contemplating a move. His hand reached into the middle of a stack, and almost without looking, he extracted the folder that he’d sought.
Taking a seat at the conference table across from Tom, Marvin said, “The game plan is to go over the discovery with you. But first, how is Jill holding up?”
Tom nodded and tried to show Marvin his appreciation. “She’s fine,” he said. “We’ve been taking things day by day but talking at least once a night. She’s been staying with Vern and Sylvia Kalinowski. They have twin girls who are Jill’s age.”
“Good. That’s good to know.”
“How’s the salt intake?” Tom asked.
“Lower.”
“And you’re taking a protein with every workout?”
“That nut mix you gave me is a good one.”
“Soybeans, sunflower seeds, and almond slices. My favorite. We’re hitting that goal weight, Marvin.”
“First your case—”
“And I’m getting you a date with Rebecca Bartholomew.”
“I might write off half of my fee if you make that happen, buddy.”
“It’s a done deal. Just say the word.”
“I’ll say it in another fifteen pounds.”
“Ten,” Tom said.
“Ten it is.”
Marvin flipped through the pages of the open folder and scanned the documents within. “So, as we discussed, I waived your right to have a probable cause hearing in exchange for the D.A. speeding up my access to their discovery materials.”
“Is it unusual they’d agree to that?” Tom asked.
“No, not really. It’s sort of a ‘you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours’ protocol that we use a lot. But it does tell me they’re eager to make a case and not at all worried about tipping their hand early.”
“Why do you say that?” Tom asked.
“The D.A. has a mountain of evidence,” Marvin said as he again sifted through the pages of an alarmingly thick set of papers. “They’ve got tons of computer forensic reports here, too. They even got the FBI involved.”
Tom nodded. “I told you about the agent who questioned me after my arrest,” he said.
“Right,” Marvin said. “I know that the D.A. had promised to crack down on teacher-student relationships, and I think they’re out to make a pretty big example out of you.”
“Well, what do we do now?” Tom asked.
Marvin picked up a pencil on his desk and twirled it between his fingers like a baton. “Tom, we need to think about a plea bargain before this goes to trial,” he said.
Tom shot Marvin a surprised look. “Doesn’t that mean pleading guilty?”
Marvin nodded. “That it does. But it also means keeping you out of prison for ten-plus years.”
“We haven’t even started to prepare for the trial,” Tom objected. “What the hell is in those discovery materials?”
“We’re going to try and prove to the jury the evidence against you was planted.”
“Right,” Tom said, acknowledging the defense strategy that he believed was not only the best, but also the truth.
“Well, the D.A. is going to try and prove, via your alleged relationship with Lindsey Wells, that you’re a sexual offender.”
“That’s insane,” Tom snapped, his eyes growing narrow. “Of course I’m not. In all my years as a teacher and coach, not once has anybody ever suspected me of that sort of thing.”
“Which is precisely why your involvement with Lindsey Wells is so critical to the prosecutor’s case. Lindsey will be proof to the jury that the evidence on the laptop wasn’t planted there. Once they think you’re having sex with a minor, a jury can be convinced of just about anything.”
“And why will they think I had a relationship with Lindsey in the first place?” Tom wanted to know.
“Well, according to the preliminary computer forensic audit, you’ve exchanged e-mails with Lindsey Wells. Graphic ones, at that.”
“E-mails?” Tom stammered. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about both of the state’s computer forensic specialists matching up IP addresses that link you and your laptop to Lindsey Wells’s home address.”
“That’s crazy. Lindsey’s just a kid. She’s my daughter’s best friend, for goodness’ sake!”
“And then there is this Leterg thing.”
“Yeah, you mentioned something about that to me. Explain that again,” Tom said.
“I had to research that myself. Leterg is ‘Gretel’ spelled backward. Every click on the Internet, every file sent or Web site accessed, is composed of broken-up data packets that originate from the sender and get reassembled by the receiver. IP addresses are what tell these broken-up data packets where to reassemble. Instead of leaving a single bread-crumb trail showing the actual route that the raw packets of data travel from point A to point B, Leterg manufactures bogus data routes, making it impossible for a computer forensic specialist to determine the exact path these data packets took.”
“And the state believes I know how to use this Leterg thing?”
“They were able to crack part of the Leterg encryption algorithm. Because of that… call it a ‘breakthrough’… the state now believes you’ve been collecting images of naked teenaged girls. The FBI has been cooperating with the Shilo and state police investigation. According to this affidavit,” Marvin said, holding up a piece of paper, “the FBI believes these multimedia format images were sent originally as text messages.”
“That’s ridiculous. The only text messages I send are to Jill!”
Marvin continued, “With the help of the FBI, the state has been able to ID ten of the forty girls whose images they found on your laptop. In their opinion, thanks to the Leterg program, the part of the encryption they couldn’t crack, you were able to conceal the identities of the people to whom you sent the images.”
“But I wouldn’t even know how to install a Leterg program, let alone use one,” Tom said.
“It would appear that isn’t the case,” said Marvin. “But that’s not all.”
“What do you mean?”
“Money, Tom. According to the indictment, you were being paid for these images. And it’s been going on for quite some time. Three years or so. The timing links you to all the girls from Shilo. The D.A. is going to ask for your help in identifying the girls they can’t.”
“I’m assuming one of those girls is the one who sent me her picture,” Tom said.
“That’s right. They were able to pull the deleted image from your cell phone provider’s network. It hadn’t been purged yet. Her image was there. They didn’t find any others.”
“This is insane, Marvin. Please tell me you believe that I’m innocent of all this.”
“Remember what I said about professing your innocence to me?”
Tom nodded dully.
“The state looked into your finances, Tom. They’ve attached the records here. Did you know you have a bank account with over a hundred twenty thousand dollars in it?”
Tom’s mouth fell open. “I what?”
“It’ll take some time to untangle where the money came in from. But it looks like a lot of offshore accounts and shell businesses. It would appear you were very good at hiding the money trail.”
“A hundred twenty thousand dollars?” Tom buried his head in his hands. “Oh, Marvin. This sounds bad.”
“Well, like I said, that’s the evidence detailed in these discovery documents,” Marvin said, holding up the packet. “I mean, you don’t usually see this many pages for a capital murder case.”
“Do they have any sworn testimony?” Tom asked. “Has anybody questioned Lindsey yet?”
Marvin scanned through the pages, but his expression suggested that he already knew the answer. “They have,” he said, “ and she’s denied, in sworn testimony, ever having any sort of sexual relationship with you, or having made wanted or unwanted
“Well, so that’s good. We’ve got a case. If Lindsey denies it all under oath, it could throw the rest of the
