actually broken the rules and given a jerk like Trautman access to his life. There was not a shred of doubt in the young lawyer’s mind that he would most likely never see Hermano again and that bail would be revoked and that the judge would look to Thaddeus to make up the other ninety percent. Much, much more dire, however, was the certainty that the identity of the person who had bailed out Sanchez in the first place would come to the judge’s attention. He would nail Thaddeus, a misfit judge’s dream come true.