Wrongful Death (15 page)

“If we had, she might have left the gate open.”

“How’d you know?” Sloane asked.

Jenkins pointed to the yard. “Big dog shit. Big dog.”

“Brilliant.”

Jenkins talked to the dog. “Easy now. Good dog.”

“Good dog?” Sloane asked. “And you’re afraid of Carolyn?”

“He’s just doing his job.” He continued to soothe the beast. “Big dogs get a bad reputation because they’re big and their own
ers abuse them. You’ve heard the saying about there being no bad dogs, just bad owners.”

“I’ll worry about the owners when they start biting.”

As the dog calmed, Jenkins reached into his pocket and pulled out a bone-shaped biscuit. “Look what I got for you. I don’t think Sam will mind. Can we be friends?” He held out the biscuit.

“Count your fingers,” Sloane said, but the dog took the biscuit gently in its jaws and got down from the fence, chomping on it. As it did, Jenkins eased the latch and slowly opened the gate.

“I’ll wait out here,” Sloane said.

“Just walk in behind me. You’ll be fine.”

Sloane gestured to the dog. “Did he agree to that?”

The dog finished chewing the first bone and looked at them like they were the next meal. Jenkins let the dog sniff the back of his hand, then gently reached around and began to rub its bony head. “You’re a good boy, aren’t you? Sure you are.”

The two men on the stoop watched slack-jawed.

“Should I do that?” Sloane asked.

“I wouldn’t. I don’t think he likes white people.”

“The dog’s racist?”

“In this neighborhood white people usually mean trouble. Dogs react the way their owners react.”

“Terrific, you wait to tell me that when I’m on this side of the fence.”

Jenkins gave the dog a second biscuit and tossed a third on the ground, then made his way to the front door. Sloane followed him like a kid keeping his big brother between him and the bully. Jenkins knocked hard enough to shake the plate-glass window facing the street.

“You trying to knock it down?” Sloane asked.

“If she didn’t come to the door with the dog barking…” Jenkins removed his sunglasses as an African American woman
pulled back the curtain and scowled at them. She looked meaner than the Rottweiler. Sloane doubted a doggie treat would appease her.

“Ms. Thomas?” Jenkins asked through the window.

“Who are you?” It sounded like, What the hell do you want?

“I’m Charles Jenkins.” Jenkins held his private investigator’s license to the glass.

The woman gave it a cursory glance. “You a cop?”

“I’m a private investigator.”

She pulled open the door. “A private investigator for who?”

“For him.” Jenkins nodded to Sloane.

The woman shifted her glare and venom to Sloane. “Who are you?”

“David Sloane,” he said. “I’m an attorney from Seattle.”

The woman put up a hand and made a face like someone had just left yesterday’s trash on her doorstep. “An attorney? That’s worse than the police.” She started to close the door.

“I tell him the same thing,” Jenkins said. “You’re stuck in an elevator with a tiger, a lion, and a lawyer. You have a gun with just two bullets. What do you do?”

The woman waited. “I don’t know. What do you do?”

“Shoot the lawyer twice to make sure he’s dead.”

The woman looked to Sloane. This was the moment when Sloane expected her to yell, “Sic ’em, Fido,” sending them running for their lives. But like the dog, she surprised him. She grinned, small at first, as if trying to hide her teeth. Then she started to wheeze, laughing.

Jenkins nodded to Sloane. “Actually, this guy’s not too bad. That’s why I let him work with me.”

The woman frowned. “What is it you want, Mr. Attorney?”

“Could we step inside?” Jenkins asked.

The woman shrugged as if to say, Whatever, and stepped back,
leaving the door open. The interior looked like the exterior—worn and tired, a mismatch of furniture cobbled around an enormous stand-alone projector TV. The screen had a hole in the corner where it looked as if someone had kicked it. The house held a pungent odor that reminded Sloane of rotting fruit.

“Are you Mrs. Thomas?” Sloane asked.

“Ms. Thomas.”

“Dwayne was your brother?”

“Why you want to know? What you want with Dwayne?”

“I represent the family of a national guardsman named James Ford. Does that name mean anything to you?”

She shook her head like a defiant brat. “Nope.”

“He served in Iraq with your brother. Your brother did serve in Iraq, didn’t he?”

