Page 41 of The Guilty Trial

Marze absorbed her statement without a visible reaction, though Allie knew none of this was what he wanted to hear. The former Marine set his pen down and crossed his arms over his chest.

“Then leaves the Torrino RICO case,” he said. “At least as far as the most prominent cases go. I'm not saying it couldn't be something buried in one of the dozens of smaller cases they shared, but my instinct tells me these murders are connected to a case significant enough to generate this level of rage.”

Allie lifted her hand off the table. “I'm not fully sold on the Torrino angle. The Torrinos were organized crime. If they wanted payback, they would have acted years ago. That's how these families operate. They don't sit on a grudge for five years and then start an elaborate revenge campaign with ransacked houses and branding irons.”

“I agreed with that.” Brandy tilted her head. “It doesn't have to be the Torrinos themselves though. The family hurt a lot of people over a long period of time.”

Mia chimed in. “The trial generated over thirty boxes of archived paperwork, and the bulk of them are still in storage and none of it’s been digitized. We’ve got witness lists, evidence logs, correspondence, motions, and exhibits that have been sitting in a federal warehouse for five years.”

“We’re coordinating with the National Archives,” Brandy continued. “They've scanned the first batch of documents, and we’re expecting them this afternoon. They’ll transmit what they can as fast as they can, but it's going to take time for them to work through everything. So, realistically, getting through all thirty-plus boxes could take a couple of weeks, even with the archives working at full speed.”

Marze’s jaw worked as he thought. “All right, let me give everyone the broad strokes on the Torrino case so we're all working from the same baseline.” He started to reorient the room to the case, and the one thing that stuck out in Allie’s mind was how absolutely massive it was. There were multiple witnesses of course, but what really got her was the number of exhibits: 487. No wonder there were thirty boxes in storage.

“It’s a lot, I know,” Marze went on, “but we need to move through this as quickly as possible. Because if we don’t find our guy in this case, we’ve got plenty of others to review. But either way, Elias Thorne is wanting answers. I need to be able to tell him with certainty that we’re finally looking in the right direction.”

Chapter Twenty-Two

Carmichael & Associates

Seattle, Washington

The building was old brick, eight stories of it wedged between newer glass towers in Seattle's downtown legal district. Allie and Jason took the elevator to the top floor, where the doors opened onto a luxurious reception area. An older woman behind a mahogany desk looked up from her reading glasses, offered a practiced smile, and asked if they had an appointment with Mr. Carmichael.

Allie showed her credentials. “Special Agents Bishop and King, FBI.”

As soon as Allie made the introductions, the expression of formal curiosity quickly tucked away behind a professional composure. She rose from her chair and led them down a carpeted hallway lined with framed photographs of Seattle's skyline from different decades. They passed a pair of paralegals hunched over laptops and were escorted into a corner office that commanded immediate attention.

Wood paneling covered the walls from floor to ceiling. Bookshelves lined two sides of the room, heavy with law volumes and brass-framed case plaques. The other two walls were floor-to-ceiling windows that looked out over Elliott Bay, where a container ship was making its slow passage beneath a sky the color of old pewter.

Leonard Carmichael stood from behind a wide desk and crossed the room to greet them. He was tall and lean, with silver hair swept back from a high forehead and frameless glasses. He gestured toward two leather chairs facing his desk, then turned to the reception area. “Margaret, would you bring us some coffee?”

She nodded and quickly disappeared. Carmichael settled into his chair and studied them with a quiet patience that Allie recognized from her experience sitting across from attorneys. The good ones, like good agents, never rushed.

“I appreciate you making time for us,” Allie said.

“I had a feeling this visit was coming.” Carmichael lightly drummed his fingers on his desk. “I've been following the news about Sterling and Judge Vance. When someone starts killing prosecutors and judges, you look at the cases that left the most wreckage.” He paused and shook his head. “The Torrino RICO case was the biggest case I ever worked. That organization destroyed a lot of people.”

Margaret returned with a tray of coffee in ceramic mugs with a mini-carafe of cream and a bowl of assorted sweeteners. Allie accepted hers with a nod of thanks and took a sip. It was better than anything she'd had outside of Grams's kitchen. She made a mental note to ask Margaret what brand it was, then reminded herself that it wouldn't be appropriate.

“You represented Sal Torrino during the trial,” Jason said as more confirmation than a question.

“I did. Lead defense counsel.” Carmichael cradled his own mug between both hands. “It consumed my life for what felt like years.”

Allie set her mug down on the edge of his desk. “What were your thoughts about the trial? Looking back on it now?”

Carmichael took his time answering, his gaze drifting briefly toward the windows and the gray water beyond. “The evidence was overwhelming. The prosecution built a fortress around their case, and frankly, there was very little room for the defense to maneuver. My team questioned some of the evidence during trial, and we filed motions challenging the admissibility of certain key pieces, but Judge Vance denied every one of them.” He turned back to face her. “They built a rock-solid case against Sal Torrino. I'll give them that.”

“But?” Allie prompted.

Carmichael's mouth tightened almost imperceptibly. “But certain things troubled me. Certain key pieces of evidence appeared very late in discovery. That alone isn't unusual in a complex federal case, but the timing and the nature of those pieces raised questions my team never fully resolved.”

“What specific evidence troubled you?” Jason asked him.

“Financial records, primarily. Bank statements and ledgers that supposedly proved money laundering through several of Torrino's legitimate businesses.” Carmichael opened his hands, palms up, as though laying out invisible documents. “These records appeared in discovery very late in the process. My team argued the documents had been altered, that timestamps on the bank statements didn't match the transaction dates they were supposed to corroborate. The prosecution countered that the records came from a cooperating witness who had been afraid to come forward earlier. Judge Vance allowed them.”

“Any issues with witness testimonies?” Allie asked, watching Carmichael's face for what he wasn't saying as much as what he was.

“That was the other concern. Several key witnesses changed their stories between depositions and trial. Substantially, in some cases. Their testimony at trial was more detailed, more damning, and more neatly aligned with the prosecution's narrative than anything they'd said previously. One witness in particular was in the U.S. Marshals Service’s witness protection program, and we couldn't access him independently to verify his account. We filed a motion for access, but that was denied as well.”