Incriminating Evidence (3 page)

“We’re a little tight on cash. We’ve put a bunch of our liquid assets into the campaign war chest. You know how it is.”

Actually, I don’t. “If you want me to represent you, I’m going to need a fifty-thousand-dollar retainer. If that doesn’t work for you, you’ll have to find somebody else to handle your case.”

I hear him sigh. “Okay,” he says, “fifty thousand it is. Bring along the letter this afternoon. I’ll sign whatever you want.”

It’s not like he’s going to read it.

“I want to be able to pick co-counsel,” he says. “I may want to bring in somebody else.” He pauses and adds, “And I’m not sure I want to use your ex-wife.”

Come again? “She’s my partner. More important, she’s one of the best criminal defense attorneys in San Francisco. If you hire me, you hire my firm. That includes Rosie. If you give her any gas, we’ll withdraw. Understood?”

“Jesus, Mike,” he says, “you have to let me pick my own team.” He pauses. “And you can’t expect me to use Carolyn.”

Carolyn O’Malley is the third attorney in our firm. She’s “of counsel,” which means she isn’t a partner but she shares office space with us and we pay her an hourly rate. She was a prosecutor in San Francisco for almost twenty years. She started out in misdemeanor court and worked her way up to the head of the sex crimes unit. She joined us about six months ago, after she was unceremoniously purged from the DA’s office in one of Skipper’s moments of uninspired judgment. In a characteristic fit of pique, she switched sides. Most of her vitriol has been directed at one person: Skipper.

“Rosie and Carolyn are essential members of my team,” I say. “I won’t work without them. Maybe it would be better if you find somebody else to handle your case.” I stand and head toward the door.

As I reach for the handle, I hear Skipper’s voice behind me. “Listen,” he says, “I’m in a tight spot. I need your help.”

I turn around and face him. “Rosie and Carolyn are part of the package. If you’re smart, you’ll hire the best defense attorneys your money can buy. Am I making myself clear?”

“Yes.”

“If you still want me to represent you, I’ll be back this afternoon with a retention letter. I’ll let you pick co-counsel, but I’m going to make all the final decisions on strategy. Rosie sits at the defense table.”

“Understood.”

“Good. And I’m going to need a check for a hundred thousand dollars.”

He’s unhappy. “I thought you said it was fifty.”

“It was. The price just went up.” Rosie and I refer to this as charging the Asshole Premium. We reserve such special treatment for our more difficult clients. “Is there a problem?”

“No,” he says through clenched teeth. “No problem.”

The deputy knocks on the door. “We need to finish your client’s paperwork,” he says.

It’s my turn to point a finger at Skipper. “Don’t talk to anybody,” I tell him. “I’ll see if I can get this cleared up before things get out of hand.”

“I didn’t do it,” he insists. “Somebody’s going to pay for this.”

I’m walking past the intake desk a moment later when I hear my name called out by an unmistakable velvet voice. “Michael, do you have a moment to chat?” Skipper’s close friend and my former partner at Simpson and Gates, Turner Hamilton Stanford IV, doesn’t speak to anyone. He chats.

I turn and look into the eyes of the man I once dubbed the Silver Fox. Everything about him is in muted tones of
gray. The impeccably tailored Italian suit. The neatly pressed kerchief in his breast pocket. The full head of hair and meticulously trimmed beard. Turner may be the best-dressed man to have set foot in the Hall in thirty years. At sixty-one, he carries his slender six-foot-two-inch frame with the erect bearing of a former athlete. He and Skipper were teammates on the Stanford basketball team.

We shake hands. Turner’s polished, soft-spoken demeanor and elegant air mask a vicious greedy streak. In legal circles, he’s what’s called a “juice” lawyer, which means he charges his clients exorbitant sums to manipulate the San Francisco planning commission and obtain building permits and zoning variances. Most people believe PacBell Park never would have been built without his influence. In his spare time, he dabbles in real estate development and political consulting. He also owns an obscenely expensive French restaurant near Union Square.

Turner’s earned millions from his law practice, but he made most of his money the old-fashioned way—he inherited it. Although I have never been able to trace his exact lineage, he claims he is a descendant of the family that founded the university in Palo Alto that bears his name. I’ve always had doubts about that.

