Judgment Cometh Read online

  Whitson turned on the revolving lights; they cast eerie shadows off of the trunks of massive trees and the leaves of rhododendron bushes. The parking lot at the Beauty Spot, a popular place atop Unaka Mountain near the Appalachian Trail and the North Carolina border, was only a couple of hundred yards ahead. It would be a logical place for the truck to pull over since there were no shoulders on the rugged, narrow road. Whitson breathed a sigh of relief when the truck’s brake lights glowed and it turned into the lot. It came to a stop a few seconds later.

  This was the first such stop the twenty-six-year-old Whitson had made on his own. He’d only been with the Unicoi County Sheriff’s Department for a year-and-a-half and had been on the road as a patrol deputy for a mere six months. Prior to that, he’d spent a year working in the jail. Before that, he served a stint with the U.S. Marines, including a twelve-month deployment to Afghanistan, and had earned an associate’s degree in law enforcement from Northeast State Community College. He was working on his bachelor’s in criminal justice at East Tennessee State University part time. Up until a few days ago, Deputy Whitson had ridden with a training officer, but now he was on his own, high up on the Northeast Tennessee mountain about seven miles out of Erwin. Unicoi County had only eighteen thousand residents, but it covered almost two hundred square miles of mountainous terrain. There was only one deputy besides Whitson on duty, and he was on the other side of Erwin. If something went wrong, the closest help was almost a half-hour away.

  Whitson turned on his spotlight and aimed it at the back of the driver’s head. There didn’t seem to be anyone else in the truck. He’d already called in the tag number and told the dispatcher he suspected the driver was under the influence and was stopping the vehicle. He unfolded his lean, six-foot frame out of his cruiser slowly and cautiously moved forward. A flashlight was in his left hand and his right hand rested on the butt of the pistol that was holstered on his hip. The mid-September wind was howling like angry ghosts, and the mountain air was chilly against Whitson’s cheeks. As he approached the driver’s window, which was rolled all the way down, Whitson took a quick look at the truck bed. It was empty except for two plastic containers about the size and shape of large beer coolers. They were beige and sealed with black electrical tape that had been wrapped around and around each container. Beside them was a fifty-pound bag of lime. Whitson turned his attention back to the driver, whose hair and beard were a dull red. He looked to be late-forties, and he was staring straight ahead.

  “Put your hands on the steering wheel!” Whitson said above the wind. The man complied with the demand.

  “Is there something wrong with you?” Whitson said.

  The man shook his head.

  “Why are you swerving all over the road?”

  The man turned to look at Whitson. His eyes were grayish-blue, swimming in pink, and he was smiling.

  “’Cause I’m hammered,” the man said in a thick slur.

  “Hammered? Do you mean you’re drunk?”

  “Drunker ‘n Cooter Brown.”

  Whitson hoped the microphone on his video camera was picking up the conversation despite the whistling wind. He ran the beam of his flashlight over the interior of the truck and spotted what appeared to be a half-empty pint bottle of Jack Daniel’s whiskey sitting in plain view on the seat next to the driver.

  “Do you have any weapons in the vehicle?”

  “Not a one.”

  Whitson reached out and opened the driver’s door.

  “Step out,” he said.

  The drunk poured himself out of the truck, using the door to balance himself. By this time, despite the strong wind, Whitson could smell whiskey. He helped the man to the front of the truck and had him place his hands on the hood and spread his feet.

  “Do you have any needles, any drugs, anything I need to know about in your pockets?” Whitson said.

  “Mebbe a lil’ weed.”

  Whitson searched him thoroughly. There was less than a quarter-ounce of marijuana and a small pipe in the left-front pocket of the man’s blue jeans, along with a small, plastic baggie containing what Whitson guessed was about a half-gram of methamphetamine. Whitson opened the man’s wallet and found his driver’s license.

  “Are you David Craig?” Whitson said.

  “That’d be me,” the man said. He was still spread-eagled against the front of the truck.

