THE LAST WITNESS
The Federal Connection
Federal jurisdiction is a powerful thing. It is also the kind of thing that can get you killed before it can help you.
FBI || Federal || Investigation || Strategy
Webb’s federal contact was a woman named Agent Diana Lore, who worked out of the FBI’s Chicago field office on Roosevelt Road and who had the specific quality of a federal agent who had been working a long-term financial crime investigation — careful, methodical, slightly frustrated by the pace of something that was moving slower than the urgency warranted. Webb made the introduction by phone on Tuesday morning, conference call, Sara at her kitchen table with James at his office across the city and the prepaid phone held against her ear and the external hard drive and the USB drive in front of her on the table. She had spent Monday night going through the external hard drive’s contents, which had been the most revelatory six hours of her professional life — Greer’s files were meticulous, the documentation of a man who had spent two years building a case with the rigor of someone who knew it needed to be litigation-grade rather than journalistically publishable. He had financial records, cell records, photos, recorded conversations (legally obtained, he had been careful), emails obtained through sources he had cultivated across years of working the Chicago beat. The picture that emerged from the files was the picture Sara had been assembling from fragments, now in full color and complete detail: Henry Cole at the center, Delaney as the enforcement mechanism, Hartwell at the DA’s office as the internal protection, the network of twelve names as the broader architecture, and the 2009 Marsh murder and the Doss conviction as the event that had started the current phase — the moment when Calvin Marsh had gotten conscience-stricken and tried to go to the Tribune, which had required his death and the rapid construction of a believable frame, which had required Delaney’s intervention at the crime scene and the witness coercion that Greer had been documenting. Sara had all of this. What she needed Agent Lore to confirm was what the federal investigation had and what it needed.
“We have the financial structure,” Lore said, on the call. Her voice was even and controlled, the specific register of someone in a position of significant information sharing that they were doing carefully. “We have wire transfer records, shell company structures, beneficial ownership documentation for four of the twelve entities. What we don’t have is a human witness with direct personal knowledge of the arrangement who can testify credibly about the criminal intent. The financial records establish the movement of money. They don’t, on their own, establish what the money is for and who knew it was criminal.” “Lillian Marsh,” Sara said. “Calvin’s wife. She has direct personal knowledge of what Calvin told her about the arrangement and who directed it. Her husband is dead, which means the spousal privilege issue doesn’t apply in the same way. She’s a credible witness — seventy-one, a public school teacher for thirty years, no criminal record, no involvement in the financial activity.” “We’d need to depose her,” Lore said. “Through formal process.” “Not yet,” Sara said. “If Delaney knows a deposition is being arranged, he’ll know exactly what’s happening and who’s cooperating. I need the formal process to wait until we have enough to ensure that the moment it goes public, the arrests happen simultaneously. One leak, one advance warning, and people disappear.” “That’s a significant coordination challenge,” Lore said. “Yes,” Sara said. “But it’s achievable. Here’s what we need to happen simultaneously: the arrest of Delaney on the physical evidence — the chain of custody documentation for the Marsh weapon, which Greer has in the files, combined with Noah Banks’s eyewitness testimony. The arrest of Hartwell on the financial evidence plus his role in suppressing the Doss appeal within the DA’s office. The arrest of Henry Cole on the full financial case plus Calvin Marsh’s statements to his wife and the documentation in Greer’s files.” “And James Cole?” Lore said. Sara held the phone. Outside the kitchen window the November city was doing its thing — grey, persistent, honest. “I’m still assessing James Cole’s involvement,” she said. “I have evidence of financial payments. I don’t yet have evidence that he knew what the payments were for or that he participated in the criminal activity directly. I want to build that clearly before any action is taken.” “That’s appropriate,” Lore said, which was not the same as agreeing with Sara’s judgment. Both of them knew that. Sara appreciated the distinction. “The timing,” Sara said. “We have approximately three weeks before I’m unable to be operationally useful.” “The baby,” Lore said. “Yes.” “We can work with three weeks,” Lore said. “But Sara — we need to talk about your safety. If Delaney’s network is aware that you’ve been investigating, and it sounds like they became aware after your visit on Monday—” “They’re aware,” Sara said. “Then you and anyone connected to you is at risk.” “I know,” she said. “The witness, Noah Banks — he’s in Evanston with family. I’ve given him protocols for communication. Lillian Marsh—” she thought about the woman in the apartment, seventy-one, clear-eyed, fifteen years of patience. “She’s been managing her own safety for fifteen years,” Sara said. “She knows how to be careful.” “And you?” “I’m managing,” Sara said. “Are you?” Lore said, with the specific directness of a federal agent who did not deal in polite imprecision. “No,” Sara said, with equal directness. “I’m in a house with a man who may or may not be part of the conspiracy that’s threatening my life and my unborn child, and I cannot move out without alerting him to the fact that I know what I know, and I cannot stay in indefinitely because three weeks is not a long time and I need to be functional for all of it.” A pause. “I’m going to put a protection detail on you,” Lore said. “Covert. You won’t see them, but they’ll be there.” “I don’t want James to see a protection detail,” Sara said. “Covert,” Lore repeated. “Okay,” Sara said. “Thank you.” She ended the call. She sat at the kitchen table with the external hard drive and the USB drive and the list of twelve names and the weight of what she had built over the last week pressing down on her with a force that was entirely real. She was exhausted. She was frightened in a way she allowed herself to feel for approximately ninety seconds before she organized it into something more manageable. She pressed her palms against her belly. The baby moved — a strong, rolling movement, the specific insistence of something that needed space and was going to take it regardless of the external circumstances. She thought: Yes. You’re right. We’re going. She got up. She made herself breakfast. She ate it. She had work to do and three weeks to do it and she was, above all things and at every moment, Sara Cole: organized, thorough, completely committed to the truth, and not finished yet. Not by a significant distance.