“I’ve helped some of them too. Once in a while they need an investigator.”
“I know you got a lot going on,” I said, “working and getting your degree. So go ahead and sleep on it, but if you could let me know tomorrow—”
“I don’t need to sleep on it,” she said. “I need the work. And internet detective work is what I like best.” I could already hear her tapping away on her keyboard. “It’s unbelievable what some people put up there. I once had to tell a PD that his car-theft client had posted a video of himself stealing the car.”
We laughed. “Dear Lord,” I said. “People really are that stupid sometimes.”
“Which is why you and I have jobs. Okay, I’m sending you some links. His Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are all public.”
I fired up my laptop and started looking over more of Jackson’s life. Going to the beach, complaining about a hangover, joking with his friends. A photo he’d posted of Karl with devil horns added on and the caption, “Happy sucky fathers day.”
Terri said, “We might want to listen to this.” I clicked on the link she’d sent and found myself on the Twitter page of some podcast called “4/20 Confessions.” The logo was some sort of collage of pot leaves and kids’ faces. One of the faces was Jackson’s.
I groaned. “Not great, but his pot use isn’t relevant to the crime. I should be able to keep any evidence of it out.”
“I’m listening to the May 5 podcast. Check out the title.”
I scrolled down. It said, “The Per420ct Murder.” Not even witty. I clicked and was treated to the sound of Jackson himself opining on the awesomeness of marijuana, then flicking a lighter to start smoking.
I said, “He clearly had his college applications in mind when he recorded this.”
She laughed. Then she said, “Oh, uh-uh. No. Leland, go to about the four-minute, twelve-second mark.”
I scooted ahead. We listened in silent horror as Jackson described a dream he’d had after smoking a blunt. He’d dreamed of committing a brutal murder, he said, beating a guy half to death and then finishing him off with a baseball bat. The phrase “I turned his face into fuckin’ hamburger” stuck in my head. All the kids were laughing.
I stopped it and asked her, “Was that hard to find?”
“No. It’s one of his friends’ pinned tweet, and it mentions Jackson’s Twitter handle.”
I looked at the clock. We hadn’t even been on the phone twenty minutes. Ruiz was going to find this for sure. Even though it was most likely inadmissible as evidence, I knew from my own experience that things like that could make a prosecutor truly believe the defendant was guilty. It could put Ruiz on a crusade, making him less likely to go along with my bail request or offer a good plea deal.
But the real problem wasn’t Ruiz. Hearing Jackson laughing like a hyena while he described beating a man to death made me have my own doubts.
10
Thursday, July 11, Morning
On the morning of Jackson’s bond hearing, Noah and I met Mazie outside the courthouse. It was a pompous-looking building, two stories, plain brick with some Greek columns thrown on the front to let you know it was important. We passed under oak trees hung with Spanish moss, then came back into the blazing sun beside the tattered-looking palm trees out front. I was telling them both what to expect, but Mazie hadn’t said a word besides hello. She was terrified.
Once I’d deposited them in a pew in the oak-paneled courtroom, I went to the pen, where prisoners were held until their hearings were called. Through the plate glass I saw Jackson in an orange jumpsuit and cuffs. In a tote bag I’d brought an old suit from law school, when I was nearly as skinny as him. I was hoping they’d let me lend it to him so he could appear in court looking like a decent man instead of a prisoner.
I chatted with the guard. When I asked, he shrugged. “Put it through,” he said, indicating the X-ray machine’s conveyor belt. He sounded like it had been a long while since he cared about anything.
Jackson changed in full view of the guard and half a dozen other prisoners. When he was in his skivvies, I discreetly looked him over for bruises. I was glad not to see any.
In the courtroom, I was dismayed to see a couple of local reporters and some rubberneckers. Ruiz was shuffling papers at the prosecutor’s table and whispering to his sidekick. When I got to the defense table, the bailiff deposited Jackson beside me. He wasn’t wearing the necktie I’d brought. I wanted to kick myself for not showing him how to tie it. Karl probably never wore a tie in his life, and even if he had, he wasn’t the kind of man to take the time to teach his son.
Jackson leaned over to me and said, “This is freaking me out.”
“It always does, the first time,” I said. “Try not to let it get to you.” Courtrooms were designed to look intimidating. They put you in your place.
Judge Chambliss was still in chambers. In front of his empty bench, set lower than it but higher than us mere mortals, his clerk was at her desk. She looked young and a little nervous. With our small-town crime rate, I wondered if this might be her first hearing in a murder case.
It was my first time before Judge Chambliss. I was at a disadvantage. Back in Charleston I knew which judges wanted incisive legal argument and which ones would let off any defendant who said he’d found Jesus while in jail. But since coming home, I hadn’t set foot in criminal court. I didn’t know which clerks and bailiffs liked a friendly chat and which didn’t. I wondered if this bailiff, who was standing at attention with his back to the chambers door, had been assigned to General Sessions—that is,
