Old School Ch. 03: Naked Justice

"OK. The sergeant is right... for the most part. I'm pretty sure that the FBI's evidence techs were involved with this and if they saw the tracker was still there and left it in place, it was a decision made in consultation with the U.S. attorney's office. If you accept the car, then you have to keep it no matter whether the tracker is still attached or not. Remove it and you could be charged with destruction of evidence, obstructing an investigation."

"So it's a crapshoot. You can leave the car here until I can make some calls tomorrow and find out what's going on and maybe get the thing removed legally if it's still there. Or you can take it now and, if it's there, drive around as you normally would while somebody somewhere sees your precise location until law enforcement decides the tracker has outlived its usefulness and says it can be removed."

She shook her head. "I want my car, but I can't stand the idea that somebody is tracking me... again! I won't do it."

"Understood. I can take you home if you want. Or we can see if any of the car rental agencies are still open at the airport and I will rent you something to use til yours is clear if you like," I said.

She was already busy on her mobile app looking for rentals. At 11:45 p.m. on a Sunday, no luck. Not in Lexington. Her breaths came in huffs. Her lips were pursed in resentment and frustration, largely at me, but definitely over the conundrum about her car and the fact that she was still more than an hour from her bed and the start of another workday in just seven hours.

"What's your advice. Legally, I mean. After all, you're my ten-dollar lawyer," she snapped.

"The cleanest route is to leave it here and let me resolve the tracking issue," I said.

"Never seen a day start so great and end so... totally shitty," she fumed. "Let's get going, then."

I nodded and we climbed back into my Tahoe, traversed New Circle Road to the west of Lexington and passed within half a mile of the homes where we grew up.

"The old neighborhood," I remarked.

Silence. And it stayed that way until I pulled up in front of an eerily silent 370 West Main Street in Danville. As soon as I cut the engine, her door opened and she retrieved her two bags from the back seat.

"Can I help you carry those?" I said, scurrying around the vehicle.

"I got 'em," she snapped. She carried them to a door on the left side of the front of her store beyond which was a long, steep flight of stairs. At their summit was a locked entrance door to her residence. She put her bags on the sidewalk on either side of her feet and found the key to unlock the door. After she pushed it open, Kass turned to me.

"It's late. You probably shouldn't try to drive back at this hour. You can sleep on my sofa if you like," she said coldly.

"Thanks, but I have to head back. I have a major client conference first thing tomorrow morning in the office."

Kass stared silently at the concrete for a moment, her arms crossed in front of her, letting me stew in my own guilt and misery and ponder a future with her that was uncertain at best.

"Yeah, well...," she said, looking into the empty distance down West Main Street where streetlights cast a silvery glow over everything beneath them. A chilly breeze tousled those auburn ringlets that I so loved to run through my fingers.

"I need time to myself now, and so do you," she said. "We've got a lot to sort out. We need distance to do that. At least I do."

I swallowed hard and nodded. "I'm sorry all this happened, Kass. It's my fault and, yes, I have to deal with that. And I have to come to terms with the fact that I've hurt the one person I love more than anyone else."

She swallowed hard, still staring into the distance. I saw a tear roll down her cheek as she nodded, though I am not sure whether it was in acknowledgement of what I'd just said or an unspoken conclusion she had reached.

"I don't doubt that you love me," she said. "And I know I've said the same to you. I just have to figure out why you'd mislead someone you love."

She bent and picked up her bags, then looked directly at me. "That's what I have to figure out, Les."

"I understand, Kass."

"Goodnight."

I stood there on the sidewalk as the downstairs door closed and latched behind her and watched her ascend the stairs, open her locked apartment door at the top landing, go inside and turn off the stairwell light. The chill, silent wind that had blown Kass's curls now sent shivers through me as I stood there in the semidarkness a few minutes more. When I finally drove away, I had never felt so desolate and alone.

▼ ▼ ▼

My first attempt to call Kass was around 1:30 on Monday, the final day of October. It rang and rang and went to voicemail. I tried again 30 minutes later. This time, it rang twice and went to voicemail. So I texted.

Hi Kass. Tried to call. I have an update on your car. -Les.

