CHAPTER TWELVE

Tampa, Florida

Monday 11:00 p.m.

January 29, 2001

“SHE STAYED IN FRANCE for a while, but then she came back to live in Tampa and married Ozgood Richardson. Didn’t you know?”

The CJ’s wife? Had a torrid affair with Gil Kelley? Hard to believe, even if they were both young and foolish at the time.

Actually, it was hard to believe Mariam McCarthy Richardson had ever been young and foolish. All the times I’ve been around her, she’s been about as interesting as paint dust.

I couldn’t believe she had suffered a broken heart at Gil Kelley’s hands, but I did believe that if she had, she’d be mortified to be living in the same town with him.

And I also understood why Kelley was a reluctant member of the Tampa social scene. He wasn’t welcome at many clubs and parties. Old Tampa has a long memory and wouldn’t have condoned such behavior, even in a young man. Especially if Mariam Richardson was there to put the kibosh on it.

Marilee and I talked for another hour or so before I got one of the waiters to drive her home and gave him cab fare back. Then, I went in and talked to George for a while before going up to bed with a great deal on my mind and hoping that all of our house guests had already retired for the night.

Tuesday morning, the U.S. v. Otter file was on my desk, along with stacks of other files, mail, and stuff that had spontaneously generated in the night. I looked at the notes I’d left for myself on what I’d planned to do today.

A few years ago, I started making a list at the end of every day for tomorrow’s work. It was the only way I could make any sense of my workload. Otherwise, I’d start the day with a plan and within minutes, be completely overtaken by the waves of work that flowed into my office as the tide overflows our beach.

While the tide ebbs and flows on a regular daily cycle, my work remains for years. Since I became a judge, I understand the story of Sisyphus on a personal level.

The Greek who was condemned to forever push the boulder up the hill was a perfect mascot for judicial work.

Today’s project list said: “No. 1 - Check Ron Wheaton’s history; No. 2 - Review U.S. v. Otter file.”

While my ancient government issue computer was booting up, to use my time wisely, I pulled the U.S. v. Otter file over toward me and took a look at it, once again lusting after the new courthouse where the judges had much newer, faster computers.

The second I started reading the U.S. v. Otter file, I forgot about my computer search altogether. Otter was being prosecuted for conspiracy to commit fraud, money laundering, witness tampering and fraud.

What was surprising was the number and caliber of people who claimed to have been fleeced by this rather ordinary man. People who should have known better. Educated people, who were obviously wealthy to have paid Otter the millions they claimed, but must have had more dollars than sense.

The indictment charged that Otter had sold, cleaned, cut, appraised, and consigned diamonds and other jewelry to the listed twenty complainants, and countless unnamed others.

All along, the indictment said, Otter had given his customers cheap imitations. When sued by fleeced customers, Otter counter-sued for slander and reached confidential settlements for less than his customers’ losses, so complaints about him never spread.

Like Fitzgerald House, several of the complainants were also involved in civil suits against Otter. Many of the complainants were names I recognized and a few were people I knew personally: celebrity golfers, performers, national and local businessmen.

The claims were eerily similar. In paragraph after paragraph, the indictment named individuals who had bought jewelry created by famous designers, now deceased.

The most frequently mentioned was the award-winning Paulding Farnham, one of the world’s most talented and artistic designers of fine jewelry. At the Paris Exposition of 1889, Farnham had received the gold medal for his Tiffany & Co. jewelry designs.

Farnham’s exquisite designs helped Tiffany’s become the leader in the field of fine jewelry and silver.

In several paragraphs, Otter was alleged to have sold copies of Farnham’s award-winning, twenty-four karat gold-and-enamel orchid brooches, and other pieces of Farnham’s original work, to unsuspecting customers.

In some instances, the original designs were now featured in public collections at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the High Museum in Atlanta, and others, the indictment said.

But Otter told his customers that Farnham created designs for private customers, as well, selling his copies as Farnham’s originals.

Because Farnham left Tiffany & Co. in 1908, when he was just forty-eight years old, the claim that he had continued to create one-of-a-kind jewelry for many years thereafter was certainly plausible.

People who should have known better believed it.

Otter had sold a pin consisting of a cluster of white tigers to a famous illusionist. It was made of diamonds in several colors. The diamonds were later determined to have been treated with radiation, and so were less valuable than the illusionist had believed.

On other pieces, Otter was alleged to have inflated the weight and value of the stones, charging his customers several times the market price for such jewelry.

A particularly unbelievable allegation concerned a 40-karat cubic zirconium that cost less than two hundred dollars. The stone was given a celebrity name and sold by Otter for over a million dollars.

As authentic looking as these manufactured stones have become, it was still hard to believe someone would part with a million dollars without a valid appraisal. Human folly among the wealthy was more rampant than I’d realized.

In all, the indictment claimed that Otter had fleeced customers for a total of more than $170 million. Punitive damages and recoverable attorney fees would also have been available in civil actions based on each individual fraud.

If convicted in the criminal case, Otter faced up to 165 years in prison, in addition to a potential order to make restitution.

No doubt about it, if Otter was convicted, his pampered lifestyle would be over. Prison would not be kind to anyone used to the finer things, to put it mildly.

If Otter could make restitution, the criminal case might be pled down to lesser charges or dismissed altogether. The complainants might be persuaded to go away quietly if they got their money back.

The negative and outraged responses I’d gotten from Otter’s insurance adjuster to my suggestion that the insurance company pay to settle the Fitzgerald House case, suggested that Otter would not have any better luck getting money for the claims in the criminal case.

