I ask him how come he doesn’t have a framed, autographed picture of Nolan Richardson on the wall like the sheriff, and Butterfield laughs and puts his feet up on his desk, saying one is in his filing cabinet.
“Woodrow has threatened to arrest me if I try to put mine up.”
I nod, appreciating his willingness to acknowledge the rivalry between him and the sheriff.
From what I’ve seen of Bonner, he doesn’t have enough of a sense of humor to joke about it. Without missing a beat, Butterfield says casually, “If your client is willing to testify at the trial that Paul Taylor hired him to murder Willie Ting, I’ll knock his charge down to second-degree murder.”
Butterfield hasn’t changed expression. This is no time for me to be cute. Though the maximum sentence is twenty years for second-degree murder, Class could be eligible for parole in five years. I reply bluntly, “I’ll talk to him. When do you need an answer?”
Butterfield, who seems the type to dress for the occasion, whatever it is, fingers the vest of his three-piece gray pinstriped suit.
“No later than this time next week,” he says, his voice going flat and betraying an intensity I haven’t seen before.
Suddenly I realize that behind his almost folksy, deferential manner,
Butterfield knows exactly what he is doing. This friendliness is just his way of dealing with white folks. Wanting to know if he has his own reasons for prosecuting Paul, I ask, “Did you know the Taylors once were the richest planters in this part of the state?”
Butterfield again retreats behind a smile and makes a show of stretching his long frame as if he is tired.
“I know lots of things about east Arkansas. Some good, some bad.”
I wonder what he knows about my history over here.
“It’s easy to make a case that the bad ole days were pretty bad,” I say, hoping to encourage him to talk.
Instead, he says, his voice bland, “That’s all in the past. Better to get along. Y’all didn’t like the bad ole days much either. They were hard on everybody.”
I think to myself this guy must be a pretty smooth campaigner among whites. What good does it do to throw the past up to somebody if you want his vote? If Butterfield is one of the blacks who wants to take over completely, he isn’t admitting it.
“Getting along isn’t so easy,” I say.
“Bear Creek is living proof of that.”
Butterfield holds up his right hand and wiggles his fingers.
“But we’re stuck with each other. I tell my campaign audiences to try to move their index fingers while keeping the ones on each side still.
You can’t do it. That’s how we are in east Arkansas.”
I smile politely. One of the flies in Butterfield’s metaphorical ointment is the rate at which whites are leaving places like Bear Creek. This guy isn’t going to give away shit. If he weren’t running for office, he might tell me what he really thinks about the Arkansas Delta, but all I will get now are platitudes.
I get to my feet and tell him that I’ll be in touch as soon as I can but no later than Thursday.
He says he’ll be in Helena and gives me his office number there. I leave the courthouse, pleased with this conversation. Second-degree murder is quite a leap from capital murder. Bledsoe may say he is innocent, but a few years in Cummins Prison compared to death row will cause him to reconsider. For whatever reason, Butterfield wants Paul in the worst way. If I have anything to do with it, he will get him.
I speed the thirteen miles to Brickeys. Bledsoe is healthy again and surprised but glad to see me.
I waste no time in telling him about my conversation with Butterfield.
“He needs your testimony to convict Paul Taylor,” I explain, after I tell him the offer.
“That’s why he is willing to give you a reduced sentence.”
Bledsoe, who has begun to lose some weight, shakes his head.
“I can’t say nothin’ that will help,” he mutters, ” ‘cause he didn’t hire me, and I didn’t do it.”
I squint at him as if the truth might become clearer if I could bring him into focus better.
What does he have to gain by lying? Maybe much more than I know. I say, hastily, “I don’t want you to tell me right now what you want to do. You think about this offer. If I could guarantee you an acquittal, I would have told Butterfield where he could go with his offer. I can’t do that. There’re innocent men who have been murdered by the state. If you insist on a trial, I can’t sit here and promise you that won’t happen to you.”
“More than a dozen people could have framed me,” he says, his voice choking into a whisper.
“Aren’t you gonna show that in court?”
I nod.
“I’ll do my best. Class, but there’s a big difference between telling a jury you might have been framed and proving that you actually were.
Juries hear alibis all the time, and frankly one of the weakest and most ineffective is that a suspect was framed, unless there’s some real evidence to support it. So far, I haven’t been able to find any, or anyone or anything that proves you were home between two and four that
afternoon. We still have a couple of months before the trial, and something may turn up, but things don’t look good.”
Class sighs heavily.
“What about Vie Worthy?”
“I still haven’t talked to him,” I admit, “but you know as well as I do that Willie wouldn’t have let him within five yards of him if he had shown up at the plant. Whoever killed him was somebody he knew and at least halfway trusted.”
His despair changes to anger, “You think it was me!” Admittedly, my faith in him was stronger three weeks ago, but I say, “Personally, I don’t think it was you, but you know as well as I do, it’s not what I think but what the jury thinks, and so far all the evidence is going to show is that the only fingerprints on the knife that killed Willie were yours, and you’re the only worker in the plant who can’t show you didn’t have an opportunity to kill Willie. Now that may change, but that’s the way it is now.”
Class shakes me by asking, “If I plead guilty, will you give some of the money back we paid you? Latrice can’t support her and the baby on what she gets from that store.”
I shake my head. I can’t let him make a decision based on money.
“If you take this deal, and, in fact, it’s only a recommendation by the prosecutor, you have to tell the judge you’re pleading guilty because you are guilty, not just saying you are.” As soon ?s I recite this
familiar phrase, “pleading guilty because you are guilty,” I realize how hypocritical the criminal law is. The judge is essentially telling a defendant he must stand trial if he believes he is innocent. But what innocent person in his right mind would risk a trial where the penalty could be death and the evidence appears overwhelming?
Class, clearly puzzled, scratches his head. I have confused him. He asks, “Can’t I plead guilty, no matter what?”
“You’re not supposed to, because you are lying to the court if you say you’re guilty when you’re not. On the other hand, I don’t see how justice is served if an innocent man can’t avoid a death sentence by pleading guilty and getting a reduced sentence. In other words, I’m telling you, if I were in a situation where I was innocent and was offered a reduced sentence but was pretty certain I’d get the death penalty if I went to trial, I’d say I was guilty.”
He looks down at his feet.
“And you think I’ll be convicted?” Butterfield is testing me by making this early offer. It’s a smart move, but he doesn’t know how smart.
“It’s too early to say.
There may be evidence by the time we get to the trial that exonerates you.”
“But it’s my decision, isn’t it?” Class asks.
“Yeah, it’s your decision,” I say.
“I’ll think about it,” Class says, dismissing me.
I drive back to Blackwell County, resisting the urge to call Angela.
She wants to go slow. I can do that.