The morning had been awful. I had tried to bolster myself with vitamins, lots of water and energy drinks on top of a redeye I picked up from the coffee shop in a corner of the main floor lobby in our building. Maybe it kept me from nodding off, but I felt a half-step behind on everything in the 8 a.m. meeting with a new client.

Write it off to sleep deprivation from my overnight drive from Danville? Maybe stress? A broken heart? Or how about all of the above, but with the broken heart hurting the most.

This was an essential meeting with our new anchor client. We put on a full-court press. Every partner in our well-regarded Private Wealth Services industry group was around the massive, oval-shaped table. The chairman of our Trusts and Estates Practice had flown in from Philly for it. The chairman of the firm even made an appearance via our secure, closed-circuit videoconferencing system on the 72-inch screen at one end of the room. And all of that was understandable considering this family who was our new client measures its wealth in ten digits to the left of the decimal. I was one of three lead partners on this priority client account with a team of two other partners and four associates backing me up on the estate work.

Clients like these are what propels a national law firm from the fifty of the AmLaw 100 -- a ranking of major U.S. law firms by annual gross revenue that American Lawyer publishes every spring -- into the prestigious first fifty. It had become a compelling obsession among gigantic, multi-office, multinational firms, and ours was no exception. That was actually a written objective in our firm's strategic plan: to climb from 78^th to 50^th or better before the end of the decade. In my nearly 10 years, I saw our firm's culture align itself behind that singular, dollar-driven goal. Rainmaker partners who brought in business like these clients ascended quickly to lead practice groups and reap the commensurately obscene partnership distributions of money that come with it.

I had just wanted to do a good job giving clients my very best. Fortunately, it was strong enough to help me build a strong -- and hugely marketable -- "rising star" reputation that lent itself to developing new business. But during this morning's sluggish start, the Trusts and Estates practice chair shot me a questioning side-eye.

"Rough weekend, Walker," he asked me after the meeting as we shared an elevator ride back to my floor from the top floor conference rooms with the best vistas of Cincinnati and the river.

"Yes sir. You could say that. Nothing that more coffee and early to bed tonight won't fix," I lied. He smiled and patted me on the shoulder before the door closed and he caught a waiting car to whisk him to the airport and a waiting private jet back to Philly.

My calls to two prosecutors now involved in the ever-widening case of Burnley, Brewer and their hateful cult -- my law school pal Cabot Nathanson of the Kenton County Commonwealth's Attorney's Office and assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Pinlok -- were a bit more productive. Neither was aware of what had become of the tracking device that had been planted on Kass's Elantra, but they promised to get back to me by lunch.

It was Pinlok who called first. Indeed, the feds' forensic team had pored over the car at the KSP district office and yes, the device was still there and was not removed. They wanted Kass to retrieve her car and continue to use it.

"That's not going to happen," I countered. "She made it clear to me that she's not driving that vehicle again knowing that someone's tracking her every turn."

"It would be helpful to the investigation if whoever planted that device continues to believe that we're not on to them," Pinlok said.

"Sorry, she's not doing it," I replied. "She's totally onboard with keeping her mouth shut and not doing anything else that would expose the investigation, but she's not going to drive that car with a GPS tracker on it."

"We'd like to speak to her ourselves," he said.

"Then you'll have to subpoena her. I am her attorney, she is fully aware of the situation -- starting with agent Gustin's surprise visit yesterday and she's not at all happy about it. I will pass along your request, but I am not going to advise her to drive that bugged car."

"We can be... persuasive," he said.

"Counselor, that sounds a lot like a threat to me. You know as well as I do that you can't draft an uninvolved party into an investigation against their will and compel them to act as an agent for the government," I said. "She's not saying a word to anybody about the investigation or anything that's happened, and unless she does, she's broken no law."

"Why are you resisting," Pinlok said.

"I'm not resisting. I've been reaching out to the police, prosecutors, you name it since my first encounter with that jack-booted thug Burnley. I've freely given you access to data my private investigator has found relevant to actions affecting my client Danny Albertson. And I'm doing all I can to aid this investigation against Ebenezer, Burnley and everything that's part of their organization. You know that," I said, my temper rising. I could feel my vein begin to pulse.

