Fatal Convictions (11 page)

29

Alex finished his hearing in Virginia Beach Circuit Court, packed his briefcase, and headed toward the exit. To his surprise, Taj Deegan was waiting in the back row. With all the events surrounding the honor killings, the sight of the chief deputy for the commonwealth’s attorney made his stomach clench.

She stood. “Got a minute?”

Alex checked his watch, as if the president might be waiting in the hallway. “I don’t have long,” he said.

The two found an empty conference room adjacent to the courtroom. Neither lawyer spoke as they took their seats. Alex noted that Taj didn’t have her briefcase or even a legal pad with her.

Taj had the look of someone you could trust. She wasn’t a flashy dresser—black suit, white blouse, a pair of black flats—and she had a quick smile, showing lots of perfect white teeth. She was slightly overweight with a rounded chin, intense almond eyes, and a pair of small black reading glasses that seemed more like a prop. She looked to be in her late thirties, and Alex knew she was the single mom of a son and daughter who were both in elementary school. He also knew that Taj was always being touted for this judgeship or that one. Politicians were enamored with the story of a young African American woman who had earned her GED, worked her way through college while her mom helped with the kids, and attended law school at night while working for a private security company.

“Alex, I want you to know that we’ve just arrested Khalid Mobassar,” she said, watching him for a reaction.

Alex took the news stoically, though his mind started churning with questions.

“As Mobassar’s attorney, sooner or later you’d be entitled to the disclosures I’m about to make. I thought if I told you about the evidence now, it might help you evaluate whether or not to stay on the case.”

Alex’s suspicions were on high alert. Deegan played fair, but she was known for her take-no-prisoners approach to high-profile cases. To Alex’s knowledge, she had never lost a murder case.

“I’ve checked you out,” Deegan continued, “and I knew your grandfather pretty well. I don’t want to see you get sucked into a case like this without knowing what you’re getting into. There are plenty of lawyers out there who can represent this guy.”

She seemed sincere, but Alex didn’t respond immediately. The possibility that this was some kind of trick crossed his mind, but he dismissed it; he wasn’t exactly known as the top criminal defense attorney in the area. If this was a tactical move, it wasn’t a very smart one.

Deegan shifted in her seat and leaned forward. “What I’m going to tell you is off the record. This conference never happened. If you stay on the case, you’ll get all this information through formal channels. Until then, it’s entirely confidential.”

“Okay.”

“For starters, your man is on the DOJ’s list for foreign nationals with terrorist connections. As a result, his phone and text messages have been tapped and his e-mails monitored under the Patriot Act since he came into the country. It took us forty-eight hours to work through the Feds’ red tape, but we eventually got the messages from your client’s allegedly missing cell phone.”

Khalid’s cell phone was missing?
Alex swallowed hard, but he didn’t break eye contact with the prosecutor.

“On June 2, your client sent two text messages to a cell phone purchased a week earlier by a man in northern Virginia using an alias. We used GPS positioning data from the cell phone signals and traced the location of that anonymous cell phone on the night of the murders. It’s the killer’s cell phone, Alex. We traced the man using it from Petersburg to Virginia Beach and then to Sandbridge. Later that night, the cell phone was near the federal preserve where the bodies were buried.”

Alex felt his mouth go dry. He liked Khalid and found it hard to imagine that his client had been part of this gruesome killing. “What did the messages say?”

“The first message explained that Ja’dah Fatima Mahdi had converted to Christianity and was attending Christian services with a man whom Khalid did not identify, that Ja’dah had defiled herself with this man, disgraced her family, and dishonored Allah. The message told the killer that if Ja’dah was unwilling to repent and return to the Muslim faith, the honor of her family must be restored. That’s pretty much an exact quote, Alex—that the honor of her family had to be restored.”

Taj looked at Alex, and he saw her measuring his reaction. “The second message told the killer that he would find Ja’dah at the Beach Bible Church on Saturday night. It contained a picture of Ja’dah and Martin Burns.”

The information stunned Alex. It sounded like an airtight case. “So you’ve got two text messages from my client’s phone to a phone whose owner is unknown.” He tried to sound unimpressed. “And that’s your case?”