He never raises his voice. “I got here as soon as I could,” he says. “I stopped to see Natalie for a few minutes. Skipper told her he was going to call you.” He pauses and adds, “This is a disaster.”

I’ve never been able to read him. Although Turner is running Skipper’s campaign and they’re close, he’s a registered Democrat. He manages to delude himself into believing the sixties never ended. It’s difficult for self-righteous liberals like me to deal with limousine liberals like him, especially when they run political campaigns for fascists like Skipper. While I’m busy casting stones, I suppose I should point out
that the lawyers of Fernandez and Daley are willing to represent Republicans as well as Democrats, as long as they are prepared to pay our very reasonable fees.

I explain that I have already spoken to Skipper. “He said you were there last night.”

“I was.”

I ask him if he knows what happened.

“The police won’t tell me anything,” he says. He glances at Sergeant Dito and lowers his voice. “We had a summit conference with Sherman’s people.”

Now he’s doing Skipper speak.

“I left around twelve-thirty,” he says. “Next thing I knew, there was a phone call from Skipper at seven-thirty this morning. By the time I got there, they had already arrested him.” He says he had a conversation with Inspector McBride about the wisdom of her decision to arrest Skipper. Notwithstanding Turner’s impassioned plea, McBride went ahead and hauled him in.

We decide the intake desk may not be the best place to talk about the events of last night. He says he’s going to see Skipper. Then he’s going to hold a press briefing.

I’m talking to Rosie from the pay phone in the lobby of the Hall. You aren’t allowed to bring cell phones into the jail. “Did you really tell Skipper he was going to have to pay the Asshole Premium?” she asks.

“He
is
an asshole,” I deadpan.

“Are you out of your mind? I’m surprised he didn’t fire you on the spot.” Rosie has never fully appreciated my rainmaking skills. It might be fair to say they are somewhat unconventional. She’s also keenly aware of my rather lackadaisical attitude toward money.

I assure her that I did not use the term
asshole
when I told Skipper he was going to have to give us a larger retainer.
I leave out any mention of the fact that Skipper isn’t wild about including her or Carolyn on the defense team.

“Maybe you’re starting to get the hang of private practice,” she says.

I tell her about my conversation with Skipper. “He’s adamant. He says he didn’t do it.”

“Do you believe him?”

I stare at the high ceiling for a second. “I find it very hard to picture him killing someone. Besides, he’s very calculating. I can’t imagine he would do anything that would jeopardize his political career.”

She reflects for a moment and asks again, “Does that mean you believe him?”

I hesitate and say, “I’m not sure.” I glance at the guard sitting by the metal detectors. “One other thing.” Here goes. “We need to talk about whether we want to take on Skipper as a client.”

“Not again,” she says. I can hear the irritation in her tone. “What’s there to talk about?”

“I don’t trust him. It’s too personal. There’s too much history.”

“I can think of about a hundred thousand reasons. That may be enough to pay for a year at Stanford when Grace gets there.”

“She’s going to Cal.”

“Mike,” she says, “let’s take it from the top.”

I hate this.

“What do we do at our firm?” she asks.

This little ritual reminds me of when we were married—and why we got divorced. “Criminal defense law.”

“That means we represent criminals, right? You know, crooks?”

“Yeah. Crooks.” I really hate this.

“And crooks do bad things, right? And they lie.”

“Yes they do, Rosie.”

“And we don’t make moral judgments about our clients, do we?”

“No, we don’t.” Well, she doesn’t. I do.

“That’s right. So the fact that Skipper may be a manipulative liar makes him just about the same as all of our other clients, doesn’t it?”

“It’s not the same.”

“It
is
the same, except for one thing.”

I always lose these arguments. “What’s that?” I ask.

“How much money does Skipper have?”

“Millions.” If he runs short, we can get paid in campaign posters.

“Millions,” she repeats. “I don’t like him any more than you do. But he needs a criminal defense attorney and he can pay us. That’s good enough for me.”

I hate it when she’s right.

“Get the retainer and we’ll see what happens,” she says. “One other thing. Natalie called. She wants to talk to you right away.”

