Mark Thomas Campbell, esq. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
aussielawyer) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
dreamlikenewyork2018-07-01 03:26 pm
aussielawyer) wrote in dreamlikenewyork2018-07-01 03:26 pm
"Sons of lawyers."
Who: Mark Campbell, with Ashley Emmerson, Clint Chevalier, James Campbell and Euan Fitzpatrick
What: Information Manipulation
Where: Campbell, Page, Waterston & Associates, Manhattan, NYC
When: After this and this
When Mark walked into his boardroom for a vital and urgent closed meeting, he baulked a little when he saw the case files stacked in front of Euan and James, who were sitting on the opposite side of the conference table. Behind them, Clint was perched on the windowsill, leaning casually back against the glass with his arms folded. Ashley was also there, who was still technically Justin’s personal independent legal representative for everything. By this point, he knew the kid almost as well as Mark did, and Mark trusted him implicitly with his son’s life.
Despite wishing Justin’s evil cunt of a birth mother a slow and painful death, which Clint orchestrated to sheer perfection, it had been too much to hope that it was as easy as getting rid of her and living happily ever after. The woman who was Clint’s connection in the women’s prison revealed to him in negotiations that the bitch was obsessed with her son and his fame. Allegedly, she had what was almost a shrine to him plastered over the walls of the cell. Clippings of pictures and interviews in the media with platitudes scribbled all over them about how she was his mother and would get him back as soon as she was out of here. Old photographs of him when he was a child. Even a lock of his hair she was determined to use as DNA once she was out to prove he was really hers. It was disturbing as fuck, and not something Clint’s conscience let him sit on.
But Clint knew Mark wouldn’t want Justin drawn into a crushing legal battle. He got the informant to have a large portion of the material about Justin taken down before sounding the alarm that his mother was dead and delivered them to the prison officer who was an old pal of Clint’s going way back. He was instrumental in making the poisoning look like natural causes, for the right price, of course. That’s what the criminal underworld was all about. Piecemeal stuff about Justin remained on the walls so it didn’t look like evidence had been tampered with, and Clint delivered the child photographs of Justin to Mark.
Once that was done, Clint had the information about the potential pedophilia ring connection channelled to James and his team because he knew other children would’ve been harmed or were at risk of ongoing harm. However, all this was orchestrated to keep Justin removed so he couldn’t be called upon as a witness in any investigations of his mother’s involvement in the dangerous and evil game of harming children in the worst possible way. Mark hated that he couldn’t be more help, but he had to protect his own son, who’s life was barely hanging by a thread from all the damage she inflicted upon him.
Euan and James had colleagues with them, because whether he wanted to face it or not, this was a serious meeting and Mark needed to know all the t’s were crossed and the i’s dotted. Ashley had a contracted the length of a small encylopaedia volume in front of him and he was eying the other Feds and the prosecuting attorneys closely when Mark arrived. “Sorry I’m late. I was on an urgent call with the hospital.”
That wasn’t entirely the truth. He had taken a call from the hospital with an update on Justin, but it had been about an hour ago. He was late because he had been sitting at his desk trying to will his guts to stop churning and douse the urge to puke that had been plaguing him on and off throughout the morning. Or since he heard the evil cunt was sending Justin letters under a false name to fuck with his head, pushing him over into relapsing on many levels, including psychotic episodes.
Mark had wanted blood, and he got it. This was the aftermath and he was technically only here as an observer. Clint hadn’t just gotten the job done from the inside, he took it all a step further and what he pulled off was ultimately criminal genius, but for Mark, it was sickening and devastating. He saw James giving him a querying look about the hospital conversation, but Justin’s current condition wasn’t something he wouldn’t elaborate on in front of outsiders who effectively hoped to access him for evidence in their case. He took a seat by Ashley and gave investigating agents an even staredown in what was effectively his dangerous court pokerface, as many called it. His staff liked to call it his “C’mon on, take me on, I dare you” mask.
One of Jim’s agents flipped open her file in front of her. “We have reason to believe--”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” Ashley cut in. Mark never not enjoyed seeing Ashley put to work the skills he learned of Mark himself. “Justin is mentally unfit to be questioned or to testify. His documented medical history has diagnosed clear patterns of dissociative amnesia in his past. He’s an unreliable witness. His father is his medical proxy and reports that any interrogation of his son is highly likely to result in an exacerbation of his condition when he is already in a mental facility on suicide watch. Do you want the blood of a sick child on your hands?”
Mark caught Clint smirking behind the Fed’s back. He wasn’t surprised Clint was getting off on this. No matter what the prosecuting officers or the Feds tried to bargain with here, they didn’t have a leg to stand on. They were here to try to convince Mark, via Ashley, to give them some wiggle room on what information they might be able to access via Justin. Or to pare all this back to the bare bones, they wanted to document some indication Justin’s mother groomed him for members of the pedophile ring or sexually abused him herself. Thankfully, everything Justin had disclosed was locked ironclad under medical privilege.
