This was her space, her husband's evidence, her 9 years of waiting. She had earned her seat at this conversation. Dempsey looked at the people at the table. Then at Rey, "Before you show me anything," she said, "I want to say something for the record. Even though this isn't on record yet," she folded her hands on the table.
"I have had suspicions about Bo Harrove for 7 years. I have not been able to act on those suspicions because suspicion without evidence in a county where Harrove has significant influence over budget approvals, including my department's budget, is a career-ending exercise. Ry nodded. I want you to understand, Dempsey said that my interest here is in what's true and what's legal, not in settling grievances, not in local politics. If what you have doesn't meet the bar of evidence, I will tell you that plainly, and you'll need to find another avenue.
Understood, Patricia Owens said. And I want to understand something else. Dempsey looked at Ray directly. Your interest in this. You moved here.
He came after you. Or more accurately, he came after your daughter to pressure you. Why are you pressing forward rather than leaving? Ry looked at her. Because I said I was staying.
He said, "Because my daughter is in that school, and this is the town I chose, and I am 60 years old, and I am done letting men like Harrove decide where I belong. " He paused. And because Dot's husband is buried in the cemetery on Route 7 and I believe he shouldn't be. Silence. Dempsey looked at Dot. Dot looked back steadily.
"All right," Dempsey said. Show me what you have. Patricia Owens placed the photograph on the table first. She had made five copies. One for Dempsey, one archived offsite, one with Patricia, one with Ry, one secured with a contact in Nashville.
The original was in a bank safe deposit box in Memphis. Rented the previous week. Dempseu looked at the photograph. Rey walked her through it. The date, the location, Darnell Cooper, what Cooper said Harrove wanted and why, what was exchanged, what Harrove's opponent in the 1999 county commissioner race.
Warren Lyle subsequently went through. Dempsey listened without interrupting. Can you identify the man in the photograph as Harrove? She said, not with certainty from this image alone, Ray said. But I was present.
I saw him. Make a sworn statement identifying him. A sworn statement from a man with a criminal history involving the Hell's Angels, Dempsey said. Not unkindly, just accurately, dismissed weapons charge from 1994. Patricia said, "No convictions and a sworn statement from a direct witness to an event 25 years ago has evidentiary value regardless of the witness's background.
I know that. " Dempsey said, "I'm saying it because a good defense attorney will say it louder. " She looked at the photograph again. "What else? " dot put Gerald's box on the table. She'd sorted through it over the past two weeks, organized it the way Gerald would have wanted, chronological labeled with a summary sheet at the front in Gerald's handwriting that she'd found tucked into a folder she hadn't opened until last Monday. The summary sheet listed dates, names, and the nature of each document. It was Gerald Fitch's own index to his own investigation, written in the careful hand of a man who expected someone to find it and needed them to be able to use it.
Dempsey read the summary sheet. Read it again. She looked at Dot. When did you find this? She said.