“There’s more,” Taj said matter-of-factly.

Alex dropped the pretenses. “I’m listening.”

“Fatih Mahdi, Ja’dah Mahdi’s husband, will testify that the
only
person he told about his wife’s conversion to Christianity was your client. After Fatih found out about the text messages, he said he would be willing to waive the priest-penitent privilege and testify about what was said in his conversation with your client.”

Alex was beginning to feel like a boxer, doubled over in a corner, taking one body blow after another. He couldn’t think of a single counterpunch.

And still Deegan wasn’t done. “Using a search warrant, we gained access to your client’s and the mosque’s banking accounts between the time of the text messages ordering the killings and the date of the murders. During that time, the mosque’s weekly deposits were down by about 50 percent. About $20,000 was diverted from the mosque’s operating account into the mosque’s building fund, and a few days before the killings, there was a $20,000 wire from that fund to a bank account in Lebanon. The wire was authorized online by Mr. Mobassar using his account password.”

This is what Alex hated about criminal law—the reason he had virtually abandoned the field. The prosecutors held all the cards. The best ones, like Taj Deegan, didn’t file charges unless they knew the case was a slam dunk. From day one he would be fighting a losing battle, looking for loopholes, trying to keep his client out of a life sentence.

Which would be bad enough in a normal case. But in this one, the bad publicity alone would threaten what was left of his personal-injury practice.

“Why are you telling me this now?” Alex asked.

Taj leaned forward, her intense stare conveying the moral authority of someone who believed in her position—
truly
believed. A crusader. “This guy is an animal,” Taj said. “He had an innocent woman
beheaded
, Alex. And he had Martin Burns buried alive.” She narrowed her eyes. “Buried alive. Tied up and thrown into a grave with his beheaded girlfriend, where he was buried one shovelful at a time.”

Alex had no comeback for this. The facts were indisputably gruesome.

“This is going to be ugly, Alex, and the press is going to be all over it. Our worst fears about fundamentalist Muslims are personified by Mr. Mobassar. To an unscrupulous criminal defense lawyer, a boondoggle like this case could be a way to get his name in lights so other thugs will hire him. But you don’t really strike me as that sort of guy.”

Taj took a breath and seemed to relax a little. “I’m not trying to tell you what to do—and someone’s got to represent this guy. But out of respect for your grandfather, I thought I should let you know what you’re up against before you get in too deep.”

Alex sincerely thanked Taj and told her he’d take the information into consideration. They shook hands, and he decided to get in at least one little jab before he left. “Does that mean you won’t be offering me a plea bargain?”

Taj Deegan did not smile. “Whether you stay in this case or not, I’m going after Mobassar with everything I have,” she promised.

“I’m kidding,” Alex said. “I really do appreciate the heads-up.”

30

Alex had missed nearly a dozen calls while he had his BlackBerry on silent in the courtroom: two from Khalid’s home number, three from Shannon, one from his office. A few local numbers he didn’t recognize—probably the press.

He ignored them all as he walked to his car in the scorching heat. He put on his shades and took off his suit coat, focused on what Taj Deegan had just told him.

He kicked around various scenarios on his way back to the office. As a lawyer, he was trained to reserve judgment until he had heard both sides. But as a human being, he had to admit that the case against his client seemed pretty damning.

Alex retraced his interactions with Khalid over the last few days and reconsidered those events in light of what he had just learned. Khalid had seemed equivocal on the issue of whether funding for his mosque could be tied to Hezbollah. Khalid had refused to divulge even to his own lawyer the substance of his conversations with Fatih Mahdi. Khalid had lost two sons fighting against Israel. He had condemned Israel’s aggressive response to the 2006 Hezbollah provocation.

Perhaps Khalid
was
part of an Islamic Trojan horse strategy. Perhaps he had positioned himself as a voice of reason among Muslim clerics so he could gain a visa to America and fight from within the bowels of the American beast.