"What I am not going to do is further expose my client in this matter," I said.

"Client? Wasn't she at your house when Mr. Gustin arrived there yesterday? Didn't she come to the attention of these people because of your relationship with her? Yet you're her lawyer?"

"There's no bar rule against representing a friend, and right now that's all she is. Has been since we were in preschool back in Versailles. She retained me last night solely on the issue of what to do about this car. I advised her that if the police release the car to her and the tracker is still on there, removing it could be construed as tampering with evidence, and based on that, she is letting the state keep it until the device is gone," I said, my tone sharpening and voice rising as I did. "So as you can see, Mr. Pinlok, Miss Felson has gone out of her way -- in this case literally! -- to comply with both the letter and spirit of the law. I am happy to make that argument in front of a judge if you insist."

Everything I just said was the whole truth. Pinlok knew it and stayed quiet.

"You guys make up whatever cover story you want for the fact that the tracker is showing that her car is sitting idle in Lexington. That's not my client's problem. Say it's inoperable because of a busted taillight. You wouldn't even have to lie."

"OK, Mr. Walker. I see your point," he said. "We'll figure something out. I'll need to talk to my boss and maybe Main Justice, but we'll find a way to accommodate Miss Felson. Could take a day or so."

"Thank you for understanding. Believe me, I want these assholes in prison as much as you do."

That conversation ended just after 1. Two hours had passed since and I still couldn't get Kass to talk to me. So just before 5 p.m., I called her from my desk phone, which would register on her phone as Gladney & Watson LLP. She answered.

"Felson's on Main, this is Kass," she said.

"Hi Kass. It's me."

"Les. What's up?"

"Sorry it took so long to update you. I talked to the state and federal prosecutors handling this case. Good thing you didn't pick up the car. The tracker is still on it. He wanted you to get it and keep driving it with the device still on it and I told him an unequivocal no. I had to remind him of the aid we've already provided the government in this case and he finally relented. He's going to ask his boss to remove the device and return the car to you clean, but the request may have to go all the way to Washington for approval and take a day or so."

"What does that mean?" she said, her voice flat.

"You should be able to get your car by Wednesday, maybe late tomorrow."

"OK. And who's paying for my taillight?"

"Go ahead and take it to the dealer and get it replaced and save all the receipts and paperwork. I'll file a civil reimbursement claim on your behalf with the state and have Cabot ride herd on it," I said.

"Well, that'll be a load of fun," she said. "Can I get reimbursed for an Uber ride from here to Lexington? Will they pay me for being without my vehicle? All the shit I've been through?"

"I'll be glad to drive down, get you and..."

"No." She cut me off. "That makes no sense at all and besides,... we need some distance... as I said."

"OK," I said. "I'll let you know when Pinlok -- the federal prosecutor -- gives me the go-ahead and the KSP tells me the car's ready."

"Fine."

"You get any sleep at all last night?" I said.

"What do you think?"

"I think you stayed wide awake the whole night just like I did. Worst night of my life. I wish I had words better than 'I'm sorry' and 'I was wrong' and 'I'll never do anything like that again.' Somehow, I think words don't help things right now and that's my fault."

The only sound from her was a deep exhale. Maybe a sigh? The line was uncomfortably silent for the better part of a minute. It felt like a day.

"You still there?" I asked at last, barely above a whisper.

"Yes," she said, accompanied by a sniffle. She was crying and had been trying to hide it.

"I love you Kass. Nothing will change that, no matter where you are or where I am. Please remember that. Please hold that in your heart."

"Stop it, Les. Just stop," she said, abandoning any effort to mute her weeping. "I don't want to love you right now. I'm trying not to. And you're not helping me do that."

"Sorry, Kass. I can't not love you. Even if you hate me."

"I can't do this right now," she said between sobs. "I've got to go." The connection dropped. She had hung up.

▼ ▼ ▼

Gene Fassbinder and I waited nervously in a spare conference room in the downtown Cincinnati office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It was appointed with what appeared to be a conference table purchased at a surplus office furniture store and second-hand swivel chairs with grimy armrests.

"This was scheduled for 2, right?" I asked Gumshoe, who had reached out to Will Gustin and Sandy Corder. Gene nodded. It was almost 2:30.

