53

Addison

Katie North was not really an heiress, except in the usual way rich kids would benefit from the passing of their parents. But the press dubbed her the Murdered Heiress, and thus, Brady Wayne Darby became the Heiress Murderer.

The newspapers and magazines and news shows dug up everyone anywhere who knew the victim or the perpetrator, alternating interviews between the upper crust and the other side of the tracks. It made for interesting television, if little else.

Friends of the Norths called Katie a troubled rebel who had recently reconciled with her family.

Acquaintances of Brady—some from as far back as Touhy Trailer Park, even his own mother—called him a dreamer, a career criminal, selfish, heartless, and cruel.

“He was always up to no good,” Erlene Darby said, her shy husband shifting nervously in the background. “Hasn’t spoke to me in years.”

Brady’s aunt Lois told the TV people that despite his troubled past, he had been doing well and that “this was a surprise and we wouldn’t be shocked to find out it was an accident.”

One of the first questions Brady was asked when he was processed into isolation at the Adamsville County Jail was whether he was suicidal. “You have no idea,” he whispered.

“Is that a yes?”

He closed his eyes and nodded.

Brady was put on suicide watch and issued prison garb that contained nothing he could fashion into a death tool. He spent the night in a padded cell with recessed, grill-covered lights that never went off. A guard sat outside, and a small video camera in the ceiling slowly swept from corner to corner with a quiet whine.

The next morning Brady was escorted to a room where a tall, thin man in his early thirties introduced himself as Jackie Kent. Everything about Kent was straight and narrow—his dark, short hair, his nose, his ears, his chin, his tie, his suit, even his trench coat and shoes.

He proved to be one of those get-to-the-point guys.

Jackie pulled a sheaf of papers from his briefcase as he sat across from Brady. “Know that part in the Miranda warning where they tell you that if you can’t afford a lawyer, one will be provided for you, blah, blah, blah? That’s me. I’m what’s called a contract attorney. Firm I work for contracts for a certain number of these cases a year and assigns them to people at my level. We each get about one case a day for every day of the year, including weekends and holidays, and I’m not exaggerating. I had exactly 365 cases last year. All that for about twenty-five hundred dollars a month, not a dime of which comes from your pocket.”

“I’m guilty,” Brady said. “What do I need you for?”

“Everybody deserves representation. You did yourself no favors by spilling your guts to the police and trying to plead guilty.”

“I am.”

“So you’ve said. But you don’t plead your case to the police. You plead it to the court. If you decide to plead guilty—”

“Aren’t you listening?”

“If you decide to plead guilty, you do the county a big favor, and that ought to be worth something. It might even be worth your life. You see? You withhold your plea until that offer is floated before you. They say they could try you and put you to death or you can plead guilty and get life without parole. You might rather be dead, but—”

“I would.”

“—but you have to admit that of the two options, one is clearly better than the other.”

“I admit it. Only I wouldn’t choose the one you’d choose.”

“I won’t even pretend I know how you’re feeling right now, Mr. Darby. But let me say that I have one job here, and that is to do the very best legal work I can for you. I happen to be anti–capital punishment, but even if I wasn’t, my goal would be to do everything I can to keep you from the death chamber.”

“You’re wasting your time.”

“So I’ve been told and more than once. But do not discount that over the next few days, while the public and the press variously call for your life or your protection, you may change your mind. I have seen men and women go from what you’re professing now to where they’d agree to anything to not be sentenced to death.”

“I can’t imagine.”

“Okay, here’s what happens next. I will ask for a continuance so we can start working together. If that is granted, it won’t be for long because of the high profile of this case. Already the capital punishment abolitionists, among whom I count myself, have cranked up their newsletters in your support. I walked through a band of demonstrators to get inside this morning.”

“What are you talking about?”

“People who oppose the death penalty. They know it’s coming. They’re marching outside on your behalf.”

“They’re supporting me. I blew a girl’s head off, and they’re on my side.”

“Don’t misunderstand. No one is condoning what you claim you did.”

“I’m not just claiming it. I did it.”

“Fair enough. No one in his right mind condones murder. But do you realize that the United States is the only democratic society that still executes its citizens?”

“Sure glad I live here, then.”

“Listen, Mr. Darby. Why should only the rich benefit from the courts? You know what they say about capital punishment? ‘If you have the capital, you don’t get the punishment.’”

