The Hidden Man

“You wanted to get home to your wife.”

“Yeah.”

“Did you guys drive together?”

“No.”

“Okay, where’d you park your car?”

“A few blocks away.”

“What direction from Downey’s?”

“Well, west of it, ’cause that’s the direction we were walking.”

“Okay, where specifically?”

“I don’t know, specifically.”

“But to have passed the Liberty Apartments Complex, you’d have to walk four city blocks from Downey’s Pub. So you were parked at least four city blocks away, right? A half mile away.”

Butcher and I had worked on this answer extensively.

“Yeah, see, but that’s on purpose,” said Butcher. “That’s what I do when I’m out. I give myself a walk after drinking. Straightens you out. Sobers you up. So yeah, I parked a way’s away.”

“But you don’t know where, exactly.”

“No.”

“And the point was, you guys were drinking, so you wanted to give yourself a walk.”

“That’s it.”

“Whiskey, I think you said.”

“Probably.”

“Probably. But definitely not soft drinks.”

“No, definitely not.”

Mapp paused, which probably meant a segue. “Now, Mr. Butcher, you have a criminal record, isn’t that true?”

Butcher adjusted his position in the witness chair. “Yeah, it’s true.”

“You were convicted of submitting a false bid application on a public construction contract, isn’t that the case?”

“Yeah.”

“You were a project manager for Emerson Construction Company back in 1982,” he said.

“Yeah, and in a bid application for an annex to a high school, we listed a subcontractor as a minority-owned business that, it turned out, was not minority owned.”

“We listed. You mean, you listed.”

“Well-yeah, I mean, I wasn’t an owner at Emerson. This was before our family owned our own company. But yeah, I was the one who filled the thing out.”

“And you knew, when you listed that subcontractor on your bid application-you knew that the sub was not a minority-owned company.”

“Yeah, I did. It was wrong.”

“And you signed an affidavit swearing to the truth of that statement.”

“Right.”

“So you lied under oath.”

“I admitted to that. I was young and stupid.”

“Were you young and stupid in 1990, too? Isn’t that when you were convicted of obstruction of justice when you lied to an IRS inspector about payroll taxes?”

“Well, I don’t know about young-but I was stupid.”

“You knew that it was a crime to lie to a federal agent, didn’t you?”

“I s’pose I did.”

Mapp nodded. I was getting uneasy. He had something up his sleeve here.

“Before you were to find yourself in another legal-predicament, let’s say-I’d just want to make sure you were clearly testifying to the truth here today.”

“Objection,” I said. “Argumentative.”

“Let’s move on,” the judge said.

“Yes, Your Honor.” Mapp did a slight bow. “Mr. Butcher, you’re sure it was Downey’s Pub you were at that night?”

“Yeah.”

“You’re sure you were drinking alcohol?”

“Yeah.”

“And you’re sure it was September 21, 2006?”

“Yeah. Why?” Butcher asked, a bit meekly. Suddenly, his brown tweed sport coat and buttoned collar seemed a little warm, a little uncomfortable, as Butcher rolled his neck and kept his eyes on the prosecutor.

“Why?” Mapp paused. “Because, Mr. Butcher, I’m just trying to figure out how Downey’s Pub could have served alcohol on September 21, 2006, when Downey’s Pub didn’t have a liquor license on that date. When it wasn’t even open on that date.”

51

OBJECTION.”I got to my feet on shaky legs. Lester Mapp handed me a certified copy of an order handed down by the state’s liquor control commission, which suspended the liquor license of Downey’s Pub effective September 1, 2006, for the period of thirty days.

“Selling alcohol to a minor was the offense,” said Mapp. “A third violation, warranting a one-month suspension. A one-month suspension that ran through the first week of October.”

“Objection,” I repeated. “This wasn’t disclosed to the defense. This wasn’t provided to me and it wasn’t in the prosecution’s written motion.” What I was saying had merit, but it was like complaining that a life preserver hadn’t been properly inflated to federal regulations. I was right, but I was still going to drown.

“I just got it today,” said Mapp. “We’re two weeks out from trial. This is just a hearing.”

The judge shot the prosecutor a look. She didn’t appreciate the grand-standing. She read from the document that Mapp handed her.

Unfair surprise, I wanted to say, but there was no cure for my ill. Mapp was right. I had almost two weeks before trial. And the document said what it said. Tommy Butcher couldn’t have been at Downey’s Pub on the evening of September 21, 2006, the night Griffin Perlini was murdered.

“Counsel,” the judge said, waving the document at me. “I don’t know-you’re right, of course, that Mr. Mapp improperly sprang this on you. But that doesn’t change what I’m reading here. Mr. Butcher.” She turned to him. “Mr. Butcher, this is a serious development for you.”

Butcher had already figured that out. He was white as a sheet. “Your Honor, best of my memory-I mean, maybe he was open anyway?”

“The front door of the establishment was locked on order of the Liquor Control Commission,” Mapp said with confidence. He was clearly enjoying himself. “The state locks the front door with a padlock. They don’t leave a key for the owner. The owner can go in the back door, but he’s not allowed to open the place to the public-”

“I understand, Counsel. You’ve more than made your point.”

I couldn’t believe this was happening. One-half of my two-pronged attack was coming apart before my eyes.

“Mr. Butcher,” the judge said. “I’m going to ask you a few questions, and you have the right to have a lawyer present if you wish.”

Butcher didn’t answer. His mouth parted, like he was a curious child.