Where would the money come from?

So Otter must be desperate to find enough money to settle these claims. Where would he get $170 million? Tampa isn’t Palm Beach. That kind of money would be hard to come by here.

The assistant U.S. attorney assigned to the U.S. v. Otter criminal case was someone I’d known for years, and had always considered an astute lawyer. Briefly, I considered picking up the phone and dialing his office, but decided against it.

Judges are not supposed to seek or obtain information about cases on our dockets except through the litigation process. Because this was a criminal case and would be tried to a jury, I would have a little more leeway than if I was to sit in the trial as the finder of fact.

I considered how to discover what the federal “fraud squad” had learned about Armstrong Otter. The only way I would feel comfortable investigating now was if I transferred the case to another judge, or if both of the parties consented. That was about as likely as rain in the desert.

I could think of no appropriate way to learn more about Otter and I was out of time to think about it further. The U.S. v. Otter case was up for a pre-trial conference in two weeks and I’d learn more about it then.

But now, both my law clerks stood in my doorway with lists of questions, the computer flashed to tell me I had mail, all four buttons of my telephone were lit up with phone calls holding for my attention, and Margaret reminded me of my afternoon calendar. My “To do today, first thing” list was buried under a mountain of paper.

I didn’t give Ron Wheaton’s computer check another thought.

The rest of the week passed swiftly and uneventfully. Fitzgerald House requested a short adjournment of the trial, which I granted, giving them time to resolve the case. I’d been required to make some pretrial rulings that would give certain advantages to Fitzgerald House. Perhaps Otter and his insurance company would agree to settle the case.

I called Ben Hathaway several times, but he wasn’t available to speak to me. Apparently, the Tampa police chief had a few things on his “To do” list, too. I hoped no news meant he didn’t have the results of Ron Wheaton’s autopsy. I allowed myself to be lulled into complacency on the investigation, thinking there was nothing to investigate.

I tried to talk to Margaret several times, but she remained uninterested in my help. She seemed to be dealing with Ron’s death just fine, and I even heard her singing in the office several times.

Margaret looked better, younger and happier than I’d seen her in months. I knew she was a bereaved widow, but someone who didn’t know her history would never have guessed that she’d just lost her husband.

She hadn’t planned a memorial service. Margaret said she was the only family Ron had, and she didn’t need a memorial to remember him. I feel the same way about funerals. The point of them is to provide closure for the living, I’m told. They do nothing for me but make me sad. I didn’t find Margaret’s decision bizarre.

Citing the need to resolve some problems with Ron’s finances and life insurance, Margaret took a couple of days off at the end of the week. I didn’t wholly believe her, but I felt she was giving me a clear message to stay out of her life, so I allowed myself to be deterred and occupied by a couple of applications for emergency temporary restraining orders and my other cases.

Dad’s investigation was moving relentlessly forward. He’d left a note on the refrigerator door before I got up Wednesday morning saying he’d found a paper trail taking him to Miami to investigate the bank and would be out of town. Thankfully, he’d taken Suzanne with him.

He was due back Saturday and I looked forward to hearing about his progress. It gave us something to talk about besides the baby, Suzanne and my hurt feelings.

Dad and Suzanne offered to get a hotel room at the Marriott Waterside when they returned on Friday. Both George and I prevailed to keep them at Minaret, if for no other reason than to avoid the awkward explanations the move would require.

After being around her for several days, Suzanne continued to make me uncomfortable. Every time I saw her, Suzanne and Dad’s adoration affected me like fingernails on a chalk board. It was going to take me a while to get used to the idea of Dad having a wife and a baby. It would have been a little easier to deal with if Suzanne wasn’t so good-natured, obviously in love with Dad, kind to everyone, and just generally so damn likeable.

My soul mother, Kate Austin, had gone on an extended vacation to Italy before Gasparilla started. She was the only person who could give me some objectivity on this thing with Dad since she had been there since he and Mom married. Without Kate to discuss everything with, I was adrift in emotions that likely had no basis in reality. Dad had known

Kate would be in Italy this month, which made me wonder whether he’d chosen to bring Suzanne to Tampa now so that he wouldn’t have to deal with Kate and me at the same time.

I couldn’t imagine that Kate, who had been my mother’s best friend, would approve of Dad’s marriage any more than I did. I tried to call Kate in Italy a couple of times, but she was always out of her room. I’d left messages, but she hadn’t called back.

George was certainly no help. He kept telling me that Suzanne was Dad’s choice and I would do well to accept her, unless I wanted to alienate Dad further.

Men can be so obtuse sometimes. Of course, I knew that.

But knowing and doing are two different things. I would come to terms with Suzanne in my own way, but the marriage was still too new, too much of a shock, to resolve itself so neatly in a few days after almost twenty-five years of the status quo.

George removed the restaurant’s money from Gil Kelley’s bank and re-deposited it elsewhere after hearing Marilee’s story about Gil’s youthful and distasteful indiscretions.

Sandra Kelley’s allegations about Senior, which George had heard from a couple of other sources, caused further disquiet. George didn’t believe Senior had embezzled from the bank, but he felt it was better to be safe than sorry. Besides that, if Marilee’s stories were true, which George didn’t wholly believe because they came from Marilee, he didn’t want to be associated with Gil Kelley anyway.

Between my personal life and my work, I had little time for Margaret. And that was before the Friday, when, for the first time in my life, I got served with a subpoena.