  Whitson asked for an address and a date of birth, and both answers – although they were somewhat difficult to understand – matched the information on the license. He called it in to the dispatcher and set the wallet on the hood.

  “Would you take a field sobriety test for me, Mr. Craig?” Whitson said. If Whitson could capture a couple of balance tests on video, there would be no doubt about his condition, and no doubt of a conviction for D.U.I.

  “I ain’t jumpin’ through none of your hoops,” Craig said.

  “How about field breathalyzer? Will you blow for me?”

  “How about you blow me?”

  Whitson felt his temper flare, but he kept it in check.

  “You’re under arrest for driving under the influence, possession of controlled substances, and violation of the implied consent law, wise ass,” Whitson said as he spun David Craig roughly around and pulled on his wrist. He felt Craig’s arm tighten at first and thought he might be in for a fight, but then the arm relaxed and Craig allowed Whitson to cuff him. Whitson straightened Craig up and began to lead him to the back of the patrol car.

  Whitson helped Craig into the back of the cruiser. He radioed the dispatcher and was informed that Craig didn’t have any outstanding warrants, although he did have three previous convictions for D.U.I., the last of which was six years earlier. Whitson then asked the dispatcher to arrange for a tow truck to pick up Craig’s vehicle and told her to notify the jailers that he’d be bringing in a D.U.I. suspect within the hour. Whitson walked back to the truck and searched the cab thoroughly. He found nothing but an empty beer can beneath the seat and a marijuana pipe that looked like it hadn’t been used in quite some time inside the glove compartment.

  He then turned his attention to the plastic containers he’d seen earlier in the bed. Whitson thought about the training he’d been given on searches incident to arrest and inventory searches. Could he open the containers? They were in plain view in the back of the truck, but they were sealed. And what was the bag of lime for? He knew lime was sometimes used to cover dead bodies because it neutralized the smell of rotting flesh. But it was also used in gardening. Was he within his rights as a police officer to open the containers? He began tugging on one and was surprised by its weight. He lifted it over the side of the truck and dropped it onto the ground. It landed with a dull thud. He decided to go for it. Whitson removed his folding knife from his pocket and set about slicing the tape. When he removed the top from the container, he discovered three black trash bags, all knotted, inside. Whitson cursed quietly under his breath, and when he began to untie one of the bags, he noticed it was cold.

  Whitson opened the bag, stared for a few seconds. He felt his stomach tighten and his legs weaken as he let go of the bag and staggered backward.

  “Jesus,” he said. “Sweet Jesus help me.”

  FRIDAY AND SATURDAY,

  SEPT. 15-16

  Jason Whitson had recovered from the nausea, but not from the shock of what he’d found a short time earlier in the back of David Craig’s truck. He was back at the sheriff’s department headquarters in Erwin now, watching through a two-way mirror as Sheriff Steve Sherfey and Chief Deputy Buck Garland faced off with Craig. Sherfey had been elected only eight months earlier and had no previous law enforcement experience. He was a red-headed, belligerent, housing contractor who was also head of the county commission’s budget committee when he and the previous sheriff had become involved in a nasty, public dispute over funding for the sheriff’s department. The previous sheriff, a dim-witted redneck named Henley, had resorted to mud-slinging and name-calling in the local p
apers and on the local television stations, and Sherfey had retaliated by resigning from the county commission and filing papers to run in the next sheriff’s election. He’d spanked Henley in the election, had turned his construction company over to his son, and was now the high sheriff of Unicoi County.

  Buck Garland was a childhood friend of Sherfey’s who was running a lumber yard in Unicoi when Sherfey decided to run. He worked hard to help Sherfey get elected and was rewarded with the chief deputy/lead investigator’s job. He went through the academy training in Nashville and also received some training in investigation and was now Sherfey’s closest confidante in the sheriff’s department. Garland was bruiser of a man, dark-haired, wide-shouldered and thick-necked. He wore bib overalls to work most days. He still ran the lumber yard; he just didn’t spend as much time there.

