Lang remained seated after he was excused, staring at the wire line.
Chapter 22: The Investigator
Martin Greer arrived at Courtroom 4A with a lawyer, a pressed gray suit, and the confidence of a man used to being called when a case needed shaping. By noon, most of that confidence had been spent.
His attorney objected to the first question, the second, and the fourth. Judge Ruth Callahan overruled each objection, because Camille Renaud was not asking Greer to speculate. She was asking him to walk through his own firm's paper.
"Mr. Greer, let's begin with the engagement letter," Camille said. "Your firm keeps one for every matter, correct?"
"Standard practice."
"This is the letter produced under subpoena this morning, Bates-stamped Greer 001 through 004. Is that your signature on page three?"
"It is."
"Date?"
"September twenty-fourth."
Camille nodded. "One day before Exhibit 18 was accessed at 2:41 a.m. One day after the State certified that video, uploaded at 5:17 p.m. on September twenty-third, as untouched. Your engagement began between certification and alteration. Who signed the client side, Mr. Greer?"
Greer's attorney leaned in and whispered. Greer listened, then shook his head slightly. "The signature block is redacted in the copy produced."
"It is," Camille agreed. "Your firm redacted it, citing client confidentiality. But the letter was not fully redacted. Page two, paragraph four. Read the billing instruction."
Greer read, reluctantly. "'All invoices to be directed to the attention of the Special Litigation Unit, Halloran County District Attorney's Office, marked confidential, not to be filed with ordinary vendor accounts.'"
"Mr. Greer, the Special Litigation Unit is a unit inside the prosecutor's office, isn't it?"
"Yes."
"Not a defense firm. Not an insurance company. Not a private citizen."
"No."
ADA Steven Krol stood. "Your Honor, vendor arrangements for investigative support are routine. Counsel is constructing guilt by letterhead—"
"Mr. Krol," Judge Callahan said, "did your office engage this firm on September twenty-fourth in connection with the Riverview matter?"
Krol hesitated one beat too long. "Your Honor, I would need to confer—"
"Sit down, Mr. Krol. Ms. Renaud, proceed."
Camille turned to the next exhibit. "Greer 007. Your intake form. Who is listed as the referring contact?"
Greer looked at the page as if it had betrayed him personally. "The form lists an initials-only contact. 'S.K.'"
"And the extension beside those initials corresponds, per the county directory at Greer 009, to which office?"
"The district attorney's office. A senior trial line."
"Did you ever meet the client in person?"
"Once. Briefly. In a parking lot near the courthouse, which I now understand was a mistake in judgment."
"Did that person tell you what was needed?"
"They said the Ross case had a timing problem. They said the parking video would confuse a jury. They said a technician could clean the file, and my job was to make sure he was taken care of and that no paper connected the request to anyone in the building."
"Taken care of," Camille repeated. "Those were the words?"
"Yes."
"And you understood that to mean payment."
"I arranged a payment of nine thousand five hundred dollars to Peter Lang on September twenty-ninth, after I confirmed the certified copy no longer contained the segment."
Judge Callahan removed her glasses. "Mr. Greer, you confirmed that personally?"
"I compared the running time against the original intake note, Your Honor. The delivered file was forty seconds shorter."
"Mr. Greer, did Mr. Lang choose you, or did you approach him?"
"I approached him. I had the name already."
"Who gave you Mr. Lang's name?"
"The same contact. On a handwritten note. I destroyed it, as instructed."
"Instructed by the contact from the district attorney's office."
Greer exhaled. "Yes."
Camille moved to the final page. "Greer 012. Your closing memo, October second. You wrote: 'Matter complete. Client satisfied. No further exposure anticipated if technician remains consistent.' What did 'consistent' mean?"
"That Lang would keep saying he acted alone, if anyone ever asked."
"And the payment was structured to help him say that, wasn't it? No contract. No invoice. Just a wire from you, with a memo naming the place."
"That was the design."
"Whose design?"
Greer looked toward the prosecution table. Krol did not look back. "The contact said the office could never appear to have touched evidence. That was the point of using me. Layers, they called it. My firm was a layer."
June Castellano, at the clerk's desk, wrote the word down and underlined it once. Thirty years had taught her which sentences a record would need later.
"Did anyone connected to Darnell Ross hire you or speak to you about this video?" Camille asked.
"Never. He did not know my name before this morning."
"The engagement letter, the intake form, the billing instruction, and the closing memo will be admitted," Judge Callahan said. "The redaction will be reviewed in camera this afternoon. Mr. Greer, you are not excused, and you will not discuss your testimony with anyone from the district attorney's office."