At 2:32, the door opened and agents Gustin and Corder entered the room. We shook hands, exchanged pleasantries and took our seats.

"Sorry we're tardy. I hate being late," Corder said. "But there's a lot going down this afternoon that we need to stay on top of and I think will be of interest to you. For that reason, we're going to have to keep this short."

The reason we had requested the meeting was to find out from the feds, who had clearly assumed the lead in this multi-jurisdictional probe, exactly how we got drawn so deeply into this situation that I never knew existed two months earlier, when Dano was still alive and struggling with troubles I could not comprehend. It was through my representation of Dano, his violent suicide and the call it generated with Mason Burnley of the Kentucky State Police that I backed into this fever swamp of hatred.

"Mr. Walker, the federal government has had its eye on the Ebenezer group for more than five years. It came to our attention as part of a Justice Department crackdown on hate crimes against LGBTQ people initiated late in the Obama administration," Sandy Corder said.

The government built a national database of anti-gay/trans/lesbian threats and attacks and when it plotted it out on a heat map, there was a conspicuous grouping of attacks in a three-state region that included northern Kentucky and Louisville, southeastern Indiana as far away as French Lick and the southwestern corner of Ohio, taking in Cincinnati all the way up to Dayton.

Most of the attacks were just harassment -- tactics like actual and online stalking, trolling, vandalism and threats to gay people and their families. Some of it went farther: 44 documented physical attacks and beatings of people known or just rumored to be gay in calendar year 2016. That pace climbed every year since then except for 2020, when the country spent much of its time quarantined from the COVID-19 pandemic.

But it was the brutal beating death near Corydon, Indiana, of a 17-year-old boy who had tried to start a support group for gay and queer youth in his high school that ramped up the Justice Department's interest. The boy had been abducted from his high school parking lot after a meeting of his group in 2019. He was beaten and sodomized with a tire tool, and then dragged down a gravel road behind a truck with a rope tied around his neck in a noose until one of the arms was ripped off his corpse. He was left on the roadside where vultures feasted on him for two days before he was found, the federal agents said.

"We were able to identify his abductors and charge them with murder in state courts, but we also began to learn of their ties to some congregation in Kentucky. It turned out to be the Eyes of Ebenezer Holiness Tabernacle. We've been able to infiltrate it with a couple of assets so we've able to foil some of their attacks, but the insidious thing is that a lot of Brewer's followers have learned from Al Quaeda to act as self-directed lone wolves," said Corder, who began her FBI career as a psychological profiler at Quantico.

"Think of it as a Mafia for stupid people. Brother Brewer is the godfather figure," Gustin said. "Under him are various captains and lieutenants. Within that organization, Burnley was a senior captain. He was Brewer's eyes and ears within law enforcement and he was his enforcer internally and the guy who could use his badge to make life hell on gay people while shielding their persecutors."

Gene nodded. "So where do we enter this whole scenario."

"That call the Sunday morning that Mr. Walker made to Burnley. Burnley wasn't accustomed to people pushing back on him. What you didn't know about Mr. Albertson was that he had been the target of a merciless harassment campaign Burnley knew about and helped oversee. People were trolling Albertson online, blackmailing him, threatening to out him unless he did exactly as they said. He was told he would be arrested for messing around with boys and violating Kentucky's unconstitutional and decommissioned sodomy laws. Burnley and other cops who were part of Brewer's network would tail him to and from work just to make sure he got the message. But Burnley miscalculated this one: he didn't figure on Mr. Albertson killing himself, particularly in such a spectacular way that directly involved Burnley."

Sandy Corder picked up the thread.

"With Mr. Albertson dead, Burnley got it in his head that he'd make an example of him, to expose that the deceased was gay and that this was somehow a tragic result of an unholy 'lifestyle,' as Burnley called it. We've had witnesses tell us that Burnley was determined to dig up as much disgusting dirt as he could and plant it with allies in shady media and blogs that Albertson had AIDS and that he had another man's semen on or in his person when he died. That's why he was so determined to search Albertson's apartment and take custody of his body and that's why he was absolutely furious when you had it cremated before he could."