  When Whitson had called Sherfey and given him the news of what he’d found in the containers, he could hear excitement in the sheriff’s voice. A cut-up, frozen body? That would mean only one thing – front page headlines and the lead on the local TV news programs. Sherfey certainly didn’t mention anything about law and procedure. When Whitson got David Craig to the sheriff’s department, the sheriff and Buck Garland were waiting. They’d already talked Craig into waiving his right to have an attorney present and his right to remain silent by convincing him they were there to help him and that they had a great deal of pull with the district attorney. Craig had scrawled his signature on a waiver and was willing to talk.

  “So David,” the sheriff said, “why don’t you start by telling us who is in those bags we found?”

  “Name’s Fletcher Bryant, I believe,” Craig said. He was slurring his words, obviously still very, very drunk, which made Whitson uncomfortable. Even he, as inexperienced as he was, knew that confessions or statements made to police had to be voluntarily and knowingly given. A confession obtained from an intoxicated person could be challenged in court as being involuntarily and unknowing. The sheriff and Garland should have let him sleep it off before they tried to question him, and they hadn’t even bothered to take him to the hospital for a forced blood draw to determine his level of intoxication. The D.U.I. case, which was the reason for the initial stop, was being totally ignored.

  “And did you have some kind of relationship with Fletcher Bryant?” the sheriff said.

  “You mean outside of you finding him dead, chopped up and bagged in the back of my truck?”

  “Yes, outside of that,” Sherfey said. “Did you know him?”

  “Nope.”

  “But you just said you killed him, correct?”

  “Did I?”

  “I believe you did. Would you mind telling us why you killed him?”

  “I’m surprised you ain’t ever heard of him,” Craig said slowly. “He wrote the opinion that set a sex offender free. I can’t remember the guy’s name right now. Williams, Weems, maybe. Anyway, he was convicted five times for sex crimes and he just got released from prison because the Supreme Court overturned his last conviction on a technicality. Know what the technicality was?”

  “Can’t say that I do,” Sherfey said.

  “The thirteen-year-old boy the dirt bag drugged and raped committed suicide rather than go through a trial. The Supreme Court said the dirt bag didn’t get to confront his accuser and let him go, even though a jury heard the evidence and packed him off to prison where he belonged and the appeals court upheld the conviction. Damn Supreme Court, though, bunch of liberal prima donnas, reversed the appeals court. Fletcher Bryant wrote the opinion. He won’t be writing any others.”

  “So you’re telling me that the man stuffed into those plastic containers in the back of your pickup truck is a Tennessee Supreme Court justice?” Sherfey said.

  “Did I stutter? I may have slurred a little ‘cause I’m drunker than a big monkey but I didn’t stutter. Justice Fletcher Bryant is his name. He lived in a fine home in Nashville in the Bel Meade neighborhood.”

  “Then this was a vigilante killing,” Sherfey said. “You’re a vigilante.”

  “This was a protection killing. He won’t be setting any more rapists free.”

  “Excuse us for a second, Mr. Craig,” Sherfey said, and he and Buck Garland got up and walked out of the room.

  “Isn’t this the fourth one?” Sherfey said in an excited tone as he looked at Garland and Whitson. “Isn’t this the fourth judge that has disappeared in the past six months or so? Two criminal court judges, one out of Knoxville and one out of Jackson, one Court of Criminal Appeals judge – a woman who lived in Knoxville – and now a Supreme Court judge. Nobody’s found a trace of any of them.”

  “I believe it is,” Garland said. “This is going to be huge, Steve. We better start getting ready for what’s coming. Our faces are going to be on every television screen in the country by tomorrow morning. This place will be crawling with media. We’re going to wind up talking to Nancy Grace on her show. My God, my wife will pee all over herself. She loves that woman. I think what we have sitting in there is a serial judge killer. Gives me goose bumps just thinking about it. Do you know that every law enforcement officer in this state has been looking for this dude for months? And we’ve got him, right here in little ol’ Unicoi County. Me and you, old buddy.”

