Vivian Laaning Ch. 63

Besides, Vivian further argued that surely an order to surrender Mr. Crawford's passport should be a sufficient safeguard to ensure his presence in further court proceedings. Oliver countered that getting a fake passport would most likely not be a problem for the accused to obtain. Vivian had no answer to that argument. Consequently, the Judge ordered a cash bail of $30 million.

Vivian went to see Sam at the MCC in the afternoon to discuss the developments. Obviously, she wanted to know if he wanted her to contact the European banks to arrange for the procurement of such sums of money, if in fact there is such sums of money available to meet the bail.

He answered, "Tell me Vivian if you were to negotiate a plea deal, what do you think would be realistically the best deal you could work out with the prosecutor?" And what would be the worst case scenario?"

"I think if we wait say a month, when the publicity has died down, I believe I can get Oliver to be reasonable. Right now this case is a major national, even international news story. There is no denying that embezzlement of $120 million from a major corporate entity such as Baxter & Sons would most certainly capture the imagination of the general public. Duane Oliver right now is riding a wave of general approbation with the public as a great crusader uncovering an insidious white collar crime that had been undetected for twelve years. Of course, the fact that he had nothing to do with the actual discovery of the crime is a no never mind. The fact that he was instrumental in getting the judge to impose such an unbelievably high bail is a feather in his cap, especially career wise.

"However, in addition to my actual legal maneuvering, in the upcoming month, I'll do my best to plant favorable news stories to present you in a favorable light, suggesting you as a sort of like a modern Robin Hood. One thing that helps is the fact that Baxter & Sons went through twelve years oblivious of your embezzlement. There is little public symphony for a company that can lose $120 million and not lose a beat.

"So, assuming the interest in your case has publicly dissipated, I think I can get Duane Oliver to agree to a ten year sentence with the last five years on probation. That way you'll be out of prison in time to see our daughter start school. The worst case scenario is that he insists on a twenty-five year sentence, in which case we will definitely go to trial as I'm confident the judge would impose a lesser sentence."

Sam then asked, "If you are to make a deal that I can accept, what happens to the $30 million bail money?"

Vivian answered, "Technically you are entitled to get it back once the proceedings are over, assuming you have not missed any scheduled court appearances. However, in practical terms, with the court privy to the $30 million bail payment, I'm certain as part of your sentence will be a restitution order of $30 million, and the bail money would be forfeited as a result.

"Before you say another word Sam, let me caution you. As I said before, conversations between us are confidential by lawyer client privilege. However, as a lawyer, I'm also an officer of the Court, and in such capacity, I cannot deliberately lie or mislead the Court. You will notice in my submissions to the judge I may have given the impression that you might have no extra monies. I was not lying since I have no actual knowledge of what monies, if any you do have in your European accounts. All I know for certain is that you have no monies in your domestic bank accounts since I personally cleaned them out to meet my legal fees.

"So, the bottom line is this. If you tell me not to try to raise bail money from your European sources, I'm entitled to assume there is not sufficient monies in those accounts to meet bail. And I'm not inclined to ask you to speculate how much monies you do have. That way in the negotiations if the judge insists on a restitution order I can argue most vociferously that it would be an undue hardship to you as you ultimately try to rehabilitate yourself. I can honestly state I'm not aware of your financial picture, and likewise since you had obeyed my first instructions to keep your mouth shut, then the Court can not speculate either how much monies you have. You can now appreciate how important it was to heed my initial instructions upon your arrest."

Sam smiled as he replied, "I knew I had a fantastic lawyer representing me. It is too bad the judge imposed such a high bail, but I'm OK to stay in jail until my trial is done."

Vivian smiled at Sam's compliance, and for the first time since he was arrested, did she sense that things would sort themselves out after all in due time. It was gratifying to Vivian that seemingly; she and Sam were able to overcome this disastrous hurdle without vicious recriminations and resorting to acrimony. It boded well for the possibility of a strong marriage still, despite such an unpromising beginning. So, Vivian left Sam in good spirits with the expectations of seeing him Thursday to map out immediate strategies.

Unfortunately, Vivian's hopes for serendipity was not to be. A new disaster struck on Wednesday, the very next day. In the morning, Sam's cell mate, in a psychotic rage, without any apparent reason, fatally stabbed Sam with a shiv, fashioned out of a glass shard. Sam died almost instantly as his throat was perforated sufficiently to cause him to bleed out quickly. Since the case had drawn extensive news coverage, the prison officials delayed announcing the death. Their deliberate aim was to avoid that day's news cycle and conduct a preliminary thorough search of the circumstances of the murder in order to make sure there was no negligence that could be attributed to the prison supervision. Thus, Vivian was not informed about the death of her husband until Wednesday night.

On Thursday morning Vivian woke up, noticing some blood stains. Alarmed into a panic, she was able to set up an emergency appointment that morning to see Dr Barrett. Luckily by a thorough examination, the doctor determined that she had not miscarried as she had feared. The doctor advised that occasional blood spotting was common enough during pregnancy. Dr Barrett could conclude that her examination of Vivian, revealed no distress or problems in the pregnancy. This proved to be the only silver lining in an otherwise horrendous week.

