Free Beyond Justice by Joshua Graham

accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial.   This part of the Sixth Amendment, derived from the Magna Carta, was a right I gladly exercised.  The sooner we proved my innocence, the better.
    The trial was set for late December, less than two months away.  When Walden announced he was going to seek the death penalty, I felt so ill I couldn’t eat for the entire day.
      Time passed too quickly in some ways, too slow in others.  In addition to preparing for the trial, we had to find the killer and prove my innocence, all in a matter of weeks.  As far as the D.A.'s office was concerned, the case had been solved.  The trial was just a formality.
    Rachel started looking for a private investigator.
    With an anklet that tracked my location and movement anywhere on the planet, I couldn’t leave my house without the sheriffs’ watchful eye.  My father-in-law was quite vocal in his protests against my visiting Aaron.  Any visit by me had to be supervised by the hospital security staff.  In Oscar's mind, I was guilty and therefore dangerous.  He never liked me much from the start and I suppose finding me guilty would make it easier for him to cope with his daughter’s death.  Who better to blame?
    The doctors said Aaron seemed to be out of the woods now, though complications always threatened.  Visiting him was always the highlight of the day.  And at the same time, the most heart-rending.
    I’d been terminated from my firm without severance.  My life plummeted into a quagmire of anxiety, despair, and financial hemorrhaging.  Bad enough I could no longer pay the mortgage, but the most painful blow was losing the medical benefits.  Without Blue Cross, I had no way of paying for Aaron’s medical bills.
    The fifty thousand dollar bail was posted with a five thousand dollar bond.  But it didn't take long before I completely depleted my reserves—exercised my options, sold my stocks, and maxed out my credit cards with cash advances.
    MetroLife would not process my claims because I was the defendant in my wife and daughter’s slaying.  At best, they'd wait until I was proven innocent.  How would it look if they paid out 2.5 million dollars to a convicted murderer?
    As for Rachel’s retainer, she had not yet brought it up, so I didn’t ask, which went against my nature.  But I was so desperate, I swallowed my pride and accepted her services not knowing how I would pay.
    I began interviewing for jobs all over San Diego, and eventually as far as Orange County.  But it was fruitless.  No one wanted to hire a murder suspect.
    Brent Stringer wrote an editorial in the Union Tribune about my arrest.  He expressed regret for having just a month ago written an article that made me out to be a modest hero—Superdad. 
    To correct that mistake, he tarred and feathered me as a psycho who had fooled and shocked the community.  In three scathing paragraphs I went from Superdad, national hero, to Super creep, a "sick deviant and a danger to society."  He held nothing back.  Like Matt Kingsley, I deserved to be put down like a rabid dog.  It was too bad the State of California didn’t castrate animals like me.
    Thank you very much, Brent. 
    Good to see that journalistic responsibility was not dead.
    After a month of failed job hunting, I admitted to myself that my legal career was over.  My checking account dwindled to triple digits and charge cards went over their credit limits.  I had to look elsewhere.  Not even Carl’s Junior, Walmart, or the Chevron station would hire me.
    The best I could do to keep from going insane was to spend my time going over the case with Rachel, combing through the prosecution’s so-called evidence.  I had forgotten to mention the CD of the pornographic images in my briefcase to Rachel.  I had decided to keep that copy for my own evidence, in case anything happened to my network directory.  A stupid thing to do, in retrospect.  Thankfully, it was deemed inadmissible