2

The debate took place in the Milton High School auditorium. It was less than half-full, and I sat next to my friend and mentor, Regina Granger, the senior assistant district attorney for Milton County. Regina, a large and loud woman, had a boisterous belly laugh that made you think she was warm and cuddly. She was not. Regina was one of the toughest people I knew, an African American woman who earned her stripes thirty years ago in Milton County’s good-ole-boy system.

If you were accused of a crime in our county, the worst news you could get was that Regina Granger was handling your case. In my three years at the prosecutor’s office, I had never seen her lose.

We were watching the Republican candidates for attorney general of Georgia debate. I would rather have been getting a root canal or watching an opera. Regina and I were both there for the same reason—our boss was one of the candidates.

District Attorney William Masterson filled every inch of his chair in the middle seat at the table of candidates and a little more. He was the John Madden of the Milton County Courthouse—demonstrative, gruff, and down to earth. Everyone in the DA’s office loved him or at least respected him. But he was also mired in third place in a five-candidate race with four months left before the primary.

The leader was the current chief assistant AG, a man named Andrew Thornton. In contrast to Masterson, Thornton was thin, bookish, and deadly serious. I had watched him argue twice before the Georgia Supreme Court, opposing Antoine Marshall’s appeals, though he never returned my phone calls. Instead, he had junior members of the AG’s office deal with bothersome victims like me.

Toward the end of the debate, the moderator asked a question about the death penalty, and Masterson pounced on it. “I will never apologize for seeking the death penalty for those members of our society who show such callous disregard for the lives of others. We hear a lot about the rights of defendants, but I can tell you this. . . .” Masterson paused and made sure he had everyone’s full attention. “In every case where I’ve sought the death penalty, the victim suffered far more than any defendant executed by the state. I could tell you some gruesome stories about how these victims were tortured, raped, and killed. And unlike the defendants, the victims had no choice in the matter.”

There was a smattering of applause from the archconservatives who had shown up for the debate. I found the whole thing a little unseemly.

“My biggest problem with the death penalty is that we allow these cases to drag on for years, costing the taxpayers millions,” Masterson continued. “In the audience tonight is one of my assistant district attorneys, Jamie Brock.”

I felt my face redden, and I knew what was coming next. I hated playing the victim card, and I hated having others play it for me.

“As many of you know, her mother was killed by a three-time felon named Antoine Marshall more than ten years ago. He’s still sitting on death row, attacking everyone and everything involved in the process, even though Jamie’s father, whom this man also shot, survived that night and ID’d him at trial. That’s why Jamie is a prosecutor today.”

Masterson motioned toward me in the audience. “Jamie, would you stand for a moment?”

I shot him a quick look to let him know that I wasn’t happy, then stood and forced a smile. The crowd applauded politely.

“For me, being a prosecutor is not just a career,” Masterson said. “I feel the same way Jamie does—what we do is a calling. Victims have rights, and they’re entitled to justice.”

When the debate was over and Masterson had finished glad-handing every person who’d stuck around, he gave me a hug. “Hope I didn’t embarrass you,” he said.

“You did,” I said. “But you can make it up to me. We need to talk.”

Masterson raised an eyebrow. “This can’t wait till tomorrow?”

“I only need five minutes.”

He grunted his approval and then decided that if the conversation couldn’t wait, we might as well get coffee and ice cream. Fifteen minutes later, we were sitting in an Applebee’s, and Masterson was replaying the debate, asking for my perspective. When his ice cream finally came, he had two questions. “You sure you don’t want some?”

“No thanks.” I was sticking with just coffee.

“What do you want to talk about?”

“Rikki Tate.”

“So talk.” He took a bite of ice cream.

I had already formulated my negotiating strategy. I wanted to work on the Tate case. I knew it was the kind of high-profile case where Masterson would want someone from the DA’s office working with the major felony squad detectives right from the start. I also knew Masterson would say I was too busy. I would tell him that I would work overtime and still handle my normal caseload. He would then say that I didn’t have enough experience to handle the case, and I would offer to ride second chair. He would claim that I was too emotionally involved, and I would quote one of his answers from earlier that night when he said that, as prosecutors, we ought to be personally involved in every case. Like I did with every cross-examination, I had scripted the conversation in my head a hundred times and had a response for every objection, a counterpoint for every argument.

“I’d like to work on the Tate case,” I said.

“I’m handling that one myself,” Masterson responded, going for another bite. “But I could use a good second chair.”

It took me a second to shift gears—I was expecting an argument, not capitulation. “Seriously?”

“On one condition.”

“Anything,” I said quickly. Maybe too quickly.

Masterson leaned forward, creating that hulking presence that intimidated defense attorneys. The look didn’t bother me; I knew he was just a big teddy bear.

“I’m calling the shots,” he said. “I’ll ask for your input, but at the end of the day, I’m making all the strategic decisions. If we go to trial, you’ll get to take a few witnesses and maybe even do the opening. Heck, I might have you try the whole case. But when it comes to whether we charge him and if so, what we charge him with—that’s all up to me.”

Masterson studied me for a moment and I knew I had no room to negotiate.

“Understood?”

“Anything you say, boss.”