Free A Criminal Defense by Steven Gore

I-was-right-about-Hamlin smirk. “So it wasn’t so pro bono after all.”
    â€œLooks that way.”
    Donnally reached for the menu standing between the napkin dispenser and the wall.
    â€œYou sure it wasn’t Rusch who sent the Aryan Brotherhood after Madison?” Navarro asked. “The rumor years ago was that they backed him in buying the bar.”
    â€œIn a credibility contest between Madison and Rusch, I’ll take Rusch. He still calls his wife The Bitch, even though saying it paints crosshairs on his forehead.”
    The cook walked up. Donnally ordered chicken chow fun. He’d missed Golden Phoenix’s version of the dish, nutty, dry-fried, and spicy, during the years since he’d moved up to Mount Shasta. Since he was doing cop work, he felt like eating cop food, at least in San Francisco. Long gone were the days when officers limited themselves to a Norman Rockwell diet of burgers and fries and roast beef or turkey plate specials.
    Navarro ordered the same.
    â€œYou get any prints off the money?” Donnally asked.
    â€œSome.” Navarro reached down and withdrew a file folder from his briefcase and handed it to Donnally, who passed over copies of his cell phone research and Hamlin’s calendar. “We’ve dusted most of the bills and recovered a few prints so far. The techs are still going through them.” He pointed at the folder. “Those are the people we’ve identified so far.”
    Donnally spotted Takiyah Jackson’s name, along with Hamlin’s and one he didn’t recognize.
    â€œHow’d you happen to have Jackson’s prints on file?” Donnally asked.
    â€œShe got arrested in a raid on a Black Prisoners Union hideout in the eighties.”
    â€œWhich one?”
    â€œThe one in which Bumper was killed.”
    Donnally now understood why Jackson had been drawn to Hamlin. It had been one of the most notorious cases of the era. The medical examiner’s autopsy had confirmed witnesses’ testimony that the ideological leader of the Black Prisoners Union had been killed by police officers while lying facedown on his bed. Donnally guessed from then on Jackson’s world was made up of cops and cons, and she saw herself as a con.
    â€œWhat was she doing there?”
    â€œA runaway from the East Oakland housing projects. Sexually abusive father. Heroin-addicted mother. She’d been in the BPU house for a couple of days. I pulled the file when we got the match. Her real name is Jeanette. They gave her the African name Takiyah. It means righteous.”
    Donnally read off the second name. “Who’s Sheldon Galen?”
    â€œDefense lawyer. Been around San Francisco for about eight years. Shares Hamlin’s point of view, but doesn’t have his brains. Hamlin would bring him in on codefendant cases. Hamlin always took the heavy and gave Galen the lightweight and expected Galen to make sure the client didn’t turn snitch and roll on Hamlin’s guy.”
    â€œHe have a criminal history, too?”
    â€œNo. His prints were in the applicant file from when he tried to get a job in the public defender’s office.”
    â€œIf his prints were on the cash,” Donnally said, “that suggests he must’ve been the bagman, collecting the fees and bringing them to Hamlin.” He smiled. “I don’t see Hamlin handing anybody a hundred grand and then telling him to strip off a couple as his cut.”
    Donnally leaned back and held the sheet against his chest as the cook delivered their plates of chow fun. The peanut-oiled noodles in brown sauce shimmered under the overhead fluorescent lights. He could tell by the aroma that nothing had changed in the kitchen of the Golden Phoenix since he’d last eaten there.
    â€œHomicides are usually about drugs, sex, or money,” Donnally said after he walked away. “Maybe I should drop in on Galen tomorrow.”
    â€œLet me