3
“HE REALLY DID IT THIS TIME”

“Those of us who are more fortunate should try to set a good example and help those who are not.”

—N
ATALIE
G
ATES
. S
AN
F
RANCISCO
J
UNIOR
L
EAGUE LUNCHEON.

A few minutes later, I’m getting nasty glares from the people in the line that has formed behind me at the pay phone in the lobby of the Hall. I dial the number Rosie just gave me. An unfamiliar female voice answers. The crackles indicate it’s a cell phone. “It’s Mike Daley,” I say.

“Ann Gates.” I’ve spoken to Skipper’s daughter only once before, when one of my clients wanted her to intercede in a dispute over a building permit. It was not a pleasant conversation. “Mother needs to talk to you right away.”

The phone goes silent before I can respond.

A moment later, the usually assured, cultivated voice of Natalie Gates sounds tenuous. “Mr. Daley—Michael—the police are here,” she says. I can barely hear her. She doesn’t sound anything like the woman who sits on the boards of the symphony and the De Young Museum.

Before I went to law school, I was a priest for three years. I summon the reserved tone I used when I listened to confessions. “Everything is going to be fine, Natalie. Let me talk to them.”

The line goes silent again. The cops must be caucusing. Then their spokesperson comes on. “Inspector Elaine McBride here.”

“It’s Michael Daley.”

“Yes?”

“I take it you want to search the house?”

“That’s correct.” She says she has a warrant.

“I’d like to look at it before you start. I’ll come right over.”

She’s smart. She’ll wait until I arrive. If we get to trial, she’ll be able to say I approved the warrant. She says, “You have fifteen minutes.”

I jog through the parking lot toward my Corolla. It’s unseasonably hot and I’m sweating when I turn over the ignition. I punch the button to the air conditioner. Wishful thinking. A blast of hot air hits me in the face. The Freon gods are not smiling. I roll down my window and head toward the Civic Center. I make my way north on Van Ness past City Hall. Traffic is heavy.

My radio is tuned to KGO. “In local news,” the announcer intones, “San Francisco District Attorney Prentice Marshall Gates the Third was arrested when a body was found in his room at the Fairmont this morning. Police are not releasing any additional details at this time. Informed sources say there is uncontroverted evidence linking Mr. Gates to the death of the victim, who has not been identified.”

I wish the “informed sources” would give me a call so we can compare notes.

I turn left onto Pine and head west past the renovated Victorians in the old Jewish neighborhood that used to be called the Western Addition but was rechristened Lower Pacific
Heights by the real estate developers in the eighties. I head north on Fillmore past the trendy coffee bars that have replaced the thrift shops in recent years. I hang a left at Broadway just before Fillmore plummets toward the bay. A mile to the west, two squad cars and two unmarked Plymouths are parked in front of the white walls and understated iron gateway to Skipper and Natalie’s mansion on the north side of the street. Like many homes in this neighborhood, only a few small windows face the street. You’d never know there was a five-million-dollar house behind the unobtrusive gate. In this part of town, it’s considered more desirable to live on the north side of Broadway, where the homes have clear views of the bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. The houses on the south side aren’t quite as fashionable because their sight lines are obstructed.

A familiar round face greets me by name when I get out of my car. “I thought you criminal lawyers never left the Hall,” says officer Rich Sullivan, a big kid from the old neighborhood. He knows that defense attorneys don’t like being called criminal lawyers. I let it go. Rich is a good guy. We went to high school together. He married his sweetie and had four kids. They still live in the Sunset.

“They’re expecting me, Rich,” I say.

He turns serious. Except for some lines around his eyes, he looks the same as he did when he played offensive tackle at St. Ignatius thirty years ago. I used to run behind him. I was a halfback. He was also a pretty fair baseball player. He had a tryout with the Giants but blew out his throwing arm. He’s been a beat cop ever since.

He escorts me through the carved wooden doors into a small foyer. I’ve never quite gotten used to the smell of affluence. I grew up in the flatlands of the outer Sunset. My dad never trusted the people who lived in the hills. He used to say the people up there took your money and you never
knew it. We had respectable criminals down where we lived. They looked you in the eye when they stole your wallet. The wisdom of the late Thomas James Charles Daley, Sr.