Eric Dinnocenzo - The Tenant Lawyer (27 page)

“Yes, of course.”

“This is interesting.”

“Yes, it most certainly is.”

My office had a group membership at the YWCA downtown, and that evening I used it for the first time. I saw it as a way to kill two birds with one stone: exercising and spending less time at my parents’ house. I still hadn’t told them exactly what happened between Sara and me; all they knew was that we had broken up. While jogging on the treadmill, it came to me as a revelation that there was no reason to fear telling them the truth. Sara and I had been coming apart at the seams for a while and finally did on our trip to Vermont. It was something that happened in many relationships and it happened in ours. I could tell them in a general way why she and I were no longer together and that would be it.

I arrived home at about nine. My parents were both upstairs watching TV in bed. I ate dinner alone at the kitchen table while reading the newspaper. When I was nearly finished, my mother came downstairs to the kitchen to get a glass of water. “Were you working late?” she asked.

“No, I went to the gym.”

“What gym?”

“My office has a membership at the Y downtown.”

“I didn’t know that. That’s nice.” She took a seat next to me at the kitchen table. “Are you okay?” she asked somewhat dramatically.

“I’m okay,” I assured her.

“Your father and I don’t really know what happened with you and Sara, but we’re concerned about you. I just want you to know that.”

“Thanks.”

It was then that I told her about the break up. She asked me a couple of questions in response—who had initiated it and if I had seen it coming. The first was easy to answer, but the second caused me to think a little before answering.

“I did see it coming,” I said, “but I didn’t acknowledge it. I guess I didn’t think either of us would actually do it.”

“I feel bad seeing you unhappy like this. You’ve been moping around. I understand that, but I wish there was something I could do.”

“I know. But this is how it goes. Sometimes people are sad.”

My mother patted my hand and told me she was going back upstairs to bed. I felt relieved that the break up was no longer the elephant in the room. I also felt glad that I had said, “Sometimes people are sad.” It was a fact of life that my family never really acknowledged with each other.

The next morning Father Kelly called me at work. “Councilwoman
DiMarco
told me that the head of the city council, Mike Flanagan, has a stranglehold over the rest of the council, and he’s the one who’s really behind this project. She said she thinks Miller paid off Flanagan. She doesn’t know for sure, but she thinks he transferred property to him to get the skywalk deal.
A quid pro quo.
She also said that there was no bidding for the project, that Miller’s company just got it.”

I let the news wash over me. It was remarkable that a member of the city council would reveal that information. I had never even considered that we would get help from the inside like that.
DiMarco
must have been disgusted by what had happened, but without the power to take on Flanagan, figured this was her only way to do something about it. “I’ll check the Registry of Deeds. I have eviction cases against him all the time, and he owns property under the name of a trust. I can search both his name and the trust name.”

Immediately after getting off the phone I began searching the Registry of Deeds website. It took me all of about a minute to discover that Miller, alone or through a trust, owned ten buildings in Worcester. I widened my search to include recent transactions where he was the seller of the property and quickly found one on Grafton Street where his trust conveyed the property to Flanagan for one hundred dollars—a common value used when property was intended to be transferred for free, since some amount of consideration, no matter how minimal, had to be stated in order for the transaction to be valid.

We have them, I said to myself.

Near the end of the day I received a terse voice mail message from Chris Bloom asking me to call him. I wondered why he called me. Maybe he wanted to continue making fun of me for the pants episode at Victoria’s Secret?

I dialed him up, and the first thing he said to me was, “Langley, this makes it twice that we cross paths.”

“Huh?”

“The Worcester City Council has hired us to defend it in this action you brought for this CDBG matter. Personally, I don’t think you have much of a case.”

My mind spun in what seemed like fifty different directions. I was having difficulty connecting the case against the city to my old firm, surprised that the city would go all the way to Boston to retain a law firm. “Well, we’ll see about that,” I replied. I didn’t want to tell him about my discovery of the property transfer just yet. I wanted to wait and size up the situation first. “You know I have a preliminary injunction scheduled.”

“I know that. That’s one of the reasons I’m calling.”

“Well, we can go ahead with it or you can agree to freeze the funds for now, and then we meet to talk about this. I think it’d be a good idea to talk.”

“What’s to talk about?”

“I think it’d be good to meet. Trust me. It’ll be worth your while.”

Chris exhaled, a little annoyed. “It seems like a waste of time.”

“It’s just temporary so we can talk. We can argue the motion afterwards if you want.”

“Let me call my client. I’ll give you a call back.”

