Kindle Edition
Amazon
Category:
Action/Thriller
Publisher: Morgan James Fiction
Type: Fiction
Pages: 347
Copyright: Jan, 2016
ISBN-13: 9781630478681
Price: $12.99 (eBook)
An intractable renegade, his exploitative wife, her capricious twin sister, a power-hungry prosecutor, and one dogged detective become entangled in a case that cannot be resolved in a courtroom.
When Carrie Marks submitted her routine complaint to the civil justice system, Randle Marks expected a fair resolution based upon the facts. Instead, he was confronted by a judge who wanted to dispose of the case quickly to clear her calendar, and his wife’s cutthroat lawyer who wanted an old-fashioned gunfight to the death so she could carve another notch in her gun belt. Realizing that he was the only person motivated to expose the truth, he refused to cooperate with authorities and sought to trap his wife in her lies and conspiracies. Carrie’s twin sister, Connie, became the uncontrollable wild card in the plan and the murder plots and traps multiplied with unpredictable results. The case then became a criminal matter, and Randle and Carrie faced a prosecutor and a detective who were determined to convict someone of something.
Defiled exposes the flaws in the civil and criminal justice systems: no one is incented to find the truth; the plaintiff and defendant are pawns in a game that lawyers play to win at all costs; and, no one is held accountable for the results.
Excerpt
After he sampled his steak, Tony said, “At mediation we’ll try for a deal that minimizes your ongoing involvement with Carrie, so you can avoid contact with the sicko.”
“Why would I be involved with her? What happened to ‘settle and go your merry way’?”
He smiled at me. “That just applies to the legal proceedings.” Leaning forward into the circular group of men, he said, “You’re lucky you don’t have kids. You won’t have to worry about custody, but you’ll still be attached by property rights and alimony, credit histories, and debts and investments. The law doesn’t cut those ties.” Leaning back again, he delivered the punch line: “The only good news is that when you wake up in the morning, the head on the pillow next to yours won't be hers.”
I lost my appetite. I set my plate on the coffee table, walked to the ice chest, and grabbed another beer. Leaning on the wet bar, I said, “I need a trial to prove I’m innocent and she’s guilty.”
Fred perked up. “Let me dig up some dirt on her so you can nail her in court.”
Before I could discourage Fred, Tony climbed on his soapbox.
“Innocence and guilt are just concepts they teach in civics class. All the Constitution guarantees is due process. It makes no promise that every innocent person will be acquitted or that every guilty person will be convicted. Juries acquit people they like and convict people they dislike. It’s that simple.”
“The O.J. trial proved that,” Fred said.
I snorted. “That makes it a game. Each side hires a proxy to climb in the ring and duke it out, and the winner is declared innocent and the loser is declared guilty. The proxies and the referee are motivated to determine a winner, but they aren’t motivated to find the truth.”
“Why are you getting hostile?” Tony said. “This is the way it works.”
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