She nodded. “He was there. Damn fool. I told him not to sign up for no National Guard, but he said it was just a couple weekends doing nothing. Said it would help him hook on getting a job with the city. Then they shipped his ass off to Iraq. Didn’t help him get no job with the city, neither. He had to take back his same old job.”

“Where was that?” Sloane asked.

“YMCA downtown. And they put his ass on the graveyard.”

“Did Dwayne ever talk to you about his time in Iraq?” Sloane asked.

She shook her head. “Nope. He didn’t like talking about it, ’cept he said it wasn’t as bad as everyone is making it out to be.”

“So he never mentioned a guardsman getting shot over there and dying?” Sloane asked.

That seemed to catch her attention. “He might have said something about that. Is that who you here for?”

Sloane nodded. “His name was James Ford. I represent his wife and four children.”

“I don’t remember no names, just that Dwayne said someone got hisself shot and killed. Said he thought he was going to die too, but he didn’t. Said it was destiny.”

“Destiny?”

Her face scrunched like she’d smelled the foul odor in the house. “Dwayne came back talkin’ bout ‘destiny this’ and ‘destiny that.’ Fool never shut up about it, saying shit like heaven being a big place with clocks and when yours stopped ticking, you was dead.” She shook her head. “Fool.”

“Did he tell you anything more about what happened that night?”

“What night?”

“The night the guardsman was shot.”

“Just what I just told you. Is his wife trying to get some money or something?”

“She filed a claim, but the military denied it.”

“Denied Dwayne too.”

“Your brother filed a claim?”

“Attorney filed it. Said Dwayne was going to get some money but he didn’t get nothing. If they denied it why you still asking about it?”

“I’m trying to find out if she has a civil action against the army.”

“Does she?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Could I file one of them too?”

“No, Ms. Thomas, you can’t.”

The woman picked up a can of Diet Pepsi from a Formica counter and drank from it. Then she said, “I heard that the military pays for the funeral. That right?”

“Yes,” Sloane said.

“Then Dwayne would have been better off getting hisself killed over there. At least someone would have paid for his funeral.”

“How did your brother die, Ms. Thomas?” Sloane asked.

“How? They shot him in the back of his head.”

“Who shot him?”

“Don’t know.”

“Do the police have any suspects?” Sloane asked.

She made a face like it was the stupidest question she’d ever heard. “Hell, no. Police don’t know and don’t care—just another nigger getting killed to them. They saying Dwayne was dealing drugs.”

“Did your brother sell drugs?” Sloane asked.

She looked indignant. “No. He did not sell drugs.”

“Then why would the police say he was?”

“Probably so they don’t have to work too hard to find out who killed him is why.”

“Where was your brother shot?” Jenkins asked.

“I told you, in the head.”

“No, I mean where did they find his body?”

“Down the street.” She pointed vaguely. “Empty lot. They park delivery trucks there at night. Police have cameras up all over this place, but they said you can’t see behind the trucks. So the tape don’t show nothing.”

“Why do the police think your brother was dealing drugs?” Sloane asked.

“’Cause he was black and it was night is why. Don’t need no more reason than that.” She sipped from the can. “They said they found rocks on him, but I’m here to tell you that Dwayne stayed away from that shit. He didn’t do crack, and he wasn’t in no gang neither.”

“Did he sell it?” Sloane asked.

“What did I just say?” She scowled. “Didn’t I just say Dwayne didn’t do
no
drugs? Didn’t take ’em and didn’t sell ’em. He was
trying
to hook on with the city.” She raised her eyebrows. “What does that tell you?”

“Drug tests,” Sloane said.

“Dwayne had to pee in a cup when he did his application. You think they’d be processing his paperwork if he had drugs in his pee?”

“Did he ever write to you? Send you any e-mails while he was in Iraq?”

“You see a computer around here?”

Sloane grew weary of the woman’s attitude. “It could be important, Ms. Thomas.”

“Why? What’s this got to do with Dwayne?”

“Maybe nothing,” Sloane said. “But we’re trying to find out why James Ford was killed.”

“Don’t the military know?”

It was a good question, but someone was making sure the men who served with Ford that night wouldn’t provide Sloane any answers.