We both hung up. I knew that before doing anything he would first pass this by one of the senior partners. He didn’t have the authority to make this type of decision on his own. I wondered who he was working with on the case. An hour later he called me and agreed to send a letter confirming a freeze of the funds and that a meeting would be held. We arranged for it to occur at his office the following Wednesday at 3:00 p.m. I felt a little apprehensive about
going there. I could picture people looking at me strangely and whispering behind my back, wondering what I was doing there. On the other hand, envisioning
myself
besting Chris with the property transfer was a delicious revenge fantasy. A little sadly, I wished that I could tell Sara about this. I had told her many times about my conflicts with Chris, and I could picture her reacting excitedly, grabbing onto my forearm and saying, “No way!”

I called Father Kelly to let him know about this development and also told him that I intended to show Bloom the deed at that time. He asked if he should come along, but I thought it’d be best if he didn’t, since it would be a meeting of attorneys. I didn’t say it, but I knew that bringing a priest with me would only look comical to Bloom and any other Morgan & Reilly lawyers who would be present. I believed, however, that I would need to bring along some extra legal manpower with me. I didn’t want to go there alone.

The next day I placed a phone call to Sergeant
DelVecchio
, the officer who wrote the police report for Miguel’s arrest. It was my fourth or fifth call to him, and each time I had left a message that he didn’t return. This time I didn’t bother leaving one and resigned myself to the fact that I wouldn’t get to interview him before the trial. He’d be helping out the housing authority.

I called Anna to confirm our trial prep on Friday and see if she’d be able to get Miguel to accompany her. She told me that she had unsuccessfully tried to get in touch with him.

“Try to find him,” I urged her.

“I will.” She paused. “Mark, I’m nervous about court.”

“I know. But don’t worry, when you start testifying it’ll be easier than you think. We’ll practice and go over everything on Friday.”

“Okay,” she said, sounding uneasy.

I walked into Alec’s office and took a seat across from his desk.

“Mark, it’s a pleasure to see you. Welcome. Please make yourself at home.”

“Thank you very much,” I said in a courtly fashion. “Your hospitality and graciousness, as always, are appreciated. I’ve come because I need a favor from you.”

“What’s that?”

“I have a meeting at a law firm in Boston. My old firm, as a matter of fact.”

“You do?”

I nodded. “For
CDBG,
and I’d like it if you came with me.”

“What’s it for? Why is it at your old firm?”

“The firm is representing the city. It’s a meeting in which I hope I can settle the case.”

“Sure, I’ll go. But why do you want me there?”

“Because otherwise it’d be just me going, and the way they operate, I suspect they’re going to have at least two lawyers there. I don’t want them to think they’re up against just me. They’ll think I’m outmatched since I’m their former junior associate. Introducing another attorney makes it seem like it’s a bigger operation on our end, and they don’t know you. Don’t
worry,
you won’t have to do anything. All you have to do is just sit there.”

Alec put his hands behind his head. “I like to take part in legal negotiations. It helps me develop professionally.”

I chuckled. “Maybe you could make an exception this one time?” I explained that I had discovered the property transfer and planned to drop that bomb at the meeting.

“Wow, that’s great,” he said. “You don’t usually get something like that in a case.”

“Yeah, I know.”

“So how are we working transportation considering that you live in Boston?”

“Actually, my situation has changed. Sara and I are apart. I’m living with my parents now until I figure things out.” I felt a little awkward telling him that, since we generally didn’t share many details about our personal lives.

“You are?
Since when?”

“Since this past weekend.”

“Sorry to hear that.” He gave me a look of sympathy. “I don’t mean to pry, but is it permanent?”

“Probably.”
My tone and body language were matter-of-fact, letting him know I really wasn’t up to answering further questions. I felt afraid that if we stayed on the subject, my eyes might start to tear up, and I didn’t want him to see me that way. I had been crying a lot since Sara and I broke up.

“Sorry,” he said again.

“Thanks.” I rose from my seat. “Umm, the meeting is next Wednesday. To answer your question, I’ll drive us both ways.”

24

I
arrived at court at 8:30 A.M. on Monday feeling as nervous as ever. I only had a small cup of coffee that morning so I wouldn’t have to go to the bathroom during the trial. For a change I ate a good breakfast of yogurt and cereal, forcing it down even though my stomach felt uneasy. There had been times when I had eaten an insubstantial breakfast and, late in the morning at court, felt light-headed and distracted. That was something I couldn’t afford to have happen on this day.

I sat down on one of the benches in the nearly empty lobby and tried to clear my mind, figuring it would be counterproductive to review my file for the umpteenth time. I knew the case backwards and forwards, and, at this point, trying to cram in more information wasn’t going to be helpful. I bounced my knee up and down and looked straight ahead, not focusing on anything in particular. Anna wasn’t there yet, and I hoped that she’d show up soon and that Miguel would be with her. While she had showed up at my office on Friday for a prep session, Miguel had been a no-show.

