Dead Lawyers Tell No Tales (24 page)

ON THE MORNING
of the subpoena hearing, Landon took Maddie to day care just like any other day. But today, Kerri tagged along. She hugged Maddie at the door and held on until Maddie started squirming. Grudgingly, Kerri let her go.

“Have fun,” Kerri called out as Maddie turned to attack the day. “Be a good girl.”

Maddie turned around—one last backward glance. “Don’t worry,” she said. Then she disappeared around the corner.

Kerri stood up and walked back to the car. Her eyes were wet, and she held Landon’s hand. He wanted to comfort her but really couldn’t think of anything to say. Besides, he was probably more anxious than she was.

///

Like the nervous rookies they were, Landon and Kerri arrived at federal court thirty minutes early. Media trucks lined the front of the large stonemasonry building, but there was none of the usual shoving of
microphones under the noses of the litigants and asking of obnoxious questions. Kerri was, after all, one of them—fighting for their right to protect confidential sources.

“Any statements, Kerri?”

She shook her head.

“Good luck,” someone said.

The courtroom was a massive space, designed to intimidate, with vaulted ceilings and carved marble and fifteen rows of wooden pews on each side. Landon sat in the front row, next to Kerri, and reviewed his notes.

The waiting was always the hard part.

Ten minutes before the hearing, the assistant U.S. Attorney entered the courtroom. He set up shop at the prosecution table and came over to give Landon a firm handshake.

“Mitchell Taylor,” he said.

“Landon Reed. Good to meet you.”

Mitchell had a reputation as a straight-shooting and talented attorney who had cut his teeth on state-court murder trials. He looked like a Marine in a dark-blue business suit. His hair was short—not quite a jarhead but close. He had that stiff Marine posture—the head held unnaturally high—and a jutting jaw. Landon could tell that the man had law enforcement in his veins. Everything was black-and-white, good guys and bad guys.

“I’m sorry to put your wife through this,” Mitchell said, surprising Landon with the comment. “But if her report is true, we’re looking at some serious crimes by these executives. My job is to make sure they pay for them.”

“And my job,” Landon said, “is to make sure my wife goes home today.”

///

Judge Lincoln Greer normally sat as a federal court judge in the Richmond division but had been assigned to this hearing in Norfolk
because the local judges either had conflicts of interest or previously scheduled hearings. Judge Greer had been appointed by President Carter in 1981, had taken senior status in 2008, and showed no signs of slowing down.

He was a short man with an eggshell skull, mostly bald with a few tufts of gray. He had been wearing the same pair of wire-rimmed bifocals for the past fifteen years, and his frame was as wiry as the glasses. His spinal column had been permanently molded into the shape of a question mark from his hunched posture on the bench. He was everything you could ever want in a federal court judge—patient, firm, fair, and decisive.

“I’ve read Mr. Taylor’s motion and his accompanying brief. Mr. Reed, I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure of meeting you before.”

Landon stood. “That’s probably because I’ve never been in federal court before.”

“Well, we don’t bite,” Judge Greer said. “But we do like to run things efficiently and get right to the point.”

“Point taken,” Landon said, and he sat down.

Mitchell Taylor took his place behind the podium, and his argument was as crisp as his suit. If Ms. Reed could be believed—and Mitchell had no reason to doubt her veracity—then she had uncovered corruption at a very high level in both a major pharmaceutical corporation and the federal government. She had unearthed a wide-ranging conspiracy involving drug companies and doctors, a conspiracy that was undoubtedly harming patients even as he spoke. It was, he said, a jaw-dropping piece of journalism.

It was also his job to see if those allegations were true. And for that, he needed the names of her confidential sources.

“As you know, Your Honor, witnesses can be intimidated. Their memories suddenly fade or their minds change or they become confused about facts that once seemed so clear. If the allegations made by Ms. Reed are true, then some very powerful men and women could be facing a long time behind bars. They may be working on her sources
right now to get them to change or conveniently forget their stories. My greatest fear, and something that weighs heavy on the court as well, is that some of the confidential sources may ‘disappear’—” Mitchell put air quotes around the word—“without federal protection in place. We see it happen all the time.”

“It happens in narcotics cases and gang wars,” Judge Greer interrupted. “But do you have any evidence that executives of Universal Labs or the FDA have intimidated or pressured witnesses?”

Landon loved the question. But Mitchell didn’t blink.

“Before this journalistic report, we had no evidence that executives at Universal Labs or the FDA were involved in conspiracies to illegally market drugs and bribe doctors. My experience is that desperate men and women do desperate things. But even if the witnesses are not in danger, it’s still my job to prosecute crimes. The law says that we’re entitled to know Ms. Reed’s sources if there are no alternative ways to find out the same information. Trust me, Your Honor, if there were another way to go about this I would be using it.”

Mitchell went through a list of cases supporting his position and answered questions from the judge for about thirty minutes. It was clear to Landon that he was now in the big leagues. The judge had read every case cited in Mitchell’s brief and asked him detailed questions about them.

