Due Process (Joe Dillard #9)(39)

“I think you might be overreacting,” Stony said.

“Maybe so, but he’s about to arrest three young black men and charge them with raping a woman with no evidence other than the false claims she’s making. Unless he manufactures something. A TBI agent told me this morning that he’s going to hire a private lab to go over the DNA evidence again because there wasn’t a single bit of DNA from an ETSU football player in or on this so-called victim.”

“So, the report is done?” Stony said.

“Yeah, they’re going to release the results Monday at a press conference. They’re also going to indict the three players she picked out of the bogus lineup you told me about. I’m going to need that tape if you can get it.”

Stony nodded. “I can.”

“That’d be nice,” I said. “I need to ask you a favor, Stony. I don’t know if you’ll want to do it, but if you can, I’d really appreciate it.”

“What’s the favor?”

“Can you get me some deep intelligence on Armstrong?” I said.

Stony’s eyebrows raised. “Deep intelligence? I’m assuming you want me to black bag him.”

The FBI’s infamous black bag teams were surveillance experts. They could get into and out of places without being noticed, insert listening devices, video cameras, track vehicles, wiretap landline phones and intercept cell phone conversations. They gathered mountains of information without the target ever knowing.

“It’s something you’re capable of doing,” I said. “When we first met, you told me you were an expert in surveillance and had carried out several black bag operations during your career with the FBI.”

“I did those jobs after obtaining warrants from federal magistrates or judges.”

“I’m afraid we don’t have that luxury. If you don’t want to do it, I understand. But if you do, I think it could go a long way toward helping us understand what’s going on. It might save a few lives. It might save more than a few.”

“You’re asking me to break the law, Joe.”

“You know something, Stony? You did more than twenty years with the FBI, right? I’ve been at this for more than twenty years now. One thing I’ve learned is that when you’re dealing with the law and this fleeting concept we call justice, exceptions sometimes have to be made. Lines sometimes have to be crossed to ultimately get what we all want, and that’s for the right thing to happen. The truth to be discovered. The guilty punished and the innocent freed. I don’t believe for a second that you could sit here and look me in the eye and tell me you’ve never crossed a line that you thought you maybe shouldn’t cross.”

Stony laced her fingers beneath her chin and began rocking back and forth in the chair. She was on a brief tour of her own soul, searching for something she could live with.

“It’ll take me some time to get everything together, get his routines locked in, and get the equipment in place. Then we’ll have to wait and see what, if anything comes of it. I’ll have to monitor the devices personally. Do you want his office, too?”

“You can do that?”

“I can do anything. They called me Cat Burglar in the unit.”

“By all means. Get his office.”

“It’s going to be expensive.”

“The Davidsons will be paying. If they can’t, I will.”

“Okay,” she said. “You’ve talked me into becoming a criminal. Let’s hope it’s for the greater good.”

Shortly after Stony left, a courier arrived with the report from the independent lab we’d hired to analyze the blood taken from Sheila Self the night she was at the hospital. As soon as I read it, I scanned it and emailed it to Dr. William Kershaw, a forensic toxicologist who was on the faculty at the Quillen College of Medicine and who had testified as an expert witness in dozens of cases in and around Washington County, most often on behalf of the state. I wrote him a brief synopsis of the case and asked if I could call him as soon as possible. I was surprised when I received an email from him only fifteen minutes later. He told me to go ahead and give him a call.

“This is quite interesting,” he said when I got him on the phone.

“I thought so, that’s why I sent it to you. I’m not sure what the numbers mean, though,” I said.

“They mean this woman was still severely impaired when the blood was taken. What concerns me the most about it is the amount of GHB in her system.”

“What concerns you about it?” I said.

“When you combine alcohol, ecstasy and GHB, especially at the levels I’m reading in this report, I wouldn’t be the least bit hesitant about going into court and offering an expert opinion that this young woman would not have been able to remember what happened to her at the party. She would have been severely impaired, and most likely would have experienced what we call anterograde amnesia. She’s actually lucky she didn’t pass out or go into a coma or possibly even die.”

“And you would testify to that under oath?”

“I’ve done it before,” he said.

“Consider yourself hired,” I said. “Can you write me a report that I can attach to a motion I intend to file in court?”

“Certainly.”