At 8:45 a.m.
Merola
and Jeannie entered the lobby together. I grew more and more nervous that Anna wasn’t going to come on time. Ten minutes later she arrived with Miguel trailing slightly behind, and I breathed a sigh of relief. She looked presentable dressed in black pants, a light purple blouse, and a leather jacket. Miguel wore baggy jeans and a black t-shirt underneath a heavy winter coat, an outfit I wouldn’t have hand-picked for him.

“Sorry we’re late,” Anna said.

I gathered from the look she gave Miguel that he had been at fault. We huddled together to quickly prepare. Because I had already spent an hour with Anna preparing her testimony, my prep focused on Miguel. After all, he was the most important witness of the two of them.

“I’m going to call you first,” I told him, “and then you,” I said, gesturing to Anna. I looked directly at Miguel. “On direct examination, I ask open-ended questions and you do most of the talking. It’ll be like, where were you? What did you do next? That type of thing. I ask basic questions, you do most of the talking. But listen to my questions carefully so you know where I’m heading with them. Cross-examination is different. You still listen carefully to the questions, but you answer them more simply and more to the point without volunteering any other information. Don’t argue and don’t get combative, even if you feel irritated at the attorney. And he can be irritating.
Basically, on cross you don’t have to score on any points, but rather just play it safe and try to avoid any damage being done. I can always ask you questions on re-direct if I need you to clarify anything.”

Anna had her arms folded tightly across her chest, like a person standing outside in the cold.

“Are you all right?” I asked her.

She didn’t respond.

“Anna?”

“I don’t know if I can do it,” she said, her voice quivering.

“What’s the matter?”

“The last time I testified in court …” Her voice choked up. “The last time was when their father was killed. I don’t want to go in there.”

Shit, I thought. It hit me that I should’ve seen this coming. She had expressed nervousness all along and I had dismissed it as a typical case of the jitters. I had
heard
her but I hadn’t
listened
to her.

“You can do it, Anna,” I reflexively told her, not knowing how else to approach the problem except to be positive and supportive. “I know it’s hard, but it’s important and you’ll be able to do it.”

Shaking her head, she muttered, “I can’t. I can’t.”

John, the court officer, came into the lobby. “Time to enter the courtroom,” he announced.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw
Merola
and Jeannie Roberts walk through the glass doors.

“Listen, Anna, I’ll lead you with questions and you just answer them, okay?”

She nodded her head only slightly, and it was unclear to me if she would follow me into the courtroom.

“It’ll be like when you taught me salsa. One person leads and the other follows. Okay?”

“Okay,” she responded, this time nodding her head with a little more confidence.

I gestured towards the courtroom. “Let’s go in there, okay?”

Just then I saw a police officer walk past us and through the glass doors. He appeared to be in his mid-forties and had a buzz cut. Sergeant
DelVecchio
, I assumed.

“It’s time,” John told me.

“Okay, we’re coming,” I responded.

I turned to Anna and gave her a look that communicated it was now or never. Tentatively, she turned in the direction of the glass doors and then walked towards them.

Seated at counsel table with Anna, waiting for Judge McCarthy to enter the courtroom, I felt calmer than I expected, which I attributed to the enormous amount of preparation I had put into the case. It took some of the pressure off to know the case backwards and forwards. Suddenly I remembered how a partner at my old firm used to say that a trial was the purest form of combat. He seemed to relish making that statement, as if trying a case was a mark of manliness. I never understood his perspective and never looked at it that way. I saw a trial as a place of danger where my client could get hurt, especially now that I was a tenant lawyer. All I wanted to do was to keep a roof over my client’s head, and when I went into the courtroom to try a case a possible outcome was that my client could end up homeless.

Soon Judge McCarthy entered the courtroom and
Merola
got his case underway by calling Jeannie to the witness stand. Through her testimony
Merola
established that Anna lived at George Washington, and he introduced into evidence her lease, which indicated that Miguel was a household member. The lease was a few years old and was annually updated with recertification forms, all of which he had Jeannie identify.

“Is there a recertification process for the lease in this case?”
Merola
inquired.

“Yes.”

“What is that?”

“The tenant comes to the housing authority and has to sign this form. Tenants are supposed to tell us about changes in income and also if there are changes in household composition.”

“Did that happen in this case?”

“Yes, the tenant came to us last July.”

“Were there any changes to the household composition?”

“No, there were not.”

“Who were the tenants, then, at that time, according to the form?”

“Anna Rivera and her two sons, Miguel and David.”