Mitchell more than held his own. He had all the cases neatly organized in a black three-ring binder and seemed to know them by heart. He even corrected the judge a couple of times on the intricacies of First Amendment law.

They had lost Landon about fifteen minutes into the argument.

WHEN IT CAME HIS TURN
to approach the podium, Landon took his yellow legal pad full of handwritten notes and his iPad, which contained copies of the five most important cases he had studied the prior night. He suddenly felt woefully unprepared.

He began his argument with a little speech about the importance of the First Amendment, but Judge Greer cut him off.

“What if your client talked to the only witness in the rape of a ten-year-old girl and reported that story on the air? What if that witness didn’t want to get involved and your client promised him or her confidentiality? Would you be making this same argument?”

Landon thought about it for a moment. “No, because my client wouldn’t do that. We’ve got a five-year-old daughter.”

Greer gave him a lopsided smile. “But in principle, it’s the same thing, isn’t it? Doesn’t a reporter’s First Amendment right to protect confidential sources have to yield to the government’s ability to prosecute serious crimes?”

In a nutshell, Landon knew, that was the law. And whether he had five cases with him or fifty, they all seemed to say the same thing—a reporter had only a
qualified
right to protect her sources. She lost that protection if those sources were witnesses to a crime and the government couldn’t prove that crime without their cooperation.

“In certain situations, Judge, that’s correct. But only if the prosecutors have exhausted all other means of getting the same information. And with all due respect for Mr. Taylor, he hasn’t even tried any other sources. I mean, he has all the firepower of the federal government at his disposal. Subpoenas. Search warrants. Wiretaps. He knows the exact company and the FDA officials who are being accused. But instead of doing his own exhaustive investigation, he just wants to piggyback on my wife’s investigation.

“Judge, that’s bad policy for a number of reasons. It would make prosecutors lazy. It would also dry up sources for investigative journalists. Let’s at least have Mr. Taylor make a good-faith effort to conduct an investigation on his own before he deputizes my wife.

“The only thing she knows about law enforcement is what she learned from visiting me in jail. If she can break this story with that limited knowledge, certainly Mr. Taylor can nail down the same information if he takes a few weeks and really tries.”

The back-and-forth with Judge Greer would go on for another forty-five minutes, but the money line had already been delivered.
“The only thing she knows about law enforcement is what she learned from visiting me in jail.”
It was jotted down almost verbatim by every reporter at the hearing.

Judge Greer found Landon’s argument compelling enough. He quashed the subpoena. He told Kerri that he didn’t agree with her decision to run a story based on confidential and unnamed sources but that the Constitution and case law gave him no real say in the matter. “Mr. Taylor, you’ll have to conduct your initial investigation without Ms. Reed’s help. If you hit a stone wall and come back to court with a
subpoena for her sources as a last resort, rather than a first resort, we might get to a different result.”

On a slow news day, the story was too juicy for the media to resist. Even though Kerri and Landon had no comment after the hearing, the video of the two of them walking hand in hand away from the courthouse made for interesting B-roll. The story had so many angles! Landon’s firm was under siege. His wife had put her future in the hands of her husband, a first-year lawyer. Here was a budding legal star and a budding media darling all rolled into one happy little family. And not only that, but this lawyer was a one-time felon who had found religion and gone straight!

The talking heads on cable loved it. Conservatives denounced Judge Greer’s opinion. He had caved to Kerri Reed, a member of the hated mainstream media, and now a bunch of corporate criminals would get away with the equivalent of murder! On the other side, the media protected one of their own. She was a courageous investigative reporter. Freedom of the press was what made this country great. If she could find these sources, why couldn’t Mitchell Taylor?

As their names were bandied around the airwaves, Landon and Kerri retreated to their condo and unhooked the umbilical cords to the outside world. No Internet. No television. No phone calls. They put Maddie to bed early and hunkered down for the night, secretly hoping that something more explosive would happen in the nation’s capital or the Mideast or in Hollywood that would redirect the collective curiosity of the American people to a new set of victims.

ON SATURDAY NIGHT,
Landon fell asleep reading Maddie a story. It was almost midnight when Kerri, who had been asleep herself on the couch, staggered into Maddie’s room and woke Landon up. “Let’s go to bed,” she suggested.

It took Landon a second to respond. He had been sleeping so hard that there was drool on the pillow. He felt like his body weighed a thousand pounds.

“Okay.”

But Simba had other plans. He was doing his little
I’ve got to go this very minute!
dance, and Landon wanted to drop-kick him.

“When’s the last time he went out?” Landon asked.

“Right after dinner.” Kerri was rubbing her eyes, sending every possible message that she wanted Landon to take out the dog. But he wasn’t going down without a fight.

“It’s part of my legal fees,” he said.

“I paid your fees last night.”

“Odds or evens?” Landon asked.

“It’s your turn.”

Landon finally gave in, put Simba on a leash, grabbed a plastic bag, and took one last shot over his shoulder. “This dog wasn’t my idea.”