U.S. ATTORNEY'S OFFICE
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

T
uesday morning, Tom Pendergrass stepped into what would be his temporary office. The freshly painted walls had no nail holes; the desk was free of dust. No papers filled the “In” or “Out” boxes, and no personal effects or photographs of Spot, the kids, or the lovely wife cluttered the desk.

Monday afternoon a process server had delivered a copy of a federal district court complaint filed by David Sloane on behalf of Beverly Ford and her four children. Any attorney with an ounce of common sense, after researching the Feres doctrine, would have known that the chances of such a claim succeeding were zero. The complaint bordered on frivolous, and federal court judges weren’t bashful about imposing sanctions on attorneys who tied up their courtrooms with a frivolous complaint. Pendergrass didn’t get it. Sloane certainly didn’t appear dumb when they spoke in the regional claims office. It made him curious. He looked up Sloane on the Internet, expecting to find out he was an attorney desperate to make a buck and willing to take any file that came in the
door. To the contrary, he couldn’t even find a Web site for “The Law Offices of David Sloane.” What Pendergrass did learn, from articles and other information posted on various Web sites, was that Sloane didn’t need the money or the work. He’d recently won several multimillion-dollar jury awards, and a two-year-old article from a legal periodical in San Francisco touted him to have been the best wrongful-death attorney in the state, one who apparently never lost. He’d won fifteen verdicts in a row in California, and from what Pendergrass could glean, Sloane had picked up where he left off when he got to Seattle.

“If you need anything, just call.” The young woman who would be Pendergrass’s assistant smiled politely before stepping from the office and disappearing down the hall.

Pendergrass knew the woman was treating her assignment as a temporary gig. He wasn’t. This was an audition. And he intended to ace it. The U.S. Attorney’s Office was the job to which he ultimately aspired once his military commitment expired. The chance to serve as a SAUSA, or special assistant United States attorney, was one more step in the right direction. Ordinarily the military officer who handled the claim at the regional office did not handle the subsequent civil matter. It was rare, though in theory it made perfect sense. Pendergrass argued to his superiors that he was familiar with Beverly Ford’s claim, military law in general, and the Feres doctrine in particular. But his real reason for lobbying for the case was that he saw the chance to defeat an attorney who apparently never lost. Succeed, and he would be one step closer to making his temporary office permanent.

Pendergrass’s lobbying led to a conference call with Western Washington U.S. Attorney Rachel Keane. Keane acknowledged that the claim could be politically sensitive and wanted to minimize publicity. Pendergrass suggested the best way to do that was
to take an aggressive approach and immediately move to dismiss the complaint. Keane had said that she liked Pendergrass’s initiative, which was all the JAG office needed to hear to temporarily assign him.

Pendergrass had his foot in the door.

He set his briefcase alongside the desk, turned on the computer, and entered the password he had been given that allowed him to reach the Justice Department network.

“You must be Captain Pendergrass.” Rachel Keane walked into the office introducing herself as if Pendergrass didn’t already know who she was.

He did. Most of Seattle knew Keane. Though approaching fifty, she remained physically attractive, with shoulder-length blond hair she had never cut or styled, as so many women did, to fit the corporate or political image. She wore it down, or pulled back in a ponytail, giving her a youthful and vibrant appearance. A dynamic presence, she was frequently featured in the newspapers and on television and had recently been profiled in
Seattle
magazine as the most eligible woman in Seattle.

“I like to personally greet each attorney who comes to work for me,” she said, extending her hand.

Pendergrass untied his tongue long enough to utter four words and immediately regret them. “I appreciate the opportunity.”

He sounded like a contestant on a game show, just happy to be there.

Keane waved him off. “You’re being modest, Captain. Magna cum laude from Montana, Order of the Coif from the University of Washington. We appreciate the opportunity to have
you.
”

Pendergrass sat behind his desk, stunned that Keane knew
his
background. He felt disjointed and didn’t know what to do with his hands. He folded them on the desk, crossed his arms across his chest, and finally laid them palms down on the desktop.

