“Sorry, I didn’t mean to upset you. I just wanted you to know where it stands.”
I leave him with his head in hands, surprised at the depth of his emotion and relieved that he didn’t mention Ramirez again. But there’s something that’s bothering me, something he said: “That’s the way I felt about her. Fatherly. Protective, you know?”
Felt about her. He’s referring to her in the past tense.
Maybe it was just a slip of the tongue.
Or maybe he knows something I don’t.
22
Anita White sat across the desk from Judge Ivan Glass while he read over her application for search warrants for Toni Miller’s home and Tommy Miller’s car. She’d drafted the affidavit carefully, laying out everything she knew about Ray Miller’s relationship with Judge Leonard Green, the suicide in the courtroom, the subsequent funeral, the judge’s murder, and her reasons for believing she had probable cause to search for evidence.
Anita had gone back to the Lake Harbor neighborhood and obtained a signed affidavit from Colonel Robbins, the neighbor who saw the white car. She’d gotten the nosy neighbor, Trudy Goodin, to sign an affidavit saying she’d seen Tommy Miller arrive early that morning in his white Honda. She’d also picked up a tape recording of the 911 call from the motorist who was nearly run off the road by the white car near the time of the murder and had it transcribed. She’d obtained copies of the vehicle registration from the Department of Motor Vehicles that said Tommy Miller was the owner of a white Honda Civic. She’d attached everything to her written application for the warrants. She’d done everything she could think of. Now it was up to the elderly judge to sign the warrants so she could proceed with this part of her investigation.
Anita had also followed Dillard’s suggestion and collected the judge’s computer. She’d sent it to Knoxville, but it would be at least a couple of weeks before the techs could sift through all of the information on the computer and report back to her. The investigation into people whom Green had sent to the penitentiary revealed that only two had been released in the last six months-a burglar named Wayne Timmons who’d moved to Jackson, and a nonviolent, drug-addicted check kiter named Melanie Buford. Anita didn’t think either of them a likely suspect.
She’d already contacted a detective in Durham, North Carolina, a veteran named Hakeem Ramakrishna-they called him “Rama”-and faxed him a copy of her application. Rama was doing the same thing in Durham that Anita was doing in Jonesborough. He was asking a North Carolina judge to issue a search warrant for Tommy Miller’s car and an order allowing the police to collect a DNA sample from him. Anita thought the logical place for Tommy to go would be back to Duke University.
Judge Glass finished reading, removed his tinted glasses, and began rubbing the bridge of his nose. This was the first time Anita had been in Glass’s office; the first time, in fact, she’d ever spoken to him. His reputation was that the pain medication he took for his plethora of health problems made him cranky and erratic, and that he suffered mightily from black-robe fever. But he was also known as an ally to law enforcement, a judge who would stretch the limits of probable cause.
Glass quit rubbing his nose and gave her a fierce look.
“This is pretty goddamned thin,” he said. “The core of this application is a white car. It doesn’t say what kind of car it is, what make or model; just that it’s white, that it might have been seen in the vicinity of the murder around the time it was committed, and that your suspect owns a white car. Very little specificity here.”
“Yes, Your Honor,” Anita said.
She knew Glass had been around forever and had probably seen and heard every trick cops use when trying to get warrants. There was no point in trying to bullshit him.
“But when you add everything up,” Anita said, “and look at the totality of the circumstances, I think there’s enough probable cause to at least search.”
“Totality of the circumstances?” Glass said. “They teach you that at the academy?”
“I have a law degree, sir,” Anita said.
“I didn’t like the son of a bitch, you know,” Glass said.
“Beg your pardon?”
Glass leaned back in his chair and looked up at the ceiling. The folds in his neck looked like string cheese.
“Green. Didn’t like him worth a damn. You know he campaigned openly against me during my last two elections? He was jealous because I was the senior judge in the circuit. He wanted to be the big shot. But he was dumber than a coal bucket and had the personality of a goddamned salamander. And those teeth, Jesus. He could eat an ear of corn through a picket fence. I don’t know how he kept getting elected.”
Anita attempted to maintain her professionalism. She’d never heard a judge speak in such a manner. His reputation was well deserved, at least the part about being erratic and cranky.
“Whatever his shortcomings, Your Honor, I’m sure you agree he didn’t deserve the death he received.”
“I heard he was hanged and burned,” Glass said. “That right?”
“Yes, sir, that’s correct.”
“Been a few times when I would like to have hanged the bastard myself.”
Glass chuckled, obviously amused with himself.
“Yes, well, as far as the standard for probable cause for a warrant goes, I think the affidavit is sufficient,” Anita said. She wasn’t about to indulge Judge Glass in bashing a murder victim.
“He was a fag, too, you know,” Glass said. “Never saw him with a woman, not once. You’d think a man in his position would at least try to fake it. Not Green, though; he was so goddamned arrogant. But you know what? He probably couldn’t have faked it even if he wanted to. It was just too obvious.”
Anita wished she’d brought a tape recorder. Norcross and the rest of the agents in the office would have loved this.
“Is there anything else I can tell you?” Anita asked. “Any more information you’d like to have before you decide?”
“You married, young lady?”
“No, sir. Never been married.”
“Lesbo?”
Anita stood. Enough was enough. She reached out and picked the warrant application up from Glass’s desk.
“Thank you for your time, Judge,” she said.
“Wait just a goddamned minute,” Glass said. He reached out and snatched the papers from Anita’s hand. “I’ll sign your warrant. What’re you getting so goddamned touchy about?”
23
Late in the afternoon, I receive a telephone call from Roscoe Stinnett. He’s the lawyer defending Rafael Ramirez, the drug dealer and murderer Mooney wants me to set free. Stinnett is from Knoxville, and he and Mooney are close friends. Both of them are Texans. They did their undergraduate work at Texas A amp;M together, and both of them were heavily involved in the ROTC program. Mooney wound up going to law school in Texas and then enlisted in the Marine Corps, where he served as a JAG officer, while Stinnett migrated to the University of Tennessee and stayed in Knoxville. He carves out most of his living defending crack cocaine dealers in federal court, but Ramirez has hired him on the murder case. During each of the few discussions we’ve had, he’s made sure to tell me how close he is to my boss.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Stinnett?”
“My client has some important information for you. He wants a face-to-face meeting with you at the jail. I think he wants to make some kind of deal.”
“You think he wants to make a deal? You mean you don’t know?”