What did Alex really know about Khalid Mobassar? And did it even matter? Whatever the true facts, Khalid would soon come to symbolize the oppression of women carried out in the name of Allah. Khalid’s case would sear the issue of honor killing into the national consciousness in the same way that Bernie Madoff personified investment greed or Charles Manson personified cult killings.

In the life of a trial lawyer, there were certain cases that defined your career. Johnnie Cochran was O.J.’s lawyer. Ken Starr prosecuted Bill Clinton. David Boies was Al Gore’s mouthpiece in the recount litigation.

Khalid Mobassar’s case was that kind of case. If Alex didn’t withdraw now, he would always be known as the guy who defended honor killings. Even if, God forbid, he won and Khalid really
was
guilty, Alex would symbolize what Americans hated most about lawyers. Lawyers find loopholes to spring criminals. They trample the rights of innocent victims.

And in this case, innocent
Christian
victims.

Alex wanted no part of it. He picked up the phone to call Shannon. The firm shouldn’t even make an appearance at the bond hearing. Taj Deegan was right. There were plenty of lawyers champing at the bit to represent even the most despicable defendants if the price was right.

Alexander Madison was not one of them.

* * *

In their five years of practicing law together, Alex could not remember the last time he had been this frustrated with Shannon. They would constantly pick at one another and give each other a hard time, but they didn’t have
real
arguments. At least . . . not until today.

He had been on the phone with her for nearly thirty minutes. She was talking in hushed tones from one of the rooms in Ghaniyah’s home. Several ladies from the mosque had come by to help Ghaniyah clean up, and Shannon was doing her part.

Alex had already explained the evidence aligned against Khalid, but his partner wasn’t listening.

“Since when did we start putting our clients on trial before we take their cases?” Shannon asked. “I can’t imagine that Khalid would have ordered something like this.”

“And I can’t believe we’re having this conversation,” Alex said. “I had to twist your arm to represent the Mobassars in the first place. You didn’t even want to take Ghaniyah’s case, and now you want to represent her husband for an honor killing?”

“I’m not one to cut and run just because the commonwealth’s attorney is trying to bring a little heat.” Shannon’s voice was insistent, though she kept the volume low.

“This isn’t about cutting and running.” Alex felt his blood pressure rising. “We can’t put our whole practice at risk for the sake of one client.”

“This is exactly what our practice is supposed to be about,” Shannon responded. “It’s number nine on the list.”

She was referring, Alex knew, to his grandfather’s list. The things that made Madison and Associates unique. The ninth item read
A lawyer’s highest duty is to defend an innocent client.

“That’s exactly my point,” Alex said. “He’s not innocent, Shannon. How can he be innocent?”

“You don’t even know him, Alex. I’ve researched this guy. Spent the afternoon at his house with his wife.” Shannon was talking faster now, her voice still hushed. Alex had heard this tone before and knew she wasn’t going to change her mind.

“I’m going to be at the arraignment tomorrow standing right next to Mr. Mobassar,” Shannon continued. “I would really like to have you there with me. But whether or not you show up, somebody’s got to argue for this man’s bail.” She let the words hang for a moment before she put the knife in. “Some of us still believe in the presumption of innocence.”

“So now you’re the big crusader,” Alex said sarcastically. “If it wasn’t sad, I might enjoy the irony.”

Shannon sighed and apparently decided she had better things to do than go on like this all afternoon. “Right now, the big crusader is just one woman helping another woman clean up her place. If you’ve got some time, we could use your help.”

Alex blew out a deep breath and tried to match her level of composure. “All right. Stay with him through the bond hearing, and then he can get new counsel.”

“You aren’t listening to a word I’m saying,” Shannon insisted. Alex had never heard her quite so dogmatic about taking a case. “Ghaniyah needs our help. And I, for one, believe in her husband. Plus, her civil case could be worth a million dollars or more based on her positive recognition of the truck I photographed earlier. I plan to be at Khalid’s arraignment tomorrow morning. You can do whatever you want.”

He hated it when his partner became so unreasonable. But there was no use discussing it further right now. “Unfortunately, I’ll be busy,” Alex said. “Somebody’s got to stay in the office and talk the other clients out of leaving.”