Fatal Convictions

33

On his drive to the office, Alex thought about the potential backlash from the bond hearing. In his conspiratorial mind, he even considered the possibility that Judge McElroy may have ruled in favor of Khalid for just such a purpose. By allowing Khalid out on bond, he would generate strong reactions against the Muslim community. Conservatives would be especially irate. How could a judge free someone with terrorist ties?

And by setting the bond at a high amount, there would inevitably be questions about where the money came from. But he and Shannon didn’t have to play this game. He picked up the phone and called his partner while the thought was fresh in his mind.

He got voice mail and remembered that she was planning on visiting Khalid in the jail. He decided to leave a message.

“We need to tell Khalid not to post bond. If he does, there could be such a public outcry that he’ll never get a fair trial. There’ll be all sorts of questions about where he obtained the money. Call me when you get a chance.”

When Alex arrived at his office building, he was surprised to find a few reporters camped in front of the building. The attention this case generated was growing by the minute. He hoped his firm could still extract itself from representing Khalid before the firm name became forever synonymous with the representation of suspected terrorists.

Alex took a deep breath and walked past them, ignoring their questions. “Does your client deny he sent text messages from his phone ordering the killings?” “Does the Islamic Learning Center receive funding from Hezbollah?”

Undeterred, a few of them followed Alex into the building. When he reached the firm’s reception area, the reporters were still on his tail. Sylvia Brunswick was looking as bad as Alex had ever seen her.

“Migraine?”

She nodded. Alex could almost see the invisible jackhammer pounding away at her temples. She handed him a number of phone slips and ignored the ringing phone, rubbing her eyebrows with her left hand. “These are the messages I took before it got really ugly.”

Alex turned and faced the reporters. There was a TV crew, a photographer, and one or two others. Alex had only three seats in his waiting area.

“Make yourselves at home,” he said. “But please try to keep it down. My assistant has a migraine.”

“Will you be taking any questions?”

“-issuing any statements?”

“Let’s at least get a picture of you behind your desk.” The man who said this had been snapping pictures since Alex arrived at the building.

“Unlike a lot of lawyers, we do our talking in the courtroom,” Alex said. “Mr. Mobassar’s not guilty, and we look forward to vindicating him in a court of law. Have a great day.”

Alex turned and headed for his office, leaving Sylvia and the reporters to keep each other company.

When he reached his office, he forwarded his calls to Sylvia and started running through his messages. His e-mail address was listed on the firm’s Web page, and as a result, his in-box was filled with vitriolic notes related to the bond hearing.

He deleted them and started surfing the Internet for news coverage. He knew he was in trouble when the bond hearing was the lead story on both CNN and Fox News. So far, his firm’s name was buried deep in the story, but he knew it wouldn’t remain that way for long.

Many criminal cases, Alex knew, were won or lost at a motion to suppress hearing. The commonwealth’s case against Khalid hinged on a text message recorded under the authority of the Patriot Act. If Alex and Shannon stayed with the case, they would have to challenge the Patriot Act and, in particular, whether Khalid’s alleged connections to Hezbollah provided sufficient grounds for tapping his text messages. If they lost that challenge, the court would be saying it believed the Department of Justice had sufficient grounds for thinking Khalid posed a terrorist threat. If they won, the public would say that Alex and Shannon had sprung their client on a technicality.

The more Alex analyzed the case, the more he knew the firm needed out.***

Before Shannon made it to the firm that afternoon, Sylvia poked her head in Alex’s office, flinching in pain so that he would not forget how terribly she was suffering, and announced that two members of Alex’s church were there to see him.

“From my church?”

Sylvia checked a note. “They said their names were Bill Fitzsimmons and Harry Dent.”

Fitzsimmons and Dent were the Mutt and Jeff of the deacon board. Fitzsimmons was tall and lanky with a long, hooked nose and black bifocals. Dent was a short, bald man with an Adolf Hitler mustache and a boulder-sized chip on his shoulder. Alex had long ago quit trying to win Dent’s affection.

“Send them in,” Alex sighed. He hesitated to reward his assistant for her contorted facial expressions designed to highlight her pain, but he decided she was no use to him in this state. “And why don’t you take the rest of the day off?”

“Thank you,” Sylvia said, as if wondering why it had taken Alex so long to figure out that she was entitled to go home.

Alex spent the next twenty-five minutes listening to Harry Dent share his concerns about Alex’s involvement in Khalid Mobassar’s case while Bill Fitzsimmons nodded along. Harry understood that Alex was a lawyer and sometimes had to take cases he didn’t like. But weren’t there other lawyers who could handle this case? Couldn’t Alex tell the judge that he had a conscientious objection to working on this case? Their little church was already struggling. They couldn’t afford this kind of publicity. Harry even threw out the name Jeremiah Wright, which Alex thought was entirely unfair.

Alex considered digging in his heels and staying on the case just to spite Harry Dent. Some of Harry’s concerns were legitimate, but he sure had a way of making Alex want to argue with him on every point. Instead, Alex kept his composure and expressed his thanks to Harry and Bill for coming by. “I’ll give it some thought,” Alex promised.

“Will you know something by Sunday?” Harry Dent asked.

“It’s not that simple,” Alex responded. Perhaps he needed to remind Harry about the time he had helped Harry’s nephew with a DUI. Had Bill forgotten how Alex helped him and his wife through some marital challenges? But Alex decided not to bring any of that up. Why use political chips if he was going to withdraw from the case anyway?

“I need to talk to my partner. But I promise you this: when we make a decision about whether or not to stay in the case, you’ll be the first to know.”

Alex could tell that Harry Dent was not satisfied with the answer, but there was little left to discuss. “Well, you know our concerns,” Harry said. The man always had to have the last word.

“We’ll be praying for you,” Bill added.