“It’s on record from the proceedings finding Justin’s mother guilty of neglect and abuse that she negligently left him accessible to a sexual predator at the age of nine. Justin is the only witness who may be able to help us connect the--”
“Then look harder,” Ashley cut in again. “Justin never named his abuser. If we want to talk about court records, you will know he stated that he didn’t remember who it was and he only had a recollection of certain physical features of the perpetrator. Despite investigations, police were never able to track down who he was. His father is willing to state for the record that Justin still has never disclosed a name or identified a specific person.”
“That could mean there were multiple perpetrators or he is sitting on the information out of fear,” the lead prosecuting officer suggested.
Ashley shrugged and shuffled his papers, making it look like all this was already a done deal. “It could. It could also mean he has a severe mental illness with associated dissociative amnesia…”
Mark felt a pain begin to twist in his chest. He was trying to get his brain to remain focused on the negotiations, but Ash’s words started to blur into a throbbing ring in his ears as his concentration was swallowed up. He felt hot and began to break out in a cold sweat. His heart was racing and his chest felt tight, like he had to force it to breathe. He wrapped his hand around the knot of his tie, tugging it away from his neck so it didn’t feel so much like a noose.
He couldn’t be sure how long he phased out of the conversation flying around him. It felt like a really long time, but also a split second all at once. He started to feel sick and woozy, and all he could think was that he had to get to the bathroom if he was going to vomit because he didn’t want to do it in front of any of these people. At least, none of those he didn't’ consider family. James, Ashley, Clint, and Euan… they had all seen him at his worst.
He pushed his chair back from the conference table, holding the edge of it to try to alleviate the wooziness. “Would you all excuse me for a moment?” he got out, but the words were a slurred mumble. He was vaguely aware of someone - or multiple someones - saying his name, but it sounded far away and muffled to him. The pain in his chest was getting worse. Fuck, why was this happening? This wasn’t supposed to happen. He vowed to do everything he could to prevent another heart attack, and if he wasn’t feeling so horrible, he would probably want to punch something in frustration. Why couldn’t they catch a fucking break?
Somehow, he got up out of the chair and stumbled towards the door of the boardroom, holding himself up on the glass walls. He got two steps out of the room before his legs buckled, a darkness rapidly engulfing his vision as he fell heavily to the floor, unconscious.
COMPLETE
What: Information Manipulation
Where: Campbell, Page, Waterston & Associates, Manhattan, NYC
When: After this and this
When Mark walked into his boardroom for a vital and urgent closed meeting, he baulked a little when he saw the case files stacked in front of Euan and James, who were sitting on the opposite side of the conference table. Behind them, Clint was perched on the windowsill, leaning casually back against the glass with his arms folded. Ashley was also there, who was still technically Justin’s personal independent legal representative for everything. By this point, he knew the kid almost as well as Mark did, and Mark trusted him implicitly with his son’s life.
Despite wishing Justin’s evil cunt of a birth mother a slow and painful death, which Clint orchestrated to sheer perfection, it had been too much to hope that it was as easy as getting rid of her and living happily ever after. The woman who was Clint’s connection in the women’s prison revealed to him in negotiations that the bitch was obsessed with her son and his fame. Allegedly, she had what was almost a shrine to him plastered over the walls of the cell. Clippings of pictures and interviews in the media with platitudes scribbled all over them about how she was his mother and would get him back as soon as she was out of here. Old photographs of him when he was a child. Even a lock of his hair she was determined to use as DNA once she was out to prove he was really hers. It was disturbing as fuck, and not something Clint’s conscience let him sit on.
But Clint knew Mark wouldn’t want Justin drawn into a crushing legal battle. He got the informant to have a large portion of the material about Justin taken down before sounding the alarm that his mother was dead and delivered them to the prison officer who was an old pal of Clint’s going way back. He was instrumental in making the poisoning look like natural causes, for the right price, of course. That’s what the criminal underworld was all about. Piecemeal stuff about Justin remained on the walls so it didn’t look like evidence had been tampered with, and Clint delivered the child photographs of Justin to Mark.
Once that was done, Clint had the information about the potential pedophilia ring connection channelled to James and his team because he knew other children would’ve been harmed or were at risk of ongoing harm. However, all this was orchestrated to keep Justin removed so he couldn’t be called upon as a witness in any investigations of his mother’s involvement in the dangerous and evil game of harming children in the worst possible way. Mark hated that he couldn’t be more help, but he had to protect his own son, who’s life was barely hanging by a thread from all the damage she inflicted upon him.