On Friday, Vivian's boss at Kirkland, Mayer & McDermott, contacted Vivian and summoned her to the office to come immediately. Obviously, the firm was now privy to the fact Vivian was not in Italy in accordance with her honeymoon plans. Since she had not been in touch with the firm since the last day she had worked, the knowledge that she was still in Chicago could only have derived from the news coverage of Sam's arrest, and that cannot be a good scenario for Vivian.

Sure enough, her boss accompanied by one of the senior partners chastised Vivian for representing Sam legally. Notwithstanding, she had just married him, she should have immediately contacted the firm upon his arrest. She must have known that no lawyer including herself could represent Sam in this case, because of their association with Jed Baxter and his company. The firm could have and would have arranged for a competent attorney from another firm to act for him. That being the case the firm had no option but to dismiss Vivian immediately, notwithstanding that Sam was no longer alive for her to represent him in criminal proceedings.

'Well,' thought Vivian, 'at least I've got $170K to play around with, which I didn't have at the start of this week'. She methodically took care of Sam's Spartan funeral. Sam had no relatives, and the employees at Baxter & Sons did not dare attend. So outside of a few friends, including Sam's "best man" at the wedding, and along with Erica and Rod were the only ones who attended the funeral. She also sorted out the personal belongings Sam had left behind. There were virtually no assets in America except for a modest automobile which Vivian was able to sell away. Apparently, most of his assets and savings were located outside the United States and were untraceable.

To escape from pervasive melancholy getting a hold of her soul, Vivian drove to Arizona, and stayed with her parents for a few months. During that time, she opted to take in an orgy at the TLR. She had a good time there, since it was a rarity for an obvious pregnant woman to attend an orgy. Consequently, she was able to fuck every one of the twenty-four men attending.

Right after the new year, Vivian returned to Chicago to give birth to her daughter. Erica, acting as her birth coach, was with Vivian as she delivered a nine pound one ounce squawking baby girl into this world. Vivian bonded immediately with her daughter, and breast fed her newborn as soon as she was cleaned up by the attending nurse. She chose the name Maia for her daughter after the name of the sister of her maternal grandmother. Although, she did list Sam as Maia's father, on the birth certificate, nevertheless since she was using her maiden name exclusively, she had her daughter's name recorded as Maia Laaning.

About five months after Maia's birth, Vivian decided to go to Europe and to convert any of Sam's monies still available to her own use. She subleased her apartment and arranged Erica to act in her stead. So, her plan was to visit the one bank in Monaco and the two banks in Switzerland, and hopefully get use of the monies. Although she was purposely coy with Sam, she did expect there would be a good deal of monies available to her. Assuming successful transfer of monies, she intended to spend some time in Germany, and then in Estonia.

During the months of her pregnancy, when she stayed with her parents in Arizona, she ascertained what relatives would be possible for her to visit. With that information she thought she would stay away perhaps as long as a year with the various relatives again assuming she would be welcome.

She was pleasantly surprised when visiting the banks. The total assets in form of money in the accounts and other money instruments totaled in excess of $90 million (US). Apparently with the monies he had embezzled, he had deposited equal amounts in the European banks vis-à-vis the North American banks. By clever, but sound investments he had increased the over all net worth in both main banks, and hence the equal amount of $90 million was available in each source. Apparently, Sam did not lavishly spend the monies. With the documents she possessed and presented to the banks she was able to transfer all Sam's assets into her name. For the moment she retained these three banks to hold on to her wealth.

Her subsequent visit to Germany was short lived, as she could not locate any of the relatives her mother had listed. However, in Estonia, the story was different. She met in Tallinn, and stayed with a family where, the husband, Jaan Läänemetts was a distant cousin of her father's and ergo of herself. While she and Maia were guests, of the Läänemetts, Jaan's brother-in-law, Eino Tarvas came for a visit as well.

Eino Tarvas was a dairy farmer in southern Estonia, and was a widower, whose wife had died little over a year previous, and he had a son about three years old. He had come to Tallinn to negotiate buying a neighboring farm, some farm machinery and some more cows with the view of expanding the size of his farm. So, Eino and Vivian went out on a date, and their compatibility as a couple was instantly self-evident. They had a couple of more dates, and on the third date Eino asked Vivian to marry him.

Vivian was upfront with Eino about her past promiscuous sexual history, except that she did not disclose that she had indulged in incestuous lesbian sex with her sister. As Eino indicated her past history had no relevance to their mutual history, Vivian happily accepted his proposal promising to be faithful to him. She extracted a concession that she would be allowed to go to the United States twice a year, for two weeks at a time, to visit her family. She did not confess that she intended to spend one weekend at the TLR to participate in an orgy; her view being that such information was not useful to their marriage. As a result of Vivian's financial input, their farm became the most predominant dairy farm in Estonia.

Vivian sighed at the irony in her life. Her sister, Erica had as a child, the sole desire to marry a dairy farmer and for a time had achieved such goal. However, she ended up as a savvy businesswoman running a highly successful restaurant and night club business. She in turn eschewed being a farmer's wife in favor of wanting to become a professional, and for a time had achieved that goal. However, she now ended up as a dairy farmer's wife. 'Life can sure take strange turns' was Vivian's observation upon contemplating her current state.

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Further adventures of Vivian Laaning continue see: "Vivian: Travels to Estonia"