The Brass Verdict

said.
    “What?”
    “What’s that mean, he ‘paid himself too quickly’?”
    “It means – let me just start at the start. The way it works is you take on a client and you receive an advance. That money goes into the client trust account. It’s their money but you are holding it because you want to make sure you can get it when you earn it. You follow?”
    “Yeah, you can’t trust your clients because they’re criminals. So you get the money up front and put it in a trust account. Then you pay yourself from it as you do the work.”
    “More or less. Anyway, it’s in the trust and as you do the work, make appearances, prepare the case and so forth, you take your fees from the trust account. You move it into the operating account. Then, from the operating account you pay your own bills and salaries. Rent, secretary, investigator, car costs and so on and so forth. You also pay yourself.”
    “Okay, so how did Vincent pay himself too quickly?”
    “Well, I am not exactly saying he did. It’s a matter of custom and practice. But it looks from the books that he liked to keep a low balance in operating. He happened to have had a franchise client who paid a large advance up front and that money went through the trust and operating accounts pretty quickly. After costs, the rest went to Jerry Vincent in salary.”
    Bosch’s body language indicated I was hitting on something that jibed with something else and was important to him. He had leaned slightly toward me and seemed to have tightened his shoulders and neck.
    “Walter Elliot,” he said. “Was he the franchise?”
    “I can’t give out that information but I think it’s an easy guess to make.”
    Bosch nodded and I could see that he was working on something inside. I waited and he said nothing.
    “How does this help you, Detective?” I finally asked.
    “I can’t give out that information but I think it’s an easy guess to make.”
    I nodded. He’d nailed me back.
    “Look, we both have rules we have to follow,” I said. “We’re flip sides of the same coin. I’m just doing my job. And if there is nothing else I can help you with, I’ll get back to it.”
    Bosch stared at me and seemed to be deciding something.
    “Who did Jerry Vincent bribe on the Elliot case?” he finally asked.
    The question came out of left field. I wasn’t expecting it but in the moments after he asked it, I realized that it was the question he had come to ask. Everything else up until this point had been window dressing.
    “What, is that from the FBI?”
    “I haven’t talked to the FBI.”
    “Then, what are you talking about?”
    “I’m talking about a payoff.”
    “To who?”
    “That’s what I’m asking you.”
    I shook my head and smiled.
    “Look, I told you. The books are clean. There’s-”
    “If you were going to bribe someone with a hundred thousand dollars, would you put it in your books?”
    I thought about Jerry Vincent and the time I turned down the subtle quid pro quo on the Barnett Woodson case. I turned him down and ended up hanging a not-guilty verdict on him. It changed Vincent’s life and he was still thanking me for it from the grave. But maybe it didn’t change his ways in the years that followed.
    “I guess you’re right,” I said to Bosch. “I wouldn’t do it that way. So what aren’t you telling me?”
    “This is in confidence, Counselor. But I need your help and I think you need to know this in order to help me.”
    “Okay.”
    “Then, say it.”
    “Say what?”
    “That you will treat this information in confidence.”
    “I thought I did. I will. I’ll keep it confidential.”
    “Not even your staff. Just you.”
    “Fine. Just me. Tell me.”
    “You have Vincent’s work accounts. I have his private accounts. You said he paid himself the money from Elliot quickly. He-”
    “I didn’t say it was Elliot. You did.”
    “Whatever. The point is, that five months ago he accumulated a hundred grand in a personal investment account and a week later called his broker and told him he was cashing out.”
    “You mean he took a hundred thousand out in cash?”
    “That’s what I just said.”
    “What happened to it?”
    “I don’t know. But you can’t just go into a broker’s and pick up a hundred grand in cash. You have to order that kind of money. It took a couple days to put it together and then he went in to pick it up. His broker asked a lot of questions to make sure there wasn’t a security issue. You know,