Euan and James had colleagues with them, because whether he wanted to face it or not, this was a serious meeting and Mark needed to know all the t’s were crossed and the i’s dotted. Ashley had a contracted the length of a small encylopaedia volume in front of him and he was eying the other Feds and the prosecuting attorneys closely when Mark arrived. “Sorry I’m late. I was on an urgent call with the hospital.”
That wasn’t entirely the truth. He had taken a call from the hospital with an update on Justin, but it had been about an hour ago. He was late because he had been sitting at his desk trying to will his guts to stop churning and douse the urge to puke that had been plaguing him on and off throughout the morning. Or since he heard the evil cunt was sending Justin letters under a false name to fuck with his head, pushing him over into relapsing on many levels, including psychotic episodes.
Mark had wanted blood, and he got it. This was the aftermath and he was technically only here as an observer. Clint hadn’t just gotten the job done from the inside, he took it all a step further and what he pulled off was ultimately criminal genius, but for Mark, it was sickening and devastating. He saw James giving him a querying look about the hospital conversation, but Justin’s current condition wasn’t something he wouldn’t elaborate on in front of outsiders who effectively hoped to access him for evidence in their case. He took a seat by Ashley and gave investigating agents an even staredown in what was effectively his dangerous court pokerface, as many called it. His staff liked to call it his “C’mon on, take me on, I dare you” mask.
One of Jim’s agents flipped open her file in front of her. “We have reason to believe--”
“I’m going to stop you right there,” Ashley cut in. Mark never not enjoyed seeing Ashley put to work the skills he learned of Mark himself. “Justin is mentally unfit to be questioned or to testify. His documented medical history has diagnosed clear patterns of dissociative amnesia in his past. He’s an unreliable witness. His father is his medical proxy and reports that any interrogation of his son is highly likely to result in an exacerbation of his condition when he is already in a mental facility on suicide watch. Do you want the blood of a sick child on your hands?”
Mark caught Clint smirking behind the Fed’s back. He wasn’t surprised Clint was getting off on this. No matter what the prosecuting officers or the Feds tried to bargain with here, they didn’t have a leg to stand on. They were here to try to convince Mark, via Ashley, to give them some wiggle room on what information they might be able to access via Justin. Or to pare all this back to the bare bones, they wanted to document some indication Justin’s mother groomed him for members of the pedophile ring or sexually abused him herself. Thankfully, everything Justin had disclosed was locked ironclad under medical privilege.
“It’s on record from the proceedings finding Justin’s mother guilty of neglect and abuse that she negligently left him accessible to a sexual predator at the age of nine. Justin is the only witness who may be able to help us connect the--”
“Then look harder,” Ashley cut in again. “Justin never named his abuser. If we want to talk about court records, you will know he stated that he didn’t remember who it was and he only had a recollection of certain physical features of the perpetrator. Despite investigations, police were never able to track down who he was. His father is willing to state for the record that Justin still has never disclosed a name or identified a specific person.”
“That could mean there were multiple perpetrators or he is sitting on the information out of fear,” the lead prosecuting officer suggested.
Ashley shrugged and shuffled his papers, making it look like all this was already a done deal. “It could. It could also mean he has a severe mental illness with associated dissociative amnesia…”
Mark felt a pain begin to twist in his chest. He was trying to get his brain to remain focused on the negotiations, but Ash’s words started to blur into a throbbing ring in his ears as his concentration was swallowed up. He felt hot and began to break out in a cold sweat. His heart was racing and his chest felt tight, like he had to force it to breathe. He wrapped his hand around the knot of his tie, tugging it away from his neck so it didn’t feel so much like a noose.
He couldn’t be sure how long he phased out of the conversation flying around him. It felt like a really long time, but also a split second all at once. He started to feel sick and woozy, and all he could think was that he had to get to the bathroom if he was going to vomit because he didn’t want to do it in front of any of these people. At least, none of those he didn't’ consider family. James, Ashley, Clint, and Euan… they had all seen him at his worst.
He pushed his chair back from the conference table, holding the edge of it to try to alleviate the wooziness. “Would you all excuse me for a moment?” he got out, but the words were a slurred mumble. He was vaguely aware of someone - or multiple someones - saying his name, but it sounded far away and muffled to him. The pain in his chest was getting worse. Fuck, why was this happening? This wasn’t supposed to happen. He vowed to do everything he could to prevent another heart attack, and if he wasn’t feeling so horrible, he would probably want to punch something in frustration. Why couldn’t they catch a fucking break?
Somehow, he got up out of the chair and stumbled towards the door of the boardroom, holding himself up on the glass walls. He got two steps out of the room before his legs buckled, a darkness rapidly engulfing his vision as he fell heavily to the floor, unconscious.
COMPLETE