  “Let’s get back in there while he’s still talking,” Sherfey said. “See what else we can get out of him.”

  Two minutes later, Sherfey and Garland were back at the table while Whitson continued to watch through the two-way mirror. David Craig was puffing lazily on a cigarette (there was no smoking in the jail, but the sheriff was making an exception) and looking down at the table top. His eyes were half-closed.

  “It’s interesting to me,” Buck Garland said, “that you were so precise about the way you cut him up. He was frozen, for one thing, which means you most likely didn’t kill him tonight.”

  “He was killed two days ago,” Craig said.

  “Where did you kill him?” Garland said.

  “He wasn’t hard to find.”

  “You cut his legs into two pieces and his arms into two pieces and removed his head. Then you bagged him and boxed him up very meticulously. It makes me wonder whether you’ve ever done this kind of thing before.”

  “I reckon it would,” Craig said.

  “You reckon it would what?” Garland said.

  “Make you wonder.”

  “Have you?” the sheriff said. “Have you done other…what’d you call them? Protection killings?”

  “I haven’t ever killed a soul that didn’t deserve it.”

  “So you have, then. You’ve killed others.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Let’s just talk about this theoretically, then,” Sheriff Sherfey said. “Let’s just assume, without you actually admitting to anything, that you’ve killed before. How many might we be talking about here? One? Two? More?”

  Craig ran his fingers through his greasy red hair and said, “Theoretically? In the judge category? Maybe four.”

  “Including this one, this Fletcher Bryant?”

  “He’d be number four in the judge category.”

  “How many other categories are there?”

  “I’d say several.”

  “So, again speaking theoretically, you’ve killed several people.”

  “It’s possible that several people have been killed.”

  “Where were you taking him?” Buck Garland said.

  “Who? The judge?”

  “Yes. Where were you taking him?”

  “To an old exploratory mine shaft.”

  “You just dump the containers in and cover them with lime?” Garland said.

  “I would’ve dumped the bags. I ain’t gonna waste good containers.”

  “Would you mind showing us?” the sheriff said.

  Craig folded his arms on the table and dropped his head on them.

  “I’m drunk and I’m sleepy,” he said. “I might tell you in the morning. I think I best take me a little nap now.
”

  Whitson watched as both Sherfey and Garland began prodding and poking Craig’s head, neck, shoulders and back, but soon he could make out the unmistakable sound of a loud snore. Sherfey pushed himself away from the table, stood, and turned toward the mirror.

  “Deputy Whitson,” he said through the glass. “That was one hell of a bust you made tonight. Looks like you went up on the mountain and bagged yourself a serial killer.”

  SATURDAY, SEPT. 16

  Of all the crazy things I could have done at the age of forty-six, I taught myself to play the drums. I think I was looking for a way to filter away some more of the stress of my wife’s ongoing battle with metastatic breast cancer. I still worked out a lot – I ran and I lifted weights – but I’d always wanted to play some kind of musical instrument. When I was young, though, my mom had always vetoed the idea of my learning an instrument, primarily because we always lived in a small house and she didn’t want to be tortured by listening to me practice. So I took some of the money I’d made defending a music executive in Nashville on a murder charge, built a room above my garage (it wasn’t entirely sound proof, but it was solid) bought myself a small set of Pearl drums, a hi-hat and a couple of cymbals, and started banging away. I also put a stationary bike in the room and some dumbbells so I could exercise when the weather was bad, and I put a desk and a computer in there so I could work if I wanted.

  After several months, I’d become decent enough on the drums that I could play along with a lot of songs. I’d put a set of headphones on, plug them into my phone or Ipod, and go to it. The Saturday Caroline came walking in holding a cell phone up in the air, I was beating the hell out of the drums to a song called “Get Your Buzz On” by The Cadillac Three, a band my son, Jack, had turned me on to. That was one of the many things I loved about having kids. Even though they were older now and had moved out of the house, they still suggested new music all the time and I kept an open mind about it.