Keane, on the other hand, was as fluid as water poured from a pitcher. She lowered herself into a chair, effortlessly crossing her legs. When the president appointed Keane the U.S. attorney for the Western District of Washington, it was not without controversy. A divorce from an Internet entrepreneur had left Keane financially well off. Local and national magazines had linked her romantically to several prominent Seattle businessmen, Hollywood actors, and national politicians. Some felt that Keane had been chosen over other more qualified candidates, and rumor had it that the Republican Party had bigger plans for her, possibly a seat on a federal appellate court bench, or in the president’s cabinet. While the president was ostensibly coming to town to stump for incumbent Republican senator Johnson Marshall, some speculated Keane was higher on the party’s agenda.

“You’re single, Captain?”

The question surprised him. Pendergrass felt himself blushing, the curse of fair-skinned redheads. When he lifted his palms from the desk, he’d left two sweaty imprints on the glass. He leaned forward to cover them with the sleeve of his jacket and cleared his throat. “I was seeing someone but—”

“This job can have long hours.”

“Right. I’m used to long hours.”

“Good.” She uncrossed her legs. “So where are we?”

“Excuse me?”

“On this Ford matter, where are we?”

“Oh. I’ll finish the motion to dismiss and file it today.”

“I’d like to hear your arguments.”

“Okay.” Pendergrass gathered himself. He felt more comfortable in the law. “Sloane has alleged that because Ford’s claim had not been officially reopened at the time he filed his complaint, she had a legal right to do so in federal court. I disagree, but I don’t
recommend we fight that argument too much, since it would leave the window open for Sloane to re-file when Ford’s claim is officially denied. I’d rather the judge rule on the merits.”

“So would I.”

“Under Feres, Sloane will be hard-pressed to argue that James Ford was not acting incident to his service at the time he was killed. When he can’t, the judge will be duty bound to dismiss the complaint with prejudice.”

“Excellent.”

“I also intend to ask for our attorney fees. The claim is frivolous and unsupported by federal law.”

“Who’s our judge?”

“Jo Natale.”

Keane smiled. “Jo and I worked together for seventeen years. If Sloane was counting on sympathy for his client, he can forget it. What do you know about him?”

This was where Pendergrass could really make some points. “We’ve met. He’s impressive. He’s won eighteen jury trials in a row, fifteen in the Bay Area and three since he moved here, from what I’ve been able to determine. He was profiled as the best wrongful-death attorney in California.”

“He sounds formidable,” Keane said.

“Even the best have to lose some time,” Pendergrass said.

Keane smiled. “Confidence, Captain, I like that in the people who work for me.”

Pendergrass felt himself starting to blush again.

Keane sat forward, a hand on the edge of the desk. “Call Sloane and invite him to a meeting, this afternoon if possible, or tomorrow morning, as soon as he is available.”

“A meeting?”

Keane stood. “One thing about this job, Tom, you have to remain flexible to change.”

CAMANO ISLAND, WASHINGTON

JENKINS REFOCUSED HIS
attention on the computer screen in his home office. He felt like he was searching for a towel at a nudist colony. Shirley in the National Guard’s public affairs office had been of no help. The National Guard’s last known address for Michael Cassidy, the only surviving guardsman to have served with James Ford the night he died, was Maple Valley, Washington. Though just half an hour from Seattle, it might as well have been on the other side of the world. The house had been a rental, the phone number associated with it long since disconnected. A property records search revealed Cassidy did not own any real estate, not surprising given that he had been just twenty when he shipped off for Iraq, and the military had no forwarding address.

Posing as an administrator from the office of Veterans Affairs, Jenkins called the owner of the property and said he was trying to forward Cassidy a military benefits check. The owner confirmed Cassidy had rented the property but only until his deployment, which meant his last known address was Baghdad, Iraq. Cassidy had paid his rent in cash. The man had no record of a bank account.

“What about a security deposit?” Jenkins asked. “Did he leave a forwarding address?”

“He told me to keep it as his last month’s rent.”

“Credit check or references?”

“Lease was month-to-month. Like I said, he put down first and last. I didn’t ask for any references—they just lie anyway.”

“Did he give you a place of employment?”

“Said he was a painter and a handyman. I had no reason to doubt him.”

“No employer?”

“Called himself an independent contractor. Like I said, paid on time.”

Jenkins suspected the landlord never pressed the issue because Cassidy had paid in cash, and cash didn’t need to be reported to the IRS.