Brady stood and shook his head. “I want the punishment, man, okay? I don’t know how else to say it.”

“You’re going to be on death row for years as it is. You might as well redeem the time by fighting for yourself. There are nearly four thousand waiting to die in this country right now and twenty-five thousand more serving life without parole.”

“How fast can I be put to death?”

“I wouldn’t answer that if I knew. It’s counter to my purpose.”

“Your purpose is to keep me alive?”

“Of course. It’s my job.”

“You’re not supposed to represent me, try to get me what I want? Because I want to die and soon. All I want to know is how soon you can get that done.”

Jackie Kent sat back and sighed. “Even if you plead guilty and don’t try for life, there are mandatory appeals of death penalty sentences at all levels.”

“Mandatory? You mean they appeal for me even if I don’t want them to?”

“Exactly.”

“How long does all that take?”

“Years.”

“No good. What’s the shortest amount of time?”

“If you don’t cooperate with the process and keep going public with your guilt and your wish to die, maybe as short as three years, the way it was back in the forties, fifties, and sixties.”

“The good old days.”

“Let me fight for you, sir. I’ve read your file.”

“Then you know what happened.”

“You made that fairly plain, yes. There’ll be no getting you cleared. But it wasn’t your car. It wasn’t your weapon. You were not in your own neighborhood. You have been a habitual drug user. You could have been high. Your relationship went sour; an argument became heated. You meant only to scare her, maybe make her think you were going to shoot yourself. The shotgun went off. You didn’t mean to do it.”

“Except none of that’s true. I was stone-cold sober. Do I regret what I did? ’Course I do. I want to die for it. But she played me for the fool, and I killed her because I wanted to.”

“Temporary insanity. A crime of passion. That fine line between love and obsession. If you couldn’t have her, no one could.” Kent looked at his watch and began refilling his briefcase. Brady wondered if he had finally convinced the man. “In case you change your mind, let me enter a plea of nolo contendere. That’s just Latin for not admitting anything but accepting punishment as if you were guilty. The judicial system of the county, in its gratitude for your willingness to spare it considerable time and expense, will come back insisting that you plead guilty in exchange for life without parole over a death sentence.”

“No deal. Now, I been pulling schemes and scams my whole life, and I’m done. What do I have to do to be guaranteed the death penalty as fast as I can get it?”

Jackie folded his arms. “I can’t believe you’re asking me this. I have an ethical and professional obligation to—”

“All right, I’m tired of hearing that. I know what your job is. I know you don’t need or want this case, and I’m going to ask for someone else if you won’t get me what I want.”

“Truth is, Mr. Darby, the fastest way to get what you want is to plead not guilty, make the county prove its case, and don’t cooperate in your own defense. Everybody will love the publicity, and all they have to prove is motive, which you just told me you had; method, which has your fingerprints all over it; and opportunity. Can you be placed at the scene? A no-brainer.”

“But wouldn’t any trial take longer than no trial?”

“If they’ll let you plead guilty and still sentence you to death, no. But if I go to the judge with that plea, without asking for life, he’ll find you or me unstable, and then you’ll be interviewed by batteries of shrinks trying to get a handle on your death wish.”

“Handle? There’s no handle. There’s a death sentence for murderers. And I’m a murderer.”

Jackie Kent told Brady it surprised even him, but within a week, the Heiress Murderer got what he wanted. He was sentenced to die at the Adamsville State Penitentiary, method to be determined. As his lawyer had predicted, a schedule of mandatory appeals was drawn up, despite Brady telling the judge in plain language that he opposed these, would not cooperate, and hoped they would all fail.

With cameras rolling, the judge said, “Mr. Darby, as you have pleaded guilty, there is no cause for me to lecture you regarding your thoughtless, wanton act. Do you wish to make any statement before being remanded to the penitentiary?”

Brady spoke so softly that the TV stations had to run subtitles. “No. I did it and I’d do it again.”

As Brady was loaded into a county van for transport to ASP, reporters and cameramen surrounded the Norths near the steps outside the courthouse. Jordan and Carole looked ten years older than their fifty years. She stared at the ground as her husband spoke solemnly.

“No death will be slow or painful enough for that animal. I pray he burns in hell, and my biggest regret is that I can’t kill him myself.”