Kerri didn’t respond.

As usual, Simba had to find exactly the right spot to do his business, and that process couldn’t be rushed. The cool night air woke Landon up a little and made him shiver. He waved at the police officer sitting in his car a few spots down from the condo entrance. It had been eight days since Brent’s and Rachel’s deaths. Landon wondered how long it would be before the city reassigned its officers and he and Kerri were on their own.

By the time he got back into the condo and brushed his teeth, Kerri was sound asleep. But having slept a few hours already, Landon had a harder time dozing off. He stared at the ceiling for about twenty minutes and then decided to get up and sneak a look at his iPad. He sat at the kitchen table and read yesterday’s stories about the hearing in federal court. Most of the press coverage was positive, but the haters were filling up the comments pages. They slammed lawyers and slammed reporters and complained about the fact that a convicted felon was allowed to practice law.

Simba heard the commotion first and started barking immediately, running in circles. There was shouting in the hallway outside the front door and a few thuds. Simba was at the door in a flash, as if he wanted in on the fight. Landon hurried to the door, and Kerri came stumbling out of the bedroom, groggy-eyed, with a gun she had purchased the previous week.

“Is it loaded?” Landon asked. With Maddie in the house, they had agreed to keep the bullets stored separately in a sock drawer.

“I don’t know.”

There was a loud bang on the front door accompanied by cursing, and Landon looked through the peephole. Kerri was right behind him and handed Landon the gun. Maddie was awake now and calling for her mommy.

The cop Landon had seen earlier was a few steps away from the door, his gun drawn and pointed at two men on the ground.

“What’s going on out there?” Landon called.

“Hands in the air, now!” the officer yelled.

Maddie was at the end of the hallway, crying. “Take care of Maddie,” Landon said to Kerri. He shouted at Simba, but the dog kept barking wildly.

Eventually the officer shouted that the coast was clear and Landon could come out. Landon opened the door just a crack, the chain lock still in place, and stared at the scene in front of him.

He dropped the gun to his right side, shut the door quickly, and unhooked the chain. He reopened the door and couldn’t believe his eyes.

“Tell Chuck Norris here to get off my neck,” the big man on the ground said. His hands were cuffed behind him, and his voice was hoarse. The lithe and muscular man on top of him—the man with the bushy eyebrows, long sideburns, and deep-set eyes—was Daken Antonov. He had his knee on the other man’s neck. The cop had his gun trained on the big man as well.

“This right here,” said Landon, “is why I had so many sacks in college football. Officer, I want you to meet the starting center for the Green Bay Packers, Mr. Billy Thurston.”

The cop looked surprised, and Antonov released his hold.

“He always got manhandled like that in college, too,” Landon said.

“Very funny,” Billy said. “That dude just about killed me.”

The Wolfman stood up. “So you know this guy?” he asked Landon.

It took about ten minutes to straighten everything out. Billy Thurston had been watching the news at his home in Green Bay and decided his buddy was in danger and needed help. He was going to surprise Landon and arrive at his condo unannounced. When he saw the police officer parked by the curb, he foolishly decided to prove a point and sneak past him, up to the condo door. Before he could knock, “this guy came out of nowhere and blindsided me.”

The Wolfman said he saw Billy sneaking around and didn’t have time to ask questions.

Listening to what happened, Kerri couldn’t resist giving Landon a little nudge in the back.
See, I told you he was good.

Landon invited everyone in, but the police officer and the Wolfman declined. They both had a job to do.

“Thanks for keeping an eye out,” Landon said.

“No problem,” the police officer responded, as if he had been the one to stop Billy Thurston.

Landon couldn’t be sure, but it looked like the Wolfman flashed a brief little smile.

///

Billy, Landon, and Kerri stayed up almost the entire night. Billy spent the first hour eating and the next few catching up on Kerri’s and Landon’s escapades. He wanted to take Kerri and Maddie back to Green Bay until the cops figured out who was killing the lawyers in Landon’s firm. But Kerri wasn’t buying it.

“We got into this together,” she said, referring to Landon and herself. “We’re going to get through it together.”

“Then you better go to the grocery store,” Billy said. “Because I ain’t leaving until it’s over.”

“You don’t have to do that,” Landon said. “We’ve got plenty of security.”

Billy snorted. “Yeah, one cop who I snuck right by and some secret-agent bozo who got lucky ’cause I didn’t see him. And besides, who’s watching Maddie and Kerri during the day when you three are split up?”

They had that covered at the moment, between two Virginia Beach police officers and the Wolfman. But Landon didn’t know how much longer the police could keep an eye on his entire family. It wouldn’t hurt to have a three-hundred-pound NFL lineman hanging around. And this
was
the off-season.

“We could get an air mattress for my home office,” Landon said. “Or that couch in our family room could probably hold you.”

Billy smiled. “I’ve got your back,” he said. “Just like the old days.”

“That’s what I’m worried about,” Landon said.