A credit check revealed Cassidy had once owned a credit card with an address in Yakima, Washington, three hours to the east. Jenkins called a friend at the IRS, but that only revealed that Cassidy had not paid income taxes. A tax account for a Jennifer and Richard Cassidy listed a Michael Cassidy as a dependent on past income taxes. The address was in Yakima, the same as on the expired credit card. It was a start.

Jenkins used an online directory to obtain a telephone number and called.

“Hello?”

“Richard Cassidy?” Jenkins asked.

“Are you a solicitor?”

“No, Mr. Cassidy, this is Corporal Charles Jennings with the Washington National Guard.”

“Christ, what’s the boy done this time?” His voice sounded rough and irritated from too many cigarettes and too much alcohol.

“Actually, sir, we’re trying to locate an address for Michael to forward his military benefits check.”

“Benefits? Hell, he didn’t serve long enough for any damn benefits.”

“It’s a onetime benefit, sir—a modest amount for his service in Iraq. We don’t have a forwarding address—”

“How much?”

“Excuse me?”

“How much is the check? That boy owes me close to five hundred dollars and hasn’t paid back a penny. And that’s not including interest.”

Jenkins surmised this wasn’t the feel-good, father-son relationship depicted on the television shows of the 1950s. “Well, sir, I’m afraid I have to forward the check to Michael to have it endorsed. You’ll have to take that up with him.”

“Sure, and I’ll go out and get water out of a damn stone while I’m at it.”

“Do you have a current address for your son?” Jenkins persisted.

“Nope. Don’t know where he is or what he’s doing, and don’t want to. He brings trouble whenever he shows up around here. We had hoped the military would shape him up. I wanted to put his ass in the marines and let them make a man out of him, but his mother begged me not to. She’s always been soft on him. We compromised on the Guard. Best news I got was when he called to say they were shipping his butt to Iraq.”

Ward Cleaver this guy was not.

“How about a past employer, Mr. Cassidy, or a close friend? Is there someone who might know where I can forward this check?”

The man chuckled. “Past employer? That’s a good one. That boy couldn’t hold down a job to save his life.”

“I understood he was a handyman of sorts, maybe did some odd painting jobs.”

“Yeah, he said that once. Came by wearing one of those white hats, you know the kind, keeps the paint out of your hair. He wanted another loan, which is a joke since he ain’t never paid back a penny in his life. I told him, ‘It ain’t a loan if you don’t pay it back. It’s just stealing.’ He took off the hat and showed it to me like he was working at Microsoft or something. Said he was making good money. So I asked him why he needed the damn loan, then. He didn’t have an answer for that one.”

Jenkins tired of the conversation. “Do you remember the name of the company?”

“Wasn’t a company, just some guy far as I know.”

“What about a name? Do you remember a name?”

“Nah. I didn’t pay no attention. Likely a bullshit story anyway. Probably found the hat and was just using it to try to get me to part with a few more bills from my wallet.”

U.S. FEDERAL BUILDING
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON

WEDNESDAY MORNING, SLOANE
stood in a concrete plaza gazing up at the twenty-three-story Federal District Court Building at Seventh Avenue and Stewart Street in downtown Seattle. The glass-facade structure with green copper trim and copper roof was quite a contrast to the squat concrete blocks he traditionally associated with government buildings. So, too, was the plaza. One hundred birch trees surrounded a sixty-foot-diameter grassy area, in the center of which stood a cast aluminum sculpture that resembled a raised fist. To the left a black wall sloped to the street, the Declaration of Independence carved in the granite. To the right, water gently cascaded over three shallow lily ponds.

Sloane was not surprised to receive a call from the U.S. Attorney’s Office. He had anticipated they’d want to meet. What did surprise him was the caller had been Tom Pendergrass, the regional claims officer. Pendergrass said he was working on temporary assignment, handling Ford’s claim. He wouldn’t elaborate over the phone, but Sloane could guess the agenda of their meeting. Pendergrass would try to persuade Sloane to voluntarily dismiss the complaint as premature. Sloane would decline. Pendergrass would then tell Sloane why Ford had no chance of success under Feres, and that the government would seek attorney fees and costs. Sloane would make a vague reference to interpreting the case law
differently. He suspected the real reason for the meeting was that Pendergrass wanted to ascertain what evidence Sloane possessed to substantiate his allegation that Ford had not been acting incident to his service.